408 Ch. 10. 1770 The royal speech. THE KING'S SPEECH ABOUT MURRAIN. It was a momentous period. A spirit of discontent more wide and deep than had been known since the last reign of the Stuarts, pervaded England. The most sacred rights of the people had been violated by Parliament; and the treachery of their representatives had been abetted by the Crown. The people of the colonies were all but in arms in vindication of their privileges which had been wantonly invaded; and the commerce of the mother country was deranged by the disturbances of those relations with the colonies, on the stability of which it mainly depended. Lastly, war itself was menaced by the common enemy, restored to vigour by a sufficient interval of peace, and burning for revenge. In addition to these many and various grievances, there was one calamity of a purely domestic character. A murrain prevailed among the bullocks; and many thousands of these useful animals had perished. This was a circumstance, no doubt, to be deplored, but hardly one of sufficient dignity and importance, even in the dearth of other matter, to be noticed in that great state paper in which the sovereign inaugurates the annual labours of his Parliament. Yet, while the minds of all men were full of such matters as the quarrel between Parliament and the people; the differences between England and her vast dependencies in America; and an impending war with France and Spain, his Majesty was advised to make the disease among the horned cattle the burden of his speech. The possibility of war was afterwards referred to in ambiguous terms; LORD CHATHAM'S MOTION ON THE ADDRESS. the distractions in America were slightly mentioned. The discontents at home were wholly omitted. Whether ignorance or insolence possessed the framers of this document may be doubtful; but never was a King's Speech received with such an ebullition of ridicule and contempt. 409 Ch. 10. 1770 and speech of But the absurdity of the Royal Speech was for Re-appearance the moment cast into the shade by the interest Chatham. which the re-appearance of Lord Chatham excited in Parliament and throughout the nation. On the first day of the session, and on the usual motion for the address, he moved an amendment, the purport of which was to censure the conduct of the House of Commons in the affair of Wilkes, and to assert the right of the constituency to make a free choice of their representatives. But though his motion was confined to one particular subject, his censures glanced over the whole field of foreign, colonial and domestic policy. The grievance of which for nine years he had never failed to explain, that, namely, of a glorious war closed by a peace which secured to this country few of the benefits she was entitled to derive from great exertions and unexampled success, was again forcibly urged. 'If war is unavoidable,' said he, 'you will enter into it without a single ally, while the whole House of Bourbon was united within itself, and supported by the closest connections with the principal powers in This speech is reported by Sir Philip Francis, the reputed author of Junius.-Note to Chatham Corr. vol. iii. p. 369. 410 Ch. 10. 1770 LORD CHATHAM'S SPEECH. Europe.' He then passed 'to the distractions and divisions which prevailed in every part of the empire.' He objected to the term 'unwarrantable' as applied in the Speech to the proceedings of the Americans. Their combinations to exclude English manufactures were indeed dangerous to the commercial interests of this country; but they were, in no wise, illegal. As to the conduct of the Americans in other respects, he would reserve his opinion until authentic information should be laid before Parliament. For the present, he would only say that we should be cautious how we invaded the liberties of any part of our fellow-subjects, however remote in situation, or unable to make resistance. The Americans had purchased their liberty at a dear rate, since they had quitted their native country and gone in search of freedom to a desert. But it was on the proceedings in the Middlesex elections, that he laid the heaviest weight of censure; and never in the days of his greatest vigour did he use more daring and emphatic language. The allusion to the King, in a passage which he quoted from Robertson's History of Charles the Fifth, then recently published, was far more pointed and severe, as well as more apposite, than anything contained in the sharp scurrility of Wilkes, or the classic libel of Junius. The peers of Castile,' said he, were so far cajoled and seduced by Charles the Fifth (a great, ambitious, wicked man), as to join him in overturning that part of the Cortes which represented the people. They were weak LORD CAMDEN'S SPEECH. enough to adopt, and base enough to be flattered with an expectation, that by assisting their master in this iniquitous purpose, they should increase their own strength and importance. What was the consequence? They exchanged the constitutional authority of peers for the titular vanity of grandees. They were no longer a part of a Parliament, for that they had destroyed; and when they pretended to have an opinion as grandees, he told them he did not understand it; and naturally enough, when they had surendered their authority, treated their advice with contempt. The consequences did not stop here. He made use of the people whom he had enslaved to enslave others; and employed the strength of the Castilians to destroy the rights of their free neighbours of Aragon.' 41 I Ch. 10. 1770 When Lord Chatham had concluded, the Speech of Lord Camden. Chancellor rose, but not to defend that administration of which he was the ablest member. He rose to support the opposition of Chatham; and he did so with equal energy, with equal virulence, and hardly with inferior eloquence and effect. He had beheld, he said, with silent indignation the arbitrary measures that were pursued by the ministry. had often hung down his head in council, and disapproved by his looks of those steps which he knew his avowed opposition could not prevent. He denounced the vote of the House of Commons by which Wilkes had been incapacitated. It was a direct attack upon the first principles of the con He 412 Ch. 10. stitution. 1770 Conduct of Anomalous position of ANOMALOUS POSITION Still he was prudent enough to confine his animadversion to the House of Commons and the ministry. I cannot, however, but think that these sentiments were more discreditable to the speaker himself than to the objects of his censure. Why did Lord Camden behold with silent indignation the measures of a ministry in which he occupied the most prominent position? Why did he sanction, by his presence and the authority of his great name, measures which he did not approve? It is difficult to conceive an apology for a cabinet councillor retaining office under such circumstances; certainly, I can discover none in Lord Camden's situation. But the Lord Chancellor seemed to think it a triumph to provoke his expulsion from office, by holding up to public scorn and detestation those colleagues with whom he had chosen to associate himself in confidential counsel, and from whom he could separate whenever he thought fit. There might have been dignity or policy in this position; but certainly it was very different from the conduct of that great man whom he affected to call 'his pole star,' when he was placed in a similar position. Pitt would not remain in office a moment after the Government, of which he was a leading member, determined on a course of policy contrary to his opinion and advice. Lord Camden, notwithstanding his denunciation. Lord Camden. of the policy of the Government, continued to keep possession of the Great Seal. But his conduct in |