such conduct fidence in the English Con stitution. IX. The minister gained, or thought he was Tendency of to gain, an excuse for his rashness to destroy con- and misconduct; and to purchase this excuse was the public money and the public quiet wantonly sacrificed. There are some effects, which, to combine with their causes, is almost sufficient to drive men mad! That the pride, the folly, the presumption of a single person shall be able to involve a whole people in wretchedness and disgrace, is more than philosophy can teach mortal patience to endure. Here are the true weapons of the enemies of our Constitution! Here may we search for the source of those seditious writings, meant either to weaken our attachment to the Constitution, by depreciating its value, or which loudly tell us that we have no Constitution at all. We may blame, we may reprobate such doctrines; but while we furnish those who circulate them with arguments such as these; while the example of this day shows us to what degree the fact is true, we must not wonder if the purposes they are meant to answer be but too successful.18 They argue, that a Constitution can not be right where such things are possible; much less so when they are practiced without punishment. This, sir, is a serious reflection to every man who loves the Constitution of England. Against the vain theories of men, who project fundamental alterations upon grounds of mere speculative objection, I can easily defend it; but when they recur to these facts, and show me how we may be doomed to all the horrors of war by the caprice of an individual who will not even condescend to explain his reasons, I can only fly to this House, and exhort you to rouse from your lethargy of confidence into the active mistrust and vigilant control which is your duty and your office. Without recurring to the dust to which the minister has been humbled, and the dirt he has been dragged through, if we ask, for what has the peace of the public been disturbed? For what is that man pressed and dragged like a felon to a service that should be honorable? we must be answered, for some three quarters of a mile of barren territory on the banks of the Dniester! In the name of all we value, give us, when such instances are quoted in derogation of our Constitution, some right to answer, that these are not its principles, but the monstrous abuses intruded into its practice. Let it not be said, that because the executive power, for an adequate and evident cause, may adopt measures that require expense without consulting Parliament, we are to convert the exception into a rule; to reverse the principle; and that it is now to be assumed, that the people's money may be spent for any cause, or for none, without either submitting the exigency to the judgment people in a useless war, simply that he might re ceive Lavinia as his bride. 18 Mr. Fox shows great dexterity in thus retorting upon Mr. Pitt those charges of weakening the Brit ish Constitution, which were brought against himself and friends so often at this time, in consequence of his admiration of the French Revolution. of their representatives, or inquiring into it afterward, unless we can make out ground for a criminal charge against the executive government. Let us disclaim these abuses, and return to the Constitution. I am not one of those who lay down rules as universal and absolute; because I think there is hardly a political or moral maxim which is universally true; but I maintain the general rule to be, that before the public money be voted away, the occasion that calls for it should be fairly stated, for the consideration of those who are the proper guardians of the public money. Had the minister explained his system to Parliament before he called for money to support it, and Parliament had decided that it was not worth supporting, he would have been saved the mortification and disgrace in which his own honor is involved, and, by being furnished with a just excuse to Prussia for withdrawing from the prosecution of it, have saved that of his Sovereign and his country, which he has irrevocably tarnished. Is unanimity necessary to his plans? He can be sure of it in no manner, unless he explains them to this House, who are certainly much better judges than he is of the degree of unanimity with which they are likely to be received. Why, then, did he not consult us? Because he had other purposes to answer in the use he meant to make of his majority. Had he opened himself to the House at first, and had we declared against him, he might have been stopped in the first instance: had we declared for him, we might have held him too firmly to his principle to suffer his receding from it as he has done. Either of these alternatives he dreaded. It was his policy to decline our opinions, and to exact our confidence; that thus having the means of acting either way, according to the exigencies of his personal situation, he might come to Parliament and tell us what our opinions ought to be; which set of principles would be most expedient to shelter him from inquiry, and from punishment. It is for this he comes before us with a poor and pitiful excuse, that for want of the unanimity he expected, there was reason to fear, if the war should go to a seeond campaign, that it might be obstructed. Why not speak out, and own the real fact? He feared that a second campaign might occasion the loss of his place. Let him keep but his place, he cares not what else he loses. With other men, reputation and glory are the objects of ambition ; power and place are coveted but as the means of these. For the minister, power and place are sufficient of themselves. With them he is content; for them he can calmly sacrifice every proud distinction that ambition covets, and every noble prospect to which it points the way! tion, unless they will give us some proof of its cor-swer, "if the right of inquiry into every part of rectness. Until then, I have a right to ask them, a negotiation they think fit, and of knowing why what if Russia had not complied? Worse and they are to vote the money of their constituents, worse for him! He must have gone on, redoub- be denied the House of Commons." But there ling his menaces and expenses, the Empress of is something like a reason why no foreign power Russia continuing inflexible as ever, but for the will negotiate with us, and that a much better salutary opposition which preserved him from his reason than a dread of disclosing their secrets, in extremity of shame. I am not contending that the right honorable gentleman's example. I dearmaments are never necessary to enforce nego- clare, therefore, for the genius of our Constitutiations; but it is one, and that not the least, of tion, against the practice of his Majesty's ministhe evils attending the right honorable gentle- ters; I declare that the duties of this House are, man's misconduct, that by keeping up the parade vigilance in preference to secrecy, deliberation of an armament, never meant to be employed, he in preference to dispatch. Sir, I have given my has, in a great measure, deprived us of the use of reasons for supporting the motion for a vote of this method of negotiating, whenever it may be censure on the minister. I will listen to his denecessary to apply it effectually; for if you pro- fense with attention, and I will retract wherever pose to arm in concert with any foreign power, he shall prove me to be wrong. that power will answer, "What security can you give me that you will persevere in that system? You say you can not go to war, unless your people are unanimous." If you aim to negotiate against a foreign power, that power will say, "I have only to persist-the British minis-"had pushed his arguments, for the purpose of ter may threaten, but he dare not act he will not hazard the loss of his place by a war." A right honorable gentleman [Mr. Dundas], in excuse for withholding papers, asked what foreign power would negotiate with an English cabinet, if their secrets were likely to be developed, and exposed to the idle curiosity of a House of Commons? I do not dread such a consequence; but if I must be pushed to extremes, if nothing were left me but an option between opposite evils, I should have no hesitation in choosing. "Better have no dealings with them at all," I should an Mr. Pitt closed the debate with great ability. He insisted on the necessity of restraining the ambition of Russia, and complained that Mr. Fox aggravation, to a degree of refinement beyond all reason." The vote was then taken, and stood 244 in his favor, and 116 against him. The country acquiesced in this decision, though most persons condemned his taking a stand on such narrow ground as the occupation of Oczakow. Subsequent events have proved that Mr. Pitt's jealousy of the growing power of Russia was well founded; and it has long been the settled policy of the other powers of Europe, at all hazards to prevent the Czar from becoming master of Constantinople. SPEECH OF MR. FOX IN FAVOR OF MR. GREY'S MOTION FOR PARLIAMENTARY REFORM, DELIVERED IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS, MAY 26, 1797. INTRODUCTION. Mr. Fox had always professed to be in favor of Parliamentary Reform, though he did not agree in the details of any of the schemes which had been hitherto proposed, and he was not, perhaps, fully persuaded that those schemes could be so modified as to accomplish the desired object. But on this occasion he seems to have given his support to Mr. Grey's motion, with a sincere desire that it might prevail. The country was in a most disastrous state; the French had subdued all their enemies on the Continent, and England was left to maintain the contest single-handed; the pressure of commercial difficulties had rendered it necessary to suspend specie payments by law; great distress prevailed throughout the nation; there was much angry feeling and despondency both in England and Scotland, and a hostility to the gov ernment in Ireland, which soon after resulted in open rebellion. Under these circumstances, Mr. Fox felt that the prospects of Great Britain were gloomy in the extreme, and that measures were called for calculated to inspire the nation with increased confidence and interest in the government. As essential to this end, he urged a reform in Parliament which should give the people their just share in the Constitution; and he took occasion, at the same time, to inveigh against the measures of Mr. Pitt as hurrying on the country to the brink of ruin. This speech bears internal evidence of having been corrected, to some extent, by Mr. Fox or his friends. While it has all the elasticity of spirit and rapidity of progress which mark his other speeches, it has greater polish and beauty than most of his parliamentary efforts, especially in an admirable passage toward the close, in which he speaks of the energy imparted to the ancient republics by the Spirit of Liberty. SPEECH,' &c. SIR,-Much and often as this question has | sion. been discussed, and late as the hour is, I feel it my duty to make some observations, and to deliver my opinion on a measure of high importance at all times, but which, at the present period, is become infinitely more interesting than ever. Reform demanded by the condition of the country. I fear, however, that my conviction on this subject is not common to the House. I fear that we are not likely to be agreed as to the importance of the measure, nor as to the necessity; since, by the manner in which it has been discussed this night, I foresee that, so far from being unanimous on the proposition, we shall not be agreed as to the situation and circumstances of the country itself, much less as to the nature of the measures which, in my mind, that situation and those circumstances imperiously demand. I can not suppress my astonishment at the tone and manner of gentlemen this day. The arguments that have been used would lead the mind to believe that we are in a state of peace and tranquillity, and that we have no provocation to any steps for improving the benefits we enjoy, or retrieving any misfortune that we have incurred. To persons who feel this to be our situation, every proposition tending to meliorate the condition of the country must be subject of jealousy and alarm; and if we really differ so widely in sentiment as to the state of the country, I see no probability of an agreement in any measure that is proposed. All that part of the argument against reform which relates to the danger of innovation is strangely misplaced by those who think with me, that, so far from procuring the mere chance of practical benefits by a reform, it is only by a reform that we can have a chance of rescuing ourselves from a state of extreme peril and distress. Such is my view of our situation. I think it is so perilous, so imminent, that though I do not feel conscious of despairan emotion which the heart ought not to admityet it comes near to that state of hazard when the sentiment of despair, rather than of hope, may be supposed to take possession of the mind. I feel myself to be the member of a community, in which the boldest man, without any imputation of cowardice, may dread that we are not merely approaching to a state of extreme peril, but of absolute dissolution; and with this conviction impressed upon my mind, gentlemen will not behieve that I disregard all the general arguments that have been used against the motion on the score of the danger of innovation from any disrespect to the honorable members who have urged them, or to the ingenuity with which they have been pressed, but because I am firmly persuadcd that they are totally inapplicable to the circumstances under which we come to the discus Two or three paragraphs of this speech are omitted, relating, not to the question of reform, but to old Contests between Mr. Fox and Mr. Pitt. With the ideas that I entertain, I can not listen for a moment to suggestions that are applicable only to other situations and to other times; for unless we are resolved pusillanimously to wait the approach of our doom, to lie down and die, we must take bold and decisive measures for our deliverance. We must not be deterred by meaner apprehensions. We must combine all our strength, fortify one another by the communion of our courage; and, by a seasonable exertion of national wisdom, patriotism, and vigor, take measures for the chance of salvation, and encounter with unappalled hearts all the enemies, foreign and internal-all the dangers and calamities of every kind which press so heavily upon us. Such is my view of our present emergency; and, under this impression, I can not, for a moment, listen to the argument of danger arising from innovation, since our ruin is inevitable if we pursue the course which has brought us to the brink of the precipice. sought from But before I enter upon the subject of the proposition that has been made to us, Reform not I must take notice of an insinuation those party that has, again and again, been flung feelings which spring from a out by gentlemen on the other side of desire of office. the House as to party feelings, in which they af fect to deplore the existence of a spirit injurious to the welfare of the public. I suspect, by the frequent repetition of this insinuation, that they are desirous of making it believed, or that they understand themselves by the word party feelings an unprincipled combination of men for the pursuit of office and its emoluments, the eagerness after which leads them to act upon feelings of personal enmity, ill-will, and opposition to his Majesty's ministers. If such be their interpretation of party feelings, I must say that I am utterly unconscious of any such feeling; and I am sure that I can speak with confidence for my friends, that they are actuated by no motives of so debasing a nature. But if they understand by party feelings, that men of honor, who entertain similar principles, conceive that those principles may be more beneficially and successfully pursued by the force of mutual support, harmony, and confidential connection, then I adopt the interpretation, and have no scruple in saying that it is an advantage to the country; an advantage to the cause of truth and the Constitution; an advantage to freedom and humanity; an advantage to whatever honorable object they may be engaged in, that men pursue it with the united force of party feeling; that is to say, pursue it with the confidence, zeal, and spirit which the communion of just confidence is likely to inspire. And if the honorable gentlemen apply this description of party feeling to the pursuit in which we are engaged, I am equally ready to say, that the disastrous condition of the empire ought to animate and invigorate the union of all those who feel it to be their duty to check and arrest a career that threatens us with such inevitable ruin; for, surely, those who The discussion, ture, involves a personality. think that party is a good thing for ordinary occa- | ed; and though in all the discussions that have sions must admit that it is peculiarly so on emer- taken place, I have had occasion to express my gencies like the present. It is peculiarly incum- doubt as to the efficacy of the particular mode, bent upon men who feel the value of united ex- I have never hesitated to say that the principle ertion, to combine all their strength to extricate itself was beneficial; and that though not called the vessel when in danger of being stranded. for with the urgency which some persons, and, But gentlemen seem to insinuate that this un- among others, the right honorable gentleman, ion of action is directed more against declared to exist, I constantly was of opinion from its very na- persons than measures, and that al- that it ought not to be discouraged. Now, howcertain degree of lusions ought not to be made to the ever, that all doubt upon the subject is removed conduct of particular men. It is not by the pressure of our calamities, and the dreadeasy to analyze this sort of imputation, for it is ful alternative seems to be, whether we shall not easy to disjoin the measure from its author, sink into the most abject thraldom, or continue nor to examine the origin and progress of any in the same course until we are driven into the evil without also inquiring into and scrutinizing horrors of anarchy, I can have no hesitation in the motives and the conduct of the persons who saying, that the plan of recurring to the princigave rise to it. How, for instance, is it possible ple of melioration which the Constitution points for us to enter into the discussion of the partic- out, is become a desideratum to the people of ular question now before the House, without a cer- Great Britain. Between the alternatives of base tain mixture of personal allusion? We complain and degraded slavery on the one side, or of tuthat the representation of the people in Parlia- multuous, though, probably, short-lived anarchy ment is defective. How does this complaint on the other, though no man would hesitate to originate? From the conduct of the majorities make his choice, yet, if there be a course obvious in Parliament. Does not this naturally lead us and practicable, which, without either violence to inquire whether there is not either something or innovation, may lead us back to the vigor we fundamentally erroneous in our mode of election, have lost, to the energy that has been stifled, to or something incidentally vicious in the treatment the independence that has been undermined, and of those majorities? We surely must be per- yet preserve every thing in its place, a moment mitted to inquire whether the fault and calamity ought not to be lost in embracing the chance of which we complain is inherent in the institu- which this fortunate provision of the British systion (in which case nothing personal is to be tem has made for British safety. ascribed to ministers, as it will operate, in a more or less degree, in all the circumstances in which we may find ourselves); or whether it is an occasional abuse of an original institution, applicable only to these times and to these men, in which case they are peculiarly guilty, while the system of representation itself ought to stand absolved. I put the question in this way, in order to show that a certain degree of personality is inseparable from the discussion, and that gentlemen can not with justice ascribe to the bitterness of party feelings, what flows out of the principle of free inquiry. Indeed, this is a pregnant example of there being nothing peculiarly hostile to persons in this subject; it is not a thing now taken up for the first time, meditated and conceived in particular hostility to the right honorable the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Be it remembered, that he himself has again and again proposed by Mr. introduced and patronized the same was supported measure, and that on all the occasions on which he has brought it forward it has invariably received my approbation and support. When he brought it forward first, in the year 1782, in a time of war and of severe public calamity, I gave to the proposition my feeble support. Again, when he brought it forward in 1783, at a time when I was in a high office in his Majesty's service, I gave it my support. Reform early Pitt, in which he by Mr. Fox. Again, in 1785, when the right honorable gentleman himself was in place, and renewed his proposition, it had my countenance and support. I have invariably declared myself a friend to parliamentary reform, by whomsoever propos against reformbe drawn from England to the case of This is my opinion, and it is not an opinion merely founded upon theory, but upon No argument actual observation of what is passing in the world. I conceive that if we are not resolved to shut our eyes to France. the instructive lessons of the times, we must be convinced of the propriety of seasonable concession. I see nothing in what is called the lamentable example of France, to prove to me that timely acquiescence with the desires of the people is more dangerous than obstinate resistance to their demands; but the situations of Great Britain and France are so essentially different, there is so little in common between the character of England at this day, and the character of France at the commencement of the Revolution, that it is impossible to reason upon them from parity of circumstances or of character. It is not necessary for me, I am sure, to enter into any analysis of the essential difference between the character of a people that had been kept for ages in the barbarism of servitude, and a people who have enjoyed for so long a time the light of freedom. But we have no occasion to go to France for examples; another country, nearer to our hearts, with which we are better acquainted, opens to us a book so legible and clear, that he must be blind indeed who is not able to draw from it warning and instruction; it holds forth a lesson which is intelligible to dullness itself. Let us look to Ireland, and see how remarkably the arguments and reasoning of this day tally with the arguments and reasoning that unfortunately prevailed in the sister kingdom, and by which the King's ministers were fatally able to overpower the voice of reason and patriotism, and stifle all | The spirit of reform spread over the country; attention to the prayers and applications of the they made humble, earnest, and repeated applipeople. cations to the Castle for redress; but there they found a fixed determination to resist every claim, and a rooted aversion to every thing that bore even the color of reform. They made their applications to all the considerable characters in the country, who had on former occasions distinguished themselves by exertions in the popular cause; and of these justly eminent men I desire to speak as I feel, with the utmost respect for their talents and virtues. But, unfortunately, they were so alarmed by the French Revolution, and by the cry which had been so artfully set up by ministers, of the danger of infection, that they could not listen to the complaint. What was the consequence? These bodies of men, who found it vain to expect it from the government at the Castle, or from the Parliament, and having no where else to recur for redress, joined the societies, which the report accuses of cherishing the desire of separation from England; and became converts to all those notions of extravagant and frantic ambition, which the report lays to their charge, and which threaten consequences so dreadful and alarming that no man can contem What, then, is the lesson to be derived from this example, but that the comparatively small societies of 1791 became strong and formidable by the accession of the many who had nothing in common with them at the outset? I wish it were possible for us to draw the line more accu It is impossible for any coincidence to be more Argument from perfect. We are told that there are the case of Ire in England, as it is said there were land as to increasing disaf in Ireland, a small number of persons fection by denying reform. desirous of throwing the country into confusion, and of alienating the affections of the people from the established government. Permit me, Mr. Speaker, in passing to observe, that the right honorable the Chancellor of the Exchequer did not represent my learned friend [Mr. Erskine] quite correctly, when he stated that my learned friend admitted the existence of such men. On the contrary, the argument of my learned friend was hypothetical; he said, if it be true, as it is so industriously asserted, that such and such men do exist in the country, then surely in wisdom you ought to prevent their number from increasing, by timely conciliation of the body of moderate men who desire only reform. In this opinion I perfectly acquiesce with my learned friend. I believe that the number of persons who are discontented with the government of the country, and who desire to overthrow it, is very small indeed. But the right honorable gen-plate them without horror and dismay. tleman [Mr. Pitt] says that the friends of moderate reform are few, and that no advantage is to be gained by conceding to this very small body what will not satisfy the violent, which, he contends, is the more numerous party; and he vehemently demands to know whom he is to divide, whom to separate, and what benefit he is to ob-rately between the small number that the report tain from this surrender? To this I answer, that if there be two bodies [the rash and the moderate], it is wisdom, it is policy, to prevent the one from falling into the other, by granting to the moderate what is just and reasonable. If the argument of the right honorable gentleman be correct, the necessity for concession is more imperious; it is only by these means that you can check the spirit of proselytism, and prevent a conversion that by-and-by will be too formidable for you to resist. Mark this, and see how it applies to the precedent of Ireland. In the re-hibits! Can you refuse your assent to the morport that has been made by the Parliament of that kingdom on the present disorders, it is said that, so long ago as the year 1791, there existed some societies in that country which harbored the desire of separation from England, and which wished to set up a republican form of govern-lamitous? I wish to warn you by this example. ment. The report does not state what was the Every argument that you have heard used this precise number of those societies in 1791; it de- day was used at Dublin. In the short-sighted clares, however, that the number was small and pride and obstinacy of the government, they insignificant. From small beginnings, however, turned a deaf ear to the supplicant; they have they have increased to the alarming number of now, perhaps, in the open field to brave the asone hundred thousand men in the province of sertor. Unwarned, untutored by example, are Ulster only. By what means have they so in-you still to go on with the same contemptuous creased, and who are the proselytes that swell and stubborn pride? I by no means think that their numbers to so gigantic a size? Obviously. Great Britain is at this moment in the same sitthe men who had no such design originally; ob-uation as Ireland. I by no means think that the viously the persons who had no other object in 2 The residence of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. view in all the petitions which they presented, 3 The societies spoken of were those of the United than Catholic emancipation and reform in Par- Irishmen, which embraced a pretty large part of the liament. This is also admitted by the report. I entire population in some parts of the island. describes to have had mischievous objects originally in view, and the numerous bodies who were made converts by the neglect of their petition for constitutional rights. Is it improbable that the original few were not more than ten or twenty thousand in number? What, then, do I learn from this? That the impolitic and unjust refusal of government to attend to the applications of the moderate, made eighty or ninety thousand proselytes from moderation to violence.3 This is the lesson which the book of Ireland ex al? Will any man argue, that if reform had been conceded to the eighty or ninety thousand moderate petitioners, you would have this day to deplore the union of one hundred thousand men, bent on objects so extensive, so alarming, so ca |