ADMINISTRATION OF LORD CORNWALLIS—BEFORE THE UNION.
"Nothing strengthens a dynasty," said the first Napoleon, "more than an
unsuccessful rebellion." The partial uprising; of the Irish people in
1798 was a rebellion of this class, and the use of such a failure to an
able and unscrupulous administration, was illustrated in the extinction
of the ancient legislature of the kingdom, before the recurrence of the
third anniversary of the insurrection.
This project, the favourite and long-cherished design of Mr. Pitt, was
cordially approved by his principal colleagues, the Duke of Portland,
Lord Grenville, and Mr. Dundas; indeed, it may be questioned whether it
was not as much Lord Grenville's design as Pitt's, and as much George
the Third's personal project as that of any of his ministers. The old
King's Irish policy was always of the most narrow and illiberal
description. In his memorandum on the recall of Lord Fitzwilliam, he
explains his views with the business-like brevity which characterized
all his communications with his ministers while he retained possession
of his faculties; he was totally opposed to Lord Fitzwilliam's
emancipation policy, which he thought adopted "in implicit obedience to
the heated imagination of Mr. Burke." To Lord Camden his instructions
were, "to support the old English interest as well as the Protestant
religion," and to Lord Cornwallis, that no further "indulgence could be
granted to Catholics," but that he should steadily pursue the object of
effecting the union of Ireland and England.
The new Viceroy entered heartily into the views of his Sovereign.
Though unwilling to exchange his English position as a Cabinet Minister
and Master-General of Ordnance for the troubled life of a
Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, he at length allowed himself to be
persuaded into the acceptance of that office, with a view mainly to
carrying the Union. He was ambitious to connect his name with that
great imperial measure, so often projected, but never formally
proposed. If he could only succeed in incorporating the Irish with the
British legislature, he declared he would feel satisfied to retire from
all other public employments; that he would look on his day as
finished, and his evening of ease and dignity fully earned. He was not
wholly unacquainted with the kingdom against which he cherished these
ulterior views; for he had been, nearly thirty years before, when he
fell under the lash of _Junius_, one of the Vice-Treasurers of Ireland.
For the rest he was a man of great information, tact, and firmness;
indefatigable in business; tolerant by temperament and conviction; but
both as a general and a politician it was his lot to be identified in
India and in Ireland with successes which might better have been
failures, and in America, with failures which were much more beneficial
to mankind than his successes.
In his new sphere of action his two principal agents were Lord Clare
and Lord Castlereagh, both Irishmen; the Chancellor, the son of what in
that country is called a "spoiled priest," and the Secretary, the son
of an ex-volunteer, and member of Flood's Reform Convention. It is not
possible to regard the conduct of these high officials in undermining
and destroying the ancient national legislature of their own country,
in the same light as that of Lord Cornwallis, or Mr. Pitt, or Lord
Grenville. It was but natural, that as Englishmen, these ministers
should consider the empire in the first place; that they should desire
to centralize all the resources and all the authority of both Islands
in London; that to them the existence of an independent Parliament at
Dublin, with its ample control over the courts, the revenues, the
defences, and the trade of that kingdom, should appear an obstacle and
a hindrance to the unity of the imperial system. From their point of
view they were quite right, and had they pursued their end, complete
centralization, by honourable means, no stigma could attach to them
even in the eyes of Irishmen; but with Lords Clare and Castlereagh the
case was wholly different. Born in the land, deriving income as well as
existence from the soil, elected to its Parliament by the confidence of
their countrymen, attaining to posts of honour in consequence of such
election, that they should voluntarily offer their services to
establish an alien and a hostile policy on the ruins of their own
national constitution, which, with all its defects, was national, and
was corrigible; this betrayal of their own, at the dictate of another
State, will always place the names of Clare and Castlereagh on the
detested list of public traitors. Yet though in such treason, united
and identified, no two men could be more unlike in all other respects.
Lord Clare was fiery, dogmatic, and uncompromising to the last degree;
while Lord Castlereagh was stealthy, imperturbable, insidious, bland,
and adroit. The Chancellor endeavoured to carry everything with a high
hand, with a bold, defiant, confident swagger; the Secretary, on the
contrary, trusted to management, expediency, and silent tenacity of
purpose. The one had faith in violence, the other in corruption; they
were no inapt personifications of the two chief agencies by which the
union was effected—Force and Fraud.
The Irish Parliament, which had been of necessity adjourned during the
greater part of the time the insurrection lasted, assembled within a
week of Lord Cornwallis' arrival. Both Houses voted highly loyal
addresses to the King and Lord-Lieutenant, the latter seconded in the
Commons by Charles Kendal Bushe, the college companion of Wolfe Tone! A
vote of 100,000 pounds to indemnify those who had suffered from the
rebels—subsequently increased to above 1,000,000 pounds—was passed _una
voce_; another, placing on the Irish establishment certain English
militia regiments, passed with equal promptitude. In July, five
consecutive acts—a complete code of penalties and proscription—were
introduced, and, after various debates and delays, received the royal
sanction on the 6th of October, the last day of the session of 1798.
These acts were: 1. The Amnesty Act, the exceptions to which were so
numerous "that few of those who took any active part in the rebellion,"
were, according to the Cornwallis' correspondence, "benefited by it."
2. An Act of Indemnity, by which all magistrates who had "exercised a
vigour beyond the law" against the rebels, were protected from the
legal consequences of such acts. 3. An act for attainting Lord Edward
Fitzgerald, Mr. Harvey, and Mr. Grogan, against which Curran, taking
"his instructions from the grave," pleaded at the bar of the House of
Lords, but pleaded in vain. (This act was finally reversed by the
Imperial Parliament in 1819.) 4. An act forbidding communication
between persons in Ireland and those enumerated in the Banishment Act,
and making the return to Ireland, after sentence of banishment by a
court-martial, a transportable felony. 5. An act to compel fifty-one
persons therein named to surrender before 1st of December, 1798, under
pain of high treason. Among the fifty-one were the principal refugees
at Paris and Hamburg: Tone, Lewines, Tandy, Deane Swift, Major
Plunkett, Anthony McCann, Harvey Morres, etc. On the same day in which
the session terminated, and the royal sanction was given to these acts,
the name of Henry Grattan was, a significant coincidence, formally
struck, by the King's commands, from the roll of the Irish Privy
Council!
This legislation of the session of 1798, was fatal to the Irish
Parliament. The partisans of the Union, who had used the rebellion to
discredit the constitution, now used the Parliament to discredit
itself. Under the influence of a fierce reactionary spirit, when all
merciful and moderate councils were denounced as treasonable, it was
not difficult to procure the passage of sweeping measures of
proscription. But with their passage vanished the former popularity of
the domestic legislature. And what followed? The constitution of '82
could only be upheld in the hearts of the people; and, with all its
defects, it had been popular before the sudden spread of French
revolutionary notions distracted and dissipated the public opinion
which had grown up within the era of independence. To make the once
cherished authority, which liberated trade in '79, and half emancipated
the Catholics in '93, the last executioner of the vengeance of the
Castle against the people, was to place a gulf between it and the
affections of that people in the day of trial. To make the
anti-unionists in Parliament, such as the Speaker, Sir Lawrence
Parsons, Plunkett, Ponsonby and Bushe, personally responsible for this
vindictive code, was to disarm them of the power, and almost of the
right, to call on the people whom they turned over, bound hand and
foot, to the mercy of the minister in '98, to aid them against the
machinations of that same minister in '99. The last months of the year
were marked besides by events already referred to, and by negotiations
incessantly carried on, both in England and Ireland, in favour of the
Union. Members of both Houses were personally courted and canvassed by
the Prime Minister, the Secretaries of State, the Viceroy and the Irish
Secretary. Titles, pensions and offices were freely promised. Vast sums
of secret service money, afterwards added as a charge to the public
debt of Ireland, were remitted from Whitehall. An army of pamphleteers,
marshalled by Under-Secretary Cooke, and confidentially directed by the
able but anti-national Bishop of Meath, (Dr. O'Beirne,) and by Lord
Castlereagh personally, plied their pens in favour of "the
consolidation of the empire." The Lord Chancellor, the Chief Secretary
and Mr. Beresford, made journeys to England, to assist the Prime
Minister with their local information, and to receive his imperial
confidence in return. The Orangemen were neutralized by securing a
majority of their leaders; the Catholics, by the establishment of
familiar communication with the bishops. The Viceroy complimented Dr.
Troy at Dublin; the Duke of Portland lavished personal attentions on
Dr. Moylan, in England. The Protestant clergy were satisfied with the
assurance that the maintenance of their establishment would be made a
fundamental article of the Union, while the Catholic bishops were given
to understand that complete Emancipation would be one of the first
measures submitted to the Imperial Parliament. The oligarchy were to be
indemnified for their boroughs, while the advocates of Reform were
shown how hopeless it was to expect a House constituted of _their_
nominees, ever to enlarge or amend its own exclusive constitution. Thus
for every description of people a particular set of appeals and
arguments was found, and for those who discarded the affectation of
reasoning on the surrender of their national existence, there were the
more convincing arguments of titles, employments, and direct pecuniary
purchase. At the close of the year of the rebellion, Lord Cornwallis
was able to report to Mr. Pitt that the prospects of carrying the
measure were better than could have been expected, and on this report
he was authorized to open the matter formally to Parliament in his
speech at the opening of the following session.
On the 22nd of January, 1799, the Irish legislature met under
circumstances of great interest and excitement. The city of Dublin,
always keenly alive to its metropolitan interests, sent its eager
thousands by every avenue towards College Green. The Viceroy went down
to the Houses with a more than ordinary guard, and being seated on the
throne in the House of Lords, the Commons were summoned to the bar. The
House was considered a full one, 217 members being present. The
viceregal speech congratulated both Houses on the suppression of the
late rebellion, on the defeat of Bompart's squadron, and the recent
French victories of Lord Nelson; then came, amid profound expectation,
this concluding sentence:—"The unremitting industry," said the Viceroy,
"with which our enemies persevere in their avowed design of
endeavouring to effect a separation of this kingdom from Great Britain,
must have engaged your attention, and his Majesty commands me to
express his anxious hope that this consideration, joined to the
sentiment of mutual affection and common interest, may dispose the
Parliaments in both kingdoms to provide the most effectual means of
maintaining and improving a connection essential to their common
security, and of consolidating, as far as possible, into one firm and
lasting fabric, the strength, the power, and the resources of the
British empire." On the paragraph of the address, re-echoing this
sentiment, which was carried by a large majority in the Lords, a debate
ensued in the Commons, which lasted till one o'clock of the following
day, above twenty consecutive hours. Against the suggestion of a Union
spoke Ponsonby, Parsons, Fitzgerald, Barrington, Plunkett, Lee,
O'Donnell and Bushe; in its favour, Lord Castlereagh, the Knight of
Kerry, Corry, Fox, Osborne, Duigenan, and some other members little
known. The galleries and lobbies were crowded all night by the first
people of the city, of both sexes, and when the division was being
taken, the most intense anxiety was manifested, within doors and
without. At length the tellers made their report to the Speaker,
himself an ardent anti-Unionist, and it was announced that the numbers
were—"for the address 105, for the amendment 106," so the paragraph in
favour of "consolidating the empire" was lost by one vote! The
remainder of the address, tainted with the association of the expunged
paragraph, was barely carried by 107 to 105. Mr. Ponsonby had attempted
to follow his victory by a solemn pledge binding the majority never
again to entertain the question, but to this several members objected,
and the motion was withdrawn. The ministry found some consolation in
this withdrawal, which they characterized as "a retreat after a
victory," but to the public at large, unused to place much stress on
the minor tactics of debate, nothing appeared but the broad, general
fact, that the first overture for a Union had been rejected. It was a
day of immense rejoicing in Dublin; the leading anti-Unionists were
escorted in triumph to their homes, while the Unionists were protected
by strong military escorts from the popular indignation. At night the
city was illuminated, and the patrols were doubled as a protection to
the obnoxious minority.
Mr. Ponsonby's amendment, affirmed by the House of Commons, was in
these words:—"That the House would be ready to enter into any measure
short of surrendering their free, resident and independent legislature
as established in 1782." This was the _ultimatum_ of the great party
which rallied in January, 1799, to the defence of the established
constitution of their country. The arguments with which they sustained
their position were few, bold, and intelligible to every capacity.
There was the argument from Ireland's geographical situation, and the
policy incident to it; the historical argument; the argument for a
resident gentry occupied and retained in the country by their public
duties; the commercial argument; the revenue argument; but above all,
the argument of the incompetency of Parliament to put an end to its own
existence. "Yourselves," exclaimed the eloquent Plunkett, "you may
extinguish, but Parliament you cannot extinguish. It is enthroned in
the hearts of the people—it is enshrined in the sanctuary of the
constitution—it is as immortal as the island that protects it. As well
might the frantic suicide imagine that the act which destroys his
miserable body should also extinguish his eternal soul. Again,
therefore, I warn you. Do not dare to lay your hands on the
Constitution—it is above your powers!"
These arguments were combated on the grounds that the islands were
already united under one crown—that that species of union was uncertain
and precarious—that the Irish Parliament was never in reality a
national legislature; that it existed only as an instrument of class
legislation; that the Union would benefit Ireland materially as it had
benefited Scotland; that she would come in for a full share of imperial
honours, expenditure and trade; that such a Union would discourage all
future hostile attempts by France or any other foreign power against
the connection, and other similar arguments. But the division which
followed the first introduction of the subject showed clearly to the
Unionists that they could not hope to succeed with the House of Commons
as then constituted; that more time and more preparation were
necessary. Accordingly, Lord Castlereagh was authorized in March, to
state formally in his place, that it was not the intention of the
government to bring up the question again during that session; an
announcement which was hailed with a new outburst of rejoicing in the
city.
But those who imagined the measure was abandoned were sadly deceived.
Steps were immediately taken by the Castle to deplete the House of its
majority, and to supply their places before another session with forty
or fifty new members, who would be entirely at the beck of the Chief
Secretary. With this view, thirty-two new county judgeships were
created; a great number of additional inspectorships and commissioners
were also placed at the Minister's disposal; thirteen members had
peerages for themselves or for their wives, with remainder to their
children, and nineteen others were presented to various lucrative
offices. The "Escheatorship of Munster"—a sort of Chiltern Hundreds
office—was accepted by those who agreed to withdraw from opposition,
for such considerations, but who could not be got to reverse their
votes. By these means, and a lavish expenditure of secret service
money, it was hoped that Mr. Pitt's stipulated majority of "not less
than fifty" could be secured during the year.
The other events of the session of '99, though interesting in
themselves, are of little importance compared to the union debates. In
the English Parliament, which met on the same day as the Irish, a
paragraph identical with that employed by Lord Cornwallis in
introducing the subject of the Union, was inserted in the King's
speech. To this paragraph, repeated in the address, an amendment was
moved by the celebrated Richard Brinsley Sheridan, and resisted with an
eloquence scarcely inferior to his own, by his former _protege_ and
countryman, George Canning. Canning, like Sheridan, had sprung from a
line of Irish literateurs and actors; he had much of the wit and genius
of his illustrious friend, with more worldly wisdom, and a higher
sentiment of personal pride. In very early life, distinguished by great
oratorical talents, he had deliberately attached himself to Mr. Pitt,
while Sheridan remained steadfast to the last, in the ranks of the Whig
or liberal party. For the land of their ancestors both had, at bottom,
very warm, good wishes; but Canning looked down upon her politics from
the heights of empire, while Sheridan felt for her honour and her
interests with the affection of an expatriated son. We can well credit
his statement to Grattan, years afterwards, when referring to his
persistent opposition to the Union, he said, he would "have waded in
blood to his knees," to preserve the Constitution of Ireland. In taking
this course he had with him a few eminent friends: General Fitzpatrick,
the former Irish Secretary, Mr. Tierney, Mr. Hobhouse, Dr. Lawrence,
the executor of Edmund Burke, and Mr., afterwards Earl Grey. Throughout
the entire discussion these just minded Englishmen stood boldly forward
for the rights of Ireland, and this highly honourable conduct was long
remembered as one of Ireland's real obligations to the Whig party.
The resolutions intended to serve as "the basis of union," were
introduced by Mr. Pitt, on the 21st of January, and after another
powerful speech in opposition, from Mr. Grey, who was ably sustained by
Mr. Sheridan, Dr. Lawrence, and some twenty others, were put and
carried. The following are the resolutions:—
1st. "In order to promote and secure the essential interests of Great
Britain and Ireland, and to consolidate the strength, power, and
resources of the British empire, it will be advisable to concur in such
measures as may tend to unite the two kingdoms of Great Britain and
Ireland into one kingdom, in such manner, and in such terms and
conditions as may be established by acts of the respective Parliaments
of his Majesty's said kingdoms.
2nd. "It would be fit to propose as the first article, to serve as a
basis of the said union, that the said kingdoms of Great Britain and
Ireland shall, on a day to be agreed upon, be united into one kingdom,
by the name of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
3rd. "For the same purpose it would be fit to propose, that the
succession to the monarchy and the imperial crown of the said United
Kingdom, shall continue limited and settled, in the same manner as the
imperial crown of the said Great Britain and Ireland now stands limited
and settled, according to the existing law, and to the terms of the
union between England and Scotland.
4th. "For the same purpose it would be fit to propose that the said
United Kingdom be represented in one and the same Parliament, to be
styled the Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and
Ireland; and that such a number of Lords, spiritual and temporal, and
such a number of members of the House of Commons, as shall be hereafter
agreed upon by the acts of the respective Parliaments as aforesaid,
shall sit and vote in the said Parliament on the part of Ireland, and
shall be summoned, chosen, and returned, in such manner as shall be
fixed by an act of the Parliament of Ireland previous to the said
union; and that every member hereafter to sit and vote in the said
Parliament of the United Kingdom shall, until the said Parliament shall
otherwise provide, take, and subscribe the said oaths, and make the
same declarations as are required by law to be taken, subscribed, and
made by the members of the Parliaments of Great Britain and Ireland.
5th. "For the same purpose it would be fit to propose, that the
Churches of England and Ireland, and the doctrine, worship, discipline,
and government thereof, shall be preserved as now by law established.
6th. "For the same purpose it would be fit to propose, that his
Majesty's subjects in Ireland shall at all times be entitled to the
same privileges, and be on the same footing in respect of trade and
navigation in all ports and places belonging to Great Britain, and in
all cases with respect to which treaties shall be made by his Majesty,
his heirs, or successors, with any foreign power, as his Majesty's
subjects in Great Britain; that no duty shall be imposed on the import
or export between Great Britain and Ireland, of any articles now duty
free, and that on other articles there shall be established, for a time
to be limited, such a moderate rate of equal duties as shall, previous
to the Union, be agreed upon and approved by the respective
Parliaments, subject, after the expiration of such limited time, to be
diminished equally with respect to both kingdoms, but in no case to be
increased; that all articles which may at any time hereafter be
imported into Great Britain from foreign parts shall be importable
through either kingdom into the other, subject to the like duties and
regulations, as if the same were imported directly from foreign parts:
that where any articles, the growth, produce, or manufacture of either
kingdom, are subject to an internal duty in one kingdom, such
counter-vailing duties (over and above any duties on import to be fixed
as aforesaid) shall be imposed as shall be necessary to prevent any
inequality in that respect; and that all matters of trade and commerce,
other than the foregoing, and than such others as may before the Union
be specially agreed upon for the due encouragement of the agriculture
and manufactures of the respective kingdoms, shall remain to be
regulated from time to time by the United Parliament.
7th. "For the like purpose it would be fit to propose, that the charge
arising from the payment of the interests or sinking fund for the
reduction of the principal of the debt incurred in either kingdom
before the Union, shall continue to be separately defrayed by Great
Britain and Ireland respectively; that, for a number of years to be
limited, the future ordinary expenses of the United Kingdom, in peace
or war, shall be defrayed by Great Britain and Ireland jointly,
according to such proportions as shall be established by the respective
Parliaments previous to the Union; and that, after the expiration of
the time to be so limited, the proportion shall not be liable to be
varied, except according to such rates and principles, as shall be in
like manner agreed upon previous to the Union.
8th. "For the like purpose, that all laws in force at the time of the
Union, and all the courts of civil or ecclesiastical jurisdiction
within the respective kingdoms, shall remain as now by law established
within the same, subject only to such alterations or regulations as may
from time to time as circumstances may appear to the Parliament of the
United Kingdom to require."
Mr. Pitt, on the passage of these resolutions, proposed an address
stating that the Commons had proceeded with the utmost attention to the
consideration of the important objects recommended in the royal
message, that they entertained a firm persuasion of the probable
benefits of a complete and entire Union between Great Britain and
Ireland, founded on equal and liberal principles; that they were
therefore induced to lay before his Majesty such propositions as
appeared to them to be best calculated to form the basis of such a
settlement, leaving it to his wisdom in due time and in proper manner,
to communicate them to the Lords and Commons of Ireland, with whom they
would be at all times ready to concur in all such measures as might be
found most conducive to the accomplishment of that great and salutary
work.
On the 19th of March, Lord Grenville introduced the same resolutions in
the Lords, where they were passed after a spirited opposition speech
from Lord Holland, and the basis, so far as the King, Lords, and
Commons of England were concerned, was laid. In proroguing the Irish
Houses on the 1st of June, Lord Cornwallis alluded to these
resolutions, and the anxiety of the King, as the common father of his
people, to see both kingdoms united in the enjoyment of the blessings
of a free constitution.
This prorogation was originally till August, but in August it was
extended till January, 1800. In this long interval of eight months, the
two great parties, the Unionists and the anti-Unionists were
incessantly employed, through the press, in social intercourse, in the
grand jury room, in county and city meetings, by correspondence,
petitions, addresses, each pushing forward its own views with all the
zeal and warmth of men who felt that on one side they were labouring
for the country, on the other for the empire. Two incidents of this
interval were deeply felt in the patriot ranks, the death at an
advanced age of the venerable Charlemont, the best member of his order
Ireland had ever known, and the return to the kingdom and to public
life of Lord Charlemont's early friend and _protege_, Henry Grattan. He
had spent above a year in England, chiefly in Wales and the Isle of
Wight. His health all this time had been wretched; his spirits low and
despondent, and serious fears were at some moments entertained for his
life. He had been forbidden to read or write, or to hear the exciting
news of the day. Soothed and cheered by that admirable woman, whom
Providence had given him, he passed the crisis, but he returned to
breathe his native air, greatly enfeebled in body, and sorely afflicted
in mind. The charge of theatrical affectation of illness has been
brought against Grattan by the Unionists,—against Grattan who, as to
his personal habits, was simplicity itself! It is a charge undeserving
of serious contradiction.