1857.1

LESSONS OF THE ELECTION.

709

therefore, a personal one. Constituents did not scrutinise closely the principles or capacity of candidates, so long as they promised to support Lord Palmerston, * and so numbers of Parliamentary Reformers crept unnoticed into the House. But in such cases the loyalty of a majority lasts no longer than the popularity of the leader. Let him make one false step that forfeits popularity, and then his supporters desert him, disinterring what they call their "principles" from buried election addresses to justify their "new departure."

It was unfortunate that neither the Queen nor Prince Albert recognised this fact, and that they both imagined that Palmerston's principles-which, in domestic policy, were reactionary and illiberal-were as popular as Palmerston himself. The only true and just criticism of this historic Election, which sent 189 new Members to the House of Commons, and for a time broke the old parties to pieces, was passed by the Duke of Newcastle. Writing to Mr. Hayward on the 10th of April, he says:-"I come to the conclusion that Palmerston will be disappointed with his new Parliament. The gain to

*Even new Tory candidates, when they saw how the current of public opinion was setting, began to beg support by saying that if they had been in the House when the China vote was taken, they would have voted for Lord Palmerston.-See Greville Memoirs, Vol. II., p. 100.

Liberal opinion is very great, and the Derby party is for the present smashed; but in these gains are to be found Palmerston's disadvantages. Nobody can fear the alternative of a Derby Ministry, and if Palmerston rises to the occasion he will soon find his popularity gone and his Government in danger. It is all nonsense to suppose that the China vote has really influenced the decision of the country; but there is a question which alone Palmerston cares about (and that in an adverse sense), which has gained ground everywhere, and is now established as the question of the day— Reform of Parliament; and I have no belief in a good measure coming from unwilling men; and how unwilling are the influential men in the present Cabinet my former association with them pretty well informs me." *

From this Election the history of the Queen's reign enters on a fresh phase. Underlying every party intrigue and combination there is henceforth to be detected an irrepressible though concealed antagonism between the Parliamentary Reformers and their opponents. In England, it is a curious fact that political parties always exhaust their ingenuity in veiling the real issue between them. When a Government is punished by dismissal, it is not dismissed for the blunder it has committed, but because it has done, or refused to do, something else, which is hardly hinted at in public, but which has offended a powerful body of its supporters. Palmerston was a Minister whose ardent, impetuous temperament, and confidence in his own dexterity, rendered him prone to commit blunders. A Minister of that type can go on blundering with impunity so long as he is supposed to be trustworthy on the one great question which lies closest to the hearts of that section of his supporters, who are prepared to sacrifice him for their cause. But whenever they discover that he is not to be trusted, they take advantage of his first mistake to combine with his enemies and overthrow him. In the new Parliament of 1857, it was therefore clear that Palmerston's personal ascendency would last till the party of Parliamentary Reform discovered that they had absolutely nothing to expect from him, save open or concealed hostility. It was because the Queen did not grasp this fact that she was startled to find, a few months after Parliament met, how rapidly Palmerston's popularity was waning. Prince Albert also, strangely enough, mistook the verdict of the country in 1857, as being one cast solely against "the peace-at-any-price people." +

On the 7th of May the House of Commons began the business of the new Session. On that day the Lord Chancellor read the Queen's Speech, which, contrary to general expectation, did not contain any reference to Parliamentary Reform. It was, says Lord Malmesbury, "the lamest production,

*Correspondence of Abraham Hayward, Q.C., Vol. I., pp. 312, 313.

+ Martin's Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXXV. On the 5th of March, 1858, he writes to Stockmar: "Lord Palmerston's sudden decline in popularity was a remarkable phenomenon."-Martin's Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXXXIV.

1857.]

THE JEWS AND PARLIAMENT.

711

even for a Queen's Speech, I ever read." However, it gave a soothing account of foreign affairs, and intimated not only that the main stipulations of the Treaty of Paris had been carried out, and that the Neufchâtel difficulty was in a fair way of being settled, but it announced the signature of a Treaty of Peace with Persia. The only subject for regret in our foreign relations was, of course, the war with China. The legislative programme was meagre in the extreme, for the only important Bills promised were, one relating to the jurisdiction of the Ecclesiastical Courts over wills and divorce, and another to check fraudulent breaches of trust. The Address was carried with very little debate, the Radicals being satisfied to let the question of Parliamentary Reform sleep, because Lord Palmerston promised that during the recess the Cabinet would give the subject serious consideration. It was, in truth, a dull and uneventful Session.

But a slight fillip of interest was imparted to it by the revival of the old controversy as to the admission of Jews to Parliament. The election of Baron Rothschild as one of the Members for the City of London compelled the Government to deal with the matter, and Lord Palmerston brought forward a Bill, on the 15th of May, to alter the law relating to Parliamentary Oaths, and remove from the statute book one of the last relics of medieval bigotry. Although it was bitterly opposed by many Tories, such as Sir F. Thesiger and Mr. Whiteside, the Bill passed the House of Commons, but only to be thrown out by the House of Lords. Lord John Russell then tried to solve the problem by bringing in a Bill to extend the operation of the Act, 1 and 2 Vict. cap. 106, giving a discretion as to the forms on which certain oaths are administered. But while this Bill was in progress it was proposed to free the Jews from their Parliamentary disabilities by applying to their case the provisions of the Act 5 and 6 William IV. cap. 62. This Act was passed to enable a solemn declaration to be substituted for an oath in certain instances. The only question was whether the Act could be stretched so as to include the oath imposed on Members of Parliament. On Lord John Russell's motion a Select Committee was appointed to inquire if the Act applied to Parliamentary Oaths, but in due time they reported that it did not. This virtually ended the controversy for the Session, and Lord John Russell could only give notice that he would renew the agitation next year.

Undoubtedly the legal and social reforms proposed by the Government in 1857 were those which created most excitement in the country. The Ecclesiastical Courts had been long threatened with extinction, and at last the Government dealt them a fatal blow. Bills were introduced in May transferring to purely secular tribunals their Testamentary Jurisdiction and the greater part of their control over the Marriage Laws, and though the establishment of the new Court of Probate was not much opposed, the Divorce Bill was fiercely debated. Members who were under sacerdotal influence attacked this measure with

* Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 70.

the utmost ferocity. Indeed, it was not opposed, but factiously obstructed, clause by clause and line by line, Mr. Gladstone being the most energetic of its opponents.* It was, however, passed, and undoubtedly the Government won some credit in the country by the pertinacity with which they piloted this embarrassing measure through both Houses of Parliament. "I am very glad," writes Lord Campbell, in his Journal, "that the Divorce Bill finally

sion over which I had the honour to preside, preserving the law as it has practically subsisted for two hundred years: that a husband who has conducted himself properly may obtain a dissolution of the marriage for the adultery of the wife, and that a wife may obtain a dissolution of the marriage for the adultery of the husband, attended by incest, or any aggravation which renders it impossible for the connubial union to continue; the

This was one of the first recorded cases of "obstruction" in the modern sense of the word. Mr. Parnell used, at one time, to justify his tactics by citing as a precedent Mr. Gladstone's opposition to the Divorce Bill.