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The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) by Edmund Burke

E >> Edmund Burke >> The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12)




It is therefore, Sir, on the opinion of Parliament, on the opinion of
the ministers, and even on their own opinion of their inutility, that I
shall propose to you to _suppress the Board of Trade and Plantations_,
and to recommit all its business to the Council, from whence it was very
improvidently taken; and which business (whatever it might be) was much
better done, and without any expense; and, indeed, where in effect it
may all come at last. Almost all that deserves the name of business
there is the reference of the plantation acts to the opinion of
gentlemen of the law. But all this may be done, as the Irish business of
the same nature has always been done, by the Council, and with a
reference to the Attorney and Solicitor General.

There are some regulations in the household, relative to the officers of
the yeomen of the guards, and the officers and band of gentlemen
pensioners, which I shall likewise submit to your consideration, for the
purpose of regulating establishments which at present are much abused.

I have now finished all that for the present I shall trouble you with on
the _plan of reduction_. I mean next to propose to you the _plan of
arrangement_, by which I mean to appropriate and fix the civil list
money to its several services according to their nature: for I am
thoroughly sensible, that, if a discretion wholly arbitrary can be
exercised over the civil list revenue, although the most effectual
methods may be taken to prevent the inferior departments from exceeding
their bounds, the plan of reformation will still be left very imperfect.
It will not, in my opinion, be safe to permit an entirely arbitrary
discretion even in the First Lord of the Treasury himself; it will not
be safe to leave with him a power of diverting the public money from its
proper objects, of paying it in an irregular course, or of inverting
perhaps the order of time, dictated by the proportion of value, which
ought to regulate his application of payment to service.

I am sensible, too, that the very operation of a plan of economy which
tends to exonerate the civil list of expensive establishments may in
some sort defeat the capital end we have in view,--the independence of
Parliament; and that, in removing the public and ostensible means of
influence, we may increase the fund of private corruption. I have
thought of some methods to prevent an abuse of surplus cash under
discretionary application,--I mean the heads of _secret service, special
service, various payments_, and the like,--which I hope will answer, and
which in due time I shall lay before you. Where I am unable to limit the
quantity of the sums to be applied, by reason of the uncertain quantity
of the service, I endeavor to confine it to its _line_, to secure an
indefinite application to the definite service to which it belongs,--not
to stop the progress of expense in its line, but to confine it to that
line in which it professes to move.

But that part of my plan, Sir, upon which I principally rest, that on
which I rely for the purpose of binding up and securing the whole, is to
establish a fixed and invariable order in all its payments, which it
shall not be permitted to the First Lord of the Treasury, upon any
pretence whatsoever, to depart from. I therefore divide the civil list
payments into _nine_ classes, putting each class forward according to
the importance or justice of the demand, and to the inability of the
persons entitled to enforce their pretensions: that is, to put those
first who have the most efficient offices, or claim the justest debts,
and at the same time, from the character of that description of men,
from the retiredness or the remoteness of their situation, or from their
want of weight and power to enforce their pretensions, or from their
being entirely subject to the power of a minister, without any
reciprocal power of awing, ought to be the most considered, and are the
most likely to be neglected,--all these I place in the highest classes;
I place in the lowest those whose functions are of the least importance,
but whose persons or rank are often of the greatest power and influence.

In the first class I place the _judges_, as of the first importance. It
is the public justice that holds the community together; the ease,
therefore, and independence of the judges ought to supersede all other
considerations, and they ought to be the very last to feel the
necessities of the state, or to be obliged either to court or bully a
minister for their right; they ought to be as _weak solicitors on their
own demands_ as strenuous assertors of the rights and liberties of
others. The judges are, or ought to be, of a _reserved_ and retired
character, and wholly unconnected with the political world.

In the second class I place the foreign ministers. The judges are the
links of our connections with one another; the foreign ministers are the
links of our connection with other nations. They are not upon the spot
to demand payment, and are therefore the most likely to be, as in fact
they have sometimes been, entirely neglected, to the great disgrace and
perhaps the great detriment of the nation.

In the third class I would bring all the tradesmen who supply the crown
by contract or otherwise.

In the fourth class I place all the domestic servants of the king, and
all persons in efficient offices whose salaries do not exceed two
hundred pounds a year.

In the fifth, upon account of honor, which ought to give place to
nothing but charity and rigid justice, I would place the pensions and
allowances of his Majesty's royal family, comprehending of course the
queen, together with the stated allowance of the privy purse.

In the sixth class I place those efficient offices of duty whose
salaries may exceed the sum of two hundred pounds a year.

In the seventh class, that mixed mass, the whole pension list.

In the eighth, the offices of honor about the king.

In the ninth, and the last of all, the salaries and pensions of the
First Lord of the Treasury himself, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and
the other Commissioners of the Treasury.

If, by any possible mismanagement of that part of the revenue which is
left at discretion, or by any other mode of prodigality, cash should be
deficient for the payment of the lowest classes, I propose that the
amount of those salaries where the deficiency may happen to fall shall
not be carried as debt to the account of the succeeding year, but that
it shall be entirely lapsed, sunk, and lost; so that government will be
enabled to start in the race of every new year wholly unloaded, fresh in
wind and in vigor. Hereafter no civil list debt can ever come upon the
public. And those who do not consider this as saving, because it is not
a certain sum, do not ground their calculations of the future on their
experience of the past.

I know of no mode of preserving the effectual execution of any duty, but
to make it the direct interest of the executive officer that it shall be
faithfully performed. Assuming, then, that the present vast allowance to
the civil list is perfectly adequate to all its purposes, if there
should be any failure, it must be from the mismanagement or neglect of
the First Commissioner of the Treasury; since, upon the proposed plan,
there can be no expense of any consequence which he is not himself
previously to authorize and finally to control. It is therefore just, as
well as politic, that the loss should attach upon the delinquency.

If the failure from the delinquency should be very considerable, it will
fall on the class directly above the First Lord of the Treasury, as well
as upon himself and his board. It will fall, as it ought to fall, upon
offices of no primary importance in the state; but then it will fall
upon persons whom it will be a matter of no slight importance for a
minister to provoke: it will fall upon persons of the first rank and
consequence in the kingdom,--upon those who are nearest to the king, and
frequently have a more interior credit with him than the minister
himself. It will fall upon masters of the horse, upon lord
chamberlains, upon lord stewards, upon grooms of the stole, and lords of
the bedchamber. The household troops form an army, who will be ready to
mutiny for want of pay, and whose mutiny will be _really_ dreadful to a
commander-in-chief. A rebellion of the thirteen lords of the bedchamber
would be far more terrible to a minister, and would probably affect his
power more to the quick, than a revolt of thirteen colonies. What an
uproar such an event would create at court! What _petitions_, and
_committees_, and _associations_, would it not produce! Bless me! what a
clattering of white sticks and yellow sticks would be about his head!
what a storm of gold keys would fly about the ears of the minister! what
a shower of Georges, and thistles, and medals, and collars of S.S. would
assail him at his first entrance into the antechamber, after an
insolvent Christmas quarter!--a tumult which could not be appeased by
all the harmony of the new year's ode. Rebellion it is certain there
would be; and rebellion may not now, indeed, be so critical an event to
those who engage in it, since its price is so correctly ascertained at
just a thousand pound.

Sir, this classing, in my opinion, is a serious and solid security for
the performance of a minister's duty. Lord Coke says, that the staff was
put into the Treasurer's hand to enable him to support himself when
there was no money in the Exchequer, and to beat away importunate
solicitors. The method which I propose would hinder him from the
necessity of such a broken staff to lean on, or such a miserable weapon
for repulsing the demands of worthless suitors, who, the noble lord in
the blue ribbon knows, will bear many hard blows on the head, and many
other indignities, before they are driven from the Treasury. In this
plan, he is furnished with an answer to all their importunity,--an
answer far more conclusive than if he had knocked them down with his
staff:--"Sir, (or my Lord,) you are calling for my own salary,--Sir, you
are calling for the appointments of my colleagues who sit about me in
office,--Sir, you are going to excite a mutiny at court against me,--you
are going to estrange his Majesty's confidence from me, through the
chamberlain, or the master of the horse, or the groom of the stole."

As things now stand, every man, in proportion to his consequence at
court, tends to add to the expenses of the civil list, by all manner of
jobs, if not for himself, yet for his dependants. When the new plan is
established, those who are now suitors for jobs will become the most
strenuous opposers of them. They will have a common interest with the
minister in public economy. Every class, as it stands low, will become
security for the payment of the preceding class; and thus the persons
whose insignificant services defraud those that are useful would then
become interested in their payment. Then the powerful, instead of
oppressing, would be obliged to support the weak; and idleness would
become concerned in the reward of industry. The whole fabric of the
civil economy would become compact and connected in all its parts; it
would be formed into a well-organized body, where every member
contributes to the support of the whole, and where even the lazy stomach
secures the vigor of the active arm.

This plan, I really flatter myself, is laid, not in official formality,
nor in airy speculation, but in real life, and in human nature, in what
"comes home" (as Bacon says) "to the business and bosoms of men." You
have now, Sir, before you, the whole of my scheme, as far as I have
digested it into a form that might be in any respect worthy of your
consideration. I intend to lay it before you in five bills.[44] The plan
consists, indeed, of many parts; but they stand upon a few plain
principles. It is a plan which takes nothing from the civil list without
discharging it of a burden equal to the sum carried to the public
service. It weakens no one function necessary to government; but, on the
contrary, by appropriating supply to service, it gives it greater vigor.
It provides the means of order and foresight to a minister of finance,
which may always keep all the objects of his office, and their state,
condition, and relations, distinctly before him. It brings forward
accounts without hurrying and distressing the accountants: whilst it
provides for public convenience, it regards private rights. It
extinguishes secret corruption almost to the possibility of its
existence. It destroys direct and visible influence equal to the offices
of at least fifty members of Parliament. Lastly, it prevents the
provision for his Majesty's children from being diverted to the
political purposes of his minister.

These are the points on which I rely for the merit of the plan. I pursue
economy in a secondary view, and only as it is connected with these
great objects. I am persuaded, that even for supply this scheme will be
far from unfruitful, if it be executed to the extent I propose it. I
think it will give to the public, at its periods, two or three hundred
thousand pounds a year; if not, it will give them a system of economy,
which is itself a great revenue. It gives me no little pride and
satisfaction to find that the principles of my proceedings are in many
respects the very same with those which are now pursued in the plans of
the French minister of finance. I am sure that I lay before you a scheme
easy and practicable in all its parts. I know it is common at once to
applaud and to reject all attempts of this nature. I know it is common
for men to say, that such and such things are perfectly right, very
desirable,--but that, unfortunately, they are not practicable. Oh, no,
Sir! no! Those things-which are not practicable are not desirable. There
is nothing in the world really beneficial that does not lie within the
reach of an informed understanding and a well-directed pursuit. There is
nothing that God has judged good for us that He has not given us the
means to accomplish, both in the natural and the moral world. If we cry,
like children, for the moon, like children we must cry on.

We must follow the nature of our affairs, and conform ourselves to our
situation. If we do, our objects are plain and compassable. Why should
we resolve to do nothing, because what I propose to you may not be the
exact demand of the petition, when we are far from resolved to comply
even with what evidently is so? Does this sort of chicanery become us?
The people are the masters. They have only to express their wants at
large and in gross. We are the expert artists, we are the skilful
workmen, to shape their desires into perfect form, and to fit the
utensil to the use. They are the sufferers, they tell the symptoms of
the complaint; but we know the exact seat of the disease, and how to
apply the remedy according to the rules of art. How shocking would it be
to see us pervert our skill into a sinister and servile dexterity, for
the purpose of evading our duty, and defrauding our employers, who are
our natural lords, of the object of their just expectations! I think the
whole not only practicable, but practicable in a very short time. If we
are in earnest about it, and if we exert that industry and those talents
in forwarding the work, which, I am afraid, may be exerted in impeding
it, I engage that the whole may be put in complete execution within a
year. For my own part, I have very little to recommend me for this or
for any task, but a kind of earnest and anxious perseverance of mind,
which, with all its good and all its evil effects, is moulded into my
constitution. I faithfully engage to the House, if they choose to
appoint me to any part in the execution of this work, (which, when they
have made it theirs by the improvements of their wisdom, will be worthy
of the able assistance they may give me,) that by night and by day, in
town or in country, at the desk or in the forest, I will, without regard
to convenience, ease, or pleasure, devote myself to their service, not
expecting or admitting any reward whatsoever. I owe to this country my
labor, which is my all; and I owe to it ten times more industry, if ten
times more I could exert. After all, I shall be an unprofitable servant.

At the same time, if I am able, and if I shall be permitted, I will lend
an humble helping hand to any other good work which is going on. I have
not, Sir, the frantic presumption to suppose that this plan contains in
it the whole of what the public has a right to expect in the great work
of reformation they call for. Indeed, it falls infinitely short of it.
It falls short even of my own ideas. I have some thoughts, not yet fully
ripened, relative to a reform in the customs and excise, as well as in
some other branches of financial administration. There are other things,
too, which form essential parts in a great plan for the purpose of
restoring the independence of Parliament. The contractors' bill of last
year it is fit to revive; and I rejoice that it is in better hands than
mine. The bill for suspending the votes of custom-house officers,
brought into Parliament several years ago by one of our worthiest and
wisest members,[45]--would to God we could along with the plan revive
the person who designed it! but a man of very real integrity, honor, and
ability will be found to take his place, and to carry his idea into full
execution. You all see how necessary it is to review our military
expenses for some years past, and, if possible, to bind up and close
that bleeding artery of profusion; but that business also, I have reason
to hope, will be undertaken by abilities that are fully adequate to it.
Something must be devised (if possible) to check the ruinous expense of
elections.

Sir, all or most of these things must be done. Every one must take his
part. If we should be able, by dexterity, or power, or intrigue, to
disappoint the expectations of our constituents, what will it avail us?
We shall never be strong or artful enough to parry, or to put by, the
irresistible demands of our situation. That situation calls upon us, and
upon our constituents too, with a voice which _will_ be heard. I am sure
no man is more zealously attached than I am to the privileges of this
House, particularly in regard to the exclusive management of money. The
Lords have no right to the disposition, in any sense, of the public
purse; but they have gone further in self-denial[46] than our utmost
jealousy could have required. A power of examining accounts, to censure,
correct, and punish, we never, that I know of, have thought of denying
to the House of Lords. It is something more than a century since we
voted that body useless: they have now voted themselves so. The whole
hope of reformation is at length cast upon _us_; and let us not deceive
the nation, which does us the honor to hope everything from our virtue.
If _all_ the nation are not equally forward to press this duty upon us,
yet be assured that they all equally expect we should perform it. The
respectful silence of those who wait upon your pleasure ought to be as
powerful with you as the call of those who require your service as their
right. Some, without doors, affect to feel hurt for your dignity,
because they suppose that menaces are held out to you. Justify their
good opinion by showing that no menaces are necessary to stimulate you
to your duty. But, Sir, whilst we may sympathize with them in one point
who sympathize with us in another, we ought to attend no less to those
who approach us like men, and who, in the guise of petitioners, speak to
us in the tone of a concealed authority. It is not wise to force them to
speak out more plainly what they plainly mean.--But the petitioners are
violent. Be it so. Those who are least anxious about your conduct are
not those that love you most. Moderate affection and satiated enjoyment
are cold and respectful; but an ardent and injured passion is tempered
up with wrath, and grief, and shame, and conscious worth, and the
maddening sense of violated right. A jealous love lights his torch from
the firebrands of the furies. They who call upon you to belong _wholly_
to the people are those who wish you to return to your _proper_
home,--to the sphere of your duty, to the post of your honor, to the
mansion-house of all genuine, serene, and solid satisfaction. We have
furnished to the people of England (indeed we have) some real cause of
jealousy. Let us leave that sort of company which, if it does not
destroy our innocence, pollutes our honor; let us free ourselves at once
from everything that can increase their suspicions and inflame their
just resentment; let us cast away from us, with a generous scorn, all
the love-tokens and symbols that we have been vain and light enough to
accept,--all the bracelets, and snuff-boxes, and miniature pictures, and
hair devices, and all the other adulterous trinkets that are the pledges
of our alienation and the monuments of our shame. Let us return to our
legitimate home, and all jars and all quarrels will be lost in embraces.
Let the commons in Parliament assembled be one and the same thing with
the commons at large. The distinctions that are made to separate us are
unnatural and wicked contrivances. Let us identify, let us incorporate
ourselves with the people. Let us cut all the cables and snap the chains
which tie us to an unfaithful shore, and enter the friendly harbor that
shoots far out into the main its moles and jetties to receive us. "War
with the world, and peace with our constituents." Be this our motto, and
our principle. Then, indeed, we shall be truly great. Respecting
ourselves, we shall be respected by the world. At present all is
troubled, and cloudy, and distracted, and full of anger and turbulence,
both abroad and at home; but the air may be cleared by this storm, and
light and fertility may follow it. Let us give a faithful pledge to the
people, that we honor, indeed, the crown, but that we _belong_ to them;
that we are their auxiliaries, and not their task-masters,--the
fellow-laborers in the same vineyard, not lording over their rights, but
helpers of their joy; that to tax them is a grievance to ourselves, but
to cut off from our enjoyments to forward theirs is the highest
gratification we are capable of receiving. I feel, with comfort, that we
are all warmed with these sentiments, and while we are thus warm, I wish
we may go directly and with a cheerful heart to this salutary work.

Sir, I move for leave to bring in a bill, "For the better regulation of
his Majesty's civil establishments, and of certain public offices; for
the limitation of pensions, and the suppression of sundry useless,
expensive, and inconvenient places, and for applying the moneys saved
thereby to the public service."[47]

* * * * *

Lord North stated, that there was a difference between this bill for
regulating the establishments and some of the others, as they affected
the ancient patrimony of the crown, and therefore wished them to be
postponed till the king's consent could be obtained. This distinction
was strongly controverted; but when it was insisted on as a point of
decorum _only_, it was agreed to postpone them to another day.
Accordingly, on the Monday following, viz. Feb. 14, leave was given, on
the motion of Mr. Burke, without opposition, to bring in--

1st, "A bill for the sale of the forest and other crown lands, rents,
and hereditaments, with certain exceptions, _and for applying the
produce thereof to the public service_; and for securing, ascertaining,
and satisfying _tenant rights_, and common and other rights."

2nd, "A bill for the more perfectly uniting to the crown the
Principality of Wales and the County Palatine of Chester, and for the
more commodious administration of justice within the same; as also for
abolishing certain offices now appertaining thereto, _for quieting
dormant claims, ascertaining and securing tenant rights_, and for the
sale of all forest lands, and other lands, tenements, and hereditaments,
held by his Majesty in right of the said Principality, or County
Palatine of Chester, _and for applying the produce thereof to the public
service_."

3rd, "A bill for uniting to the crown the Duchy and County Palatine of
Lancaster, for the suppression of unnecessary offices now belonging
thereto, for the _ascertainment and security of tenant and other
rights_, and for the sale of all rents, lands, tenements, and
hereditaments, and forests, within the said Duchy and County Palatine,
or either of them, _and for applying the produce thereof to the public
service_."

And it was ordered that Mr. Burke, Mr. Fox, Lord John Cavendish, Sir
George Savile, Colonel Barre, Mr. Thomas Townshend, Mr. Byng, Mr.
Dunning, Sir Joseph Mawbey, Mr. Recorder of London, Sir Robert Clayton,
Mr. Frederick Montagu, the Earl of Upper Ossory, Sir William Guise, and
Mr. Gilbert do prepare and bring in the same.

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