第19章 Reform Movements(7)

V.SINISTER INTERESTS

In questions of foreign policy,of law reform,of political economy,and of religious tests,the Utilitarians thus saw the gradual approximation to their most characteristic views on the part of the Whigs,and a strong infiltration of the same views among the less obstructive Tories.They held the logical creed,to which others were slowly approximating,either from the force of argument or from the great social changes which were bringing new classes into political power.

The movement for parliamentary reform which for a time overshadowed all other questions might be regarded as a corollary from the position already won.Briefly,it was clear that a new social stratum was exercising a vast influence;the doctrines popular with it had to be more or less accepted;and the only problem worth consideration by practical men was whether or not such a change should be made in the political machinery as would enable the influence to be exercised by direct and constitutional means.To the purely obstructive Tory parliamentary reform was a step to the general cataclysm,the proprietor of a borough,like the proprietor of a church patronage or commission in the army,had a right to his votes,and to attack his right was simply confiscation of private property.The next step might be to confiscate his estate.But even the more intelligent Conservative drew the line at such a measure.Canning,Huskisson,and even Peel might accept the views of the Utilitarians in regard to foreign policy,to law reform,to free trade,or the removal of religious tests,declaring only that they were obeying 'experience'instead of logic,and might therefore go just as far as they pleased.But they were all pledged to resist parliamentary reform to the utmost.Men thoroughly steeped in official life,and versed in the actual working of the machinery,were naturally alive to the magnitude of the change to be introduced.They saw with perfect clearness that it would amount to a revolution.The old system in which the ruling classes carried on business by family alliances and bargains between ministers and great men would be impracticable.The fact that so much had been done in the way of concession to the ideas of the new classes was for them an argument against the change.If the governing classes were ready to reform abuses,why should they be made unable to govern?A gradual enfranchisement of the great towns on the old system might be desirable.Such a man as Huskisson,representing great commercial interests,could not be blind to the necessity.But a thorough reconstruction was more alarming.As Canning had urged in a great speech at Liverpool,a House of Commons,thoroughly democratised,would be incompatible with the existence of the monarchy and the House of Lords.So tremendously powerful a body would reduce the other parts of the constitution to mere excrescences,feeble drags upon the new driving-wheel in which the whole real force would be concentrated.

That this expressed,in point of fact,a serious truth,was,I take it,undeniable.The sufficient practical answer was,that change was inevitable.To refuse to adapt the constitutional machinery to the altered political forces was not to hinder their growth,but to make a revolution necessary.When,accordingly,the excluded classes began seriously to demand admission,the only question came to lie between violent and peaceable methods.The alarm with which our fathers watched the progress of the measure may seem to us exaggerated,but they scarcely overestimated the magnitude of the change.The old rulers were taking a new partner of such power,that whatever authority was left to them might seem to be left on sufferance.As soon as he became conscious of his strength,they would be reduced to nonentities.The Utilitarians took some part in the struggle,and welcomed the victory with anticipations destined to be,for the time at least,cruelly disappointed.But they were still a small minority,whose views rather scandalised the leaders of the party with which they were in temporary alliance.The principles upon which they based their demands,as formulated by James Mill,looked,as we shall see,far beyond the concessions of the moment.

One other political change is significant,though I am unable to give an adequate account of it.Bentham's denunciation of 'sinister interests'--one of his leading topics --corresponds to the question of sinecures,which was among the most effective topics of Radical declamation.The necessity of limiting the influence of the crown and excluding 'placemen'from the House of Commons had been one of the traditional Whig commonplaces,and a little had been done by Burke's act of 1782towards limiting pensions and abolishing obsolete offices.

When English Radicalism revived,the assault was renewed in parliament and the press.During the war little was achieved,though a revival of the old complaints about placemen in parliament was among the first symptoms of the rising sentiment.In 1812an attack was made upon the 'tellers of the Exchequer.'Romilly 31says that the value of one of these offices had risen to £26,000or £27,000a year.The income came chiefly from fees,and the actual work,whatever it was,was done by deputy.The scandal was enormous at a time when the stress upon the nation was almost unbearable,One of the tellerships was held by a member of the great Grenville family,who announced that they regarded the demand for reform as a personal attack upon them.The opposition,therefore,could not muster even its usual strength,and the motion for inquiry was rejected.

When the war was over,even the government began to feel that something must be done,in 1817some acts were passed 32abolishing a variety of sinecure offices and 'regulating certain offices in the Court of Exchequer.'