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1ST EARL OF JOHN GEORGE LAMBTON DURHA...

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Originally appearing in Volume V08, Page 706 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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1ST See also:

EARL OF See also:JOHN See also:GEORGE LAMBTON See also:DURHAM (1792–1840)  , See also:English statesman, son of See also:William See also:Henry Lambton of Lambton See also:Castle, See also:Durham, was See also:born in See also:London on the 12th of See also:April 1792 . His See also:mother was See also:Anne See also:Barbara See also:Villiers, daughter of the 4th See also:earl of See also:Jersey . See also:Lamb ton was only five years old when by his See also:father's See also:death at See also:Pisa (1797) he succeeded to large estates in the See also:north of See also:England which had been in the uninterrupted See also:possession of his See also:family since the 12th See also:century . In 1805 he went to See also:Eton, and in 1809 obtained a See also:commission in the loth Hussars . In 1812, while still a See also:minor, he made a runaway match with Henrietta, natural daughter of See also:Lord Cholmondeley, whom he married at Gretna See also:Green, and who died in 1815 . In 1813 he was elected to the See also:House of See also:Commons as member for the See also:county of Durham . Whig principles of a pronounced type were traditional in Lambton's family . His grandfather, See also:General See also:John Lambton, had refused a See also:peerage in 1793 out of See also:loyalty to See also:Fox, and his father was not only one of See also:Pitt's keenest opponents, but was chairman of " The See also:Friends of the See also:People " and author of that society's address to the nation in 1792 . Lambton adhered to this tradition, and soon See also:developed opinions of an extremely See also:Radical type, which he fearlessly put forward in See also:parliament and in the See also:country with marked ability . His See also:maiden speech in the House of Commons was directed against the See also:foreign policy of Lord See also:Liverpool's See also:government, who had sanctioned, and helped to enforce, the See also:annexation of See also:Norway by See also:Sweden . In 1815 he vehemently opposed the See also:corn tax, and in general began to take a prominent See also:part in opposition to the Tories . In 1816 he made the acquaintance of See also:Lafayette in See also:Paris, and narrowly escaped See also:arrest for alleged complicity in his See also:escape .

In 1817 he began to speak on every opportunity in favour of See also:

parliamentary reform . His See also:political position was strengthened by his See also:marriage in See also:December 1816 to Louisa See also:Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Lord See also:Grey, and as See also:early as 1818 he was taken into the political confidence of his father-in-See also:law and other leaders of the Whigs in matters touching the leadership and policy of the party . But from the first Lambton belonged to the avowedly Radical wing of the party, with whose aims Grey had little sympathy; and when he gave See also:notice of a See also:resolution in 1819 in favour of shortening the duration of parliaments, and of a wide See also:extension of the See also:franchise, he found himself discountenanced by old Whigs like Grey, See also:Holland and See also:Fitzwilliam . Having warmly espoused the cause of See also:Queen See also:Caroline, Lambton ably seconded Lord See also:Tavistock's resolution in See also:February 1821 censuring the government for their conduct towards the queen; and in April he made his first See also:great speech in the House of Commons on parliamentary reform, when he proposed a See also:scheme for the extension of the See also:suffrage to all holders of See also:property, the See also:division of the country into electoral districts and the disfranchisement of rotten boroughs . He was now one of the recognized leaders of the advanced Liberals, forming a connecting See also:link between the aristocratic Whig leaders and the irresponsible and often violent politicians of the great towns . His opposition to those members of his party who in 1825 were prepared for See also:compromise on the question of See also:Catholic emancipation led to his first conflict with See also:Brougham, with whom he had been on terms of See also:close friendship . While supporting the candidature of his See also:brother-in-law, Lord Howick, for See also:Northumberland in the elections of 1826, Lambton fought a See also:duel with T . W . See also:Beaumont, the Tory See also:candidate, but without bloodshed on either See also:side . Unlike his father-in-law, Lambton supported the See also:ministry of See also:Canning, though he had some grounds for See also:personal grievance against the new See also:prime See also:minister, and after Canning's death that of Lord Goderich . On the See also:advice of the latter Lambton was raised to the peerage in 1828 with the See also:title of See also:Baron Durham . Owing to his Liberal principles Lord Durham was on terms of friendship with the See also:duke of See also:Sussex, and also with See also:Prince See also:Leopold of See also:Saxe-See also:Coburg, who sought his advice in the difficult crisis in 1829 when he was offered the See also:throne of See also:Greece, and who, after he became See also:king of the Belgians as Leopold I., continued to correspond with Durham as a trusted confidant; the same confidential relations also existed between Durham and Leopold's See also:sister, the duchess of See also:Kent, and her daughter, afterwards Queen See also:Victoria .

In See also:

November 183o when Grey became prime minister in See also:succession to the duke of See also:Wellington, Lord Durham entered the See also:cabinet as lord privy See also:seal . Parliamentary reform was in the forefront of the new government's policy, and with this question no statesman except Lord Grey himself was more closely indentified than Durham . To ardent reformers in the country the presence in the cabinet of " Radical See also:Jack," the name by which Lambton had been popularly known in the north of England, was a See also:pledge that thorough-going reform would not be shirked by the Whigs, now in See also:office for the first See also:time for twenty years . And it was to his son-in-law that Lord Grey confided the task of preparing a scheme to serve as the basis of the proposed legislation . Full See also:justice has not generally been done to the leading part played by Lord Durham in preparing the great Reform See also:Act . He was the See also:chief author of the proposals which, after being defeated in 1831, became law with little alteration in 1832 . He was chairman of the famous See also:committee of four, which met at his house in See also:Cleveland See also:Row and See also:drew up the scheme submitted by the government to parliament . His colleagues, who were appointed rather as his assistants than as his equals, were Lord John See also:Russell, See also:Sir See also:James See also:Graham and Lord Duncannon; and it was Durham who selected Lord John Russell, not then in the cabinet, to introduce the See also:bill in the House of Commons; a selection that was hotly opposed by Brougham, whose later vindictive animosity against Durham is to be traced to his having been passed over in the selection of the committee of four . Durham was See also:present with Grey at an See also:audience of the king which led to the sudden See also:dissolution of parliament in See also:March 1831; and when the deadlock between the two Houses occurred over the second Reform Bill, he was the most eager in pressing on the prime minister the See also:necessity for a creation of peers to overcome the resistance of the house of Lords . After the passing of the Reform Act, Durham, whose See also:health was See also:bad and who had suffered the loss of two of his See also:children, accepted a See also:special and difficult See also:diplomatic See also:mission to See also:Russia, which he carried out with much tact and ability, though without accomplishing its See also:main purpose . On his return he resigned office in March 1833, ostensibly for reasons of health, but in reality owing to his disagreement with the government's Irish policy as conducted by Lord See also:Stanley; in the same See also:month he was created earl of Durham and See also:Viscount Lambton . His advanced opinions, in the assertion of which he was too little disposed to consider the convictions of others, gradually alienated the more moderate of his See also:late colleagues, such as See also:Melbourne and See also:Palmerston, and even Lord Grey often found his son-in-law in-tractable and self-assertive; but the growing hostility of the treacherous Brougham was mainly due to Durham's undoubted popularity in the country, where he was regarded by many, In See also:July 1837 he resisted the entreaty of Lord Melbourne that he should undertake the government of See also:Canada, where the See also:condition of affairs had become alarming; but a few months later, giving way to the urgent insistence of the prime minister who promised him " the firmest and most unflinching support " of the government, he accepted the See also:post of See also:governor-general and lord high See also:commissioner, with the almost dictatorial See also:powers conferred on him by an act passed in February 1838, by which the constitution of See also:Lower Canada was suspended for two years .

Phoenix-squares

Having secured the services of See also:

Charles See also:Buller (q.v.) as first secretary, and having with more doubtful See also:wisdom appointed See also:Thomas See also:Turton and See also:Edward See also:Gibbon See also:Wakefield (q.v.) to be his unofficial assistants, Durham arrived at See also:Quebec on the 28th of May 1838 . See also:Papineau's See also:rebellion had been quelled, but the See also:French Canadians were sullen, the attitude of the See also:United States equivocal, and the general situation dangerous, especially in the Lower See also:Province ' where government was practically in See also:abeyance . Durham at once issued a conciliatory See also:proclamation . His next. step was to dismiss the executive See also:council of his predecessor and to appoint a new one consisting of men uncommitted to any existing See also:faction, a step much criticized at See also:home but generally commended on the spot . On the 28th of See also:June, the See also:day of Queen Victoria's See also:coronation, he issued a proclamation of See also:amnesty, from the benefit of which eight persons only of those who had taken part in the rebellion were excepted; while an accompanying See also:ordinance provided for the transference of these eight excepted persons from See also:Montreal to Bermuda, where they were to be imprisoned without trial . Papineau and fifteen other fugitives were forbidden on See also:pain of death to return to Canada . In a See also:letter of congratulation to the queen, Durham took See also:credit for the clemency of his policy towards the rebels, and it was defended on the same ground by Charles Buller and by public See also:opinion in the See also:colony . In England, however, as soon as these proceedings became known, Brougham seized the opportunity for venting his malice against both Durham and the ministry . He had already raised objections to the See also:appointment of Turton and Wakefield; he now attacked the ordinance in the House of Lords, challenging the legality of the clause transporting prisoners to Bermuda, where Durham had no See also:jurisdiction . Melbourne and his colleagues, with the See also:honourable exception of Lord John Russell, made little effort to defend the public servant to whom they had promised " the most unflinching support "; and, although both the prime minister and the colonial secretary when first fully informed of the governor-general's proceedings had hastened to assure him of their "entire approval," three See also:weeks later, cowed by Brougham's II See also:malignant invective, they disallowed the ordinance, and carried an Act of See also:Indemnity the terms of which were insulting to Durham . The latter immediately resigned; but before returning to England he put himself in the wrong by issuing a proclamation in which he not only justified his own conduct in detail, but made public complaint of his grievances against the ministers of the See also:Crown, a step that alienated much sympathy which his unjust treatment by the government would otherwise have called forth, though it was defended by men like Charles Buller and J . S .

See also:

Mill . The usual See also:official honours given to a returning plenipotentiary were not accorded to Durham on his arrival at See also:Plymouth on the 3oth of November 1838, but the populace received him with See also:acclamation . He immediately set about preparinghismemorable " See also:Report on the Affairs of See also:British North See also:America," which was laid before parliament on the 31st of See also:January 1839 . This report, one of the greatest See also:state papers in the English See also:language, laid down the principles, then unrecognized, which have guided British colonial policy ever since . It was not written or composed by Charles Buller, as Brougham was the first to suggest, and the credit for the statesmanship it exhibits is Lord Durham's alone, though he warmly acknowledged the assistance he had derived from Buller, Wakefield and others in preparing the materials on which it was based . With regard to the future government of British North America, Durham had at first inclined towards a federation of all the colonies on that See also:continent, and this aim, afterwards achieved, remained in his eyes an ideal to be striven for; but as a more immediately See also:practical policy he advised the legislative See also:union of Upper and Lower Canada, his avowed aim being to organize a single state in which the British inhabitants would be in a See also:majority . He further urged the creation of an executive council responsible to the colonial legislature; he advised state-aided See also:emigration on the broadest possible See also:scale, and the formation of an intercolonial railway for the development of the whole country . Meantime Durham, who almost alone among the statesmen of his time saw the importance of imperial expansion, interested himself in the emigration schemes of Gibbon Wakefield (q.v.); he became chairman of the New See also:Zealand See also:Company, and was thus concerned in the enterprise which forestalled See also:France in asserting See also:sovereignty over the islands of New Zealand in See also:September 1839 . His health, however, hadlong been failing, and he died at See also:Cowes on the 28th of July 1840, just five days after the royal assent had been given to the bill giving effect to his project for uniting Upper and Lower Canada . Lord Durham filled a larger See also:place in the eyes of his contemporaries than many statesmen who have been better remembered . He was in his lifetime regarded as a great popular See also:leader; and his See also:accession to supreme political See also:power was for some years considered probable by many; his opinions were, however, too extreme to command the confidence of any considerable party in parliament before 1840 . That Brougham hated him and Melbourne feared him, is a See also:tribute to his abilities; and in the first Reform Act, of which he was the chief author, and in the famous Report on the lrinciples of colonial policy, he See also:left an indelible See also:mark on English aistory .

His personal defects of See also:

character did much to See also:mar the success of a career, which, it must be remembered, terminated at the See also:age of See also:forty-eight . He was impatient, hot-tempered, hypersensitive to See also:criticism, vain and prone to take offence at fancied slights; but he was also generous and unvindictive, and while personally ambitious his care for the public See also:interest was genuine and untiring . By his first wife Durham had three daughters; by his second, who was a See also:lady of the bedchamber to Queen Victoria but resigned on her See also:husband's return from Canada, he had two sons and three daughters . The eldest son, Charles William, the " See also:Master Lambton " of Sir Thomas See also:Lawrence's celebrated picture, died in 1831; the second, See also:George See also:Frederick d'Arcy (1828–1879), succeeded his father as 2nd earl of Durham . The latter's son, John George Lambton (b . 1855), became 3rd earl in 1879 . See See also:Stuart J . See also:Reid, See also:Life and Letters of the First Earl of Durham (2 vols., London, 1906) ; The Greville See also:Memoirs, parts i. and ii . (London, 1874–1887) ; See also:Richard, duke of See also:Buckingham and See also:Chandos, Memoirs of the Courts and Cabinets of William IV. and Victoria (2 vols., London, 1861); William See also:Harris . See also:History of the Radical Party in Parliament (London, 1885) Harriet See also:Martineau, History of the See also:Thirty Years' See also:Peace (4 vols., London, 1877) ; William See also:Kings-See also:ford, History of Canada, vol. x . (10 vols., See also:Toronto, 1887–1898) ; H . E .

See also:

Egerton, See also:Short History of British Colonial Policy (London, 1897) . (R . J .

End of Article: 1ST EARL OF JOHN GEORGE LAMBTON DURHAM (1792–1840)
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