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2ND EARL CHARLES GREY GREY (1764-1845)
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2ND See also:EARL See also: The unparalleled successes which followed portended See also:grave changes . Pitt's See also:elevation to the premiership, his brilliant and hard-fought See also:battle in the house, and his See also:complete rout of the Whig party at the general election of 1784, when he came in for Cambridge` at the head of the poll, threatened the See also:great territorial See also:interest with nothing less than extinction . It was to this interest that Grey belonged; and hence, when at length returned for Northumberland in 1786, he at once came forward as a vigorous assailant of the government of Pitt . He was hailed by the opposition, and associated with See also:Fox, See also:Burke and See also:Sheridan as a manager in the See also:Hastings See also:impeachment . During the nineteen years whichremained of the career of Fox, he followed the great Whig statesman with See also:absolute fidelity, and succeeded him as See also:leader of the party . The shortcomings of Fox's statesmanship were inherited by Grey . Both were equally devoid of political originality, shunned the severer labours of the politician, and instinctively feared any deviation from the traditions of their party . Such men cannot See also:save a party in its decadence, and the See also:history of Fox and Grey has been aptly termed the history of the decline and fall of Whiggism . The stunning See also:blow of 1784 was the first incident in this history . Its full significance was not at once perceived . An opposition, however weak in the beginning, generally has a tendency to revive, and Grey's early successes in the house helped to revive the Foxites . The See also:European situation became favourable to this revival . The struggle in See also:France for popular rights, culminating in the great Revolution, was watched by Fox with interested sympathy . He affected to regard the domination of Pitt as the domination of the See also:crown, and as leading logically to See also:absolutism, and saw in that popular sympathy for the French Revolution which naturally arose in See also:England an See also:instrument which might be employed to overthrow this domination . But Pitt gathered the fruits of the windfall . The spread of " Jacobinism," or " French principles," became the pretext on which the stronger half of the opposition went over to the government . Burke led the See also:movement in the See also:Commons, the See also:duke of See also:Portland and See also:Lord See also:Fitzwilliam in the Lords, and with this second incident in the Whig decline began .the difficulties of Grey's career . The domination of the premier had already stirred the keenest resentment in the younger and more ambitious members of the Whig party . Freed from the See also:restraint of the steadier politicians under Burke and Portland, the residuum under Fox See also:fell into a See also:series of grave mistakes . Of this residuum Grey became the moving spirit, for though Fox did not check their activity, he disclaimed the responsibility of their policy . Fox had refused to condemn " French principles," and denounced the war with France; but he would take no See also:part in exciting agitation in England . It was otherwise with the restless See also:spirits among whom Grey was found . Enraged by the attitude of Pitt, which was grounded on the support of the constituencies as they then stood, the residuum plotted an See also:ill-timed agitation for parliamentary reform . The demand for parliamentary reform was as yet in a rudimentary See also:stage . See also:Forty years later it had become the demand of an unenfranchised nation, disabused by a sudden spread of political and economical knowledge . It was as yet but the occasional instrument of the scheming politician . See also:Chatham had employed the cry in this sense . The See also:Middlesex See also:agitators had done the same; even the premier of the See also:time, after his See also:accession to See also:power, had sought to strengthen his hands in the same way . But Pitt's hands were now strengthened abundantly; whereas the opposition had nothing to lose and much to gain by such a measure . The cry for reform thus became their natural expedient . Powerless to carry reform in the House, they sought to overawe parliament by See also:external agitation, and formed the Society of the See also:Friends of the See also:People, destined to unite the forces of all the " patriotic " See also:societies which already existed in the See also:country, and to pour their violence irresistibly on a terrified parliament . Grey and his friends were enrolled in this portentous association, and presented in parliament its menacing petitions . Such petitions, which were in fact violent impeachments of parliament itself, proceeding from voluntary associations having no corporate existence, had been hitherto unknown in the English parliament . They had been well known in the French See also:assembly . They had heralded and furthered the victory of the See also:Jacobins, the See also:dissolution of the constitution, the calling of the Convention and the fall of the See also:monarchy . The Society of the Friends of the People was originally an after-See also:dinner folly, extemporized at the house of a man who after-wards gained an earldom by denouncing it as seditious . Fox discountenanced it, though he did not directly condemn it; but Grey was overborne by the fierce Jacobinism of See also:Lauderdale, and avowed himself the parliamentary See also:mouthpiece of this dangerous agitation . But Pitt, strong in his position, cut the ground from under Grey's feet by suppressing the agitation with a strong See also:hand . The suspension of the Habeas Corpus See also:Act, the Gagging Acts and the See also:state prosecutions See also:form a painful See also:historical See also:episode . But the discredit belongs as much to Grey and Lauderdale as to Pitt . Grey always spoke regretfully of his See also:share in the movement . " One word from Fox, " he said, " would have kept me out of all the See also:mess of the Friends of the People . But he never spoke it." It was Grey who moved the impeachment of Pitt, and he next promoted the equally foolish " See also:Secession." Since the parliament did not properly represent the nation, and refused to reform itself or to impeach the See also:minister, nothing remained but to disown it; and the opposition announced their intention of " seceding," or systematically absenting themselves from their places in parliament . This futile movement was originated by Grey, Lauderdale and the duke of See also:Bedford . It obtained a somewhat wider support . It suited the languor of some dispirited politicians like Fox, and the avarice of some lawyers in large practice like See also:Erskine; but sensible politicians at once condemned it . It directly ignored parliamentary government, and amounted to nothing but a pettish See also:threat of revolution .. " Secession," said Lord See also:Lansdowne, with characteristic shrewdness, " either means See also:rebellion, or it is nonsense." Pitt easily dashed this feeble weapon from the hands of his opponents .
He roused See also:jealousy in the absent by praising the parts and the patriotism of the See also:rest, and thus gradually brought them back
.
Grey himself reappeared to protest against the See also:union with See also:Ireland
.
When Pitt died in 8o6 nothing could prevent the reunited opposition from coming into power, and thus the Broad-bottom See also:ministry was formed under Fox
.
On his See also:death See also:Grenville became premier, and Grey, now Lord Howick, See also:foreign secretary, and leader of the House of Commons
.
Disunion, always the bane of English Liberalism, lurked in the See also:coalition, and the Foxites and Grenvillites were only ostensibly at one
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Grey opposed the war policy of Grenville; and this policy was not more successful than it had been in the hands of Pitt
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And the See also:change from the leadership of Fox to that of Grenville was only too perceptible
.
Both in court and country Grenville affected the role of Pitt, and assumed a stiff and See also:peremptory attitude which ill became him
.
An ill-advised dissolution weakened their See also:majority; they lost ground by the " delicate investigation " into the conduct of the princess of See also:Wales; Lord Henry See also:Petty's See also:budget was too specious tQ command confidence; and the See also: Opposition See also:united Grey and Grenville for a time, but the parties finally split on the old war question . When Napoleon returned from See also:Elba in 1815, and once more seized the government of France, the same question arose which had arisen in 1792, Was England to go to war for the restoration of the Bourbons ? Grenville followed the traditions of Pitt, and supported the ministry in at once renewing hostilities . Grey followed those of Fox, and maintained the right of France to choose her own See also:governors, and the impossibility of checking the reaction in the See also:emperor's favour . The victory of See also:Waterloo put an end to the dispute, but the disruption became permanent . The termination of the war, and the cessation of all See also:action in See also:common, reduced the power of the opposition to nothing . Grenville retired from public See also:life, and his adherents reinforced the ministry . Little remained for the Whigs to do . But the persecution of the See also:queen afforded an opportunity of showing that the ministry were not omnipotent; and the part taken on that occasion by Grey won him at once the increased respect of the nation and the undying aversion of George IV . It sealed the exclusion of himself and his few friends from See also:office during the king's life; and when in 1827 Grey came forth to denounce the ministry of See also:Canning, he declared that he stood alone in the political See also:world . His words were soon justified, for when Lord Goderich resigned, the remnant which had hithertosupported Grey, hastened to support the ministry of the duke of See also:Wellington . We now reach the See also:principal episode in Grey's career . 
In 1827 he seemed to stand forth the solitary and powerless relic of an See also:extinct party . In 1832 we find that party restored to its old See also:numbers and activity, supreme in parliament, popular in the nation, and Lord Grey at its head . The duke of Wellington's foolish See also:declaration against parliamentary reform, made in a See also:season of great popular excitement, suddenly deprived him of the confidence of the country, and a coalition of the Whigs and Canningites became inevitable . The Whigs had in 1827 sup-ported the Canningites; the latter now supported the Whigs, of whom Grey remained the traditional head . George IV. was dead, and no obstacle existed to Grey's elevation . Grey was sent for by William IV. in See also:November 1830, and formed a coalition cabinet, pledged to carry on the See also:work in which the duke of Wellington had faltered . But Grey himself was the See also:mere instrument of the times . An old-fashioned Whig, he had little See also:personal sympathy with the popular cause, though he had sometimes indicated a certain measure of reform as necessary . When he took office, he guessed neither the extent to which the Reform Act would go, nor the means by which it would be carried . That he procured for the country a measure of constitutional reform for which he had agitated in his youth was little more than a coincidence . In his youth he had put himself at the head of a frantic agitation against parliament, because he there found himself powerless . In his old See also:age the See also:case was reversed . Suddenly raised to a position of authority in the country, he boldly stood between parliament, as then constituted, and the formidable agitation which now threatened it and by a forced reform saved it from revolution . In his youth he had assailed Pitt's See also:administration because Pitt's administration threatened with extinction the political See also:monopoly of that landed interest to which he belonged . In his old age, on the contrary, unable to check the progress of the See also:wave, he swam with it, and headed the movement which compelled that landed interest to surrender its monopoly . The second See also:reading of the first Reform See also:Bill was carried in the Commons by a majority of one . This was See also:equivalent to a defeat, and further failures precipitated a dissolution . The confidence which the bold action of the ministry had won was soon plainly proved, for the second reading was carried in the new parliament by a majority of 136 . When the bill had at length passed the Commons after months of debate, it was Grey's task to introduce it to the Lords . It was rejected by a majority of 41 . The safety of the country now depended on the prudence and courage of the ministry . The resignation of Grey and his colleagues was dreaded even by the opposition, and they remained in office with the intention of introducing a third Reform Bill in the next session . The last months of 1831 were the beginning of a political crisis such as England had not seen since 1688 . The two extreme parties, the Ultra-Radicals and the Ultra-Tories, were ready for See also:civil war . Between them stood the ministry and the majority of intelligent peace-loving Englishmen; and their course of action was soon decided . The bill must be passed, and there were but two ways of passing it . One was to declare the consent of the House of Lords unnecessary to the measure, the other to create, if necessary, new peers in sufficient number to outvote the opposition . These two expedients did not in reality differ . To swamp the house in the way proposed would have been to destroy it . The question whether the ministry should demand the king's consent to such a creation, if necessary, was debated in the cabinet in See also:September . See also:Brougham proposed it, and gradually a majority of the cabinet were won over . Grey had at first refused to employ even the threat of so unconstitutional a See also:device as a means to the proposed end . But his continued refusal would have broken up the ministry, and the breaking up of the ministry must now have been the See also:signal for revolution . The second reading in the Commons was passed in See also:December by a majority of 162, and on New-Year's See also:day 1832 the majority of the cabinet resolved on demanding power to carry it in the Lords by a creation of peers . Grey carried the See also:resolution to the king . Some time still remained before the bill could be committed and read a third time . It was not until the 9th of See also:April that Grey moved the second reading in the Lords . A sufficient number of the opposition temporized; and the second reading was allowed to pass by a majority of nine . Their intention was to mutilate the bill in See also:committee . The Ultra-Tories, headed by the duke of Wellington, had entered a protest against the second reading, but they were now politically powerless . The struggle had become a struggle on the one hand for the whole bill, to be carried by a creation of peers, and on the other for some mutilated measure . Grey's See also:instinct divined that the crisis was approaching . Either the king must consent to swamp the House, or the ministry must cease to stand in the See also:breach between the peers and the country . The king, a weak and inexperienced politician, had in the meantime been wrought upon by the temporizing leaders in the Lords . He was induced to believe that if the Commons should reject the mutilated bill when it was returned to them, and the ministry should consequently retire, the mutilated bill might be reintroduced and passed by a Tory ministry . He was See also:deaf to all representations of the state of public See also:opinion; and to the surprise of the ministry, and the terror and indignation of every man of sense in the country, he rejected their proposal and accepted their resignation, May 9, 1832 . The duke of Wellington undertook the hopeless task of constructing a ministry which should pass a restricted or sham Reform Bill . The only man who could have made the success of such a ministry even probable was See also:Peel, and Peel's See also:conscience and See also:good sense forbade the See also:attempt . He refused, and after a See also:week of the profoundest agitation throughout the country, the king, beaten and mortified, was forced to send for Grey and Brougham . On being told that his consent to the creation of peers was the only See also:condition on which they could undertake the government, he angrily and reluctantly yielded . The See also:chancellor, with cool forethought, demanded this consent in See also:writing . Grey thought such a demand harsh and unnecessary . " I wonder," he said to Brougham, when the interview was over, " you could have had the See also:heart to See also:press it." But Brougham was inexorable, and the king signed the following See also:paper: " The king grants permission to Earl Grey, and to his chancellor, Lord Brougham, to create such a number of peers as will be sufficient to ensure the passing of the Reform Bill, first calling up peers' eldest sons.—WILLIAM R., See also:Windsor, May 17, 1832." Grey had now won the See also:game . There was no danger that he would have to resort to the expedient which he was authorized to employ . The introduction of sixty new peers would have destroyed the opposition, but it would have been equivalent to the abolition of the House . The king's consent made known, a sufficient number of peers were sure to withdraw to enable the bill to pass, and thus the dignity of both king and peerage would be saved . The duke of Wellington headed this movement on the part of the opposition; and the third reading of the bill was carried in the Lords by a majority of 84 . It is well known that in after years both Grey and Brougham disclaimed any intention of executing their threat . If this were so, they must have merely pretended to brave a danger which they secretly feared to See also:face, and intended to avoid; and the See also:credit of rescuing the country would belong to the duke of Wellington and the peers who seceded with him . To argue such cowardice in them from statements made when the crisis was See also:long past, and when they were naturally willing to palliate the rough policy which they were forced to adopt, would be to set up a needless and unjustifiable See also:paradox . Nothing else in the career of either Grey or Brougham leads us to suppose them capable of the moral baseness of yielding up the helm of state, in an See also:hour of darkness and peril, to reckless and unskilled hands . Such would have been the result if they had lacked the determination to carry out their See also:programme to the" end . The See also:influence of every statesman in the country would then have been extinguished, and the United See also:Kingdom would have been absolutely in the hands of O'Connell and Orator See also:Hunt . Grey took but little part in directing the legislation of the reformed parliament . Never anxious for power, he had executedthe arduous task of 1831–1832 rather as a See also:matter of See also:duty than of inclination, and wished for an opportunity of retiring . Such an opportunity very shortly presented itself . The Irish policy of the ministry had not conciliated the Irish people, and O'Connell denounced them with the greatest bitterness . On the renewal of the customary See also:Coercion Bill, the ministry was divided on the question whether to continue to the lord-See also:lieutenant the power of suppressing public meetings . See also:Littleton, the Irish secretary, was for abolishing it; and with the view of conciliating O'Connell, he informed him that the ministry intended to abandon it . But the result proved him to have been mistaken, and O'Connell, with some See also:reason supposing himself to have been duped, called on Littleton to resign his secretaryship . It had also transpired in the discussion that Lord Althorp, the leader of the House of Commons, was privately opposed to retaining those clauses which it was his duty to push through the house . Lord Althorp therefore resigned, and Grey, who had lately passed his seventieth year, took the opportunity of resigning also .
It was his opinion, it appeared, which had overborne the cabinet in favour of the public See also:meeting clauses; and his voluntary withdrawal enabled Lord Althorp to return to his See also:post and to proceed with the bill in its milder form
.
Grey was succeeded by Lord See also:Melbourne; but no other change was made in the cabinet
.
Grey took no further part in politics
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During most of his remaining years he continued to live in retirement at Howick, where he died on the 17th of See also:July 1845, in his eighty-second year
.
By his wife See also:Mary See also: J . |
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