The Press. — London, England, 1855-07-21 00:00:00

country be any longer intrusted to his care, the first will be degraded, and the last, I believe, will be betrayed. • (Loud cheers.) Mr. ROEBUCK commented with great severity on the conduct of Lord John Russell, who had written to his Government from Vienna on the subject of the Austrian proposal an entreaty that no decisive answer should be returned to it till he had been heard ; and yet appeared, immediately upun his return, as the uncompromising advocate of war. He had himself voted with the Ministry in consequence of that speech. The noble lord had practised on him a deceit, and the Government had condoned with that deceit. The noble lord had declared that circumstances had occurred which induced him to change his opinion. The house had a right to know what those circumstances were. Mr. Roebuck then went through the conduct and speeches of Lord John Russell, adverting strongly to their imprudence and inconsistencies, and observing that such conduct shook the confidence of the whole world in political society. They ought to know what were the opinions of other members of the Cabinet, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the First Lord, the Home Secretary. Sir G. GREY rose to deny the right of the hon. member to ask this question. If he had said or done anything to throw doubt upon the sincerity of his conduct, such a question might be asked ; but when any one alluded to circumstances which had no existence but in his own imagination, he should demean himself by replying to them. The rejection of the Austrian proposition was approved by every one, except that small section the peace party. The papers were before them ; he was bound by those papers; and denied the right to question the opinions he might hold in his individual capacity. The assertion that the Cabinet was at any time dis posed to listen to that proposition was contrary to the fact; it was rejected by the members of the Cabinet for different reasons, but unanimously and decisively. He asserted that Lord John Russell spoke his sincere opinions at the moment when he advocated war so warmly on the 24th of May. Mr. GLADSTONE said that most imperfect informa tion as to the subject had been elicited, and there must at an early time be a more satisfactory discus sion. Re thought that when on the 24th of May he bad himself advocated the feasibility of the Russian propositions, and Lord John Russell had denounced them in such strong terms, that it was surprising to find that he had been in favour of terms founded on the same basis, that of counterpoise, and, if anything, more limited and less favorable to Turkey than that put forward by the Russian plenipotentiary. He then adverted to the rejection by Lord Clarendon of the Vienna proposition on the same 21st of May, in which the letter from Lord John Russell requesting to be heard personally upon the subject was re ceived, and the manner in which the house was allowed to debate proposals formally rejected as if still open questions. He alluded in detail to many points of the late diplomatic transactions, alleging that they required further information, and trusting that the full facts would be before the house when they resumed the discussion. The motion was then withdrawn. MR. ROEBUCK'S RESOLUTION. Mr. ROEBUCK, on Tuesday, moved his resolution, in the following terms : That thie house, deeply lamenting the sufferings of our army during the winter campaign in the Crimea , and coincidin g with the resolution of their committee, that the oonduct of the Ad ministration was the first and chief cause of the calamities which betel that army, do hereby visit with severe repre hension every member of that Cabinet whose counsels led to such disasters. After adverting to the appointment of the Sebastopol Committee, and praising the manner in which it had performed its duties, be called attention to the terms of its report, which expressly declared that " the sufferings of the army resulted mainly from the circumstances in which the expedition to the Crimea was undertaken and executed." He would not be satisfied with leaving it as a mere brutum fulmen, or with the retirement of Lord Aberdeen and the Duke of Newcastle. Believing all the members of the late Cabinet equally responsible, ho could not allow the herd to shelter themselves under their insignificance ; those who followed in the wrong should share the condemnation of their superiors, and they had only themselves to thank for their punishment. He then classified his objections to that Cabinet, that after declaration of war they made no adequate preparations, or provided a suffi cient reserve for the force already inadequate ; that they intrusted the management of the war to persons whom many of their own body believed to be incompetent; that they then ordered the expe dition to the Crimea without sufficient information, without proper provision of means, whether of mili tary operations, of transport, or of medical service. He supported these accusations by statements taken from the report, as well as from other sources of information. After blaming the members of the Cabinet who were absent from their posts in Sep tember, when the great expedition was arranged, THE PRESS. and when only the Duke of Newcastle, Mr. S. Her bert, and Lords Aberdeen and Clarendon were in town, he commented on the unfairness of visiting all their offences on the Duke of Newcastle, who had always acted to the best of his ability. He excused Mr. S. Herbert on the same grounds, and had no fault to find with Sir J. Graham, except that he built too large vessels. For the rest, he would have them all punished, when all had deserved punishment. General PEEL, in moving the previous question, said that the words of the resolution, if they meant anything, meant a condemnation of the expedition to the Crimea, in which he was not prepared to concur. That expedition he defended on several grounds : on the great chance there proved to be of taking Sebastopol by a coup de main; on the necessity of doing something to raise the drooping spirits of the army, and of satisfying public feeling at home, which demanded that a great blow should be struck some where. After admitting this, he declared that he could see no great sagacity in the conduct of the expedition, which he blamed in several points. But, believing that the mistakes of the Government arose from their desire to carry on the war with vigour, he could not be a party to casting censure upon honourable men who had exerted themselves to the utmost of their power in performing the duties of their office. Too much blame had already been cast upon our best public servants, who were deeply pained by the insinuations that had been thrown out against them. He read several statements in vindi cation of the management of the Ordnance by Sir Hew Ross, and added a warm vindication of the memory of Lord Raglan. He concluded by saying that he had never been very sanguine as to the re sults of the Sebastopol Committee, whose labours had ended in casting censure on men most of whom had already left office. Lord R CECIL, in seconding the motion, said that those wbom it was proposed to censure were only chargeable with errors of judgment, and deprecated the principle of introducing historical and retrospec- _ tive motions. Colonel ADAIR was disposed to attribute the checks of our army to the extraordinary defences of Sebastopol, and to our own organisation arranged under less pressing circumstances, rather than to the negligence or mismanagement of the Ministry. He defended in detail the proceedings of the Minis try against the objections of Mr. Roebuck. He warmly approved of the expedition to the Crimea as according to the dictates of a sagacious war policy, and had placed a motion on the paper as a protest against the form in which the motion was met, which was not a direct verdict of acquittal in favour of the Ministry, and regretted that he had not an opportunity of moving it. Mr. CONOLLY said that the question before the house was not whether the policy of the Ministry was right or not., but whether the means of carrying it out were adequate. Believing that those means were totally inadequate, he felt bound to give his vote against them. Mr. LowE appealed to the words of the report of the committee itself, as proof that its investigations were incomplete, and its conclusions unsatisfactory. He asked how the house, in a judicial capacity, could come to a fair judgment upon evidence so partial on the very face of it ? Any conclusion at which they might arrive might be demolished if those absent on the public service could be beard, or examinations made which had been omitted from reasons of State policy. The question before them involved a cen sure, not only on our own Government, but on that of France. Now, could we retain a cordial alliance if we thus passed our opinions upon her conduct, which was so intimately mixed up with our own ? He reprobated the attempt to fix a stigma on every member of the old Administration, and subjected them severally to a political ostracism. He asked how members on that side of the house could thus censure men whom they had been supporting since, or how the other side could pa s such a sentence when the attempted Government of Lord Derby was willing to include some of the most distinguished members of the old Administration ? The Marquis of GRANBY said that if a vote of cen sure was to be passed, it was not on the past or the present Government, but on the house and the coun try, which had reduced our establishments, and treated the chances of future war as a delusion. He shonld vote for the amendment, not wishing to weaken the hands of the Government. Mr. R. J. PHILLIWORE denied that the whole body of the Cabinet could be made responsible for every Ministerial act. Such an attempt was absurd and unconstitutional, and would expose our principles of Government to the ridicule of other countries. He thought that risking a fresh change of Government would jeopardise the best interests of the country. Mr. GORDON said that the manner in which evi dence was taken before the committee would have been tolerated in no court of justice. Nothing could justify such a motion as that of Mr. Roebuck's but the unanimous decision of the committee, while the report of that committee was carried only by the SATURDAY, casting vote of the chairman. To condemn the expedition to Sebastopol was to condemn many others beside the Government at home. He objected to the way in which the motion was met, and thought that a proposition of censure like the present in volved a direct ay or no. He defended the pro ceedings of the late Administration, and could not vote for a censure founded on imperfect evidence, and directed against men who had already expiated what errors they had committed. Sir J. WALSH adverted to the fatality which had pursued every one—whether political, naval, or mili tary—who had been mixed up in the contest. Public opinion was itself, he thought, a great de faulter; and one of the chief faults of men in power was that they followed that opinion, which they ought to have directed. The house itself and tl • public press were accomplices in the errors which had been committed, and were the authors of the present hazards. The house was, at least, as mistaken and misguided as the Government itself. Mr. MAGUIRE commented on the silence of the Government, whom he could not acquit without some asurance that there would not be a repetition of the horrors of last year, and passed a warm eulogium I it the press, from which the Ministry bad derived its most important information, and by whose energy it had been galvanised into action. The motion, he contended, could not be a censure on France, whose manageme; it contrasted so favorably with our own. Sir J. GRAHAM would not admit that the evidence tak*i before the Sebastopol Committee sus tained the resolution before the house. At the same time be thought that the adoption of the motion of the gallant colonel would create some mis understanding out of doors. After the appoint ment of the committee and the expectations that had been formed out of doors it was impossible to give the question the "go-by." He then pro ceeded to comment upon the labours of the committee, which had been conducted, he admitted, with great prudence, but in consequence had been incomplete, and thus justice had not been done. He thought that a decision of "ay or no" should have been proposed, and regretted that no member of the Go vernment had spoken as to the course which it in tended to pursue. Lord SEYMOUR explained the circumstances under which the committee had voted when it adopted its• report, and did not think himself pledged to support the resolution, which, while condemning the conduct of our own Ministry, condemned likewise that of our allies. He would not agree with Sir J. Graham that a direct vote ought to have been taken, seeing that the imperfect evidence pubYished by the com mittee did not warrant any absolute conclusion. IC there was no evidence for acquittal, how could there. be for condemnation ? Sir J. PAKINOTON had, as Sir J. Graham bad done before him, waited for some announcement from• the Government. Failing this, it was his duty to explain the reasons for the course he intended to take. It was with great reluctance that he felt. sous pelled to censure any member of high charaater„ but the country was in a state of peril, the pokrUer mind was uneasy and anxious, and it was isec the time for drawing nice distinctions. The principle of passing a sentence of condemnation on the Minister: was unanimously adopted by the committee, how ever they might differ as to the form. No doubt there were matters on which the committee declined to enter, but he asserted that, as far as it went, its report was complete; it had stated nothing that was. not fully borne out by the evidence. He denied that. the resolution reflected on our allies, or blamed the expedition to the Crimea, in itself ; but, considering: that the expedition had been improperly carried out,. he telt bound to vote for the resolution. The expe rience of the previous night had added to his belief that the Government did not intend to act honestly and fairly by the country. What assurance was. there tbat the same disasters would not occur next. winter ? In what state was the reserve, the Militia,. the Foreign Legion? Sir C. WOOD declared the intention of the Govern ment to vote for the previous question. He argued; that the policy of going to the Crimea was in volved in the resolutions, and professed his full expectation, warranted by the testimony of those who knew best, of ultimate success. Long peace had caused some persons to forget that war must necessarily be accompanied with pain and suffering. Replying to Mr. Roebuck's speech, he said that the hon. member had on former occasions charged Lord Raglan with faults which he now laid upon the Go vernment, and said that it argued a strange notion of the functions of our Administration to blame the absence of its members from affairs with which they had nothing whatever to do. The debate was then adjourned to Thursday, when it was resumed by Mr. GASKELL, who felt bound to vote for the original resolution, believing the errors which had been committed by the Ministry to be worse than errors of judgment. The ATTORNEY-GENERAL entered into a long de fence of Lord Palmerston, against whom, he said, the resolution was specially directed. ii.._