The Sun.
London, England, 1865-11-27 00:00:00

Lord Campbell on Foreign Policy•

LIBERAL MEETING AT HARWICH.

On Thursday evening the annual meeting of the
Harwich Liberal Association was held at the Three
Cups Hotel, Dr. Burt in the chair. The attendance
was both numerous and influential. Lord Camp-
bell, who formerly represented the borough, had
been invited to attend and address the meeting, and
he had accepted the invitation.
Dr. BURT introduced, in some appropriate obser-
vations, the noble visitor.

Lord CAMPBELL, on rising, was received with loud
and reiterated cheering. He said—Dr. Burt and gen-
tlemen, amid the many cares and disadvantages which
belong to a political career, there are few greater
pleasures than that of meeting from time to time a
body of electors. When with that body of electors
one has lately had the intimate relation of a mem-
ber, when that relation has not been put an end to
by any difference of opinion, but has only ceased
under inevitable circumstances involving no breach
of friendship or regard, the pleasure is still greater.
(Cheers.) I lied little hesitation, therefore, in obzy-
ing the summons to attend here with which I had
been honoured. Dr. Burt has alluded to the cir-
cumstances of the recent contest. It would be out
of place for me to touch upon them. But I have
heard with satisfaction that in his judgment they
ought not to damp the spirit of our party. (Cheers.)
Gentlemen, when this association meets, as it has
done to-night, a question must present itself, wider
and more serious than even those which lately oc-
cupied the borough. The question must present it-
self, what ought now to be the aim of the reforming
party in the country ? Ought that party to repose
on the triumphs it has gained, or seek new dangers
and exertions ? And if it is not doomed, if it is not
permitted to stand still, what ought to be the field
of its activity ? It cannot be denied that when great
results have been attained, there is not so much as
there was before to be accomplished. (Cheers.) We
live no longer in the days when slavery existed in
our colonies, when ratepayers had little voice in cor-
porations, when a demoralising poor-law under-
mined the capital and weighed upon the labour of
the country, when foreign corn was driven from our
harbours, when commerce was restricted as regards
the vessels it employed, when children toiled without
protection in our factories. (Cheers.) Whilst re-
flecting on the great objects which had then to be
approached, and the great problems which had then
to be adjusted, reformers may sometimes be tempted
to cast on those days " a lingering, longing look be-
hind ;" to prefer the animation of the struggle to the
honour of the victory ; to think pursuit more en-
viable than attainment, and to despise the charms of
rest, amidst the torment of insatiate activity. Gen-
tlemen, the man would be a happy one who could
point out safe and creditable, and at the same time suf-
ficient objects, to the passion I have pointed to, and
which, unless in some degree exhausted and as-
suaged, must tend, from time to time, to prey upon
the social fabric of the country. (Cheers.) In
addressing his constituents, about a year ago, the
member for King's Lynn enumerated a series of
measures which, in his opinion, might yet be sub-
mitted to the Legislature. What they were I need
not now consider ; but this I would not hesitate to
say, that if, as we have heard, "The man who
makes two blades of grass grow where but one
grew before, is a benefactor to society," still more
gratitude is due in our age, and in our country, to
the person who explains a dozen possible improve-
ments when there appeared to be hardly any method
left for occupying Parliament. (Cheers.) If lam
not mistaken, the member for King's Lynn, amongst
other plans for that great and necessary object,
mentioned the assimilation of the marriage laws in
England, Ireland, and Scotland. It ought perhaps
to be considered as the privilege of our day that
minor topics may be listened to. (Hear, hear.) It
is only when great political anomalies have been
withdrawn from the statute-book that questions-
which regard still more intimately the happiness of
individuals and families are apt to be considered by
the public. Amongst these a high place has justly
been accorded to everything bearing upon the sana-
tory state of our cities. (Cheers.) Lord Palmerston,
whilst at the Home Department, had the good for-
tune
to lay down the principle that in great esta=
blishments smoke ought to be consumed. (Hear,
hear.) The principle has had as yet a partial and
not unsuccessful application. One would like to !,
see it carried out until a thorough change had been
effected in the atmosphere of' cities. When you
reflect on the masses they contain, the benefits of
such a change would be incalculable. (Cheers.)
Daylight is an advantage in itselZ, but it has this
peculiar force besides, that every other benefit ap-
pears to be enhanced by it. Gloom and darkness
are in themselves considerable evils, •but beyond
that, they give an aggravated form and colour to
all the other evils under which humanity may
labour. To pass to another point of possible im-
provement, he could not help believing that some-
thing might be done in connexion with the official
salaries of the subordinate appointments held by
members of the Government in both Houses of Par-
liament, calculated to give merit and ability a mere
sure, a more encouraging career, and to defeat the
jobbery and nepotism by which they were occa-
sionally hindered. (Cheers.) It would not be judi-
cious upon his part to go into all the details of what
had struck him on that question, since he had not
had an opportunity of submitting to the correction
of any other mind. And in a country like ours no
scheme ought ever to be prematurely or incautiously
submitted to a body of electors. (Hear, hear.) The
general idea would be to reward administrative
labour on the one hand, and to encourage Parlia-
mentary exertion on the other. (Cheers.) It seemed
to him that a double obligation fell on public men
in such an epoch as the present ; one to remind the
country- that we had no such field as we used to
have for legislative progress ; the other to rack
their weary and exhausted brain's for such improve-
ments as might still be added to our system.
(Loud cheers.) Eloquent encomiums have been
passed on Lord Palmerston. (Cheers.) But the
most eloquent of all is, perhaps, that which facts are
daily heaping upon him. (Hear, hear.) His loss is
teaching us his value. Where there was tranquillity
and confidence, we now observe a certain restless
expectation. "Where there was contentment and
repose, excitement and distrust appear to have re-
placed them. (Cheers.) We thus have ascertained
the space he filled, because we see the chasm he has
opened. We know the luminary -which has gone,
because we feel the darkness which succeeds to it.
At such a moment it is not uninteresting to glance
at the peculiar difficulties to which the country is ex-
posed, not with a view to any exaggerated sense of
their importance, but in order more clearly to remark
the remedies which they admit, or the securities which
balance them. (Hear.) Every political society has
certain dangers of its own, and difficulties which
beset it. It is enough for us if those which relate
to our country are less serious and grave than those
by which other countries are frequently encom-
passed. (Cheers.) From the exalted place which com-
merce occupies amongst us, the first of these stand-
ing difficulties which. naturally strikes our attention
13 the liability to those monetary panics which
alarmed us in 1847 and 1857, and unhappily on
.many more remote occasions. The mischief they
ixtolve can hardly be imagined, because it threatens
only every class, but every individual in society.
When credit suffers: when permoney is felt to
be no longer convertible, whenpa celebratedbanks are
closed, when great establishmentst ffare ruined,i the
labour market cannot fail
~er,,,,anc no man
feels secure as to the income hesu s. (Loud
cheers). The evils of invasion ap.rue_sien'sseome de4ree
those evils the most salient
produced, becaisse among
is the blow which monetary conficlenrt,
livsatsleaartl.yticetro-
tain to sustain from it. (Cheers.)
these serious calamities tha t the Bank Chalarterylet
of 1811 was
designed by Sir Robert Peel, yiindatieia
car-
ried by the Legislature. (Hear, hear.)
men are still in doubt -as to its policy, and as the
panics of 1847 arfd 1857 took place under its pro-
visions, one cannot say that it has yet fulfilled its
admirable purposes. At the same time, it may have
rendered the Bank of England more cautious than
it used to be. (Cheers.) it may have taught them
by a well considered elevation of the rate of interest
on certain given symptoms to prevent that rapid
efflux of the precious metals from the country, which
must occasionally tend to non-convertibility.
(Cheers.) The principle appears to be indisputable,
because all the facts unite in its support ; that a
high rate of interest compels gold to find its way into
the country where such a rate of interest is known