LORD NORTH
Obtaining his seat in the House of Commons he was,
in 1759, appointed a commissioner of the treasury, but resigned in 1765, when he joined the opposition to the Rockingham
ministry. He came into office again with the Grafton ministry, 1766; in 1767 became chancellor of the exchequer;
and in 1770 succeeded the Duke of Grafton as minister. Lord North was never a Prime Minister in the modem sense
of the words :
Eighteenth-century politicians, acting together in
small groups, were averse from such a sole or superintending minister. In Lord North's day, the term "Prime
Minister" was still one of abuse, its bearer exposed to suspicion and attack. A Prime Minister could only
take the place of the King as chief of the executive after the development of organized, disciplined parties. Lord
North's daughter recalled in 1839 that he would never allow his family to call him Prime 'Minister, because there
was no such thing in the British Constitution: he himself told Fox in 1779 that he should be considered in two
lights, as head of a very important department (First Lord of the Treasury, 1770 -1782), "where I acknowledge
I am solely answerable for whatever is transacted," and as working in concert with others in His Majesty's
confidential councils. In fact, Lord North held the principal post in the ministry chosen by the King. He acted
as his deputy in Parliament, defending royal policy, and since he was in charge of the cementing alliance of patronage,
he dealt with home affairs as understood in the eighteenth century: revenue, and the making and managing of Parliament,
in the constituencies and at Westminster.
Frederick North,
Lord, Earl of Guildford,
the eldest son of Francis, second earl of Guildford, born in 1732, died 1792.
It was his duty to secure support of that body
to ensure that the King's government was carried on.
Lord North belongs in English history as the chief administration during the American war of Independence, his retention of the tea-duty, imposed upon the American colonists, led to the rising in American, and to the declaration of independence, 4th July 1776.
The eighteenth-century system of government in Great
Britain was ill-muted for the conduct of. war. Many new political ideas and practices tentatively originated, only
to disappear when the situation returned to normal. Even when ministers had agreed upon measures, the ordinary
routine of administration encumbered action; there was little coordination between departments, no effective supervision
of detailed preparations. As each department of government was considered to be separate and self-contained, the
minister in charge being individually answerable to the King. the execution of a vigorous policy was rendered extremely
difficult. The successful outcome of plans depended upon an efficiency of organization, a degree of co-operation
between departments, which did not yet exist. "War can't be carried on in departments," wrote John Robinson,
Secretary to the Treasury, on 18th August 1777, "there must be consultation, union, and a friendly and hearty
concurrence in all the several parts which set the springs at work, and give efficiency and energy to the movements
without which the machine must fail." Lord Sandwich, First Lord of the Admiralty, expressed in September 1779
the need for Lord North to "take the lead at our councils, and act with the spirit that becomes the principal
person who has the honour of Your Majesty's confidence as a minister."
For this role, Lord North had neither aptitude nor liking. William Knox wrote of him, "in his chamber and
at the Cabinet, inattentive, indifferent, and considering every proposition of a public nature as wholly irrelative
to him. He was so far from leading the opinions of the other ministers that he seldom gave his own and generally
slept the greatest part of the time he was with them." North was aware of his shortcomings. "I am not
equal in abilities to the station which I ought to hold, as the place next the director of public affairs at this
time," he informed George
III in November 1779. Throughout
1778, he pressed on the King the need for "one directing minister," impossible so long as the King still
remained an active figure in politics. On 6th May, North insisted that "Your Majesty's service requires a
man of great abilities, and who is confident of his abilities, who can chuse decisively, and carry his determinations
authoritatively into execution. .
. there should be one capable of
forming wise plans, and of combining and connecting the whole force and operations of government." Only so
could this country "act uniformly and with force." On 10th November, he formulated the two points he
believed most important for government. First, "in critical times, it is necessary that there should be one
directing minister, who should plan the whole of the operations of government, and control all the other departments
of administration so far as to make them co-operate zealously and actively with his designs even tho contrary to
their own." Next - a reason for the ill-success of his administration which has been insufficiently recognized
"the public business can never go on as it ought, while the principal and most efficient offices are in the
hands of persons who are either indifferent to, or actually dislike, their situation."
This dislike of having charge of public affairs
in "this very alarming crisis," as North described it in March 1778, lies behind the premature appearance
of collective responsibility in the Cabinet. As well as individual responsibility to the King for the running of
their departments, ministers were also legally responsible to the courts, especially to the House of Lords, since
impeachment had not yet rusted into disuse. Impeachment was a constant fear of North. In November 1779, he suspected
that " the distress of the times" had made his colleagues "wish to separate themselves from me and
to lay the fault upon me" ; after Yorktown, he defended his support of the American War, "should I hereafter,
as I am menaced, mount the scaffold in consequence of the part that I have performed"; the Rockingham administration
which succeeded his in 1782 discussed the possibility of publicly trying hint. Indeed, this fear was the main motive
of his "unnatural alliance" with Fox in 1783. Impeachment of a Cabinet in the mass was dearly more difficult
and impracticable than that of selected individuals. In private, Lord North's Cabinet was unanimous in one thing,
dislike of each other - " totally disjointed," wrote Robinson in 1779, "hating I may say, but I
am sure not loving, each other, never acting with union even when they meet, looking forward with anxiety to the
moment of their parting." In public, in that same year, North told the House of Commons that a vote of censure
against one member of the Cabinet involved the whole. This was not a sincere declaration of constitutional principle,
but a convenient umbrella.
Many of the difficulties of his administration were due to the weakness of Lord North; he was, said Robinson in
1779, "the original cause of the bad situation of everything." He was wanting in that force of personality
which, as the elder Pin's career in the Seven Years' War showed, could produce effective results from an unsuitable
system. An acceptable minister in time of peace, North's misfortune was to hold office in tine of war, Constitutionally
incapable of taking decisions, he lacked the essential asset of a man in his position. Nor did he possess the resolution
to effect his primary duty, to ensure that the King's business was carried on. It was the threat of a breakdown
in government that explains the co-operation between George III. and such men as Robinson and Jenkinson, which
has needlessly distracted most writers on this period from the real issues. The King and the administrative group
were the two permanent elements in eighteenth-century government, essentially concerned in the maintenance of administration,
"fact and business." Hence their joint interest in finding a solution for the vexing problems facing
North, who would not grapple with them -" in a disposition to wait events," as Stormont recorded in December
1781. Their efforts were directed at bringing him to a decision - he had to be worked up to act decisively, the
hardest of Robinson's many duties, who had to press upon him the execution of policies initially his own. "It
is impossible your ideas can be followed," the King wrote to North on 2nd June 1778, "whilst you have
not yourself decided the path you mean to take; the moment you will decide the love and esteem most of the House
have for you will appear conspicuously, as a little attention on your part will restore due order." But attention
was precisely what North too often failed to give ; as Robinson put it, he had not spirits to set to anything,
though his judgment was still good, "when you can fix his attention, but that is most difficult to do."
The King commented in August 1779 of his frequent changes of opinion which stopped all business, particularly the
choice of new Secretaries of State; Lord Chancellor Thurlow was even more blunt in January 1780: "Nothing
can goad him forward, he is the very dog that loads everything." In August, Thurlow was anxious that North
should determine what plan was to be pursued in the East Indies. "That once done .. . the difficulty of then
finding proper measures to effect it does not seem to him difficult. . . he is willing to give his assistance when
that first necessary step has been decided by Lord North." Henry Dundas, main support of North in the House
of Commons, told Robinson in November 1780 that "more than six weeks ago, it was intimated to me that I was
to hear from Lord North immediately upon many points
... although my curiosity was excited
by that intimation, I was not very much disappointed when I did not receive it." Samuel Romilly described
a speech of his in June 1782, when he was out of office, "very usual with him, uncertain, undecided; wishing,
but not daring to join in opposition; saying that he should vote against the motion, but exhausting his invention
to find arguments in its support." At Buxton that year, Loughborough found him" just as undecided in
a party of pleasure as . . .in any other party" none of the outings proposed for one day took place because
of the tine wasted choosing between them. In the formation of a new ministry between February and April 1783, Richard
Fitzpatrick thought North "amazingly indecisive ; the difficulty is to secure Lord North whose weakness of
character and indecision has been even more conspicuous than ever."
North failed to understand the importance of personal relationships - a quality essential in the eighteenth century for one holding an office in which "a thousand little arts of trafficking" in the distribution of places, pensions, contracts, and sinecures were everyday necessities. "One of his great errors," wrote Jenkinson, " is that he thinks that interest alone without any seasoning is the only motive on which men act." "Little acts of civility," chided the King in 1779, "sometimes create more goodwill than any other thing, that is what I would wish him to shew." Anthony Storer told Lord Carlisle in June 1781 that there was "something so extraordinary in Lord North's manner of conferring what are generally called favours that his excessive awkwardness ought rather to amuse one than to make one angry."
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George Selwyn recorded his supineness, insensibility,
and natural arrogance, "no tact in point of breeding," which made him lay all this business on Robinson,
to whom he showed very little gratitude. There was also in him, to use Eden's description, "a mixture of reserves
and jealousies." North was more influenced by importunity than by service: as Robinson put it, "Lord
North from wanting to get out of the evil of the day but too often fills into what may prove ruin in futurity."
In January 1782, Jenkinson thought "natural good humour" inclined North to settle disputes amicably;
he would put up with almost anything to avoid unpleasantness. George III noted this in his attitude towards his colleagues in 1779, "principally in view to please them," rather than to exert himself, and court unpopularity. This, North confirmed in his reply. "They have always known all that I know, unless I was forbid to communicate anything to them, which has been very seldom. I have never interfered in any of their departments. I have never clash'd with their views - but have promoted their interest as much as lay in my power on every occasion. I have always made common cause with them - I have always defended them when attack'd, though they have not always had the same attention to me - I have really endeavour'd to the best of my knowledge to gratify them in everything. |
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Lord North's - Tax on Soap |
North was neither their leader nor a Tory. He had been Chancellor of the Exchequer under Grafton, 1767-1770, and was in the fullest sense an eighteenth-century Whig, an active politician; most of his colleagues in a miscalled "Tory" administration - Halifax (his uncle), Sandwich, Dartmouth, Weymouth, Rochford, Gower, Hillsborough - had all served in the previous decade under "respectable" leaders. Nor can an administration which included amongst its measures the Quebec Act ('774) be contemptuously and summarily dismissed as "reactionary." Whatever the motives which lay behind it, the Quebec Act, bitterly criticized by groups in opposition, marked a liberal advance in the treatment of a country conquered but a decade earlier, an almost unique example of generosity. Compared with the Rockingham Declaratory Act, described by Lord Mansfield in 1775 as the compound of all American grievances, the Quebec Act was a model of enlightenment. It, set a pattern for the government of alien peoples upon which the Crown Colony system was modeled in the next century; it is as important in the history of the dependent Empire as the Durham Report for the self-governing Dominions. Lord North did not unwillingly carry out an American policy with whose aims he disagreed. He believed it unfortunate but not unjust he maintained to the end that the American War was founded on right and dictated by necessity, the maintenance of Parliamentary supremacy over the colonies, "that due obedience and respect to the laws of this country and the security of the trade of its people." This policy, despite the Whig historians, found favour with the majority of the politically conscious in Great Britain. It was the method of achieving the aim which increasingly alarmed North. His correspondence with Eden and Jenkinson shows that he never favoured a policy involving military subjugation of the colonies ; it was the financial and trading aspect which worried him. On 25th March 1778, he told the King "the condition of this country as to its faculties is deplorable ; it is totally unequal to a war with Spain, France, and America, and will be overmatch'd .... Great Britain will suffer more in the war than her enemies." He does not mean, by defeats, but by an enormous expense, which will ruin her, and will not in any degree be repaid by the most brilliant victories. " Great Britain will undo herself while she thinks of punishing France." He believed the bad situation of affairs would be attributed with much appearance of reason to obstinate perseverance in war, and pleaded for accommodation, reserving a dependence upon Great Britain - as in the 1778 Conciliatory Mission. In December 1781, he stated to the two Secretaries of State, Hillsborough and Stormont, that the reserves of this country were nearly exhausted; such sovereignty as could then be retained was of little importance. Nevertheless," he did not intimate the least intention of agreeing to give up the sovereignty." By January 1782, peace seemed to him necessary for economic reasons, even if it could be obtained on no better terms than some Federal Alliance, or perhaps even in a less eligible mode.
Before becoming Chancellor of the Exchequer, North
had served as a Junior Lord of the Treasury (from 1759), and as Joint Paymaster-General (1766). He was a financial
expert, at home in the core of eighteenth-century government business. His brother described his skill in finance
as being in high repute in the City in 1772 ; Wraxall thought his Budget speeches in 1781-2 "peculiarly lucid,
clear, and able." Even those of his colleagues who deplored his indecision were aware of the burden upon him
in this field, increased by the expensive war, and by his own carelessness about papers - by what Hillsborough
termed his "flimsy way" of doing business. North described himself to Jenkinson in 1764 as "the
worst correspondent in England"; Thurlow suggested in September 1780 that he should appoint a secretary to
himself as Chancellor of the Exchequer whose sole duty it should be to answer the letters he received. Eden deplored
his pre-occupation with too much business of little detail, which prevented him finding time for great superintending
duties. In May 1780, Jenkinson acknowledged that his labours were immense, such as few constitutions could bear;
by March 1782, " much is to be forgiven in consideration of the load that at present oppresses him."
In December 1772, North himself confessed to Samuel Martin that a day spent in discussion in the country was worth
fifty visits in Downing Street, where a dozen impatient gentlemen would be waiting in the antechamber, and he was
liable to interruption at every moment. Here is how North described his work to George III in March 1778 "to
perform the duties of the Treasury, to attend the House of Commons at the rate of three long days a week, to see
the numbers of people who have daily business with the first lord of the Treasury, and to give all thought to the
principal measures of government .
. . is enough to employ the greatest
man of business, and the most consummate statesman that ever existed, and is infinitely more than Lord North can
undertake, so that if this load of important duties is any longer entrusted to him, national disgrace and ruin
will be the consequence." But Jenkinson, who observed North at close quarters, believed his often expressed
desire to resign insincere. In November 1779, he reported to the King this was "nothing permanent," but
" a disease of the mind which goes and comes; and which as long as it lasts is very unpleasant to those who
have anything to do with him." North had told Robinson he could not go on, but when pressed to form a decision
and adhere to it, he always declined. Jenkinson considered he intended to go on, but in his own way, wishing it
to be generally understood it was not with his own consent - a further defence against impeachment. On 14th April
1780, Jenkinson commented "he is too fond of having it believed that he continues in office contrary to his
inclination;" on 22nd January 1782, "at this season of the year, Lord North has always one of these sort
of fits, which are really like the paroxisms of a disease, and ought as such to be treated." Lord North, like
George III and Chatham, was a pathological case. Like many, he loved power, despite his protestations he told his
father after his resignation that he wished to appear with as much dignity and importance as possible - a further
reason for joining Fox in 1783.
As he told his father in August 1777, "almost worn out with continual fretting," with "vexations
enough in my office to make me melancholy amidst all the honours I receive." Having assumed his duties in
January 1770, to prevent "the whole frame of administration from falling to pieces in a moment of trouble
and danger," as he later described it, the only peer then in the King's service whom George III. could consent
to place in the Duke of Grafton's employment, North could not in honour decline taking a part "in a thousand
affairs wherein one would choose to be quiet."
Lord North resigned on the 20th of March, 1782, after the dismissal of the Portland administration in December 1783, in which he had been Home Secretary he never held office again - a coalition which was too much even for a century accustomed to loose political groupings.
Increasingly troubled by defective vision, North became blind in 1788. In 1789, he made his last appearance in the House of Commons. He became Earl of Guildford by the death of his father in 1790, and died on 5th August 1792 As Burke said, he wanted something of the vigilance and spirit of command that his times required or, as Grafton judged, "his abilities, though great, did not mark him as a character suited to the management and direction of great military operations. His Lordship was formed for the enjoyment of domestic comforts and to shine in the most elegant societies ; his knowledge, however, was very extensive, as was his wit, but he became confined when he was agitated by the great scenes of active life."
