Politicians From England

"The point is, these [oil spill] accidents will happen. As we scientists say, shit happens."

"I have begun drafting a memorandum for the prosecuting authorities, together with all evidence necessary to establish not only the existence of numerous specific instances of scientific or economic fraud in relation to the official "global warming" storyline but also the connections between these instances, and the overall scheme of deception that the individual artifices appear calculated to reinforce."

"I would want to make absolutely sure that he [President Obama] was born here before allowing him to be elected. And the birth certificate that he put up on that website, I don't know where he was born. But I do know that birth certificate isn't genuine."

"After his defeat in 1846 he made a bold attempt to prove that he had been a consistent Free Trader since 1841. And it is not surprising that this attempt to throw the responsibility of defection upon his Cabinet should have failed. If ever a statesman were pledged to a policy, Peel was pledged to the protection of the agricultural interest. "I believe that the abolition of the Corn Laws," said Peel in 1844, "would produce great confusion and distress"; and again, "I can say with truth I have not contemplated and do not contemplate an alteration in the present Corn Laws." Politicians have short memories; and not merely did Peel contemplate in 1845 the change that he had never contemplated in 1844, but in 1848, after the episode was closed, he asserted in a certain letter that the measures taken by his Cabinet in 1842 were preparatory to and intended to lead up to the Repeal of the Corn Laws."

"He says no other Minister but Sir Robert Peel could have carried the repeal of the Corn Laws; that half the commercial men in the City would have been against it, had it been attempted by Lord John or anyone else; but their confidence in Sir Robert Peel's knowledge and sagacity is such that they say—‘Upon a question where so much is said on both sides, upon which our own minds are not made up, we feel that the safest course is to trust to him who has proved himself the greatest financier of the day’."

"Your Lordships must all feel the high and honourable character of the late Sir Robert Peel. I was long connected with him in public life. We were both in the councils of our Sovereign together, and I had long the honour to enjoy his private friendship. In all the course of my acquaintance with Sir Robert Peel, I never knew a man in whose truth and justice I had a more lively confidence, or in whom I saw a more invariable desire to promote the public service. In the whole course of my communication with him I never knew an instance in which he did not show the strongest attachment to truth; and I never saw in the whole course of my life the smallest reason for suspecting that he stated anything which he did not firmly believe to be the fact."

"Sir Robert was long an energetic and consistent enemy to Catholic Emancipation. He resisted the arguments of colleagues and opponents alike. Not even the persuasive eloquence of Canning availed to move him. Nor had he formed his judgment hastily and without experience. He had been Chief Secretary in Ireland; he was familiar with the facts and prejudices of either side. And then, having remained upright for some seventeen years, he threw a political somersault, turned his head in the air, and landed on his feet a staunch supporter of the Catholic claims. What argument and reason could not achieve, was achieved in a moment by Canning's death and the Clare Election. For Peel, being first minister of the Crown, might now claim the glory of all his actions, and O'Connell's majority spoke with an eloquence denied to Canning. But the minister cannot be extricated from both horns of the dilemma. Either his sincerity or his prudence was at fault. It was he who had changed, not the situation; and, leaving out of the question the justice of the case, his party had a perfect right to resent what seemed a betrayal."

"Peel is, in fact, the embodied reflex of the public mind of England."

"Peel's speech is, to me, the most affecting public event which I ever remember: no return of Cicero from exile, no triumphal procession up to the temple of Capitoline Jove, no Appius Claudius in the Roman Senate, no Chatham dying in the House of Lords, could have been a truly grander sight than that great Minister retiring from office, giving to the whole world free trade with one hand, and universal peace with the other, and casting under foot the miserable factions which had dethroned him."

"For a quarter of a century, at least, he was without question the first public servant of England; not the first in position only, but in knowledge of the public business, and in capacity for transacting it throughout all its departments; the man to whom all good public servants looked up as their model and their worthy chief. He must be credited with all the industry, the self-control, the patience, the judgment which such a part required. His integrity was as great as his other qualities; no jobbery, no connivance at abuses stains his name. Setting party questions aside, he was the man who would have been chosen as the chief ruler of England by the almost unanimous voice of the English people, and a heavy price was paid for party when he was excluded from the administration during ten of the best years of his life, and banished from power at the moment when the national confidence in him was at its height."

"[W]hat was Peel really notable for? It was surely the perfection of what may be called “concessionary” Conservatism. This is the concept that the highest virtue in politics is to resist change until change becomes inevitable, and then to concede to it with as little fuss and as much obeisance to tradition as possible... Peel assumed, as most Conservative politicians until Mrs Thatcher generally have, that his political opponents represented the future. Their excesses must be resisted, but most of their causes in the end would prevail and the business of the Conservative Party was to make the transition as smooth as possible."

"[F]or God's sake, be sure, if the King is driven to the wall, of Peel. An appeal to him and his countrymen could not be disregarded. Unless you have Peel, the House of Commons cannot be managed."

"[T]he people at large did care and enthusiastically care for the Conservative statesman who had sacrificed power to give the millions cheap bread; and there was scarcely a schoolboy who had not got by heart Sir Robert Peel's pathetic expression of his hopes that his name might live in the homes of those whose lot it was to labour, when at the end of their day's toil they recruited their exhausted strength by “abundant and untaxed food, no longer leavened by a sense of injustice.”"

"Whether he was a model of statesmanship may be doubted. Models of statesmanship are rare, if by a model of statesmanship is meant a great administrator and party leader, a great political philosopher and a great independent orator, all in one. But if the question is whether he was a ruler loved and trusted by the English people there is no arguing against the tears of a nation."

"[T]he right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government is a man of considerable capabilities as a legislator: he possesses great talents for debate, for the management of this House, and for the transaction of official business. He has great knowledge, and I doubt not is actuated by a sincere desire to promote the interests of the country; but it is impossible for me with truth to deny that there is too much ground for the reproaches of those who having, in spite of bitter experience, a second time trusted him and raised him to power, have found themselves a second time deluded. It is impossible for me not to say that it has been too much the habit of the right hon. Baronet to make use of, when in opposition (as he has done in reference to the present question), passions with which he has not the slightest sympathy, and prejudices which he regards with profound contempt. As soon as he reaches power, a change—a salutary change for the country—takes place. The instruments are flung aside—the ladder by which he climbed is kicked down. This is not a solitary instance, and I am forced to say that this sort of conduct is pursued by the right hon. Baronet on something like a system."

"Lord Robert Cecil while at Oxford occasionally joined in the debates of the Union Society, taking the strong Tory side, and speaking sometimes with a young man's vehemence. I recollect his declaiming that Sir Robert Peel, for breaking up the Conservative party, should be left to lie in the grave of infamy which his tergiversation had dug."

"I never in my time saw a minister who possessed more absolute power in the House of Commons than Peel. His influence and power are most extraordinary. In the House he is everything—but there his power ceases. If he was the same in Council, and in all his intercourse with mankind, he would exceed anything this country, or perhaps any other, ever saw, but I fear he is not equal to the situation he fills, and to the times in which he lives. By his power in the House of Commons alone does he keep his party together. Out of the House his conduct is well calculated to destroy it. Cold and uncourteous to every one—even to his colleagues in office, who appear to me to be afraid to differ from him—at times in manner he is almost insolent. It will be found when he dies that no minister ever possessed fewer friends, or would be personally less lamented. In his policy he is deficient in vigour and in courage. He rather looks too much to popularity, and if any great emergency were to arise ... I feel that Peel would be found wanting."

"The Whig opposition in the house appears spiritless and several of the Radicals, Roebuck, Raikes, Curry etc., laud Peel to the skies and contrast his vigour and liberality with the feebleness and irresolution of the late Ministry."

"For concocting, producing, explaining, and defending measures he had no equal, or anything like an equal. There was nothing simile aut secundum. When a thing was to be done, he did it better than anybody."

"I appeal to the contemptible speech made lately by Sir Robert Peel to an applauding House of Commons. "Orders of merit," said he, "were the proper rewards of the military" (the desolators of the world in all ages). "Men of science are better left to the applause of their own hearts." Most learned legislator! Most liberal cotton-spinner! Was your title the proper reward of military prowess? Pity, you hold not the dungeon-keys of an English Inquisition! Perhaps Science, like Creeds, would flourish best under a little persecution."

"What struck me above all in the conversation of Sir Robert Peel was his constant and passionate preoccupation with the state of the working classes in England."

"The Protection Parliament has voted and passed, by a great majority, the total repeal of the Corn-laws! No living soul could have done this but Peel, and I am not surprised at the increasing rage of the Protectionists. They appear more angry than ever."

"Peel brought forward his financial plans in a speech of three hours and forty minutes, acknowledged by everybody to have been a masterpiece of financial statement. The success was complete; he took the House by storm; and his opponents, though of course differing and objecting on particular points, did him ample justice... It is really remarkable to see the attitude Peel has taken in this Parliament, his complete mastery over both his friends and his foes. His own party, nolentes aut volentes, have surrendered at discretion, and he has got them as well disciplined and as obedient as the crew of a man-of-war. This just measure, so lofty in conception, right in direction, and able in execution, places him at once on a pinnacle of power, and establishes his Government on such a foundation as accident alone can shake. Political predictions are always rash, but certainly there is every probability of Peel's being Minister for as many years as his health and vigour may endure. Only a few weeks ago I heard from my Whig friends of nothing but his weakness and embarrassments, and of all the difficulties his own supporters would cause him, what a poor figure he cut, &c.; but now they have not a word to say, and one of them who had been loudest in that strain brought to the Travellers’, where I was dining, an account of Peel's speech, and said, ‘One felt, all the time he was speaking, “Thank God, Peel is Minister!”’ There can be no doubt that he is now a very great man, and it depends on himself to establish a lasting reputation."

"The great virtue of Peel was that he had such an enormous conscience. Conscience, they say, is a very expensive thing to keep. Peel certainly kept one."

"Taken all round, Peel was the greatest man I ever knew."

"Sir Robert Peel, perhaps the greatest peacetime prime minister in British history... Probably no one man has ever possessed such a comprehensive and detailed grasp of the whole machinery of government... As he saw it, the problem facing the ruling class, during a period when Britain was undergoing a revolution in population and in rising expectations, was how to preserve a fundamentally sound system from violent overthrow by making it more acceptable and efficient. In his view acceptability and efficiency were inseparable. To work, Conservatism thus demanded well-judged and carefully timed but none the less fundamental reforms. The entire operations of government had to be improved and so popularized by applying sensible commercial principles. That is the pragmatic and, if you like, materialistic approach which Mrs Thatcher so clearly shares."

"I believe it to be impossible that anything can prevent Peel's speedy return to office; he has raised his reputation to such a height during this session, he has established such a conviction of his great capacity and of his liberal, enlarged, and at the same time safe views and opinions, that even the Radicals, such as Hume, join in the general chorus of admiration which is raised to his merits; he stands so proudly eminent, and there is such a general lack of talent, that he must be recalled by the voice of the nation and by the universal admission that he is indispensable to the country."

"The Right Honourable gentleman caught the Whigs bathing and walked away with their clothes."

"Sir Robert had studied the change which has been progressively taking place in the public mind and, from very close observation, I am thoroughly convinced that one of his greatest objects was, if possible, to encourage a kind and sympathetic feeling between the different classes and ranks in society, so that each might have adapted itself to a change which is inevitable. This belief is so firmly fixed in my mind, that I have always regarded it as the key by which much of his conduct that has exposed him to obloquy, was to be explained."

"Peel was decidedly for a property tax. He wished to reach such men as Baring, his father, Rothschild, and others, as well as absentees and Ireland. He thought too it was expedient to reconcile the lower with the higher classes, and to diminish the burthen of taxation on the poor man."

"His smile was like the silver plate on a coffin."

"There were two things especially conspicuous about him. One was his over-mastering sense of public duty; this never deserted him. The other thing was his sense of measure. He had generally an exact sense of the proportion between one Bill, and the general policy of the Government; also of the proportion between the different parts of the same Bill; and of the relation in which the leaders of his party stood to their followers."

"His very name seems a synonym for all that is safe, judicious, business-like, sound, and practical. In spite of the two great schisms of 1829 and 1846, we cannot help looking back upon him as a man whom any party would have been wise to follow. We cannot help it. Nor can I doubt that if he had been spared, his old followers would again have fallen under the spell, and again have mustered under his banner."

"I decidedly liked Peel; and could not but hope some real good might yet lie in him for the country... Incomparably better furnished both with talent and disposition than any other we have at present."

"The statesman who more than any other had the instinct of the necessity of the moment"

"Peel was the most admirable and high-principled of contemporary politicians."

"Peel himself is a much better man than any we can oppose to him. He really is exceedingly dexterous and handy, as well as eloquent and powerful."

"My belief is, that a wiser decision than that to which you came—to subject property to direct taxation within certain limits—to remove the prohibition upon foreign cattle—to permit swine and sheep to be imported—to reduce the duty on corn, on sugar, on lard, on butter, and on cheese—you never made. My belief is that you have been amply repaid for any loss you may have sustained by that reduction; that you have gained the confidence and goodwill of the labouring classes in this country, by parting with that which was thought to be directly for the benefit of the landed interest. It was that confidence in the generosity and justice of Parliament which in no small degree enabled you to pass triumphantly through that storm which convulsed other nations during the year 1848."

"What is this diplomacy? It is a costly engine for maintaining peace. It is a remarkable instrument used by civilised nations for the purpose of preventing war. Unless it be used for that purpose, unless it be used to appease the angry passions of individual men, and check the feelings which arise out of national resentment, unless it be used for that purpose, it is an instrument not only costly but mischievous. If then your application of diplomacy be to fester every wound, to provoke instead of soothing resentments, to place a minister in every court of Europe for the purpose, not of preventing quarrels, or of adjusting quarrels, but for the purpose of continuing an angry correspondence in this place, or of promoting what is supposed to be an English interest by keeping up conflicts with the representatives of other powers, then I say that not only is the expenditure upon this costly instrument thrown away, but this great engine, used by civilised society for the purpose of maintaining peace, is perverted into a cause of hostility and war."

"[T]here is always so much wisdom and prudence in the view he takes of great and difficult affairs, that his opinion cannot but be valuable."

"Now, the whole interest centres in yourself. You represent the IDEA of the age, and it has no other representative amongst statesmen."

"I believe as firmly as any of those who dissent from me with respect to the mode in which the object is to be attained, that it is a vital question for the country—that unless our domestic industry be encouraged, we cannot expect peace, contentment, or prosperity. ... It is a question which affects the happiness of the people, which affects their social progress, their progress in morals, in the enjoyment of life, in refinement of taste and civilisation of manners—it concerns these things at least as much as it concerns the accumulation of wealth."

"I boldly maintain that the principle of protection to domestic industry, meaning thereby legislative encouragement for purpose of protection—duties on import imposed for that purpose, and not for revenue, is a vicious principle. I contest the hon. Gentleman's assumption, that you cannot fight hostile tariffs by free imports. I so totally dissent from that assumption, that I maintain that the best way to compete with hostile tariffs is to encourage free imports. So far from thinking the principle of protection a salutary principle, I maintain that the more widely you extend it, the greater the injury you will inflict on the national wealth, and the more you will cripple the national industry."

"The principles which should govern the commercial intercourse of nations, do not differ from those which regulate the dealings of private individuals."

"It was impossible to reconcile the repeal of the Corn Laws by me with the keeping together of the Conservative party, and I had no hesitation in sacrificing the subordinate object, and with it my own political interests."

"Practical reforms are the order of the day, and you are by common consent the practical reformer. The Condition of England Question—there is your mission!"

"...if wheat were at this moment subject to a duty of twenty shillings the quarter, and if Indian corn were virtually excluded, next winter would not pass without a convulsion endangering the whole frame of society, without the humiliation of constituted authorities forced to yield after a disgraceful struggle...if their [the Protectionists'] advice had been taken, we should have had famine prices for many articles, and a state of exasperated public feeling and just agitation, which it would require wiser heads than theirs to allay. So far from regretting the expulsion from office, I rejoice in it as the greatest relief from an intolerable burden. To have your own way, and to be for five years the Minister of this country in the House of Commons, is quite enough for any man's strength. He is entitled to his discharge, from length of service. But to have to incur the deepest responsibility, to bear the heaviest toil, to reconcile colleagues with conflicting opinions to a common course of action, to keep together in harmony the Sovereign, the Lords and the Commons; to have to do these things, and to be at the same time the tool of a party—that is to say, to adopt the opinions of men who have not access to your knowledge, and could not profit by it if they had, who spend their time in eating and drinking, and hunting, shooting, gambling, horse-racing, and so forth—would be an odious servitude, to which I will never submit. I determine to keep aloof from party combinations."

"[Famine-stricken districts in Ireland] would require some better consolation than the doctrine of Adam Smith on the true Principles of demand and supply and the danger of Government interference."

"Each town and each country will command the amount of currency which it requires for its own purposes, undisturbed in the slightest degree by consulting its manifest interest, namely, by purchasing that which it wants in the cheapest market. [Derisive cheers.] Yes, by purchasing that which it wants in the cheapest market. You consider this a very low and unworthy principle; that it is a doctrine of the Manchester school; that it is a novel doctrine of some speculative political philosophers, and that it may be safely rejected. But this doctrine of purchasing in the cheapest market is not a doctrine of speculative philosophers only. It is not a doctrine introduced by modern economists. It is, no doubt, a doctrine sanctioned expressly and directly by the authority of Adam Smith. It is the doctrine of Say and of Hume. It is opposed to a doctrine which was fashioned some eighty or ninety years since, of which such writers as Montesquieu and Voltaire were the patrons; but Smith, and Say, and Hume, demonstrated the true principles which ought to regulate the commercial policy of a nation."

"Do you not admit to me that in the social condition of the millions in the manufacturing districts, who earn their subsistence by the sweat of their brow, the price of wheat is of the first importance, and has become an object of the deepest interest? Have you read the Reports on the Health of Towns? Are you not deeply convinced that some effort ought to be made to improve the social condition of the masses of the population, who earn their subsistence in the manufacturing towns? It seems to me that the first foundation of any such improvement is, that there should be abundance of food. You may talk of improving the habits of the working classes, introducing education amongst them, purifying their dwellings, improving their cottages; but believe me the first step towards improvement of their social condition is an abundance of food. That lies at the bottom of all. It is in vain, if the people are suffering under scarcity, or if any apprehension of scarcity prevails; the suffering, or the apprehension of it, so depresses the spirits, that it is vain for you to inculcate lessons of cleanliness, or to improve dwellings, until the people are provided with abundance of food."