by Edmund Burke
I do not know whether the slaughters that have been made and suffered in many parts of America; and the burthens which have been imposed, or are in a course of being imposed at home, are sufficient to satisfy us. I remember it was the language of last year, in excuse for not offering terms to North America, that we could not make peace with dignity until we had given our colonies some heavy blow. Is not this blow of New-York heavy enough for our dignity? We have already sacrificed many millions of our own treasure, a good many lives of the insular English, and at one stroke about 3000 of the Continental English to that fierce Court-God, Dignity. Is the season not yet arrived when we are to give some attention to that humble, houshold God, Self-Interest?
But we are,
“at all events, to prepare for another campaign.”
We do not quite forget, that when 50,000 regular troops, and an hundred ships of force, and such an artillery as never was employed in any foreign war, were sent last year to America, all this vast power and expence was said to be employed in order to prevent hostilities from being drawn out into length, and to finish the war in another campaign. But that second another is, we see, to produce a third another; and thus, as our poet says,
“To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow
“Creeps on his petty pace from day to day,
“To the last syllable of recorded time,
“And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
“The way to dusty death.”
And thus shall we war on, till after irreparable injuries done and received, we shall, from mere weariness and fatigue, fall back to the miserable, vexatious, and precarious state of peace without reconciliation.
I will suppose America laid at Lord North’s feet, and reduced to Lord George Germaine’s
“unconditioned submission,”
yet without the formal establishment of liberty to satisfy and content, or the formal establishment of slavery in its instrument a mercenary army, to awe and terrify, do you seriously, my countrymen, Whigs or Tories, as you may be, do you seriously expect a continuance of obedience?
There has been a great victory at Long Island. Many English were butchered by the Hessians after they had laid down their arms. This, it seems, was proper, and was justified by the law of arms, and shews that a rabble of freemen are not to trifle with Hessian spirit and resentment. Col. Balfour has brought an account of the taking of the uninhabited walls of New York, which were snatched, half burnt, from the fire. Has he brought any account of any thing like a movement towards a general submission in all the Colonies? or even in any one of them? Very far from it. The Hessians must, justifiably, slaughter more men in cold blood; your people must abandon, and in despair burn more of their towns; there must be more mutual rapine of the property of English on English: Thus we must go on — For what? To establish a standing army in America for our ruin, in order to furnish Commissions to the younger Adelphi of antient decayed Northern Families. It can be for nothing else; for I do not believe that any one man living has the folly to imagine that all the taxes to be drawn from America for a century together, will even pay for the repair of New York, so as to fit it, for its only purpose, a barrack for General Heister’s and General Howe’s army.
The case in short is this. Our war for taxation, in America, has not yet, and never will produce a revenue. America is not taxed — but England is. America is impoverished, undone if you please, but England is not enriched. The Colonies have now avowed independence. I have ever said, and I think shewn in my former letters, that it was in no sort their original intention in this contest; but that they would infallibly be driven to it by the measures of violence hotly and obstinately pursued, and by the rejection with the same intemperate pertinacity, of every means of reconciliation. But one phrase serves for all reasons.
“They have avowed independency.”
They have so; and is it because America has avowed independency, that England must be ruined? can we be quite certain that the offer of terms of liberty, which will cost us nothing, will not draw them from that independency; when we are sure, that offers of slavery, which have cost us millions, have driven them to it?
It would, in my opinion, be wise to seize this first moment of success to do proudly, what long since we ought to have done wisely — To repeal the obnoxious acts — To put things on the footing they stood on in 1763 — To unite this country, and to give a justification to your friends in America, for adhering to the free and reasonable dependence of that country on this — This salutary and wholesome end, is not to be effected by evasion and chicane.
“Means of conciliation,”
one of the new invented phrases, that aims to convey a sense which facts will not support. It would convey to the reader, that terms and conditions of reconciliation have been rejected by the Americans. It is a truth now universally notorious, that no terms have been offered to them. Lord George Germaine at the end of last session, positively and justly declared, that the commission neither had, nor could have powers of giving other terms of peace; except those of pardon on the laying down their arms. It carried simply the power of accepting
“unconditioned submission.”
In the dialect of ministers, this is means of conciliation; in the language of common sense, it is a declaration of an eternal war. But, to make peace, terms and conditions must be held out; and to satisfy our grand idea of dignity, they ought to be held now, in this first moment of success. For can we affirm, that war, however successful, is not liable to reverses of fortune? No man can say where a spark may arise from the apparently extinguished fire of revolt and insurrection.
In the beginning of these troubles, the majority in both Houses have not been ashamed to vote the rebellion in America, as confined to one spot; when the very same distemper, whatever it was, raged over the whole continent. This was done to instigate a civil war; why should they be ashamed of a similar finesse to restore domestic peace, at a time too when we are threatened with the hostility of foreign powers? Let them now vote, that all America is subdued, and to a people conquered, graciously bestow
“the blessings of peace and the security of liberty.”
The success, real or pretended, may, if they please, be made the preamble to the act of repeal and settlement.
If war be not exempt from mutability, even in this hitherto single handed war with our Colonies alone, what will be the consequences of an unfavourable turn in a war with France and Spain united? I would not therefore put my whole trust in war, so as to neglect every thing else; lest, agreeably to the ministerial prognostic,) tho’ I am far from presuming to adopt the lofty tone of the epithets so becoming them, but so little becoming me,)
“if their treason be suffered to take root, much mischief must grow from it, to the safety of the loyal Colonies — to the commerce of these kingdoms; — and indeed to the present system of all Europe.”
May treason (since this revolt must be so) never take root from the continuance of tyranny! — This is my prayer. My Lords the Bishops will hardly find a better, in their form for the fast.
You will not be farther troubled on these American affairs by your humble servant, and his country’s true, disinterested, and uninfluenced friend.
VALENS.
REPORT FROM THE SELECT COMMITTEE ON INDIA
CONTENTS
NINTH REPORT
I. — OBSERVATIONS ON THE STATE OF THE COMPANY’S AFFAIRS IN INDIA.
II. — CONNECTION OF GREAT BRITAIN WITH INDIA.
III. — EFFECT OF THE REVENUE INVESTMENT ON THE COMPANY.
INTERNAL TRADE OF BENGAL.
SILK.
RAW SILK
CLOTHS, OR PIECE-GOODS.
OPIUM.
SALT.
REMARK BY THE BOARD.
SALTPETRE.
BRITISH GOVERNMENT IN INDIA.
ELEVENTH REPORT
APPENDIX.
NINTH REPORT
OF THE
SELECT COMMITTEE OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS
/>
ON
THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA.
June 25, 1783.
NINTH REPORT
From the SELECT COMMITTEE [of the House of Commons] appointed to take into consideration the state of the administration of justice in the provinces of Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa, and to report the same, as it shall appear to them, to the House, with their observations thereupon; and who were instructed to consider how the British possessions in the East Indies may be held and governed with the greatest security and advantage to this country, and by what means the happiness of the native inhabitants may be best promoted.
I. — OBSERVATIONS ON THE STATE OF THE COMPANY’S AFFAIRS IN INDIA.
In order to enable the House to adopt the most proper means for regulating the British government in India, and for promoting the happiness of the natives who live under its authority or influence, your Committee hold it expedient to collect into distinct points of view the circumstances by which that government appears to them to be most essentially disordered, and to explain fully the principles of policy and the course of conduct by which the natives of all ranks and orders have been reduced to their present state of depression and misery.
Your Committee have endeavored to perform this task in plain and popular language, knowing that nothing has alienated the House from inquiries absolutely necessary for the performance of one of the most essential of all its duties so much as the technical language of the Company’s records, as the Indian names of persons, of offices, of the tenure and qualities of estates, and of all the varied branches of their intricate revenue. This language is, indeed, of necessary use in the executive departments of the Company’s affairs; but it is not necessary to Parliament. A language so foreign from all the ideas and habits of the far greater part of the members of this House has a tendency to disgust them with all sorts of inquiry concerning this subject. They are fatigued into such a despair of ever obtaining a competent knowledge of the transactions in India, that they are easily persuaded to remand them back to that obscurity, mystery, and intrigue out of which they have been forced upon public notice by the calamities arising from their extreme mismanagement. This mismanagement has itself, as your Committee conceive, in a great measure arisen from dark cabals, and secret suggestions to persons in power, without a regular public inquiry into the good or evil tendency of any measure, or into the merit or demerit of any person intrusted with the Company’s concerns.
Present laws relating to the East India Company, and internal and external policy.The plan adopted by your Committee is, first, to consider the law regulating the East India Company, as it now stands, — and, secondly, to inquire into the circumstances of the two great links of connection by which the territorial possessions in India are united to this kingdom, namely, the Company’s commerce, and the government exercised under the charter and under acts of Parliament. The last [first] of these objects, the commerce, is taken in two points of view: the external, or the direct trade between India and Europe, and the internal, that is to say, the trade of Bengal, in all the articles of produce and manufacture which furnish the Company’s investment.
The government is considered by your Committee under the like descriptions of internal and external. The internal regards the communication between the Court of Directors and their servants in India, the management of the revenue, the expenditure of public money, the civil administration, the administration of justice, and the state of the army. The external regards, first, the conduct and maxims of the Company’s government with respect to the native princes and people dependent on the British authority, — and, next, the proceedings with regard to those native powers which are wholly independent of the Company. But your Committee’s observations on the last division extend to those matters only which are not comprehended in the Report of the Committee of Secrecy. Under these heads, your Committee refer to the most leading particulars of abuse which prevail in the administration of India, — deviating only from this order where the abuses are of a complicated nature, and where one cannot be well considered independently of several others.
Second attempt made by Parliament for a reformation.Your Committee observe, that this is the second attempt made by Parliament for the reformation of abuses in the Company’s government. It appears, therefore, to them a necessary preliminary to this second undertaking, to consider the causes which, in their opinion, have produced the failure of the first, — that the defects of the original plan may be supplied, its errors corrected, and such useful regulations as were then adopted may be further explained, enlarged, and enforced.
Proceedings of session 1773.The first design of this kind was formed in the session of the year 1773. In that year, Parliament, taking up the consideration of the affairs of India, through two of its committees collected a very great body of details concerning the interior economy of the Company’s possessions, and concerning many particulars of abuse which prevailed at the time when those committees made their ample and instructive reports. But it does not appear that the body of regulations enacted in that year, that is, in the East India Act of the thirteenth of his Majesty’s reign, were altogether grounded on that information, but were adopted rather on probable speculations and general ideas of good policy and good government. New establishments, civil and judicial, were therefore formed at a very great expense, and with much complexity of constitution. Checks and counter-checks of all kinds were contrived in the execution, as well as in the formation of this system, in which all the existing authorities of this kingdom had a share: for Parliament appointed the members of the presiding part of the new establishment, the Crown appointed the judicial, and the Company preserved the nomination of the other officers. So that, if the act has not fully answered its purposes, the failure cannot be attributed to any want of officers of every description, or to the deficiency of any mode of patronage in their appointment. The cause must be sought elsewhere.
Powers and objects of act of 1773, and the effects thereof.The act had in its view (independently of several detached regulations) five fundamental objects.
1st. The reformation of the Court of Proprietors of the East India Company.
2ndly. A new model of the Court of Directors, and an enforcement of their authority over the servants abroad.
3rdly. The establishment of a court of justice capable of protecting the natives from the oppressions of British subjects.
4thly. The establishment of a general council, to be seated in Bengal, whose authority should, in many particulars, extend over all the British settlements in India.
5thly. To furnish the ministers of the crown with constant information concerning the whole of the Company’s correspondence with India, in order that they might be enabled to inspect the conduct of the Directors and servants, and to watch over the execution of all parts of the act; that they might be furnished with matter to lay before Parliament from time to time, according as the state of things should render regulation or animadversion necessary.
Court of Proprietors.The first object of the policy of this act was to improve the constitution of the Court of Proprietors. In this case, as in almost all the rest, the remedy was not applied directly to the disease. The complaint was, that factions in the Court of Proprietors had shown, in several instances, a disposition to support the servants of the Company against the just coercion and legal prosecution of the Directors. Instead of applying a corrective to the distemper, a change was proposed in the constitution. By this reform, it was presumed that an interest would arise in the General Court more independent in itself, and more connected with the commercial prosperity of the Company. New qualification.Under the new constitution, no proprietor, not possessed of a thousand pounds capital stock, was permitted to vote in the General Court: before the act, five hundred pounds was a sufficient qualification for one vote; and no value gave more. But as the lower classes were disabled, the power was increased in the higher: proprietors of three thousand pounds were allowed two votes; those of six thousand were e
ntitled to three; ten thousand pounds was made the qualification for four. The votes were thus regulated in the scale and gradation of property. On this scale, and on some provisions to prevent occasional qualifications and splitting of votes, the whole reformation rested.
Several essential points, however, seem to have been omitted or misunderstood. No regulation was made to abolish the pernicious custom of voting by The ballot.ballot, by means of which acts of the highest concern to the Company and to the state might be done by individuals with perfect impunity; and even the body itself might be subjected to a forfeiture of all its privileges for defaults of persons who, so far from being under control, could not be so much as known in any mode of legal cognizance. Indian interest.Nothing was done or attempted to prevent the operation of the interest of delinquent servants of the Company in the General Court, by which they might even come to be their own judges, and, in effect, under another description, to become the masters in that body which ought to govern them. Nor was anything provided to secure the independency of the proprietary body from the various exterior interests by which it might be disturbed, and diverted from the conservation of that pecuniary concern which the act laid down as the sole security for preventing a collusion between the General Court and the powerful delinquent servants in India. The whole of the regulations concerning the Court of Proprietors relied upon two principles, which have often proved fallacious: namely, that small numbers were a security against faction and disorder; and that integrity of conduct would follow the greater property. In no case could these principles be less depended upon than in the affairs of the East India Company. However, by wholly cutting off the lower, and adding to the power of the higher classes, it was supposed that the higher would keep their money in that fund to make profit, — that the vote would be a secondary consideration, and no more than a guard to the property, — and that therefore any abuse which tended to depreciate the value of their stock would be warmly resented by such proprietors.
