ABSTRACT
A T T H E W AR O FFIC E-CA STLEREAG H A N D N A PO LEO N
The first difficulty encountered by the new ministry was, however, domestic. The Constitutional question involved in the dismissal o f the Grenville Ministry was too grave to escape animadversion at the hands o f parliamentary critics. W hen Parliament reassembled after the change o f Governm ent (8 April 1807), the ministry was immediately challenged in both Houses on the Constitutional issue. Mr. Brand moved in the Commons ‘that it is contrary to the first duties o f the confidential servants o f the Crown to restrain themselves by any pledge expressed or implied from offering to the K ing any advice which the course o f circumstances may render necessary for the welfare and security o f the empire’. The m otion was naturally opposed by the new ministers, many o f whom, including Lord Castle reagh, took part, in one House o r the other, in the debate that ensued. Castlereagh justly complained that the late ministers had no t only been guilty o f ‘in tro ducing His Majesty’s name and personal character into the debate’ but had ‘given the minutes o f the Cabinet to persons who were no t o f the Cabinet-nor even o f the Privy Council’—a proceeding which he regarded as ‘a high crime and misdemeanour’. O n the merits o f
the question he defended the action o f the K ing whose mind, as his late ministers well knew, ‘was irrevocably made up on the subject, no t from political considerations, but from a param ount religious feeling’. ‘Parliament’, he declared, ‘as well as the nation had determined to stand by the Crown.’ His bold assertion was verified by the event. After an acrimonious debate and an excit ing division, the ministry carried the Orders o f the Day in an unusually full H ouse by a majority o f 46 (244 against 198). A similar m otion in the House o f Lords had been defeated, despite a memorable speech in its favour by Lord Erskine, by a majority o f 81.1
The new ministry had escaped defeat but their position in the House o f Commons was precarious, and though the Parliament was no t yet six months old they decided to appeal to the country.
