Salisbury: The Man and his Policies PDF
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SALISBURY: THE MAN AND HIS POLICIES Also by Lord Blake (Robert Blake) THE PRIVATE PAPERS OF DOUGLAS HAIG (editor) THE UNKNOWN PRIME MINISTER: BONAR LAW DISRAELI THE OFFICE OF THE PRIME MINISTER A HISTORY OF RHODESIA THE CONSERVATIVE PARTY FROM PEEL TO THATCHER THE DECLINE OF POWER: ENG LAND, 1915-64 Salisbury The Man and his Policies Edited by Lord Blake Provost ofThe Queen's College, Oxford and Hugh Cecil Lecturer in History, University of Leeds Palgrave Macmillan ISBN 978-1-349-18635-8 ISBN 978-1-349-18633-4 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-18633-4 ©Lord Blake and Hugh Cecil1987 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1987 978-0-333-36876-3 All rights reserved. For information, write: Scholarly & Reference Division, St. Martin's Press, Inc., 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010 First published in the United States of America in 1987 ISBN 978-0-312-69748-8 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Salisbury, the man and his policies Includes index. 1. Salisbury, Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne-Cecil, Marquess of, 1830-1903. 2. Prime ministers-Great Britain-Biography. 3. Great Britain-Politics and government-1837-1901. I. Blake, Robert, 1916- 11. Cecil, Hugh (Hugh P.) DA564.S2S35 1986 941.081'092'4 [B] 86-10227 ISBN 978-0-312-69748-8 Contents Preface Vll Notes on the Contributors ix 1 Introduction 1 Lord Blake 2 Lord Salisbury: A Librarian's View 10 J. F. A. Mason 3 Lord Salisbury in Private Life 30 Lady Gwendolen Cecil 4 Lady Gwendolen Cecil: Salisbury's Biographer 60 Hugh Cecil 5 'The Conservative Reaction': Lord Robert Cecil and Party Politics 90 Robert Stewart 6 Salisbury at the India Office 116 E. D. Steele 7 Lord Salisbury, Foreign Policy and Domestic Finance, 1860-1900 148 A. N. Porter 8 Salisbury and the Church 185 E. D. Steele 9 Salisbury and the Unionist Alliance 219 lohn France 10 Private Property and Public Policy 252 F. M. L. Thompson Reading List 290 Index 292 v Preface A hundred years ago, Robert, third Marquis of Salisbury, formed his first majority government. Since then, he has been the subject of one major biography and several importance monographs. This volume offers a wide range of Salisbury studies, presenting fresh insights, much new research and a variety of interpretations. After the Introduction (Ch. 1), which outlines his career, the next three essays deal with aspects of his personality. J. F. A. Mason gives us a portrait of the man and his interests, drawing on a uniquely broad knowledge of the Salisbury archives (Ch. 2). The sketch 'Lord Salisbury in Private Life' by Lady Gwendolen Cecil (Ch. 3) was found recently among her papers and contains details not used in her four-volume work on her father; herbiographical approach, her unusual character and Salisbury' s horne life are discussed in the explanatory essay that follows (Ch. 4). The other six essays are on Salisbury's politics. R. M. Stewart looks anew at the combative young Tory at the outset of his public life and the early political journalism (Ch. 5). E. D. Steele considers Salisbury's record as India Secretary in its entirety, giving dose attention for the first time to his concern for the domestic as weIl as the external affairs of the Indian sub-continent (Ch. 6). A. N. Porter reviews Salisbury's foreign policy and seeks to bridge the historiographical divide between those historians who have looked at the 'realities behind diplomacy' and those who have studied the subject from a traditional 'pure diplomacy' angle (Ch. 7). Dr Steele, on the Anglican Church, demonstrates the central place of religion in Salisbury's politicallife, using Lambeth records and the imperfectly explored sources in the Hatfield collection (Ch. 8). John France takes the themes of Conservative leadership and the perplexing relationship between the third Marquis and the Liberal Unionists which was a vital factor in his party's success at the end of the nineteenth century (Ch. 9). Finally, F. M. L. Thompson employs hitherto untouched Hatfield estate papers to compare Salisbury's record of improvement on his own properties with his well publicised pronouncements favouring housing-reforms on a national scale (Ch. 10). It was never supposed that a collection of this kind could be vii viii Preface comprehensivei Ireland, for example, is not the subject of aseparate essay (though it has received attention in two essays), because the scholars approached were otherwise engagedi essays on other topics were offered but had to be withdrawn because of serious illnessi treatment of Salisbury's foreign policy in a 'traditional' manner was passed over in favour of its examination from a less familiar viewpoint. Nor is this a 'commemorative' volume, conceived of in a devotional spirit. If Salisbury emerges, none the less, with credit, this is the result of independent judgement. Besides the presentation of his personality, our concern is that the disinterested research on his politics, embodied here, shall illuminate key aspects of his career for the reader and ease the burden of a future biographer struggling through the vast mass of documents in the'Hatfield House Muniment Room. We are much indebted to the present Marquis of Salisbury for permitting the contributors to quote from material in the Salisbury papers and for his interest and generous hospitality. We are also deeply grateful to the Hatfield Librarian, Robin Harcourt Williams, who has given so much of his time and expert advice. We should like to record our warm thanks to Professor L. P. Curtis, Dr Roy Foster, the late Viscount Macmillan of Ovenden, Mr David Tweedie and Professor John Vincent for help and ideas, to Leeds University for financial assistance towards research, and to Mrs Ann Dale, Mrs E. D. Steele, Mrs Margaret Walkington and Mrs Lorraine Winter for all the typing-work they have done on this volume. ROBERT BLAKE HUGH CECIL Notes on the Contributors Lord Blake is Provost of The Queen' s College, Oxford. His writings inc1ude Disraeli (1966) and The Conservative Party from Peel to Thatcher (1985). Lady Gwendolen Cecil (1860-1945) was the younger daughter and biographer of the third Marquis of Salisbury. Hugh Cecil is a Lecturer in History at the University of Leeds. He wrote his doctoral thesis on Lord Robert Cecil during the First World War and at the Peace Conference of Paris. John France wrote his doctoral thesis (Cantab. ) on 'Personalities and Politics in the Formation of the Unionist Alliance, 1885-1895'. J. F. A. Mason is the Librarian of Christ Church, Oxford. He was the custodian and cataloguer of the papers of the third Marquis of Salisbury during the twenty-five years they were housed at Christ Church (up to 1975). A. N. Porter is a Reader in History at King's College, London. His writings inc1ude The Origins of the South African War: ]oseph Chamberlain and the Diplomacy of Imperialism (1980) and Victorian Shipping, Business and Imperial Policy: Donald Currie, the Castle Line and Southern Africa (forthcoming). E. D. Steele is a Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Leeds. His writings inc1ude Irish Land and British Politics: Tenant Right and Nationality, 1865-70 (1974). Robert Stewart hold~ a his tory doctorate from Oxford University. His writings inc1ude The Foundation of the Conservative Party 1830- 1867 (1978) and Henry Brougham, 1778-1868: His Public Career (1986). Professor F. M. L. Thompson is the Director of the Institute of Historical Research, University of London. His works inc1ude English Landed Society in the Nineteenth Century (1963) and Hampstead: Building aBorough, 1650-1969 (1974). ix 1 Int rodu ction LORD BLAKE Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, third Marquis of Salisbury, was born at Hatfield, the family seat, on 3 February 1830. He died on 22 August 1903. Electorally he was the most successful of all Conser\Tative leaders. He was Prime Minister 1885-6, 1886-92 and 1895--1902. He led his party in five general elections, three of which - 1886, 1895 and 1900 - he won with conclusive majorities. Of the two that he lost, the election of 1885 was a short-lived Gladstonian victory soon reversed, and the election of 1892 was a temporary hiccup in the long run of Conservative success from 1886 to 1905. It did little harm to his party and little good to his opponents. Cecil was the third son of his father. The second died in infancy. The eldest, who was eight when Robert was born, suffered from a disease of the nerves which caused blindness and death before he was fifty. He never married and his younger brother was therefore, from childhood onwards, the probable but by no means certain heir to the title and its great estates. The nomenclature of the British aristocracy is notoriously confusing. I shall refer to hirn as Lord Robert Cecil or Cecil till the death of his brother on 14 June 1865, when he becomes Viscount Cranborne, the courtesy title of the heir to the marquisate. He becomes Lord Salisbury with the death of his father on 21 April 1868. The Cecils were and are one of the oldest and grandest of English families. The originator of their eminence was Lord Burghley, minister of Queen Elizabeth 1. He was married twice and had a son by each wife. From the eIder son descends the peerage which became the marquisate of Exeter. In August 1853 Lord Robert Cecil obtained his parliamentary seat, the borough of Stamford in Lincolnshire, from his distant cousin, the current Lord Exeter, in whose gift it was. There was no contest then or at any subsequent election during the fifteen years be fore Lord Robert succeeded his father in the peerage. Burghley's younger son, Robert - a name 1
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