Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 549 pages of information about Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914.

Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 549 pages of information about Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914.

The noble lord said that the payment to Russia was made for services done and performed by Russia, which were notorious, and which required no explanation.  But did the House remember the pathetic appeal of the Solicitor-General?  ‘Oh!’ said the Solicitor-General, ’if you had seen what I have seen, if you had had access to the pile of documents I have waded through, you would have no hesitation in granting the money.’  When the House asked for a sight of these convincing documents, the noble lord got up and quoted to them Hansard’s Parliamentary Debates and the Reports of Lord Castlereagh’s and Lord Liverpool’s speeches.  He never could believe that the documents so pathetically alluded to by the Solicitor-General were two speeches of Lord Liverpool and Lord Londonderry to which every human being had access in that most excellent work.  If the noble lords wished to convince the House that they had acted correctly in this transaction, let them produce the official document on which their judgement professed to be founded.  It was vain for them to rely upon a majority of forty-six, vain for them to call a motion for information factious.  The only sufficient answer would be the production of the documents.  But the noble lord said it was extremely clear that the money was to be paid to Russia for past services performed; why, then, did the noble lord require a new convention?  The preamble of the second convention certainly referred to the first, and it expressly recited it, but nothing whatever could be found in it about the past services of Russia.  It stated the consideration to be the adhesion of Russia to the general arrangements of the Congress of Vienna.  If it were true that the original payment to Russia was made on account of services rendered to the general cause of Europe and sacrifices made by Russia, why did the second convention allege that the equivalent which England was to receive from Russia in return for the continued payments was this, that Russia would not contract any new engagement respecting Belgium, without a previous agreement with His Britannic Majesty, and his formal assent?  Where, then, was the justification of the assertion that the two treaties were founded upon the same consideration?  The Government gave to the House conflicting documents.  The one corresponded not with the other.  The noble lord contended that the money was due to Russia for old services.  Then why the new condition in the second convention?  The preamble bound Russia, in consideration of the continuance of the payment, to identify her policy with that of England with respect to Holland.  That, he contended, was entirely a new condition, and how could it be maintained that, if the money was fairly due to Russia for former services performed, it was now just to impose upon Russia, as a condition of payment, that she should change her policy with regard to Holland so often as the policy of this country was changed?  The question has been repeatedly

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Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.