204 



PITT 



into the fray. He spoke on the 26th February 

 with brilliant success in defence of Burke's Bill for 

 Economical reform, ami on several successive 

 occasions he assailed the falling ministry. He 

 denounced the American war and the .corrupt 

 influence of the crown with extreme violence, but 

 he refused to throw in his lot irrevocably with the 

 party of the op|isition, and shortly liefore the fall 

 of North he publicly declared that he could not 

 expect to bear a [>art in the coming ministry, as he 

 ' would never accept a subordinate position.' The 

 words are said to have escaped from him in the 

 heat of the debate, and the House was start led and 

 a little amused at the arrogance of a young man 

 who was not twenty-three, who was absolutely 

 without official experience, and who had been little 

 more than a year in parl iament . declaring that he 

 would accept no office except in the Cabinet. 



But Pitt nad attained a posit i..n that placet! him 

 far above lasting ridicule. Fox s|x>ke of him as 

 already one of the first men in parliament. Burke 

 said of him that he was not a chip of the old block, 

 but the oltl block itself ; Horace Walpole wrote 

 that he had shown logical powers that made men 

 doubt whether he might not prove superior even 

 to Fox ; anil when upon the resignation of North in 

 March 1782 a ministry was formed under the 

 leadership of Kockingliam, combining the two 

 sections of the opposition, Pitt remembered his 

 pledge and refused several oilers, among others the 

 Vice-treasurership of Ireland with a salary of 

 5000 a year. He gave, however, a general and 

 cordial support to the new ministers, but be at the 

 same time brought forward the question of parlia 

 mcntary reform on which they were profoundly 

 divided. It was a question which fell naturally to 

 him, for his father had been one of the first to urge 

 it. On the 7th May he moved, in a speech of great 

 brilliancy, for a select committee to inquire into 

 the state of the representation, and was only 

 defeated by 161 to 141. He soon afterwards sup- 

 ported a measure of Sawbridge for shortening the 

 duration of parliament, and a measure of Lord 

 Mahon for preventing bril*ery at elections. 



A close personal and poUneal connection about 

 this time grew up between Pitt and Henry I Mindas, 

 who had been Lord Advocate under North. It 

 proved of great importance to the career of Pitt. 

 Dundas had none of the intellectual brilliancy or of 

 the moral dignity of the_younger statesman, out he 

 had one of the best political judgments of his time, 

 he had great talents both for business and for 

 debate, and he was a most shrewd and sagacious 

 judge of the characters of men a gift in which 

 Pitt through bis whole life was somewhat wanting. 



The Rockingliam ministry la-ted only for three 

 'month-. The king detested it; it was from tin 1 

 lir-t profoundly divided, and a bitter personal and 

 political animosity bad broken out betwi-rii ( 'harles 

 Vox and Lord Shelburne, its two most, conspicuous 

 members. On 1st July 1782 Lord Kockingham 

 died, anil the question of leadership at once broke 

 up the party. Fox insisted on the leadership of 

 the Duke of Portland, a wealthy and res|>ectable, 

 but perfectly undistinguished nobleman, who was 

 then Ix>rd lieutenant of Ireland. The king gave 

 the post of First Lord of the Treasim to Shelburne. 

 who had an incomparably higher |x>litical position, 

 and who had )>pen a favourite friend and colleague 

 of Chatham, though there were features in his 

 character that already excited great unpopularity 

 and distru-l. Fox, with a considerable section of 

 the Hockingham Whigs, at once resigned, and Pitt 

 enienil the Cabinet as Chancellor of the Exchequer 

 in the reconstructed ministry. Public opinion 



generally blamed Fox, and one of tin nsequcnccs 



of his resignation was that the House of Commons 

 was divided into three distinct parties. There wan 



the party of Fox, the party of North, and the party 

 of the government, and no one of them could 

 command a clear majority. A coalition of some 

 kind was inevitable. Shelhiirne leaned towards an 

 alliance with North, but Pitt positively refused ti> 

 have any connection with the statesman whom 1m 

 deemed responsible for the American war. Peace 

 was not yet attained, but the negotiations which 

 had lieen pursued by the preceding ministry were 

 steadily pushed on. Provisional articles of peace 

 between England and the 1'nitcd States were 

 signed in November 1782, and preliminary articles 

 with France and Spain in the following January, 

 while a truce was established with Holland, and 

 the first Btejs were taken towards a very liberal 

 commercial treaty with the I'nited States. 



Pitt bore a leading part in the debates in ]trlia- 

 inent, and bis reputation steadily rose, but the 

 Shel burnt*, ministry was weak, divided, and short- 

 lived. The peace following a disastrous war 

 necessarily involved sacrifices that were profoundly 

 unpopular, and the character of Shelburne aggra 

 vateu the divisions that bad already app<-an-d. 

 Several resignations took place, but Pitt stood 

 loyally by his chief, and endeavoured without 

 success to induce Fox to rejoin the ministry. Fox, 

 however, declared that he would never again serve 

 any ministry with Shelburne for its head, and to 

 the astonishment and indignation both of the king 

 and of the country, he united with the very states- 

 man whose expulsion from public power had been 

 for years the main object of his policy, and whom 

 he had repeatedly threatened with impeachment. 

 North, irritated at the ostracism with which he had 

 been threatened, readily entered into the alliance. 

 Two factious votes of censure directed against the 

 l>eace were carried through the Commons by 

 majorities of 16 and 17, and on 24th February 1783 

 Shelburne resigned. 



Pitt bad displayed the most splendid jiarlia- 

 mentary talents in the discussions that preceded 

 the fall of the ministry, and although fie could 

 not overthrow the compact weight of parlia 

 mentary influence opposed to him, he profoundly 

 inoviil 'the country and placed his own |Kwition 

 beyond dispute. On the fall of the Shelburne 

 ministry, the king, hoping to escape the yoke of 

 the coalition, implored the young^ statesman to 

 accept the leadership, and gave him an absolute 

 authority to name his colleagues. It was a daz- 

 zling otler, and Pitt was not yet twenty-four, but 

 he already possessed a judgment ami self-restraint 

 which is rarely found at any age in combination 

 with such brilliancy and such courage, and he saw 

 clearly that the moment of triumph had not yet 

 come. After a long struggle and many abortive 

 cIl'ortN the king was obliged to yield, and on the 2d 

 April the coalition ministry wax formed with the 

 Duke of Portland as First Lord of the Treasury, 

 and Fox and North as joint Secretaries of State. 



It commanded a large majority of the votes, and 

 included a great preponderance of the ability in 

 the House of Commons, but the king viewed it, 

 with a detestation amounting to loathing, and the 

 nation was profoundly scandalised by the alliance 

 on which it rested. Pitt was ollered his old jKist 

 of Chancellor of the Exchequer, which he peremp- 

 torily refused. As leader of the opposition, he 

 brought forward, in the form of resolutions, an 

 elaborate scheme of parliamentary reform, includ 

 ing an increase of the country members. He was 

 defeated by 293 to 149, but he at least succeeded in 

 bringing Fox and North into direct -collision. II. 

 brought forward another imixirtant mea-ure for the 

 reform of abuses in the public offices, which passed 

 the Commons but was rejected in the Lords. The 

 ]N*ace which was carried by the new ministry 

 differed very little from that which they had 



