["Neue Oder-Zeitung" No. 88, February 22, 1855]

London, February 17. The Parliament resumed its sittings yesterday. The House of Commons was visibly out of sorts. It seemed tormented by the conviction that the transactions of the last three weeks had completely shattered its authority. There sat the old ministry again, newly polished. Two old lords who could not get on with each other had vanished from it, but a third old lord who had shared the vote of no confidence with both had not fallen down a step, but merely fallen up the highest step. Lord Palmerston was received with solemn silence. No “cheers”, no enthusiasm. His speech was, by way of exception, received with visible indifference and sullen scepticism. By way of exception, too, his memory failed him, and he rummaged hesitantly among the notes lying before him until Sir Charles Wood, whispering, handed him back the lost thread. His audience seemed unconvinced that the change of firm would save the old house from bankruptcy. His whole appearance called to mind Cardinal Alberoni’s judgment on William of Orange:

“That man was strong as long as he held the scales. He is weak since he has thrown himself into one of the pans.”

The most important fact, however, was undoubtedly the appearance of a new coalition in the face of the renovated old one — the coalition of the Tories under Disraeli with the most outspoken section of the Radicals, Layard, Duncombe, Horsman, etc. It was precisely among the latter, the Mayfair Radicals, that Palmerston had hitherto counted his loudest supporters. Disappointed hope on Layard’s part of obtaining a subordinate post in the War Office — whispers a ministerial paper. Throw him a post! — hisses another.

Lord Palmerston began the announcement of his new ministry with a brief history of the ministerial crisis. Then he praised his own handiwork. The ministry he had formed,

“possesses sufficient administrative skill, sufficient political acumen, sufficiently liberal principles, sufficient patriotism and resolve to do its duty.”

Lord Clarendon, Lord Panmure, Mr. Gladstone, Sir James Graham — each received his compliment. Excellent as the ministry was, however, it was faced with a great difficulty. There was Mr. Roebuck insisting that his committee of inquiry be appointed next Thursday. Why did the House need a committee? He reminded them of an anecdote from the reign of Richard II, at the time of Wat Tyler’s rebellion. The young monarch had met a troop of rebels whose chief had just fallen before their eyes. Boldly advancing on them, he had exclaimed: “You have lost your leader; I, my friends, will be your leader.” “So I say” (the young (!) dictator Palmerston), “if you, the House of Commons, will give up this committee, the government itself will be a committee.”

This not very respectful comparison of the House to a club of “rebels” and the unceremonious demand that the Cabinet be installed as judge in its own cause was received with ironic laughter. What do you want, then?, cried Palmerston, raising his voice and throwing his head into the well-known Irishly impudent position. What is the point of a committee of inquiry? Administrative improvements? Very well! Listen to what we are resolved to improve. You previously had two war ministers, the Secretary at War and the Minister for War. In future you shall have only one, the latter. In the Ordnance Department, the supreme military command will be transferred to the Commander-in-Chief (the Horse Guards), the civil administration to the War Minister. The transport service will be expanded. Hitherto, under the Act of 1847, the term of service was ten years. Now it will be open to men to enlist for any number of years from one to ten. No one shall be recruited under 24 or over 32. Now to the theatre of war! Here Palmerston, in order to bring unity, energy and order into the conduct and administration of the war, chooses the peculiar expedient of placing a controller with indeterminate full powers behind every post. Lord Raglan remains Commander-in-Chief, but General Simpson becomes Chief of the General Staff, and Raglan “will consider it his duty to carry out his advice”. Sir John Burgoyne is recalled, and Sir Harry Jones becomes Commissary-General of the commissariat with indefinite dictatorial authority. At the same time, however, a civilian, Sir John MacNeill (author of the famous pamphlet: “Russian Progress in the East”) is ordered to the Crimea to investigate the embezzlements, incapacity, and breaches of duty of the commissariat. New hospital arrangements in Smyrna, Scutari; reform of the medical department in the Crimea and at home, transport ships plying every ten days between the Crimea and England for the sick and wounded. At the same time, however, the War Minister will borrow three civilians from the Minister of Health and send them to the Crimea to make the necessary sanitary arrangements there to prevent the plague when spring weather sets in, and to conduct investigations into the personnel and management of the medical department. As one can see, provision is made for conflicts of competence. To compensate Lord Raglan for his supreme command, now “surrounded with constitutional institutions”, he receives full power to negotiate in Constantinople for a corps of 300 Turkish street-sweepers and gravediggers whose job it will be, when the thaw sets in, to deliver the dead army, putrefied horses and the rest of the refuse into the sea. A separate land transport service will be set up in the theatre of war. While thus, on the one hand, war is being waged, on the other peace will be prepared by Lord John Russell in Vienna, if feasible.

Disraeli: Having heard the noble Lord’s boast of his colleagues’ “administrative skill and political acumen”, one could [scarcely] believe that he was speaking of the same “blunderers without parallel” whom the House had condemned 19 days ago! Assuming the promised improvements were put into effect and were what they are claimed to be, did they not form the sharpest satire on the ministry which alone had opposed them, which had declared an inquiry by the Commons into the previous maladministration to be a vote of no confidence in itself? Even Lord John Russell had stated that the mysterious disappearance of the army was inexplicable to him and an investigation into its secret causes was indispensable. Was the House to befool itself and rescind the resolution it had only passed ten days ago? It would thereby irretrievably forfeit its public influence for years. What was the argument of the noble Lord and his newly varnished colleagues to induce the House of Commons to stultify itself?

Promises that would never have been made without the threat of a committee of inquiry. He insisted on a parliamentary inquiry. Palmerston was assuming his new dignity with a threat against the independent movement of Parliament. Never had a ministry found such support and willingness on the part of the Opposition as that of Lord Aberdeen, the “last” ministry — but how should he put it! The two Dromios had completely confused him; he would therefore say “the last ministry and their present faithful — their identical representatives on the Treasury Bench”.

Roebuck declared that he would propose the names for the committee already voted for by the House next Thursday. The administration was the old one, the cards had merely been shuffled but had fallen back into the old hands. Only the direct intervention of the House of Commons could break the fetters of routine and remove the obstacles which prevented the government from carrying out the necessary reforms, even if it wished to do so.

T[homas] Duncombe: The noble Lord had told them that he and the government would form their committee! They were much obliged! What the House demanded was precisely to inquire into the conduct of the noble Lord and his colleagues! He had promised reforms, but who was to carry them out? The same men whose administration had been forced into reforms. Nothing was changed in the administration. It was the status quo ante <the state of things before [Roebuck’s motion]>. Lord John Russell had cravenly deserted his post. Lord Palmerston himself was the “faded flower” of 13 cabinets gathered to their fathers, from Lord Liverpool’s down to the present one. He must therefore incontestably possess “great experience and high administrative talent”. His Lord Panmure did not even weigh as much as the Duke of Newcastle. The appointment of the committee was no censure. It was a matter of inquiry. Censure would probably follow close upon its heels. As for the negotiations in Vienna, here, too, the government found itself in opposition to the people. The people demanded the revision of the Treaties of Vienna of 1815 in the interests of the Poles, Hungarians and Italians. By a war against Russia, however, it understood the literal annihilation of Russian preponderance.

As one can see, the Palmerston ministry is beginning where the Aberdeen ministry ended — with the struggle against Roebuck’s motion. Until next Thursday, every effort will be made to sneak a ministerial majority against the committee of inquiry.