Karl Marx

The Opening of Parliament

[“Neue Oder-Zeitung” No. 45, 27 January 1855]

London, January 24. The sitting of Parliament was reopened yesterday. In the House of Lords the Earl of Ellenborough gave notice that on Thursday, 1 February, he would move for an official return of the number of troops sent to the Crimea – infantry, cavalry and sailors – as well as of the number of killed, wounded, sick and altogether unfit for service. The Duke of Richmond interpellated the Minister of War as to why the fighters of Balaklava had been passed over in the distribution of campaign medals. Not only were the fighters of Balaklava to receive campaign medals, but also all the sailors in the Black Sea who had not fought. Thus the Duke of Newcastle, Minister of War, outbid the Duke of Richmond. The Duke of Richmond, together with the Earl of Ellenborough and Hardwicke, on the other hand, advanced the proposition long ago discovered by Adam Smith, that the value of imaginary commodities, and therefore also of medals of honour, stands in inverse ratio to their quantity. After this important debate, which lasted about half an hour, the Lords adjourned.

In the House of Commons the crush was great. However, expectations were disappointed. Disraeli was not present, and Sir Benjamin Hall spoke. The sitting, which began at a quarter to four, was already closed before six. The Roman Senate has been admired for the noble calm with which it received the news of the defeat at Cannae. The patres conscripti <honorific title and form of address for ancient Roman senators> of Rome are now surpassed by the Commoners <members of the lower house> of England. It was impossible to see this physiognomy and to believe in the downfall of the English armies in the Crimea. The state of health of the

army in the Crimea seems to have prompted Sir Benjamin Hall to introduce two bills for the better regulation of the sanitary police in England. Sir Benjamin Hall is one of the so-called radicals of the sort of Sir William Molesworth, Osborne and Co. The radicalism of these gentlemen consists in their demanding ministerial posts, although they belong neither to the oligarchy nor possess plebeian talent. But their mere sitting in the ministry is a radical fact. So say their friends. When, therefore, the cholera raged malignantly in England in the summer of 1854 and the “Board of Health”, hitherto under the control of Palmerston, the Home Secretary, proved itself as incapable as the medical department in the camp before Sevastopol, the Coalition deemed the time suitable to create a new ministerial post – an independent President of the Board of Health – and to strengthen itself by the accession of the “radical” Sir Benjamin Hall. Sir Benjamin Hall thus became Health Minister. The cholera did not, it is true, disappear from London as soon as his appointment appeared in the “Gazette”, but a certain Taylor disappeared from “Punch”, where he had teased the Coalition and the Emperor of Russia. For Sir Benjamin Hall appointed him secretary to the Board of Health at a salary of £1,000. Sir Benjamin Hall, being a radical, loves radical cures. There will be time enough to speak of the merit of his bills when they are introduced. Yesterday they merely aimed at giving him the opportunity of his ministerial entry into the lower house. To Layard’s question:

Lord John Russell replied that he did not know whether it would be possible for him to lay any of the documents in question before the House. That would not be parliamentary. With regard to the history of the four points, however, he could inform his honourable friend in quite general terms as follows: At the end of November Russia had, through [Alexander Mikhailovich] Gorchakov, announced acceptance of the so-called four points; then came the Treaty of 2 December; then on 28 December a meeting at Vienna of Gorchakov with the envoys of England, France and Austria. The French envoy had read out, in the name of the Allies, a document in which they interpreted the four points – an interpretation which was to be regarded as the basis of the negotia-
tions. In the third point it was proposed to put an end to the preponderance of Russia in the Black Sea. Gorchakov did not accept the interpretation, but declared that he would apply to his government for instructions. Ten days later he declared to Count Buol that he had received these instructions. On 7 or 8 January another meeting took place in the office of the Austrian Minister of Foreign Affairs. Gorchakov read out a memorandum containing the views of his government. Count Buol, Lord Westmoreland and Baron de Bourqueney declared that they were not authorised to receive the memorandum. The basis of the negotiations must be the acceptance of the interpretation of the four points. Gorchakov then pocketed his memorandum and accepted the interpretation as the basis of the negotiations. Russia, Russell added, despite the acceptance of this “basis”, has the right to “dispute every point” of it as soon as it is articulated. (It was already drawn up in points.) The English government declared itself ready to enter into negotiations on the above-mentioned basis. “Up to now, however, it has not yet given its envoy any powers to negotiate.” The last sentence is the only news that Russell disclosed to the “Commoners”. The most important incident of the sitting is Roebuck’s notice that he

“next Thursday will move for the appointment of a select committee to ascertain the numerical strength and condition of the army before Sevastopol and the mode of proceeding of those government departments whose duty it was to satisfy the needs of the army.”

The “Times” “implores” Roebuck “to cry out loud and spare nothing”. The imploring of the “Times” and the past of Mr Roebuck are both not calculated to dispel altogether the suspicion that Roebuck will cry out, or rather croak, in order to prevent others from speaking. Thersites, so far as we know, was never used by Ulysses, but Roebuck certainly was, by the Whigs, who in their way are as cunning as Ulysses.