The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 08 (of 12). Edmund Burke
it could not be supposed that they could carry on the public business for any length of time without the services of a Secretary and Clerk of Appeals, two offices that required personal attendance, and which would be a general injury to the servants on their establishment, and in particular to the person who acted in those capacities, as they learnt that Mr. Sulivan had been appointed Judge-Advocate-General in Bengal,—and to request the Governor-General and Council to inform Mr. Sulivan of their sentiments, and to desire him to inform them whether he meant to return to his station or to remain in Bengal."
On the 5th December, as a mark of their approbation of Mr. Freeman, who had so plainly contradicted their opinion of Mr. Sulivan, the President and Council agree to appoint him to act as Secretary and Clerk of Appeals, till Mr. Sulivan's answer should arrive, with the emoluments, and to confirm him therein, if Mr. Sulivan should remain in Bengal.
On the 14th February, 1781, the President and Council received a letter from Bengal in reply, and stating their request that Mr. Sulivan might reserve the right of returning to his original situation on the Madras establishment, if the Court of Directors should disapprove of his being transferred to Bengal. To this request the board at Madras declare they have no objection: and here the matter rests; the Court of Directors not having given any tokens of approbation or disapprobation of the transaction.
Such is the history of Mr. Sulivan's service from the time of his appointment; such were the qualifications, and such the proofs of assiduity and diligence given by him in holding so many incompatible offices, (as well as being engaged in other dealings, which will appear in their place,) when, after three years' desultory residence in India, he was thought worthy to be nominated to the succession to the Supreme Council. No proof whatsoever of distinguished capacity in any line preceded his original appointment to the service: so that the whole of his fitness for the Supreme Council rested upon his conduct and character since his appointment as Persian Translator.
Your Committee find that his Majesty has not yet given his approbation to the nomination, made by the Court of Directors on the 30th of August, 1781, of Messrs. Stuart and Sulivan to succeed to the Supreme Council on the first vacancies, though the Court applied for the royal approbation so long ago as the 19th of September, 1781; and in these instances the king's ministers performed their duty, in withholding their countenance from a proceeding so exceptionable and of so dangerous an example.
Your Committee, from a full view of the situation and duties of the Court of Directors, are of opinion that effectual means ought to be taken for regulating that court in such a manner as to prevent either rivalship with or subserviency to their servants. It might, therefore, be proper for the House to consider whether it is fit that those who are, or have been within some given time, Directors of the Company, should be capable of an appointment to any offices in India. Directors can never properly govern those for whose employments they are or may be themselves candidates; they can neither protect nor coerce them with due impartiality or due authority.
If such rules as are stated by your Committee under this head were observed in the regular service at home and abroad, the necessity of superseding the regular service by strangers would be more rare; and whenever the servants were so superseded, those who put forward other candidates would be obliged to produce a strong plea of merit and ability, which, in the judgment of mankind, ought to overpower pretensions so authentically established, and so rigorously guarded from abuse.
Deficiency of powers to ministers of government. The second object, in this part of the plan, of the act of 1773, namely, that of inspection by the ministers of the crown, appears not to have been provided for, so as to draw the timely and productive attention of the state on the grievances of the people of India, and on the abuses of its government. By the Regulating Act, the ministers were enabled to inspect one part of the correspondence, that which was received in England, but not that which went outward. They might know something, but that very imperfectly and unsystematically, of the state of affairs; but they were neither authorized to advance nor to retard any measure taken by the Directors in consequence of that state: they were not provided even with sufficient means of knowing what any of these measures were. And this imperfect information, together with the want of a direct call to any specific duty, might have, in some degree, occasioned that remissness which rendered even the imperfect powers originally given by the act of 1773 the less efficient. This defect was in a great measure remedied by a subsequent act; but that act was not passed until the year 1780.
Disorders increased since 1773. Your Committee find that during the whole period which elapsed from 1773 to the commencement of 1782 disorders and abuses of every kind multiplied. Wars contrary to policy and contrary to public faith were carrying on in various parts of India. The allies, dependants, and subjects of the Company were everywhere oppressed;2 dissensions in the Supreme Council prevailed, and continued for the greater part of that time; the contests between the civil and judicial powers threatened that issue to which they came at last, an armed resistance to the authority of the king's court of justice; the orders which by an act of Parliament the servants were bound to obey were avowedly and on principle contemned; until at length the fatal effects of accumulated misdemeanors abroad and neglects at home broke out in the alarming manner which your Committee have so fully reported to this House.3
Proceedings in India not known to Parliament. In all this time the true state of the several Presidencies, and the real conduct of the British government towards the natives, was not at all known to Parliament: it seems to have been very imperfectly known even to ministers. Indeed, it required an unbroken attention, and much comparison of facts and reasonings, to form a true judgment on that difficult and complicated system of politics, revenue, and commerce, whilst affairs were only in their progress to that state which produced the present inquiries. Therefore, whilst the causes of their ruin were in the height of their operation, both the Company and the natives were understood by the public as in circumstances the most assured and most flourishing; insomuch that, whenever the affairs of India were brought before Parliament, as they were two or three times during that period, the only subject-matter of discussion anywise important was concerning the sums which might be taken out of the Company's surplus profits for the advantage of the state. Little was thought of but the disengagement of the Company from their debts in England, and to prevent the servants abroad from drawing upon them, so as that body might be enabled, without exciting clamors here, to afford the contribution that was demanded. All descriptions of persons, either here or in India, looking solely to appearances at home, the reputation of the Directors depended on the keeping the Company's sales in a situation to support the dividend, that of the ministers depended on the most lucrative bargains for the Exchequer, and that of the servants abroad on the largest investments; until at length there is great reason to apprehend, that, unless some very substantial reform takes place in the management of the Company's affairs, nothing will be left for investment, for dividend, or for bargain, and India, instead of a resource to the public, may itself come, in no great length of time, to be reckoned amongst the public burdens.
Inspection of ministers has failed in effect. In this manner the inspection of the ministers of the crown, the great cementing regulation of the whole act of 1773, has, along with all the others, entirely failed in its effect.
Failure in the act. Your Committee, in observing on the failure of this act, do not consider the intrinsic defects or mistakes in the law itself as the sole cause of its miscarriage. The general policy of the nation with regard to this object has been, they conceive, erroneous; and no remedy by laws, under the prevalence of that policy, can be effectual. Before any remedial law can have its just operation, the affairs of India must be restored to their natural order. The prosperity of the natives must be previously secured, before any profit from them whatsoever is attempted. For as long as a system prevails which regards the transmission of great wealth to this country, either for the Company or the state, as its principal end, so long will it be impossible that those who are the instruments of that scheme should not be actuated by the same spirit for their own private purposes. It will be worse: they will support the injuries done to the natives for their selfish ends by new injuries done in favor of those before whom they are to account. It is not reasonably to be expected that a public rapacious and improvident should be served by any of its subordinates with disinterestedness or foresight.
II.—CONNECTION
Vide Secret Committee Reports.
Vide Select Committee Reports, 1781