HC Deb 12 August 1850 vol 113 cc1043-56

MR. HUME moved that the evidence taken before the Ceylon Committee be printed. It would be in the recollection of the House that though the Committee had not thought fit to report the evidence to the House, it had, on his own Motion, been laid on the table, and he could hardly have supposed that after that the House would follow the ridiculous course of withholding it. Yet the noble Lord at the head of the Government had given notice of an Amendment to his present Motion. Her Majesty's Ministers were, in his opinion, equally culpable with Lord Torrington. He admitted that that House could not supersede the courts of law. Here, however, was a Governor who had thought proper to suspend the constitution of Ceylon, had tried almost innumerable innocent parties, executed eighteen, banished and imprisoned many more, and allowed the military wildly to confiscate and sell property, and had afterwards got a Bill of Indemnity passed in the island which precluded the injured parties, or their relatives, from having recourse to the courts of law to obtain redress, and left them no resource but an appeal to the British Parliament. Into the circumstances of this case Parliament had ordered an inquiry. Every possible obstacle had been thrown in the way of obtaining the requisite information; but at last the Committee came to a conclusion, though not till after divisions of six to six and seven to six, and such extraordinary proceedings as the history of Committees could scarcely parallel. The noble Lord had given notice of a Motion for submitting the consideration not to Members, but to the Colonial Secretary and to Her Majesty's Government. In his opinion Lord Torrington ought to be brought to serious account. He doubted whether the Governor General had the power of proclaiming martial law, except in such a case of emergency as had not arisen; but even if he had that power, be doubted whether it could be deputed by him to a Lieutenant General, and by that officer to a major, and whether all parties entrusted with it could proceed without any Judge Advocate to take care that justice was done. But there being no forms of law, no rules observed, nothing but the will of one man, it was in evidence that after a number of persons had been shot, Lord Torrington wrote to the Judge Advocate to know what powers he possessed. He was continuing shooting till the Judge Advocate interfered. [Mr. HAWES: No!] He would say yes. Lord Torrington went on until the Judge Advocate told him that if he did not stop, he would come and impeach him. His complaint was, that after petitions had been presented for two years from thousands of inhabitants of Ceylon, containing charges of high crimes and misdemeanours against the Governor, the Government stepped in to prevent the publication of the evidence by which he believed the accusations could be proved. He learnt from a newspaper that the Governor had been removed. But was the House to be satisfied with that? After the destruction of so many human beings, and the punishment of so many who had since died, was the matter to pass away unexamined? Were they to be content with referring the matter to the Colonial Office? When he considered the noble Lord's (Earl Grey's) persevering obstinacy in Demerara; his approval of what had taken place in the Ionian Islands and in Malta; and the sanction which he had given to the proceedings in Ceylon without having before him the facts of the case, he could not feel satisfied with the course proposed by the Government. All he asked, then, was, that the evidence which lay on the table might be printed, with the view of enabling Members who ought to be, and who ultimately must be, the judges in the case, to come to a conclusion. As to Her Majesty's Ministers, they would be put on their trial; and, unless he were mistaken, something more than ordinary skill would be required to defend their conduct. He hoped the House would not refuse his reasonable request that the evidence be printed.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Minutes of the Evidence taken before the Select Committee on Ceylon be printed."

MR. HAWES

said, it was not in his power to refer to the evidence to contradict the statements of the hon. Gentleman; and no Member who had not been on the Committee could form a correct judgment. The report of the Committee contained this sentence:—"Your Committee are of opinion that the serious attention of Her Majesty's Government should be called to the evidence taken in the course of this inquiry;" and his hon. Friend the Member for Montrose was one of those who voted in the majority. With regard to the printing of the report, a Motion was made and a question put to this effect—"That the whole of the evidence taken before the Committee be reported to the House." For that Motion the Ayes were only two; the Noes were ten, and the hon. Gentleman whom he saw on the third bench was one of those who agreed that the evidence should not be laid before the House. [Sir J. WALMSLEY bowed in acknowledgment of the allusion.] The Committee came to a resolution that inasmuch as certain parts of the evidence were personal and confidential, an effort should be made to separate those parts from the rest, and an effort was made by some Members of the Committee to effect that separation. The Chairman of the Committee, however, would not consent to put the question in that form. It was resolved that no further evidence should be reported to the House. Why did the Committee come to that resolution? For the simple reason that a particular portion of the evidence was of an entirely confidential character. That evidence materially affected the Governor of Ceylon: and it was thought that as he was not aware that his own private and confidential letters were to be read before the Committee, it would be most unjust to publish those letters to the world. He believed that whenever the subject should be debated in that House, many Members would be disposed to raise the question whether or not the Committee were justified in taking such evidence; and, for his own part, he should rely on the good feeling and sense of honour which prevailed in that House to decide in the negative. As to the other portions of the evidence, the Government had no desire to exclude any of them from public observation; and when the report thus constituted had been published, it would enable him to meet many of the charges which had been preferred. He ventured to say, that until the private evidence was laid before the Committee, scarcely a single Member of it thought any charge could be brought against the Governor of Ceylon; but undoubtedly when that material evidence had forced itself on the minds of the Committee, so great appeared to be the differences amongst the public servants of the Crown in Ceylon that it seemed utterly impossible that Lord Torrington could continue to administer the public service with advantage to the Crown, and on that ground alone did the Government take the step of recalling him. He was most anxious that the whole of the evidence should be laid on the table; but it would be most unjust to print private letters at a moment when the writer had not the slightest idea of their being used for such a purpose; and he trusted, therefore, that the House would not consent to their production. Under these circumstances, being precluded from entering into the details of the question, he should simply move the Amendment of which the noble Lord at the head of the Government had given notice.

Amendment proposed, to leave out the word "printed," and add the words "referred to the Secretary of State for the Colonies and the Members of Her Majesty's Government," instead thereof.

Question proposed, "That the word 'printed' stand part of the Question."

MR. NEWDEGATE

wished to know whether a Committee appointed by that House to inquire into certain matters had any right to suppress the evidence laid before them? He also wanted to know what the Government had been about? Were they aware of all these circumstances? Did it need a Committee of the House to inform them of the state of Ceylon? Or did they sanction all the acts of the Governor? If the Committee gave them the first information as to the nature of these acts, they had taken the gravest proceedings in total ignorance of the circumstances under which they were taken. Either they knew of, or did not know of, all the circumstances appearing in that evidence. If they did not know of them, they had been sanctioning the proceedings in total ignorance of that which it was their duty to understand. If they did know of them, they had sanctioned proceedings which every Member of the Committee seemed to lament and condemn. Two years were allowed to elapse before any remedy was adopted for the evils with which the colony was oppressed, and it was impossible for any Member of the House to shut his eyes to the fact that the Government of Ceylon would be recorded in the blackest page of their colonial history. And all they had now was the assurance that Her Majesty's Government, having got the information, would keep it to themselves.

SIR J. WALMSLEY

said, that having been referred to in the manner that he had been by the hon. Under Secretary for the Colonies, he must observe that he had voted in the manner stated because he considered that it would be improper to publish private and confidential letters. The House might, however, soon be placed in a somewhat different position; for very near the close of the proceedings letters were received from two of the witnesses, whose evidence was considered private and confidential—he referred to Mr. Wodehouse and Sir James Emerson Tennent—praying that their letters might be made public. Having entered upon the inquiry with an anxious desire to act justly and rightly, up to a certain point he believed that although the acts of the Government might not be justifiable, yet no harsh judgment would be adopted, considering the long period of time which had elapsed, and the distance of place. So far he was disposed to vote for a complete acquittal, as he stated more than once; but when the private letters came before the Committee, his opinion underwent a great change, and, without using any harsh terms, he must say that he thought the dismissal of Lord Torrington was fully justified by the evidence brought before the Committee.

MR. TORRENS M'CULLAGH

said, the question was not whether the Government were justified in recalling Lord Torrington, but whether the House would, under existing circumstances, order the printing of certain documents which he believed a majority of the Committee were now of opinion that they ought never to have received. It was absurd to talk of the matter as a suppression of evidence. The fault, if fault there had been, lay in the Committee having admitted a great deal more than they ought to have done. But, less or more, the whole of what had been taken before them was now matter of record; and the sole question the House was called upon now to determine was, whether it was for the interests of the public service that a particular portion of it which was supposed to affect the character of an absent man, should be prematurely published. He used the phrase advisedly; and he thought that when the House considered the state of the case as it stood at the present moment, it would recognise the justice and propriety of at least deferring any decision. The whole of the evidence taken by the Committee during the Session of 1849 was already before them. No ground of personal exculpation had, even by his accusers, been found against the Governor of Ceylon or his principal advisers, in that voluminous body of testimony; and as little would be found in the evidence taken during the present Session, up to a comparatively recent period, when the Committee thought proper to allow the production of private and confidential letters. Were they prepared to vote, that when a public servant had undergone a searching scrutiny into all his public acts during the greater portion of two successive Sessions of Parliament, without damage to his reputation, resort might be had to means which in no case would be tolerated, and to testimony which no court of justice would allow? Would they make a rule which would sanction the rifling of private desks, for evidence, and the breaking of private seals? It was perfectly well understood, that no man holding office in this country knew of the existence of the letters in question, until one of them was first quoted from, and.subsequently read in extenso, to the Committee. They were not produced by the person said to have written them, or the person to whom they injuriously referred; nor were they even authenticated. He could not help saying that it appeared to him (Mr. M'Cullagh) that the House would be setting a precedent fraught with evil, if, before a party thus impugned had had an opportunity of knowing what had been so laid to his charge, the whole of these documents were put upon every market cross, and given as food for comment to the public journals. How could the diplomatic service, or the colonial administration, or even the domestic government, of the country be decorously or efficiently carried on, if such a course of proceeding were adopted? Confidential letters on any conceivable subject might thus be forced upon the attention of a Committee sitting with closed doors, and then forced upon the attention of the public out of doors by a peremptory order for printing made by the House. As a Member of the Committee, he had throughout objected to the reception of the documents adverted to; and in point of fact they had been at first received upon an express understanding, that the question of making them evidence, or of reporting them as such, should be reserved. Had he supposed that they were not safe in that reservation, he should have divided again and again against their admission. He greatly regretted that they had been (un-intentionally no doubt) trepanned into suffering these letters to be mixed up with other and legitimate evidence; and he had reason to know that similar sentiments were entertained by others as well as himself on the subject. In the last conversation he had had with the late Sir Robert Peel, that experienced and forethoughtful statesman expressed his fears regarding the misuse that might possibly be made of such evidence. If, then, there were in the estimation of many persons, serious grounds for excluding these letters from the consideration of a Select Committee, à fortiori there were grave reasons why they ought not hastily to be ordered for publication. As regarded the other Members of the Ceylon Government, he was bound to say that he thought the majority of them had passed through a severe ordeal unscathed; and he could not refrain from adding, that in his opinion Sir E. Tennent, although placed in some respects under circumstances of no ordinary provocation, had throughout his examination before the Committee manifested a degree of dignified forbearance highly honourable to him.

MR. VILLIERS

said, he thought the House ought to be informed why many Members of the Committee had felt a difficulty in reporting the evidence on the general subject of the inquiry to the House, without also reporting that which was termed private and confidential. It was this—that the latter evidence affected the credit of some of the witnesses, and it was not deemed right to report their evidence without allowing the House to know that other evidence had been taken which much weakened the effect of that testimony. This evidence certainly consisted of private letters; but the Committee had possessed themselves of it with no understanding that it would not be published. It was ultimately, however, considered, that as these letters had been written by those who were not then in the country, and who were not aware of their production, that it would not be proper to publish them until such persons had been apprised of the fact; and this accounted for none of the evidence being reported. The conduct of the Committee had been censured for not having made a report themselves; hut he thought that the Committee were justified in not making a report by the inquiry not being complete, and, in his judgment, it could not be rendered so in a Committee of the House of Commons. In the first place, he thought that where charges of a criminatory character were brought against individuals at a distance, they ought to be investigated where there was somewhat more of regularity and responsibility than there was in a Committee-room upstairs; and in the next place, owing to the distance of the colony, the expense and delay of bringing witnesses were so great, that they were precluded from getting much evidence which in the progress of the inquiry was shown to be necessary; and from not having persons present who ought to have been examined, or statements confirmed that had been made, it was difficult to judge of the validity of much of the evidence that had been taken. The majority of the Committee had on this account come to the conclusion, at the close of last Session, that a Commission ought to be appointed to obtain evidence on the spot, where it could be easily obtained and properly sifted; and the result of the inquiry during this Session had, in his opinion, only made it more apparent that such was the right course to take, with a view to a just and proper termination of the inquiry; and he believed that if the Committee were to sit for a third Session they would come to no other conclusion. As far as the evidence went, he was bound to say there appeared much to justify or account for the course adopted by Lord Torrington in suppressing the insurrection; but, at the same time, he thought that there must have been many things done that the actual circumstances of the country did not justify. Lord Torrington was apparently supported by all the authorities—civil, military, and legal—in proclaiming martial law; but it appeared that he must have been misled or misinformed in continuing that measure for so great a length of time. The Chief Secretary of the Colony, Sir Emerson Tennent, had in his evidence fully supported that policy, and all that had been done upon the occasion; but other evidence had been given which went far to show that there must have been considerable ignorance of the circumstances, condition, and feelings of the people in the districts where the disturbances broke out, and that less severity would have been sufficient. The evidence, however, throughout was unsatisfactory, and consisted chiefly of that of official persons who were at variance with each other. In reply to some observations which had been made as to the length of time occupied by this Committee, and which had led to no result, it should be remembered that the case of Ceylon was not the only one referred to the Committee, and that the affairs of British Guiana wore also made the subject of investigation, and occupied a very large portion of their time last Session. Under these circumstances, and considering that the task which devolved upon the Committee was a difficult one, he thought that some of the observations made upon it might have been spared.

MR. BRIGHT

wished to ask the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he understood him right when he fanceid him to say that this postponement of the printing of the evidence was intended to be temporary? From some of the observations of the hon. and learned Member for Dundalk, it would seem as if the evidence ought not to be printed now, but might be got ready for the use of the House next Session. The hon. and learned Member referred to the hardship that some parties would suffer from the printing of evidence now. If it were only the object of the Government to prevent that hardship, it put the matter in quite a different light. He was of opinion also that the Amendment of the hon. Gentleman was not put in the proper form, as Her Majesty's Government were not known in that House as any legal and constitutional body; and he thought that the latter part of it should be left out, as the Secretary of State was the only responsible party on the question. The hon. Under Secretary of State for the Colonies made several statements, and others were made by the hon. Member for Montrose. They contradicted each other in the most undoubted and decided manner, though he believed that both hon. Gentlemen believed what they stated to he true. If, however, that contradiction did take place in such statements, it was the more necessary that the House should have the entire evidence before it. The hon. Under Secretary for the Colonies told them that there was not a circumstance before the Committee on which they should be called upon to take any step before they had had certain private letters before them. But they should recollect that the Government had taken a step by recalling the Governor, and had expressed their condemnation of the policy which he had pursued. It was to be regretted that certain letters of a private nature had been brought forward. He himself regretted that they should be brought forward; but if the tranquillity and the good government of the colony had been ensured by the publication of these letters, he would not consider it to be a very great misfortune. If they had not been produced, Lord Torrington would still be the Governor. He thought that this case ought to give the hon. Under Secretary for the Colonies, and the noble Lord who was his chief, a warning with regard to the government of Ceylon and the Ionian Islands and other dependencies. It occurred that when an insurrection took place in either of these places, the noble Lord, without knowing anything of the facts of the case, sent out a despatch giving the sanc- tion of the Government to the course of conduct that had been pursued by the Governor. But when the matter came to be examined in this case, it was found out that his conduct deserved anything but their approval. He felt that if a similar inquiry took place with regard to the Ionian Islands, a similar result would take place. He thought when such occurrences took place in any of their colonies, a full and fair investigation should be held, whether the population were black or white. Though he fully appreciated the abilities of the noble Lord, and took into consideration the weight of the duties which devolved on his hon. Friend the Under Secretary for the Colonies, yet he thought that they had not taken the course which it was proper for them to take, and he called upon them to consider whether they should not grant such an inquiry as was sought for before they involved the Queen, the Government, and the country in the consequences of such deplorable occurrences.

SIR J. HOGG

was sorry the hon. Gentleman the Member for Montrose had not taken this discussion on a distinct Motion. [Mr. HUME: I have done so.] No, the hon. Gentleman had taken it on a Motion to print the evidence; and it was competent for him to take it on the policy of Lord Torrington alone, for everything relating to the declaration of martial law, and the evidence in reference thereto, had been laid on the table of the House and printed, and might be referred to by every Member of the House, if the hon. Gentleman had brought forward a distinct Motion calling attention to the evidence that was published. Now, the complaint against the Committee was, that they had taken upon themselves, contrary to the duty and usage of the Committee, to state what evidence ought to lie upon the table. He contended that it was perfectly competent for the Committee to do so. It was a thing of every day's experience; but the House might overrule the decision of the Committee. But when the proceedings of a Committee were produced before the House, and it appeared from those proceedings that only two out of the twelve members of the Committee were favourable to the printing of the evidence; the good sense of the House would be generally found to be in accordance with the majority of the Committee. After the Motion to print the evidence had been negatived by the Committee, another propo- sition was made to print those portions of the evidence which were not private and confidential. That Motion was agreed to, and three of the Members of the Committee undertook to sever the two portions of the evidence. When those hon. Members had concluded their labours, the hon. Chairman of the Committee and the hon. Member for Montrose stated that it would be contrary to usage if the Committee were to delegate their functions to those hon. Members. They refused to receive their report, and expressed themselves ready to sit and go through the whole of the evidence line by line. Subsequently a resolution was come to, to the effect that it would be impossible to sever the private from the public evidence—that the task was hopeless. The previous Motion of the Committee was accordingly reconsidered, and it was finally decided that as they could not publish the whole of the evidence, it would be better to publish none at all. Such was what he must term the history of the evidence. The Committee then considered that although the evidence could not be laid before the House, it was of importance that the attention of Her Majesty's Government should be called to it. There was nothing criminal in the conduct of the Committee with respect to their deciding upon taking that course, although it had been decided by Mr. Speaker to be informal, and the more regular course was adopted of laying the evidence upon the table of the House, with a view to its being referred to the noble Lord the Secretary for the Colonies. With respect to the evidence itself, he perfectly agreed with what had been stated in the course of the debate—that a great deal of the evidence ought never to have been offered, and when offered not received. Upon the reception, however, of the evidence, it was perfectly well understood that it should not pass beyond the room. The first deviation from the correct mode of proceeding, namely, that of the reception of the evidence, had led the Committee into the whole of its errors, for it was found impossible to separate completely the private from the public evidence, inasmuch as a great portion of the private evidence was explanatory, and referred to that which was public; and if the Committee had struck out the private evidence, they must also have struck out that portion of the public to which it referred. A great portion of the private evidence was mere idle gossip of the worst descrip- tion, and certainly ought not to be published, until, in consequence of some change in the state of things, it could be done with greater safety; and a change of circumstances must soon inevitably take place, for the evidence showed such a state of social disorganisation in the island as rendered it impossible for things to remain much longer as they were; and he was perfectly ready to admit that individual and private feeling should not be allowed to stand in the way of any beneficial change in the condition of Ceylon. A great deal had been said with respect to the murders and atrocities committed by Lord Torrington. It was not his intention to go into that subject; but the impression made on the minds of the hon. Member for Montrose and an hon. Baronet who was a Member of the Committee, and who took views most hostile to the conduct and administration of Lord Torrington, by the evidence given on the subject of those atrocities, was clearly shown in the two draft reports submitted to the Committee by those hon. Members; and he felt confident, if the evidence were to be judged of by the language now in those reports, there would not have been found three Members of the Committee who would have come to the conclusion that the conduct of Lord Torrington was reprehensible in proclaiming martial law. He hoped, therefore, that the House would adopt the Amendment before it. He admitted that the report of the Committee was a most unsatisfactory one—it was a say-nothing report, and a do-nothing report; but he trusted that no injustice would be done to an absent nobleman by the publication of the evidence.

MR. HUME

stated that in his draft report he had characterised the conduct of Lord Torrington as unnecessary and unjustifiable, and it was purely out of mercy that he had not made use of stronger terms. The great importance of the documents which were kept back was shown by the fact that nothing would have been done to Lord Torrington by the Government, except for that "Ceylon gossip," as it had been called. The Government were only injuring themselves in the course which they had taken in this matter; and one of his (Mr. Hume's) first acts in the next Session would be to bring the whole subject before the House, and he would give notice of his intention to do so before the present Session closed; and, what was more, he would carry out his Motion, and would endeavour by all means in his power to persuade the House to instruct the Attorney General to prosecute Lord Torrington. He would not trouble the House by dividing, but would, with its consent, withdraw his Motion.

Amendment and Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

Ordered— That the Minutes of the Evidence taken before the Select Committee on Ceylon, be referred to the Secretary of State for the Colonies, for the consideration of Her Majesty's Government.

The House adjourned at a quarter before Nine o'clock till Wednesday.