Lords Sitting of 21 February 1873

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILL—First Reading—Marriage with a Deceased Wife's Sister* (21).
FOREIGN DECORATIONS.

  MOTION FOR AN ADDRESS.
  LORD HOUGHTONrose to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, If it is his intention to interfere with the acceptance of foreign decorations that may be awarded to any British subjects engaged or employed in the Vienna Exhibition of 1873, not being in Her Majesty's service? and to move an Address for certain Correspondence, and said: My Lords, I do not know that I should have considered the subject I have placed on the Paper of sufficient importance to be brought before your Lordships' House had I not accidentally been placed in a position which has forced upon my mind a strong conviction that under cover of the general principle that has been adopted in regard to these matters, much individual injustice has been committed. The point to which I wish to direct the attention of my noble Friend the Foreign Secretary is the position in which the rules of the Office over which he presides, as to the prevention of Her Majesty's subjects from receiving any foreign decoration or honour, may place foreign Sovereigns who, either through private friendship or from public reasons, may wish to confer such a distinction on any of our countrymen. But I am anxious, in the first place, very clearly to lay down what points in this matter I do not wish to interfere with. I shall feel obliged to my noble Friend to consider this point particularly, because no doubt what I am about to say might otherwise be misinterpreted. I have no intention to interfere with the conduct of Her Majesty's Government—or rather of Her
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  Majesty herself—as to any decoration, honour, office, or promotion, or any matter of that kind, in connection with persons in Her Majesty's service. Over all such matters Her Majesty must maintain the most absolute authority; and unless in some very peculiar case, in which public opinion is directed against them, all necessary regulations are made and are acted upon without difficulty. I wish, therefore, distinctly to state that I do not wish to interfere with any rule that has been made or may hereafter be made with regard to such persons as may be holding commissions under Her Majesty in respect to their receiving or wearing the decorations of the Sovereign of any foreign country. Nor, on the other hand, would I seek to interfere with any regulation Her Majesty may choose to make with regard to her own Court. These must depend entirely on her own will. Such being the case, I wish to direct my noble Friend's attention to some facts which I will now state. In 1867, I had the gratification of being one of Her Majesty's Commissioners in connection with the International Exhibition at Paris. With others, I took an active part in the management of that Exhibition, and in the distribution of the prizes, and in the recommendation of such exhibitors who were thought fit to receive some honour or reward, and I know that among the persons on whom it was thought fit to bestow honour or reward in the shape of a medal were many British subjects. That form of honour was no doubt, most satisfactory to those who obtained it. But there were also a considerable number of persons engaged in that Exhibition to whom it would have been inappropriate to accord medals or any such recognition for the trouble they had taken or the merit they had shown in connection with the Exhibition. Many of the persons who assisted in the way I did myself were men distinguished in science, art, or literature; and there were also persons who, though not equally distinguished, had taken great trouble in the management of the Exhibition, and had been very useful to others. When the rewards were to be distributed, I was asked to draw out a list of persons who were to receive such form of approbation as it might please the Emperor of the French to confer on them. The same request

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  was made of other gentlemen connected with the Exhibition as I was. But the other day I was surprised to find that while the services of the subjects of every other nation had been recognised in the only manner they could have been, some communication had taken place between the French Government and the head of our Foreign Office, who considered it impossible that any British subject could be allowed to receive such reward for his labour and services. I quite understand that a distinction might have been drawn as between myself and others, who, being Commissioners, were Her Majesty's representatives on the occasion, and persons who did not hold any sort of commission from the Crown. Indeed, I think it to be fully in accordance with the spirit of the Regulations on the subject that persons in the position we held should be held to be inhibited from receiving decorations. But there was some interference on the part of the Foreign Office which prevented the persons to whom I allude from being properly and justly rewarded. It did strike me as such a flagrant injustice that I now call attention to it. I do not wish it to be repeated. In the International Exhibition of 1855, under the presidency of Prince Napoleon, where the circumstances were entirely similar, no such inhibition was placed on British subjects—they stood in the same position as the subjects of other nations. Several Members of both Houses of Parliament were decorated at that time with the Legion of Honour; and I believe the same thing occurred with regard to all the Exhibitions that have taken place in Europe. There is now to be another of those occasions when great public interest will be excited, and when it is to be desired that England should make the best appearance possible. I think it would be a great discouragement to all English subjects who have anything to do with the preparations for the Vienna Exhibition if they heard that this special prohibition was to be in force against them, and that whatever the trouble and expense to which they might be put, and whatever the services they might render, they would be debarred by some unknown and mysterious regulation from accepting any recognition by Order or decoration which it might please the Emperor of Austria to wish to confer upon them. In 1855 Lord Elcho, Mr.
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  Redgrave, Mr. Wheatstone, Mr. De la Rue, and other gentlemen received decorations, and several of them would have received additional decorations in 1867 but for the interference of the Foreign Office, and this, no doubt, was the cause of great discontent. Englishmen not in the service of Her Majesty are at liberty to do anything against which there is no positive command, and I am not aware that there is any Act of Parliament against their receiving foreign decorations; nor do I know of the right of inhibition in this matter having been exercised in any such formal way as to make Englishmen regard it as the duty of every loyal subject to submit himself to the rule laid down in 1867. There was a circumstance in connection with the action of the Foreign Office on that occasion which went to show how entirely it was optional. One would have supposed that if such a rule ought to apply to any portion of Her Majesty's subjects not holding commissions, it ought to apply to them all; but, as a matter of fact, subjects of Her Majesty from Canada and from all other British Colonies received decorations in 1867, and were thus allowed to stand on the same footing with people of all other nations. It is a great object in International Exhibitions that no distinction should be drawn between the subjects of one nation and the subjects of another; and I believe it will produce a feeling of great discomfort if my noble Friend at the head of the Foreign Office should say that he will consider it his duty to prevent any English subject from accepting a decoration of the kind to which I refer at the forthcoming Vienna Exhibition. My noble Friend will see that this matter, though apparently frivolous, touches the feelings of many of Her Majesty's subjects. My noble Friend will remember that Lord Macaulay received the Order of Merit from the King of Prussia; and I think it would not be grateful to the feelings of an Englishman distinguished in literature or art to hear that, in consequence of some mysterious regulation, he would not be allowed to accept such an Order if offered to him by the Monarch of the German Empire. I beg to ask my noble Friend, Whether it is his intention to interfere with the acceptance of foreign decorations that may be awarded to any British subjects engaged or employed in the

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  Vienna Exhibition of 1873, not being in Her Majesty's service? Further, I beg to move for a copy of the Correspondence that passed between the French Government and our Foreign Office in 1867 on the subject of Foreign Decorations.
  Moved that an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty for, Return of any correspondence that may have passed between the Foreign Office and the Government of France with regard to decorations that might be offered for British subjects engaged or employed in the International Exhibition of Paris.—(The Lord Houghton.)
  EARL GRANVILLE: Before I reply to my noble Friend, I beg to repeat an observation which I made to him when he told me he had put his Notice on the Paper. I told him then that I thought he had couched his Question in a somewhat invidious form, because it represents me as having needlessly and officiously interfered with the grant of honours due to certain persons in this country. My Lords, I can assure my noble Friend that that is not the case. With regard to the particular instance to which my noble Friend has more particularly referred, I only took the course which it has been my duty to adopt on previous occasions. I was myself connected with the International Exhibition held in 1867, alluded to by the noble Lord, and the French Government asked me whether Her Majesty's Government had any objection to the acceptance by certain British subjects connected with the Exhibition of the Legion d'Honneur. It was my duty to answer, that in accordance with the Regulations in existence, no such permission could be given. To individuals who asked me the same question I had, as a matter of course, to give the same reply. The noble Lord speaks as if this Regulation dated only since 1855. I believe it has been held for centuries that orders from foreign Sovereigns could not be held by English subjects without the consent of their own Sovereign. My noble Friend's historical knowledge must have put him in possession of the saying of Queen Elizabeth—that she did not like her dogs to wear any collar but her own. The same sentiment was repeated in a more bucolic manner by George III. when he said he liked his sheep to be marked with his own mark. I do not say, my Lords, that there was not something coarse in this somewhat despotic observation;
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  but it contains the germ of good sense, and a right appreciation of the national feeling that for Englishmen, at all events, the Sovereign should be the only fountain of honour. My Lords, with regard to the instances referred to by my noble Friend as those in which he says that no objection was made to the reception of foreign decorations by Englishmen, I do not know anything about them. Lord Elcho may have the Legion of Honour, but certainly I never saw Lord Elcho with a decoration on his breast. In the reign of Queen Elizabeth two exceptions were permitted. Her Majesty allowed the Duke of Norfolk and the Earl of Leicester to accept decorations from the King of France; but when another gentleman ventured to act on these two exceptions and take the Order, Queen Elizabeth's proceedings were very summary—the offender was committed to close imprisonment in the Fleet, and was forced to return the Order. No further steps were taken in respect of foreign Orders till George III.'s time, when the inconvenience became so manifest that in 1812—and not in 1855, as my noble Friend seems to suppose—the Regulation to which my noble Friend has alluded was drawn up on the recommendation of Lord Castlereagh. According to the terms of this Regulation no subject of Her Majesty is allowed to accept any Order of a foreign State unless the same is conferred in consequence of active and distinguished service against an enemy, either at sea or in the field, or unless he is actually employed in the service of the Sovereign who confers the distinction. There is one exception to the rule so laid down, and it is only fair that I should mention it. When the Sovereign of this country sends a person to a foreign Sovereign with an Order, it has been the; custom to allow that person to receive an Order from the Sovereign to whom he is sent. It appears to me that this exception does not stand on such clear ground as do the cases of the persons mentioned in the Regulation; but there is, at all events, this great distinction between it and the case of individuals generally—that the person who is sent out to another Sovereign with an Order is in some degree selected for the receipt of a decoration by his own Sovereign, because she knows when she sends him on his mission that he is sure to be offered the de-

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  coration. I must say that I think the noble Lord weakened his case when he said he did not wish in any way to include persons in the service of the Queen. Without wishing to detract from the merits of other persons, there is an instinctive feeling that such honours are more suitable to men who have risked their lives with the soldiers or sailors of another country against a common enemy than they are to persons engaged in peaceful pursuits; but I think also that persons in the Civil Service would have great reason to complain if they alone, of all the community, were to be debarred from receiving such honours. I had the honour to be sent to Moscow to the coronation of the Emperor of Russia at a time when I had not yet had the honour to be enrolled in that distinguished and historic Order of which since then, though most unworthy, I have been made a member. Well, my Lords, at that time, not from any merit of my own, but owing to circumstances, I had had the offer of several foreign Orders which, as a matter of course, I had refused; and my noble Friend now beside me (the Earl of Kimberley), who was then our Minister at the Court of Russia, and myself, and our Secretaries, appeared at the coronation of the Emperor, without a single decoration, while the breast of every person around us was covered with decorations. I remember, my Lords, that on that occasion several members of the diplomatic circle reminded me of what Prince Metternich said at the Congress of Vienna, when it was pointed out to him that Lord Castlereagh was the only representative at the Congress who bore no decoration, and added that although they wore foreign Orders themselves, they had seen at particular times, and with particular objects, Orders given in such a manner as made them of opinion that our rule was the best. The remark of Prince Metternich was—"Ma foi, c'est bien distingué." I think, my Lords, the Regulation on this subject is sound and good; and when the noble Lord says that he wishes exceptions to be made to the rule, my reply is that it is impossible to make exceptions at all without breaking down the whole thing. The noble Lord seems to think that before 1867 there was no difficulty in the way of any one wearing any decoration that might have been offered to and received by him, and he has referred to
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  the case of Lord Macaulay and the Order of Merit. When that Order was offered to Lord Macaulay my noble Friend (Lord Malmesbury) filled the office of Foreign Secretary; and what was his reply when asked for a permission? He said that, with the greatest respect for Lord Macaulay, the rule against English subjects being permitted to accept foreign decorations was one to which no exception could be made, however distinguished the person to whom the Order was offered. I am sure my noble Friend will not accuse me of wishing to undervalue the Vienna Exhibition; but how could an exception be made in respect of this particular Exhibition? I should have thought that this would have appeared clear to one with the literary merits and cosmopolitan experience of my noble Friend. I may refer to a case that occurred during the last war. The Legion of Honour was offered to Colonel Loyd Lindsay, who already bore the Victoria Cross on his breast, who was in every way worthy of the honour the French Government offered to confer upon him, and in whose case an exception to our general rule would, I venture to think, have been equally agreeable to Germany as to France. But I should have been obliged to make the same answer in his case as I have in all others, if from other reasons he had not been entitled to wear it. I wish to point out some of the difficulties which would probably have arisen from a compliance with the application for permission in Colonel Loyd Lindsay's case. He had distinguished himself in bringing aid to the wounded; but at the same time he was doing that, there were others engaged in it. In France, there were subjects of Her Majesty engaged in it who might have been influenced by political and religious feelings. Some of them belonged to the Home Rule party. If permission to wear a foreign decoration were given to these persons, the exception would have been made in favour of men who to some extent deny the supremacy of the Sovereign; but if the distinction was offered to them on the ground of their being engaged in a humane work, your Lordships will see what a difficulty would have arisen in their case. With regard to the rule itself, I think it is a good and wise one to maintain. I have no doubt that if this rule were abrogated there would

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  be a small percentage of Englishmen intriguing at the great and small Courts for the purpose of bringing home on their breasts decorations, in some instances of considerable consequence, but in other instances signifying not the value of one brass farthing in the mind of anyone knowing anything of those matters. I have no desire to interfere to prevent honour being bestowed on any man who is worthy of it; but I think it is impossible your Lordships can fail to see the necessity for a stringent rule on the subject of foreign decorations. I should like to add that at the time of the International Exhibition of 1862, this subject was discussed at a meeting of Members of both sides of this and the other House of Parliament, and of the representatives from the chief manufacturing and commercial centres. A proposal that permission ought to be given to Englishmen to receive foreign decorations was introduced at that meeting by a friend of mine, but it received no support, and his motion was either withdrawn or rejected. I think that fact shows that, whatever may be said of individual cases, there is a general feeling in favour of such a Regulation as that to which my noble Friend raises an objection.
  EARL STANHOPEsaid, that during the short time that he held the office of Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, he had occasion to consider this question fully. He then came to the same conclusion as the noble Earl the present Foreign Secretary—that it was of paramount importance to uphold the principle that the Sovereign was the sole fountain of honour; and therefore he was quite prepared to express his opinion in favour of the Regulation in favour of which his noble Friend had spoken so strongly. Great inconveniences would follow if that Regulation were to be repealed; and to make occasional exceptions at the choice of the Secretary of State would be of invidious tendency. At the same time, he regretted that there was no Order emanating from the Crown of England which was applicable to persons who, like those that had been referred to, had spent much time and shown much zeal at foreign Exhibitions, and other useful objects. He thought the Sovereign had not sufficient means of conferring honour on persons who distinguished themselves otherwise than
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  by military services. The Order of the Bath, as at present constituted, did not enable Her Majesty to do it; and he regretted that an Order of Merit, or some such Order, was not instituted in this country. He hoped that some day it would be.
  EARL GREYalso wished to express the satisfaction with which he had listened to the speech of his noble Friend the Secretary for Foreign Affairs. He was satisfied that the rule in existence on this subject was a wholesome one, and that its abrogation would at no distant date lead to serious abuses. He admitted with his noble Friend who had just sat down that there was a good deal to be said in favour of an Order of Merit; but, on the other hand, there were objections to it.
  LORD HOUGHTON,after a few words of explanation, said, he would withdraw his Motion for an Address.
  Motion (by leave of the House) withdrawn.

HORSES—OUR SUPPLY OF HORSES.

  MOTION FOR A SELECT COMMITTEE.
  Moved, That a Select Committee be appointed to inquire into the condition of this country with regard to horses, and its capabilities of supplying any present or future demand for them.—(The Lord Rosebery.)
  Motion agreed to.
  And, on Monday, February 24, the Lords following were named of the Committee:

  D. Cambridge.

  E. Grey.

  Ld. Privy Seal.

  V. Falmouth.

  D. Richmond.

  Ld. Steward.

  M. Lansdowne.

  L. Tyrone.

  M. Ailesbury.

  L. Redesdale.

  E. Portsmouth.

  L. Rosebery.

  E. Malmesbury.

  L. Kesteven.

  E. Lucan.

  L. Balchford.

  And, on Tuesday, February 25, His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales added.
  And, on Thursday, February 27, The Lord Strathnairn added, in the place of The Earl of Lucan.
  House adjourned at Six o'clock, to Monday next, Eleven o'clock.