Online Encyclopedia
Search over 40,000 articles from the original, classic Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th Edition.
FLOOD, HENRY (1732-1791)
Online EncyclopediaEncyclopedia Home :: FLA-FRA
del.icio.us it!
|
See also:FLOOD, See also: But during the viceroyalty of See also:Lord Townsend the See also:aristocracy, and more particularly these " undertakers " as they were called, were made to understand that for the future their privileges in this respect would be curtailed. When, therefore, an opportunity was taken by the government in 1768 for reasserting the constitutional subordination of the Irish parliament, these powerful classes were thrown into temporary See also:alliance with Flood. In the following year, in accordance with the established See also:procedure,. a See also:money bill was sent over by the privy council in London for See also:acceptance by the Irish House of Commons. Not only was it rejected, but contrary to See also:custom a See also:reason for this course was assigned, namely, that the bill had not originated in the Irish House. In consequence parliament was peremptorily prorogued, and a See also:recess of fourteen months was employed by the government in securing a majority by the most extensive corruption.' Nevertheless when parliament met in See also:February 1771 another money bill was thrown out on the See also:motion of Flood; and the next year Lord Townsend, the lord See also:lieutenant whose policy had provoked this conflict, was recalled. The struggle was the occasion of a publication, famous in its See also:day, called Baralariarta, to which ' See also:Walpole's See also:George III., iv. 348. 525 of powerful letters after the his collaborators being Henry Flood contributed a See also:series manner of See also:Junius, one of Grattan. The success which had thus far attended Flood's efforts had placed him in a position such as no Irish politician had previously attained. He had, as an eminent historian of Ireland observes, proved himself beyond all comparison the greatest popular orator that his country had yet produced, and also a consummate See also:master of parliamentary See also:tactics. Under parliamentary conditions that were exceedingly unfavourable, and in an See also:atmosphere charged with corruption, venality and subserviency, he had created a party before which ministers had begun to See also:quail, and had inoculated the See also:Protestant constituencies with a genuine spirit• of See also:liberty and self-reliance."' Lord See also:Harcourt, who succeeded Townsend as See also:viceroy, saw that Flood must be See also:con-ciliated at any See also:price " rather than See also:risk the opposition of so formidable a See also:leader." Accordingly, in 1775, Flood was offered and accepted a seat in the privy council and the See also:office of See also:vice-treasurer with a See also:salary of £3500 a year. For this step he has been severely criticized. The See also:suggestion that he acted corruptly in the See also:matter is groundless; and although it is true that he lost See also:influence from the moment he became a See also:minister of the crown, Flood may reasonably have held that he had a better prospect of advancing his policy by the leverage of a ministerial position than by means of any opposition party he could See also:hope to See also:muster in an unreformed House of Commons.' The result, however; Was that the leadership of the national party passed from Flood to Grattan, who entered the Irish parliament in the same session that Flood became a minister. Flood continued in office for nearly seven years. During this See also:long period he necessarily remained silent on the subject of the independence of the Irish parliament, and had to be content with advocating See also:minor reforms as occasion offered. He was thus instrumental in obtaining bounties on the export of Irish See also:corn to See also:foreign countries and some other trifling commercial concessions. Qn the other See also:hand he failed to procure the passing of a Habeas Corpus bill and a bill for making the See also:judges irremovable, while his support of Lord See also:North's See also:American policy still more gravely injured his popularity and reputation. But an important event in 1778 led indirectly to his recovering to some extent his former position in the country; this event was the alliance of See also:France with the revolted American colonies. Ireland was thereby placed in peril of a See also:French invasion, while the English government could provide no troops to defend the See also:island. The celebrated volunteer See also:movement was then set on See also:foot to meet the emergency; in a few See also:weeks more than 40,000 men, disciplined and equipped, were under arms, officered by the country gentry, and controlled by the See also:wisdom and patriotism of Lord See also:Charlemont. This volunteer force, in which Flood was a See also:colonel, while vigilant for the See also:defence of the island, soon made itself See also:felt in politics. A Volunteer See also:Convention, formed with all the See also:regular organization of a representative See also:assembly, but wielding the See also:power of an See also:army, began menacingly to demand the removal of the commercial restrictions which were destroying Irish prosperity. Under this pressure the government gave way; the whole colonial trade was in 1779 thrown open to Ireland for the first time, and other concessions were also extorted. Flood, who had taken an active though not a leading See also:part in this movement, now at last resigned his office to rejoin his old party. He found to his chagrin that his former services had been to a great extent: forgotten, and that he was eclipsed by Grattan. When in a debate on the constitutional question in 1779 Flood complained of the small See also:consideration shown him in relation to a subject which he had been the first to agitate, he was reminded that by the See also:civil See also:law " if a man should See also:separate from his wife, and abandon her for seven years, another might then take her and give her his See also:protection." But though Flood had lost See also:control of the movement for independence of the Irish parliament, the agitation, backed as it now was by the Volunteer Convention 2 W. E. H. See also:Lecky, Leaders of Public Opinion in Ireland (enlarged edition, 2 vols., 1903), I. 48. 3 nee See also:Hardy's Life of Charlemont, i. 356. and by increasing signs of popular disaffection, led at last in 1782 to the concession of the demand, together with a number of other important reforms (see GRATTAN, HENRY). No sooner, however, was this great success gained than a question arose—known as the See also:Simple See also:Repeal controversy—as to whether See also:England, in addition to the repeal of the Acts on which the subordination of the Irish parliament had been based, should not be required expressly to renounce for the future all claim to control Irish legislation. The chief See also:historical importance of this dispute is that it led to the memorable rupture of friendship between Flood and Grattan, each of whom assailed the other with unmeasured but magnificently eloquent invective in the House of Commons. Flood's view prevailed—for a Renunciation See also:Act such as he advocated was ungrudgingly passed by the English parliament in 1783—and for a time he regained popularity at the expense of his rival. Flood next (28th of See also:November 1783) introduced a reform bill, after first submitting it to the Volunteer Convention. The bill, which contained no See also:provision for giving the franchise to Roman Catholics—a proposal which Flood always opposed—was rejected, ostensibly on the ground that the attitude of the See also:volunteers threatened the freedom of parliament. The volunteers were perfectly loyal to the crown and the connexion with England. They carried an address to the king, moved by Flood, expressing the hope that their support of parliamentary reform might be imputed to nothing but a sober and laudable See also:desire to uphold the constitution . . . and to perpetuate the cordial See also:union of both kingdoms." The convention then dissolved, though Flood had desired, in opposition to Grattan, to continue it as a means of putting pressure on parliament for the purpose of obtaining reform. In 1776 Flood had made an See also:attempt to enter the English House of Commons. In 1783 he tried again, this time with success. He See also:purchased a seat for See also:Winchester from the See also:duke of See also:Chandos, and for the next seven years he was a member at the same time of both the English and Irish parliaments. He reintroduced, but without success, his reform bill in the Irish House in 1784; supported the movement for protecting Irish See also:industries; but See also:short-sightedly opposed See also:Pitt's commercial propositions in 1785. He remained a See also:firm opponent of Roman Catholic emancipation, even defending the penal See also:laws on the ground that after the Revolution they " were not laws of persecution but of See also:political necessity "; but after 1786 he does not appear to have attended the parliament in Dublin. In the House at See also:Westminster, where he refused to enrol himself as a member of either political party, he was not successful. His first speech, in opposition to See also:Fox's See also:India Bill on the 3rd of See also:December 1783, disappointed the expectations aroused by his celebrity. His speech in opposition to the commercial treaty with France in 1787 was, however, most able; and in 1790 he introduced a reform bill which Fox declared to be the best See also:scheme of reform that had yet been proposed, and which in See also:Burke's opinion retrieved Flood's reputation. But at the See also:dissolution in the same year he lost his seat in both parliaments, and he then retired to Farmley, his See also:residence in See also:county Kilkenny, where he died on the 2nd of December 1791. When See also:Peter Burrowes, notwithstanding his See also:close personal friendship with Grattan, declared that Flood was " perhaps the ablest man Ireland ever produced, indisputably the ablest man of his own times," he expressed what was probably the See also:general opinion of Flood's contemporaries. Lord Charlemont, who knew him intimately though not always in agreement with his policy, pronounced him to be " a man of consummate ability." He also declared that avarice made no part of Flood's See also:character. Lord Mountmorres, a critic by no means partial to Flood, described him as a pre-eminently truthful man, and one who detested flattery. Grattan, who even after the famous See also:quarrel never lost his respect for Flood, said of him that he was the best tempered and the most sensible man in the See also:world. In his youth he was genial, See also:frank, sociable and witty; but in later years disappointment made him gloomy and taciturn. As an oYator he was less polished, less epigrammatic than Grattan; but a closer reasoner and a greater master of See also:sarcasm and invective. Personal ambition often governed his actions, but his political judgment was usuallysound; and it was the opinion of See also:Bentham that Flood would have succeeded in carrying a reform bill which might have preserved Irish parliamentary independence, if he had been supported by Grattan and the See also:rest of his party in keeping alive the Volunteer Convention in 1783. Though he never wavered in See also:loyalty to the See also:British crown and See also:empire, Ireland never produced a more sincere patriot than Henry Flood. See Warden Flood, See also:Memoirs of Henry Flood (London, 1838) ; Henry Grattan, Memoirs of the Life and Times of the Right Hon. H. Grattan (5 vols., London, 1839–1846) ; See also: See also:Mus.) ; also The Charlemont Papers, and Irish Parl. Debates, vols. i.-iv.). (R. J. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
» Add information or comments to this article.
Please link directly to this article:
Highlight the code below, right click, and select "copy." Then paste it into your website, email, or other HTML. Site content, images, and layout Copyright © 2006 - Net Industries, worldwide. |
|
|
[back] FLOOD PLAIN |
[next] FLOOR (from O. Eng. flor, a word common to many Teu... |