Source.—Annual Register, vol. 106; English History, p. 7.

Attack on Earl Russell’s Foreign Policy by Lord Derby (February 4).

He then called the attention of the House to the portion of the Queen’s speech relating to foreign affairs. Her Majesty’s Government had for two or three years past mainly rested their claim to public confidence on their foreign policy. They had abandoned the question of Parliamentary Reform the moment it had served the purpose of putting them in office. The fulfilment of the promises they had made was defeated by Lord Russell, and when he was transferred to the more serene atmosphere of the House of Lords, he pronounced the funeral oration of Reform. He had told them ... “to rest and be thankful,” and from that time their foreign policy had been the groundwork of the claim of Her Majesty’s Government to public confidence. I think, proceeded Lord Derby, that at the commencement the foreign policy of the noble Earl opposite might be summed up in the affirmation of the principle of non-intervention in the internal affairs of other countries, the extension of Liberal principles by the exercise of our moral interference, and, above all, the maintenance of uninterrupted and cordial relations with the Emperor of the French. We were told more than once that the present Government was the only one to maintain a good understanding with the Emperor of the French, or, at least, that its predecessor could not possibly have done so, and that, if the country desired to preserve cordial relations between itself and France, Her Majesty’s present advisers, and especially the noble Earl opposite, were the only persons qualified to secure that most desirable object.

Now, my lords, as to non-intervention in the internal affairs of other countries, when I look around me I fail to see what country there is, in the internal affairs of which the noble Earl has not interfered.

“Nihil intactum reliquit, nihil tetigit quod”—I cannot say, “non ornavit,” but “non conturbavit.” The foreign policy of the noble Earl, as far as the principle of non-intervention is concerned, may be summed up in two homely but expressive words—“meddle” and “muddle.” During the whole course of his diplomatic correspondence, wherever he has interfered—and he has interfered everywhere—he has been lecturing, scolding, blustering, and retreating. Seriously—for though there may be something ludicrous about it, the matter is of too great importance to be treated only in a light and jocular manner—I cannot but feel as an Englishman that I am lowered and humiliated in my own estimation, and in that of other nations, by the result of the noble Earl’s administration of foreign affairs. Thanks to the noble Earl and the present Government, we have at this moment not one single friend in Europe, and, more than that, this country, the chief fault of which was that it went too direct and straightforward at what it aimed, which never gave a promise without the intention of performing, which never threatened without a full determination of striking, which never made a demand without being prepared to enforce it, this country is now in such a position, that its menaces are disregarded, its magniloquent language is ridiculed, and its remonstrances are treated with contemptuous indifference by the small as well as by the great Powers of the Continent. With regard to the policy of keeping up a good understanding with France, there is hardly a single question in which Her Majesty’s Ministers have not thwarted the policy of the Emperor. From the Mexican expedition it had withdrawn, and it had not supported the Emperor’s policy in relation to the Confederate States of America. It had also declined the Emperor’s proposition of a Congress.