Sir William Harcourt | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Whewell Professor of International Law | |
| Succeeded by | Henry Maine |
| Leader of the Opposition | |
| In office 6 October 1896 – 8 December 1898 | |
| Preceded by | The Earl of Rosebery |
| Succeeded by | Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman |
| Chancellor of the Exchequer | |
| In office 18 August 1892 – 21 June 1895 | |
| Prime Minister | William Ewart Gladstone The Earl of Rosebery |
| Preceded by | George Goschen |
| Succeeded by | Sir Michael Hicks Beach, Bt |
| In office 6 February 1886 – 20 July 1886 | |
| Prime Minister | William Ewart Gladstone |
| Preceded by | Sir Michael Hicks Beach, Bt |
| Succeeded by | Lord Randolph Churchill |
| Home Secretary | |
| In office 28 April 1880 – 23 June 1885 | |
| Prime Minister | William Ewart Gladstone |
| Preceded by | R. A. Cross |
| Succeeded by | R. A. Cross |
| Born | (1827-10-14)14 October 1827 |
| Died | 1 October 1904(1904-10-01) (aged 76) |
| Nationality | British |
| Alma mater | Trinity College, Cambridge |
| Political party | Liberal |
| Spouse(s) | (1) Maria Theresa Lister (d. 1863) (2) Elizabeth Cabot Motley (d. 1928) |
| Father | William Vernon Harcourt |
| Relatives | Edward Venables-Vernon-Harcourt (paternal grandfather) George Harcourt (uncle) |
Sir William George Granville Venables Vernon Harcourt,KC (14 October 1827 – 1 October 1904) was a British lawyer, journalist andLiberal statesman. He was Member of Parliament forOxford,Derby, thenWest Monmouthshire and held the offices ofHome Secretary andChancellor of the Exchequer underWilliam Ewart Gladstone before becomingLeader of the Opposition. A talented speaker in parliament, he was sometimes regarded as aloof and possessing only an intellectual involvement in his causes. He failed to engender much emotional response in the public and became only a reluctant and disillusioned leader of his party.[1]
HistorianRoy Jenkins says he was "too much of a party man. In manner and by origin he was a patrician figure, but he saw most issues exclusively in terms of parliamentary infighting… His views were usually much more of a reaction to what his political enemies, in the other party and in his own, were saying than the result of any objective thought. He inspired considerable loyalty among his followers – the Great Gladiator he was sometimes enthusiastically called – but his colleagues, partly as a result of his execrable temperament and his bullying… found him a difficult man with whom to work."[2]
Harcourt was the second son ofRev. CanonWilliam Vernon Harcourt, a scientist and owner ofNuneham Park,Nuneham Courtenay,Oxfordshire and his wife Matilda Mary, daughter ofColonel William Gooch.[3] His father was the fourth son and eventually heir ofThe Most Rev.Edward Harcourt,Archbishop of York[3] and his wife Lady Anne Leveson-Gower.[4] Anne was a daughter ofGranville Leveson-Gower, 1st Marquess of Stafford and kinswoman Lady Louisa Egerton. Her maternal grandparents includedScroop Egerton, 1st Duke of Bridgewater and Rachel.[5] Rachel was a daughter ofWriothesley Russell, 2nd Duke of Bedford and the rich heiress Elizabeth, daughter of John Howland of Streatham.[5] William was, due to the family's appendage of a surname to recognise an inheritance, born a Vernon, and his position as a senior heir in the landed Vernon andHarcourt was emphasised by his link to many of the greater English houses, a fact of which he was proud. In later life his descent from thePlantagenets was a joke among his political opponents.[1]
Hisprobate was sworn in the year he died (when he was resident at Nuneham Park and atMalwood in Hampshire) then resworn, over £3000 upward, at ninepence short of£190,265 (equivalent to about £25,900,000 in 2023).[6]
William's childhood was an austere one, educated at home by a Swissgoverness, he was sent to a private school atSouthwell, Nottinghamshire, when he was eight. William's father denied him apublic school education, sending him to be educated inclassics at the small class of Rev. John Owen Parr. In 1840, Parr moved toPreston and William witnessed thePreston bread riots there in 1842. He left Parr in 1844 and, after two more years' study at home, William enteredTrinity College, Cambridge, to pursue his interest in mathematics.[7] At Cambridge he became anApostle, and graduated with first-class honours in the classicstripos in 1851, but he did not enjoy the mathematics, graduating onlysenior optime.[3]
At Cambridge, William rejected his family'sTory instincts and began to write for theMorning Chronicle in support ofSir Robert Peel. William's father encouraged him to seek aCambridge fellowship or a career in politics but William chose law and journalism. He enteredLincoln's Inn in 1852 and wascalled to the bar at theInner Temple in 1854.[3]
He quickly made his mark as a speaker,[1] his reception into London society being eased by his uncleGeorge Harcourt and aunt Frances Waldegrave. From 1855 William started to write for theSaturday Review, becoming increasingly a follower ofWilliam Ewart Gladstone and an opponent ofLord Palmerston. He practised in railway law, commentating, especially inThe Times oninternational law. In 1862, he wrote some famous letters toThe Times over the signature of "Historicus," supportingBritain's neutrality in the American Civil War and condemning the widespread public sympathy for theConfederate States. He also wrote on theTrent Affair and theAlabama controversy.[3][8] He became aQueen's Counsel in 1866, and was appointedWhewell professor of international law at theUniversity of Cambridge in 1869.[1]
Harcourt enteredparliament asLiberal member forOxford, and sat from 1868 to 1880, being appointedSolicitor General andknighted in 1873. He was re-elected in the Liberal victory at the1880 United Kingdom general election and, though he had not been a strong supporter of Gladstone in opposition, he was appointedHome Secretary.[1] A mandatory re-election was then required on acceptance of such an office and Harcourt was defeated byAlexander William Hall by just 54 votes. Though Hall was then unseated for political corruption, a seat was found for Harcourt atDerby, by the voluntary retirement ofSamuel Plimsoll.[3] He continued to co-represent Derby until 1895, when, having been defeated, he found a seat inWest Monmouthshire.[1]
His name became connected with the passing of theGround Game Act 1880 and theArms (Ireland) Act 1881. As Home Secretary at the time of thePhoenix Park killings and the subsequent Londonbombings he reacted rapidly, and theExplosive Substances Act 1883 was passed through all its stages in the shortest time on record. His robust stand onlaw and order brought him into conflict with theIrish members. In 1884 he introduced an aborted bill for unifying the municipal administration of London.[1] and led the demand for a prosecution in thesurvival cannibalism case ofDudley and Stephens, but also advised the Queen to grant clemency, to six months' in prison.[9] In 1885 he similarly saw commutation ofJohn 'Babbacombe' Lee's death penalty tolife imprisonment after his execution failed three times.[10] He was further the victim of the embarrassing stunts of theHarcourt interpolation and theHome Office Baby.[11]
He was recognised as one of the ablest and most effective leaders of the Liberal party and when, after a brief interval in 1885, Gladstone returned to office in 1886, Harcourt was madeChancellor of the Exchequer, an office which he again filled from 1892 to 1895. Between 1880 and 1892 Harcourt acted as Gladstone's political deputy. A first-rate party fighter, his services were of huge value. However, in spite of his great success as a platform speaker, he was generally felt to be speaking from an "advocate'sbrief", and did not impress the public as a conviction politician. It was he who coined the phrase about "stewing inParnellite juice", and, when the split came in the Liberal party on theIrish question, even those who gave Gladstone andJohn Morley the credit of being convincedHome Rulers could not be persuaded that Harcourt had followed anything but the line of party expediency.[1]
In 1894 he introduced and carried a memorablebudget, which equalised thedeath duties onreal andpersonal property. After Gladstone's retirement in 1894 andLord Rosebery's selection asprime minister, Harcourt became the leader of the Liberal party in theHouse of Commons, but it was never probable that he would work comfortably in the new conditions. He had been ignored as Gladstone's successor, and it was evident that Rosebery's ideas of Liberalism and of the policy of the Liberal Party were not those of Harcourt. Their differences were patched up from time to time, but the combination was unstable. However the one significant legacy of the government was the introduction of a high uniform rate of death duties in Harcourt's 1894 budget. Harcourt himself was a second son, and thus unlikely to ever have to pay such duties himself, so it was often quipped that this introduction was a "second son's revenge".[1] However, this proved to not be the case, when Harcourt inherited the Nuneham Park estate in Oxfordshire.
At the1895 elections it was clear that there were divisions as to what issue the Liberals were fighting for.[1] The effect of Harcourt's abortedLocal Veto Bill, which would have given parishes the right to vote on the closure of all localpublic houses,[12] on the election was seen not only in his defeat at Derby, which gave the signal for the Liberal rout, but in the set-back it gave totemperance legislation. Though returned forWest Monmouthshire (1895, 1900), Harcourt's speeches in debate only occasionally showed his characteristic spirit, and it was evident that for the hard work of opposition he no longer had the same motivation as of old.[1] In October 1896 Gladstone, in his last public speech, called for action to support the Armenians who were beingmassacred by their Ottoman rulers. Harcourt backed Gladstone but Rosebery used the incident as an excuse to resign asLeader of the Opposition and Harcourt became an unenthusiastic leader.[3]
During Harcourt's period as leader of the Liberal party in the House of Commons, the all-House enquiry into the failedJameson Raid took place. Harcourt's performance in the enquiry disillusioned sections of the Liberal party, as the Opposition let the Conservative government off the hook by not exposing the involvement of the Colonial SecretaryJoseph Chamberlain in the raid's genesis and preparation, Harcourt instead settling for censure of the Prime Minister of the Cape Colony,Cecil Rhodes.[13][14]
In December 1898 the crisis arrived and, with Morley, Harcourt retired from the party and resigned his Leadership of the Opposition, alleging as his reason, in letters to Morley, the cross-currents of opinion among his old supporters and former colleagues. The split excited considerable comment, and resulted in much heart-searching and a more or less open division between the section of the Liberal party following Rosebery and those who disliked hisimperialism.[1]
Though now a private member, Harcourt still continued to assert his independent position, and his attacks on the government were no longer restrained by any deference to Liberal Imperialism. He actively intervened in 1899 and 1900, strongly condemning the government's financial policy and their attitude towards theTransvaal. Throughout theSecond Boer War he lost no opportunity of criticising the South African developments in a pessimistic vein. A great parliamentary debater, he sprinkled his speeches with humour. From 1898 to 1900 he was conspicuous, both on the platform and in letters toThe Times, in demanding active measures againstRitualism in the Church of England. However, his attitude in this was reflected in his political advocacy ofdisestablishment. In March 1904, just after he had announced his intention not to seek election again to parliament, he succeeded, by the death of his nephew, to the family estates at Nuneham. He found that the estate was in crisis, especially after having to pay the death duties he himself had introduced, and he died suddenly there in the same year.[1]
Harcourt was offered a peerage in 1902 but he declined it in order to stay in the House of Commons, and to allow his son to advance his political career.[15]
On 5 November 1859, Harcourt married his first wife Maria Theresa Lister, known as Therese.[citation needed] She was a daughter of novelistThomas Henry Lister and LadyMaria Theresa Villiers. They had two children:
His first wife died on 1 February 1863, only a day after giving birth to their second and last son. Harcourt remained a widower for thirteen years. On 2 December 1876, he married his second wife Elizabeth Cabot Motley.[17] Elizabeth was a daughter of American historianJohn Lothrop Motley and his wife Mary Benjamin. Her maternal unclePark Benjamin was apatent lawyer and writer on scientific subjects. She had been previously married to naval officer Thomas Poynton Ives. Ives was among the casualties of theAmerican Civil War. By this second marriage, Harcourt had his third and final son:
Attribution
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Chisholm, Hugh (1911). "Harcourt, Sir William George Granville Venables Vernon".Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 12 (11th ed.). pp. 939–940.
| Parliament of the United Kingdom | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Member of Parliament forOxford 1868–1880 With:Edward Cardwell 1868–1874 Alexander William Hall 1874–1880 Joseph William Chitty 1880 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Member of Parliament forDerby 1880–1895 With:Michael Thomas Bass 1880–1883 Thomas Roe 1883–1895 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Member of Parliament forWest Monmouthshire 1895–1904 | Succeeded by |
| Legal offices | ||
| Preceded by | Solicitor-General for England 1873–1874 | Succeeded by |
| Political offices | ||
| Preceded by | Home Secretary 1880–1885 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Chancellor of the Exchequer 1886 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Chancellor of the Exchequer 1892–1895 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Leader of the House of Commons 1894–1895 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Leader of the Opposition 1896–1898 | Succeeded by |
| Party political offices | ||
| Preceded by | Liberal Leader in the Commons 1894–1898 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Leader of the British Liberal Party 1896–1898 withThe Earl of Kimberley | Succeeded by |
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