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Patronage and Revolution: Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France and His Theory of Legislative Corruption

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2014

William Selinger
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Abstract

Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France is most famous and controversial for Burke's opposition to the philosophy behind the Revolution. This essay examines Burke's more practical criticisms of the French National Assembly which pervade the pamphlet, and shows their connection to his earlier arguments about corruption in the House of Commons. Burke's insight into the future course of the French Revolution is based in his distinctive approach to thinking about the pathologies of legislative assemblies, which he initially developed in the House of Commons, and later applied to the French National Assembly.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Review of Politics , Volume 76 , Issue 1 , Winter 2014 , pp. 43 - 67
Copyright
Copyright © University of Notre Dame 2014 

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References

1 See for instance Bromwich, David, A Choice of Inheritance (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989), 43–59Google Scholar; Bullard, Paddy, Edmund Burke and the Art of Rhetoric (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 140–74Google Scholar; White, James Boyd, “Making a Public World: The Constitution of Language and Community in Burke's Reflections,” in When Words Lose Their Meaning (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984), 192–231Google Scholar; and Williams, Raymond, Culture and Society (New York: Columbia University Press, 1983), 4–12Google Scholar. Readers less sympathetic to Burke also focus primarily on his opposition to the ideas behind the French Revolution. See Macpherson, C. B., Burke (New York: Oxford University Press, 1980), 38–70Google Scholar; Robin, Corey, The Reactionary Mind (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), lst–50Google Scholar, 219–41; and Kramnick, Isaac, The Rage of Edmund Burke (New York: Basic Books, 1977), 143–69Google Scholar.

2 See Burke, Edmund, Writings and Speeches, vol. 7, ed. Mitchell, L. G. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989), 243–45Google Scholar, 266, 293. While his prophecy of a Napoleonic ending to the Revolution is most famous, Burke's argument about the corruption of the National Assembly would also be loosely confirmed by fall of the Girondin party, in large part owing to charges of corruption. Of course Burke was not entirely correct in every prediction. For instance he would later acknowledge his surprise at France's financial survival and military success (ibid., 499). However, as Lock, F. P. notes (Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France [London: Allen & Unwin, 1985], 18)Google Scholar, in the years following his death Burke came to be considered a sage because he had articulated in broad outline the Revolution's practical failure.

3 See Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 7:91–104, 117–21, 166–92, 212–93.

4 Ibid., 174, 222–23, 238–43.

5 Burke, Edmund, Writings and Speeches, vol. 2, ed. Langford, Paul (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981)Google Scholar, 280.

6 The political and ideological challenges that being in opposition posed to Rockingham Whigs are analyzed in Brewer, John, Party Ideology and Popular Politics at the Ascension of George III (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), 55–76Google Scholar; as well as Pares, Richard, King George III and the Politicians (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1953)Google Scholar; and Elofson, W. M., The Rockingham Connection and the Second Founding of the Whig Party (Montreal: McGill-Queens University Press, 1996)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

7 For an account of Burke's immediate political aims in writing the pamphlet, as well as his ultimate disappointment with its effects, see Brewer, John, “Party and the Double Cabinet: Two Facets of Burke's Thoughts,” Historical Journal 14, no. 3 (1971): 479–501Google Scholar.

8 The clearest example is Burke's outright glorification of the ruling Whig party under Queen Anne. See Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:258–59, 269, 316–17. Burke's argument for parties extends beyond the “regulated rivalry” which Nancy Rosenblum astutely attributes to him, and also includes the benefits of parties for governing which she associates with Hegel (Rosenblum, Nancy, On the Side of the Angels: An Appreciation of Parties and Partisanship [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008], 119–27Google Scholar).

9 Attempts to combine the traditional Whig position in favor of party government with a critique of royal patronage were clearly in the air in the late 1760s, although Burke's was far and away the most brilliantly achieved. See for instance A Letter to Duke of Grafton, on the Present Situation of Public Affairs (1768), and Considerations on the Times (1769). For a broad treatment of the opposition pamphlet literature of the 1760s see Brewer, John, “The Misfortunes of Lord Bute: A Case-Study in Eighteenth Century Political Argument and Public Opinion,” Historical Journal 16, no. 1 (1973): 95–116Google Scholar.

10 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:261–76.

11 Harvey Mansfield offers the most forceful claim for the originality of Burke's defense of party (Mansfield, Harvey, Statesmanship and Party Government [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1965]CrossRefGoogle Scholar); as opposed to the more measured originality claimed by Frank O'Gorman (O'Gorman, Frank, Edmund Burke [Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1973], 22–45Google Scholar). Against Mansfield, Pat Rogers has argued that the earlier country-party rhetoric was not so much antiparty as antifaction—in favor of a broad-based opposition (Rogers, Pat, “Swift and Bolingbroke on Faction,” Journal of British Studies 9 [1970]: 71–101Google Scholar). Although Rogers is right on this point, she largely misses the degree to which Burke's argument is about regular party governing, and not merely opposition. Brewer has argued that none of Burke's readers or opponents in 1770 found anything disturbing or novel about his defense of party (John Brewer, “Party and the Double Cabinet,” 493–98).

12 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:264, 272, 280, 299, 318. At some points Burke suggests that fear of the Court's growing power is also an important motivation behind members’ acquiescence (ibid., 261). He envisions Members enriching not only themselves but also their constituents, in order to have an advantage in gaining reelection (ibid., 299).

13 Ibid., 264.

14 Ibid., 298–300.

15 This point echoes throughout the scholarly literature. Most prominent are Skinner, Quentin, “Bolingbroke vs. Walpole,” in Historical Perspectives, ed. McKendrick, Neil (London: Europa, 1974), 113–26Google Scholar and Pocock, J. G. A., “The Varieties of Whiggism from Exclusion to Reform: A History of Ideology and Discourse,” in Virtue, Commerce, and History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 230–79CrossRefGoogle Scholar. An older but still important rendition is Robbins, Caroline, The Eighteenth-Century Commonwealthman (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1959), 271–378Google Scholar. See also Nelson, Eric, The Greek Tradition in Republican Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 139–45Google Scholar.

16 See Kramnick, Isaac, Bolingbroke and His Circle (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968), 122–28Google Scholar, 137–53.

17 Although David Hume was an uneven and idiosyncratic supporter of Walpole, he expressed that position quite well (Hume, David, Essays Moral, Political and Literary [Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1987], 44–45Google Scholar). For an analysis of similar arguments made by Walpole himself, see Kramnick, Bolingbroke and His Circle, 121–24.

18 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:260–263, 265–272.

19 Ibid., 269–72.

20 Ibid., 265–66.

21 The most important Whig publication under Walpole in the 1730s was the London Journal, which featured numerous defenses of party government. See J. Gunn, A. W., Factions No More: Attitudes to Party in Government and Opposition in Eighteenth Century England (London: Cass, 1972), 112–18Google Scholar; as well as Kramnick, Bolingbroke and His Circle, 119–22.

22 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:266.

23 Ibid., 314.

24 Ibid., 260–66, 270–76.

25 Ibid., 270.

26 Ibid.

27 Ibid., 285.

28 Ibid., 437–56.

29 Ibid., 427.

30 Ibid., 413–26, 450–54.

31 Ibid., 308.

32 Ibid., 296.

33 Ibid., 264.

34 Ibid., 77.

35 Ibid., 240.

36 Ibid., 240–41.

37 Ibid., 239.

38 Burke, Edmund, Correspondence, vol. 2, ed. Sutherland, Lucy (Cambridge and Chicago: Cambridge University Press and University of Chicago Press, 1965)Google Scholar, 41, 44, 51–52, 57.

39 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:286.

40 Ibid., 294.

41 Ibid., 292–94.

42 Ibid., 280.

43 Ibid., 234.

44 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:294.

45 Ibid., 258–60. Compare with Bolingbroke, Political Writings, ed. Armitage, David (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 172–73Google Scholar.

46 Edmund Burke, Correspondence, 2:351, 354–55, 399, 451, 490, 503.

47 Burke, Edmund, Writings and Speeches, vol. 5, ed. Marshall, P. J. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981), 443–44Google Scholar. For an analysis of Burke's opposition to the East India Company's influence in Parliament, see Whelan, Frederick, Edmund Burke and India (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1996), 104–22Google Scholar.

48 Burke, Edmund, Correspondence, vol. 5, ed. Furber, Holden and Marshall, P. J. (Cambridge and Chicago: Cambridge University Press and University of Chicago Press, 1965)Google Scholar, 154, 196–99.

49 Burke, Edmund, Writings and Speeches, vol. 3, ed. Elofson, W. M. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), 533–39Google Scholar.

50 David Hume, Essays, 10–13, 44–45.

51 Bolingbroke, Political Writings, 252–94.

52 For a history of the struggle over electoral reform during Burke's political career, see Cannon, John, Parliamentary Reform, 1640–1832 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973), 47–143Google Scholar.

53 See Cartwright, John, Take Your Choice! (London, 1776), 1–4Google Scholar, 37, 41; Price, Richard, Political Writings, ed. Thomas, D. O. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 25–30Google Scholar, 99; Priestley, Joseph, Political Writings, ed. Miller, Peter (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993)Google Scholar, 16, 137, 139.

54 See Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:210–14.

55 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:309–11; 3:592–600.

56 On this point see especially Burke's letter to Joseph Harford, September 27, 1780, in Correspondence, vol. 4, ed. Copeland, Thomas and Woods, John (Cambridge and Chicago: Cambridge University Press and University of Chicago Press, 1963), 295–98Google Scholar.

57 Ibid., 296.

58 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:234–35.

59 It is important, however, that Burke expressed parallel concerns about the House of Commons seizing constitutional omnipotence during the Regency crisis, which ended in 1789 literally months before the French Revolution broke out. See Cobbett, William, Parliamentary History of England, vol. 27 (London: Hansard, 1816), 818–30Google Scholar, 1118–19.

60 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:234–35.

61 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 7:91.

62 For perceptive examinations of Burke's defenses of established religion and landed nobility, and their intellectual roots, see Boyd, Richard, “‘The Unsteady and Precarious Contribution of Individuals’: Edmund Burke's Defense of Civil Society,” Review of Politics 61, no. 3 (1999): 465–92Google Scholar; and O'Neil, Daniel, The Burke-Wollstonecraft Debate (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2007), 134–56Google Scholar.

63 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 7:118–21, 157–64, 286–91.

64 Ibid., 212.

65 Paddy Bullard perceptively observes Burke's criticisms of the members of the National Assembly, but connects them straightforwardly to Burke's ethical and psychological argument against radical intellectuals (Edmund Burke and the Art of Rhetoric, 141–44, 174–77).

66 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 7:94.

67 Ibid., 365.

68 Burke's fears about more frequent elections in England were somewhat similar. See Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:308–10.

69 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 7:366.

70 Ibid., 346. For an account of Burke's political economy in Reflections (though which fails to bring up the centrality of legislative corruption) see Pocock, J. G. A., “The Political Economy of Burke's Analysis of the French Revolution,” Historical Journal 25, no. 2 (1982): 331–49Google Scholar.

71 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 7:365.

72 Ibid., 95.

73 Ibid., 93–95.

74 Ibid., 367.

75 Ibid., 92.

76 See Edmund Burke, Correspondence, 5:25, 65, 43–55, 78–81, 105–6.

77 Burke's belief in the inevitable collapse of the National Assembly and its proposed constitution is clearly revealed by his conclusion: “I have told you candidly my sentiments … they may be of use to you in some future form which your commonwealth may take. In the present it can hardly remain” (Writings and Speeches, 7:293).

78 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 7:242.

79 Ibid., 157.

80 Ibid., 158.

81 Ibid., 158–62.

82 Ibid., 170–74.

83 Burke believed that East India Company did actually dream of attaining that sort of influence. He counts it among the groups which would eagerly support imitating the French “system” in England (ibid., 345).

84 Burke distinguishes the prosperous financial interests seeking to maintain a large French debt from the “needy agitators” and “presumptuous young clerks” who were eager to enrich themselves through offices created by it (ibid., 365–66).

85 Ibid., 118–21.

86 Ibid., 118.

87 Ibid., 221–24, 236–37, 224–27, 238–42.

88 Ibid., 268–72.

89 Ibid., 272–73.

90 “In the weakness of one kind of authority, and in the fluctuation of all, the officers of an army will remain some time mutinous and full of faction until some popular general, who understands the art of conciliating the soldiery, and who possesses the true spirit of command, shall draw the eyes of all men upon himself. … But the moment in which that event shall happen, the person who really commands the army is your master … the master of your Assembly, the master of your whole republic” (ibid., 266). Of course, by the time that Napoleon seized command in 1799 the Assembly had long been superseded by the Directory.

91 Burke, Edmund, Works, vol. 7 (London: J. C. Nimmo, 1887)Google Scholar.

92 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 3:589.

93 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:211.

94 Paddy Bullard, Edmund Burke and the Art of Rhetoric.

95 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 2:282, 296, 311–12, 318, 319.

96 Ibid., 296, 320, 282.

97 Ibid., 319.

98 Ibid., 320.

99 Edmund Burke, Writings and Speeches, 3:498, 501, 508–20.