From the total want of police, hardly a day elapses but I am informed of some tragical event, whereof the bare recital is shocking to humanity.
Edmund Burke
The Public Record
Edmund Burke was an Anglo-Irish writer, philosopher, and politician who is widely credited as the founder of the cultural and political philosophy of conservatism. Regarded as one of the most influential conservative thinkers and political writers of the 18th century, Burke spent the majority of his career in Great Britain and was elected as a member of Parliament (MP) from 1766 to 1794 in the House of Commons of Great Britain with the Whig Party. His writings played a significant role in influencing public views and opinions in both Great Britain and France following the French Revolution in 1789, and he remains a major figure in modern conservative circles.
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That no regular courts of justice have been established in this country is particularly pointed at in my instructions, as the most disreputable defect in his Highness's government; yet the minister seems determined on abolishing even the…
The original establishment, inadequate as it was, is mouldering away, and the officers now attached to it are literally starving, as no part of their allowance has been paid for above six months past.
My situation has for years past been increasing in wretchedness to a degree that I am in want of daily bread, and my servants and animals are dying of hunger.
My distresses are so great that I have not been able to pay a daum to the surgeons for the cure of my wounds; and they, too, are discouraged from affording me their assistance or furnishing me with medicines.
Whereas you have done many generous acts, be pleased so to show us your favor, that by some means we may receive our allowances from the Company's treasury, and not be obliged to depend upon and solicit others for it.
The growth of these evils was early made known to me, and their effects foreboded in the same order and manner as they have since come to pass.
In such a state of calamity and disgrace, I can no longer remain a passive spectator; nor would it be becoming to conceal my sentiments, or qualify the expression of them.
Do not reply to me, that what I have written is from the suggestion of your enemies; nor imagine that I have induced myself to write in such plain and declaratory terms, without a clear insight into all the consequences of it, and a fixed…
By bringing him to justice I mean, that you urge the Nabob, on due conviction, to punish him with death, as a necessary example to deter others from the commission of the like crimes; nor must you desist till this is effected.
To this reasoning I shall join the obligations of justice and good faith, which cut off every pretext for your exercising any power or authority in this country, as long as the sovereign of it fulfils the engagements he has articled with…
It is very much my desire to impress the Nabob with a thorough confidence in the faith and justice of our government,--that is to say, in my own, while I am at the head of it: I cannot be answerable for the acts of others independent of me.
You need not be told the character of the king, whose inertness, and the habit of long-suffering, has debased his dignity and the fortunes of his house beyond the power of retrieving either the one or the other.
The reason they assigned was as infamous as the act: declaring that women had been too long under the tyranny of parents and of husbands.
That all these suggestions and assertions were false, and, if they had been true, would have furnished no just occasion for attacking either the Mahrattas or the French, with both of whom the British nation was then at peace.
Much less can I agree, that, with such superior advantages as we possess over every power which can oppose us, we should act merely on the defensive.
On the contrary, if it be really true that the British arms and influence have suffered so severe a check in the Western world, it is more incumbent on those who are charged with the interests of Great Britain in the East to exert…
We have the means in our power, and, if they are not frustrated by our own dissensions, I trust that the event of this expedition will yield every advantage for the attainment of which it was undertaken.
That these lessons of public duplicity and artifice, and these devices of ostensible faith and real treachery, could have no effect but to degrade the national character, and to inspire the Mahrattas themselves, with whom we were in…
The petty sovereign of a country estimated at six or eight lacs ought not for a moment to prove an impediment to any of our measures, or to affect the consistency of our conduct.
That the acceptance of the said sum, in this circumstance, was beneath the dignity of the said government, and did tend so to discredit us; and that the motion of the said Hastings for such acceptance was therefore highly derogatory to the…
That, by the vague and indefinite term of evasion, the said Warren Hastings did introduce a loose and arbitrary principle of interpreting formal engagements, which ought to be regarded, more especially by guaranties, ill a sense the most…
And that a basis of negotiation so inconsistent, so arbitrary, and so unjust is contrary to that uprightness and integrity which should mark the transactions of a great state, and is highly derogatory to the honor of this nation.
I should have deemed it particularly dishonorable to receive for my own use money tendered by men of a certain class, from whom I had interdicted the receipt of presents to my inferiors, and bound them by oath not to receive them.
My Lords, there are persons who, looking rather upon what was to be found in our records and histories than what was to be expected from the public justice, had formed hopes consolatory to themselves and dishonorable to us.
Politicians like Edmund Burke
