by Edmund Burke
He was not called upon to acknowledge them to be his judges. Both he and they were called upon to inquire into all corruptions without exception. It was his duty not merely [not?] to traverse and oppose them while inquiring into acts of corruption, but he was bound to take an active part in it, — that if they had a mind to let such a thing sleep upon their records, it was his duty to have brought forward the inquiry. They were not his judges, they were not his accusers; they were his fellow-laborers in the inquiry ordered by the Court of Directors, their masters, and by which inquiry he might be purged of that corruption with which he stood charged.
He says, “Nundcomar is a wretch whom you all know to be the basest of mankind.” I believe they did not know the man to be a wretch, or the basest of mankind; but if he was a wretch, and if he was the basest of mankind, if he was guilty of all the crimes with which we charge Mr. Hastings, (not one of which was ever proved against him,) — if any of your Lordships were to have the misfortune to be before this tribunal, before any inquest of the House of Commons, or any other inquest of this nation, would you not say that it was the greatest possible advantage to you that the man who accused you was a miscreant, the vilest and basest of mankind, by the confession of all the world? Do mankind really, then, think that to be accused by men of honor, of weight, of character, upon probable charges, is an advantage to them, and that to be accused by the basest of mankind is a disadvantage? No: give me, if ever I am to have accusers, miscreants, as he calls him, — wretches, the basest and vilest of mankind. “The board,” says he, “are my accusers.” If they were, it was their duty; but they were not his accusers, but were inquiring into matters which it was equally his duty to inquire into. He would not suffer Nundcomar to be produced; he would not suffer Nundcomar to be examined; he rather suffered such an accusation to stand against his name and character than permit it to be inquired into. Do I want any other presumption of his guilt, upon such an occasion, than such conduct as this?
This man, whom he calls a wretch, the basest and vilest of mankind, was undoubtedly, by himself, in the records of the Company, declared to be one of the first men of that country, everything that a subject could be, a person illustrious for his birth, sacred with regard to his caste, opulent in fortune, eminent in situation, who had filled the very first offices in that country; and that he was, added to all this, a man of most acknowledged talents, and of such a superiority as made the whole people of Bengal appear to be an inferior race of beings compared to him, — a man whose outward appearance and demeanor used to cause reverence and awe, and who at that time was near seventy years of age, which, without any other title, generally demands respect from mankind. And yet this man he calls the basest of mankind, a name which no man is entitled to call another till he has proved something to justify him in so doing; and notwithstanding his opulence, his high rank, station, and birth, he despises him, and will not suffer him to be heard as an accuser before him. I will venture to say that Mr. Hastings, in so doing, whether elevated by philosophy or inflated by pride, is not like the rest of mankind. We do know, that, in all accusations, a great part of their weight and authority comes from the character, the situation, the name, the description, the office, the dignity of the persons who bring them; mankind are so made, we cannot resist this prejudice; and it has weight, and ever will have primâ facie weight, in all the tribunals in the world. If, therefore, Rajah Nundcomar was a man who (it is not degrading to your Lordships to say) was equal in rank, according to the idea of his country, to any peer in this House, as sacred as a bishop, of as much gravity and authority as a judge, and who was prime-minister in the country in which he lived, with what face can Mr. Hastings call this man a wretch, and say that he will not suffer him to be brought before him? If, indeed, joined with such circumstances, the accuser be a person of bad morals, then, I admit, those bad morals take away from their weight; but for a proof of that you must have some other grounds than the charges and the railing of the culprit against him.
I might say that his passion is a proof of his guilt; and there is an action which is more odious than the crimes he attempts to cover, — for he has murdered this man by the hands of Sir Elijah Impey; and if his counsel should be unwise enough to endeavor to detract from the credit of this man by the pretended punishment to which he was brought, we will open that dreadful scene to your Lordships, and you will see that it does not detract from his credit, but brings an eternal stain and dishonor upon the justice of Great Britain: I say nothing further of it. As he stood there, as he gave that evidence that day, the evidence was to be received; it stands good, and is a record against Mr. Hastings, — with this addition, that he would not suffer it to be examined. He railed at his colleagues. He says, if the charge was false, they were guilty of a libel. No: it might have been the effect of conspiracy, it might be punished in another way; but if it was false, it was no libel. And all this is done to discountenance inquiry, to bring odium upon his colleagues for doing their duty, and to prevent that inquiry which could alone clear his character.
Mr. Hastings had himself forgotten the character which he had given of Nundcomar; but he says that his colleagues were perfectly well acquainted with him, and knew that he was a wretch, the basest of mankind. But before I read to you the character which Mr. Hastings gave of him, when he recommended him to the Presidency, (to succeed Mahomed Reza Khân,) I am to let your Lordships understand fully the purpose for which Mr. Hastings gave it. Upon that occasion, all the Council, whom he stated to lie under suspicion of being bought by Mahomed Reza Khân, all those persons with one voice cried out against Nundcomar; and as Mr. Hastings was known to be of the faction the most opposite to Nundcomar, they charged him with direct inconsistency in raising Nundcomar to that exalted trust, — a charge which Mr. Hastings could not repel any other way than by defending Nundcomar. The weight of their objections chiefly lay to Nundcomar’s political character; his moral character was not discussed in that proceeding. Mr. Hastings says, —
“The President does not take upon him to vindicate the moral character of Nundcomar; his sentiments of this man’s former political conduct are not unknown to the Court of Directors, who, he is persuaded, will be more inclined to attribute his present countenance of him to motives of zeal and fidelity to the service, in repugnance perhaps to his own inclinations, than to any predilection in his favor. He is very well acquainted with most of the facts alluded to in the minute of the majority, having been a principal instrument in detecting them: nevertheless he thinks it but justice to make a distinction between the violation of a trust and an offence committed against our government by a man who owed it no allegiance, nor was indebted to it for protection, but, on the contrary, was the minister and actual servant of a master whose interest naturally suggested that kind of policy which sought, by foreign aids, and the diminution of the power of the Company, to raise his own consequence, and to reëstablish his authority. He has never been charged with any instance of infidelity to the Nabob Mir Jaffier, the constant tenor of whose politics, from his first accession to the nizamut till his death, corresponded in all points so exactly with the artifices which were detected in his minister that they may be as fairly ascribed to the one as to the other: their immediate object was beyond question the aggrandizement of the former, though the latter had ultimately an equal interest in their success. The opinion which the Nabob himself entertained of the services and of the fidelity of Nundcomar evidently appeared in the distinguished marks which he continued to show him of his favor and confidence to the latest hour of his life.
“His conduct in the succeeding administration appears not only to have been dictated by the same principles, but, if we may be allowed to speak favorably of any measures which opposed the views of our own government and aimed at the support of an adverse interest, surely it was not only not culpable, but even praiseworthy. He endeavored, as appears by the abstracts before us, to give consequence to his master, and to pave the way to his independence, by obtaining a fi
rman from the king for his appointment to the subahship; and he opposed the promotion of Mahomed Reza Khân, because he looked upon it as a supersession of the rights and authority of the Nabob. He is now an absolute dependant and subject of the Company, on whose favor he must rest all his hopes of future advancement.”
The character here given of him is that of an excellent patriot, a character which all your Lordships, in the several situations which you enjoy or to which you may be called, will envy, — the character of a servant who stuck to his master against all foreign encroachments, who stuck to him to the last hour of his life, and had the dying testimony of his master to his services.
Could Sir John Clavering, could Colonel Monson, could Mr. Francis know that this man, of whom Mr. Hastings had given that exalted character upon the records of the Company, was the basest and vilest of mankind? No, they ought to have esteemed him the contrary: they knew him to be a man of rank, they knew him to be a man perhaps of the first capacity in the world, and they knew that Mr. Hastings had given this honorable testimony of him on the records of the Company but a very little time before; and there was no reason why they should think or know, as he expresses it, that he was the basest and vilest of mankind. From the account, therefore, of Mr. Hastings himself, he was a person competent to accuse, a witness fit to be heard; and that is all I contend for. Mr. Hastings would not hear him, he would not suffer the charge he had produced to be examined into.
It has been shown to your Lordships that Mr. Hastings employed Nundcomar to inquire into the conduct and to be the principal manager of a prosecution against Mahomed Reza Khân. Will you suffer this man to qualify and disqualify witnesses and prosecutors agreeably to the purposes which his own vengeance and corruption may dictate in one case, and which the defence of those corruptions may dictate in another? Was Nundcomar a person fit to be employed in the greatest and most sacred trusts in the country, and yet not fit to be a witness to the sums of money which he paid Mr. Hastings for those trusts? Was Nundcomar a fit witness to be employed and a fit person to be used in the prosecution of Mahomed Reza Khân, and yet not fit to be employed against Mr. Hastings, who himself had employed him in the very prosecution of Mahomed Reza Khân?
If Nundcomar was an enemy to Mr. Hastings, he was an enemy to Mahomed Reza Khân; and Mr. Hastings employed him, avowedly and professedly on the records of the Company, on account of the very qualification of that enmity. Was he a wretch, the basest of mankind, when opposed to Mr. Hastings? Was he not as much a wretch, and as much the basest of mankind, when Mr. Hastings employed him in the prosecution of the first magistrate and Mahometan of the first descent in Asia? Mr. Hastings shall not qualify and disqualify men at his pleasure; he must accept them such as they are; and it is a presumption of his guilt accompanying the charge, (which I never will separate from it,) that he would not suffer the man to be produced who made the accusation. And I therefore contend, that, as the accusation was so made, so witnessed, so detailed, so specific, so entered upon record, and so entered upon record in consequence of the inquiries ordered by the Company, his refusal and rejection of inquiry into it is a presumption of his guilt.
He is full of his idea of dignity. It is right for every man to preserve his dignity. There is a dignity of station, which a man has in trust to preserve; there is a dignity of personal character, which every man by being made man is bound to preserve. But you see Mr. Hastings’s idea of dignity has no connection with integrity; it has no connection with honest fame; it has no connection with the reputation which he is bound to preserve. What, my Lords, did he owe nothing to the Company that had appointed him? Did he owe nothing to the legislature, — did he owe nothing to your Lordships, and to the House of Commons, who had appointed him? Did he owe nothing to himself? to the country that bore him? Did he owe nothing to the world, as to its opinion, to which every public man owes a reputation? What an example was here held out to the Company’s servants!
Mr. Hastings says, “This may come into a court of justice; it will come into a court of justice: I reserve my defence on the occasion till it comes into a court of justice, and here I make no opposition to it.” To this I answer, that the Company did not order him so to reserve himself, but ordered him to be an inquirer into those things. Is it a lesson to be taught to the inferior servants of the Company, that, provided they can escape out of a court of justice by the back-doors and sally-ports of the law, by artifice of pleading, by those strict and rigorous rules of evidence which have been established for the protection of innocence, but which by them might be turned to the protection and support of guilt, that such an escape is enough for them? that an Old Bailey acquittal is enough to establish a fitness for trust? and if a man shall go acquitted out of such a court, because the judges are bound to acquit him against the conviction of their own opinion, when every man in the market-place knows that he is guilty, that he is fit for a trust? Is it a lesson to be held out to the servants of the Company, that, upon the first inquiry which is made into corruption, and that in the highest trust, by the persons authorized to inquire into it, he uses all the powers of that trust to quash it, — vilifying his colleagues, vilifying his accuser, abusing everybody, but never denying the charge? His associates and colleagues, astonished at this conduct, so wholly unlike everything that had ever appeared of innocence, request him to consider a little better. They declare they are not his accusers; they tell him they are not his judges; that they, under the orders of the Company, are making an inquiry which he ought to make. He declares he will not make it. Being thus driven to the wall, he says, “Why do you not form yourselves into a committee? I won’t suffer these proceedings to go on as long as I am present.” Mr. Hastings plainly had in view, that, if the proceedings had been before a committee, there would have been a doubt of their authenticity, as not being before a regular board; and he contended that there could be no regular board without his own presence in it: a poor, miserable scheme for eluding this inquiry; partly by saying that it was carried on when he was not present, and partly by denying the authority of this board.
I will have nothing to do with the great question that arose upon the Governor-General’s resolution to dissolve a board, whether the board have a right to sit afterwards; it is enough that Mr. Hastings would not suffer them, as a Council, to examine into what, as a Council, they were bound to examine into. He absolutely declared the Council dissolved, when they did not accept his committee, for which they had many good reasons, as I shall show in reply, if necessary, and which he could have no one good reason for proposing; — he then declares the Council dissolved. The Council, who did not think Mr. Hastings had a power to dissolve them while proceeding in the discharge of their duty, went on as a Council. They called in Nundcomar to support his charge: Mr. Hastings withdrew. Nundcomar was asked what he had to say further in support of his own evidence. Upon which he produces a letter from Munny Begum, the dancing-girl that I have spoken of, in which she gives him directions and instructions relative to his conduct in every part of those bribes; by which it appears that the corrupt agreement for her office was made with Mr. Hastings through Nundcomar, before he had quitted Calcutta. It points out the execution of it, and the manner in which every part of the sum was paid: one lac by herself in Calcutta; one lac, which she ordered Nundcomar to borrow, and which he did borrow; and a lac and a half which were given to him, Mr. Hastings, besides this purchase money, under color of an entertainment. This letter was produced, translated, examined, criticized, proved to be sealed with the seal of the Begum, acknowledged to have no marks but those of authenticity upon it, and as such was entered upon the Company’s records, confirming and supporting the evidence of Nundcomar, part by part, and circumstance by circumstance. And I am to remark, that, since this document, so delivered in, has never been litigated or controverted in the truth of it, from that day to this, by Mr. Hastings, so, if there was no more testimony, here is enough, upon this business. Your Lordships will remark that this charge consisted of two par
ts: two lacs that were given explicitly for the corrupt purchase of the office; and one lac and a half given in reality for the same purpose, but under the color of what is called an entertainment.
Now in the course of these proceedings it was thought necessary that Mr. Hastings’s banian, Cantoo Baboo, (a name your Lordships will be well acquainted with, and who was the minister in this and all the other transactions of Mr. Hastings,) should be called before the board to explain some circumstances in the proceedings. Mr. Hastings ordered his banian, a native, not to attend the sovereign board appointed by Parliament for the government of that country, and directed to inquire into transactions of this nature. He thus taught the natives not only to disobey the orders of the Court of Directors, enforced by an act of Parliament, but he taught his own servant to disobey, and ordered him not to appear before the board. Quarrels, duels, and other mischiefs arose. In short, Mr. Hastings raised every power of heaven and of hell upon this subject: but in vain: the inquiry went on.
Mr. Hastings does not meet Nundcomar: he was afraid of him. But he was not negligent of his own defence; for he flies to the Supreme Court of Justice. He there prosecuted an inquiry against Nundcomar for a conspiracy. Failing in that, he made other attempts, and disabled Nundcomar from appearing before the board by having him imprisoned, and thus utterly crippled that part of the prosecution against him. But as guilt is never able thoroughly to escape, it did so happen, that the Council, finding monstrous deficiencies in the Begum’s affairs, finding the Nabob’s allowance totally squandered, that the most sacred pensions were left unpaid, that nothing but disorder and confusion reigned in all his affairs, that the Nabob’s education was neglected, that he could scarcely read or write, that there was scarcely any mark of a man left in him except those which Nature had at first imprinted, — I say, all these abuses being produced in a body before them, they thought it necessary to send up to inquire into them; and a considerable deficiency or embezzlement appearing in the Munny Begum’s account of the young Nabob’s stipend, she voluntarily declared, by a writing under her seal, that she had given 15,000l. to Mr. Hastings for an entertainment.