John Lambton, 1st Earl of Durham

John George Lambton, 1st Earl of Durham , called "Radical Jack", (born April 12, 1792 in London , † July 28, 1840 in Cowes ), was a British statesman of the Whig Party and member of the British delegation to the Vienna Congress .

John George Lambton

Life

John George Lambton was born in London on April 12, 1792 and attended Eton College in Eton . In 1813 he became a Member of the House of Commons as a Member of the House of Commons for County Durham , where he became a major proponent of reforming the electoral process for MPs. On January 29, 1828 he was given the hereditary title of Baron Durham , of the City of Durham and of Lambton Castle in the County Palatine of Durham , which he resigned from the House of Commons and took a seat in the House of Lords . As a Councilor of State and Lord Keeper of the Seal, he carried out his duties from 1830 to 1833, working under his father-in-law, Prime Minister Charles Gray, 2nd Earl Gray , and was entrusted by him with other members of parliament to work on and pass the draft Reform Act of 1832 . The Reform Acts should, among other things, expand the right to vote in Great Britain . Because Durham was particularly committed to it, he received the title of Earl of Durham and Viscount Lambton from the king on March 23, 1833 . In the same year, however, he resigned from office in protest against the actions of his government in Ireland. From 1835 to 1837 he was British ambassador to Russia .

But in 1838 he was appointed Governor General of British North America . Since today's Canada was settled partly by English-speaking and partly by Francophone Canadians, there was tension between the colonies. After five months, he resigned because of the sharp criticism from Great Britain of his behavior. Nevertheless Durham wrote his "Report on the affairs of British North America" ​​(1839), in which he proposed that British North America be united into a colony and placed under an autonomous government. These local governments were to be distributed to all of the smaller provinces, but the British remained supreme. The unification of Canada according to Durham's plans took place in 1867 with the British-North America Treaty, when it had been dead for more than 20 years. This concept of colonial self-government under British sovereignty developed by him later became the basis of the British Commonwealth in a slightly modified form .

According to Jürgen Osterhammel , the Durham Report is “one of the most important documents in global constitutional history. He established the principle of the balance of interests between settlers and the imperial metropolis in the housing of versatile democratic institutions. "

Durham despised the French-speaking population of North America:

"... a people without history, without literature and without education."

- Durham : 1839, cit. after Hans-Jürgen Lüsebrink

Durham died on July 28, 1840 in Cowes on the Isle of Wight.

literature

• Stuart Johnson Reid: Life and letters of the first earl of Durham, 1792-1840 , 2 vols. Longmans, Green, London 1906
• CP Lucas (Ed.): Durham's Report . 3 volumes. London 1912 (Reprint Bibliobazaar ISBN 978-1-113-80927-8 ) (detailed contributions from the publisher; the report is in Volume 2)
• Chester W. New: Lord Durham: a biography of John George Lambton, first earl of Durham . Clarendon, Oxford 1929
• Leonard Cooper: Radical Jack: the life of John George Lambton, first earl of Durham, 1792-1840 . Cresset, London 1959
• Durham, John George Lambton, 1st Earl of . In: Encyclopædia Britannica . 11th edition. tape 8 : Demijohn - Edward . London 1910, p. 704 (English, full text [ Wikisource ]).

Web links

Commons : John Lambton, 1st Earl of Durham  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Portraits in the portrait index Early Modern Age
• Jörg Seifarth: Souvenir: Historical Images and Identity References in the Context of Language and National Culture (Québec) . (PDF) Dissertation, HU Berlin , 2004 (excursus on Durham: pp. 151–168 .; the whole dissertation, full text, contains 260 "Durham")

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Jürgen Osterhammel: The transformation of the world. A story of the 19th century. Munich 2009, p. 595
2. ↑ Despite quotation marks in the book there is no literal quotation, the original is C'est un peuple sans histoire et sans littérature. He freely added the “education” from the wider context. According to country report Canada . Federal Center for Political Education BpB, Bonn 2018, p. 125. Original: There can hardly be conceived a nationality more destitute of all that can invigorate and elevate a people, than that which is exhibited by the descendants of the French in Lower Canada, owing to their retaining their peculiar language and manners. They are a people with no history, and no literature. 1912 edition, volume 2, p. 294. Those of French origin as uneducated people can be found ibid. P. 30.

predecessor	Office	successor
New title created	Baron Durham 1828-1840	George Lambton
New title created	Earl of Durham 1833-1840	George Lambton