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 Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow 46.: MR. HUSKISSON AND THE JACOBIN CLUB EXAMINER, 26 SEPT., 1830, PP. 611-12 - The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, Volume XXII - Newspaper Writings December 1822 - July 1831 Part I

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Subject Area: Political Theory
Collection: The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill

46.: MR. HUSKISSON AND THE JACOBIN CLUB EXAMINER, 26 SEPT., 1830, PP. 611-12 - John Stuart Mill, The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, Volume XXII - Newspaper Writings December 1822 - July 1831 Part I [1822]

Edition used:

The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, Volume XXII - Newspaper Writings December 1822 - July 1831 Part I, ed. Ann P. Robson and John M. Robson, Introduction by Ann P. Robson and John M. Robson (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1986).

Part of: Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, in 33 vols.

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46.

MR. HUSKISSON AND THE JACOBIN CLUB

EXAMINER, 26 SEPT., 1830, PP. 611-12

This article comments on rumours (see Morning Chronicle, 18 Sept., 1830, p. 2, and 23 Sept., p. 3) about the radical background of William Huskisson, who had died on 15 Sept., after being run over by a train. Headed as title, this leading article in the “Political Examiner” is identified in Mill’s bibliography, with No. 47, as “Two short leading articles in the Examiner of 26th Sept. 1830 headed ‘Mr. Huskisson and the Jacobin Club’ and ‘The recent Combination of the [Journeymen] Printers in Paris’ ”

(MacMinn, p. 11).

in a discussion which has gone the round of the daily papers respecting the very unimportant fact, whether Mr. Huskisson was or was not a member of the Jacobin club,1 the Times remarks that a speech professing to be delivered by him at that club, was published at Paris in 1790.2 “In the title of the speech,” continues the Times, “Mr. Huskisson is described as an Englishman, and a member of the société from 1789. The Right Honorable Gentleman had most probably abandoned the society long before it became formidable under the name of the Jacobin club, and hence he is justified in saying that he never attended the sittings of that club but once.”3

“A member of the société from 1789.” This looks very much like a translation of “membre de la société de 1789.” If so, the editor of the Times, or his informant, is ignorant both of French and of history. Of French, because “a member of the société from 1789,” if expressed in that language, would stand thus, “membre de la société depuis 1789,” not de 1789. Of history, because he apparently is not aware that there existed a society under the name of “La Société de 1789,” more shortly “le club de quatre-vingt-neuf,” which was established by seceders from the Jacobin club, and in opposition to it;4 to defend the original principles of the revolution of 1789, principles which the Jacobin club had by its founders been intended to promote, in opposition to the more democratic views which that club subsequently adopted.

Without pretending to peculiar sources of information, we have always understood that Mr. Huskisson was in fact a member, not of the Jacobin Club, but of the Club of 1789. Our belief is now confirmed, both by his own disavowal of having ever belonged to the former society,5 and by the apparently ill-translated and ill-understood title-page of his speech, as referred to by the Times.

[1 ]The Jacobin Club, founded in 1789, was originally called La Société des Amis de la Constitution Monarchique. By the end of 1791, it had fallen into the hands of radicals; its meetings were opened to the public, and it became a forum for promoting the Terror. In 1794, after the fall of Robespierre, the Society was disbanded.

[2 ]Discours prononcé par M. Huskisson, Anglois et membre de la Société de 1789, à la séance de cette Société, le 29 août 1790, sur les assignats, in Mémoires de la Société de 1789, No. XIV (Paris: LeJay fils, 1790).

[3 ]The Times, 22 Sept., 1830, p. 3.

[4 ]In August 1789, Mirabeau, Lafayette, J.S. Bailly, and E.J. Sieyès left the Société des Amis de la Constitution and founded the Société de 1789 (also called Les Feuillants). After Mirabeau’s death in April 1791 the Society declined.

[5 ]See Huskisson’s letter (7 July, 1830) to “G.P.,” The Times, 20 Sept., 1830, p. 3.