Dictionary of National Biography, 1927 supplement/Cross, Richard Assheton
CROSS, RICHARD ASSHETON, first Viscount Cross (1823-1914), statesman, was born at Red Scar, near Preston, Lancashire, 30 May 1823, the third son of William Cross, of Red Scar, by his wife, Ellen, eldest daughter of Edward Chaffers, of Liverpool and Everton, a collateral relative of Richard Chaffers [q.v.], the well-known potter and rival of Josiah Wedgwood, and of William Chaffers [q.v.], the virtuoso. Cross was educated at Rugby under Thomas Arnold, and at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he rowed in the First Trinity eight at the head of the river, and in 1845 was president of the Cambridge Union Society. Called to the bar by the Inner Temple in 1849, he went the Northern circuit. As his father and grandfather had held legal office in the County Palatine Court of Common Pleas at Preston, he started with the advantage of a well-known name, and quickly built up a substantial practice. He became leader of the Preston and Salford quarter-sessions bar; wrote a book on pauper settlement (1853), and collaborated in another on the jurisdiction of quarter-sessions in non-criminal matters (1858), which remained the standard manual for practitioners until that jurisdiction, save for a few fragments, was abolished on the creation of county councils. In 1857 his position was sufficiently assured to permit of his standing for parliament. He won Preston for the conservative interest and held the seat till 1862. The only pledge on which his supporters insisted was that he would not join the Carlton Club; and he signalized his independence by being the only conservative member to vote in favour of Mr. Gladstone’s repeal of the paper duties, as well as by voting against the same proposal when Gladstone unconstitutionally, as he held, tacked it to a money-bill in order to circumvent opposition in the House of Lords.
In 1860 the death of his father-in-law led to Cross’s becoming a partner in Parr’s bank at Warrington, a step which involved giving up both his practice at the bar and his seat in parliament. But the years 1862–1868 were of great importance in his career; for to the legal ability which he had already shown he was now to add financial experience as partner in a great bank in times of exceptional difficulty (the ‘cotton famine’), and an intimate knowledge of the problems of local government. In 1865 when Parr’s bank became one of the pioneers of limited liability as applied to banking, Cross became deputy chairman, and he succeeded to the chairmanship in 1870. During these years he also became chairman or deputy chairman of every local government body then existing in his neighbourhood, including two courts of quarter-sessions, a highway board, a board of guardians, and the governing bodies of many charitable institutions. The eminent services which he afterwards rendered to the state were based on the intimate knowledge thus gained of local conditions in an industrial area.
In the general election of 1868 Cross again stood for parliament, this time for the new constituency of South-West Lancashire, where he achieved a sensational success by defeating Gladstone, then at the height of popularity and power, and heading the poll. Family connexions and the influence of his old school and college friend, the fifteenth Earl of Derby, had their share in this, but Cross’s personal popularity was the decisive factor. Yet, though he returned to parliament a marked man, he was entirely without that sparkle which attracts attention in debate: and it was, therefore, as Disraeli himself said, an ‘almost unexampled mark of confidence’ when Cross was in 1874 put at the head of the Home Office without undergoing a probation in some minor post.
From the very start, however, Cross was an unqualified success as home secretary. Disraeli had shown in his early novels, and in his Manchester speech of 1872, an appreciation of the need for social reform; but he had no idea what direction it should take, and the only promise on the subject made in his election address of 1874 was that he would give the country a rest from ‘incessant and harassing legislation’; moreover, he not only allowed but expected his colleagues to have policies of their own. It is certain, therefore, that. Cross was not merely responsible for the details, but had a large part in shaping the principles of the social reforms which are perhaps the greatest achievement of the ministry of 1874–1880.
Cross’s first bill, the Licensing Act, 1874, was dictated by the necessity of redeeming pledges which had been given to the licensed victuallers in the general election: ‘not much to be proud of’ was his own admission in after years, but at least he cut down concession to a minimum and spoke very plainly about the increase in drunkenness which had taken place. A measure more congenial to him was the Artisans’ Dwellings Act, 1875. Its preamble was apparently intended to disarm criticism by a disavowal of socialist tendencies. Nevertheless, the Act marks the definite introduction of collectivist principles into legislation, for it armed municipal authorities with compulsory powers to acquire and pull down unhealthy slums; it authorized them to undertake the building of suitable houses and to embark on the business of owning and letting them; it forbade the enhancement of compensation on the ground of compulsion; and it substituted the award of a departmental arbitrator for the proprietary and local sympathies of juries. At the same time a home office order was issued requiring all local authorities to appoint medical officers of health and sanitary inspectors; in other ways also Cross showed that the executive was determined to enforce the policy of the legislature. Joseph Chamberlain afterwards said that the reforms which have made a model city of Birmingham would have been impossible without this Act. The Factory Act, 1875, dealt with the employment of women and children in textile factories; and the Factories and Workshops Act, 1878, consolidated and codified the mass of legislation on this subject. The latter embodies the recommendations of a royal commission appointed in 1876. The Employers and Workmen Act, 1875, and its concomitant, the Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act, on the other hand, owe little or nothing to the royal commission which preceded them. We have Disraeli’s authority for saying that the policy of these Acts was initiated by Cross and would have been vetoed by the rest of the Cabinet but for his own support. However, the boldness and statesmanship of the policy were warmly applauded by the representatives alike of employers and employed, and provided a satisfactory settlement of their legal relations for many years. Other Acts introduced by Cross dealt with friendly societies and with the preservation of open spaces near large towns; the management of prisons throughout the three kingdoms was transferred to the central government, and the cost of their maintenance from local to imperial funds, uniformity and economy of administration being thus secured without abolishing the visitatorial powers of the justices. Cross’s last proposal, to acquire and transfer to a single authority all the undertakings which supplied London with water, was sharply criticized on the ground of extravagance: but the main idea was sound.
In opposition (1880–1885) the school of business men in politics to which Cross belonged was speedily thrown into the shade by Lord Randolph Churchill, whose dislike for them was open and violent. Accordingly, although Cross returned to the Home Office in the short-lived ministry of 1885, it was no surprise when in 1886 that department was given to Lord Randolph’s nominee, and Cross received the lighter India Office, being at the same time raised to the peerage as Viscount Cross, of Broughton-in-Furness. His tenure of the India Office, which lasted till 1892, was uneventful, its only important piece of legislation being the India Councils Act, 1892. This was regarded at the time as a bold advance; but it was highly successful, and Cross is entitled to a considerable share of the credit. In 1895 he accepted the office of privy seal, which he retained till 1900, and he finally retired in 1902. After this his appearances in parliament were few, but he voted and spoke against the 1909 Finance Bill. He died 8 January 1914 at Eccle Riggs, Broughton-in-Furness.
Lord Cross was a fellow of the Royal Society, a bencher of the Inner Temple, and an ecclesiastical commissioner, and was keenly interested in the affairs of the Church. His honours included, besides the viscounty, the G.C.B. (1880) and G.C.S.I, (1892). Cross was among the small band of her ministers whom Queen Victoria honoured with her close personal friendship, and he was a trustee of more than one royal marriage settlement. But the picturesque story that he was the queen’s confidential business agent is unfounded. Very far from being a brilliant man, Cross was yet gifted with unfailing good sense; and he had the knack of securing the affection and trust of his subordinates. His speeches were of a type which the House of Commons listens to with respect rather than enjoyment, well-documented and clear statements such as might be made at a meeting of a business company. Only twice did he rise to a note of passion in oratory, namely, when introducing the Artisans’ Dwellings Act (1875) and when repudiating on behalf of the Cabinet the charge of indifference to the sufferings of Bulgaria. The last-named speech (7 May 1877) also contains a cogent defence of the whole policy of the government over the treaty of San Stefano, and created a widespread impression.
Lord Cross married in 1852 Georgiana (died 1907), third daughter of Thomas Lyon, of Appleton Hall, near Warrington, by whom he had four sons and three daughters. His two elder sons predeceased him, and he was succeeded as second viscount by his grandson, Richard Assheton Cross (born 1882).
[The Times, 9 January 1914; Annual Register, 1914; Lord Cross’s own Family History and Political History (printed for private circulation, 1908); Sir Spencer Walpole, The History of Twenty-five Years (1856–1880), 4 vols., 1904–1908; W. F. Monypenny and G. E. Buckle, Life of Benjamin Disraeli, 6 vols., 1910–1920; Herbert Paul, History of Modern England, 5 vols., 1904–1906; private information.]