Morley, the Secretary of State for India. Lord Minto, the Governor-General in India, was
also a member of the Cecil Bloc in a peripheral fashion but held his appointment through
a family claim on the Governor-Generalship rather than by favor of the Cecils.
The Act of 1909, however, while not a product of the groups with which we are
concerned, was formed in the same social tradition, drawn up from the same intellectual
and social outlook, and put into effect in the same fashion. It legalized the principle of
election (rather than nomination) to Indian councils, enlarged their membership to
provide majorities of non-officials in the provincial councils, and gave them the power to
discuss affairs and pass resolutions. The seats were allotted to communal groups, with the
minorities (like Moslems and Sikhs) receiving more than their proportionate share and
the Moslems having, in addition, a separate electorate for the incumbents of Moslem
seats. This served to encourage extremism among the Moslems and, while a logical
development of 1892, was a long step on the road to Pakistan. This Act of 1909 was, as
we have mentioned, put through the House of Commons by Sir Thomas Buchanan, a
Fellow of All Souls and an associate of the Cecil Bloc.
The Government of India Act of 1919 is outstanding in many ways. It is the most
drastic and most important reform made in Indian government in the whole period from
1861 to the achievement of self-government. Its provisions for the central government of
India remained in force, with only slight changes, from 1919 to 1946. It is the only one of
these acts whose "secret" legislative background is no longer a secret. And it is the only
one which indicated a desire on the part of the British government to establish in India a
responsible government patterned on that in Britain.
The legislative history of the Act of 1919 as generally known is simple enough. It runs
as follows. In August 1917 the Secretary of State for India, Edwin S. Montagu, issued a
statement which read: "The policy of H.M. Government, with which the Government of
India are in complete accord, is that of the increasing association of Indians in every
branch of the administration and the gradual development of self-government institutions
with a view to the progressive realization of responsible government in India as an
integral part of the British Empire." The critical word here is responsible government,
since the prospect of eventual self-government had been held out to India for years. In
accordance with this promise, Montagu visited India and, in cooperation with the
Viceroy, Lord Chelmsford, issued the Montagu-Chelmsford Report, indicating the
direction of future policy. This report became the basis for the bill of 1918, which, after a
certain amount of amendment by Lord Selborne's Joint Select Committee, came into
force as the Government of India Act of 1919.
The secret history of this Act is somewhat different, and begins in Canada in 1909,
when Lionel Curtis accepted from his friend William Marris the idea that responsible
government on the British pattern should be extended to India. Two years later, Curtis
formed a study group of six or eight persons within the London Round Table Group. We
do not know for certain who were the members of the study group, but apparently it
included Curtis, Kerr, Fisher, and probably Brand. To these were added three officials of
the India Office. These included Malcolm Seton (Sir Malcolm after 1919), who was
secretary to the Judicial Department of the India Office and joined Curtis's group about
1913; and Sir William Duke, who was Lieutenant Governor of Bengal in 1911-1912,
senior member of the council of the Governor of Bengal in 1912-1914, and a member of
the Council of India in London after 1914. At this last date he joined the Curtis group.
Both of these men were important figures in the India Office later, Sir William as
Permanent Under Secretary from 1920 to his death in 1924, and Sir Malcolm as Assistant
Under Secretary (1919-1924) and Deputy Under Secretary (1924-1933). Sir Malcolm
wrote the biographical sketch of Sir William in the
and also wrote the volume on
member from this same source was Sir Lionel Abrahams, Assistant Under Secretary in
the India Office.
The Curtis study group was not an official committee, although some persons (both at
the time and since) have believed it was. Among these persons would appear to be Lord
Chelmsford, for in debate in the House of Lords in November 1927 he said:
“I came home from India in January 1916 for six weeks before I went out again as
Viceroy, and, when I got home, I found that there was a Committee in existence at the
India Office, which was considering on what lines future constitutional development
might take place. That Committee, before my return in the middle of March gave me a