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 opposition, conducted the anti-Home Rule campaign to a victorious issue, manifesting, according to Lord Morley, remarkable skill and judgement [Life of Gladstone, iii. 338]. He himself, however, modestly considered that he was overshadowed by his colleague, Lord Randolph Churchill, and for this reason, when the new Salisbury ministry was formed in August, he insisted on making way for Churchill as chancellor of the exchequer and leader of the House of Commons [Churchill, 527–8]. On Churchill's suggestion he was offered and accepted the position of Irish secretary, which he had held twelve years before, and which was at this time the most difficult position in the government. This appointment was not approved by the Ulstermen and the more extreme Unionists, who considered him to be too much in sympathy with the Irish point of view. What was more serious, Hicks Beach found that his views about Ireland and Irish landlords differed from those of Lord Salisbury, and he became apprehensive of being forced to administer Ireland too much on a landlords' rights basis [Lord Randolph Churchill to Lord Salisbury, 22 August 1886, Churchill, 603]. Churchill's unexpected resignation in December 1886 deprived him of support in the Cabinet, from the meetings of which his Irish duties frequently compelled him to be absent [ibid., 605]. On 4 March 1887 he was compelled to resign office on account of an ‘acute affection of the eyes’ which several times threatened him with loss of sight. He was succeeded by Mr. Arthur (afterwards Earl of) Balfour. For some time he remained in the Cabinet without portfolio; then he withdrew, but re-entered on 21 February 1888 as president of the Board of Trade, an office which he continued to hold until the fall of Lord Salisbury's government in August 1892.

In 1895 Hicks Beach became for the second time chancellor of the exchequer, and retained office until 1902. His budgets were carefully worked out and clearly presented. The first years concluded a period of great prosperity, but beyond a reduction of the rates on agricultural land in 1896, a modification of the incidence of income tax on middle-class incomes in 1898, and an abatement of the duty on tobacco in the same year, little was done to relieve taxation. In 1899 the South African War began to affect national finance. By 1902 the income tax had risen from eightpence to one and threepence, and in that year Hicks Beach reimposed the shilling corn duty which Lowe had discontinued in 1869. It was abandoned in the following year by his successor, Mr. (afterwards Baron) Ritchie [q.v.]. Hicks Beach resigned office on Lord Salisbury's retirement in July 1902. He was entirely out of sympathy with Mr. Joseph Chamberlain's movement in favour of ‘tariff reform’, and during the debates on Ritchie's budget he described himself as a ‘thorough-going free-trader’. During the next few years he conducted a strenuous campaign against protection and in favour of administrative economy, and by his efforts contributed to deter Mr. Balfour from committing the party to Mr. Chamberlain's programme. At the same time the decided character of his opinions prevented him from returning to office. In 1906 he was raised to the peerage with the title of Viscount St. Aldwyn, of Coln St. Aldwyn, Gloucestershire, and in 1915 he was created an earl. He died in London 30 April 1916, and was buried at Coln St. Aldwyn.

St. Aldwyn was twice married: first, in 1864 to Caroline Susan (died 1865), daughter of John Henry Elwes, of Colesbourne Park, Gloucestershire; and secondly, in 1874 to Lady Lucy Catherine, third daughter of Hugh Fortescue, third Earl Fortescue [q.v.]. By his second wife he had one son and three daughters. His son, Michael Hugh Hicks Beach, Viscount Quenington (1877–1916) predeceased him by a week, and he was succeeded as second earl by his grandson, Michael John Hicks Beach (born 1912).

St. Aldwyn was a reserved man with a vein of shyness, and he made few close political friends. The most notable of these were his early patron, Disraeli, and at a later time, Lord Randolph Churchill. In 1890 he strongly urged Lord Salisbury to readmit Churchill to office, and in 1895 Churchill's bust in the House of Commons was unveiled ‘by his oldest and truest political comrade, Sir Michael Hicks Beach’ [Churchill, 771, 820]. Although Churchill was entirely loyal to him it may be doubted whether the alliance was favourable to Hicks Beach's political fortunes, particularly in 1886. He has been described as ‘a thorough conservative of the old school’, but he had no toleration for established abuses, and was more sympathetic than the bulk of his party in his attitude towards Ireland. His inability to suffer fools gladly in public matters and his merciless logic in debate gained him a reputation for austerity of demeanour and asperity of temper which was on the whole undeserved. Goschen 256