At the moment when he spoke, however, the imminent fear of invasion had been removed--removed, indeed, for a century--by Nelson's crowning victory at Trafalgar. From that time forward the military forces of the Crown were required not so much for the defence of the United Kingdom itself as for the provision of garrisons for the vast Empire which had grown up during the eighteenth century. These imperial garrisons had necessarily to be drawn from professional troops voluntarily enlisted. Thus the militia declined. An effort was made in 1852 to revive it, and again the underlying principle of compulsion was explicitly recognized. The Militia Act of that year[22] contains the provision: "In case it appears to H.M. ---- that the number of men required ... cannot be raised by voluntary enlistment ... or in case of actual invasion or imminent danger thereof, it shall be lawful for H.M. ---- to order and direct that the number of men so required ... shall be raised by ballot as herein provided." The effort at revival was unfortunately vain, and when in 1859 international trouble again seemed to be brewing, instead of appealing once more to the immemorial defence of the country, the Government weakly and with most deplorable results allowed the formation of a new body, the volunteers--a body whose patriotism was noble, whose intentions were admirable, but whose inefficiency became and remained a byword.[23] The militia continued ingloriously, mainly as a nursery for the regular army.
Finally, in 1908, Mr. (now Lord) Haldane absorbed both volunteers and militia into the new Territorial and Reserve Forces, the militia becoming a Special Reserve.[24] It is much to be regretted that the Act of 1908 did not expressly reaffirm the continued validity of the compulsory principle of service which from the earliest times had been the basis of the militia. But, though it did not expressly reaffirm it, it left it absolutely unimpaired and intact. Said Mr. Haldane himself in the House of Commons on April 13th, 1910: "The Militia Ballot Acts and the Acts relating to the local militia are still unrepealed, and could be enforced if necessary."
[21] Cobbett. _Parliamentary Debates_, vol. vii, p. 818.