Hugh Cairns was the second son, and was educated at Belfast Academy and at Trinity College Dublin, graduating with a senior moderatorship in classics in 1838.

On the other occasion referred to, Cairns spoke in opposition to Lord John Russell's amendment to the motion for the second reading of the government Reform Bill, winning the approval of Benjamin Disraeli.

[1] In 1866, Lord Derby, returning to office, appointed Cairns Attorney General, and in the same year he had availed himself of a vacancy to seek the comparative rest of the Court of Appeal.

[1] He had distinguished himself in the Commons by his resistance to the Roman Catholics Oath Bill brought in 1865; in the Lords, his efforts on behalf of the Church of Ireland were equally strenuous.

Not long after this, Lord Cairns resigned the leadership of his party in the upper house, but resumed it in 1870 and opposed the Irish Land Bill in that year.

Upon the Conservatives' return to power in 1874, he again became Lord Chancellor; in 1878 he was created Viscount Garmoyle and Earl Cairns; and, in 1880, his party went out of office.

[1] In opposition he did not take as prominent a part as previously, but when Disraeli (by then created Earl of Beaconsfield) died in 1881, there were some Conservatives who considered that his claim to lead the party was better than that of Lord Salisbury.

His judgments are to be found in the Law Reports and those who wish to consider his oratory should read the speeches above referred to, or that delivered in the House of Lords on the Compensation for Disturbance Bill in 1880, and his memorable criticism of Mr Gladstone's policy in the Transvaal, after Majuba Hill.