James Gascoyne-Cecil, 2nd Marquess of Salisbury James Gascoyne-Cecil, 2nd Marquess of Salisbury James Brownlow William Gascoyne-Cecil, 2nd Marquess of Salisbury, (17 April 1791 – 12 April 1868), styled Viscount Cranborne until 1823, was a British Conservative politician. He held office under the Earl of Derby as Lord Privy Seal in 1852 and Lord President of the Council between 1858 and 1859. He was the father of Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, three times Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and grandfather of Arthur Balfour, who also served as Prime Minister. Salisbury was the son of James Cecil, 1st Marquess of Salisbury, and Lady Emily Mary
Lords Commissioners of the Treasury government as a whole. Indeed even after decades of the emergence of the Prime Ministership William Pitt the Younger proferred that the Prime Minister "ought to be the person at the head of the finances." The two exceptions were Lord Chatham and Lord Salisbury. During Chatham's ministry of 1766-68 he occupied the office of Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal instead. Lord Salisbury became First Lord neither during his first term (1885-1886) nor his third (1985-1902), though he did become First Lord for the first two years of his second ministry (1886-1892). Since Salisbury, the two roles have become completely