XXII. 1830. over again, during the last fifteen years, and these petitions CHAP. had uniformly been rejected. Cities equally with counties, manufacturers alike with farmers, shopkeepers with squires, had earnestly implored relief, and offered to substantiate their distresses by evidence; but their prayers had been disregarded. They were told that they were altogether mistaken, that they were eminently prosperous, and that the cutting off of £150,000,000 annually from the remuneration of productive industry in the State had occasioned no diminution in its ability to bear the existing and undiminished burdens. Capital, intrenched in the close boroughs, which it had acquired by purchase, was more than a match for the industrial classes, still, under the existing constitution of the House of Commons, in a minority; and, finding itself increased by a half by the existing system, derided the impotent efforts of labouring industry. Like the farmers-general of the revenue in France, who made colossal fortunes out of the labour of the people anterior to the Revolution, they said, " Pourquoi tant de bruit? nous sommes si bien." Worse even than that, the influence of the capitalists had become such that they had succeeded not only in stifling the cry of distress, but in blinding men to its real cause, and, by their influence over the press, had withdrawn the public attention from the only change by which the general suffering could be alleviated. 42. tion of the liamentary These causes produced that general and blind cry for change, which ere long acquired such force as to be irre- Disinclinasistible. The Whig leaders, who were the proprietors of Whigs genea large part of the close boroughs, and by means of them rally to parhad governed the country for eighty years after the Revo- reform. lution, were in no hurry to forward their extinction; and although this obliged them, in order to keep up their credit with the people, to join, on some occasions, in the outcry against the corruptions of Parliament, yet in secret they were not less inclined than their opponents to uphold them. "In this," says the historian of their party," there is nothing to be wondered at. All the VOL. IV. CHAP. great families had almost entirely receded from the ranks XXII. of the reformers; and they looked with jealousy upon 1830. all who based their pretensions to popular favour upon views of parliamentary reform. In 1819, they made the most bitter invectives against the reformers; and when the Whigs, under Mr Canning, became themselves part of the Government, their wishes for reform appear 1 Roebuck, to have entirely disappeared." The Cauning party, both "The History of the Whigs, before and after the death of its leader, was still more strongly, and on principle, opposed to any general reform.† But although these two great sections of the liberal party, the Whigs and Canningites, were thus strongly opposed to the very last to any sweeping plan of parliamentary Roebuck, reform, yet the general and long-continued distress conAnn. Reg. sequent on the contraction of the currency,2 from 1819 to 1830, obliged them to alter their tone, and, in order to preserve their lead with the people, give in to the i. 205, 206. i. 210, 212; 1830, 87, 94. * “Mr Tierney declared that he never rose with more of the spirit of moderation, or with more a disposition to harmony, than he felt at that moment; and in the first place, he must thank his noble friend (Lord John Russell) for the opportunity which he had afforded the House of unanimously and decidedly discountenancing the wild and visionary doctrines of reform which had lately agitated the country." Lord John Russell said, on July 1, 1819," I agree in the propriety of disfranchising such boroughs as are notoriously corrupt, and I will give my consent to any measure that will limit the duration of Parliament to three years. I cannot, however, pledge myself to support a measure that goes the length of proposing an inquiry into the general state of the representation, because such an inquiry is calculated to throw a slur upon the representation of the country, and to fill the minds of the people with vague and indefinite alarm."-Parl. Deb. xli. p. 1106, and xl. p. 1440. "Now, what remains behind ?" said Mr Huskisson, in 1829-" Parliamentary reform. I trust it will long remain behind. I hope we shall always resist it firmly and strenuously. I am sure, if we adopt the proposition of my honourable friend the member for Blitchingly [for giving the members for East Retford to Birmingham], the chance of our making a successful resistance to parliamentary reform will be increased; but if we adopt the proposition of the honourable member for Hertford [for giving the franchise to the Hundred], we shall see parliamentary reform, backed by a powerful auxiliary out of the House (I mean public opinion), made an annual and formidable subject of discussion."— Mirror of Parliament, 1829, p. 1450. "I feel no difficulty," said Lord Howick, in 1830,"in understanding the right honourable gentleman. He has made an admission, for which I thank him. Individuals who think as the right honourable gentleman does, are willing to give up some of the outworks of corruption, in order that they may be better able to defend the stronghold." —Ibid., 1830, p. 127. general demand for an entire change in the representa- CHAP. tion. XXII. 1830. motions on tary reform Parliament 1830. Parliament, 135. The first symptoms of this feverish and unconquerable 43. anxiety for change, appeared in a variety of motions on Various the subject of parliamentary reform, brought forward parliamenduring the session of 1830 by several detached members, made in without any apparent concert with each other, but which during the showed in an unmistakable manner how earnestly the session of subject was forced upon them by their constituents. Lord Howick, who, like his father Earl Grey, had, almost alone of the aristocratic members of the Whig party, been throughout a decided and consistent reformer, first brought forward a motion "for some general and comprehensive measure, the only means of checking the scandalous abuses which prevail," which was lost by a majority of only 27; the numbers being 126 to 99.1 On 18th Mirror of February, the Marquess of Blandford, a leader of the High- 1830, 131, Church party, which was so profoundly irritated at Mr Peel and the Duke of Wellington for their conduct on Catholic emancipation, made motion for a vague and very sweeping measure of reform, conceived rather in anger than wisdom, which was negatived by a much larger majority-the numbers being 160 to 57.2 A much more for- 2 Ibid., 361 midable, because better conceived and reasonable onslaught 23, on the existing state of things, was made by Lord John Russell, who, on 29th February, brought forward a motion for leave to bring in a bill "to enable the towns of Manchester, Leeds, and Birmingham to return representatives to Parliament." Nothing more reasonable could be conceived; for this proposal, laying aside all projects of sweeping reform, went only to provide a remedy in the most moderate way for a great and acknowledged defect, and lessened the danger of future innovation by detaching from it the formidable alliance of present grievance. The motion, accordingly, was supported by the whole strength of the united Whig and Canning parties in addition to the Radical reformers; and the division showed only a et seq., Feb. 1 Mirror of 1830, 376. CHAP. majority of 48, the numbers being 188 to 140.1 The XXII. strength of the Reform party, evinced by this division, 1830. induced Mr O'Connell, on 28th May, to bring in a bill, Parliament, limiting the duration of Parliament to three years, to make suffrage universal, and protect the voters by the ballot. Lord John Russell upon this moved an amendment to the effect," that it is expedient to extend the basis of the representation of the people in this House, by giving * Mirror of members to large unrepresented towns, and to coun1830, ii. ties of greatest wealth and population." Mr O'Connell's Ann. Reg. motion was rejected by a majority of 309, the numbers being 319 to 13; and Lord John Russell's amendment by 96, the numbers being 213 to 117.2 Parliament, 2054, 2056; 1830, 87, 97. 44. political influence. These different decisions sufficiently proved the progress Rise of the which, in spite of the disinclination of the leaders of the unions, and Whigs and Canningites, the Reform question was, from their great the pressure from without, making in the House of Commons. But meanwhile a still more efficient ally to the cause was arising, and had already acquired considerable strength in the country. This was the POLITICAL UNIONS, which, in imitation of the Catholic Association, were formed in the principal unrepresented great towns in the empire, and which ere long acquired an influence that came to overbalance for the time that of both Houses of Parliament. They began in Birmingham, the city in the kingdom which had suffered most from the measures pursued by the legislature, in consequence of the immense reduction in the price of hardware goods from the contraction of the currency. Their object was to collect funds, appoint committees, and organise corresponding societies, in order to raise a universal cry for parliamentary reform through the country; and to carry the question in spite of all the opposition which could be made by the holders of the close boroughs, by exaggerating the difficulAnn. Reg. ties and distresses of the country, and representing reform in Parliament as the one and only panacea which would at once terminate all its sufferings.3 By steadily pursu 1830, 91, 92. XXII. 1830. ing this object, and turning the whole ill-humour of the CHAP. country arising out of the general distress into this one channel, they hoped to carry their point in spite of all the lukewarmness of the Whig, and the opposition of the whole Tory borough proprietors. 45. death of Such, however, was the strength of the great capitalists interested in the continuance of the existing order of Illness and things, monetary as well as political, that it is doubtful George IV. whether these hopes would have been realised, at least June 26. without the aid of open violence, or for a long period, had it not been for two events which occurred in rapid succession at this period, and totally disturbed the balance of parties and equilibrium of the national mind in Great Britain. The first of these was the death of the King, which took place on the 26th June, and rendered a dissolution of Parliament in the course of the autumn unavoidable; the second the French Revolution, and fall of Charles X. on July 28th, which caused the new elections to take place during a period when the public mind was excited to the very highest degree by the sight of the overturn of a throne by urban revolt in the neighbouring kingdom. The health of George IV., which had been long precarious, and much impaired by the anxieties and regrets consequent on Catholic emancipation, failed so rapidly in the spring of this year, that on 15th April a April 15. bulletin was issued, stating that his Majesty was labouring under a bilious disorder, which was soon ascertained to be in reality an ossification of the heart. So rapid was the progress of this frightful disease, that within six weeks afterwards it became necessary to bring a bill into May 24. Parliament, authorising the royal sign-manual to be adhibited by stamp. The malady ran its usual course, exhi-Ann. Reg. biting alternately symptoms of alleviation and aggravation, 132; Roe and at length terminated fatally on 26th June, in the 244, 245. 68th year of the Sovereign's age.1 George IV., who thus paid the debt of nature at one of the most critical periods of English history, is a Sovereign 1830, 131, buck, i. |