had specially protested against the Carlsbad Decrees (q.v.). The
first steps towards the inevitable breach with the reactionary
powers had already been taken before Castlereagh’s tragic
death on the eve of the congress of Verona brought George
Canning into office as the executor of his policy. With
George Canning.
Canning, foe of the Revolution and all its works though
he was, the old liberal Toryism of Pitt’s younger days
seemed once more to emerge. It might have emerged in any
case; but Canning, with his brilliant popular gifts and his frank
appeal to popular support, gave it a revivifying stimulus which
it would never have received from an aristocrat of the type of
Castlereagh.
The new spirit was most conspicuous in foreign affairs; in
the protest of Great Britain against the action of the continental
powers at Verona (see Verona, Congress of), in
the recognition of the South American republics, and
later in the sympathetic attitude of the government
Changed tendency
of British policy.
towards the insurrection in Greece. This policy had
been foreshadowed in the instructions drawn up by Castlereagh
for his own guidance at Verona; but Canning succeeded in giving
it a popular and national colour and thus removing from the
government all suspicion of sympathy with the reactionary spirit
of the “Holy Alliance.” In home affairs, too, the government
made tentative advances in a Liberal direction. In January
1823 Vansittart was succeeded as chancellor of the exchequer
by Robinson (afterwards Lord Goderich), and Huskisson became
president of the Board of Trade. The term of office of the latter
was marked by the first tentative efforts to modify the high
protective system by which British trade was hampered, especially
by the Reciprocity of Duties Act (1823), a modification of
the Navigation Acts, by which British and foreign shipping
were placed on an equal footing, while the right to impose restrictive
duties on ships of powers refusing to reciprocate was
retained. In spite, however, of the improvement in trade that
ultimately resulted from these measures, there was great depression;
in 1825 there was a financial crisis that caused widespread
ruin, and in 1826 the misery of the labouring poor led
to renewed riots and machinery smashing. It became increasingly
clear that a drastic alteration in the existing system
was absolutely inevitable. As to this necessity, however, the
ministry was in fact hopelessly divided. The government was
one of compromise, in which even so burning a question as
Catholic emancipation had been left open. Among its members
were some—like the lord chancellor Eldon, the duke of Wellington,
and the premier, Lord Liverpool, himself—whose Toryism
was of the type crystallized under the influence of the Revolution,
adamant against change. Such progressive measures as it had
passed had been passed in the teeth of its own nominal supporters,
even of its own members. In 1826 Lord Palmerston,
himself a member of the government, wrote: “On the Catholic
question, on the principles of commerce, on the corn laws, on
the settlement of the currency, on the laws relating to trade in
money, on colonial slavery, on the game laws...; on all these
questions, and everything like them, the government will find
support from the Whigs and resistance from their self-denominated
friends.” It was, in fact, only the personal influence
of Liverpool that held the ministry together, and when, on the
17th of February 1827, he was seized with an apoplectic fit, a
crisis was inevitable.
The crisis, indeed, arose before the nominal expiration of the Liverpool administration. Two questions were, in the view of Canning and his supporters, of supreme importance—Catholic emancipation and the reform of the Corn Laws. The first of these had assumed a new urgency since the Catholic Emancipat-ion and Corn Laws. formation in 1823 of the Catholic Association, which under the brilliant leadership of Daniel O’Connell established in Ireland a national organization that threatened the very basis of the government. In March 1826 Sir Francis Burdett had brought in a Catholic Relief Bill, which, passed in the Commons, was thrown out by the Lords. A year later Burdett’s motion that the affairs of Ireland required immediate attention, though supported by Canning, was rejected in the Commons. A bill modifying the Corn Laws, introduced by Canning and Huskisson, passed the House of Commons on the 12th of April 1827, but was rejected by the Lords.
Meanwhile (April 10) Canning had become prime minister,
his appointment being followed by the resignation of all the most
conspicuous members of the Liverpool administration:
Wellington, Eldon, Melville, Bathurst, Westmorland
and Peel, the latter of whom resigned on account
Canning ministry.
Wellington ministry.
of his opposition to Catholic emancipation. The new government
had perforce to rely on the Whigs, who took their seats
on the government side of the House, Lord Lansdowne being
included in the cabinet. Before this coalition could be completed,
however, Canning died (August 8). The short-lived
Goderich administration followed; and in January 1828 the king,
weary of the effort to arrange a coalition, summoned
the duke of Wellington to office as head of a purely
Tory cabinet. Yet the logic of facts was too strong
even for the stubborn spirit of the Iron Duke. In
May 1828, on the initiative of Lord John Russell, the Test and
Corporation Acts were repealed; in the same session a Corn
Bill, differing but little from those that Wellington had hitherto
opposed, was passed; and finally, after a strenuous agitation
which culminated in the election of O’Connell for Clare, and in
Catholic emancipat-ion passed. Revolution of 1830.
spite of the obstinate resistance of King George IV.,
the Catholic Emancipation Bill was passed (April 10,
1829) by a large majority. On the 26th of June 1830
the king died, exactly a month before the outbreak
of the revolution in Paris that hurled Charles X. from
the throne and led to the establishment of the Liberal
Monarchy under Louis Philippe; a revolution that was to exert a
strong influence on the movement for reform in England.
King William IV. ascended the throne at a critical moment
in the history of the English constitution. Everywhere misery
and discontent were apparent, manifesting themselves
in riots against machinery, in rick-burning on a large
scale, and in the formation of trades unions which
William IV.
tended to develop into organized armies of sedition. All the
elements of violent revolution were present. Nor was there
anything in the character of the new king greatly calculated
to restore the damaged prestige of the crown; for, if he lacked
the evil qualities that had caused George IV. to be loathed as
well as despised, he lacked also the sense of personal dignity
that had been the saving grace of George, while he shared the
conservative and Protestant prejudices of his predecessors.
Reform was now inevitable. The Wellington ministry, hated
by the Liberals, denounced even by the Tories as traitorous for
the few concessions made, resigned on the 16th of November;
Whig ministry under
Lord Grey.
The great Reform Bill.
and the Whigs at last came into office under Lord
Grey, the ministry also including a few of the more
Liberal Tories. Lord Durham, perhaps the most
influential leader of the reform movement, became
privy seal, Althorp chancellor of the exchequer, Palmerston
foreign secretary, Melbourne home secretary, Goderich colonial
secretary. Lord John Russell, as paymaster-general, and
Stanley (afterwards Lord Derby), as secretary for Ireland, held
office outside the cabinet. With the actual House of Commons,
however, the government was powerless to effect its purpose.
Though it succeeded in carrying the second reading
of the Reform Bill (March 21, 1831), it was defeated
in committee, and appealed to the country. The
result was a great governmental majority, and the
bill passed the Commons in September. Its rejection by the
Lords on the 8th of October was the signal for dangerous rioting;
and in spite of the opposition of the king, the bill was once more
passed by the Commons (December 12). A violent agitation
marked the recess. On the 14th of April 1832 the bill was read
a second time in the Lords, but on the 7th of May was again
rejected, whereupon the government resigned. The attempt
of Wellington, at the king’s instance, to form a ministry failed;
of all the Tory obstructionists he alone had the courage to face
the popular rage. On the 15th Lord Grey was in office again;
the demand was made for a sufficient creation of peers to swamp
