to traitors, and introduced an act enabling it to commute the
death penalty to transportation. The “insurrection” had from
the first proved abortive. With Smith O’Brien’s transportation
it practically terminated.
In the meanwhile the difficulties which the government was experiencing from the Irish famine had been aggravated by a grave commercial crisis in England. In the autumn of 1847 a series of failures in the great commercial centres created a panic in the city of London, which forced consols down to 78, and induced the government to take upon itself the responsibility of suspending the Bank Charter Act. That step, enabling the directors of the Bank of England to issue notes unsecured by bullion, had the effect of gradually restoring confidence. But a grave commercial crisis of this character is often attended with other than financial consequences. The stringency of the money market increases the distress of the industrial classes by diminishing the demand for work; and, when labour suffers, political agitation flourishes. Early in 1848, moreover, revolutions on the continent produced a natural craving for changes at home. Louis Philippe was driven out of Paris, the emperor of Austria was driven out of Vienna, the Austrian soldiery had to withdraw from Milan, and even in Berlin the crown had to make terms with the people. While thrones were falling or tottering in every country in Europe, it was inevitable that excitement and agitation should prevail in Great Britain. The Chartists, reviving the machinery which they had endeavoured to employ in 1839, decided on preparing a monster petition to parliament, which was to be escorted to Westminster by a monster procession. Their preparations excited general alarm, and on the invitation Chartism. of the government no less than 170,000 special constables were sworn in to protect life and property against a rabble. By the judicious arrangements, however, which were made by the duke of Wellington, the peace of the metropolis was secured. The Chartists were induced to abandon the procession which had caused so much alarm, and the monster petition was carried in a cab to the House of Commons. There it was mercilessly picked to pieces by a select committee. It was found that, instead of containing nearly 6,000,000 signatures, as its originators had boasted, less than 2,000,000 names were attached to it. Some of the names, moreover, were obviously fictitious, or even absurd. The exposure of these facts turned the whole thing into ridicule, and gave parliament an excuse for postponing measures of organic reform which might otherwise have been brought forward.
If the ministry thus abstained from pressing forward a large scheme of political reform, it succeeded in carrying two measures of the highest commercial and social importance. In 1849 it supplemented the free trade policy, which Sir Robert Peel had developed, by the repeal of the Navigation Acts. Navigation Acts. Briefly stated, these acts, which had been originated during the Protectorate of Cromwell, and continued after the Restoration, reserved the whole coasting trade of the country for British vessels and British seamen, and much of the foreign trade for British vessels, commanded and chiefly manned by British subjects. The acts, therefore, were in the strictest sense protective, but they were also designed to increase the strength of Great Britain at sea, by maintaining large numbers of British seamen. They had been defended by Adam Smith on the ground that defence was “of much more importance than opulence,” and by the same reasoning they had been described by John Stuart Mill as, “though economically disadvantageous, politically expedient.” The acts, however, threw a grave burden on British trade and British shipowners. Their provisions by restricting competition naturally tended to raise freights, and by restricting employment made it difficult for shipowners to man their vessels. Accordingly the government wisely determined on their repeal; and one of the last and greatest battles between Free Trade and Protection was fought over the question. The second reading of the government bill was carried in the House of Lords by a majority of only ten: it would not have been carried at all if the government had not secured a much larger number of proxies than their opponents could obtain.
If the repeal of the Navigation Acts constituted a measure of the highest commercial importance, the passage of the Ten Hours Bill in 1847 marked the first great advance in factory legislation. Something, indeed, had already been done to remedy the evils arising from the employment Ten Hours Bill. of women and very young children in factories and mines. In 1833 Lord Ashley, better known as Lord Shaftesbury, had carried the first important Factory Act. In 1842 he had succeeded, with the help of the striking report of a royal commission, in inducing parliament to prohibit the employment of women and of boys under ten years of age in mines. And in 1843 Sir James Graham, who was home secretary in Sir Robert Peel’s administration, had been compelled by the pressure of public opinion to introduce a measure providing for the education of children employed in factories, and for limiting the hours of work of children and young persons. The educational clauses of this bill were obviously framed in the interests of the Church of England, and raised a heated controversy which led to the abandonment of the measure; and in the following year Sir James Graham introduced a new bill dealing with the labour question alone. Briefly stated, his proposal was that no child under nine years of age should be employed in a factory, and that no young person under eighteen should be employed for more than twelve hours a day. This measure gave rise to the famous controversy on the ten hours clause, which commenced in 1844 and was protracted till 1847. Lord Ashley and the factory reformers contended, on the one hand, that ten hours were long enough for any person to work; their opponents maintained, on the contrary, that the adoption of the clause would injure the working-classes by lowering the rate of wages, and ruin the manufacturers by exposing them to foreign competition. In 1847 the reform was at last adopted. It is a remarkable fact that it was carried against the views of the leading statesmen on both sides of the House. It was the triumph of common sense over official arguments.
During the first four years of Lord John Russell’s government, his administration had never enjoyed any very large measure of popular support, but it had been partly sustained by the advocacy of Sir Robert Peel. The differences which estranged Sir Robert from his old supporters Death of Peel. were far greater than those which separated him from the Whigs, and the latter were therefore constantly able to rely on his assistance. In the summer of 1850, however, a lamentable accident—a fall from his horse—deprived the country of the services of its great statesman. His death naturally affected the position of parties. The small remnant of able men, indeed, who had been associated with him in his famous administration, still maintained an attitude of neutrality. But the bulk of the Conservative party rallied under the lead of Lord Stanley (afterwards Derby) in the House of Lords, and gradually submitted to, rather than accepted, the lead of Disraeli in the House of Commons.
In the autumn which succeeded Sir Robert Peel’s death, an event which had not been foreseen agitated the country and produced a crisis. During the years which had succeeded the Reform Bill a great religious movement had influenced politics both in England and Scotland. Oxford movement. In England, a body of eminent men at Oxford—of whom J. H., afterwards Cardinal, Newman was the chief, but who numbered among their leaders Hurrell Froude, the brother of the historian, and Keble, the author of the Christian Year—endeavoured to prove that the doctrines of the Church of England were identical with those of the primitive Catholic Church, and that every Catholic doctrine might be held by those who were within its pale. This view was explained in a remarkable series of tracts, which gave their authors the name of Tractarians. The most famous of these, and the last of the series, Tract XC., was published three years after the queen’s accession to the throne. In Scotland, the Presbyterian Church—mainly under the guidance of Dr Chalmers, one of the most eloquent preachers of the century—was simultaneously engaged in a contest with the state on the subject of ecclesiastical patronage. Both movements had this
