Great Britain and the American Civil War

by Ephraim Douglass Adams

"That gentleman [Bright] could not be asked to enter the Cabinet in person. The country abhorred him; Parliament despised him; his inveterate habits of slander and vituperation, his vulgarity, and his incurable want of veracity, had made him so hateful to the educated classes that it would have required no common courage to give him office; his insolent sneers at royalty would have made his appointment little less than a personal insult to the Queen; and his bad temper would have made him an intolerable colleague in the Council. But Mr. Bright had another self; a faithful shadow, which had no ideas, no soul, no other existence but what it borrowed from him, while its previous life and education had accustomed it to the society of statesmen and of gentlemen[1386]."

Such expressions gained nothing for the Conservative cause; they were too evidently the result of alarm at the progress of Radical and pro-Northern sentiment. Goldwin Smith in a "Letter" to the Southern Independence Association, analysed with clarity the situation. Answering criticisms of the passionate mob spirit of Northern press and people, he accused the Times of having

"... pandered to the hatred of America among the upper classes of this country during the present war. Some of us at least had been taught by what we have lately seen not to shrink from an extension of the suffrage, if the only bad consequence of that measure of justice would be a change in government from the passions of the privileged class to the passions of the people.... History will not mistake the meaning of the loud cry of triumph which burst from the hearts of all who openly or secretly hated liberty and progress, at the fall, as they fondly supposed, of the Great Republic." British working men "are for the most part as well aware that the cause of those who are fighting for the right of labour is theirs, as any nobleman in your Association can be that the other cause in his[1387]."

The question of democracy as a political philosophy and as an institution for Great Britain was, by 1864, rapidly coming to the front in politics. This was very largely a result of the American Civil War. Roebuck, after the failure of his effort for mediation in 1863, was obsessed with a fear of the tendency in England. "I have great faith in my countrymen," he wrote, "but the experience of America frightens me. I am not ashamed to use the word frightened. During my whole life I have looked to that country as about to solve the great problem of self-government, and now, in my old age, the hopes of my youth and manhood are destroyed, and I am left to reconstruct my political philosophy, and doubt and hesitation beset me on every point[1388]." More philosophically Matthew Arnold, in 1864, characterized the rule of aristocracy as inevitably passing, but bent his thought to the discovery of some middle ground or method--some "influence [which] may help us to prevent the English people from becoming, with the growth of democracy, Americanized[1389]." "There is no longer any sort of disguise maintained," wrote Adams, "as to the wishes of the privileged classes. Very little genuine sympathy is entertained for the rebels. The true motive is apparent enough. It is the fear of the spread of democratic feeling at home in the event of our success[1390]."

The year 1864 had witnessed a rapid retreat by wiser Conservative elements in proclaming the "lesson" of American democracy--a retreat caused by alarm at the vigour with which Radicals had taken up the challenge. Conservative hopes were still fixed upon Southern success and Conservative confidence loudly voiced. Even the pride of the Times in the accuracy of its news and in its military forecasts was subordinated to the purpose of keeping up the courage of the faction it represented[1391]. Small wonder, then, that Delane, on receiving the news of Sherman's arrival before Savannah, should be made physically ill and write to Dasent: "The American news is a heavy blow to us as well as to the South." The next day he added: "I am still sore vexed about Sherman, but Chenery did his best to attenuate the mischief[1392]." "Attenuation" of Northern progress in arms was, indeed, attempted, but the facts of the military situation were too strong for continued concealment. From January, 1865, only the most stubborn of Southern friends could remain blind to the approaching Northern victory. Lord Acton, a hero-worshipper of the great Confederate military leader, "broke his heart over the surrender of Lee," but was moved also by keen insight as to the political meaning of that surrender[1393].

So assured were all parties in England that the great Civil War in America was closing in Northern victory that the final event was discounted in advance and the lines were rapidly being formed for an English political struggle on the great issue heralded as involved in the American conflict. Again, on the introduction of a motion in Parliament for expansion of the franchise the ultra-Conservatives attempted to read a "lesson" from America. The Quarterly for April, 1865, asserted that even yet "the mass of educated men in England retain the sympathy for the South which they have nourished ever since the conflict assumed a decided shape." America was plainly headed in the direction of a military despotism. Her example should warn England from a move in the same direction. "The classes which govern this country are in a minority," and should beware of majority rule. But events discredited the prophecy of a military despotism. The assassination of Lincoln gave opportunity not merely for a general outpouring of expressions of sympathy but also to the Radicals a chance to exalt Lincoln's leadership in democracy[1394].

In July Great Britain was holding elections for a new Parliament. Not a single member who had supported the cause of the North failed of re-election, several additional Northern "friends" were chosen, and some outspoken members for the South were defeated. Adams thought this a matter deserving special notice in America, and prophesied a new era approaching in England:

"As it is, I cannot resist the belief that this period marks an era in the political movement of Great Britain. Pure old-fashioned conservatism has so far lost its hold on the confidence of the country that it will not appear in that guise any more. Unless some new and foreign element should interpose, I look for decided progress in enlarging the popular features of the constitution, and diminishing the influence of the aristocracy.... It is impossible not to perceive traces of the influence of our institutions upon all these changes.... The progress of the liberal cause, not in England alone, but all over the world, is, in a measure, in our hands[1395]."

The "Liberal progress" was more rapid, even, than Adams anticipated. Palmerston, ill for some months past, died on October 18, 1865. Russell succeeded him as head of the Ministry, and almost immediately declared himself in favour of Parliamentary reform even though a majority in both Houses was still opposed to such a measure. Russell's desertion of his earlier attitude of "finality" on franchise expansion correctly represented the acceptance, though unwillingly, by both political parties of the necessity of reform. The battle, long waged, but reaching its decisive moment during the American Civil War, had finally gone against Conservatism when Lee surrendered at Appomatox. Russell's Reform Bill of 1866 was defeated by Tory opposition in combination with a small Whig faction which refused to desert the "principle" of aristocratic government--the "government by the wise," but the Tories who came into power under Derby were forced by the popular demand voiced even to the point of rioting, themselves to present a Reform Bill. Disraeli's measure, introduced with a number of "fancy franchises," which, in effect, sought to counteract the giving of the vote to British working-men, was quickly subjected to such caustic criticism that all the planned advantages to Conservatism were soon thrown overboard, and a Bill presented so Radical as to permit a transfer of political power to the working classes[1396]. The Reform Bill of 1867 changed Great Britain from a government by aristocracy to one by democracy. A new nation came into being. The friends of the North had triumphed.