CHAPTER VII
MEMBER FOR OXFORD
"Mr. Gladstone's career," says his biographer, G.W.E. Russell, "naturally divides itself into three parts. The first of them ends with his retirement from the representation of Newark. The central part ranges from 1847 to 1868. Happily the third is still incomplete." The first division, according to Dr. Russell, of this remarkable life, we have considered, and we now pass on to the development of the second period. The causes which led up to Mr. Gladstone's retirement from the representation for Newark to that of Oxford we will now proceed to trace.
The agitation by the ablest orators against the corn laws had been going on for ten years, when an announcement was made in the "Times" of December 4, 1845, that Parliament would be convened the first week in January, and that the Queen's address would recommend the immediate consideration of the corn laws, preparatory to their total abolition. This startling news took the other daily papers by surprise, for there had been recently a lull in the agitation, and several of them contradicted it positively. Yet the newspapers had noticed the unusual occurrence of four cabinet meetings in one week. The original statement was confirmed. The ministry was pledged to support the measure. The hour had come, the doom of the corn laws was sealed. Mr. Gladstone's thoughts and labors for some years past had been leading him away from Protection, in which he had been brought up, in the direction of Free Trade; and although he was unable to participate in the last part of the struggle in Parliament, because he was not a member of the House, he was yet in harmony with Sir Robert Peel, and indeed is said to have converted the Premier to Free Trade views. Such a change of views was not the sudden impulse of an hour. The next step was to announce his changed convictions. And so upon other occasions in his life, his attitude on the question of the corn laws led to his separation from some old and greatly cherished political and personal friends, and among the first to disapprove of his new departure must have been his own father, who would think his son was going to ruin the country.
The Duke of Buccleuch and Lord Stanley informed Sir Robert Peel that they could not support a measure for the repeal of the corn laws, and Sir Robert Peel, being doubtful whether he could carry through the proposed measure in the face of such opposition, tendered his resignation as premier to the Queen. Lord John Russell was called upon to form a new ministry, but, having failed in this, the Queen desired Sir Robert Peel to withdraw his resignation, and resume the head of the government again.
It was found when the list of the new Peel Cabinet was published, that Mr. Gladstone was a member of it; having accepted the office of Colonial Secretary, in the place of Lord Stanley, who had resigned because not in sympathy with the proposed movement and of repeal. Accepting office in a ministry pledged to repeal the corn laws led to the retirement of Mr. Gladstone from the House of Commons as the representative for Newark. The Duke of New Castle, the patron and friend of Mr. Gladstone, was an ardent Protectionist, and could not sanction the candidature of a supporter of Free Trade principles. His patronage was therefore necessarily withdrawn from Mr. Gladstone. Indeed, the Duke had turned his own son, Lord Lincoln, out of the representation of Nottinghamshire for accepting office under Sir Robert Peel, and he naturally showed no mercy to the brilliant but wayward politician, whom his favor had made member for Newark. Besides, Mr. Gladstone felt he held opposite principles from those he held when elected, and that unless the constituency had changed with him, he could no longer honorably continue to represent them, even if the influence and friendship of the Duke permitted it.
Accordingly he did not offer himself for re-election, but retired and issued an address to the electors of Newark, dated January 5, 1846, of which the following is an extract: "By accepting the office of Secretary of State for the Colonies, I have ceased to be your representative in Parliament. On several accounts I should have been peculiarly desirous at the present time of giving you an opportunity to pronounce your constitutional judgment on my public conduct, by soliciting at your hands a renewal of the trust which I have already received from you on five successive occasions, and held during a period of thirteen years. But as I have good reason to believe that a candidate recommended to your favor through local connections may ask your suffrages, it becomes my very painful duty to announce to you on that ground alone my retirement from a position which has afforded me so much of honor and of satisfaction." Mr. Gladstone further goes on to explain that he accepted office because he held that "it was for those who believed the Government was acting according to the demands of public duty to testify that belief, however limited their sphere might be, by their co-operation." He had acted "in obedience to the clear and imperious call of public obligation."