Stemming the Tide of Democracy—Lord Derby and Reform—The Reform League—The Riots in Hyde Park—Cowing the Ministry—The Adullamites—Mr. Disraeli’s Resolutions—Crises in the Cabinet—The Ten Minutes Bill—The Government Measure—Mr. Gladstone’s Alterations—A Leap in the Dark—The Movement in Favour of German Unity—The Austro-Prussian War—The Luxembourg Question—Execution of the Emperor Maximilian—Mr. Disraeli’s Budget—Academic Discussions of Irish Grievances—Fenian Outrages at Manchester and Clerkenwell—Rattening at Sheffield—Prince Arthur Passes his Military Examination—Illness of the Princess of Wales—Founding of the Royal Albert Hall—The Sultan in England—Abdul Aziz, K.G.—Visit of the Queen to the Duchess of Roxburghe—Dr. Macleod at Balmoral—Prince Arthur ill of Smallpox—The Queen Keeping Hallowe’en—Her Majesty Visits Lady Palmerston.
When Lord Derby came to power in 1866 he was reported to have said that it would be his mission “to stem the tide of democracy.” It has, therefore, been supposed that he was an irreconcilable opponent of Reform. As he passed an extremely democratic measure of Parliamentary Reform—thereby, to use his own phrase, “dishing the Whigs”—he has been accused of the grossest possible tergiversation. What, then, was the attitude of the Tories to Reform in 1866? The party, as a whole, was certainly hostile to it. To give votes to people who paid £6 a year for their houses meant, as Sir E. Bulwer Lytton declared, the enfranchisement of “poverty and passion.” No speeches stirred the hearts and sympathies of the Tory party throughout this country so strongly as those in which Mr. Lowe, and other Adullamites, heaped the coarsest abuse on the working-classes of England. In those days an English artisan was spoken of in Tory society with an antipathy stronger even than that with which the “mean whites” regarded the negroes in the Southern States. The leaders of the Tory party, however—Lord Derby, Lord Stanley, Mr. Disraeli, and Mr. Henley—never shared these prejudices. But what would they do after being called to power by the declared enemies of Reform? The first public utterances of Ministers did not throw much light on their intentions. Mr. Disraeli told his constituents that when the Government attempted to deal with Reform they would not adopt any foreign pattern—either American or French—as a model for the Parliamentary institutions of the country. He protested that he could not discover whether the defeated Bill was based on the rights of man or the rights of numbers. He seemed to have some notion that “the estate of the Commons” should, like all other estates, have a fair share in the Government of the country. But his idea evidently was to enfranchise not masses but classes, and to give electoral power to the élite of all the different “orders” of society. Sir Stafford Northcote was opposed to bringing in any new Reform Bill.[250] Lord Stanley said bluntly that he had objected to the defeated Bill, because it made the franchise lower than the House of Commons would endure; and as for Lord Derby, his opinion was very ambiguous. He had no objection to see the electorate largely increased. But his difficulty was, that the agitators who were alone earnest in demanding Reform would never be satisfied with any Bill which the great parties in the State could unite in accepting. It was quite clear that he intended to let the matter rest and ripen. Lord Derby and his colleagues, however, made a fatal mistake in imagining that they would be allowed to let the matter rest. He completely miscalculated the strength of the social and political forces which had been let loose by the death of Lord Palmerston. The nation was in a condition of suspense and excitement that recalled revolutionary memories of 1848, and the working-classes had been roused from their apathy by the speeches in which the Tories and Adullamites had held them up to contempt. The Reform League promptly set on foot a great popular agitation, and, to the astonishment of the Adullamites and the Tories, the reply of the people to the refusal of a £6 franchise was a demand for “registered residential manhood suffrage and the ballot.” Huge mass meetings were held all over the country, at which this demand was put forward, and the temper of the populace rapidly became revolutionary. An accident brought this unpleasant fact home to the minds of Ministers.
The Reform League, under the leadership of Mr. Edmond Beales—an energetic barrister, who afterwards became a County Court Judge—organised a meeting in Hyde Park. On the 22nd of July, 1866, notices were posted up by order of the Government prohibiting the Reformers from holding the meeting. On the 23rd the Leaguers, accompanied by an angry mob, proceeded to the Park and demanded admission. When this was refused, Mr. Beales and his colleagues tried to lead the crowd to Trafalgar Square for the purpose of protesting against the action of the Home Secretary. But the crowd refused to be led. It took a more summary and effective method of protesting, for it tore down the railings of Hyde Park and held the ground till it was driven out, after a desperate fight with the police and Life Guards. It was at first supposed that this timely exhibition of force would end the conflict; and Mr. Walpole, the Home Secretary, posted strong patrols of police and soldiery all over the Park. That step was, of course, quickly resented by the people. They attacked the police and the troops on the 24th, and it was not till cavalry were employed that the turmoil was suppressed. But during the whole day the fashionable people in carriages were pelted with mud and stones by the “roughs” whenever they made their appearance. This inglorious warfare went on in the same manner till the 27th, when the Duke of Cambridge decided to bring up three additional regiments of cavalry, whereupon it began to dawn on Society that somehow or other life was not altogether pleasant in the West End of London under the new “Government of moral order.” The Queen, whose legal right to exclude people from the Royal Parks was the pretext for the action of the Government, became extremely nervous as to the effect which the policy of her Ministers might have on the stability of the Monarchy, and it finally turned out that the Home Secretary had gone beyond the law, in vindicating her Majesty’s rights over Hyde Park by military force. Those rights were secured to the Crown solely by a civil action for trespass. At the height of the dispute the leaders of the Reform League obtained an interview with Mr. Walpole, in the course of which that amiable but misguided Minister shed tears when the grave consequences of his action became manifest to him. He withdrew his opposition to the use of the Park. The Reformers held their meetings, and on the 28th of July London was so quiet and orderly, that no chance visitor would have dreamt that it had during the week been on the verge of revolution. Parliament was prorogued on the 11th of August, and the agitation went on throughout the country.
The Derby-Disraeli Government were by this time completely cowed by the mob, and they frankly admitted that it was too dangerous to let Reform alone. Parliament met on the 5th of February, 1867, and was opened by the Queen, who, though driven in a close carriage from the Palace to Westminster, was received with the heartiest cheers by crowds of people, who, despite the wet and dismal weather, came out to greet her as she passed. The Royal Speech was listened to with suppressed excitement, especially when the paragraph relating to Reform was read by the Lord Chancellor. It, however, merely hinted at the introduction of a measure for extending the Franchise, so that naturally attention was next concentrated on Mr. Disraeli’s utterances on the vexed question.[251] He rather amused his opponents by solemnly announcing that the subject of Reform should no longer be treated as one to determine the fate of Cabinets.[252] No doubt it was a little difficult to treat such an announcement seriously, coming from a Minister who had dexterously used the question for the purpose of upsetting Lord Russell’s Cabinet. Still, it was the wisest policy that could be adopted in the circumstances, and its adoption had been strongly pressed on Lord Derby by the Queen herself. Her Majesty’s view was that the history, especially the recent history, of the Reform agitation, proved conclusively two things—first, that no possible Government could by its own effort and authority carry a Reform Bill; and second, as Mr. Gladstone had himself admitted to her, that with a £10 franchise it was not likely that a House of Commons could be obtained with a strong working majority pledged to support a Reform Ministry. “If,” said Lord Derby, in his speech on the Address, in words which aptly reflected the
GREAT DEMONSTRATION AT THE REFORMERS’ TREE IN HYDE PARK.
opinion of the Sovereign, “we desire to see the representation of the country placed upon a sound basis; if we desire to see a settlement of the question, which I will not say shall be final, but which shall render unnecessary and improbable any further agitation upon the subject for a very considerable time, then I say this object cannot be attained by making the question one of party and political strife for the purpose of obtaining office or Parliamentary majorities. The question must be examined in a fair, deliberate, and dispassionate spirit; we must be prepared to give and take, to meet each other’s views, and, above all things, to cast away all party objects.”