Richard W. Davis

Wellington and the “Open Question”: The Issue of Catholic Emancipation, 1821–1829

For all the recognition of the immense importance of Catholic Emancipation, both in itself and for what it is supposed to have led to (most notably, parliamentary reform), significant questions still surround it. Why, after Daniel OConnells victory in County Clare in June 1828 precipitated a crisis, did that crisis drag on for more than six months of perpetual wavering and mixed signals from the British government? Why was a cabinet not summoned? Why did the prime minister so long refuse either to confide in or to remove the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland? Finally, what was the likely effect of these months of shuffling and confusion in shaping the course of politics in the years to come?The Duke of Wellington is central to answering such questions. Before 1828, Wellington was a key player whose doubts and fears were broadly representative of those that reshaped the positions of many of emancipations most powerful opponents and brought them around to the necessity of accepting the measure. In 1828 and 1829 as prime minister, Wellington made decisions that were critical in determining how the measure would be carried. Some of those decisions had an important bearing on how emancipation was received in the country and therefore on the political divisions that followed.The explanation usually given for the governments failure to act is that the king refused to permit it and would not allow the cabinet to consider the matter. In January, when the king asked Wellington to form a government, he had stipulated and the duke had agreed that Catholic Emancipation should not be a government measure.

The Mid-Nineteenth Century Electoral Structure

It is far too early to talk with any real certainty about the mid-nineteenth century electoral structure. The very materials of which it was built are in dispute, let alone the shape of the edifice. A deference school of historians is challenging traditional notions of the growth of political individualism in the period, while so-called quantitative historians are beginning to question the assumptions and approach of both deference historians and traditionalists. Serious and detailed study of the questions involved has hardly begun. Still, some comment on the present state of the controversy may not be entirely out of place. An enduring interpretation can only be constructed of sound materials; and I am by no means certain of the soundness of some of those now being put forward for our use. W. O. Aydelotte, in a paper read a couple of years ago and soon to be published in a series of essays entitled The History of Parliamentary Behavior , notes the divergence of opinion among historians on the role of the electorate in shaping parliamentary opinion after 1832. As he rightly suggests, Norman Gash in his Politics in the Age of Peel appears to be of two minds on the subject, depending on whether one reads his introduction or his text. In the former Professor Gash stresses the increase of popular influence on Parliament, in the latter the continuance of traditional influences over the mass of the electorate. D. C. Moore comes down heavily on the side of the latter influences, contending that a relatively few leaders of what he has called “deference communities” represented effective electoral opinion, which was simply registered by the mass of the electorate.

Toryism to Tamworth: The Triumph of Reform, 1827-1835

The Great Reform Act has received a great deal of much needed attention in the last decade. One mode of getting at its significance has, however, been largely ignored. The mode usually followed, particularly recently, has been to examine what the Whig framers of the Act thought they were about, and then, by means of electoral analysis, whether they achieved their object. The two questions are not necessarily the same, of course. For example, most historians of the period would now agree that Professor D. C. Moore, however valuable and stimulating his contribution to the debate, is wrong about Whig intentions. Some may suspect he is also at least in part wrong about the electoral system which grew out of the Act. That, however, has yet to be proven. Yet, even if we could know all about the reformed electoral system, we would still not know all about the impact of the Great Reform Act. For in history what is important is not only what actually happened, but what people of the time believe happened. It is to this sort of question that I want to turn my attention in this paper. Because one of the best ways to appreciate the great significance of the Reform Act is to examine the change it wrought in the attitudes of politicians, particularly of Tory politicians. Undoubtedly, the two most important of the recent works on the Act are the books of Professors Brock and Cannon. Essentially, both represent a vindication of the main outlines of the old “Whig interpretation.” Thus, both Brock and Cannon see the Act as a response to mounting pressures out-of-doors, the culmination of a long historical process, and an important turning point in the emergence of a more liberal and broadly based political system. Nor does either doubt that the Act marked an important concession to the middle classes, or that it deserves its old designation of “Great.”