228 



GLADSTONE 



suffrage. It was assumed by every one that, Lord 

 Russell and Mr Gladstone being now at the head of 

 affairs, a reform bill would be sure to come. It did 

 come ; a very moderate and cautious bill, enlarging 

 the area of the franchise in boroughs and counties. 

 The Conservative party opposed it, and were sup- 

 ported in their opposition by a considerable section 

 of the Liberals, who thought the measure was 

 going too far on the road to universal suffrage and 

 the rule of the democracy. The bill was defeated, 

 and the Liberal statesmen went out of office ( 1866). 

 Mr Gladstone had carried his point, however, for 

 when Mr Disraeli came into office he saw that a 

 reform bill was inevitable, and he prepared his 

 party, or most of them, for the course which would 

 have to be taken. In the very next session Mr 

 Disraeli introduced a Reform Bill of his own, 

 which was enlarged and expanded until it became 

 practically a measure of household suffrage for 

 cities and boroughs. 



Somewhere about this time the attention of Mi- 

 Gladstone began to be attracted to the condition of 

 Ireland. The distressed and distracted state of 

 Ireland, the unceasing popular agitation and dis- 

 content, the Fenian insurrection, brought under 

 England's very eyes by the scheme for an attack 

 on Chester Castle all these evidences of malady 

 in Ireland's system led Mr Gladstone to the convic- 

 tion that the time had come when statesmanship 

 must seek through parliament for some process of 

 remedy. Mr Gladstone came after a while to the 

 conclusion that the Protestant state church in 

 Ireland must be disestablished and disendowed, that 

 the Irish land tenure system must be reformed, and 

 that better provision must be made for the higher 

 education of the Catholics of Ireland. He made 

 short work with the Irish state church. He de- 

 feated the government on a series of resolutions 

 foreshadowing his policy ; the government appealed 

 to the country ; the Liberals returned to power, 

 and Mr Gladstone became prime-minister (1868). 

 In his first session of government he disestablished 

 and disendowed the state church in Ireland. In 

 the next session he passed a measure which for 

 the first time recognised the right of the Irish 

 tenant to the value of the improvements he 

 had himself made at his own cost and labour. 

 Never probably was there such a period of ener- 

 getic reform in almost every direction as that 

 which set in when Mr Gladstone became prime- 

 minister. For the first time in English history 

 a system of national education was established. 

 The Ballot Act was passed for the protection of 

 voters. The system of purchase in the army was 

 abolished by something, it must be owned, a little 

 in the nature of a coup d'etat. Then Mr Gladstone 

 introduced a measure to improve the condition of 

 university education in Ireland. This bill was 

 intended almost altogether for the benefit of Irish 

 Catholics ; but it did not go far enough to satisfy 

 the demands of the Catholics, and in some of its 

 provisions was declared incompatible with the prin- 

 ciples of their church. The Catholic members of 

 the House of Commons voted against it, and with 

 that help the Conservatives were able to throw out 

 the bill ( 1873 ). Mr Gladstone tendered his resigna- 

 tion of office. But Mr Disraeli declined just then to 

 undertake any responsibility, and Mr Gladstone 

 had to remain at the head of affairs. The great 

 wave of reforming energy had, however, subsided in 

 the country. The period of reaction had come. 

 The by-elections began to tell against the Liberals. 

 Mr Gladstone suddenly dissolved parliament and 

 appealed to the country, and the answer to his 

 appeal was the election of a Conservative 

 majority. Mr Disraeli came back to power, and 

 Mr Gladstone retired from the leadership of the 

 House of Commons (1874). 



For a while Mr Gladstone occupied himself in 

 literary and historical studies, and he published 

 essays and pamphlets. But even in his literary 

 studies Mr Gladstone would appear to have always 

 kept glancing at the House of Commons, as Charles 

 V. in his monastery kept his eyes on the world 

 of politics outside. The atrocious conduct of the 

 Turkish officials in Bulgaria aroused his generous 

 anger, and he flung down his books and rushed out 

 from his study to preach a crusade against the 

 Ottoman power in Europe. The waters rose and 

 lifted him, whether he would or no, into power. 

 The parliament which had gone on from the spring 

 of 1874 was dissolved in the spring of 1880, and the 

 Liberals came in with an overwhelming majority. 

 The period of reaction had gone. Mr Gladstone, 

 now after the famous Midlothian campaigns M.P. 

 for the county of Edinburgh, had to become prime- 

 minister once more. His name was the only name 

 that had come out of the voting urns. 



It was an unpropitious hour at which to return 

 to office. There were troubles in Egypt ; there was 

 impending war in the Soudan and in South Africa. 

 There was something very like an agrarian revolu- 

 tion going on in Ireland ; and the Home Rule party 

 in the House of Commons M r as under new, resolute, 

 and uncompromising leadership. Mr Gladstone 

 succeeded, nevertheless, in carrying what might be 

 called a vast scheme of parliamentary reform, a 

 scheme which established something very near to 

 universal suffrage, arranged the constituencies into 

 proportionate divisions, extinguished several small 

 boroughs, leaving their electors to vote in their 

 county division, and in general completed the work 

 begun in 1832, and carried further in 1867. It is to 

 the credit of the Conservative party that after a 

 while they co-operated cordially with Mr Gladstone 

 in his reforming work of 1885. This was a triumph 

 for Mr Gladstone of an entirely satisfactory char- 

 acter ; but he had sore trials to counterbalance it. 

 He found himself drawn into a series of wars in 

 North and South Africa ; and he whose generous 

 sympathy had of late been so much given to Ireland, 

 and who had introduced and carried another land 

 bill for Ireland, found that in endeavouring to pass 

 the measures of coercion which the authorities in 

 Dublin Castle deemed advisable, he had to encounter 

 the fiercest opposition from the Irish members of 

 parliament ancl the vast bulk of the Irish popula- 

 tion. That time must have been for a man of Mr 

 Gladstone's nature a time of darkness and of pain. 

 Lord Frederick Cavendish and Mr Burke were 

 assassinated in Dublin ; General Gordon perished at 

 Khartoum. In the end the Irish members coalesced 

 with the Conservatives in a vote on a clause in the 

 budget, and Mr Gladstone's government was de- 

 feated. Lord Salisbury came back into office, but 

 not just then into power. His was a most precari- 

 ous position, depending on the course which might 

 be taken by the Irish members. He was out of 

 office in a few months, and then the general elec- 

 tions came on. These elections were to give the 

 first opportunity to the newly-made voters under 

 Mr Gladstone's latest reform act ; and these voters 

 sent him back into office and apparently into power 

 once again. 



The use Mr Gladstone made of office and of power 

 astonished his enemies, and startled and shocked 

 not a few of his friends. His government had had 

 in the years between 1881 and 1884 to fight a fierce 

 battle against the policy of obstruction organised 

 by Mr Parnell, the leader of the Home Rule party. 

 The obstruction was organised to prevent or delay 

 the passing of coercion measures, and to force the 

 attention of the British public to the claims of Ire- 

 land. The struggles that were carried on will be 

 always memorable in the history of parliament. 

 The fiercest passions were aroused on both sides, 



