xxvm YORKSHIRE REFORM MOVEMENT 357 



proved to be the first organised step in that movement 

 for reform which, carried on under varying fortunes for 

 half a century, led to the victory of 1832, and brought 

 in democracy for England. 



Fothergill, who seems to have been a Yorkshire free- 

 holder, addressed a letter in December to his friend, the 

 Rev. H. Zouch of Sandal, which was read in a committee 

 of the assembly. He was perhaps a little afraid that 

 the new reform movement would go to an extreme. 

 Writing with his accustomed modesty, but with much 

 knowledge of the temper of those in authority in London, 

 Fothergill sought to divert the assembly from following 

 lines of petition that had no chance of success, lest " an 

 attempt for general reformation be stifled in its infancy." 

 They should use temperate yet firm language ; although 

 there was no room for flattery, they should shun every- 

 thing offensive and all invective. If they moved for 

 retrenchment in expense and to abridge the power of the 

 Crown they would obtain nothing ; nor let them make 

 any reflection on the king or ministry. The necessary 

 points in his view were to dwell upon the general decay 

 of the county, the decline in manufactures, commerce and 

 land, and the poverty of the people under heavy taxes ; 

 and to pray that peace might be restored with America, 

 since the war was the main cause of the distress ; 

 economies of lesser importance might then be solicited. 

 A petition from the Association in favour of reform was 

 presented by Sir G. Savile on February 8 following. 1 



An anonymous pamphlet, " An English Freeholder's 

 Address to his Countrymen," appeared in the same year, 

 1780. Lettsom intimates that Fothergill was the author, 

 and that the work contains the substance of letters from 

 Fothergill to Zouch. The Address is hardly characteristic 

 of FothergiU's pen, nor is it written with so much force 

 as his paper on the Stamp Act. It consists in the main 

 of a plea for making peace with America. War had now 



1 Foth. Works, iii. p. clxix ; G. S. Veitch, The Genesis of Parliamentary 

 Reform, 1913, pp. 58 ff. ; Diet. Nat. Biog. arts. Savile and Wyvill. A letter 

 from Fothergill to Zouch on other topics is in a Collection of Autographs in the 

 possession of John Albert Bright. 



