The Liberal Party and the Trade Unions in the 1870S
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Trade unions Did the Liberals miss an historical opportunity to become the party of organised labour and the trade unions in the 1870s? By Tim Hughes. The Liberal Party and the trade unions in the 1870s n Tuesday 27 September 1870, Glad- Karl Marx and it stands, for all concerned, as a stone met with a delegation from the failure to focus on the real issue of the long-term Labour Representation League, an relationship between organised labour and the O 2 organisation created to promote the election of Liberal Party following the Second Reform Act. working-class MPs, but described by Gladstone in It may seem strange that trade union repre- his diaries simply as a ‘Deputn of working Men’.1 sentatives were meeting with the prime min- They met to discuss the Franco-Prussian War. ister to discuss matters of foreign policy. They The initiative for the meeting had come from were, after all, representatives of emerging 20 Journal of Liberal History 99 Summer 2018 The Liberal Party and the trade unions in the 1870s sectional interests rather than of a class. Cer- concerns for personal and public economy. He tainly Gladstone had built a strong reputation even referenced his meetings with the unions with the unions in the 1860s as Chancellor of in his ‘Pale of the Constitution’ speech, which the Exchequer, when unions demonstrated appeared to embrace universal male suffrage in an interest in his Post Office Savings scheme. 1864.3 This was a matter of state policy. Foreign This interest was founded on their need to policy was, however, an area on which popu- keep union funds safe, and for Gladstone was lar support could be built, as Palmerston had evidence that the working man shared his demonstrated. Journal of Liberal History 99 Summer 2018 21 The Liberal Party and the trade unions in the 1870s In doing this, a more knowing Gladstone a Conservative sensibility based on his Peelite Overleaf (page 20:) could have opened up the possibility of creat- beliefs rather than coming from an internation- ing a new political paradigm. Gladstone’s foreign alist perspective that would have been shared by Thomas Burt policy has come to be seen as rooted in moral con- his working-class delegation. The delegation had (1837–1922) victions that had first surfaced in his ‘Letters to reason to be suspicious of the monarchy, given the Earl of Aberdeen’ on the abuses in the Nea- Victoria’s later interventions in foreign policy at Alexander Macdonald politan prisons. This has been seen as Gladstone’s the behest of Disraeli in order to put pressure on (1821–81) first meaningful alignment with an identifiable Cabinet members to support Disraeli’s policies in Liberal foreign policy.4 His ‘Letters to Aberdeen’ the Balkans.9 Liberal Prime Minister railed against injustice and was readily supported Looking more closely at the Labour Repre- W. E. Gladstone by Palmerston and republicans as an attack on the sentation League, this was created with the pri- (1809–98) abuses of monarchical rule. Palmerstone distrib- mary aim of registering working-class men for uted them, with no lack of glee for the embarrass- the vote and getting working-class men elected as ment it caused Aberdeen, to the British embassies. MPs ‘proportionate to other interests and classes Gladstone argued unconvincingly that these at present represented in Parliament’.10 This was letters should be seen as a defence of monar- a significant ambition, with 30 per cent of work- chy rather than an attack on the tyrannies of ing-class men having the vote in 1867 but – with untempered monarchical rule; for Shannon few seats with a working-class majority – one they ‘retarded Gladstone’s movement towards that depended upon building alliances. Rooted Liberalism’.5 It is certainly premature in the con- in the London Working Men’s Association and text of Gladstone’s career to begin to call him the embryonic TUC, their very presence in No. a Liberal at this juncture and his foreign policy 11 Downing Street was the result of an impres- remained distinctive from either Palmerston or sive series of working-class successes that could the Manchester School of Cobden and Bright, be seen as culminating in the Trade Union legisla- which embraced the dichotomy of free trade and tion of 1871, which saw the trade unions achieve peace. Gladstone would, however, go on to set a legal status that gave them protection through the boundaries of a new ‘liberal’ foreign policy, the courts. creating a school of foreign policy now defined It is, however, too easy to see a separation by scholars of international relations as liberal. between organised labour and Liberalism, a sepa- If he could do this in the realm of foreign policy ration of tradition as well as creed. The meet- he could also have broadened this out in terms of ing’s significance comes from its taking place in organised labour within the emerging Gladsto- a period of transience and consolidation which nian Liberalism. builds on the ‘community of sentiment’ and ‘a Interestingly, suspicion of monarchy was also coalition of convenience’ of the 1860s to form a a theme in the September meeting, where the del- more robust Gladstonian Liberalism: a form of egation sought reassurances that there were no Liberalism which, while it should not be confused pro-German ‘dynastic influences’ holding back with Gladstone, was nevertheless focussed on Britain’s involvement in the Franco-Prussian his person.11 It remains to be considered whether War, a less than subtle reference to Queen Victo- Gladstonian Liberalism was a change of substance ria.6 For the delegation of working men there was rather than of sentiment, but it left room for the a more pragmatic reasoning behind supporting ascendancy of organised Nonconformity from its a republican government in France: the broader interest in disestablishment and church rates into primacy of the people and the principles of free- becoming the foundation stone of a popular more dom in foreign policy. It is not that morality radical liberalism.12 This led through clear choices did not play a role in the thinking of the Labour of policy directed by Gladstone, not least towards Representation League – which has been con- Ireland and the eventual Whig split from the Lib- vincingly linked to the thinking of the Repub- eral Party in 1886. lican, Italian nationalist, Mazzini more than the Gladstone favoured working-class men enter- internationalist Marx in this respect – but that ing parliament and would be the first to appoint a it was rooted in a different thinking to that of working man to his government – Thomas Burt, Gladstone.7 Republicanism was never an aspect the leader of the Northumberland Miners’ Asso- of Gladstonian Liberalism, although it was pre- ciation – as parliamentary secretary to the Board sent in a Liberal Party that contained Bradlaugh of Trade, even though he was not at that time a and Dilke. Marx stressed the fear of ‘Prussian member of the Liberal Party. On being elected instruction’ and it could be that he had laid down in 1874 as one of the first two Lib-Lab MPs, Burt the grounds for suspicion rather than these com- was honoured alongside his fellow miners’ leader, ing directly from the delegation. Marx also men- Alexander Macdonald, in a banquet held by the tions these as coming from the ‘oligarchic part of Labour Representation League. Here he spoke the Cabinet’.8 Clearly Marx himself saw a divi- about how ‘something had been done to break sion between the Whig and radical elements. It the exclusiveness which had hitherto kept the appears that Marx saw Gladstone as an unreliable poor man outside the House of Commons’ but ally. Marx was of course right to be suspicious of that it would be a mistake to become an expo- Gladstone, who brought to even foreign policy nent of ‘class representation and legislation’.13 He 22 Journal of Liberal History 99 Summer 2018 The Liberal Party and the trade unions in the 1870s Overleaf (page 21:) was instinctively Liberal in his politics and would vulnerability of their support from organised refuse to take the Labour Party whip when the labour. Howell wrote, ‘Everyone vied with the A. J. Mundella miners affiliated to the Labour Party in 1908. other to do the best thing. Cross deserves our (1825–97) Interestingly, in 1870 he was active in the Work- warmest gratitude for his conscientious work.’17 men’s Peace Association campaigning for British The failure of the leaders of organised labour Robert Applegarth neutrality during the Franco-Prussian War, fur- was to not recognise Gladstone’s limitations and (1834–1924) ther evidence of the importance of foreign policy conservatism at this point, although to be fair in the formation of political allegiances among these limitations were also not clear to middle- George Howell the representatives of the working class. class radicals sympathetic to the trade unions like (1833–1910) There is therefore some credence to seeing Mundella. For Gladstone, when entrenching his Gladstone as bringing ‘the working man within Post Office savings accounts, he had spoken to the pale of the constitution’.14 However, while he the unions but responded to their Friendly Soci- promoted the careers of individuals, he did this in ety characteristics.18 He related to the self-help recognition of individual merit rather than rec- they represented but he did not see their collec- ognising the rights of a class. For the leaders of tive nature and never retreated from his commit- organised Labour and their representatives who ment to a more libertarian individualism; he was entered the House of Commons, the language of never an egalitarian despite Bebbington linking class did not necessitate class politics, as shown Gladstone, via his Ancient Greek sensibilities, to above.