Liberal Unionists The defection of the Liberal Unionists in 1886 was the greatest blow the Liberal Party suffered in the nineteenth century. Tony Little explains what happened and suggests that there are still some unanswered questions. OutOut fromfrom underunder thethe umbrellaumbrella his, if I understand it, is one of those golden been neglected. And despite the degree of attention, ‘Tmoments of our history, one of those opportu- there remain a number of unanswered questions nities which may come and may go, but which which would repay further study. rarely returns.’ Gladstone was at his most persuasive There are two main theses explaining the great as he wound up the debate on the second reading of disruption of the party. One may be described as the the Government of Ireland Bill on the night of ‘conspiracy theory’. In this haut politique version of June . But his final words, ‘Think, I beseech you; events, the ageing Titan, Gladstone, saw off a two- think well, think wisely, think, not for the moment, pronged attack on his leadership by Hartington for but for the years that are to come, before you reject the Whigs and Chamberlain for the Radicals but was this bill’ betrayed that he knew he faced defeat. unexpectedly outmanoeuvred by Churchill and Salisbury for the Tories. We were heavily beaten on the nd Reading, by to . A scene of some excitement followed the declara- The alternative ‘great forces’ explanation argues tion of the numbers: one or two Irishmen lost their that the growing democratisation of the political balance. Upon the whole we have more ground to be system inevitably drove the aristocratic elements of satisfied with the progress made, than to be disap- the Liberal Party into the arms of the Tories to pro- pointed at the failure. But it is a serious mischief. tect their landed interests. Meanwhile, the remnants Spoke very long: my poor voice came in a wonderful manner. of the Liberal Party, obsessed with Ireland, took an inordinately long time to discover the need to ap- The stoic note in Gladstone’s cryptic diary suggests peal to the wider electorate through New Liberal- that even after the scale of the defeat was known the ism, creating the frustrations which inevitably led to Liberal leadership were underestimating the damage the formation of the Labour Party. In this theory the done to the party. The split, which was crystallised in defection of Chamberlain was a lucky bonus for the the biggest Commons division to date, was as signifi- opposition. cant as the break up of the Tories in over the A third explanation, which is gaining ground, fo- Corn Laws. Some ninety-three Liberals voted cuses on the unfortunate collision of views over Ire- against the whip and others sympathised with the land without which the party would have had time rebels. The great separation kept the Liberals out of to develop new leaders and policies to succeed power for all but three of the next twenty years and Gladstone. But if Ireland was an accident was it just deprived the party of the leadership of both its waiting to happen? Radical and Whig wings. It created a new party, the Each of these summaries is of course a caricature of Liberal Unionists, which maintained a parliamentary the views held on a complex issue but are offered as presence into the twentieth century. route-maps through the complex pot-pourri of prin- The crisis of is perhaps the most heavily ciples, personalities and power plays which follows. analysed of all incidents in late nineteenth-century politics but attention has been so much on the im- Gladstone’s umbrella plications for the two major parties that the signifi- After several fruitless attempts, the modern Liberal cance of the Liberal Unionists in their own right has Party was formed in out of a coalition of Journal of Liberal Democrat History 25: Winter 1999–2000 5 Whigs, Radicals and Peelites with an- jointly by Lord Hartington in the domestic reform in a manner which cillary support from Irish members. Al- Commons and Lord Granville in the had not been necessary under his own though the majority of the party, even Lords. However, and perhaps inevitably, leadership of the party. The continuous then, described themselves simply as Gladstone could not keep out of poli- feuding within the cabinet required the Liberals, the terms Whig and Radical tics. The Bulgarian atrocities of continuation of Gladstone’s leadership continued to be used and can be a gave him the excuse he needed. His — only he was able to enjoy the confi- source of confusion in the struggles of return disrupted Hartington’s leader- dence of both sides and he provided the the s. ‘Whig’ was used not only for ship but Gladstone’s loathing for oratorical skills to give cohesion to the the small coterie of aristocratic families Disraeli’s (now Lord Beaconsfield’s) diversity of views within the wider of the ‘Cousinhood’ but more widely foreign policy, expressed through the party, the umbrella under which they all for those with links to the gentry and great Midlothian speechmaking cam- sheltered. land rather than industry, and often in- paign of –, made a second pre- While all concerned recognised the discriminately for any Liberal of mod- miership unavoidable. It also sowed the desirability of sheltering under the erate views. Similarly, ‘Radical’ covered seeds of the secession. umbrella, the tensions of working to- not only those of firm utilitarian views Shannon is highly critical of gether and the jockeying for the suc- but also those who argued vigorously Gladstone’s leadership in – but cession created the initial ingredients for one or more of the single-issue re- argues a convincing case. Gladstone for the crisis. The marked differences form campaigns. performed best leading from the front in in the personality of Gladstone, Despite the diversity of its parliamen- a positive campaign imbued with moral Hartington and Chamberlain are tary membership, the Liberals formed conviction. His victory in was seen as a further but frequently exag- the government between –, achieved on the negative theme of un- gerated complication. – and –. Disraeli’s – doing the evils of Beaconsfieldism. Con- Inevitably for senior Victorian politi- government was seen as a temporary sequently, he failed to give the cabinet a cians, all were rich. Gladstone inherited disturbance allowing the Liberal Party strong lead but despite continuously wealth from his merchant father but to recuperate from Gladstone’s great threatening, failed to retire. The failure had to make it work to help rescue his reforms. to lead was exasperated by Irish ob- wife’s family from financial embarrass- Following Palmerston’s death in struction in the Commons and by a di- ment. He had an establishment educa- , Gladstone had become the domi- vided government reaction to various tion and an early entry into politics. He nant personality in the party, and in foreign, especially colonial, events was extremely energetic both physi- spite of a crisis over the reform which forced themselves haphazardly cally and mentally and driven by an bill, its inevitable leader. His reforming onto the agenda. Into the vacuum cre- evangelical need to justify himself to his government of – came to grief ated stepped special-interest groups Maker. His movement from the Tory to over internal disputes on education with a variety of nostrums for reform. the Liberal Party did not undermine his policy and Ireland. Gladstone’s disgust In the cabinet, Joseph Chamberlain and desire to see the aristocracy play its full and, at sixty-five, a longing to spend a Charles Dilke were the spokesmen for part in the leadership of the nation. A retirement in settling accounts with action. The radicalism of Chamberlain high church Anglican, he derived con- God led him to resign the leadership of and Dilke was resisted by Hartington, siderable support from the noncon- the party in . He was succeeded who came to be seen as obstructive to formist masses. An efficient administra- tor and persuasive orator, it was spite- Gladstone addresses the cabinet in 1883, a rather fanciful artist’s impression. Chamber- fully thought that he was always able to lain is recognisable by his monocle, near the pillar. Hartington is second from the right convince himself that his self-interest with Harcourt to his right. was also the interest of the nation. Chamberlain and Hartington were of a younger generation, both in their early fifties in . Lord Hartington was heir to the Duke of Devonshire, one of the largest landowners in the country. Known for his keen interest in horse racing, he enjoyed a full social life, mix- ing with the Malborough House set sur- rounding the Prince of Wales. He con- veyed the impression that his involve- ment in politics was purely noblesse oblige, for which he had to endure endless en- nui. However, Reginald Brett, his former secretary, later Lord Esher, made it clear that ‘apart from politics he has no real interest in life; and cut off from them 6 Journal of Liberal Democrat History 25: Winter 1999–2000 he would be in reality as bored as he ap- pears to be by them’. Very straightfor- ward, with a ‘pulverising style of argu- ment’, he led by virtue of his position rather than through organisation, ora- tory or policy development. Joseph Chamberlain could not have been a greater contrast. His fortune was made in manufacturing in Birmingham. His political fortune grew from his dy- namic mayoralty of the city. He entered national politics through the organisa- tion of nonconformist protests over the Forster Education Act. His strength was in the efficient electoral organisation of Birmingham, which he was attempt- ing to expand into a national grassroots radical campaigning body through the Originally captioned ‘Brains, Birth and Brummagen’, this caricature shows Gladstone, National Liberal Federation (NLF).