131. Sea change

131. Sea change

A sea change took place at the 1874 British general election.

The previous year, Gladstone and his government, exhausted by its searing pace of reform, lost a parliamentary vote on what he saw (and many of his colleagues didn’t) as the essential third leg of his tripod of measures to pacify Ireland, the foundation of a Catholic university in Ireland. They resigned but Disraeli, in a brilliant political move, refused to take his place. So Gladstone had buckle on the armour again and his failing government struggled on for a few months more.

Over those months, a scandal hit them and, in the course of reshuffling his ministers, he decided to take on the Chancellorship of the Exchequer himself, a further burden on a man already worn out by his responsibilities.

So, when the election was finally called, the Conservatives went in revitalised while the Liberals fought it already half defeated. The result? For the first time in 33 years, the Conservatives won a parliamentary majority and Disraeli could finally form a government with a chance of lasting a while.

What’s more, a new party representing Irish interests took a big block of seats too. Far from pacifying Ireland, all Gladstone had done was preside over the appearance of a new organisation speaking out against British rule. And even against his own party.

Another episode in the unravelling rule of Britain in Ireland…


Illustration: Gladstone, cartoon by Carlo Pellegrini published in Vanity Fair, 6 February 1869
National Portrait Gallery 1978
Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License.

Avsnitt(274)

273. From a humble address to a royal arrest

273. From a humble address to a royal arrest

Well, we’re living in curious times.For the first time in four centuries, a member of the British royal family has been arrested in connection with a criminal investigation. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor...

22 Feb 14min

272. What a fine mess you've got us into

272. What a fine mess you've got us into

This is the last episode in this main series of A History of England. I may add others on specific topics – by all means use the comments to suggest any you’d like me to examine – or in response to in...

20 Dec 202543min

271. Breaking records

271. Breaking records

Following the rather grim comedy of Boris Johnson, the Conservatives gave Britain the even more ridiculous spectacle of Liz Truss. She proceeded to push the British economy to the edge of the abyss, a...

7 Dec 202514min

270. Phenomenal Boris

270. Phenomenal Boris

It’s the time of Boris. This episode tracks Boris Johnson’s character, starting with a less than complimentary report from his housemaster at Eton to this parents, through his time in the rich kids’ B...

30 Nov 202514min

269. Brexit

269. Brexit

In 2015, Cameron returned to office with a majority of his own even if it wasn’t particularly huge. At least it meant he no longer needed to be in a coalition with the Lib Dems, who’d taken a terrible...

23 Nov 202514min

268. The winners and the damned: peacetime coalition

268. The winners and the damned: peacetime coalition

It’s 2007, and Tony Blair is out. In his place is Gordon Brown, who’d proved his capacity as a Chancellor. Sadly, he was now to show that promotion to Prime Minister was one step too many , since he s...

16 Nov 202514min

267. Bliar

267. Bliar

As the title of this episode suggests, this is where we look at how Tony Blair’s reputation was wrecked by the growing awareness that he’d produced infamously bad justifications to launch Britain into...

9 Nov 202514min

266. A time of dodgy dossiers

266. A time of dodgy dossiers

When Tony Blair took Britain to war in Iraq in 2003, as part of a US-led and rather limited coalition of nations, it was against the will of large numbers of Brits expressed in possibly the biggest de...

2 Nov 202514min

Populärt inom Historia

massmordarpodden
p3-historia
historiska-brott
motiv
kod-katastrof
olosta-mord
rss-historien-om
rss-historiska-brottslingar
rss-seriemordarpodden
rss-brottsligt
historiepodden-se
historianu-med-urban-lindstedt
rss-massmordarpodden
krigshistoriepodden
harrisons-dramatiska-historia
mannen-utan-spar
militarhistoriepodden
obskyr-historia
nu-blir-det-historia
bedragare