Trusting the People
William Gladstone complained that some politicians talk about freedom but don’t trust the people enough to let them have any.
1878
Queen Victoria 1837-1901
William Gladstone complained that some politicians talk about freedom but don’t trust the people enough to let them have any.
1878
Queen Victoria 1837-1901
As a young Tory, William Gladstone had opposed extending the vote to more people; by 1878, and now a Liberal Party MP and former Prime Minister, he was all in favour of it. Justifying his U-turn at Oxford University’s newly-founded Palmerston Club, he explained that it is not enough to talk of liberty: you have to trust the people with it.
abridged
I TRACE in the education of Oxford of my own time one great defect. Perhaps it was my own fault; but I must admit that I did not learn, when at Oxford, that which I have learned since, viz., to set a due value on the imperishable and inestimable principles of human liberty. The temper which, I think, too much prevailed in academic circles, was that liberty was regarded with jealousy and fear, something which could not be wholly dispensed with, but which was continually to be watched for fear of excess.
I think that the principle of the Conservative party is jealousy of liberty and of the people, only qualified by fear;* but I think the policy of the Liberal party is trust in the people, only qualified by prudence.* I can only assure you, gentlemen, that now I am in front of extended popular privileges.* I have no fear of those enlargements of the Constitution that seem to be approaching.* On the contrary, I hail them with desire.
abridged
Gladstone uses the word ‘jealous’ in the sense of ‘fiercely protective of rights or possessions.’ The Tories, he believed, felt so protective towards both liberty and the public that their fear of what the public might do with liberty made them wary of letting them have any.
The Liberal party emerged in the 1850s out of a split in the Tories, offering a home to those who believed in free trade rather than customs unions and complex trade deals, and opposed nanny-government and military interventions abroad. Between the Wars the Liberal party turned its back on Gladstone’s principles, never winning an election since; today, Gladstonians are more likely to be Conservatives in the mould of Margaret Thatcher (PM 1979-1990).
That is, Gladstone is a leader in the campaign to let more people have the vote.
On the progressive enlargement of the franchise, see The Reform Acts. The Reform Act of 1884 and the Redistribution Act of 1885, both during Gladstone’s second term as Prime Minister, widened the franchise to some 5.6 million men out of a total population in Great Britain (figures were not yet kept for Northern Ireland) of just over 36 million. However, all women and over half of men remained ineligible to vote.
1. What is the author aiming to achieve in writing this?
2. Note any words, devices or turns of phrase that strike you. How do they help the author communicate his ideas more effectively?
3. What impression does this passage make on you? How might you put that impression into words?
Based on The English Critic (1939) by NL Clay, drawing on The New Criticism: A Lecture Delivered at Columbia University, March 9, 1910, by J. E. Spingarn, Professor of Comparative Literature in Columbia University, USA.