Isaac Saunders Leadam

“ Bright had presented a petition bearing twenty thousand signatures from Manchester and its neighbourhood against the bill. He admitted, however, that in his own opinion the action of the government was justified, and voted for the measure. But in a luminous speech delivered in the House of Commons on 13 Dec. he expounded his consistent conception of Irish policy—that Irish unrest should be attacked in its causes rather than in its effects. He advocated a measure facilitating the sale of encumbered estates, and providing occupation for the peasantry by an increased partition of landed property. ”

“ Bright and Cobden were the two leading representatives of the emergence of the manufacturing class as a force in English politics after the Reform Act of 1832. Both believed in the middle class as more valuable to a civilised community than an aristocracy bred in martial traditions. This belief was based rather upon economical considerations than upon personal antipathy. Bright, for example, advocated for the pacification of Ireland the substitution of a resident middle-class proprietary for the existing absentee landowners. ”

“ He demonstrated that the maintenance of slavery was the motive to secession, and that, as working men, they could not be neutral when the degradation of labour was the issue at stake. At a meeting at the London Tavern on 16 June he treated the question from the point of view of economics, enlarging upon the thesis that emancipated labour would increase, the supply of cotton. When Roebuck brought forward his motion in the House of Commons for the recognition of the southern confederacy (30 June) , a brilliant speech by Bright largely contributed to its defeat. ”

“ When parliament met in November the free traders resolved to extort from Lord Derby's ministry an explicit adhesion to free trade policy. Ministers were invited in Villiers's amendment to the address, supported by Bright in a remarkably brilliant speech, to endorse the legislation of 1846 as 'wise, just, and beneficial.' A successful diversion was, however, made by Palmerston in the ministry's favour, to the indignation of Cobden and his following. ”

“ Scarcely was the league dissolved when Cobden conceived the idea of a similar organisation as an engine for effecting further reforms, to be called 'The Commons' League.' It took shape in January 1849 at a great meeting in Manchester, at which Cobden advocated financial and Bright parliamentary reform. It soon became apparent that if the new league was to make way it must concentrate attention upon one object. ”

“ As mover of a resolution against the corn law he addressed a meeting of two thousand people at Manchester on 15 April, which decided upon stirring anew, by means of deputations, the agitation in the great towns. During 1841 the effects of the United States tariff were keenly felt in Lancashire. The Rochdale flannel trade was almost annihilated. Manufacturers who had hitherto been indifferent to corn laws were awakened by misfortune to a sense of the cogency of Bright's demonstrations that they had a common interest in free trade. ”

“ In connection with the French treaty Gladstone's budget of 1860 assumed exceptional importance. The conservatives especially attacked its concessions to the French treaty by the repeal of duties on manufactured articles. Part of the scheme involved the repeal of the paper excise, the item most fiercely resisted by them. Having passed the third reading in the commons by 219 to 210 votes, this portion of the budget was rejected by the House of Lords (21 May) , Bright threw himself with ardour into the constitutional question of the power of the lords to deal with tax bills. ”

“ Upon the failure of the conference at Vienna he delivered one of his longest speeches (7 June) , occupying nearly thirty columns of Hansard, in which he reviewed the negotiations; and he vigorously attacked Lord Palmerston (19 July) for sacrificing Lord John Russell to the war party. Though he found it difficult to obtain a hearing out of doors, he was always listened to with attention in the House of Commons.
A man of Bright's sensitive nature could not bear unruffled the strain of public obloquy. His nervous system showed signs of giving way. ”

“ In 1842 the league determined to carry its campaign to the doors of parliament. At a meeting attended by delegates from various parts of the country, held in the Crown and Anchor tavern in the Strand, Bright made his first great speech in London and at once established his reputation as an orator. ”

“ Bright demanded nothing less than perfect freedom of trade; the motion was defeated by 62 to 25 votes. His second speech, delivered on 14 Aug., was against a bill rendering Chelsea pensioners liable to be called out on home service. During the autumn and winter of 1843, in company with Cobden, he addressed a series of meetings in favour of free trade throughout the midlands and south of England. In January they went to Scotland; the work was arduous; scarcely a day passed without a meeting. With the session of 1844 came the turn of the landowners. ”

“ A year earlier, when Palmerston was still living, he had replied to an invitation, 'I cannot bear the weight of an agitation for reform' (10 Sept. 1866) . The accession of the tories to office had inspired him with the strength for this great campaign. From Glasgow he proceeded to Ireland. At Dublin he delivered two addresses (30 Oct. and 2 Nov.) , linking the cause of disestablishment and land reform in Ireland with the reform of parliament through the agency of a new democratic constituency. It was at a banquet organised by the National Reform Union at Manchester on 20 Nov. ”

“ They comprised the extension of the borough franchise to all rate paying householders, and all lodgers paying 10l. a year; the county franchise to be on a 10l. rental; elections to be by ballot and the expenses levied from the rates. The government reform bill, memorable by its 'fancy franchises,' was introduced by Disraeli on 20 Feb. Its introduction was preceded by a conference between Bright and Lord John Russell, which excited much surmise. ”

“ In the darkest hours of disaster, when even the North's well-wishers despaired, Bright invariably anticipated a reunion. The value of his speech on 30 June was recognised' by a formal tribute of thanks from the New York Chamber of Commerce.
Cobden, it has been seen, had practically abandoned expectation of an effective parliamentary reform, at least during Palmerston's lifetime. He hoped, however, to arouse popular interest in finance and land-reform. On 24 Nov. he met his constituents at Rochdale and delivered an address on the subject of the laws as affecting agricultural labourers. ”

“ CAIRD, Sir JAMES (1816–1892) , agriculturist and author, was the third son of James Caird of Stranraer, Wigtownshire, a ‘writer’ and procurator fiscal for Wigtownshire, by Isabella McNeel, daughter of Archibald McNeel of Stranraer. He was born at Stranraer in June 1816, and received his earliest education at the burgh school. Thence he was removed to the high school at Edinburgh, where he remained until he entered the university. After studying at the university for about a year he left without taking a degree, and went to learn practical farming in Northumberland. ”

“ A contemptible example of the malignancy with which Bright was at this time assailed will be found in an anonymous pamphlet, dated 1864, entitled 'Remarks on certain Anonymous Articles designed to render Queen Victoria unpopular, with an Exposure of their Authorship.' The writer selected passages from articles in the 'Manchester Examiner' and 'London Review,' which, with the assistance of innuendo and leaded type, were distorted into reflections upon the queen imputing them to Bright as the author of a plot to render the queen unpopular and thereby to undermine the throne. ”

“ Cobden was strenuous in promoting his return, and on 18 March he addressed the Manchester electors at the Free Trade Hall, telling them that he 'heard one of the oldest and most sagacious men in the House of Commons say that he did not believe there was any man in the house, with the exception of Mr. Bright and Mr. Gladstone, who ever changed votes by their eloquence.' At the election on 30 March Bright was at the bottom of the poll, nearly three thousand votes below Sir John Potter [see under Potter, Thomas Bailey, Suppl.] ”

“ As president of the economic section of the social science congress held at Aberdeen in 1877, he delivered an address published in the Statistical Society's 'Journal' for December of that year on 'Food Supply and the Land Question.' After the great Indian famine of 1876-7 Caird was appointed by Lord Salisbury, then secretary of state for India, to serve on the commission instructed to make an exhaustive inquiry into the causes and circumstances of that calamity. ”

“ Most of the lands granted had been held by the rebels, and these grants (9 March and 28 May 1484) are expressly stated in the patent roll to have been the reward of his services against them. According to Sir Thomas More, Richard III, being at Gloucester, 'sent John Green, a creature of his, to Sir Robert Brackenbury, constable of the Tower, with a letter, desiring him one how or other to make away with the two children whom he had in keeping. Brakenbury refused to do it, and Green returned to King Richard with the constable's answer,' the king being then at Warwick. ”

“ A general turn-out of operatives in South Lancashire was proclaimed foe 10 Aug. 1842. Bright's workpeople joining in the strike. He addressed the crowd in the neighbourhood of Greenbank mill and was successful in persuading them to abstain from the violence committed in other towns; On 17 Aug. he published an 'address to the working men of Rochdale.' In this he pointed out that 'with a bad trade wages cannot rise,' that the agitation for the charter would do nothing to improve their economic condition, and that the real cause of their misfortune was the corn law. ”

“ Bright replied pleading for delay, and in the meantime addressed himself, in conjunction with one or two friends, to the task of raising a fund to relieve Cobden's immediate difficulties. It was a critical moment. 'The rain that rained away the corn laws' had already set in. Famine had announced its advent in Ireland, The prime minister, already a convert to repeal, was calculating how far he could carry his colleagues on the way. On 22 Nov. Lord John Russell published his 'Edinburgh letter' to his constituents of the city of London. It declared his conversion to the doctrine of the league. ”

“ Four years before, Delane, the editor of the 'Times,' had written that Bright and Cobden must have been ministers but for the Russian war. Cobden was offered and refused a seat in Palmerston's cabinet. 'Recent speeches,' wrote Lord John Russell on 25 June, 'have prevented the offer of a cabinet office to Mr. Bright.' Palmerston, in conversation with Cobden, was more explicit. 'It is his (Bright's) attacks on classes that have given offence to powerful bodies who can make their resentment felt' (cf. Bright's speech of 18 Jan. 1865) . ”

“ A revival of prosperity and two good harvests robbed the free trade agitation of much of its point and force. Villiers's annual motion (25 June) for repeal of the corn law was defeated by the great majority of 204, and Bright was forced to sit down before the conclusion of his speech. Earlier in the session Sir James Graham [q. v.] introduced a bill for restricting the labour of children and young persons to twelve hours a day. Lord Ashley [see Cooper, Anthony Ashley, seventh Earl of Shaftesbury] moved a reduction of the hours to ten. ”

“ With characteristic courage and self-sacrifice he chose the constituency which no liberal but himself could hope to contest with any prospect of success. In the result he won the election by 393 votes, and the Wynn family was deposed from the representation of the county for the first time for 182 years. This service was rewarded, on Gladstone's accession to office in February 1886, by the appointment of Osborne Morgan as parliamentary under-secretary for the colonies. ”

“ Caird's letters to the 'Times,' dated throughout 1850, furnish the first general review of English agriculture since those addressed by Arthur Young and others to the board of agriculture at the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century. They were republished in 1852 in a volume entitled 'English Agriculture in 1850-1851.' The work was again published in the United States, and was translated into French, German, and Swedish. At the general election of 1852 Caird contested the Wigtown Burghs, which included Stranraer, as a liberal conservative. ”