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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 January 2014
Although party was a considerably more limited force in the British political system between the repeal of the Corn Laws and the Second Reform Act than it had been either during the thirties and early forties or in the later decades of the nineteenth century, it was nonetheless a significant fact of English political life throughout the Victorian period. Few students of nineteenth-century British politics, however, would look to J.S. Mill, perhaps the most influential political thinker of his time, for insights into the role of party. The consensus has been that very little of a positive nature can be said about Mill and party. In The Elements of Politics, Henry Sidgwick observes that “Mill… hardly seems to contemplate a dual organisation of parties as a normal feature of representative institutions.” A.H. Birch asserts, in his Representative and Responsible Government, that Mill “simply ignored the existence of political parties.” Dennis Thompson's study of the structure of Mill's political thought devotes some three pages to Mill's attitude towards party government, the author concluding that he was hostile to it and did not consider it necessary “for effective, stable democracy.” Indeed, Mill's major political treatise, Considerations on Representative Government, says remarkably little about parties, and where they are referred to no constructive influence is imputed to them. His discussion of Thomas Hare's plan of personal or proportional representation, for example, makes clear that one of its numerous virtues is the security it provides for insuring the representation not of “two great parties alone” but of every significant “minority in the whole nation.”
I would like to thank J.M. Robson and Ann Robson for their very helpful criticism of an earlier version of this paper.
1 Sidgwick, Henry, The Elements of Politics (4th ed. London, 1929), p. 590Google Scholar.
2 Birch, A.H., Representative and Responsible Government (Toronto, 1964), p. 114Google Scholar.
3 Thompson, Dennis F., John Stuart Mill and Representative Government (Princeton, 1976), pp. 118–21, 187Google Scholar.
4 Considerations on Representative Government, in Essays on Politics and Society, ed. Robson, J.M., Collected Works, XVIII and XIX (Toronto, 1977), XIX, 455Google Scholar.
5 Ibid., p. 456.
6 Ibid., p. 373.
7 Robson, J.M., The Improvement of Mankind: The Social and Political Thought of John Stuart Mill (Toronto, 1968), pp. 191–99CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
8 “Recent Writers on Reform,” in Essays on Politics and Society, CW, XIX, 348Google Scholar.
9 Hamburger, Joseph, Intellectuals in Politics: John Stuart Mill and the Philosophic Radicals (New Haven and London, 1965)Google Scholar.
10 “Notes on the Newspapers,” Monthly Repository, n.s. VIII (March 1834), 174Google Scholar.
11 Jeffrey, Francis, “Leckie on the British Constitution,” Edinburgh Review, XX (Nov. 1812), 315–46Google Scholar.
12 “Edinburgh Review,” Westminster Review, I (April 1824), 530Google Scholar.
13 “Reorganization of the Reform Party,” Westminster Review, XXXII (April 1839), 475Google Scholar.
14 “Coleridge,” in Essays on Ethics, Religion, and Society, ed. Robson, M., Collected Works, X (Toronto, 1969), 163Google Scholar.
15 It was Mill's opinion that the Toryism of Peel's Conservative Party, not to mention that of Derby and Disraeli, had little in common with Coleridge's speculative Toryism. Although Mill recognized the obvious superiority of Peel to the mass of his followers, and was indeed prepared, in “Reorganization of the Reform Party” (p. 508), to regard Peel as the legitimate representative of Conservative principle in national politics, he was far less impressed by Peel than modern historians tend to be. In 1837 Mill wrote: “What gives Sir Robert Peel his personal influence? What makes so many adhere to him? The opinion, a greatly exaggerated one, entertained of his capacity for business …. If Radicalism had its Sir Robert Peel, he would be at the head of an administration within two years: and Radicalism must be a barren soil if it cannot rival so sorry a growth as that; if it cannot produce a match for perhaps the least gifted man that ever headed a powerful party in this country …. He does not know his age; he has always blundered miserably in his estimate of it. But he knows the House of Commons, and the sort of men of whom it is composed. He knows what will act upon their minds, and is able to strike the right chord upon that instrument. He has, besides, all that the mere routine of office-experience can give, to a man who brought to it no principles drawn from a higher philosophy, and no desire for any.” (“Parties and the Ministry,” London and Westminster Review, VI and XXVIII [Oct. 1837], 25–26Google Scholar.) It is perhaps ironic that in 1846 Disraeli's criticism of Peel resembled Mill's assessment of the Conservative leader, whereas, in that year, Peel probably shared Mill's view of the rank and file of the Tory Party. Partisanship doubtless blinded Mill to Peel's virtues, though it may be that twentieth-century historians have been overly generous in their estimation of Peel's statesmanship. Relevant modern studies include: Blake, Robert, The Conservative Party from Peel to Churchill (London, 1970), pp. 10–59Google Scholar; Gash, Norman, Mr. Secretary Peel (London, 1961)Google Scholar, Sir Robert Peel (London, 1972)Google Scholar, Reaction and Reconstruction in English Politics, 1832-1852 (Oxford, 1965)Google Scholar; Clark, George Kitson, Peel and the Conservative Party, 1832-1841 (London, 1929)Google Scholar; Stewart, Robert, The Foundation of the Conservative Party (London, 1978)Google Scholar, Part II.
16 Mill to Hare, 5 Feb. 1860, Later Letters of John Stuart Mill, ed. Mineka, Francis E. and Lindley, Dwight N., Collected Works, Vols. XIV–XVII (Toronto, 1972), XV, 672Google Scholar.
17 Representative Government, CW, XIX, 452nGoogle Scholar. Mill did not claim that all Conservatives were silly and stupid, only that the conduct of the party tended to reflect the silliness and stupidity characteristic of most of its members. “Is it not surprising that Conservatives have no sense or appreciation of Conservative principles? Conservatism with us means a blind opposition to change. I know no Conservatives who are really so but the Saturday reviewers whose adherence is to principles of stability & principles of unjust domination so far as now practically maintainable, but who have no mere instinctive attachment to details as they are.” (Mill to Helen Taylor, 2 Feb. 1860, Later Letters, CW, XV, 667–8Google Scholar.)
18 For provocative and controversial interpretations of Mill's liberalism, see Cowling, Maurice, Mill and Liberalism (Cambridge, 1963)Google Scholar, and Himmelfarb, Gertrude, On Liberty and Liberalism: The Case of John Stuart Mill (New York, 1974)Google Scholar. Cowling, reading On Liberty as a defense of freedom for an intellectual and moral elite, asserts that Mill's brand of liberalism was not libertarian, but authoritarian, exclusive, and intolerant in nature. Himmelfarb, on the other hand, arguing that On Liberty is not consistent with most of Mill's works, considers it a highly pernicious document advocating an extreme form of individualism. An authoritative answer to both Cowling and Himmelfarb is Ten's, C.L.Mill on Liberty (Oxford, 1980)Google Scholar. The fullest and best account of Mill's social and political thought remains Robson's The Improvement of Mankind.
19 Morning Star, 6 July 1865, p. 2Google Scholar.
20 Hamburger, , Intellectuals in Politics, pp. 65–67, 132–34, 170–75, 214–16Google Scholar.
21 Ibid., pp. 242-72.
22 Daily News, 8 July 1848, p. 3Google Scholar, and 19 July 1848, p. 2.
23 Ibid., 8 July 1848, p. 3.
24 Representative Government, CW, XIX, 452nGoogle Scholar.
25 Historians of the politics of this period have reached much the same conclusion. In The Foundation of the Conservative Party (pp. 310-17), Stewart refers to the “truce of parties” characteristic of the Palmerstonian ascendancy, while Gash, in Aristocracy and People: Britain 1815-1865 (Cambridge, Mass., 1979)Google Scholar, entitles his chapter on these years, “The Decline of Party Politics.” Stewart observes: “Seldom in its long history has the Conservative party been less powerful than it was during the decade of Palmerston's ascendancy. But then, since Palmerston was a Liberal by habit, not by creed, it has never had less reason to lament its impotence.” (P. 310.) In the autumn of 1855, Palmerston invited Lord Stanley, the son of the leader of the Conservative Party, to join his ministry. Although Stanley declined the offer, he admitted, in his reply to Palmerston, that “of late years, the lines of demarcation which separate political parties have been finely drawn, and have even at times appeared to be altogether effaced” (see Vincent, J.R. [ed.], Disraeli, Derby and the Conservative Party: The Political Journals of Lord Stanley, 1849-69 [Hassocks, Sussex, 1978], p. 138)Google Scholar. The Tories, recognizing that they were not in a position to form a majority government and that their fundamental interests were secure with Palmerston at the helm, offered only a token opposition to his 1859-65 government. In 1864 Lord Robert Cecil, the Tory politician and future prime minister, praised Palmerston's parliament for having “done that which it is most difficult and most salutary for a Parliament to do—nothing” (“The House of Commons,” Quarterly Review, CXVI [July 1864], 245Google Scholar).
26 Representative Government, CW, XIX, 448–66Google Scholar.
27 “Recent Writers on Reform,” CW, XIX, 363Google Scholar.
28 For a brief but useful consideration of shifts in attitude towards party in the mid-Victorian period, see McGowen, Randall E. and Arnstein, Walter L., “The Mid-Victorians and the Two-Party System,” Albion, XI (Fall, 1979), 242–58CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
29 See Mill's letter to Beal, James, 7 March 1865, in Later Letters, CW, XVI, 1005–07Google Scholar.
30 Daily Telegraph, 10 July 1865, p. 2Google Scholar.
31 Mill to Plummer, 27 Nov. 1865, Later Letters, CW, XVI, 1122Google Scholar.
32 Mill to Hare, 11 Jan. 1866, ibid., p. 1138.
33 Mill to Gomperz, 22 Aug. 1866, ibid., p. 1197.
34 Autobiography, in Autobiography and Literary Essays, ed. Robson, J.M. and Stillinger, Jack, Collected Works, I (Toronto, 1981), 275Google Scholar.
35 Ibid., p. 276.
36 See Cowling, Maurice, 1867: Disraeli, Gladstone and Revolution (Cambridge, 1967)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
37 See 3 Hansard 183:1087-97 (17 May 1866). The measure proposed to secure for Irish tenants compensation for their improvements when there existed no contract between tenant and landlord to the contrary effect.
38 Autobiography, CW, I, 279Google Scholar.
39 See 3 Hansard 182:1253-63 (13 April 1866).
40 See ibid., 184: 1797-1806 (31 July 1866); 187:817-29 (20 May 1867); 190: 1516-32 (12 March 1868).
41 Morning Star, 23 July 1868, p. 3Google Scholar.
42 Ibid., 12 Nov. 1868, p. 7.
43 The Times, 16 Nov. 1868, p. 7Google Scholar.
44 Mill to Bouverie, 19 Oct. 1868, Later Letters, CW, XVI, 1463Google Scholar.
45 Mill to Chadwick, 19 Nov. 1868, ibid., p. 1488. The working men's candidates Mill had in mind were probably Edmond Beales, Charles Bradlaugh, George Howell, and W.R. Cremer, all of whom were defeated at this general election. The “University Liberals” were men who professed strong liberal opinions and had close ties to the old universities. Their political views in the 1860s were best-exemplified in the articles that made up the volume Essays on Reform (ed. Stephen, Leslie [London, 1867])Google Scholar. Those who can be so classified and who unsuccessfully sought election in 1868 included G.C. Brodrick, Edward A. Freeman, Auberon Herbert, George Young, Godfrey Lushington, and Charles Roundell. An excellent study of the university liberals is Harvie's, ChristopherThe Lights of Liberalism: University Liberals and the Challenge of Democracy (London, 1976)Google Scholar.
46 Mill to Norton, 28 Nov. 1868, Later Letters, CW, XVI, 1493Google Scholar.
47 See Mill to Thornton, 16 Jan. 1869, ibid., XVII, 1547n-8n.
48 3 Hansard 182:1259-60 (13 April 1866).
49 Mill to Plummer, 5 Nov. 1868, Later Letters, CW, XVI, 1479Google Scholar.
50 Mill to Madge (Secretary of Committee of Chelsea Working Men's Parliamentary Electoral Association), 7 Dec. 1868, ibid., p. 1514.
51 Mill to Odger, 19 Feb. 1870, ibid., XVII, 1697.
52 “Reorganization of the Reform Party,” pp. 494-99.
53 Ibid., p. 494.
54 This is not to deny that Mill assigned an important administrative and educative function to an intellectual elite, an elite that through its expertise, wideranging vision, and persuasive powers would secure for itself, in certain spheres, a measure of deference from all elements participating in the political system. But this was, at least in Mill's eyes, a non-class elite, one whose authority would be acknowledged by both middle and working classes.
55 Thompson, John Stuart Mill and Representative Government.
56 Both Robson, in The Improvement of Mankind, and Thompson, in John Stuart Mill and Representative Government, have argued effectively for the unity of Mill's political thought.
57 Morley, John, The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, (London, 1903), II, 544Google Scholar.
58 Morley, John, Recollections, (New York, 1917), I, 55Google Scholar.
59 It is not without interest to find, several decades after Mill's death, J.A. Hobson and L.T. Hobhouse, both heavily influenced by Mill's moral and intellectual legacy, having a similar problem with the Liberal Party. Hobson, dismayed by the failure of the party to make a principled stand against imperialism, asserted that the “majority of the influential Liberals fled from the fight which was the truest test of Liberalism in their generation because they were ‘hirelings,’ destitute of firm political principle” (Imperialism: A Study [1902] [Ann Arbor, 1965], p. 144Google Scholar). Collini, Stefan, in his fine book, Liberalism and Sociology: L.T. Hobhouse and Political Argument in England, 1880-1914 (Cambridge, 1979)Google Scholar, says of Hobhouse: “In more sanguine moods the historic role of the Liberal party as the vehicle of Progress seized his imagination strongly. But principles were always more important than party, and during the last decade of his political life, as during the first, his hopes … really rested upon the formation of a new progressive party which would combine the essentials of Liberalism with the best elements from the labour and Socialist movements.” (P. 91.)
60 See Barker, Michael, Gladstone and Radicalism: The Reconstruction of Liberal Policy in Britain, 1885-1894 (Hassocks, Sussex, 1975)Google Scholar.
61 Autobiography, CW, I, 35Google Scholar.
