Gladstone & Disraeli

Disraeli became Prime Minister. He was 70 years old,in frail health and desolated by his wife's death, but he made the most of his opportunity at the topвЂ"after a quarter-century rebuilding the Tory party. Disraeli pushed through Factory Acts in 1874 and 1878, increasing government regulation of business. Disraeli's Trade Union Act essentially put labor union bosses above the law. With the Sale of Food and Drugs Act, Disraeli's government assumed responsibility for the health of people. The Artisan's Dwelling Act authorized local governments to take private property for housing projects.

More distressing for Gladstone, Disraeli promoted imperialism. He spent more money on armaments. He got involved in the war between Russia and Turkey. He occupied Cyprus. He had British forces invade Transvaal, South Africa, and Kabul, Afghanistan. He guaranteed to protect three states on the Malay Peninsula. He claimed about 200 Pacific islands. He acquired controlling interest in the Suez CanalвЂ"a move which afforded more secure access to British India but became an 80-year occupation of Egypt, including wars, big military expenditures and political embarrassments. Disraeli flattered Queen Victoria by naming her Empress of India, and she cherished the thought that the sun never set on the British Empire. Gladstone was outraged.

Events in the Mideast brought Gladstone back into the public arena. Between April and August 1876, Turkish forces slaughtered some 12,000 rebellious Bulgarian Christians. Disraeli played this down, because he supported the Turkish empire to offset Russian influence. Gladstone insisted that moral standards apply to everyone, including allies. Gladstone wrote a pamphlet, The Bulgarian Horrors and the Question of the East, which came out in early September and soon sold 200,000 copies. Disraeli dismissed the pamphlet as passionate, vindictive, and ill-written. Disraeli added: There may be more infamous men but I don't believe there is anyone more wicked.

To Gladstone, imperialism inevitably meant more burdens on British taxpayers and more risks of war. On May 7, 1877, he declared: Consider how we have conquered, planted, annexed, and appropriated at all the points of the compass, so that at few points on the surface of the earth is there not some region or some spot of British dominion at hand. Nor even from these few points are we absent. . . . And then I ask you what quarrel can arise between any two countries or what war, in which you may not, if you be so minded to set up British interests as a ground of interference. Gladstone went on to warn against the arrogance of good intentions which end up squandering blood and treasure in foreign wars.

Russia and Turkey negotiated a treaty, but Disraeli objected because Russia gained the upper hand. He claimed it was Britain's business to push back the Russians, and this was his aim at an international diplomatic conference held in Berlin, June 1878. He succeeded and enjoyed a hero's welcome back in London. Gladstone denounced Disraeli's imperialist pretensions as all brag . . . prestige . . . jingo.

Disraeli scorned Gladstone as a sophisticated rhetorician, inebriated with the exuberance of his own verbosity, and gifted with an egotistical imagination that can at all times command an interminable and inconsistent series of arguments to malign an opponent and glorify himself.

Disraeli's imperialist policies, however, brought unwanted complications. He tangled with the Emir of Afghanistan, who refused to let British diplomats into the country. In South Africa, about 800 British soldiers were killed by Zulus. European pressures led Disraeli to ask for an expanded British naval presence in the Mediterranean.

Because of all this, as Prime Minister, Disraeli hiked taxes by P5 million and incurred P6 million of budget deficits versus Gladstone's previous five years marked by P12 million of tax cuts and P17 million of budget surpluses.

Since imperialism was popular, Gladstone recognized he couldn't stop it by following the traditional practice of debating political issues only within Parliament. He had to win over voters. Which constituency? On November 24, 1879, he launched a campaign for a Parliamentary seat in Midlothian, Scotland, long held by Tories. This was the first British political campaign that started before an election date was set.

Gladstone, his wife, and youngest daughter traveled by train and greeted thousands of people who, despite bitterly cold temperatures, had turned out for a glimpse of this famous man. He spoke to as many as 6,000 at a time. He urged that foreign policy be based on six principles. First, keep government small so people can prosper. Second, promote peaceful relations among nations. Third, maintain cooperation in Europe. Fourth, avoid entangling engagements. Fifth, try to treat all nations equally. Sixth, the foreign policy of England should always be inspired by the love of freedom . . . in freedom you lay the firmest foundations both of loyalty and order.

Queen Victoria thought it unseemly for a former Prime Minister to address ordinary people from a railway carriage. Disraeli called Gladstone an Impetuous Hyprocrite and knocked the Midlothian campaign as a pilgrimage of passion, while Gladstone declared it was a festival of freedom. But Gladstone won his seat, the Liberals swept out Disraeli's Tories, and Gladstone became Prime Minister again.

Gladstone wrestled with the consequences of Disraeli's reckless commitments around the world. Turks disregarded terms of the treaty which Disraeli helped broker with Russia. Boers battled British soldiers in South Africa. Arab nationalists revolted against the Egyptian government, and the popular British adventurer Charles Gordon was killed in Khartoum. Afghanistan became a quagmire. Although Gladstone withdrew from Afghanistan, overall he failed to reverse Disraeli's imperialist policies. At least he resisted embroiling Britain in more overseas conflicts.

Disraeli was obsessed with Gladstone, referring to him as the Arch Villain. Disraeli remarked that I really am alarmed for the country, governed by a vindictive lunatic. The bitter rivalry ended with Disraeli's death on April 19, 1881.

Besides dealing with foreign policy issues, Gladstone engineered the 1884 Reform Act, which expanded the number of voters from about 3 million to 5 million. Gladstone's Game Bill allowed farmers to hunt wild game, ending the centuries-long tradition that reserved the privilege exclusively for landlords.

There was an agricultural depression, and Irish discontent flared up as the biggest issue for Gladstone.

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