| William Ewart Gladstone (1809-98) was the | | | | Party splits, he was defeated again and again on |
| greatest British reforming statesman of the 19th | | | | the Home Rule legislation that he tried to push |
| century. He was Prime Minister of Britain three | | | | through. |
| times. | | | | Even though he did not prevail on this issue, he still |
| Gladstone originally intended to become an | | | | believed that Irish Home Rule would have to |
| Anglican clergyman but, following his father's | | | | come in due course: |
| advice, he took up politics. He entered the British | | | | "We are bound to lose Ireland in consequence of |
| Parliament in 1832 as a Conservative (or Tory). | | | | years of cruelty, stupidity and misgovernment |
| During the prime ministerships of Sir Robert Peel, | | | | and I would rather lose her as a friend than as a |
| George Hamilton and Lord Palmerston, Gladstone | | | | foe." (Gladstone as quoted in Margot Asquith's |
| became President of the Board of Trade | | | | 1933 book, More Memories.) |
| (1843-45) and Chancellor of the Exchequer | | | | Gladstone's magnificent record of Parliamentary |
| (1852-55; 1859-66). During these latter periods, he | | | | achievements was somewhat tarnished by the |
| set about cutting tariffs and government | | | | death of General Gordon in Khartoum, Sudan in |
| expenditure. | | | | 1885 (an event blamed on the failure of |
| Careful husbandry of government monies would | | | | Gladstone's government to help the general in |
| be an ever-recurring theme in Gladstone's political | | | | Khartoum and on Gladstone's supposed disinterest |
| philosophy. "Finance is, as it were, the the | | | | in foreign affairs) and by Britain's defeats in the |
| stomach of the country, from which all the other | | | | First Boer War (1881). |
| organs take their tone," he wrote in 1858. | | | | On the subject of foreign policy, Gladstone |
| In 1867 Gladstone left the Conservatives to | | | | certainly had strong views which were often at |
| become leader of the Liberal Party. | | | | odds with the jingoism and imperialism of his day. |
| He became Prime Minister for the first time in | | | | For example, on Britain's invasions of Afghanistan |
| 1868. In 1870 he established a system of national | | | | during the Victorian era, here are the eloquent |
| elementary education (a first in British educational | | | | words of Gladstone in an 1879 speech: |
| history). | | | | "Remember the rights of the savage, as we call |
| He viewed the British rule of Ireland as the cause | | | | him. Remember the happiness of his humble |
| of many evils and injustices for the Irish people | | | | home, remember that the sanctity of life in the hill |
| over a period of centuries. He therefore | | | | villages of Afghanistan, among the winter snows, |
| disestablished the Irish Church (that is, the | | | | is as inviolable in the eye of Almighty God, as can |
| Anglican Church in Ireland), thereby reducing the | | | | be your own." |
| power of Protestant Anglicanism in the mainly | | | | (These words, written as they are in Victorian |
| Roman Catholic Ireland. He also passed the Irish | | | | English, still remain painfully relevant during the |
| Land Act, which made it more difficult for British | | | | current NATO intervention in in Afghanistan.) |
| landlords to evict their Irish tenants. | | | | Like his parliamentary arch rival, the Conservative |
| He undertook a scheme of parliamentary reform, | | | | Benjamin Disraeli, William Gladstone was a |
| bringing in secret ballots and extending voting | | | | magnificent orator. He was also an outstanding |
| rights to working class males (the latter went a | | | | classical scholar. |
| long way towards achieving universal male | | | | Gladstone was a man of strong moral convictions, |
| suffrage). | | | | who, some say, acted more like a clergyman than |
| In his final two periods as Prime Minister, | | | | a typical politician. These convictions - and thereby |
| Gladstone tried to bring in Irish Home Rule, | | | | the achievements of his political career - were |
| another measure designed to end centuries of | | | | founded on the bedrock of his profound Christian |
| British misrule in Ireland. However, due to Liberal | | | | religious principles. |