Striving for a world transformed by justice and peace - a TL from 1827

[pipisme]

From a letter written by Benjamin Disraeli to his sister Sarah dated 23 October 1850:

At the cabinet meeting today the Prime Minister finally rejected my proposal for a bill to disestablish the Church of Ireland. Grey and Wood both said they could not possibly such legislation and would resign if it were ever introduced. As two of the most important ministers in the government Russell regarded them as too important to lose.

I want now to push for legislation to bring justice to tenant farmers in Ireland. There must be fair rents, fixity of tenure and the right of tenants to receive compensation for improvements they have made to their farms.

Yesterday I went to the offices of the Westminster Review to leave an article I had written for that journal. Marian Evans was there. (1) She is a very intelligent young lady, though hardly a beauty. She is very sympathetic to the Jewish people.

(1) Marian Evans is better known in OTL as George Eliot.

[stevep]

pipisme

That could have some interesting impacts, if those two get friendly.

Steve

[pipisme]

From the Diaries of John Bright:

10 February 1851. Met Disraeli in the House [of Commons] today. He said he wants to persuade the cabinet to introduce legislation which would give the three Fs to Irish tenant farmers: fair rents, fixity of tenure, and fair compensation for improvements by tenants.

[pipisme]

In late February 1851 the cabinet agreed to legislation in respect of tenant farmers in Ireland. Though less radical than Disraeli wanted, he reluctantly accepted as the best from his viewpoint to which the cabinet would agree.

The Irish Land Bill was published in mid March 1851. It contained the following provisions:
1) The 'Ulster custom' was extended to all of Ireland and given the force of law. (1)

2) Landlords would not be allowed to raise rents by an "excessive amount".

(1) For 'Ulster custom' see http://www.libraryireland.com/articl...stom/index.php .

[pipisme]

The Irish Land Bill also contained a clause that made illegal the right of landlords to refuse leases to tenants because of their religious beliefs. In practice this was directed at Protestant landlords who refused leases to their Roman Catholic tenants, because a lease conferred the right to vote.

The Irish Land Bill passed through the House of Commons and the House of Lords and became law at the end of July 1851.

Benjamin Disraeli, the Chief Secretary for Ireland, had developed a strong friendship with Prince Albert, the Prince Consort. They were both liberal minded and very much open to new ideas. One day in September 1851 Disraeli suggested that a royal tour of Ireland by Queen Victoria and the Prince would win affection and love for the royal family in Ireland. He also suggested that the royal couple should buy a country house in Ireland, in the same way that they had bought Balmoral Castle in Scotland.

In April 1852 Victoria and Albert purchased Lismore Castle in County Waterford from Wiliam Cavendish, 6th Duke of Devonshire. (1)

The Irish royal tour took place in May 1852. They went to all the major cities of Ireland and it was a great success.

(1) http://www.lismorecastle.com

[pipisme]

Meanwhile the friendship between Benjamin Disraeli and Marian Evans was ripening into something close to love. (1) It was no longer Miss Evans and Mr. Disraeli, but Marian and Benjamin, or Benji if she was feeling particularly affectionate. (2) They were not lovers in the sense that their relationship was not sexual, but they were affectionate with each other. They had also exchanged love letters. Anna, Disraeli's wife, knew of their friendship, though not of their love and affection for one another. In fact she had met Marian several times and they had become friends.

In the last week of August 1852 Marian accepted the invitation by Anna and Benjamin to stay at the Chief Secretary's Lodge in Phoenix Park, Dublin. He was Chief Secretary for Ireland. It was her first visit to Ireland and while ahe was there travelled all over the island with her hosts. The intensity of the impression Ireland made on Marian Evans is evident from her writing about that country - both fiction and non-fiction.

In Dublin the three friends several times met Jane Francesca Dillon and her husband John Blake Dillon and their son Thomas who just four years old. (3) He was born on 18 August 1848. Marian lavished all the maternal love and affection on Thomas which was denied expression as she had no child of her own.

(1) Marian Evans is better known in OTL as George Eliot.

(2) From my reading of Victorian novels it was not until couples were engaged, or close to it, that they called each other by their first names.

(3) In OTL she is Jane Francesca Wilde, the mother of Oscar.

[pipisme]

I will now return to events in the United States. In the 1848 presidential election Lewis Cass and William Orlando Butler were elected as President and Vice President on the Democratic Party ticket. William Gladstone was elected to the House of Representatives as a Free Soil candidate for a district in New York.

In this TL the Compromise of 1850 was enacted as in OTL. It was bitterly opposed by Gladstone. Like William Seward he appealed to a 'Higher Law' in rejecting the Compromise. In an hour long speech in the House of Representatives he denounced the Fugitive Slave Bill as immoral and unjust. It was the sacred duty of every person to resist it and not to return fugitive slaves to servitude.

[pipisme]

President Cass appointed William L. Marcy as Secretary of State when he formed his administration. Marcy had been Secretary of War in the Polk adminstration.

[pipisme]

Two major foreign policy initiatives by the Cass administration were the opening of Japan and the annexation of Hawaii.

The opening of Japan by the United States was effected by Commodore Philip Voorhees in June 1850 - the date of his first visit. I have little interest in 19th century Japanese history so I'll just say that it runs its course at it did in OTL except Voorhees is substituted for Perry, and that events happen about three years earlier than in OTL.

Kamehameha III, the King of Hawaii, signed a treaty of annexation of his country by the United States in Honolulu in March 1852. It was ratified by the United States Senate in June 1852. It was opposed by the Whigs and the Free Soilers. (1)

(1) In OTL a treaty of annexation was negotiated in Honolulu in 1854, but the death of Kamehamema III produced a change in Hawaiian policy, and the treaty was never signed.

[stevep]

Originally Posted by pipisme

Two major foreign policy initiatives by the Cass administration were the opening of Japan and the annexation of Hawaii.

The opening of Japan by the United States was effected by Commodore Philip Voorhees in June 1850 - the date of his first visit. I have little interest in 19th century Japanese history so I'll just say that it runs its course at it did in OTL except Voorhees is substituted for Perry, and that events happen about three years earlier than in OTL.

Kamehameha III, the King of Hawaii, signed a treaty of annexation of his country by the United States in Honolulu in March 1852. It was ratified by the United States Senate in June 1852. It was opposed by the Whigs and the Free Soilers. (1)

(1) In OTL a treaty of annexation was negotiated in Honolulu in 1854, but the death of Kamehamema III produced a change in Hawaiian policy, and the treaty was never signed.

pipisme

Never realises that the US was seeking oceanic expansion that early. Thought they didn't really take that much interest in Hawaii until after the 1890's coup by American settlers. Very interesting. I wonder if this earlier expansion will provoke more interest from the other powers in the region at the time?

Steve

[pipisme]

Steve

Information about a treaty of annexation having been negotiated in Honolulu in 1854 is in the book A History of United States Foreign Policy by Julius W. Pratt et al., Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 4th edition 1980.

pipisme

[pipisme]

In the United States the treaty of annexation of Hawaii was opposed by the Northern Whigs and Free Soilers, but supported by the Democrats and Southern Whigs.

In Britain Viscount Palmerston denounced the annexation and called upon the British government to send troops to preserve the independence of Hawaii. This was rejected by Lord John Russell, the Prime Minister. In alliance with the Palmerstonians, the Conservative Party tabled a motion of censure on the government in early July 1852 for its failure to defend the independence of Hawaii. It was debated in the House of Commons on 6 and 7 July 1852. In the vote at the end of the debate the censure motion was defeated by 276 votes to 279 votes. The Liberal government had scraped through by a majority of three. After the vote the Prime Minister said that he would not resign.

[pipisme]

The Democratic Party convention opened in Baltimore, Maryland on 1 June 1852. Lewis Cass and William Orlando Butler were nominated with only token opposition as candidates for president and vice-president respectively.

The Whig Party convention opened in Baltimore on 17 June. The main battle for the presidential nomination was between Millard Fillmore and General Winfield Scott. with Senator Daniel Webster of Massachusetts securing in the region of 20 votes. On the 42nd ballot Fillmore received an overall majority of votes. Senator John Bell from Tennessee was chosen as the Vice-Presidential candidate.

[pipisme]

The Northern Whigs, or radical Whigs or Conscience Whigs as they were sometimes called, were bitterly opposed to the selection of Fillmore and Bell, and the promise on the Whig Platform to keep the Compromise of 1850 and the Fugitive Slave Act. They bolted the Whig Party and entered into negotiations with the Free Soil Party. At a joint convention in Boston, Massachusetts, on 11 and 12 August 1852 the Free Soil Party merged with the Northern Whigs and the remnants of the moribund Liberty Party to form a new party. Liberty was the name chosen by the convention for the new party. Wiiliam Gladstone was a Free Soil, then Liberty, delegate at the convention.

The convention picked William Seward, Senator from New York and a former Whig, for President, and Joshua Reed Giddings, Representative from Ohio, and formerly Free Soil Party, as Vice President. The Platform of the Liberty Party was very miuch like this: http://www.angelfire.com/indie/ourcampaigns/1852.html .

[pipisme]

In the presedential election campaign there was little discernible difference between the Democratic and Whig Parties. The real opposition was provided by the Liberty Party. In New York City William Gladstone, his wife Alice Haverly campaigned for the Liberty Party ticket of William Seward and Joshua Reed Giddings. Their three children - Frances (born 16 August 1838), Angelina (born 3 December 1839), and Robert (born 27 April 1841) - also did campaigning stuff suitable for their ages, particularly Frances. Gladstone also ran for re-election as Representative for the 8th District of New York on the Liberty Party ticket.

The result of the election for president on 2 November 1852 was as follows:
Lewis Cass/William Orlando Butler (Democrat): 195 electoral votes
William Seward/Joshua Reed Giddings (Liberty): 58 electoral votes
Millard Fillmore/John Bell (Whig): 43 electoral votes.

So Cass and Butler remained in office as president and vice-president respectively.

[pipisme]

Here are the states won by each ticket in the 1852 presidential election. (Number of electoral votes for that state).
Cass/Butler (Democrat):
Alabama (9), Arkansas (4), California (4), Connecticut (6), Florida (3), Georgia (10), Illinois (11), Indiana (13), Iowa (4), Maine (8), Maryland (8), Michigan (6), Mississipi (7), Missouri (9), New Jersey (7), Ohio (23), Pennsylvania (27), Rhode Island (4), South Carolina (8), Texas (4), Virginia (15), Wisconsin (5). Total electoral votes = 195 .

Seeward/Giddings (Liberty):
Massachusetts (13), New York (35), New Hampshire (5), Vermont (5). Total electoral votes = 58.

Fillmore/Bell (Whig):
Delaware (3), Kentucky (12), Louisiana (6), North Carolina (10), Tennessee (12), Total electoral votes = 43.

The percentage votes were as follows:
Cass/Butler (Democrat): 48.7
Fillmore/Bell (Whig): 25.6
Seeward/Giddings (Liberty): 25.3
Others: 0.4

Seeward/Giddings came second in the electoral vote, but third in the popular vote, because they were not on the ballot in the states below the Mason-Dixie Line.

[pipisme]

After the congressional elections on 2 November 1852 the composition of the House of Representatives was as follows:
Democratic Party: 119 seats
Whig Party: 68 seats
Liberty Party: 45 seats
Independents: 2 seats
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Total: 234 seats
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So the Democrats narrowly kept control of the House.

William Gladstone was re-elected as representative from the 8th District of New York on the Liberty Party ticket.

The composition of the Senate after the elections was as follows:
Democratic Party: 32 seats
Whig Party: 19 seats
Liberty Party: 11 seats
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Total: 62 seats
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So the Democrats just kept control of the Senate.

I will now leave events in the United States.

On 21 May 1849 Karl Marx and his wife Jenny died in a cholera epidemic in Paris. His life up to then was the same as in OTL.

[pipisme]

The Reform Bill received its second reading in the House of Commons on 7 March 1853, after eight days of debate. Under its provisions the occupation qualification in borough constituencies would be reduced from £10 rateable value to £7 rental value, and in county constituencies the occupation qualification would be reduced from £50 rental to £10 rental. A new £15 lodger (non-householder) franchise in both the boroughs and the counties.

[pipisme]

The Reform Bill 1853 also provided for a redistribution of 76 seats from boroughs with small electorates to give 28 seats to the boroughs with large electorates, 47 seats to the counties, and one seat to the University of London.

It was estimated that the Bill would enfranchise some 500,000 to 600,000 new voters, increasing the number of voters to around 1 million.

[stevep]

pipisme

That sounds like a good step forward. Not sure quite how it compares with OTL but hopefully a bit faster progress being made.

Is the fact that the increase seems to be targeted more toward country than urban voters deliberate? [Since for urban areas there is a 30% cut while for country areas it is a 80% cut]. Or does this simply reflect that urban prices are probably rising more rapidly than non-urban ones?

Steve

Originally Posted by pipisme

The Representation of the People Bill received its second reading in the House of Commons on 7 March 1853. Under its provisions the occupation qualification in borough constituencies would be reduced from £10 rateable value to £7 rental value, and in county constituencies the occupation qualification would be reduced from £50 rental to £10 rental. A new £15 lodger (non-householder) franchise in both the boroughs and the counties.

Originally Posted by pipisme

The Representation of the People Bill 1853 also provided for a redistribution of 76 seats from boroughs with small electorates to give 28 seats to the boroughs with large electorates, 47 seats to the counties, and one seat to the University of London.

It was estimated that the Bill would enfranchise some 500,000 to 600,000 new voters, increasing the number of voters to around 1 million.