Disraeli v. Gladstone: The Poll

Who was the better PM, Disraeli or Gladstone?

  • Benjamin Disraeli

    Votes: 49 62.8%
  • William Gladstone

    Votes: 29 37.2%

  • Total voters
    78

Wolfpaw

Banned
That's about as mild as he got on this subject.
I agree that the second part is really just a boatload of anti-Turkish bigotry and is pretty noxious even by 19th century standards (Gobineu was probably more polite than this).

As for the first part, yeah, there's that ugly racism, but it sounds like Gladstone is more lamenting the Hamidian massacres than anything else, and I don't see what's so wrong with that.
 
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Balderdash. It's more like comparing Woodrow Wilson to Ronald Reagan.

I'd say more like comparing Lyndon Johnson to Harry Truman, except give Truman's racism to Johnson. Then you've got Lyndon Gladstone and Harry Disraeli. Though, personally I hate Truman's foreign policy. But a lot of people in more credibly positions than me admire it, I guess.
 

Wolfpaw

Banned
[I'd say more like comparing Lyndon Johnson to Harry Truman, except give Truman's racism to Johnson. Then you've got Lyndon Gladstone and Harry Disraeli. Though, personally I hate Truman's foreign policy. But a lot of people in more credibly positions than me admire it, I guess.
Harry Truman wasn't actually all that racist; he even refused to join the Klan when just starting out in politics even though it would have greatly helped his career (locally and state-wide, at least). He supported Civil Rights and did more on that front than even FDR, who was, if anything, less racist than Truman. I mean, we're talking about the guy who desegregated the armed forces, here.
 
Marginally Dizzy, for introducing the Second Reform Act. The act which brought popular (if not Universal) democracy to Britain. That said, it was purely out of ambition (at least partly fuelled by a desire to get one over Gladstone.)
 
I've always thought Gladstone gets too much flak and Disreali is overhyped, but neither was terribly brilliant.

Disreali's 2nd Reform Act was a purely political move, done after he had sunk Gladstone's own efforts while his slew of 'social' legislation was overwhelmingly permissive with no real effect. Nevermind that he himself had little to do with such laws, he was very much about broad brushstrokes and let others, his Home Secretary in particular I believe do most of the heavy lifting.

Foreign Policy is his strong point but Imperial Policy was irresponsible, again permissive was his watchword, letting commanders and officials on the scene do what they felt like, gave Britain a few extra Pacific islands and kicked off the Zulu War basically. Had he been in charge in a period that Britain wasn't all powerful god knows what messes he would have gotten everyone into.

Gladstone's flaws have already been well-noted but he did encourage Dominion self-rule, education reform, military reform, a meritocratic Civil Service and fought for Home Rule in the face of major opposition. He came very close to avoiding a century of on and off violence in Ireland and Britain as well, for that reason I voted him over Dizzy.

That said I'm sure Disreali would be more fun at the bar.
 
I've always thought Gladstone gets too much flak and Disreali is overhyped, but neither was terribly brilliant.

Disreali's 2nd Reform Act was a purely political move, done after he had sunk Gladstone's own efforts while his slew of 'social' legislation was overwhelmingly permissive with no real effect. Nevermind that he himself had little to do with such laws, he was very much about broad brushstrokes and let others, his Home Secretary in particular I believe do most of the heavy lifting.

Foreign Policy is his strong point but Imperial Policy was irresponsible, again permissive was his watchword, letting commanders and officials on the scene do what they felt like, gave Britain a few extra Pacific islands and kicked off the Zulu War basically. Had he been in charge in a period that Britain wasn't all powerful god knows what messes he would have gotten everyone into.

Gladstone's flaws have already been well-noted but he did encourage Dominion self-rule, education reform, military reform, a meritocratic Civil Service and fought for Home Rule in the face of major opposition. He came very close to avoiding a century of on and off violence in Ireland and Britain as well, for that reason I voted him over Dizzy.

That said I'm sure Disreali would be more fun at the bar.

Nothing matches the irresponsibility and recklessness of Gladstone's foreign policy. Just his invasion of Egypt was an enduring disaster for Britain, and certainly for Africa.
 
Dizzy, no question. That his no-nonsense foreign policy was the superior is quite obvious, and given how much we did put our feet in it over Egypt that's a fairly major consideration by itself; and it's hardly like Dizzy was a bad domestic premier. He did a lot of good at home, including tentative social reform: "permissive" it most certainly was, but what exactly is he up against on that count? It's not like Gladstone was some kind of social-democrat: what labour representation existed in the 1870s certainly shared the view that better something than nothing. The great bulk of the British people live in execrable permission either way, but doing something without that much effectat least changes attitudes. Britain's electoral public was "permissive" at the time, and it would take the serious social study of the 1890s before real efforts were made.

Disraeli was a statesman who, at home and abroad, accomplished a lot of practical good; whereas Gladstone was an idealist who's "ideals" would disgust modern people (like those of the bulk of his contemporaries, obviously: that's just the way it is) and who's prejudices were marked even for the time.

I'd have been a home-ruler, but not a particularly convinced one, and Ireland is for me a secondary issue compared to the preference for a level-headed foreign policy and my distaste for an ideological belief in laissez faire.

There is the Married Women's Property Act to Gladstone's credit, but that was going to happen eventually, whereas Bulgaria and Egypt could only happen once.

And I just prefer Dizzy the man: he overcame a disadvantageous background, he climbed the greasy pole, he was a consumate showman, he wrote books. I find plenty to admire in him.

Why does talk about his being pragmatic and ambitious like that was a bad thing?
 
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Benjamin Disraeli was born Jewish and became Prime Minister of Britain and was even granted peerage. While Prime Minister he matched wits with Otto von Bismarck and didn't lose.

Disraeli ranks alongside Lincoln, Bismarck, the American Founding Fathers, Bolivar, and Napoleon on my "competent politicians " list.
 
Gladstone all the way. One of the best, if not the, best PMs ever.
Disraeli....myeh. Too much on the imperialism and protectionalism. And the rich.
 
Disraeli....myeh. Too much on the imperialism and protectionalism. And the rich.

You mean like how he was almost single-handedly responsible for the imperialist catastrophe in Egypt, which tied British foreign policy to whatever Bismarck felt like doing for a decade?
 
You mean like how he was almost single-handedly responsible for the imperialist catastrophe in Egypt, which tied British foreign policy to whatever Bismarck felt like doing for a decade?

And France. More than a decade... I'm not sure what Disraeli did that was all that imperialist. He bought the canal shares, but that was to protect existing interests; ditto for South Africa. Maybe the Afghanistan thing is a mark against him.
 

Keenir

Banned
I like how he reminded everyone that his ancestors were Temple priests when Gladstone's ancestors were woad-painted brutes.

And France. More than a decade... I'm not sure what Disraeli did that was all that imperialist. He bought the canal shares, but that was to protect existing interests; ditto for South Africa. Maybe the Afghanistan thing is a mark against him.

some people are still upset about the "Empress of India" bit.
 

Thande

Donor
I like how he reminded everyone that his ancestors were Temple priests when Gladstone's ancestors were woad-painted brutes.

Did every Jewish politician in the 19th century do that? Judah P. Benjamin was famous for making the same comment...
 
Well obviously; I was talking about the specific banter between the two, apart from the one about Disraeli being the power at the summit (know that already).

I seem to recall that Bismarck was rather ill during the Berlin Conference and participated as little as possible.

Bismarck wasn't really that huge a super-genius; he was in power a long time so he could provide continuity of policy, and then there was the whole having the Prussian then Imperial German war machine to back him up. There were times when he could be pretty petulant and let petty personal grudges affect policy.
 
And the rich.

As I say, ineffective as Disraeli's social legislation was, contemporary labour leaders still said that it was more than the Liberals had ever done. The idea of the 19th C Tories as a party of rich bastards hardly holds up to analysis. The New Liberals were in some part motivated by a fear that the Tories would steal a march on them.

I seem to recall that Bismarck was rather ill during the Berlin Conference and participated as little as possible.

Bismarck wasn't really that huge a super-genius; he was in power a long time so he could provide continuity of policy, and then there was the whole having the Prussian then Imperial German war machine to back him up. There were times when he could be pretty petulant and let petty personal grudges affect policy.

I agree. Bismarck was a skilled diplomat, good at keeping his head, forming schemes, and manipulating others, but he actually made a lot of mistakes, often for very impulsive reasons. The Alvensleben Comvention, IIRC, actually put Prussia in some hot water and necesitated an embarrasing climbdown despite its later consequences, and he had entered into it because of an exaggerated scare that the exasperated Alexander II and Gorchakov were going to just walk out of Poland.

His great strength, coming to power when diplomats liked to make grand speculations about their preferred alliance and avoid doing much (Napoleon III being the archetype), was to do something, and thanks to his quick wit and immunity to domestic attack, he managed to dodge the consequences of his mistakes and keep up his frantic policy until he was in the advantageous position of actually being "saturated" while everybody else in Europe still had interests to pursue.
 
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