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Gladstone, the Whigs and the Leadership of the Liberal Party, 1879–1880*
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
Extract
The return of Gladstone as prime minister, after the Liberals had secured a decisive majority at the polls in April 1880, has for long been established in the mythology of the Liberal party. In retrospect, the series of events which had drawn Gladstone back into active politics after his retirement in 1875 – his opposition to Beaconsfield's Eastern policy, the oratorical campaigns in Midlothian, and the rout of ‘Jingoism’ at the general election – came to be seen as a natural, linear development, whereby his special sense of affinity with the ‘;people’ was re-established and the great election victory assured. His subsequent resumption of the premiership accordingly became surrounded by an air of inevitability: the hesitant leadership of the whigs giving way to that of the man who had inspired the struggle against Beaconsfield's ‘system of government’ and who alone could command the allegiance of all sections of the great Liberal majority.
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References
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143 Gladstone may have been fortunate in that the outcome of the general election was so unexpected that it seemed natural to assume that his moral critique of ‘Beaconsfieldism’ had been the decisive element. It would be quite impossible, now, to separate the influence of Gladstone from that of, say, the agricultural depression, which must have played a vital part in swinging the counties to the Liberals. The most that can be said is that Gladstone's strength lay in his ability to provide a moral framework for more materialistic feelings of discontent.