Big interests, especially West Indian slave owners, elected puppet representatives from these hollow areas. A whole class of political consultants called “borough sluggers” have arisen to steer merchants and earls – or their complacent allies – to available seats.
This has created deep inequalities. A handful of people from rotten neighborhoods sent 112 dupes, puppets and aristocrats to the House of Commons each year. No one could ever be sure who paid for a seat; it was the 19th century version of black silver. Abolitionists like William Wilberforce cursed West Indian interests. As long as it remained intact, slavery would persist.
As a result, the English working classes began to sympathize with the slaves of the Caribbean, victims of the same heavy hand that pushed British industrial workers deeper into abject poverty. The radical speakers drew the crowds; at one such rally at St. Peter’s Field in Manchester, a militia charged the crowd to disperse it, attacking passers-by with sabers and job function email database killing 18 people. The carnage became a major scandal and raised the national temperature. He also drew attention to the extreme dissatisfaction of city dwellers with Parliament.
Then, in the election of 1830, the Reform Whigs gained a precarious majority, their overwhelming popularity spreading even on the high gunwales of the gerrymandered district lines. When the House of Lords blocked three successive bills to add seats in Parliament, more and more rioters took to the streets and citizens’ committees began to talk about the least British subject of subjects: the revolution . The Birmingham Political Union boasted of two million citizens ready “to regain the liberty, happiness and prosperity of the country”.
The government – even the monarchy – seemed to be on the brink, unless a valve could be found to relieve the pressure. Historians have given this period the cinematic name of “May Days”. On May 10, 1832, the Whig Prime Minister Charles Gray, the 2nd Earl Gray, resigned after the failure of the third bill to expand Parliament and was replaced by Arthur Wellesley, the 1st Duke of Wellington, a famous deaf politician. . He reiterated his support for the status quo, and the commoners erupted. Plans of street barricades similar to the Paris Commune have been disseminated; reform activists prepared for combat and seizure of power. King William IV’s wife told her friends that she hoped she would behave like a lady when executed.
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