Disraeli and Gladstone: Opposing Forces

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• 1. Mutual dislike
• 2. The duel begins
• 3. Face to face
• 4. The tide turns
• 5. Clashes of policy and personality
• 6. Find out more
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The tide turns

In 1874 the tide turned, and Disraeli - to his own surprise - won the first clear Conservative victory since Sir Robert Peel in 1841. He saw that the country had had enough constitutional reform. The English people, he said, would be 'idiotic' if they had not long perceived that the time had arrived 'when social and not political improvement is the object which they ought to pursue'. And his government passed a series of measures of that sort in the field of health, housing, sale of food and drugs, factory conditions and agricultural tenancies. They may not have been as important as later Conservative propagandists have claimed, but at least they showed that the party was not opposed to all changes and had a reformist side.

'What really mattered to Disraeli, however, was not home affairs but foreign and imperial policy.'

What really mattered to Disraeli, however, was not home affairs but foreign and imperial policy. He was a strong supporter of empire and of English nationalism. This was a traditional Conservative mantra, but as long as Palmerston was leader of the Liberals it was hardly possible for the Conservatives to outbid them in terms of patriotic self-assertion. Palmerston's death left a vacancy. Gladstone was altogether more internationally minded - the protagonist of an ethical foreign policy that sometimes meant compromise over some of Britain's interests. Disraeli was all for cutting a dash - as with his purchase of the Suez Canal Company's shares, and, though somewhat less enthusiastically, with the passing of the Royal Titles Act in 1876, making the Queen Empress of India.

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Published: 2001-06-01