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Parliament denounced it as far too complicated and benefiting only the professional classes. The bill was voted out at the second reading.

Benjamin Disraeli

BENJAMIN DISRAELI (1804-1881)

• First Earl of Beaconsfield
• The informally educated son of Isaac D'Israeli who suffered an inferiority complex and who was never quite accepted by the Establishment
• At first, Victoria could not stand him, but she came to trust him more than any other politician since Melbourne at the start of her reign
• Following Burke, Disraeli is seen as one of the important Tory models - Conservative was a contemporary term
• It is through his novels, that his political ideology was apparent, including his concept of One Nation, which survived him to the end of the 20th Century
• Led the Protectionists during the Corn Law crisis of 1845-1846 and was never forgiven by the Tory leadership of failing to support Peel
• Became Prime Minister in 1868 and again between 1874 and 1880
• It was said he won "peace with honour" in the Russo-Turkish war
• Very pro-Empire
• Bought a majority share of the Suez Canal for £4million
• In 1876 negotiated the addition of Empress of India to Queen Victoria's titles

Lionel Rothschild was the first practicing Jew to sit in Parliament. Disraeli had converted to Christianity.

EXTRACT FROM GLADSTONE'S SPEECH IN THE HOUSE IN SUPPORT OF THE TORIES
"I must frankly own it appears to me that to proceed far in the disfranchisement of small boroughs is a course injurious to the efficiency of the House of Commons.

"You must not consider this matter the question only of the electors. You must consider quite as much who are likely to be elected. And permit me to say that the time has come when, in the examination of any scheme of Reform, it is of vital and capital importance that this matter should be brought fully under the view of the House.

"Let me point out that the Reform Bill of eighteen thirty two has not, in this respect, been fairly and fully tried. For twenty seven years, it is true, it has been in operation, and it has communicated great vigour to the working of the legislative machine.

"For the first ten or fifteen years of that period the working of the Reformed Parliament has exhibited a union of power, circumspection, and sagacity such as it would be difficult to find an equal in the history of legislative assemblies. But look at the advantages which attended the first working of this change in our representation. It is true we had a new electoral system, but we had the old statesmen to work it.

"Well, I am no lover of small constituencies, and it was never my lot to sit for one. At the same time small constituencies undoubtedly tend to answer the great purpose of a representative system in securing its diversity and completeness.

"If you have nothing but large and populous bodies to return your Members of Parliament, there, as recent experience seems, I am sorry to say, in a great degree to prove, local interests and local influences will upon the whole prevail, and you will not find it possible to introduce adequately into this House the race of men By whom the Government of the country is to be carried on. By means of small boroughs, generally considered...you introduce into this House the representatives of separate interests, who stand apart from the great and the paramount interests of the country.

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1837	William IV dies Victoria becomes Queen
1838	The People's Charter is issued
1839	The Opium War breaks out
1840	Victoria marries Prince Albert
1841	Peel becomes Prime Minister
1842	The Opium War ends
1845	The Irish famine starts
1846	The corn laws are repealed Russell becomes Prime Minister
1848	Public Health Act
1851	The Great Exhibition Louis Napoleon seizes power in France
1854	The Crimean War breaks out Florence Nightingale arrives at Scutari
1855	Palmerston becomes Prime Minister
1856	The Treaty of Paris ends the Crimean War
1857	The Indian Mutiny breaks out
1858	The Crown takes over the government of India Derby becomes Prime Minister
1859	Palmerston becomes Prime Minister
1861	Prince Albert dies
1865	Palmerston dies Russell becomes Prime Minister