Benjamin Disraeli - Political Advancement - 1868, 1874-1880
Hanna Arendt wrote : "Disraeli came from an entirely assimilated family; his father, an enlightened gentleman, baptized the son because he wanted him to have the opportunities of ordinary mortals. He had few connections with Jewish society and knew nothing of Jewish religion or customs. Jewishness, from the beginning, was a fact of origin which he was at liberty to embellish, unhindered by actual knowledge. The result was that somehow he looked at this fact much in the same way as a Gentile would have looked at it. He realized much more clearly than other Jews that being a Jew could be as much an opportunity as a handicap. And since, unlike his simple and modest father, he wanted nothing less than to become an ordinary mortal and nothing more than "to distinguish himself above all his contemporaries," - he began to shape his "olive complexion and coal-black eyes" until he with "the mighty dome of his forehead no Christian temple, to be sure (was) unlike any hving creature one has met." He knew instinctively that everything depended upon the "division between him and mere mortals," upon an accentuation of his lucky "strangeness."
"All this demonstrates a unique understanding of society and its rules. Significantly, it was Disraeli who said, "What is a crime among the multitude is only a vice among the few". Perhaps the most profound insight into the very principle by which the slow and insidious decline of nineteenth- century society into the depth of mob and underworld morality took place. Since he knew this rule, he knew also that Jews would have no better chances anywhere than in circles which pretended to be exclusive and to discriminate against them; for inasmuch as these circles of the few, together with the multitude, thought of Jewishness as a crime, this "crime" could be transformed at any moment into an attractive "vice." Disraeli's display of exoticism, strangeness, mysteriousness, magic, and power drawn from secret sources, was aimed correctly at this disposition in society. And it was his virtuosity at the social game which made him choose the Conservative Party, won him a seat in Parliament, the post of Prime Minister, and, last but not least, the lasting admiration of society and the friendship of a Queen. One of the reasons for his success was the sincerity of his play."
Disraeli entered the political arena as candidate for High Wycombe in 1832, he was nominated by a Tory and seconded by a Radical—in vain; and vain were two subsequent attempts in the autumn of 1832 and in 1834. In the first he was recommended to the electors by Daniel O'Connell and the Radical Hume. In his last candidature at Wycombe he stood on more independent ground, commending himself by a series of speeches which fully displayed his quality. He was "thought of" for various boroughs, Marylcbone among the number, but his democratic Toryism seems to have stood in his way in some places and his inborn dislike of Radicalism in others. It was an impracticable situation — no getting on from it; and so, at Lyndhurst's persuasion, as he afterwards acknowledged, he determined to side with the Tories. Accordingly, when in the spring of 1835 a vacancy occurred at Taunton, Disraeli contested the seat in the Tory interest with Carlton Club support. Here again he failed, but with enhanced reputation as a fighting politician.
A more mature Disraeli in the general election of 1837 was returned for Maidstone as the colleague of his providential friend Mr Wyndham Lewis. Though the fortunes of the Tory party were fast reviving under Peel's guidance, the victory was denied him on this occasion; but, for once, the return of the Whigs to power was no great disappointment for the junior member for Maidstone. To gain a footing in the House of Commons was all that his confident spirit ever asked, and he succeeded only just in time to avert financial ruin. His electioneering ventures, the friendly backing of bills, and his own expense in keeping up appearances, had loaded him with debt. He had gone frankly to the professional money-lenders, who made advances to him in a speculation on his success ": they were to get their money back with large interest or lose it altogether. Such conditions were themselves incitement enough to a prompt redemption of the promise of parliamentary distinction, even without the restless spurring of ambition.
His books and speeches up to this time and a little beyond, are quite enough to show what Disraeli's Tory democracy meant, how truly national was its aim, and how exclusive of partisanship for the "landed interest"; though he did believe the stability and prosperity of the agricultural class a national interest of the first order, not on economic grounds alone or even chiefly.
The pecuniary need of office were lightened, if not extinguished, by his marriage with Mrs Wyndham Lewis. Mrs Lewis — a lady fifteen years his senior — brought him a considerable fortune which, however, was but for her life. She lived to a great age, and would gladly have lived longer, in any of the afflictions that time brings on, to continue her mere money-worth to her "Dizzy." Her devotion to him, and his devotion to her, is the whole known story of their private life; and it may believed that nothing ever gratified him more than offering her a coronet from Mr Disraeli.
In the parliament of 1841 he was member for Shrewsbury. In 1847 he was returned for Buckinghamshire, and never again had occasion to change his constituency. Up to this time his old debts still embarrassed him, but now his private and political fortunes changed together. Froude reports that he "received a large sum from a private hand for his Life of Lord George Bentinck" (published in 1852), while a Conservative millionaire took upon himself the debts to the usurers; the 3 % with which he was content being exchanged for the 10 % under which Disraeli had been staggering." In 1848 his father Isaac Disraeli died, leaving to his son Benjamin nearly the whole of his estate. This went to the purchase of Hughenden Manor — not, of course, a great property, but with so much of the pleasant and picturesque, of the dignified also, as quite to explain what it was to the affectionate fancy of its lord.
The first three years of Disraeli's leadership in Opposition were skilfully employed in reconstructing the shattered Tory party. In doing this he made it sufficiently clear that there could be no sudden return to Protectionist principles. At the same time, however, he insisted (as he did from first to last) on the enormous importance to the country, to the character of its people no less than to its material welfare, of agricultural contentment and prosperity; and he also obtained a more general recognition of the fact that "the land" had borne fiscal burdens under the old regime which were unfair and unendurable under the new.
In 1848 and the three following years, Queen Victoria's dislike of Palmerston's foreign policy steadily increased, but in December 1851, his wholly unwarranted approval of the coup d'etat in France caused Lord John Russell to remove him from office. During the period of the no-popery outcry which followed the reestablishment of Roman Catholic bishoprics in England in 1850, the queen steadily discountenanced Protestant bigotry. Lord John Russell was defeated in 1832, and Lord Derby formed a new ministry with Disraeli as chancellor of the exchequer and leader of the lower House. After a reign of ten months he was again in Opposition, and remained so for seven years.
Of the Crimean War he had a better judgment than those whose weakness led them into it, and he could tell them the whole truth of the affair in twenty words: "You are going to war with an opponent who does not want to fight, and whom you are unwilling to encounter." Neither were they prepared; and the scandals and political disturbances that ensued revealed him as a party leader who could act on such occasions with a dignity, moderation and sagacity that served his country well, maintained the honor of party government and cost his friends nothing. The mismanagement of the war broke down the Aberdeen government in 1855, and then Disraeli had the mortification of seeing a fortunate chance of return to office lost by the timidity and distrust of his chief, Lord Derby — the distrust too clearly including the undervaluation of Disraeli himself.
The government in which Disraeli was again financial minister lasted for less than eighteen months (1858-1859), and then ensued another seven years in the cold and yet colder shade of Opposition. Both of these seven-year outings were bad, but the second by far the worse. Parliamentary reform had become a burning question and an embarrassing one for the Tory party. An enormous increase of business, consequent upon the use of steam machinery and free-trade openings to commerce, filled the land with prosperity, and discredited all statesmanship but that which steered by the star over Manchester. Gladstone's budgets, made possible by this prosperity, were so many triumphs for Liberalism. Foreign questions arose which strongly excited English feeling — the arrangements of peace with Russia, Italian struggles for freedom, an American quarrel, the " Arrow " affair and the Chinese war, the affair of the French colonels and the Conspiracy Bill; and as they arose Palmerston gathered into his own sails (except on the last occasion) every wind of popular favour. Amid all this the Tory fortunes sank rapidly.
The prejudice against Disraeli as Jew, the revolt at his theatricalisms, the distrust of him as "mystery man," which up to this time had never died out even among men who were his nearest colleagues, were now more openly indulged. Out of doors he had a "bad press," in parliament he had some steady, enthusiastic friends, but more that were cold. Sometimes he was seen on the front Opposition bench for hours quite alone.
Though Lord Palmerston stumbled over his Foreign Conspiracy Bill in 1858, his popularity was little damaged, and it was in no hopeful spirit that the Tories took office again in that year. They were perilously weak in the House of Commons, and affairs abroad, in which they had small practice and no prestige, were alarming. Yet the new administration did very well till, after resettling the government of India, and recovering from a blunder committed by their Indian secretary, Lord Ellenborough, they must needs launch a Reform Bill to put that dangerous question out of controversial politics. The well-intended but fantastic measure brought in for the purpose was rejected. The country was appealed to, with good but insufficient results; and at the first meeting of the new parliament the Tories were turned out on a no-confidence vote moved by Lord Hartinglon. Foreign affairs supplied the motive: failure to preserve the peace of Europe at the time of the Italian war of independence.
Lord Palmerston now returned to Downing Street, and while he lived, Disraeli and his colleagues had to satisfy themselves with what was meant for useful criticism, though with small hope that it was so for their own service. A Polish insurrection, the Schleswig-Holstein question, a commercial treaty with France, the Civil War in America, gave Disraeli occasions for speech that was always forcible and often wiser than all could see at the time. He never doubted that England should be strictly neutral in the American quarrel when there was a strong feeling in favour of the South. All the while he would have gladly welcomed any just means of taking an animated course, for these were dull, dark days for the Conservatives as a parliamentary party. It was much more than a joke that Palmerston sheltered Conservative principles under the Liberal flag.
In October 1865 Lord Palmerston's rule, which had been characterized by six years of political inaction at home and by constant disturbance abroad, was terminated by his own death. The ministry was temporarily reconstructed under Lord Russell, Mr Gladstone as leader of the House of Commons; and the new minister at once decided to put an end to the period of internal stagnation, which had lasted so long, by the introduction of a new Reform Bill. Accordingly, in March 1866 Gladstone, who now led the House of Commons, introduced a measure, but the Commons showed little disposition to give the ministry any effective support. The cabinet, recognizing from the division that the control of the House had passed out of its hands, resigned office, and the queen was compelled to entrust Lord Derby with the task of forming a new administration, with only a minority of the House of Commons to support him.
Earl Russell's defeat on the reform bill led to his resignation in 1866, and a Derby-Disraeli ministry came into power. Disraeli had the Queen's active support in carrying his reform bill, which was congenial to her Whig principles. This Conservative government, would be chiefly recollected for its remarkable concession to democratic principles by the passage of the Reform Act of 1867. Another Reform Bill, memorable for driving certain good Liberals into a Cave of Adullam, broke up the new government in a few months; Disraeli contributing to the result by the delivery of opinions not new to him and of lasting worth, though presently to be subordinated to arguments of an inferior order and much less characteristic. "At this rate," he said in 1866," you will have a parliament that will entirely lose its command over the executive, and it will meet with less consideration and possess less influence." Look for declining statesmanship, inferior aptitude, genius dying off. "Instead of these you will have a horde of selfish and obscure mediocrities, incapable of anything but mischief, and that mischief devised and regulated by the raging demagogue of the hour." The Reform legislation which promised these results in 1866 was thrown out. Lord Derby's third administration was then formed in the summer of the same year, and for the third time there was a Tory government on sufferance.
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