and into a
dangerous rebellion. Few greater misfortunes have befallen party
government than the failure of the Whigs to form a ministry in 1845. Had
they done so the abolition of the Corn Laws would have been carried by
statesmen who were in some measure supported by the Free-trade party,
and not by statesmen who had obtained their power as the special
representatives of the agricultural interests.

Another case which in a party point of view was more successful, but
which should in my opinion be much more severely judged, was the Reform
Bill of 1867. The Conservative party, under the guidance of Mr.
Disraeli, defeated Mr. Gladstone's Reform Bill mainly on the ground that
it was an excessive step in the direction of Democracy. The victory
placed them in office, and they then declared that, as the question had
been raised, they must deal with it themselves. They introduced a bill
carrying the suffrage to a much lower point than that which the late
Government had proposed, but they surrounded it with a number of
provisions securing additional representation for particular classes and
interests which would have materially modified its democratic
character.

But for these safeguarding provisions the party would certainly not have
tolerated the introduction of such a measure, yet in the face of
opposition their leader dropped them one by one as of no capital
importance, and, by a leadership which was a masterpiece of unscrupulous
adroitness, succeeded in inducing his party to carry a measure far more
democratic than that which they had a few months before denounced and
defeated. It was argued that the question must be settled; that it must
be placed on a permanent and lasting basis; that it must no longer be
suffered to be a weapon in the hands of the Whigs, and that the Tory
Reform Bill, though it was acknowledged to be a 'leap in the dark,' had
at least the result of 'dishing the Whigs.' There is little doubt that
it was in accordance with the genuine convictions of Disraeli. He
belonged to a school of politics of which Bolingbroke, Carteret and
Shelburne, and, in some periods of his career, Chatham, were earlier
representatives who had no real sympathy with the preponderance of the
aristocratic element in the old Tory party, who had a decided
disposition to appeal frankly to democratic support, and who believed
that a strong executive resting on a broad democratic basis was the true
future of Toryism. He anticipated to