What led to the reform of 1867?

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What led to the reform of 1867?

Roxanne Slevin

In 1865, Britain was in need of reform. There were two parties; the Whigs and the Tories, they were very biased towards the needs of the upper classes and often laisse-faire. At this time, Britain was at its height; it was the most powerful, wealthy and industrialised country in the world. It had the largest empire and Britain itself had a population of 30 million. The House of Lords had the most power, but the queen also dominated political scenes and chose each prime minister. There was no education for the poor, only a few voluntary schools that were run by religious groups and no public health system. In addition, only rich men and middle class were allowed to vote over the age of 21, this also meant that there were no rights for workers, and only open voting existed. All this created many factors that would inevitably lead to the reform in 1867, the question is was it social and economic or political factors that caused this change?

Perhaps the most important factors were the social and economic reasons. One instance was the American Civil War 1861-65. The war was over the slave trade; the Tories were divided between support for the slave trade (in the south, who owned most of the slaves) and the Tories for the abolishment of the slave trade (northern states). This was very important because abolishing slavery had a huge effect on the British cotton industry, as it was imported from America, so when the Northern states blocked their ports (caused by the war), British supplies of cotton were interrupted and therefore people would lose their jobs due to the decline in the industry.

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The war also links with the population increase. In 1865 there was 5 million more people than in 1832. These were mostly in the industrial towns. However, the growth from approximately 25 million people to 30 million people therefore had a big impact on the reforms, especially within the cotton market, as there are more people, there are more jobs needed and so the cotton industry is vital.

The population increase also links in with the factor of trade unions. This is because the more people needed to work, the more people joined. By the 1860s, trade unions were ...

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