The dismissal of Melbourne allowed Peel to take over; although this ministry only lasted 100 days here had been a remarkable transformation in the fortunes of the party. He had shown courage, energy, firmness, and good temper in handling both his own party members and the oppositions. It had convince him to make the Tory Party more relevant to the changing society; he wanted to widen the electorate by appealing to the newly enfranchised urban middle classes, to rekindle the support that voted for Whigs and ensure everyone that they were not about opposing to change. He did all this by publishing the ‘Tamworth Manifesto’ in 1834, it proved to be a success and the catalyst for changing the Tory Party into the Conservatives as they had gained 100 seats in the election of 1835 and became the largest single party in the House of Commons. However some may argue that Peels motivation was not improve the conservative party but instead actually just trying to get them elected to improve the country.
He was also able to successfully broaden the base of the Tory party voters to include more middle class voters by accepting the reforms act which changed their issues; this is shown in the statistics of the number of conservative MPs rose between 1832 – 1841. but some may say that the Tory electorate did not widen to include the middle class as the statistics show that the most gain of votes were in the traditional Tory areas.
The transformation also brought the before broken party back together, the ultras were firmly behind Peel and so disappeared as a separate group. Therefore leading to victory in the 1841 elections and were able to secure a majority of 76 seats.
However, the defeat of the Whigs was not primarily due to the revival of the Conservative Party which had taken place under Robert Peel but is also because of the externals like the weakness of the Whigs.
One of the reasons behind the Whigs defeat was due to them being a party of reform and reaction. For example when the agricultural depression took place in 1830, the Swing disturbances were taking place throughout southern England led to severe legislations to punish them. This was also the case with many of the radical, working class people who were not satisfied with the reforms, like the Factory Act of 1833 which was optional and not imposed on therefore there were widespread demands for parliamentary reform. The Whigs acted quickly to repress the oppositions, culminating in the case of the Tolpuddle Martyrs who were sent to Australia for the trade union activity. The stamp duty also caused campaigns as many believed that putting up the prices of newspapers was a government devise for keeping information out of the hands of the working class. This lost the Whig a lot of supporters as it convinced many in the working class that the Whigs were ignoring their needs. It also showed that the Whigs were unable to control the radicals e.g. chartists; this was exploited by the Tories to their favour. But this is seen as weakness to an extent because at this time the Tory Party were also seen as a narrow minded party who did not appeal to the working class.
Another reason to why the Whigs were overcome was due to a dispute within the party. A long running battle between Edward Stanley, the Irish secretary and Lord John Russell over the direction of Irish policy caused four cabinet ministers to resign over the question of lay appropriation. This factor showed that the internal division caused the Whigs to gradually lose their majority in the House of Commons. This was a major draw back as it was used to the Tory’s advantage because the numbers of the Tory MPs rose drastically as over 30 MPs who had voted for reform crossed to the Tory benches. In addition showed Whigs did not have a strong leader to pull the together.
Melbourne and the Whigs had O’Connell’s Irish MPs and the radicals on their side to maintain the majority. This showed great weakness as it implied that they could not have done it on their own and they also had to compromise their polices to keep them on side e.g. the tax on churches and promising grants to Irish education. This was also the case with the close relation between Melbourne and Victoria which led to the ‘Bedchamber crisis’, when Melbourne decided to resign due to the majority being reduce however the queen refused to change any of the ladies of her bedchamber, who were all Whigs. This gave the Whigs two more years in power, this showed the failure of the Whigs and the only reason to an extra two years was due to the queen which resulted in the revival of the Chartists movement and hardship for the working class. This also allowed Peel to use this time to build up his control of the part and widen the electoral appeal.
Therefore in conclusion, the reason behind the conservative victory was not primarily due to the weakness of the Whigs but a combination of the strength of the Conservatives and the vulnerability of the Whigs. I believe the main reason to this conclusion is due to the fact that where ever the Whigs showed weakness, Peel had used this to his advantage for example, the bedchamber crisis where Peel had used this time constructively to reconstruct his party and gaining victory in 1841.
