One difficulty with a cross-class alliance made the Charter’s objectives more vulnerable to pressure from other preoccupations of the middle class. This affected the question of repeal of the Corn Laws. This issue had significant meaning in south east Lancashire where confidant factories and commercial bourgeoisie stood uncompromisingly for repeal but also saw a solution for their workforces demanding wage increases to meet the price of bread. Working Class Chartists were doubtful of these motivations and saw antagonistic employers. The Manchester Guardian, which spoke for the free trade interest was antagonistic of the Chartists. However, according to the Anti-Corn Law League meetings were interrupted by Chartist hecklers. There was little hope of a partnership but a sympathetic understanding did develop and Peel’s Corn Law Repeal in 1846 was approved by most Chartist spokesmen. (Charlton p. 52)
If the Chartists and Leaguers had united, then a middle class campaign with the threat of a working class pressure behind it, it might have persuaded Parliament to look at the Chartists seriously. If they had united after 1848 and if Lord John Russell and Benjamin Disraeli reopened the Reform issue in Parliament in the 1850s, the modification of the franchise had to wait twenty more years. The Chartists during the 1840s had no hope of a future success. (Royle p. 55) Rather than asking why the Chartists failed we should ask ourselves why they believed they could succeed and why they tolerated for so long to suffer so many setbacks. However, we also have to look at why Chartism failed, is it because of the leadership, the flawed leader being Feargus O’Connor.
Chartists aimed for one man one vote but this was not achieved until after the Second World War and their vision of Parliament who would be responsible to the whole people, was never achieved. Working men were carefully admitted into the electoral system between 1867 and 1919, but as more people were admitted the rules changed. The power of the non-parliamentary elements of government, civil service, the judiciary and other advisory organisations, were only accessible to those who had been educated within a system where the working class people were excluded. The first working men to enter Parliament went through the cordon sanitaire of Liberalism. These men were ‘safe’ men who showed reliability by cooperation with the Liberals in local politics or industrial negotiations. ‘The Chartists’ aim of a free, universal system of education, controlled by the communities in which children lived, also died with Chartism’. The post-Chartist years were regarded by a series of Factory Acts with educational provisions, similar by an increase in a network of ‘provided’ schools, offered by rival religious bodied which were supported by government grants in the 1870 Act after this school attendance became compulsory. The Chartists aim of an education system moved further away in the post-Chartist period and finally disappeared. (Thompson p. 335-336)
The most important gain in the Chartist period was the sphere of independent working class organisations; however, these had limited aims. The legal recognition of trade unions, the de facto recognition of apprenticeship regulation by the unions, wage bargaining and negotiation of other working conditions by some trades, were gained despite the resistance of employers and strong ideological opposition from powerful belief of the political economy. In a sense cooperative societies and friendly societies were also representative victories. By stopping to believe in the effectiveness of political change as the lever of social change and establisher of social justice, the working men lost unity of the Chartist period, the sense of interrelatedness of the demands from all sections of the propertyless and unrepresented. They believed in re-defining the nature of power and politics, acknowledging the division between ‘political’ and ‘industrial’ activity which the Chartists never recognised. The new divisions made advances of the ‘industrial’ sector which ensured some share for the workers in the industrial expansion of Victorian Britain. (Thompson p. 336-337)
Early foreign surveys show that Chartism failed. Hovell found the difference between its failure in the short term and its success in the long term, when all political and social purposes were achieved. Julius West, states that a more direct fulfilment for Chartism in the start of the class consciousness of the working men. ‘It achieved not the Six Points but a state of mind’. The failure of Chartism can only be seen when we look at its purpose and Chartism’s purpose was to obtain and pass the People’s Charter. This has often been left out by many historians as they see the Six Points as means to more important ends which are social and economic in character. Chartism’s form was political democracy and its content social democracy. The statement of J. R. Stephens that ‘universal suffrage was a knife and fork question’ has frequently been quoted in support of this view. However, he was not a reliable source as he was a Tory paternalist driven to rebellion by the success of Laissez Faire than he was a Chartist. Many of the Chartists believed in and valued enfranchisement not only because of the economic benefit but as an absolute right of man. Julian Harney and other leaders in the movement in East London believed themselves to be apostles of ‘that great philosopher and redeemer of mankind, the Immortal Thomas Paine’ they established the East London Democratic Association in 1837 and broadcasted its objective ‘ the achievement of a democratic and republican England-a natural society based on the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity’. The hungry people of the industrial North and Midlands attached more importance to the social and economic consequences which were a result from gaining the franchise than to manhood suffrage itself. The aspirations were too sectional and often too formulated to be seen as an economic programme of the whole movement supplementary to the Charter. Therefore, everyone agrees that the achievement of the Six Points was a crucial first step. (Mather, p. 26-27)
Chartism failed in its purpose on effecting an immediate transition to democracy they contributed to the slow evolution of the British constitution in a democratic direction. The Chartists campaign had encouraged a portion of the middle class in taking up franchise reform to win over the working class support in order to win against Toryism and aristocratic privilege. The Complete Suffrage movement of 1842 and the New Reform movement of 1848 were both linked to the Chartists. The Chartists learnt slowly that constitutional change could be brought about if they cooperated with the middle class radicals; the movement played a part in building up the pressure which produced the 1867 Reform Act. (Mather, p. 27-28)
Bibliography
D. Thompson, (1984) The Chartists, Hounslow: Maurice Temple Smith Ltd.
E. Royle, (1980) Chartism, London: Longman Group Limited.
F. C. Mather, (1965) Chartism, London: Cox & Wyman Ltd.
J. Charlton, (1997) The Chartists The First National Workers’ Movement, Chicago: Pluto Press.