Whiggery, religion and social reform: the case of Lord Morpeth

Abstract

M.P.s who supported the Grey, Melbourne, Russell and Palmerston governments were all described as ‘Liberals’ in contemporary registers such as those by Dod and McCalmont. However, historians have recently attempted to differentiate intellectually among these M.P.s, and in particular to sort out the liberals from the whigs. A difficulty here is that, in a period which was almost equally dominated by religious and ecclesiastical issues on the one hand and social and economic issues on the other, it appears that those politicians who were most ‘liberal’ in one context were least ‘liberal’ in the other. The subject of this article, Lord Morpeth, conformed to a type of ‘whig–liberal’ politician whose social policies were ‘whig’ rather than ‘liberal’, but who exemplified that tolerant approach to religious politics which has been termed ‘liberal Anglican’. It is possible to infer Morpeth's theological views from his many comments on sermons and devotional texts, and it appears that the best way to understand his religion (and its impact on his politics) is in terms, not of liberal Anglicanism, but of incarnationalism combined with a type of joyous pre-millenarianism (or jolly apocalypticism) not uncharacteristic of the mid nineteenth century. Reacting against the evangelical and high church revivals, yet sharing their piety and rectitude, Morpeth's incarnational religion represented an attempt to reconcile a theory of individual personality with ideas of community and brotherhood – to soften the ‘spiritual capitalism’ implied by ‘moderate’ Anglican evangelicalism, while retaining its emphasis on individual responsibility. Its secular equivalent was the type of ‘half-way’ social reform espoused by many whig-liberals in the third quarter of the century.

The Impact of Legislative Reform on Baptisms, Marriages and Burials 1836–52, with particular reference to London

“…66 Against the background of the resurgence of Chartism in 1848, a severe cholera outbreak precipitated the Public Health Act 1848, steered by the devout Anglican Viscount Morpeth, responsible for public health as chief commissioner for woods and forests. 67 It established a General Board of Health, with Chadwick and Lord Ashley, with their long-standing interests in public health and the burial problem, as commissioners, and Thomas Southwood Smith, a Unitarian minister, physician, Benthamite and close associate of Chadwick in public health reform, as medical commissioner. It was empowered to create local boards of health, which might provide mortuaries and arrange burials, and inspect and close burial grounds.…”

Geographies of Science and Religion: Catholics, the British Association and Repeal Agitation in Cork (1843)

“…To better understand why leading members were deeply concerned about a trip to Cork, it is useful to recall that liberal Anglicanism was the dominant creed of the BAAS's leadership in its early days. This creed linked politics and religionlargely liberal Whig tendencies and varieties of moderate Anglicanism -together (Hilton 1994). Frank Turner has defined the liberal Anglicanism, typical of the BAAS's leadership, as characterised by its support for the 'political and social status quo', Paleyean natural theology and, importantly, the 'avoidance of any connection of respectable science with political radicalism' (Turner 1993, pp.55-56).…”

Missionaries, Evangelical Identity, and the Religious Ecology of Early Nineteenth‐Century South Carolina and the British Caribbean

“…63 Parliament was hardly susceptible to the religion of the Dissenters; in fact, many prominent MPs, such as Fox, Holland, Grey, and Palmerston did not subscribe to any religion. 64 But imperial officials were susceptible to the protests of middle-class Dissenters. The outcry over the abuses that ensued when an aristocratic minority ruled over a dependent and poor majority rang true on both sides of the Atlantic; striking parallels were drawn between peasants and the aristocracy in Britain and the planters and slaves in the Caribbean.…”