The Whigs were a political faction and then a political party in the Parliaments of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom. Between the 1680s and the 1850s, the Whigs contested power with their rivals, the Tories. The Whigs merged into the Liberal Party with the Peelites and Radicals in the 1850s. Many Whigs left the Liberal Party in 1886 to form the Liberal Unionist Party, which merged into the Conservative Party in 1912.
Sir Robert Peel, 2nd Baronet, was a British Conservative statesman who served twice as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, simultaneously serving as Chancellor of the Exchequer (1834–1835), and twice as Home Secretary. He is regarded as the father of modern British policing, owing to his founding of the Metropolitan Police Service. Peel was one of the founders of the modern Conservative Party.
The Representation of the People Act 1832 was an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom that introduced major changes to the electoral system of England and Wales. It abolished tiny districts, gave representation to cities, gave the vote to small landowners, tenant farmers, shopkeepers, householders who paid a yearly rental of £10 or more, and some lodgers. Only qualifying men were able to vote; the Act introduced the first explicit statutory bar to women voting by defining a voter as a male person.
Henry Peter Brougham, 1st Baron Brougham and Vaux, was a British statesman who became Lord High Chancellor and played a prominent role in passing the 1832 Reform Act and 1833 Slavery Abolition Act.
Edward George Geoffrey Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby,, known as Lord Stanley from 1834 to 1851, was a British statesman and Conservative politician who served three times as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. To date, he is the longest-serving leader of the Conservative Party. He is one of only four British prime ministers to have three or more separate periods in office. However, his ministries each lasted less than two years and totalled three years and 280 days. Derby introduced the state education system in Ireland, and reformed Parliament.
Frederick John Robinson, 1st Earl of Ripon,, styled The Honourable F. J. Robinson until 1827 and known between 1827 and 1833 as The Viscount Goderich, the name by which he is best known to history, was a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1827 to 1828.
Henry Bathurst, 2nd Earl Bathurst, known as The Lord Apsley from 1771 to 1775, was a British lawyer and politician. He was Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain from 1771 to 1778.
Catholic emancipation or Catholic relief was a process in the kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, and later the combined United Kingdom in the late 18th century and early 19th century, that involved reducing and removing many of the restrictions on Roman Catholics introduced by the Act of Uniformity, the Test Acts and the penal laws. Requirements to abjure (renounce) the temporal and spiritual authority of the pope and transubstantiation placed major burdens on Roman Catholics.
Charles Watkin Williams-Wynn PC was a British politician of the early- to mid-19th century. He held office in both Tory and Whig administrations and was Father of the House of Commons between 1847 and 1850.
The Leader of His Majesty's Most Loyal Opposition, more commonly referred to as the Leader of the Opposition, is the person who leads the Official Opposition in the United Kingdom. The position is seen as the shadow head of government of the United Kingdom.
Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby led the "Who? Who?" ministry, a short-lived British Conservative government which was in power for a matter of months in 1852. Lord Derby was Prime Minister and Benjamin Disraeli served as Chancellor of the Exchequer. It marked the first time the protectionist wing of the Conservative Party had taken office since the Corn Laws schism of 1846. It is also called the First Derby–Disraeli ministry.
The Whig government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland that began in November 1830 and ended in November 1834 consisted of two ministries: the Grey ministry and then the first Melbourne ministry.
The Fox–North coalition was a government in Great Britain that held office during 1783. As the name suggests, the ministry was a coalition of the groups supporting Charles James Fox and Lord North. The official head was William Cavendish-Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland, who took office on 2 April 1783.
Canningites were a faction of British Tories in the first decade of the 19th century through the 1820s who were led by George Canning. The Canningites were distinct within the Tory party because they favoured Catholic emancipation and free trade.
The Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829, also known as the Catholic Emancipation Act 1829, was passed by the Parliament of the United Kingdom in 1829. It was the culmination of the process of Catholic emancipation throughout the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
The 1830 United Kingdom general election was triggered by the death of King George IV and produced the first parliament of the reign of his successor, King William IV. Fought in the aftermath of the Swing Riots, it saw electoral reform become a major election issue. Polling took place in July and August and the Tories won a plurality over the Whigs, but division among Tory MPs allowed Earl Grey to form an effective government and take the question of electoral reform to the country the following year.
The Days of May was a period of significant social unrest and political tension in the United Kingdom in May 1832, after the Tories blocked the Third Reform Bill in the House of Lords, which aimed to extend parliamentary representation to the middle and working classes as well as the newly industrialised cities of the English Midlands and the North of England.
The Ultra-Tories were an Anglican faction of British and Irish politics that appeared in the 1820s in opposition to Catholic emancipation. The faction was later called the "extreme right-wing" of British and Irish politics.
The Canningites, led by George Canning and then the Viscount Goderich as First Lord of the Treasury, governed the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 1827 until 1828.
