ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the National Reform Association (NRA), exploring the timing and aims of the campaign and its wider reception. Reform was temporarily submerged in the excitement of a Protectionist government. With an election looming, radical energies switched to the defence of free trade, and in the ensuing contest the abortive reform bill was almost forgotten. The chapter examines Lord John Russell's constitutional thought and his decision to reopen the 1832 settlement. Russell had first suggested a reform bill in 1849, when the threat from Palmerston was muted, and by 1851 he was looking to the Peelites for parliamentary support. The formation of a parliamentary committee was followed by a gathering of former officials of the Anti-Corn Law League in Manchester, which agreed to approach previous donors on behalf of a new reform campaign. The radicals argued that reform would stabilize the constitution. The European revolutions, Joseph Hume asserted, showed the dreadful risk of denying constitutional outlets for opinion.
