ABSTRACT
the whig cabinet formed in 1830 represented a breadth of political opinion that accommodated the aristocratic whig ideals of Lord Grey at the one extreme and the radicalism of Lord Durham at the other. United on the issue of parliamentary reform, the cabinet was often divided over other matters, and it was an open disagreement between the prime minister and his colleagues over Irish problems that caused Grey to leave office in 1834. Two of the three men closely associated with formulating Irish policy were of conservative persuasion. The home secretary, Lord Melbourne, who had been chief secretary for Ireland in 1827–8, seems to have been both bored by the demands of Irish politics and angered by the endemic violence of the countryside. But his influence on Irish matters was less than that of his predecessor. The chief secretary, Edward Stanley, was made a member of the cabinet in 1831, and it was he who ‘represented’ Ireland in its meetings. Stanley, who as Lord Derby was to be three times prime minister, was a dominating figure in whig circles. His ‘latent toryism’, as manifested in his staunch defence of the established church and his support of coercive legislation to restore order in Ireland, caused trouble for Grey, hastened Stanley’s transfer to the colonial office in 1833, and has tended to obscure the fact that 203he was closely associated with a number of important but unspectacular Irish reforms. 1
