ABSTRACT
The Conservative Party entered the 1847 General Election in a divided state as a result of the Repeal of the Corn Laws. The Protectionists constituted approximately two-thirds of the party and the Peelites one-third. Peel offered his justification of recent events in an address at Tamworth which quickly became known as the ‘Tamworth Letter’.
Peel admitted that ‘the position in which I stand is, in some respects, a peculiar one’. He disclaimed any ambition to resume high office or to ‘that influence which is conferred by the lead and guidance of a great political party aspiring to power’.
He proceeded to review the achievements of his administration, first, in foreign affairs, where peace had been restored with the United States and France, and also in Church policy, where measures such as the Populous Parishes Act of 1843 were particularly noticed. The Act had allowed for the creation of more than 200 ecclesiastical districts and new parishes.
In respect of Ireland, Peel referenced the legislation which had been passed to ease sectarian divisions, including the Charitable Bequests Act of 1844 and the enhanced grant to the Roman Catholic seminary at Maynooth in 1845. The latter had divided the Conservative Party, but Peel maintained that there was ‘no new violation of religious principle’ in enhancing a settlement which had first been made by William Pitt the Younger in 1795.
Peel proceeded to a lengthy exploration of the financial and commercial policies of the government, including Income Tax, reduction of tariffs, and Repeal of the Corn Laws. It was because ‘the attempt to maintain those laws inviolate after their suspension would be impolitic … the struggle for their maintenance would assume a new character [and] no advantage to be gained by success could counterbalance the consequences of failure’ that he had proposed the Repeal of the Corn Laws.
Sir Robert Peel and his younger brother William Yates Peel (1789–1858) were returned as Tamworth’s two MPs at the General Election.
