Methods
Unlike some other radical political organisations of the period, the Birmingham Political Union used mainly law-abiding, non-violent methods, and had a greater claim to be a 'respectable' movement than most such organisations. However, the organisation had a large membership, and the government of the time feared the consequences if it took up arms; during the Days of May in 1832, when 200,000 people attended a meeting of the Union, rumours that the Union would take up arms contributed to the pressure on the house of Lords to pass the 1832 Reform Act.
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Famous quotes containing the word methods:
“A writer who writes, “I am alone” ... can be considered rather comical. It is comical for a man to recognize his solitude by addressing a reader and by using methods that prevent the individual from being alone. The word alone is just as general as the word bread. To pronounce it is to summon to oneself the presence of everything the word excludes.”
—Maurice Blanchot (b. 1907)
“In inner-party politics, these methods lead, as we shall yet see, to this: the party organization substitutes itself for the party, the central committee substitutes itself for the organization, and, finally, a “dictator” substitutes himself for the central committee.”
—Leon Trotsky (1879–1940)
“The comparison between Coleridge and Johnson is obvious in so far as each held sway chiefly by the power of his tongue. The difference between their methods is so marked that it is tempting, but also unnecessary, to judge one to be inferior to the other. Johnson was robust, combative, and concrete; Coleridge was the opposite. The contrast was perhaps in his mind when he said of Johnson: “his bow-wow manner must have had a good deal to do with the effect produced.””
—Virginia Woolf (1882–1941)