Premiership of William Gladstone - Third Government (1886)

Third Government (1886)

The general election in November/December 1885 saw the Liberals lose 33 seats but in January 1886 Salisbury resigned the premiership after losing a vote in the Commons and so Gladstone formed a government on 1 February. He turned to Ireland. The First Home Rule Bill was introduced to Parliament on 8 April and the Land Purchase Bill on 16 April. Joseph Chamberlain and George Otto Trevelyan resigned from the Cabinet when Gladstone told them that he intended to introduce the bills.

The Land Purchase Bill enabled landlords in Ireland—mostly Protestants—to sell their land to the their tenants who were to be financed by British loans funded by £120,000,000 secured on British credit at 3%. The price was set equal to 20 years' rent. The bill was a shock to Liberals and brought down Gladstone's government in a matter of months. Irish nationalist reaction was mixed, Unionist opinion was hostile, and the election addresses during the 1886 election revealed English radicals to be against the bill also. Among the Liberal rank and file, several Gladstonian candidates disowned the bill, reflecting fears at the constituency level that the interests of the working people were being sacrificed to finance a rescue operation for the landed elite. The Land Purchase Bill was criticised heavily from all sides and was dropped. The Home Rule Bill was defeated by 343 votes to 313, with 93 Liberals voting against. Thus nothing was accomplished except the permanent disruption of the Liberal Party.

Men who left the Liberal Party now formed the Liberal Unionist Party. Gladstone dissolved Parliament and called a general election which resulted in a Unionist (Conservative and Liberal Unionist) landslide victory under Salisbury.