Peel, Robert PM
ACHIEVEMENTS: Prime Minister of Britain. Set up first police force in Britain.
NICKNAME/ALIAS: Occasionally called Orange Peel
DATE AND PLACE OF BIRTH: February 5, 1788, Bury, England
DATE AND PLACE OF DEATH /AGE AT DEATH: July 2, 1850, London. Aged 62
DISCIPLINE: Statesman
FIELD: Politics
LANGUAGE: English
EDUCATION: Harrow School, England
MAJOR WORK: None
LIFE AND TIMES:
In 1800, Peel went to Harrow School , where contemporaries included the future poet Byron*. In I804, Peel went to live with his father in London, where he spent a lot of time at the House of Commons, where Pitt* and Charles Fox were among the luminaries. After Oxford, in 1809, when Peel was 21, his father bought him a Tory Parliamentary seat in Cashel, Tipperary, Ireland to which he was recommended for this seat by Arthur Wellsley (later Duke of Wellington*). It was a so-called "rotten" borough" with only 24 voters, and no election was held. In 1810, Peel was made Under-Secretary for War and the Colonies, responsible for organizing military operations against the French.
After Prime Minister Spenser Percival was murdered in 1812, Liverpool succeeded him and Peel became Chief Secretary for Ireland. Peel also was in charge of law and order. The Irish radical Daniel O'Connell was causing much unrest and had set up the Catholic Board to fight for political rights. It was O'Connell who first used the term "Orange Peel," a reference to Peel's Protestant religion. Peel eventually felt forced to suppress the Catholic Board and to establish the Royal Irish Constabulary.
At 31, in 1819, Peel brought to England a system of metallic currency, arguing that paper currency caused reductions in foreign exchanges and a rise in the price of gold, resulting in a depreciated currency. The Currency Act (known as Peel's Act) decreed that Britain should go back to the Gold Standard. This established what was to become the dominant financial wisdom of the Victorian age. From this time to the end of his life, Peel was associated with what came to be called "economic liberalism", the theory that giving business and industry more freedom to increase profits would improve the lot of all society.
1822, as Home Secretary Peel did significant work in the areas of law, prisons, trade unions and police. In his five-year tenure, he succeeded in bringing about the repeal of most laws that imposed extraordinary restrictions on liberty. In the area of trade unions, he fought for the reinstatement of the law that made them legal. Since 1799, when William Pitt had made unions illegal, followers of the philosopher Jeremy Bentham* had campaigned to reinstate them. Aware that law and order were a local matter in England , Peel set up committees to look at the need for police*. London, with a population 10 times that of any other English city, had special problems. In 1829, Peel's Metropolitan Police Act established new professional police commissioners for London, Britain's first professional preventive police force.
In the 1834 election, the Tories lost many seats, and Peel was made Prime Minister of a minority government. After a brief "100 days" he resigned because of a defeat in the House. But he also felt he lacked the support to carry out his plan to bring in Parliamentary reforms gradually.. He never gave up his view that the executive government should remain in the hands of an elite.
In 1834, Peel issued the Tamworth Manifesto, which pledged modest reform. The term "Conservative", rather than "Tory", was now gaining currency. In 1836, MP Sir John Welsh made a distinction between Conservatives and Tories, saying the Conservative party included all those who are attached to the constitution and who believe it is "threatened with subversion by the encroachments of democracy". In 1839, Queen Victoria* offered Peel the premiership but he refused.
In 1841, as Prime Minister of a majority government, Peel appointed Gladstone* his first government office, making him deputy to the President of the Board of Trade. Under Peel, in 1842, income taxes were introduced for the first time since 1816. In 1844, the Factory Act reduced hours of work in textile factories, but Peel was not in favor of the legislation, deploring the fact that such a measure would deprive textile owners of seven weeks' work per year.
In 1845, Peel's proposal to triple a grant to the Irish Roman Catholic seminary at Maynooth, where most Irish clergy were educated, caused great controversy and resulted in the resignation of William Gladstone. Peel was flabbergasted at the opposition, which also included Disraeli* .
In 1845, at the beginning of Irish Potato Famine, Peel committed cabinet to repeal of the Corn Laws. These laws protected corn-growers and kept the price of bread artificially high. The government said repeal was necessary because of the potato famine, but the true reason was that the high and inconsistent price of bread was causing unrest. An Anti-Corn Law League (a.k.a. the Free Trade Movement*), led by Cobden*, was formed, but Peel disapproved of it, seeing it as a threat to the established order.
Peel was an "intellectual convert" to free trade and a follower of Adam Smith*, the political theorist who published "The Wealth of Nations" in 1776. Smith maintained that economic growth depended on freedom from trade restrictions. In 1846 Peel was defeated over a bill and resigned. On June 29, 1850, while riding on Constitution Hill. Peel's horse threw him and he died.
ASSESSMENT: One of the most renowned Prime Ministers of the 19th century, and probably the most successful in terms of legislative achievement.
EXTRA CONNECTIONS: Knew Somerville*
A friend of Burbett-Coutts*
Airy convinced him to pull funding from Babbage's Engine.
ONELINER: Robert Peel, British Prime Minister who set up the police.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Eric J. Evans; Sir Robert Peel. Statesmanship, Power and Part; Routledge, London and New York, 1991.
Gash, Norman; Mr Secretary Peel; Longman, London and New York, 1985
PARENTS: Robert Peel, wealthy cotton manufacturer, MP, and baronet; and Ellen Yates, daughter of wealthy partner in cotton manufacturing
SIBLINGS: None of note
SPOUSE: Julia Floyd
CHILDREN: Robert, Frederick (Chief Railway Commissioner), William, Arthur
(Speaker House of Commons), two daughters, one son died in infancy