Page:History of the Radical Party in Parliament.djvu/152

 138 History of the Radical Party in Parliament. [1815- measures, and they began to speak once more, although in guarded terms, of the necessity for Parliamentary reform. They were beginning to learn that it was impossible for them to make any impression upon Parliament as then constituted. The ministers on their side did not hesitate to defy them. During the recess Earl Fitzwilliam had been dismissed from the office of Lord-Lieutenant of the West Riding of Yorkshire for having signed a requisition for, and attended, a reform meeting ; and in a debate on a motion for a committee in the House of Commons on the 3Oth of November, Castlereagh made a violent attack upon the whole body of the Whigs, which astonished as much as it annoyed them. They could not but be aware that to destroy the Tory supremacy some change must be made in the representative system, and, at the same time, that no change would be acceptable to the class in whose hands that system placed the power of government. Moderate reformers were as hateful as extensive ones to the men who would lose by any reform whatever. The obstacle thus formed could be broken down only by means of popular support, and for this none of the Whigs could compete with the Radicals, and many of them would have objected to making the attempt. Mr. Rush, the American minister, described the- situation in the statement that "the Whigs have lost their strong ground, the reformers having taken it from under them. They are a party of leaders with no rank and file ; accom- plished men, but as aristocratic as the Tories." * They were, in fact, still jealous of the Radicals ; still anxious to try if, by opening a kind of middle way, they could obtain a leader- ship which would not involve too rapid a march or too extensive operations. Further evidence on both these points was given during 4. An Act for the seizure and detention of arms (authorizing search by day or night). 5. An Act to subject certain publications to the duties of stamps upon news- papers, and to make other regulations for restraining the abuses arising from the publication of blasphemous and seditious libels. 6. An Act for more effectually preventing seditious meetings and assemblies.
 * " Residence at the Court of London," vol. i. p. 362,