Third Party (British political faction)

The Foxite Whigs had sat in opposition to the ministry of William Pitt since falling from power in 1783. The faction's unity was maintained by the personal affection of many of its members to the faction's leader Charles James Fox and its figurehead the Duke of Portland, opposition to Pitt, and a vague sense of shared Whiggish principles. By the late 1780s the faction was experiencing increasing personal and ideological divisions, exacerbated by frustrations over their failure to regain office in the Regency Crisis. By this time the Foxites had largely absorbed the small, moribund faction loyal to Lord North, whose conservatism and association with the American Revolutionary War left the Foxites suspicious of them, despite having co-operated since the start of Pitt's government.Frank O'Gorman, The Whig Party and the French Revolution (Macmillan, 1967), pp. 26.

Personal and political animosities were present among the faction's leading members. Portland, the faction's nominal leader and figurehead, held traditional conservative aristocratic Whig sentiments but was unprepared to threaten the party's unity and was unable to restrain younger and more radical elements in the faction. This pragmatic stance was shared by many of the faction's moderate-to-conservative MPs. Opinion within the Foxite faction ranged from radicals

through to conservative Whigs of the calibre of Burke. Fox, a political moderate at this time, was nevertheless increasingly influenced by the more liberal politics of Richard Brinsley Sheridan over the conservative Edmund Burke, who was increasingly isolated within the faction, with a small number of associates, namely William Windham and Lord Loughborough.Boyd Hilton, A Mad, Bad, and Dangerous People? England, 1783-1846 (Oxford University Press, 2006), pp. 62-3.

File:Portrait of Edmund Burke 128.jpg, whose writings and defection from the Foxite faction helped provoke his fellow conservative Whigs.]] The reaction of much of the nation to the Storming of the Bastille was, at least initially, supportive.Jennifer Mori, Britain in the Age of the French Revolution 1785-1820 (Routledge, 2000), p. 188. Fox in particular would become a strong supporter and apologist for the French Revolution. Burke would quickly turn against the Revolution which eventually resulted in the publication of his Reflections on the Revolution in France in 1790. Among Burke's aims in publishing his tract was to provoke his conservative colleagues into adopting a clear stance in opposition to the Revolution.F. P. Lock, Edmund Burke. Volume II: 1784–1797 (Oxford University Press, 2006), p. 259. While many conservative Whig MPs and peers privately agreed with Burke, they refused to publicly split from Fox. Fox's increasing support for the Revolution would drive a wedge between Burke and himself which culminated in Burke's public severing of political and personal ties with Fox during the debate on the Quebec Bill on 6 May 1791. Burke summarily adopted an independent stance, sitting apart from the Foxite opposition and the Pittite government, while advocating a hawkish position against France.

Burke persisted in his strategy of trying to split conservative Foxites from Fox with the publication of An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs in August 1791. This was again met without success.P. J. Marshall & Donald C. Bryant (ed), The Writings and Speeches of Edmund Burke, vol 4 (Oxford University Press, 2015), p. 6. Despite their refusal to budge, conservative Whigs were increasingly alarmed by events in France and the reception of their more liberal colleagues at home. Conservative Foxites supported the Royal Proclamation Against Seditious Writings and Publications, issued by George III with several prominent conservative Foxites being provided advanced copies by Pitt.Mark Philp (ed), The French Revolution and British Popular Politics (Cambridge University Press, 1991), p. 7. One conservative Whig, Loughborough was swayed to Burke's position and was later appointed Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain, a position he had long coveted.Eric J. Evans, The Forging of the Modern State: Early Industrial Britain, 1783-1870 (Routledge, 2001), p. 75. Further alarm was raised by the support of liberal Foxites such as Sheridan and Charles Grey for the reformist Society of the Friends of the People. The abolition of the French monarchy in September 1792 coupled with frustration over Portland's continued vacillation made a schism within the Foxite faction appear inevitable.

File:William Windham by Sir Thomas Lawrence.jpg, leader of the Third Party.]]

The execution of Louis XVI on 21 January 1793 provoked a considerable shift in political and popular opinion in Great Britain, which became decidedly anti-Revolutionary.Richard Brown, Church and State in Modern Britain 1700-1850 (Routledge, 1991), p. 136. This event in addition to the 1 February 1793 declaration of war by the French Republic finally provoked the conservative Whigs into action. By the end of February 1793 forty-five members of the Whig Club resigned their membership, placing the blame for their secession squarely at the feet of Fox and his sympathy for French Revolutionary principles. While the conservatives had seceded from the Foxite faction, they continued to hope for Portland to secede as well, yet the nominal leader of the Whigs refused follow this action. Their particular concern over France and Jacobinism prompted the nickname of 'Alarmists'.

The conservative Whigs first met at Windham's residence at 106 Pall Mall, where out of an expected turnout of 50 Members of Parliament, a mere 21 were in attendance. Ultimately membership of the faction would number 38 MPs, of which only 26 were former Foxites, with the remaining 12 varying shades of Independent MPs.O'Gorman, Whig Party, p. 126. Windham proved a reluctant leader, hampered by lethargy and depression. He was finally roused to leadership with his spirited opposition to proposals for parliamentary reform by Charles Grey in May 1793. Under Windham the faction stubbornly adhered to a position of independence, dropping systematic opposition to Pitt while remaining independent of the ministry. Pitt, desiring to split apart the Foxite opposition, had taken to offering ministerial or diplomatic offices to several of the conservative Whigs. Opinions within the Third Party differed over the correct approach to these overtures from Pitt. Some, like Loughborough and Sir Gilbert Elliot, accepted government offices over the course of 1793 as individuals, while Windham insisted on continuing to maintain political independence and to bargain as collective.

The Third Party was ideologically conservative and functioned as the most right-wing grouping in the House of Commons. Its members were unified in their opposition to French republican and Jacobin politics and were all influenced by the political outlook of Burke. While supportive of the prosecution of the war, the Alarmists supported counter-revolutionary efforts in France, the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy, and were among the most sympathetic to the cause of the émigré refugees.Hilton, Mad, Bad, and Dangerous, pp. 67-8. Most prominent Alarmists were opposed to parliamentary reform and supported anti-seditious and coercive legislation proposed by the Pitt government.

The faction functioned much like a ginger group, motivated by a desire to convince Portland to join them in secession from Fox, which would in turn convince a considerable number of remaining moderate Foxites Whigs, who were personally loyal to Portland, to defect from Fox.{{cite web|url=https://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/research/parliaments/parliaments-1790-1820|title=Parliaments, 1790-1820, Parliament in the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, History of Parliament Online|accessdate=28 December 2024}} While supporting the prosecution of the war, Portland was reluctant to engage in any action that would strengthen Pitt.Max Skjönsberg, The Persistence of Party: Ideas of Harmonious Discord in Eighteenth-Century Britain (Cambridge University Press, 2021), p. 301-2. Events would conspire against the continued unity of the Foxite faction.

The execution of Marie Antoinette in October 1793, followed by the fall of the British-backed Royalists in Toulon, and a perception of Fox's increasing radicalism, would all gradually convince Portland of the futility of his position. On 20 January 1794 Portland would formally secede from the Foxite faction and formally adopted the independent line championed by the Third Party.David Wilkinson, The Duke of Portland: Politics and Party in the Age of George III (Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), pp. 104-5. In total 51 Portlandite Whigs would defect with Portland from the Foxite faction, leaving around 66 MPs still loyal to Fox.Emma Vincent Macleod, A War of Ideas British Attitudes to the Wars Against Revolutionary France, 1792-1802 (Ashgate, 1998), p. 95. The Third Party, having acted as a ginger group, quickly merged with the Portlandite Whigs, who nevertheless adopted the independent line that Windham had championed for much of 1793. Ultimately this position of negotiating with the Pitt ministry as a faction rather than as individuals would culminate in the formation of the Pitt-Portland Coalition in July 1794, with various conservative Whigs, including Portland, Windham, and the Earl Fitzwilliam entering cabinet as full coalition members.

The membership of the party, as it stood on its formation in February 1793 was recorded in several lists compiled by Windham, Lord Sheffield, and those who publicly seceded from the Whig Club in spring 1793. Most MPs appeared on at least two of these lists, though there was some disagreement between them, with at least two non-MPs included on each of the lists.O'Gorman, Whig Party, pp. 250-1.David Wilkinson, 'The Pitt–Portland Coalition of 1794 and the Origins of the 'Tory' Party', History, (vol 83, 1998), p. 253. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/24423878 in JSTOR] Nevertheless, a hardcore of around 38 MPs were acknowledged to have formed the new faction. The members of the faction were:

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• Ehrman, John, The Younger Pitt. The Reluctant Transition (Constable, 1983).
• Evans, Eric J., The Forging of the Modern State: Early Industrial Britain, 1783-1870 (Routledge, 2001).
• Lock, F. P., Edmund Burke. Volume II: 1784–1797 (Oxford University Press, 2006).
• Mitchell, Leslie, Charles James Fox (Oxford University Press, 1992).
• Mitchell, Leslie, Charles James Fox and the disintegration of the Whig Party, 1782-1794 (Oxford University Press, 1971).
• Mori, Jennifer, Britain in the Age of the French Revolution 1785-1820 (Routledge, 2000).
• O'Gorman, Frank, The Whig Party and the French Revolution (Macmillan, 1967).
• Philp, Mark (ed), The French Revolution and British Popular Politics (Cambridge University Press, 1991).
• Skjönsberg, Max, The Persistence of Party: Ideas of Harmonious Discord in Eighteenth-Century Britain (Cambridge University Press, 2021).
• Wilkinson, David 'The Pitt–Portland Coalition of 1794 and the Origins of the 'Tory' Party', History, (vol 83, 1998), pp. 249-64. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/24423878 in JSTOR]

Category:Whigs (British political party)

Category:Politics of the Kingdom of Great Britain