“Palmerston’s Opium War”?: The 1832 Reform Act, its attendant domestic contexts and their influence on the outbreak of the First Opium War (1839-42)

By Samuel Jardine, 21 March 2020*

*Based upon an essay written for my MA Modern History at King’s College London; S. Jardine, ‘”Palmerston’s Opium War”?: The 1832 Reform Act, its attendant domestic contexts and their influence on the outbreak of the First Opium War (1839-42), (King’s College London, 2019), 1-12

Article Overview:

When looking at the causes of the First Opium War (1839-42) academics have tended to either apply the blame for the wars outbreak to Britain, doing so through a study of its foreign policy towards China that emphasizes economic or imperialist concerns, or to China, by looking specifically at its domestic situation and why the Qing Court would have benefited from war, and victory over the British. It is rare for either side of the argument to apply the latter’s focus to their own state of choice. This article will do just that by applying a domestic lens to Britain in the run-up to the First Opium War, in doing so it presents an entirely new set of further influencing and key factors as to why the war happened that challenges, enhances or re-orientates traditional interpretations.

The article argues that when a domestic lens is taken there indeed existed indecisiveness, contradiction and most of all complete inaction in British foreign policy towards China and particularly Chinese provocations, that sent mixed signals to the Qing Court and allowed the situation to spiral to a point where war was unavoidable and the pro-war pressure groups could no longer be ignored. This was to a large extent due to political upheaval domestically surrounding the 1832 Great Reform Act, whose enfranchisement of middle-class men fostered a series of weak governments who were unable to act with assertion abroad for fear of losing votes, influence and power at home. The attendant fear of further social upheaval, also stemming from the passing of the Act’s exclusion of working class men, and the potential for a wide-scale uprising over this added further impetus for the government to concentrate its political capital on the domestic sphere and ‘tread lightly’ abroad, with the result that too little attention was paid to the situation in China for fear of lighting the powder keg at home by taking a side among pro-China or pro-British lobby groups, whose support the government felt it needed to court lest it lose power. Inaction was thus the watchword of the day.  

This new context to the outbreak of the Opium War is by no means a definitive new interpretation, much further work is needed for it to become orthodox. But it highlights a new area of research for the ongoing debate about the causes of the First Opium War that challenges some current interpretations, while lending further support to others. It also contributes to the point that domestic and foreign policies are usually closely entwined, with one having a direct influence upon the other, despite which is currently in ascent politically. 

Introduction:

The fallout of the First Opium War (1839-42) continues to resonate strongly today, it informs the context for modern diplomatic faux pas[i] and provides as the Sino-historian Julie Lovett explains, the basis for nationalisms that espouse the wars injustice for China, and its imperial shame for Britain[ii]. It’s modern relevance for international relations means the war, its causes and the allocation of blame remains fertile ground for academic debate. Over the past few decades a variety of causes for the war have been argued the most common being;

• A clear policy of economic expansion by the British government.[iii]
• The prevalence of a racist imperialism in Britain.[iv]
• The private interests of influential British merchants.[v]
• The Chinese government’s fears of a stagnating economy and social unrest.[vi]

It is noticeable that while those who emphasize that the Chinese are at fault for the outbreak of war, such as Harry Gelber, make their argument based upon China’s domestic policy perspective to highlight how a successful war against Britain may have helped to alleviate its internal situation, those on the opposite side who emphasize Britain’s role for causing the conflict concentrate primarily on Britain’s own foreign policy- seeking to highlight why Britain was interested in China, be it due to innate imperialism, British international merchants wanting better terms or the British government hoping to improve its economic situation through foreign conquest in the richest area of Asia. 

There is thus a gap in the analysis, as neither side bases their argument in the policy sphere of the other. For instance, much of this debate over blame can be challenged, enhanced or reoriented if a similar domestic analysis is applied to Britain in this period as it is applied to China by those who wish to blame it.

This article seeks to do just that, to twist the tables and see what, if any, new insights can be gleaned to the causes of the Opium war if instead of simply concentrating on British foreign policy, we also look at Britain’s own domestic context and the pressures and challenges there that might have seen Britain and China be placed upon a trajectory towards conflict.  

The premise: Political and social unrest in the homeland causes inaction and indecisiveness abroad

When the domestic political and social events within Britain are examined one of the key longer-term causes of the Opium wars can be ascribed to the implementation of the 1832 Reform Act whose electoral reorganization and enfranchisement led to a decade of politically weak governance, which facilitated a foreign policy of inaction regarding China. This was exacerbated by the Act’s disappointingly limited scope of enfranchisement, which led to a potentially mass revolutionary movement in the form of the Chartists who had both a political and economic platform. This would severely constrain the Second Melbourne Ministry (1834-1841) in its ability to have too proactive a foreign policy, trapping the usually media-savvy Foreign Secretary Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston (1784-1865)[vii] into a waiting position in regard to China and the Opium trade as there was no political capital to be gained from the publicly contentious trafficking of Opium, and a government to lose if things went awry which an active policy would make more likely.

           This essay will explore this through two interlinking sections. The first will argue the case for a foreign policy of inaction regarding China and then will explore the domestic circumstances; political, social and economic dictating this. The second part will show how the 1832 Reform Act informed this inaction by creating the domestic context for a politically weak government, threatened by losing its majority and by violent social unrest throughout the 1830s. The historiography mentioned will be reexamined and others engaged with throughout this essay. The primary sources used will mainly be drawn from speeches in Hansard Parliamentary papers, Palmerston’s private correspondence, press articles from both Whig and Chartist supporting papers, and pamphlets from missionaries and opium traders seeking to influence public opinion on the subject of Opium and China.

           As well as its primary concern of the Opium war, this essay will also provide a case-study for the ongoing debate around the primacy of domestic or foreign affairs in shaping policy in Britain. The First Opium War is conspicuously absent from from W. Mulligan and B. Simms application of the German-inspired debate over foreign or domestic policies primacy to the British context. Its inclusion, as this essay will highlight, would both support their conclusion that the first half of the 1800s was primarily driven by domestic policy, while also challenging their underplaying of Britain’s domestic instability during this period as the reason for its domestic focus[viii]. It also offers a glimpse of one of Victorian Britain’s political titan’s uniquely not in control as far from ‘masterfully’ handling matters, [ix] the articles argument will show that in this crisis Palmerston was actually consistently on the back-foot.    

‘Have you considered masterly inactivity?’: Palmerston’s policy of inaction in China and its domestic drivers 

William Gladstone speaking in Parliament on 8 April 1840 had decried that the ongoing conflict with China had covered the country with ‘permanent disgrace’ due to its entirely ‘unjust’ nature and made no secret of who he blamed, [x] he labeled the entire fiasco as ‘Palmerston’s Opium War’[xi]. In doing so he threw the entire fault for this conflict right at the then Foreign Secretary Palmerston’s feet. It was a label taken up with gusto by the press as seen in a report on the London papers in 1841 stating the Morning Herald had used the term, though unlike Gladstone, the paper was not condemning Palmerston for waging an unjust war of naked-aggression, but for not actually being aggressive enough in his demands from China for its surrender.[xii] Palmerston though was quite used to being stuck in the middle, under fire from all sides of the Opium debate for being too imperialistic, or not aggressive enough, as will be shown. However, the irony here was that it was not a debate Palmerston, or the Whig government had wanted to be had at all. They had in fact tried to avoid the whole issue through a foreign policy of complete passivity in regard to China.

This runs counter to the theory Gallagher and Robinson in 1953 purported for British imperial expansion. They argued there was a coherent government foreign policy which advocated the aggressive use of force, which drove the creation of an informal liberal economic empire built on the back of British coercion and gunboat diplomacy. They used the Opium War with China as key example of this.[xiii] Palmerston indeed stated in 1841 to Lord Auckland that ‘It is the business of government to open… roads for the merchant’[xiv]. However, this was two years since the Opium War had begun. If Palmerston’s earlier 1830s position is examined a very different picture emerges.     

Sir Charles Elliot,[xv] received in a letter his orders from Palmerston, his direct superior in 1835 in which Palmerston specifically told him to do nothing that would interfere with the British merchants, or that would give ‘offense to the Chinese authorities’[xvi]. This was essentially a policy of passive inactivity as it meant both ignoring the fact that British citizens of whom he had jurisdiction over were illegally smuggling Opium into China, directly contravening the Qing Emperors law that forbade its sale in his realm,[xvii] as well as attempting to ignore the increasingly aggressive Chinese crack-downs on British merchants thought to be engaged in the trade which were ramped up with the appointment of the virulently anti-opium Special Imperial Commissioner Lin Zexu. Elliot was to do nothing that would change the current situation, despite both the increasing frustration of the Qing court that Britain’s government seemed to be aiding and abetting these smugglers by not exercising control over their own people and obeying Chinese law when in China, and the frustration of the British merchants, many of who did not deal in Opium, but were being subjected to increasingly harsh treatment by Qing officials while the British government who were supposed to protect their interests sat idly by.

Qing and British merchants were also equally agitated given that a year before Elliot’s predecessor, Lord Napier had attempted on his own authority to violently force China to open further trade ports and respect the rights of British merchants.[xviii] His defeat and early death was considered by some British merchants as a national humiliation,[xix] and had aggravated relations with the Qing court. However, Palmerston was neither interested in continuing his policy of trying to protect the rights of British merchants, nor in ‘avenging’ any humiliation the Chinese may have inflicted upon the British. He however also made no attempts to apologize to the Qing for the incident or try to pacify them, nor of course did Palmerston promote the defense of British merchants by sanctioning a continuance to Napiers far more aggressive policy towards China. There was thus no coherent policy in the 1830s to force China’s opening to British merchants and specifically opium, or protect the rights of British merchants, or for that matter to seriously reconcile with the Chinese government, as despite Palmerston’s support as a Whig for free trade he was also a political pragmatist for Britain’s interests at home and abroad.[xx]

Painting attributed to a contemporary Chinese artist in 1839, it portrays Commissioner Lin ordering the destruction of British opium at Humen.

           This pragmatism was also shared by the upper echelons of the Whig party. It was not fostered by a lack of interest in China as Elliot mused about his superiors in a letter to his sister in 1837, going so far as to state Palmerston himself neither ’knows nor thinks anything about the matter [China]’[xxi]. Elliot’s belief was fostered by the downgrading of the government’s presence in China in 1836, with a reduction in staff, as well as Elliot’s salary being cut in half,[xxii] little wonder perhaps at his attitude. However, Palmerston justified the cuts as ‘rationalizations’,[xxiii] which was a key part of the Whig’s election platform in the 1830s where they touted a policy of retrenchment regarding British finances,[xxiv] not a specific lack of interest in China. Indeed, opium revenues from Asia remained integral to the British exchequer as shown by an 1831 Parliamentary committee into the matter finding it was too valuable a trade to give up.[xxv] This was perhaps because government revenues from the opium trade were incredibly low-cost to collect. Over a period of ten years opium taxes were ten times cheaper to collect than Salt taxes.[xxvi] This kept with the Whigs commitment to retrenchment and in the context of a British economic downturn brought about by the 1825-6 bank crash which saw widespread bankruptcies,[xxvii] was an important budgetary alleviator. Especially in being one of the few sources of efficient funding to directly or indirectly help service the large Napoleonic war-debt which was taking more than 10% of GDP in 1831,[xxviii] compared with a mere 4% for 1831’s entire defense budget.[xxix]

           Thus, there was a clear reason for British national interest in China and the opium trade for Palmerston and the Whig government. However, a pro-active foreign policy here that would protect the British merchants who partook in the trade and promote their interests was impossible due to the publicly contentious nature of the opium trade. Palmerston who was well known for courting public opinion, as he made clear in a Parliamentary speech in 1829 when he declared that there was no power in politics without ‘public opinion’,[xxx] was sensitive to the fact that electoral groups the Whig’s professed to represent such as middle-class reformers and free-trading merchants held divided opinions on the opium trade. Many reformers strongly opposed the trade as is epitomized by Reverend Thelwall’s 1839 thesis, published just prior to war, in which he argues the benefits of free-trade for Britain are lost so long as British opium merchants are ‘poisoning’ the Chinese people.[xxxi] While Thelwall adopts a clear religious emphasis in his attack on the opium trade with the chastisement that it brings ‘disgrace’ upon the Christian name.[xxxii]

Thelwall also makes free trade the crux of his argument. He extolls how the opium trade undermines and endangers the concept and positives of free trade with the British empire, as it presents the Chinese with a ‘grasping and selfish’ interpretation of the British, as opposed to them as true and honourable free traders[xxxiii]. He clearly thus falls into the Whigs and Palmerston’s intended electoral audience through his particular advocacy of free trade, and indeed is a popular enough commentator that his work is even being supported by the politically ‘neutral’ paper,[xxxiv] Morning advertiser. [xxxv] The fact then that key elements of the Whigs core voters, who have a far-reaching public platform are against the trade, and moreover that their opinions are popular enough in Britain to be printed even in papers which are bi-partisan highlights the political dangers for the Whigs in taking a stance in favour of supporting British opium merchants, and thus protecting their revenues, despite the importance of those finances to the budget. 

The growing consumption of opium in China (which British merchants tapped into and helped increase) presented the Qing court with a growing crisis. It not only drained the states silver as large quantities flowed out of China to foreign powers in return for the drug, but also by 1838 there was around 12 million Chinese addicted to Opium and the numbers were growing.[i] Image drawn by Thomas Allom, ‘Chinese Opium Smokers c.1858’, The Chinese Empire Illustrated, 1 (1858), 23.

[i] W.T. Hanes and F. Sanello, Opium Wars: the addiction of one empire and the corruption of another (Sourcebook Inc., 2002), 34 

           In opposition to these anti-opium groups were the opium merchants themselves. These merchants were also a key electoral block that the Whigs needed to court and keep onside as they naturally had an affinity to the Whiggish support for, and push of, free trade, it was the policy that made their accumulation of wealth if not possible, at least was responsible for new avenues and opportunities to gain wealth in global marks. Two of the foremost opium merchants, William Jardine and James Matheson, consistently lobbied parliament and the public throughout this period for a tougher stance on China to both protect British merchants’ rights as well as push for ever-greater access to Chinese markets. In 1836 Matheson published a book that advocated publicly for the British government to take a more aggressive and hardline stance with China over the opium trade, in which he studiously ignored references to that very opium trade,[xxxvi] instead equating his position to supporting the ‘noble and persevering enterprise’ of free trade, [xxxvii] while stereotyping the Chinese as characterized by ‘imbecility, avarice, conceit and obstinacy’.[xxxviii] He thus painted a picture where British merchants looked simply to extend the benefit of free trade to help and ‘civilize’ the Chinese, a very different picture to the one that Thelwall painted. In this endeavor Matheson argued, the British state would be key to essentially save the Chinese from themselves through the power of free trade. Nowhere was it mentioned that this was in reality subtle lobbying for the government to give official and open sanction to the opium trade and protect those smuggling it into China from the Chinese state, who were portrayed as barbarians who did not know better. Both sides then of this debate opium merchants, and middle-class reformers, were key to the Whigs electoral chances of getting into and staying in power, and both utilized and appealed to the economic benefits of free trade to justify their cause, the very thing that was one of the guiding economic principals of the Whigs during this era,[xxxix] one that set them apart from their Tory rivals who leaned more towards protectionism until 1846.[xl] Free trade was thus being weaponized by both sides of the Whigs key electoral groups, leaving the Whigs stranded in the middle and potentially damned if they do, damned if they don’t. In this domestic context a policy of inaction seems entirely pragmatic to attempt to ignore the issue for as long as possible, and thus hope to mitigate any electoral fallout there may be for as long as can be, and perhaps even hope that it might disappear as an issue altogether.

 Within Matheson’s book we also find one of the core premises for Christine Su’s argument that there was an ethnocentrically informed derision of the Chinese within Britain’s establishment that caused the Opium war. [xli] However as noted domestically, the policy of inaction by the Whig government, as well as the existence of substantial opposition to the opium trade and any hostility to China, an opposition that was important to the Whigs electoral success as well, shows this was not such a pervasive mindset as Su imagined. The governments passivity also complicates Chen’s argument that a ‘war party’ of British merchants forced the war, [xlii] as over the longer-term Palmerston ignored the persistent pro-opium merchant lobbying for as long as feasibly possible, taking no action even against perceived Chinese ‘insults’ to the British nation such as the defeat of Lord Napier. However, this inactivity which ignored and sought to sideline both camps in an attempt to avoid controversy, would eventually bring things to a boiling point with both the Chinese and with the pro-opium British merchants as the longer a stance was put off, the further encouraged the Chinese would be that Britain was both complicit in the opium trade, and too weak compared to Qing China to resist Chinese actions, Napier’s failed attack no doubt adding to this image. It also meant that pro-opium British merchants were left with tacit state approval of their actions and were not reigned in, they would thus continue to smuggle opium in ever greater quantities while also campaigning further in Britain to build up public support for a more aggressive policy towards China. Through this the Whig government by not stepping in earlier due to their policy of inactivity limited how they could properly respond to the Chinese when the impending tensions finally flared. This ironically was something Elliot rightly predicted and indeed warned the government of in 1836, a full three years prior to the outbreak of the Opium war, that its current ignoring of the China situation would see ‘any choice but armed interference, impossible’. [xliii] Palmerston ignored this claim and continued on with the Whiggish policy of masterly inactivity.

More voters, more problems: The political instability created by the 1832 Reform Act

The Whigs and their need to not rock the boat among key segments of their electoral base is not alone a solid enough reason to justify a policy of inaction regarding a controversial subject though. Indeed in 1833 the Whig party would be the ones to take decisive action and pass through the slavery abolition act, despite their being opposition from wealthy and influential merchants such as the West India Lobby who courted both Tories and Whigs.[xliv] That was different however in a very specific regard, the 1832 General election had given the Whigs a sizeable majority of 266 over the Tories.[xlv] They could thus very comfortably afford to expend political capital and alienate elements of the electorate that might have lent them support otherwise, without fear of being cast from power either now, or at the next election. However, in 1837 the Whig majority had shrunk to only 24,[xlvi] and it was unstable at that.

In these circumstances a publicly contentious issue such as opium, which would usually not affect foreign policy decisions, especially when there was a clear national economic interest at stake due the government being able to successfully swallow the criticism electorally, was suddenly an issue that could spell the collapse and end of the Whig government. Thus with Palmerston being a political pragmatist, aware of the importance of the opium trade to state finances, but also aware that this controversial issue could very well see the Whigs collapse both in parliament with backbench Whig MP’s split on the issue, as well as be cast out of office electorally by splitting the parties electoral base, took the decision to try and sideline the issue completely by ignoring it.

           The unstable foundation of this Whig government was entirely due to the radical changes brought about by the 1832 Reform Act. This constitutional reform had created a true two-party, partisan parliamentary system where grassroots voters took note of party stances at national level. [xlvii] This change meant that a government could no longer as effectively rely on Royal support to prop up their administrations as had been the case earlier, [xlviii] but had to take note of public opinion as MP’s would be hesitant to move too far away from their elector’s beliefs. This meant that the contentious nature of opium among Whig supporters would translate into an issue that might well have split the party.

           The 1832 Reform Act’s ‘Chandos Clause’ would further foster Whig political weakness. It was an amendment, proposed by Tory MP Lord Chandos to extend the franchise to agrarian tenants. He argued successfully that if the vote was to be given to urban households paying a yearly rental of ￡10, then it should be surely extended to farmers renting land for ￡50 annually.[xlix] These voters though could be coerced by their landlords who typically were agricultural landowners who voted Tory. [l] The evidence for this is seen in a later 1840 parliamentary debate, where it is noted by a Tory MP, that reports of Tory coercion had been ‘exaggerated’,[li] instead of simply denying that coercion took place at all. Indeed, it had been the Tories who had been most resistant to any electoral reform prior to 1832 as a significant proportion of their MP’s came from rotten boroughs, which they argued provided stability for Britain’s political system.[lii] The Chandos Clause was essentially premised around the hope of maintaining this stability, as instead of corrupt rotten boroughs, it would ensure a sympathetic or even manipulated voting group who would continue to vote for the Tories, this had the effect indeed of switching some traditional Whig constituencies over to the Tories. So ironically overall the acts effect consistently chipped away support not for the Tories, but instead for the Whigs themselves seen in the elections over this period where they achieved an ever-dwindling majority.[liii] In 1832 what had been 226 was by 1837 a mere 24 seats. [liv]

The 1832 Reform Act did significantly tackle electoral corruption. It ended 57 rotten boroughs such as the one displayed above in an 1829 painting by John Constable of Old Sarum Hill in Wiltshire. The Hill was completely uninhabited, but until 1832 somehow elected two MP’s every election. The rotten boroughs were disenfranchised, and new northern constituencies replaced them. 

           These 24 seats were not even entirely secure though as the Whigs throughout the 1830s were reliant on Radical MP’s for support. The reform act had increased representation for new northern industrial areas which tended to vote in Radicals.[lv] These MP’s aggressively supported free trade and an increased enfranchisement to eliminate political and economic monopolies.[lvi] They naturally felt the 1832 Reform Act had not gone far enough and that the Whigs conservatism at home, made clear in Queen Victoria’s 20 November 1837 address to the Commons, where further reform was conspicuously absent, [lvii] was a betrayal. This attitude is highlighted by the Radical MP Thomas Wakely who vocally highlighted this for the Whigs, as well as indirectly threatened the withdrawal of Radical support from the Whig government.[lviii] However, with the anti-reform Tory’s growing electoral support since the 1832 Reform Act it was difficult for the Whigs to satisfy their Radical partners appetite for reform while continuing to scrape into power. It was in this context with an eye to the situation in the Commons that the Prime Minister Lord Melbourne told Palmerston in 1836 to ‘be very careful’ in Foreign affairs.[lix] This was a clear endorsement for inaction in foreign policy due to the tenuous domestic political situation the Whigs found themselves in.

A very British revolution? How the Chartists constrained the government over China

The Whigs and Palmerston’s attempts to portray Britain as needing no further constitutional reforms beyond the 1832 Reform Act upset more than much needed parliamentary allies. [lx] It, alongside general working-class disappointment with the limited scope of the Reform Act coalesced into the 1836 Chartist movement. [lxi] This was a mass movement whose 1838 petition had 1.28 million signatures, a huge number of people bearing in mind that later in 1851 there were only around 27 million people living in the entirety of Britain and Ireland.[lxii] The signatories demanded universal male suffrage without property qualifications,[lxiii] issues that the 1832 Reform Act had severely disappointed them in, so much so that there were sporadic outbreaks of fairly vicious violence in this period caused by the Chartists all over the country who actively advocated intimidation and ‘physical force’ as a means to achieve their aim of enfranchisement.[lxiv]

Chartism, and its attendant violence, was perceived as being potentially revolutionary by the British establishment. This can be seen vividly in an article in the Morning Chronicle on the 8 November 1839, in which the writer compared one of the Chartist leaders as a ‘would be despot’ who presided over ‘lawless brigandism’. [lxv] To provide evidence to this claim, the paper claimed that some Chartists had actually been overheard planning a violent revolution. [lxvi] Whether this is true or not, it highlights the fears being disseminated around the country regarding this potential outcome. The Morning Chronicle itself was a paper purchased by Whig supporters in 1834 with the hope of creating a national mouthpiece to rival the pro-Tory The Time, [lxvii] Palmerston himself specifically cultivated a relationship with the papers proprietor going so far as to influence who worked there. [lxviii]. It thus supported the Whig government and naturally held the Chartists in contempt, especially as the Whig government had voted against acknowledging the 1838 Chartist petition.

While its contents can then be seen as being a view that would please the government, the paper also in fulfilling its goal of becoming a ‘national’ mouthpiece would reflect the fears and concerns of its national readership, who probably leaned towards the Whigs in electoral terms. Certainly too the paper was an important electoral apparatus for the Whigs, as seen by Palmerston’s keen cultivation of it, and so its anti-Chartist content, appealing to the concerns of its Whig-leaning readership could very easily turn on the government, if they were seen to be making the situation worse, or failed to properly deal with it.

This would all have been compounded for the Whigs too by the actual Chartist uprisings, such as the 1839 Newport rising where clashes with the military led to 22 dead and many injured after the Chartists attempted to storm the local garrison. [lxix] The Whig government then clearly had a very large domestic problem on their hands during this period to deal with, the failure to do so, or indeed taking actions that would exacerbate tensions would be bad for the country, but also might see their core public supporters turn on them at a time when the party was already rather fragile in parliament.

An engraving by Alfred Pearse from the 1886 book True Stories of the Reign of Queen Victoria. It shows local police clashing with Chartist rioters.

While the Chartists demanded political reform, they also had an economic platform that was against consumption taxes, which they felt disproportionately affected the earnings of the working class, for instance they were responsible for taking away half of a laborer’s income.[lxx] Chartists instead favored an income tax like that which was repealed in 1816 as it was thought to more fairly spread the tax burden among the classes.[lxxi] However, income tax had been so unpopular among the upper classes that upon its repeal, Parliament had jubilantly applauded.[lxxii] This for Palmerston and the government then presented a difficulty as it made the tax in Asia on the Opium trade even more essential for the exchequer as in the context of a violent and potentially Chartist revolutionary movement at home, the ability to raise money through taxation in Britain for any foreign crisis was compromised. Another income tax would see valuable political capital drained fighting those eligible to vote, while an increase in consumption taxes would likely see the Chartists spread further discontent and potentially more violence, which beyond the threat to the state would be received very poorly by the pro-Whig press whose support they relied upon, particularly in their current politically fragile state. There is an argument here then that the policy of inaction in the face of growing Chinese aggression to British interests in China may have been fostered also partly by their lack of confidence in being able to fund a war, without costly domestic repercussions. There is of course also the context of the aforementioned Napoleonic debt repayments.[lxxiii]    

           Furthermore, the Chartists were also vocal critiques of the opium trade. The Charter was a newspaper established by the London Working Men’s Association in 1838 to act as a mouthpiece for Chartism in London[lxxiv]. Its 3 November 1839 edition disparaged the merchants calling for government action against China as ‘stupid war-mongers’ and confidently asserted the British government had too much to attend to elsewhere.[lxxv]The implication that the British government should be concentrating on domestic affairs is a major constraint to Palmerston taking a more proactive approach in China, unless he risk the feared increased unrest at home, and the attendant danger of offering his political opponents further ammunition against the Whigs. It was far better to continue with a policy of inaction, which kept the revenues flowing while also keeping stability at home in the face of violent Chartists, unstable parliamentary politics and a nationally engaged electorate willing to punish Whig failings at the ballot box as had been seen in the elections since 1832, all circumstances directly fostered by the 1832 Reform Act. This runs counter then to the argument put forward by Cain and Hopkins that Palmerston in fact was actively aiming to create and use a war in China to distract from this domestic unrest.[lxxvi] Such a theory would not have worked given an analysis of the domestic context, but potentially instead would have destroyed the government politically and incite further domestic unrest as has been made clear.

War comes to those who wait

The Opium War’s outbreak was eerily similar to Elliot’s prediction in 1836 of how things would unfold. Through their inaction the British had no choice but to respond to the Qing siege of their merchants’ compound, their forced eviction, and the burning of their opium supplies without compensation with war. It was too late, too large an incident and too great a humiliation if the Whigs had chosen any response other than armed force. Their policy of inaction, pursued by Palmerston even until December 1838, where he failed to support Elliot’s protests to the Chinese Governor after rioters had attacked British merchants,[lxxvii] had meant the Chinese had been over the years lulled into believing the British would not react to their increasingly violent measures which aimed to stamp out the opium trade permanently.

The Chinese scholar Pin-Chia Kuo in 1935 supported a similar argument as I have presented here through using Chinese records, however, he placed the blame on Elliot who he said conformed to Chinese officials after Napier’s far more aggressive attitude and so convinced the Chinese that Britain was backing down and was an inferior power.[lxxviii]However, as we have seen it was not Elliot’s doing though, but, his Minister Palmerston’s, and the Whig government’s domestically enforced policy of inaction. This, and not Elliot personally was the issue that fostered a perception of British weakness in the Chinese court.

Painting by Edward H. Cree of British forces invading Chusan in 1841. While fighting would begin in 1839, it was not until late June 1840 that the British expeditionary force started to arrive, prior to this 1839 had seen a series of skirmishes such as the wars opening battle fought in Kowloon where Britain’s Chief Superintendent Elliot attempted to force the Chinese to life their ban and sell the now exiled British merchants and citizens food through ‘gunboat diplomacy’, either Elliot became too impatient or the Chinese were merely playing for time while they sent for reinforcements, but Elliot opened fire after becoming frustrated at the lack of progress. The battle between 4 small British ships (the largest being a cutter) and 3 Chinese war junks ended in stalemate.

A final desperate balancing act and the consequences of inaction

The Whigs in response to the increasingly aggressive Chinese clamp-downs on British merchants were reluctantly directed by the Tories into full-scale war through a motion of censure on 7 April 1840, which attacked not the necessity of conflict, but as Tory MP Sir Follett stated, the lack of foresight and preparations earlier to avoid it.[lxxix] Prior to this though an expedition had already been sent to attempt to gain compensation for both British merchants, and for Britain’s national honour for the sleights that could no longer be easily ignored lest Britain lose prestige internationally and be perceived as a weaker power to both China but also its European neighbors who also operated in China. The expedition though had lacked the full support or indeed even the awareness of the British parliament until early 1840 as Palmerston sought to keep the controversial action of defending the opium merchants out of the public eye for as long as possible.[lxxx] Indeed the ‘official’ funding for this expedition now turned invasion force, would only be given by parliament much later on 27 July 1840,[lxxxi] around the time that British forces had already landed in China.

By keeping parliament and country in the dark so far as possible, Palmerston hoped to keep together the government’s unstable majority as long as he feasibly could, downplay the action to the Whigs key anti-opium electors so as to not lose their support, while also provide help to their equally important pro-opium supporters by providing said government help to them. This was a balancing act and level of secrecy that even Palmerston could not maintain though. It smacks less of Machiavellian attempted genius, and more of a government trapped between a rock and a hard place desperately treading water and clinging to a solution that was clearly untenable. 

A situation and balancing act fostered ironically directly by Palmerston’s policy of inactivity regarding China which had attempted to reconcile these two groups of key Whig supporters. A policy which had meant there had been no effort, show of force or negotiations undertaken to head off the increasing severity of Chinese clampdowns, nor had British merchants officially been pulled up on their conduct. The situation had been left to spiral out of control to a point where in a context of national prestige and political weakness the Whig government now lacked the wiggle room to do anything but initiate an armed response, lest as mentioned earlier they risk political, national and international humiliation.

While the Whig government defeated the motion, it was only narrowly done so by 9 votes,[lxxxii] despite their majority ostensibly being around 24. The government’s political weakness thus had become dire and the votes close margin which acted as a warning that the Whigs may be toppled or may lose a vote of no confidence if they did not take a firm public stance on the issue and resolve it. The Whigs attempting to cling to power and ensure at least some stability were thus finally forced to choose to take a side domestically, they in the context of the Chinese humiliation had little choice but to support the merchants through war with Qing China, abandoning their anti-opium supporters. This was a contributing factor in the 1841 election becoming a landslide for the Tories under Peel who won 367 seats compared to the Whigs’ 271. Even prior to this the writing had been on the wall for the Whigs as earlier in the year, they had lost the vote on their budget by 36 votes and a vote of no confidence by 1. The election landside thus merely confirmed officially the death of their time in government. Even the Radicals, so key in propping up the Whigs flocked to the Tories.[lxxxiii]  

A firm stance far earlier prior to 1839 may have entirely avoided the coming conflict. If circumstances had been headed off in China far earlier by an assertive government policy (be it aggressive or conciliatory towards the Chinese, or their own merchants) that was consistently applied, those pushing for war on either side could have been sidelined far sooner, and the events that were deemed to be too insulting to ignore may never have happened. Escalation could thus have been avoided if the right path, or indeed any path had been tried. Instead however due to fears of offending either pro-China pressure groups such as middle class evangelicals or indeed inflaming the Chartists, or offending the pro-British groups such as the merchants, and thus losing much needed support that propped up a dwindling and unstable government, Palmerston and the Whigs pursued a policy which aimed to through inaction to brush everything under the carpet. 

Conclusion:

This is not an exhaustive analysis, and far more research is needed before it can claim to be a sweeping new revision of the Opium Wars. For example, while this analysis has been built around government documents and letters, including some of Palmerston’s correspondence, his entire personal archives at Southampton University have not been utilized. These correspondences could shed more light on Palmerston’s own thoughts and actions during this period. However, even in its present form this analysis raises questions about and indeed directly contradicts some of the traditional interpretations of the Opium Wars causes, which rely on the existence of a coherent government policy, by applying Britain’s domestic political landscape to the question. It was the constitutional reform with the 1832 Reform Act which played a key role directly and indirectly in constraining Palmerston to inactivity in his China foreign policy. Directly it fostered a decade of weak government politically due to a growing risk to the Whigs ever dwindling and shaky majority. Indirectly it would further compound this through its creation of a potentially revolutionary movement, the Chartists. They took issue with the Act, but also held strong views on economic and foreign policy that complicated further the divided public opinion surrounding the Opium trade.

These opinions threatened the Opium related revenues important to the national economic interest. Palmerston had to balance social and economic stability. This partially validates Mulligan and Simm’s conclusion that domestic affairs were in the ascendency over foreign policy in the early-1800s, it also though complicates their reasoning by highlighting that they underplayed Britain’s potential for instability.[lxxxiv] Palmerston, despite being one of the true political titans of his age was trapped by this context. The war was not his active policy, but it was his inaction regarding China throughout the 1830s that directly contributed to it. It was ‘Palmerston’s Opium War’ indeed, just not in the respect his detractors perhaps meant it.  

 Footnotes:

[i] ‘David Cameron in China: ministers refuse calls to remove poppies’, Telegraph, 10 November 2010. 

[ii] J. Lovell, ‘The Opium Wars’, History Today, 62 (2012), 1.  

[iii] J.Gallagher and R. Robinson, ‘The Imperialism of Free Trade’, The Economic History Review, 6 (1953), 9-10.

[iv] C. Su, Justifiers of the British Opium Trade: Arguments by Parliament, Traders and the Times Leading Up to the Opium War (Stanford University, 2008) 49.

[v] S. Chen, Merchants of War and Peace: British Knowledge of China in the making of the Opium War (Hong Kong University Press, 2017) 150.

[vi] H. Gelber, China as ‘Victim’? The Opium War that Wasn’t (Harvard University, 2006), 2-4.

[vii] From here-on simply referred to as Palmerston. He was Foreign Secretary for nearly the entire period, 1830-4 and 1835-41.

[viii] W. Mulligan and B. Simms, The Primacy of Foreign Policy in British History, 1660-2000, How Strategic Concerns Shaped Modern Britain (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010), 337.

[ix] Gelber, China as’ Victim’? 7.

[x] Gelber, China as ‘Victim’?, 7.

[xi] L. Foxcroft, The Making of Addiction, The ‘use’ and ‘abuse’ of Opium in Nineteenth-Century Britain (Ashgate, 2007), 66.

[xii] Belfast Commercial Chronicle, 16 October 1841, 1.

[xiii] Gallagher and Robinson, ‘Imperialism’, p.9

[xiv] C. Eldridge, Englands Mission: The Imperial Idea in the Age of Gladstone and Disraeli 1868-1880 (Palgrave Macmillan, 1973), 18.

[xv] Elliot was the government’s chief superintendent charged with protecting British interests in China, both overseeing the merchants and acting as an Ambassador to China.

[xvi] S. Hoe and D. Roebuck, The Taking of Hong Kong: Charles and Clara Elliot in China Waters (Curzon Press, 1999), 53.

[xvii] F. Lo-Shu, A Documentary Chronicle of Sino-Western Relations 1644-1820 (University of Arizona Press, 1966), 380

[xviii] M. Greenberg, British Trade and the Opening of China 1800-42 (Cambridge University Press, 1951), 191.

[xix] G. Hao, ‘Prelude to the Opium War? British reactions the ‘Napier Fizzle’ and attitudes towards China in the mid eighteen-thirties’, Historical Research, 87 (2014), 498.

[xx] P. Ziegler, Palmerston (Palgrave Macmillan, 2002) 2.

[xxi] S. Hoe and D. Roebuck, Elliot, 57.

[xxii] Ibid, 47.

[xxiii] Ibid.

[xxiv] M. Taylor, ‘Empire and Parliamentary Reform’ in A. Burns and J. Innes (eds) Rethinking the Age of Reform Britain 1780-1850 (Cambridge University Press, 2003), 303.  It entailed the promise of downsizing state expenditure back to its pre-Napoleonic Wars levels.

[xxv] D. Budetti, ‘From Silver to Opium: A Study of the Evolution and Impact of the British-Chinese Trade System from 1780-1842’ (Loyola Marymount University, 2016), 8.

[xxvi] J. Wong, Deadly Dreams: Opium and the Arrow War (1856-1860) (Cambridge University Press, 2009), 395-6.

[xxvii] L. Neal, ‘The Financial Crisis of 1825 and the Restructuring of the British Financial System’, Review, 80 (1998), 65.

[xxviii] W. Buiter, ‘A Guide to Public Sector Debts and Deficits’ in C. Wyplosz (ed), Thirty Years of Economic Policy (Oxford University Press, 2015) 148.

[xxix] M. Roser and M. Nagdy, ‘UK Defence Spending as a percentage of GDP, 1692-2014’, Our World in data (https://ourworldindata.org/military-spending, accessed 30 December 2018)

[xxx] D. Brown, Palmerston and the Politics of Foreign Policy, 1846-1855 (University of Southampton, 1998) 11-12.

[xxxi] A. Thelwall, The Iniquities of the Opium trade with China (W.H. Allen and Co, 1839), 152-153.

[xxxii] Ibid, 177.

[xxxiii] Ibid, 154-56.

[xxxiv] The British Newspaper Archive (https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/titles/morning-advertiser, accessed 29 December 2018)a.

[xxxv] Morning Advertiser, 25 May 1839, 1.

[xxxvi] Of which he and William Jardine were the biggest participants- C. Su, British Opium Trade, 47.

[xxxvii] J. Matheson, The Present Position and Prospects of the British Trade with China (Smith, Elder and Co., Cornhill, 1836) 3.

[xxxviii] Ibid, 1.

[xxxix] Anthony Howe, Free Trade and Liberal England (Oxford, 1997), 3

[xl] C. Schonhardt-Bailey, ‘Ideology, party and interests in the British parliament of 1841-47’, British Journal of Political Science, 33 (2003), 581

[xli] C. Su, British Opium Trade, 50.

[xlii] S. Chen, Merchants, 150

[xliii] S. Hoe and D. Roebuck, Elliot, 64.

[xliv] The Abolition Project [Online], Available at: https://abolition.e2bn.org/slavery_110.html (Accessed 11 March 2020)

[xlv] C. Rallings and M. Thrasher, British Electoral Facts 1832-1999 (London, 2000), 3

[xlvi] M. McCord and B. Purdue, British History 1815-1914 (Oxford University Press, 2007), 161-2

[xlvii] M. Cragoe, ‘The Great Reform Act and the Modernization of British Politics: The impact of Conservative Associations, 1835-41’, Journal of British Studies, 47 (2008), 602.

[xlviii] T. Jenkins, The Liberal Ascendancy 1830-1886 (Macmillan, 1994), 35.

[xlix] The Marquis of Chandos, Hansard 1803-2005, 6 (18 August 1831), 273.

[l] E. Hennock and D. Moore, ‘The Sociological Premises of the First Reform Act: A Critical Note’, Victorian Studies, 14 (1971), 324.

[li] Mr Sheil, Hansard’s Parliamentary Debates for session 1840, LVII (Hansard, 1841), 1208; Mr Wood, Ibid, 1105

[lii] R. Pearce and R. Stearn, Government and Reform: Britain 1815-1918 (Hodder and Stoughton, 2000), 22

[liii] Tory seats rose from 175 in 1832, to 273 in 1835 and 314 in 1837- C. Rallings and M. Thrasher, British Electoral Facts 1832-2006 (Routledge, 2007), Table 1.01-03.

[liv] M. McCord and B. Purdue, British History 1815-1914 (Oxford University Press, 2007), 161-2.

[lv] N. Gash, Reaction and Reconstruction in English Politics, 1832-1852 (Faber and Faber, 1964), 162-6.

[lvi] J. Belchem, ‘Radical Language and Ideology in the Early Nineteenth-Century England’, Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned with British Studies, 20 (1988), 250.

[lvii] M. Beer, A History of British Socialism Volume II (Routledge, 1919), 32.

[lviii] Mr Wakley, Hansard 1803-2005, 39 (20 November 1837), 38.

[lix] D. Brown, Palmerston: A Biography (Yale University Press, 2011), 124.

[lx] J. Parry, The Politics of Patriotism, English Liberalism, national identity and Europe, 1830-1886 (Cambridge University Press, 2006) 47.

[lxi] The Act had only enfranchised the middle classes with its property qualifications of ￡10.

[lxii] Office for National Statistics, UK Population Estimates 1851 to 2014 [online], Available at: https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/populationandmigration/populationestimates/adhocs/004356ukpopulationestimates1851to2014 (Accessed 11 March 2020)

[lxiii] British Library, London, The Peoples Charter, 1838.

[lxiv] W.H. Mael, ‘The Dynamics of Violence in Chartism: A Case Study in North-eastern England’, Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned with British Studies, 7 (1975), 101

[lxv] Morning Chronicle, 8 November 1839, 3.

[lxvi] Ibid.

[lxvii] D. Bostick, ‘Sir John Easthope and the “Morning Chronicle”, 1834-1848’, Victorian Periodicals Review, 12 (1979), 51.

[lxviii] D. Brown, ‘Compelling but not Controlling?: Palmerston and the Press, 1846-1855, History, 86 (2011), 51-2.

[lxix] W. Johns, The Chartist Riots at Newport: November 1839 (W. N. Johns, 1889), 44.

[lxx] S. Utz, ‘Chartism and Income Tax’, British Tax Review, 2 (2013), 197-198.

[lxxi] Ibid, 194.

[lxxii] The National Archives (https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20130127153155/https://www.hmrc.gov.uk/history/taxhis1.htm, Accessed 1 January 2019)

[lxxiii] L. Neal, ‘Financial Crisis’, 54

[lxxiv] The British Newspaper Archive (https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/titles/the-charter, Accessed 1 January 2019)b.

[lxxv] The Charter, 3 November 1839, 2.

[lxxvi] P. Cain and A. Hopkins, ‘Gentlemanly Capitalism and British Expansion Overseas I. The Old Colonial System, 1688-1850’, The Economic History Review, 39 (1986), 523.

[lxxvii] S. Hoe and D. Roebuck, Elliot, 66.

[lxxviii] P. Kuo, A critical study of the first Anglo-Chinese War: with documents (Commercial Press, 1935), 262-3.

[lxxix] Sir Follett, Hansard 1803-2005, 53 (7 April 1840), 721-722.

[lxxx] Su, ‘Justifiers of the British Opium trade’, 48

[lxxxi] L. Chen, Chinese Law in Imperial Eyes: Sovereignty, Justice and Transcultural politics (Columbia University Press, 2016), 228

[lxxxii] War with China, Ibid, 53 (9 April 1840), 951.

[lxxxiii] B. Kemp, ‘The General Election of 1841’, History, 37 (1952), 146-157

[lxxxiv] Mullingan and Simms, The Primacy of Foreign Policy, 337.

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