TORY PARTY (c.1769-c.1832) NOW CONSERVATIVE PARTY

PITT THE YOUNGER

British political party traditionally opposed to the WHIG party. The word “Tory” originated and described an Irish Catholic outlaw. Later on it changed as an abusing word for royalists supporting the succession of James II even so he was Roman Catholic. The word was first used during the political crisis in 1679 when Earl of Shaftesbury tried to recall the Parliament in order to pass a bill excluding James from the throne. The Tories opposed this because of their belief in hereditary royal successions.

After the Glorious Revolution in 1688 which a great number of the Tory leaders supported but somehow reduced them on the issue of royal rights. The parties Tories and Whigs opposed on religious tolerance and English involvement in foreign wars. The Tories stood for solid Anglicanism and limited military involvement abroad. In other word they represent the interests of country gentry. The Whigs identified with the aristocratic landowners and the wealthy middle class.

The leader Robert Harley masterminded the party greatly during the later years of Queen Anne’s reign (1702-14).

They fell out of favour during the leadership of Henry Bolingbroke for the association with Jacobites rebellion in 1715.  The Tories stayed out of favour for 60 years.

In 1784 with William Pit the younger winning the election he revitalised the Tory Party under his political direction. They now controlled the government until 1830. However, in 1932 their power in the House of Commons was destroyed by the Reform Act.

The party was completely undermined morally but they regrouped and started to call themselves Conservative Party.

JACOBITE  -  English and Scottish supporters of the exiled royal house of Stuart after the Glorious Revolution. 

After James II was disposed in 1688-9 the word Jacobites was formed from the Latin for James (Jacobus).  Their power came from the Highland Clan brotherhood of Scotland. They led a major rebellion in 1715 and 1745 but it never achieved the dreams to restore the Stuarts to the throne. The Jacobites receive a major defeat in 1746, the government suppressed the clans and the Jacobites ceased to exist as a great force.