Gladstone as “Troublemaker”: Liberal Foreign Policy and the German Annexation of Alsace-Lorraine, 1870–1871

Abstract

“I think it my duty … to cherish respect and sympathy for every foreign state, without exception and distinction.“But, when there is apparent reason to believe they are prosecuting schemes adverse to liberty beyond their own borders, then, as I have tried in former times, so I will now raise up moral forces as far as in me lies, to defeat their aims….”Gladstone to Lord Reay, 9 April 1880.“He was by nature an interferer, by training a man of Power,” A. J. P. Taylor remarked of Gladstone in his noted Oxford Ford Lectures on “Dissent over Foreign Policy, 1791-1939,” later published as The Troublemakers. He continued: “Press Bright's policy to its conclusion and you arrive at isolation, inaction except in the case of actual invasion. Press Gladstone's doctrine to its conclusion; and you have universal interference, as the Radicals discovered too late.” This view of Gladstone's contribution to the foreign policy of Victorian England is highly attractive. It stresses the ethical basis for much of his “conscience politics;” and it points to the laudable actions of liberals in championing the cause of “national self-determination” — “peoples struggling to be free” — in nineteenth-century Europe. So far so good. But is it right to make a direct connection between liberal sympathies for nationality and the actual use of British power or prestige abroad? Indeed, is it true that Gladstone's “moral fervour tempted him to universal interference?” And if it is valid, did Gladstone always get his own way in the Cabinet?