Robert Peel: Order, Reform and the Price of Principle (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9798186919308)

Robert Peel did not lose power through scandal, corruption or incompetence. He lost it because he chose what he believed Britain required over what his own party demanded.

Born into industrial wealth and educated for public office, Peel rose to become one of the most consequential statesmen of nineteenth-century Britain. As Home Secretary, he helped reform the criminal law and created the Metropolitan Police, permanently attaching his name to the "bobbies" and "peelers" who patrolled London's streets.

As a political leader, Peel attempted something even more difficult. He rebuilt Conservatism after the Great Reform Act, accepted constitutional changes he had once opposed, restored government finances, reintroduced income tax and moved Britain towards freer trade.

But Peel's method of government carried a devastating political price.

He opposed Catholic emancipation before deciding that continued exclusion threatened public order. He resisted parliamentary reform before accepting that the political world had changed. Finally, amid the catastrophe unfolding in Ireland and growing pressure for cheaper food, he turned against the Corn Laws.

Repeal succeeded, but it shattered the Conservative Party and ended Peel's premiership.

Robert Peel: Order, Reform and the Price of Principle examines the industrial fortune that launched him, his experience governing Ireland, the creation of modern policing, Catholic emancipation, the Tamworth Manifesto, his relationship with Queen Victoria, the Irish famine and the final political battle that destroyed his leadership.

This is the story of a conservative who repeatedly changed Britain, not because he welcomed revolution, but because he believed institutions survived only when they adapted before crisis became collapse.