III. The Yorkshire Association, 1780–4: a Study in Political Organization

E-ISSN： 1469-5103|3|2|144-161

ISSN： 0018-246x

Source： The Historical Journal, Vol.3, Iss.2, 1960-06, pp. : 144-161

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Abstract

The Yorkshire Association of the early 1780's marked the first effective extension of modern political radicalism in Great Britain from the metropolitan region into the provinces. During what may for convenience be described as the first—the Wilkite—phase of British radicalism, in the early 1770's, the focus of the radical movement had lain in and around London. Attempts to stir up the country provoked only a brief response in a very few constituencies. There was little trace anywhere of sustained radical activity. Provincial apathy at the general election of 1774 caused acute disappointment to the metropolitan radicals. Six years later the situation had changed remarkably, and from 1780 till 1784 politics in Yorkshire were dominated, and in the rest of England considerably affected, by that remarkable political phenomenon, the Yorkshire Association. Starting in December 1779, an extraordinary, widespread upsurge of discontent among the members of the ‘upper class’ in the county, provoked by the North ministry's inept handling of the American crisis, first produced the well-supported petition of 1780 for economical reform, and was then channelled and organized into an instrument of agitation for reform of the parliamentary system. The association proper came into being between its adoption at a county meeting on 28 March 1780 and the middle of the following August, when the parchment copies which had been circulated for signature were gathered in and the roll of some 5800 names was compiled from them.