[After passage of the First Reform Bill of 1832,] bonfires of rejoicing replaced burning haystacks across the country; in Lincolnshire, Alfred Tennyson and his sister rang peal after peal on their church bells. But to the Tory landowners who had fought reform every inch of the way, the end of the world was at hand. The Established Church was about to fall, the monarchy was to be dethroned, the House of Lords abolished, and private property confiscated. “The barriers of the constitution are broken down,” announced Wellington; “the waters of destruction have burst the gates of the temple.”
It was not quite that bad. The First Reform Bill enlarged the electorate in England and Wales from 435,000 to 652,000, an increase of approximately 50 per cent - which meant that five out of every six adult males still had no vote. It also abolished the most flagrant of the rotten and pocket boroughs, although several scores were preserved; despite much redistricting, the size of constituencies still varied greatly, and the one man, one vote principle was far from realized. After hysteria on all sides, relief on the one hand - the Tories discovered that he sun still rose in the morning - and disillusionment on the other.
”This sounds so familiar ….
Richard D. Altick, Victorian People and Ideas, pp 87-88
