Editing John Russell, 1st Earl Russell (section)

==Between premierships==
=== In opposition: February–December 1852 ===
Following Russell's resignation, on 23 February 1852 the [[Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby|Earl of Derby]] accepted the Queen's invitation to form a government. The new Conservative ministry were a minority in the Commons due to the continuing rift with the [[Peelites]]. Derby called a [[1852 United Kingdom general election|general election]] for July but failed to secure a majority. After the election Derby's Conservatives held 292 out of the 662 seats in the Commons but were able to carry on in office due to divisions among the opposition. Negotiations over a Whig-Peelite coalition stalled over the question of who would lead it. Russell's authority and popularity within the Whigs had been dented by his falling out with Palmerston, who flatly refused to serve under him again. Moreover, he had alienated many in the Peelites and the Irish Brigade, who held the balance of power in the Commons, leaving them unwilling to support another Russell-led government. Palmerston proposed [[Henry Petty-Fitzmaurice, 3rd Marquess of Lansdowne|Lord Lansdowne]] as a compromise candidate. This was acceptable to Russell but Lansdowne was reluctant to take on the burdens of leading a government. The defeat of [[Benjamin Disraeli|Disraeli's]] [[Budget of the United Kingdom|Budget]] in December 1852 forced the issue. Derby's government resigned and the Queen sent for Lansdowne and the Peelite [[George Hamilton Gordon, 4th Earl of Aberdeen|Lord Aberdeen]]. Lansdowne declined the Queen's invitation, pleading ill-health and so Aberdeen was tasked with forming a government.{{sfn|Prest|2009}}{{sfn|Scherer|1999|pp=195-199}}

=== The Aberdeen coalition: 1852–1855 ===
{{Further|Aberdeen ministry}}
[[File:John Russell, 1st Earl Russell by Sir Francis Grant detail.jpg|thumb|upright|left|alt=John Russell, 1st Earl Russell, by Sir Francis Grant|Detail of Russell's portrait by [[Francis Grant (artist)|Francis Grant]], 1853]]
Russell, as the leader of the Whigs, agreed to bring his party into a coalition with the Peelites, headed by Aberdeen. As the leader of the largest party in the coalition, Russell was reluctant to serve under Aberdeen in a subordinate position, but agreed to take on the role of Foreign Secretary on a temporary basis, to lend stability to the fledgling government. He resigned the role in February 1853 in favour of [[George Villiers, 4th Earl of Clarendon|Clarendon]], but continued to lead for the government in the Commons and attended cabinet without ministerial responsibilities. Russell was unhappy that half of Aberdeen's cabinet was made up of Peelites, despite the fact that the Whigs contributed hundreds of MPs to the Government's support in the Commons, and the Peelites only around 40. However, he came to admire some of his Peelite colleagues, particularly the Chancellor of the Exchequer [[William Ewart Gladstone|William Gladstone]], who would go on to become an important political ally in later years.{{sfn|Scherer|1999|pp=199-204}}

With Aberdeen's agreement, Russell used his position as [[Leader of the House of Commons]] to push for a new Reform Act. Although Russell had promoted the [[Reform Act 1832]] as a one-off measure to re-balance the constitution, after twenty years he had become convinced of the need for further electoral reform. In February 1854 Russell introduced his bill to the House. The property qualification was to be reduced from £10 to £6 in boroughs, and from £50 to £10 in the counties. Additionally 66 seats would be removed from undersized constituencies and redistributed.{{sfn|Scherer|1999|pp=204-206}} The second reading of the bill was set for March 1854, but the prospect of imminent war with Russia led to it being postponed until April. After the outbreak of war on 28 March Russell came under pressure from the cabinet to withdraw the bill entirely. Russell threatened to resign if the cabinet abandoned the reform bill, but he was convinced to stay on by Aberdeen, who promised that he would support the reform bill if Russell reintroduced it in a future session.{{sfn|Reid|1895|pp=240-243}}{{sfn|Scherer|1999|p=208}} However, with the fall of the Aberdeen government the following year, it would be 12 years before Russell had another chance to introduce a reform bill.

Together with Palmerston, Russell supported the government taking a hard line against Russian territorial ambitions in the [[Ottoman Empire]], a policy that ultimately resulted in Britain's entry into the [[Crimean War]] in March 1854, an outcome that the more cautious Aberdeen had hoped to avoid. In the following months Russell grew frustrated by what he saw as a lack of effective war leadership by Aberdeen and the [[Secretary of State for War]], the [[Henry Pelham-Clinton, 5th Duke of Newcastle|Duke of Newcastle]]. Dispatches from the front reported that the army was suffering from supply shortages and a lack of adequate accommodation and medical facilities. In November 1854 Russell urged Aberdeen to replace Newcastle with Palmerston, who he believed would get a firmer grip on the organisation of the war, but these suggestions came to nothing. In January 1855, after a series of military setbacks, a Commons motion was brought by the radical MP [[John Arthur Roebuck|John Roebuck]] to appoint a select committee to investigate the management of the war. Russell, not wishing to vote against an inquiry he believed was badly needed, resigned from the cabinet in order to abstain. Aberdeen viewed the Roebuck motion as a vote of no confidence in his leadership and, accordingly, when it passed by 305–148, he resigned.{{sfn|Scherer|1999|pp=225-229}}{{sfn|Prest|2009}}

In the eyes of many, including the Queen and Aberdeen, Russell's temperamental behaviour and personal ambition had undermined the stability of the coalition.{{sfn|Martin|1923|pp=107–112}} On visiting [[Windsor Castle]] to resign, Aberdeen told the Queen "Had it not been for the incessant attempts of Lord John Russell to keep up party differences, it must be acknowledged that the experiment of a coalition had succeeded admirably," an assessment with which the Queen agreed.<ref>''Queen Victoria's Journals, Tuesday 30 January 1855, Windsor Castle, Princess Beatrice's copies'', Volume:39 (1 January 1855 – 30 June 1855), pp. 47–48, [http://www.queenvictoriasjournals.org/search/displayItem.do?FormatType=fulltextimgsrc&QueryType=articles&ResultsID=2738818125973&filterSequence=1&PageNumber=1&ItemNumber=7&ItemID=qvj08067&volumeType=PSBEA Online from the Bodleian Library]</ref> Russell accepted an invitation from the Queen to form a new government but found that he could not assemble the necessary support, with many of his colleagues having been angered by his abandonment of Aberdeen over the Roebuck motion.{{sfn|Scherer|1999|pp=229-230}} Palmerston became prime minister, and Russell reluctantly accepted the role of Colonial Secretary in his cabinet. Russell was sent to Vienna to negotiate peace terms with Russia, but his proposals were rejected and he resigned from the cabinet and returned to the backbenches in July 1855.{{sfn|Vincent|1981|pp=37–49}}{{sfn|Arnold|2002|p=121}}

=== Return to the backbenches: 1855–1859 ===
Following his resignation Russell wrote to his father-in-law that he would not serve again under Palmerston or any other prime minister.{{sfn|Scherer|1999|p=246}} For a time it appeared as if his career in frontbench politics might be over. Russell continued to speak out from the backbenches on the issues he most cared about – lobbying for increased government grants for education and for reduction in the property qualification for Parliamentary elections.{{sfn|Scherer|1999|pp=246-247}} In early 1857 Russell became a vocal critic of Palmerston's government over the [[Anglo-Persian War]] and the [[Second Opium War]]. Russell spoke in support of a motion tabled by [[Richard Cobden]], which criticised British military action in China and calling for a select committee inquiry. When the motion passed on 3 March, Palmerston dissolved Parliament and went to the country.{{sfn|Reid|1895|p=287}} In the subsequent [[1857 United Kingdom general election|general election]] Palmerston was swept back into power on a tide of patriotic feeling with an increased majority. Many of Palmerston's critics lost their seats but Russell hung on in the City of London, after fighting off an attempt to deselect him and replace him with a pro-Palmerston Whig candidate.{{sfn|Scherer|1999|pp=247-248}} Palmerston's triumph was short-lived. In February 1858 the Government rushed through a Conspiracy to Murder bill, following the [[Orsini plot|attempted assassination]] of Napoleon III by Italian nationalist [[Felice Orsini]] – an attack planned in Britain using British-made explosives. Russell attacked the bill, which he saw as undermined traditional British political liberties to appease a foreign government.{{sfn|Reid|1895|p=290}} On 19 February Russell voted in favour of [[Thomas Milner Gibson|Thomas Milner Gibson's]] motion, which criticised the government for bowing to French demands. When the motion passed by 19 votes Palmerston's government resigned.{{sfn|Prest|2009}}

=== Foreign Secretary under Palmerston: 1859–1865 ===
{{Further|Liberal government, 1859–1866}}
{{See also|United Kingdom and the American Civil War}}
In 1859, following another short-lived Conservative government, Palmerston and Russell made up their differences, and Russell consented to serve as [[Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (UK)|Foreign Secretary]] in a new Palmerston cabinet, usually considered the first true [[Liberal Party (UK)|Liberal]] cabinet. This period was a particularly eventful one in the world outside Britain, seeing the [[Unification of Italy]] (the change of British government to one sympathetic to Italian nationalism had a marked part in this process{{sfn|Trevelyan|1909|p=120-123}}), the [[American Civil War]], and the [[Second Schleswig War|1864 war]] over [[Schleswig-Holstein]] between [[Denmark]] and the [[German Confederation|German states]]. Russell arranged the [[London Conference of 1864]], but failed to establish peace in the war. His tenure of the Foreign Office was noteworthy for the famous dispatch in which he defended Italian unification: "Her Majesty's Government will turn their eyes rather to the gratifying prospect of a people building up the edifice of their liberties, and consolidating the work of their independence, amid the sympathies and good wishes of Europe" (27 October 1860).{{sfn|Reid|1895|loc=Ch. 14}}

=== Elevation to the peerage: 1861 ===
In 1861 Russell was elevated to the peerage as [[Earl Russell]], of [[Kingston Russell]] in the County of [[Dorset]], and as [[Viscount Amberley]], of [[Amberley, Gloucestershire|Amberley]] in the County of Gloucester, and of [[Ardsalla]] in the [[County Meath|County of Meath]]
in the [[Peerage of the United Kingdom]].<ref>{{London Gazette |issue=22534 |date=30 July 1861 |page=3193 }}</ref> Henceforth, as a [[suo jure]] peer, rather than merely being known as 'Lord' because he was the son of a Duke, he sat in the House of Lords for the remainder of his career.