Editing William Ewart Gladstone (section)

==Attitude towards slavery==
Initially a disciple of [[High Tories|High Toryism]], Gladstone's maiden speech as a young [[Tories (British political party)|Tory]] was a defence of the rights of [[Slavery in the British and French Caribbean | West Indian sugar plantation magnates]] (slave owners) among whom his father was prominent. He immediately came under attack from anti-slavery elements. He also surprised the duke by urging the need to increase pay for unskilled factory workers.<ref>Morley (1901) 1:90–91.</ref>

Gladstone's early attitude towards slavery was highly shaped by his father, [[Sir John Gladstone, 1st Baronet|Sir John Gladstone]], one of the largest slave owners in the British Empire. Gladstone wanted gradual rather than immediate emancipation, and proposed that slaves should serve a period of apprenticeship after being freed.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Quinault|first= R|year=2009|title=Gladstone and Slavery|journal=The Historical Journal|volume=52|issue=2|page= 372|doi= 10.1017/S0018246X0900750X|s2cid= 159722399}}</ref> They also opposed the international slave trade (which lowered the value of the slaves the father already owned).<ref>{{cite journal |first1=Trevor |last1=Burnard |first2=Kit |last2=Candlin |title=Sir John Gladstone and the debate over the amelioration of slavery in the British West Indies in the 1820s |journal=Journal of British Studies |volume=57 |issue=4 |date=2018 |pages=760–782|doi=10.1017/jbr.2018.115 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |first=Michael |last=Taylor|title=The British West India interest and its allies, 1823–1833 |journal=English Historical Review |volume=133 |issue=565 |date=2018 |pages=1478–1511 |doi=10.1093/ehr/cey336}}</ref> The anti-slavery movement demanded the immediate abolition of slavery. Gladstone opposed this and said in 1832 that emancipation should come after moral emancipation through the adoption of education and the inculcation of "honest and industrious habits" among the slaves.  Then "with the utmost speed that prudence will permit, we shall arrive at that exceedingly desired consummation, the utter extinction of slavery."<ref>Quinault, pp. 366–367.</ref> In 1831, when the Oxford Union considered a motion in favour of the immediate emancipation of the slaves in the West Indies, Gladstone moved an amendment in favour of gradual [[manumission]] along with better protection for the personal and civil rights of the slaves and better provision for their Christian education.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Quinault|first= R|year=2009|title=Gladstone and Slavery|journal=The Historical Journal|volume=52|issue=2|page=366|doi= 10.1017/S0018246X0900750X|s2cid= 159722399}}</ref> His early Parliamentary speeches followed a similar line: in June 1833, Gladstone concluded his speech on the 'slavery question' by declaring that though he had dwelt on "the dark side" of the issue, he looked forward to "a safe and gradual emancipation".<ref>{{cite book|last=Henry Barrow|first=John|year=1833 |title=The Mirror of Parliament, 1833 |volume=2 |pages=2079–2082}}</ref>

In 1834, when slavery was abolished across the British Empire, the owners were paid full value for the slaves. Gladstone helped his father obtain £106,769 ({{Inflation|UK|106769|1834|r=-4|fmt=eq|cursign=£}}) in official reimbursement by the government for the 2,508 slaves he owned across nine plantations in the Caribbean.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/britains-colonial-shame-slaveowners-given-huge-payouts-after-abolition-8508358.html|title=Britain's colonial shame: Slave-owners given huge payouts after abolition|newspaper=Independent on Sunday|date=24 February 2013|access-date=18 September 2017|archive-date=25 September 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150925162316/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/britains-colonial-shame-slaveowners-given-huge-payouts-after-abolition-8508358.html|url-status=live}}</ref>

In later years Gladstone's attitude towards slavery became more critical as his father's influence over his politics diminished. In 1844 Gladstone broke with his father when, as [[President of the Board of Trade]], he advanced proposals to halve duties on foreign sugar not produced by slave labour, in order to "secure the effectual exclusion of slave-grown sugar" and to encourage Brazil and Spain to end slavery.<ref>Quinault, p. 374.</ref> Sir John Gladstone, who opposed any reduction in duties on foreign sugar, wrote a letter to ''The Times'' criticizing the measure.<ref>''The Times'' (14 June 1844), p. 7.</ref> Looking back late in life, Gladstone named the abolition of slavery as one of ten great achievements of the previous sixty years where the masses had been right and the upper classes had been wrong.<ref name="The Times 1886 p. 11">''The Times'' (29 June 1886), p. 11.</ref>

Shortly after the outbreak of the [[American Civil War]] Gladstone wrote to his friend the [[Harriet Sutherland-Leveson-Gower, Duchess of Sutherland|Duchess of Sutherland]] that "the [[Cornerstone Speech|principle announced]] by the [[Alexander H. Stephens|vice-president of the South]]...which asserts the [[White supremacy|superiority of the white man]], and therewith founds on it his right to hold the black in slavery, I think that principle detestable, and I am wholly with the opponents of it" but that he felt that the North was wrong to try to restore the Union by military force, which he believed would end in failure.<ref name=":5">Morley, ''Life of Gladstone: II'', p. 82.</ref>

In a memorandum to the Cabinet later that month Gladstone wrote that, although he believed the Confederacy would probably win the war, it was "seriously tainted by its connection with slavery" and argued that the European powers should use their influence on the South to effect the "mitigation or removal of slavery."<ref>Quinault, pp. 376–377.</ref>