Editing Edward Baines (1774–1848)

{{for|his son of the same name|Edward Baines (1800–1890)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2020}}
{{Use British English|date=September 2020}}
{{Infobox person
| name        = Edward Baines
| image       = Edward Baines (1744 - 1848).jpg
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| birth_date  = {{birth date text|1774}}
| birth_place = [[Walton-le-Dale]], near [[Preston, Lancashire]]
| death_date  = {{death date and age|3 August 1848|1774|df=y}}
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| occupation  = Journalist, Politician
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| boards      =
| spouse      =Charlotte Talbot
| children    =[[Matthew Talbot Baines]] (1799–1860)<br />[[Edward Baines (1800–1890)|Edward Baines Jnr.]] (1800–1890)<br />[[Thomas Baines (journalist)|Thomas Baines]] (1806–1881)<br />Margaret Baines (d. 1891)<br />Charlotte (1800–1890)
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'''Edward Baines''' (1774–1848) was the editor and proprietor of the ''[[Leeds Mercury]]'' (which, by his efforts, became the leading provincial paper in England), politician, and the author of historical and geographic works of reference.
On his death in 1848, the ''[[Leeds Intelligencer]]'' (a rival of the ''Mercury'', and its political opponent for over forty years) described his as "one who has earned for himself an indisputable title to be numbered among the notable men of Leeds".<ref name="Intelligencerobit">{{cite news|title=Edward Baines Esq|work=Leeds Intelligencer|date=5 August 1848|page=5}}</ref>

Of his character and physical appearance it remarked: "Mr Baines had great industry and perseverance, as well as patience and resolution; and with those he possessed pleasing manners and address, - that debonair and affable bearing, which conciliated even those who might have felt that they had reason to regard him as an enemy… In person he was of a firm well-built frame, rather above the average stature; his features were regular, his expression of countenance frank and agreeable; and he retained his personal comeliness as well as his vivacity and suavity of manners to the last".<ref name="Intelligencerobit" />

==Early years==
Edward Baines was born in 1774 at [[Walton-le-Dale]], near [[Preston, Lancashire]]. He was educated at [[Hawkshead Grammar School]] (where [[William Wordsworth|Wordsworth]] was a contemporary),<ref name=Thornton>{{cite book|last1=Thornton|first1=David|title=Mr Mercury - a biographical study of Edward Baines with special reference to his role as editor, author and politician|date=1999|publisher=University of Leeds, School of History|location=Leeds|url=http://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/441/1/uk_bl_ethos_269708.pdf}} (e-published PhD thesis)</ref> and then in the lower school of the grammar school in Preston.<ref name=Thornton />{{rp|42}}  He then became a weaver, but at the age of sixteen he was apprenticed for seven years to a printer in Preston. In the fifth year of his apprenticeship, he terminated it and moved to [[Leeds]], where he finished his apprenticeship with the printer of the ''[[Leeds Mercury]]'', one of two Leeds weekly newspapers. In later years, both Baines and his political opponents would have it that he arrived in Leeds with little more than the clothes on his back,{{efn|But where Baines and his admirers thought ambition (or disagreement with his master) the reason for his move some of his opponents (such as [[Richard Oastler]]) said he was escaping a pregnant fiancee in Preston.<ref name=Thornton />{{rp|46–47}}}} but on completion of his apprenticeship he set up his own printworks with the aid of a loan of £100 from his father.<ref name=Thornton />{{rp|55}} He became a member of the Leeds Reasoning Society (a discussion group which eschewed religious or political issues) and of the local subscription library. He became attracted to [[Nonconformist (Protestantism)|non-conformism]], and after attending the chapels of both Unitarians and Congregationalists settled for the latter (although he did not formally become a member until 1840).<ref name="Thornton" />{{rp|290}} (He married Charlotte Talbot in 1798; she and their children were also lifelong non-conformists, with the exception of the eldest son [[Matthew Talbot Baines]] who became an [[Church of England|Anglican]], and therefore was able to take a degree at [[University of Cambridge|Cambridge]].)

==Journalism==
===Revitalisation of ''Leeds Mercury''===
In 1801, he was approached to start a third Leeds newspaper to support the interests of Dissent and Reform; the ''Mercury'' was not a reliable friend of Dissent and the leading paper, the ''[[Leeds Intelligencer]]'', was avowedly opposed. In the event, the owner of the ''Mercury'' offered to sell up, and with the help of loans from like-minded supporters Baines bought the paper for £1,552.<ref name=Thornton />{{rp|61–62}}  The paper he acquired was published every Saturday, cost sixpence (including fourpence newspaper tax) for four pages, and had a circulation of 700–800. Baines set about improving content and circulation. Baines rapidly introduced material reflecting the commercial interests of Leeds: regular agricultural and commercial reports, shipping news (from Hull and from Liverpool) and a report of the state of the London markets. Political affairs were not neglected; a digest of parliamentary proceedings in the previous week was also added.  The ''Mercury'' soon outsold the ''Intelligencer'', and by 1807 it was selling up to 3,000 copies in a good week. Production methods were improved and outclassed those of the ''Intelligencer'', with new fonts allowing more text per page, and cast-iron handpresses allowing clearer printing than wooden ones. He encouraged "letters to the editor" and was amongst the first provincial newspaper editors to make editorial comment a routine feature of their paper. His leading articles could be vigorous and pointed. In the first ''Mercury'' under new ownership, Baines promised "Our Paper shall never be made the Vehicle of Party or Personal Abuse",<ref>editorial on page 1 of the ''Leeds Mercury'' for 7 March 1801 which was reproduced in facsimile as page 7 of the ''Leeds Mercury'' of 17 September 1836</ref> but within the year the ''Mercury'' was exchanging insults with the ''[[Cambridge Intelligencer]]'', which accused the ''Mercury'' of dancing to the Government's tune with vague reports of (and editorial comment deploring) nocturnal meetings of the disaffected. In 1805 a new editor of the ''Leeds Intelligencer'' attacked the ''Mercury'' as "bespattered with ... sedition"; together with Baines' heated response this initiated a long-lasting state of mutual incivility between the two papers which makes each an unreliable source for the other's deeds and motives.{{efn|For example, in 1817 Baines spoke ('after acknowledging that spontaneous burst of public favour which had called him forth' according to the report in the ''Mercury'')<ref>{{cite news|title=Leeds Meeting to Address the Prince Regent|work=Leeds Mercury|date=1 March 1817|page=3}}</ref> at a Leeds meeting drawing up a loyal address to the Prince Regent.  The report of the speech finished with an assertion to which the next Intelligencer (3 March)responded at length, inviting its readers to "read your assertion that "THE DELIVERY OF THAT SPEECH … MADE THE PROPRIETOR OF THE INTELLIGENCER, WITH THE PUSILLANIMITY FOR WHICH HE IS REMARKABLE, SHRINK BACK IN SILENT DISMAY!" - let them read this assertion; and then let them have mercy on the feelings of Mr Baines, if he has any, when they are told (what is the fact) that the Proprietor of the Intelligencer had actually ''retired from the Meeting'', immediately after the Address was carried, ''long before Mr Baines began to speak'' - never dreaming, impudent as the "factious editor" of the Mercury is, that at such a meeting, ''even he'' could have the effrontery to intrude his well-known canting trash upon the public!"}}  According to counsel in an 1820 libel case "When there was a dearth of political news, nothing was more common for one Editor to attack another, and the public appeared to find amusement in their squabbles".<ref>{{cite news|title=Yorkshire Spring Assizes: Important to Newspaper Editors - Libel Watts v Baines|work=Leeds Intelligencer|date=1 April 1824|page=3}}</ref>
The ''Mercury'' sent its own reporters to significant events outside its circulation area, such as York Assizes: a ''Mercury'' reporter was present and taking shorthand notes at the giant Reform meeting at Manchester which became the [[Peterloo massacre]].  That reporter was Baines' second son Edward, who from 1820 onwards progressively took over the everyday running of the ''Mercury'' as his father became more involved in local politics.<ref name=Thornton />{{rp|182}}  Not only did the ''Mercury'' displace the ''Intelligencer'' as the leading Leeds paper, by 1832 it could be described by another provincial paper as "the leading provincial paper in England".<ref>so described by the ''Western Times''; comment was reprinted in the ''Mercury'', and the ''Mercury''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s response reprinted (with sardonic comments on false modesty) as {{cite news|title=The ''Western Times'' and the ''Leeds Mercury''|work=Leeds Intelligencer|date=16 February 1832|page=4}}</ref>

=== "The spy Oliver" ===
On 14 June 1817, the first edition of the ''Mercury'' reported that ten Yorkshire men were held in Wakefield jail accused of planning insurrection. It noted that they had been arrested the previous week at a meeting near Dewsbury between them and a [[William J. Oliver|Mr Oliver]], who had represented himself as a delegate from a central organising committee in London; its readers would probably infer that 'Oliver' was a spy. Following the arrest of the men, there had been disturbances at Huddersfield and Ossett.  The second edition made three further charges, supported by the evidence of respectable named moderate reformers: firstly that 'Oliver' had repeatedly urged one of them a Dewsbury bookseller, to attend the meeting: secondly, that 'Oliver' had been seen by another of them at Wakefield after the arrests, and with no satisfactory explanation why he was still at liberty: thirdly that he had been seen in conversation with a liveried man-servant of General Byng, the army officer responsible for internal security in the North of England, the man-servant later saying that on a previous occasion he had driven Oliver from Byng's house to Wakefield to catch a coach. The Mercury made no charge against Byng, but asked who were the employers of 'this double-distilled traitor' and called upon local magistrates to investigate.<ref>{{cite news|title=Projected Insurrection in Yorkshire|work=Leeds Mercury|date=14 June 1817|page=3}}</ref> "On the 16th the exposure of Oliver in the Leeds Mercury was read in both houses of parliament, by Earl Grey in the lords and Sir Francis Burdett in the commons. A strong sensation was produced; and those members, supported by the body of the opposition condemned in the most indignant language the atrocious proceedings brought to light".<ref>{{cite book|last1=Baines|first1=Edward|title=History of the reign of George III (volume IV)|date=1820|location=London|page=82|url=http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015085534702;view=1up;seq=90;size=150|access-date=30 January 2016}}</ref>

Byng wrote to the Mercury, denying much of the initial report, but Baines printed the letter the following week accompanied by further evidence supporting the ''Mercury''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s account and rebutting Byng's.<ref>{{cite news|title=Exploded Plots|work=Leeds Mercury|date=21 June 1817|page=3}}</ref> The report triggered revulsion locally against Oliver and against conviction of those led to crime by government agents. [[William Fitzwilliam, 4th Earl Fitzwilliam|Earl Fitzwilliam]], a [[Whigs (British political party)|Whig]] magnate and Lord Lieutenant of the West Riding, wrote to the Home Office saying that any disturbances in the Riding had been minor and were brought about by Oliver's activities (of which he complained) : the government should not use them to justify a renewed suspension of [[Habeas Corpus]]. Fitzwilliam advised the Huddersfield magistrates not to gather evidence against their rioters; that could only come from accomplices and hence be highly objectionable. At York assizes, the judge in his [[direction to the jury]] was even harsher than Fitzwilliam on the unreliability of the evidence of accomplices, and no convictions were secured. Whilst the ''Mercury''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s exposure of Oliver prevented the conviction of the Yorkshire prisoners, in Derbyshire the participants in the '[[Pentrich rising|Pentridge rebellion]]' (also triggered by Oliver) were not so fortunate, having by mischance killed a man before dispersing when faced with the magistrates and twenty dragoons. Thirty-five were tried for high treason and twenty-three convicted; four being executed.<ref name=skilled>{{cite book|last1=Hammond|first1=John Lawrence|author-link1 = John Lawrence Hammond|last2=Hammond|first2=Barbara|author-link2 = Barbara Hammond|title=The Skilled Labourer 1760–1832|date=1995|publisher=Alan Sutton Publishing|location=Stroud|isbn=0-7509-0967-6|edition=paperback}}</ref>{{rp|362–366}}  Baines could therefore claim to have saved the lives of fellow-Yorkshiremen., and the unmasking of 'Oliver' gave Baines a national reputation.

However, critics such as [[William Cobbett]] pointed out that it was the suspicions of a linen-draper, rather than any investigation by the editor of the ''Mercury'', that had unmasked Oliver,<ref name="CobbettLeeds1830">{{cite news|title=Northern Tour|work=Cobbett's Weekly Political Register|date=6 February 1830|pages=1–2}}</ref> and objected to Baines's treatment of Joseph Mitchell. Oliver had made a previous tour of the North and Midlands with Mitchell, who knew and introduced him to potential insurrectionists. Mitchell was arrested in early May and Oliver made his second tour alone. After Oliver's exposure, Baines prevented Mitchell speaking at meetings of Yorkshire fellow reformers, alleging that Mitchell was under the gravest suspicion of being a spy too. No evidence (other than 'guilt by association') to support Mitchell being an informer - let alone an ''agent provocateur'' -  was produced at the time, nor has any been revealed by subsequent investigation in Home Office archives.<ref name="skilled" />

==="The Great Liar of the North"===
Baines used the ''Mercury'' to advance the causes he supported, and to resist those he opposed, not only in its editorials, but also in its news reporting.  This went beyond the selective choice of events to report, and non-neutral reporting of events covered, to the confident assertion of convenient untruths: for example on factory reform the Mercury asserted that [[Michael Thomas Sadler]] had never spoken, attended a debate or voted on Hobhouse's Bill of 1831, (a statement promptly contradicted by Hobhouse);<ref>untitled editorial item on page 3 following generic header of {{cite news|title=The Leeds Intelligencer; Thursday 15 December 1831|work=Leeds Intelligencer|date=15 December 1831|page=2}}</ref> it put into the mouth of [[Sir George Strickland, 7th Baronet|Sir George Strickland]] a speech in Parliament calling for Sadler's Bill of 1832 to go to a select committee, when Strickland had made no such speech and had called for the bill to be considered by a "Committee of the whole House" and not be delayed by a select committee;<ref>{{cite journal|title=LABOUR OF CHILDREN IN FACTORIES|journal=Hansard House of Commons Debates|date=10 February 1832|volume=10|at=Columns 190–195|url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1832/feb/10/labour-of-children-in-factories#S3V0010P0_18320210_HOC_5}}</ref> when Strickland attended a great county meeting in York on factory reform and disowned the words put in his mouth by the ''Mercury'' the ''Mercury''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s report put into Strickland's mouth its explanation of its mistake, avoiding any mention of the ''Leeds Mercury''.  The report of the county meeting alleged widespread drunkenness amongst the attendees,<ref>{{cite news|title=County Meeting in Support of the Factory Bill|work=Leeds Mercury|date=28 April 1832|page=3}}</ref> a point which had somehow gone unnoticed by other newspapers.{{efn|The ''Mercury'' report is not consistently slanted; most is in good agreement with other newspaper reports, including praise of the perseverance of attendees who marched from the West Riding to York in atrocious conditions.  On a subsequent occasion, a ''Mercury'' reporter was reported (by the other Leeds papers but not by the ''Mercury'') to have defended himself against a motion to expel him from a Radical meeting by claiming that his practice was to always submit a fair report; any unfairness was added at the ''Mercury'' offices.}} Offended by the claims of drunkenness, factory reform supporters subsequently burnt Baines in effigy outside the Mercury offices;<ref>{{cite news|title=Burning of the ''Leeds Mercury'', and of Mr. Baines's Effigy|work=Leeds Intelligencer|date=3 May 1832|page=3}}</ref> the effigy was labelled front and back "The Great Liar of the North", an epithet Cobbett had previously hurled at the ''Mercury''<ref>{{cite news|title=Mr Cobbett's Northern Tour|work=Leeds Intelligencer|date=28 January 1830|page=4}}</ref> and Baines,<ref name="CobbettLeeds1830" /> to whom it had stuck.<ref>{{cite news|title=Hunt's Visit to Leeds|work=Sheffield Independent|date=12 November 1831|page=3}}</ref> Cobbett later wrote more memorably, and more quotably, of

<blockquote>"BROUGHAM's grand puffer, "the GREAT LIAR OF THE NORTH," NED BAINES, publisher of that mass of lies and nonsense called the "''Leeds Mercury''" … this swelled-up, greedy, and unprincipled puffer, who has been the deluder of Yorkshire for twenty years past."<ref name="Cobbett1833">{{cite book|author=William Cobbett|title=Cobbett's tour in Scotland; and in the four northern countries of England: in the autumn of the year 1832|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Vg0HAAAAQAAJ|date=1833|pages=246–247|chapter=Oldham, 16, November, 1832.}}</ref></blockquote>

==Authorship==
As well as his journalistic output, Baines was the author of a number of histories and gazetteers.  His first book - a ''History of the Wars of the French Revolution'' - was published in 1817, having first been published as a part-work from 1814 onwards.  Its account up to 1801 borrowed extensively (and sometimes ''verbatim'') from another author's earlier work of 1803 on the same topic (A Stephens ''The History of the Wars Which Arose out of the French Revolution to Which is Prefixed a Review of the Causes of that Event'' (London 1803)). This went unacknowledged until Baines revised, expanded and retitled the work as a ''History of the Reign of King George III'' (1820); his new preface stating "To facilitate ... progress, and at the recommendation of the publisher and proprietor of Mr Alexander Stephens' s History of the Wars published in 1803, nearly half the details of the first volume were abridged from that work."  This later led to denunciation of Baines as a plagiarist by one of the editors of the ''Intelligencer''. He also produced history/directory/gazetteers for Yorkshire and for Lancashire, later reworking the latter as a county history, ''The History of the County Palatine of Lancaster'' which was continued by other authors.<ref>''The History of the County Palatine and Duchy of Lancaster''; by the late Edward Baines; the biographical department by the late W.  R. Whatton; with the additions of the late [[John Harland]]; and the Rev. Brooke Herford; new rev. & enl, ed, 5 vols. Manchester; London: J. Heywood, 1888-1893.</ref>

==Political career==
===Leeds===
[[File:Edward Baines 1774-1848 statue in Leeds City Hall 2.jpg|thumb|Statue of Edward Baines in Leeds City Hall]]
As proprietor and editor of the ''Mercury'' Baines became an important figure in the affairs of Leeds.  An obituary in 1848 noted <blockquote>Mr Baines took a part in the formation and support of many, if not most of the public institutions of Leeds.  In early youth he was a visitor of the Benevolent, or Strangers' Friend Society, to which he always continued a warm friend.  He assisted to establish the House of Recovery, the Dispensary, the Lancasterian School, the Philosophical Society, the Mechanics' Institution, the Literary Society, the New Library, the Tradesman's Benevolent Society, the Leeds and Yorkshire Insurance Company, our Provident institutions, our Waterworks…- in short, nearly all the institutions for public utility and benevolence established in Leeds within the last half century.<ref name="Ltimesobit">{{cite news|title=Death of Edward Baines, Esq|work=Leeds Times|date=5 August 1848|page=5}}</ref></blockquote>
He also became an important figure in Leeds politics, although as a Dissenter and a Reformer he was effectively excluded from Leeds Corporation which until the 1830s was a 'closed corporation'; vacancies were filled by election by the existing members of the corporation; they were Tories and generally Anglicans, and hence so were their successors. One area of political life from which Reformers and Dissenters could not be excluded was the vestry meeting of the (Anglican) parish church - all property owners (including Dissenters and other non-conformists) had to pay church rates and rate-payers were entitled to attend and vote. Baines fought a prolonged campaign to impose strict economy on church outgoings, starting in 1819 with a demand that accounts be published, and finally in 1828 managing to secure the election of churchwardens committed to economy.<ref name="Thornton" />{{rp|192}}{{efn|By 1833, church out goings had been reduced from £1500 a year to £500. Although Baines had some Anglican allies, the 1832 Leeds election showed a strong denominational tinge to Leeds politics: helped by the fact that the Tory candidate ([[Michael Thomas Sadler]] (a vocal opponent of Baines at vestry meetings) although now an Anglican was well-known to have been a Methodist in his earlier years.}}
 
In the decade before the [[Great Reform Act 1832]] Leeds was not a parliamentary borough but was included in the Yorkshire constituency, now returning four MPs (normally two Whigs and two Tories, normally unopposed). In the 1830 General Election, Baines organised West Riding reformers to ensure that their interests were reflected by the choice of [[Henry Brougham, 1st Baron Brougham and Vaux|Lord Brougham]] and [[George Howard, 7th Earl of Carlisle|Viscount Morpeth]] as Whig nominees, a selection seen as a defeat of county Whigs by "Bainesocracy" of Leeds.<ref>{{cite thesis|title=Politics in Leeds 1852-1865 |date=1983 |first=Richard M. | last=Green| degree=[[Master of Arts|MA]] |page=10 |publisher=[[University of Alberta|The University of Alberta]]|url=https://archive.org/details/Green1983_1}}</ref> On the Whigs coming to power, Brougham became [[Lord Chancellor]], necessitating a by-election: this time the Whigs of rural Yorkshire forestalled the West Riding and secured a more traditional candidate: Sir [[John Vanden-Bempde-Johnstone]] of Harkness Hall, near Scarborough.<!-- http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1820-1832/member/vanden-bempde-johnstone-sir-john-1799-1869 -->

Baines was a leading light in reform agitation in Leeds, and was commissioned by [[Lord John Russell]] to determine whether qualification in borough constituencies could safely be set as low as £10 (rates paid a year).<ref name="Thornton" /> Baines found that in Leeds a £10 franchise would give the vote to the middle classes but still exclude the working classes: the results of Baines' investigation were reported by Russell in parliamentary debate as showing that "the £10 qualification does not admit any person who may not safely be intrusted with the elective franchise".<ref name = LJR>{{cite journal|title=PARLIAMENTARY REFORM—BILL FOR ENGLAND—SECOND READING—ADJOURNED DEBATE.|journal=Hansard House of Commons Debates|date=17 December 1831|volume=9|at=Columns 429–547|url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1831/dec/17/parliamentary-reform-bill-for-england|access-date=31 August 2014}}</ref>{{efn|... Leeds has been regularly canvassed for the purposes of election, by twenty or thirty gentlemen, of respectable station and known character, in that chief seat of our woollen manufacture. The result of their canvass has been, that, in the quarters of the town chiefly inhabited by the working classes, not more than one in every fifty householders will have a vote under the 10l. clause. In the principal streets for shops, almost every male householder will have a vote. In the parts of the town occupied by dwelling houses, the number occupied by females makes a very material deduction from the number of votes. The working classes in Leeds, almost all live in houses of from 5l. to 8l. rent; out of 140 householders, heads of families (including several overlookers) employed in the mill of Messrs. Marshall and Co., not more than two will have votes; out of 160 householders in the mill of Messrs. C. Willans and Sons, Holbeck (including fifteen overlookers) many earning 25s. to 30s. a-week, not one will have a vote; out of 100 householders in the works of Messrs. Taylor and Wordsworth, machine makers, only one, even of this high class of mechanics, will have a vote; out of 11,000 inhabitants of the township of Holbeck, chiefly occupied by the working classes, but also containing mills, dye-houses, public-houses, and some respectable dwellings, there would be only 150 voters. The township of Wortley has nearly 6,000 individuals, and 130 voters. Armley, with 5,000 inhabitants, will have only 150 votes. Upon the whole, the unanimous opinion of the canvassers was, that the 10l. qualification does not admit any person who may not safely be intrusted with the elective franchise...<ref name = LJR />}} As the reform crisis of 1831–1832 developed, Radicals (who wanted a more thorough-going reform: significantly wider suffrage, annual parliaments and the secret ballot) broke away from the Leeds reform organisation (the Leeds Association, set up by Baines and his associates) and founded the Leeds Radical Reform Union, pressing for Whig reform bills to be more thorough-going with a minority holding that they should be opposed (as a half-measure intended to choke off thorough reform). Baines strove to minimise the Radical breakaway, and to retain Radical support for moderate reform, by his own actions, by encouraging formation of a rival Leeds Political Union, by editorials in the ''Mercury'' and by ensuring that Radical meetings and manifestations were reported upon unfavourably by the ''Mercury''. The ''Leeds Patriot'', a Radical paper, soon found itself under attack from Baines, responding that "veracity has no charms for Mr Baines, when he has an object to carry...he will stoop to the meanest prevarication and the most contemptible falsehoods".<ref>{{cite news|title=Mr Baines and His Audacious Falsehoods|work=Leeds Patriot and Yorkshire Advertiser|date=30 April 1831|page=3}}</ref>

In the expectation that the Reform Bill of 1831, would pass, and would establish [[Leeds (UK Parliament constituency)|Leeds as a two-member borough constituency]], the Leeds reformers chose two candidates in August 1831: [[John Marshall (MP for Leeds, died 1836)|John Marshall]] (whose father, also [[John Marshall (industrialist)|John Marshall]] was a leading Leeds millowner and had served as an MP for Yorkshire), and (at Baines's urging) [[Thomas Babington Macaulay]], a gifted Whig orator with a national reputation, but no previous connection with Leeds. When elections for the first reformed parliament eventually took place in December 1832, the two Whigs comfortably defeated the sole Tory candidate [[Michael Thomas Sadler]] despite active support for Sadler from the Leeds radical reformers.  Sadler had taken up the issue of [[Factory Acts|factory reform]]; the ''Mercury'' (which had printed [[Richard Oastler]]'s first letter on "Yorkshire Slavery" (the over-working and ill-treatment of children in the West Riding textile industry) before cooling on the issue) denounced this as a Tory trick to lure the gullible away from the Whig reform programme.  (Baines and the ''Mercury'' were to hold similar views on the anti-Poor Law movement of the late 1830s; the underlying cause of working-class discontent was the Corn Laws, and all efforts should go into removing the underlying cause, rather than palliating its symptoms). Years of activity by Sadler and his brother in Leeds meant that much was known for and against him, and the ''Mercury'' was assiduous in reminding its readers of the 'against'.

The Tories and their Radical allies had attacked Macaulay as a placeman and a stranger: interested in Leeds only as providing him with a seat in Parliament; interested in a seat in Parliament largely as a means of securing comfortable sinecures for himself and his family (whose government appointments were currently yielding them a total annual income of over £4000).<ref>{{cite news|last1=Common Sense|title=Letter to an Elector of Leeds|work=Leeds Intelligencer|date=18 October 1832|page=4}} goes into this in detail.</ref> The Macaulay family was seriously financially embarrassed, and Macaulay soon decided that income from posts held only for so long as the Whigs held power was insufficiently secure. He resigned from parliament and went out to India in 1834 as a member of the supreme council of India, on an annual salary of £10,000.  Baines was the Whig candidate at the ensuing by-election; there was a separate Radical candidate, but Baines's chief opponent was the Tory [[Sir John Beckett, 2nd Baronet|Sir John Beckett]].  Beckett was Leeds-born and educated; the Beckett family bank was pre-eminent in Leeds ("The Rothschilds and Barings of Leeds") and was recognised to have acted in the interests of Leeds as a whole in past crises, but Sir John had pursued a legal career away from Leeds, culminating in his appointment in mid-1817 (soon after his marriage to a daughter of the [[William Lowther, 1st Earl of Lonsdale|Earl of Lonsdale]]) as [[Judge Advocate General of the Armed Forces|Judge Advocate-General]], and consequent entry into Parliament in 1818 in [[Cockermouth (UK Parliament constituency)|Cockermouth]], one of his father-in-law's [[pocket borough]]s. As the ''Mercury'' pointed out,<ref>quoted at length in {{cite news|title=Leeds Election|work=Morning Chronicle|date=27 January 1834|page=3}}</ref> he had been Under-Secretary of State at the Home Office from 1806 to 1817, the ''Mercury'' going on to claim that it was from him that Oliver had received his instructions{{efn|Beckett was employed as a lawyer, not a politician, and was (he asserted) ignorant of the existence of Oliver until his exposure.  There is (to this day) at least plausible deniability that the Home Office knew precisely what Oliver was up to. When the Whig opposition objected strongly in Parliament to Oliver having been sent on tour as an ''agent provocateur'', Lord Liverpool said Oliver had been positively instructed not to going beyond information-gathering to the encouragement or incitement of insurrection.<ref>{{cite journal|title=HABEAS CORPUS SUSPENSION BILL|journal=Hansard House of Lords Debates|date=16 June 1817|volume=36|at=Columns 975–1016}}</ref> Informants present at other meetings attended by 'Oliver' took him at face value (as a genuine delegate from insurrectionists in London) and reported to local magistrates his presence and incitement of insurrection, but the magistrates to whom they reported had not been informed by the Home Office that Oliver was working for it.<ref name="skilled" />}} These and other accusations against Beckett were widely placarded across Leeds. Beckett (unlike Sadler) directly addressed Baines's accusations at the earliest opportunity in a good-humoured speech.<ref>{{cite news|title=Sir John Beckett's Visit to Leeds|work=Leeds Intelligencer|date=1 February 1834|page=3}}</ref> Baines was elected, but his majority over Beckett was only thirty-one.<ref>{{cite news|title=Close of the Leeds Election|work=Leeds Intelligencer|date=22 February 1834|page=3}}</ref> Better Tory organisation for the 1835 general election saw Beckett displace Marshall, but at this and the 1837 general election Baines topped the poll; he stood down in at the 1841 election because his health was deteriorating.

===Parliament===
In parliament he occasionally spoke against Whig policies, but generally voted for them.{{efn|His views on national political issues should be distinguished from those of his son Edward Baines who succeeded him both as editor of the ''Mercury'' and (eventually) as MP for Leeds.  Unfortunately, it is not always easy to do so: as Thornton notes historians have often failed to distinguish between the two Edwards (sometimes taking them to be a single person); furthermore the son's biography of his father did not always clearly distinguish between the views which the elder Baines held and those which his son felt he should have held.}} He spoke (and voted) against the [[Poor Law Amendment Act 1834]], introducing the New Poor Law, because he felt that there was no call for central government to interfere in areas where poor rates were low;<ref>{{cite journal|title=POOR LAWS' AMENDMENT - REPORT|journal=Hansard House of Commons Debates|date=27 June 1834|volume=24|at=Columns 913–935|url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1834/jun/27/poor-laws-amendment-report#S3V0024P0_18340627_HOC_31|access-date=15 February 2016}}</ref> however he became a supporter when the new Poor Law Commission did not in practice intervene.  He spoke frequently on the grievances of Dissenters: in May 1834 he chaired a national meeting of Dissenter delegations which preceded discussion of specific grievances with a resolution describing "full and complete separation of church and state" as "the true basis on which equal rights and justice can be secured to all classes of his majesty's subjects
";<ref>All the resolutions passed at the meeting were printed as an advertisement e.g. {{cite news|title=AT a MEETING for conference, between the UNITED COMMITTEE appointed to obtain the REDRESS of the GRIEVANCES of DISSENTERS and DEPUTIES from various parts of the Country, summoned specially for the purpose, held at the City of London Tavern, on Thursday, the 8th of May 1834, EDWARD BAINES, ESQ. M.P. IN THE CHAIR 
|work=Bradford Observer|date=15 May 1834|page=1}}</ref> later that year he told parliament that "If the principles of dissent were properly understood, the very circumstance of a man being a Dissenter was a declaration that he could not agree to the union between Church and State."<ref>{{cite journal|title=VIEWS OF THE DISSENTERS|journal=Hansard House of Commons Debates|date=11 June 1834|volume=24|at=Columns 354–360|url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1834/jun/11/views-of-the-dissenters#S3V0024P0_18340611_HOC_7|access-date=15 February 2016}}</ref> However, the ''Mercury'' reported although the 1834 meeting had readily endorsed the principle behind its resolution, there had been considerable debate as to the policy of stating it; as a compromise "it was determined to state the principle, but not put it forward in any petition or memorial".<ref>untitled item under generic heading {{cite news|title=The Mercury|work=Leeds Mercury|date=17 May 1834|page=5}}</ref> In 1837 Baines seems to have been badly worsted in debate as a result: in a debate on the abolition of church rates he was challenged whether this was the ultimate "healing measure" as far as Dissenters were concerned: he responded by denying that Dissenters had any intention to interfere with the connection between Church and State.<ref name="1837churchrates">{{cite journal|title=CHURCH-RATES|journal=Hansard House of Commons Debates|date=22 May 1837|volume=38|at=Columns 929–978|url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1837/may/22/church-rates#S3V0038P0_18370522_HOC_5|access-date=15 February 2016}}</ref> The next speaker, however, not only gave the House an account of the proceedings at a recent anti-church rate meeting in Leeds, he had come prepared with a copy of the resolutions of the 1834 meeting, which he read out to the House.<ref name="1837churchrates" />{{efn|Speech of Mr. Hardy, to which ''Hansard'' does not do full justice - a fuller version can be found in the parliamentary report of the ''Evening Standard'',<ref>{{cite news|title=Imperial Parliament|work=Evening Standard|date=23 May 1837|location=London|page=2}}</ref> which comments on the intermittent audibility in the reporters' gallery of the speech.}} Baines failed to retrieve the situation by a subsequent editorial in the ''Leeds Mercury'' which asserted that whilst the vast majority of Dissenters thought any connection between church and state wrong, the vast majority of them did not see the existence of an established church as a political question, let alone a grievance;<ref>item in editorial section under generic heading {{cite news|title=The Mercury|work=Leeds Mercury|date=27 May 1837|page=5}}</ref> but was not believed. He spoke against the continuance of the English [[Regium Donum]],<ref>{{cite journal|title=SUPPLY—DISSENTING CLERGYMEN|journal=Hansard House of Commons Debates|volume=44|date=9 July 1838|at=Columns 39–41|url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1838/jul/09/supply-dissenting-clergymen#S3V0044P0_18380709_HOC_35|access-date=15 February 2016}}</ref> and repeatedly argued that [[Queen Anne's Bounty]] ( a fund for augmenting the income of poor Church of England ministers) should be put on a much sounder basis: its revenue of 'First Fruits and Tenths' - calculated from revenues in the reign of Henry VIII - would be greatly increased by being calculated from current revenues.<ref>for example {{cite journal|title=FIRST FRUITS AND TENTHS|journal=Hansard House of Commons Debates|date=17 February 1840|volume=52|at=Columns 338–343|url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1840/feb/17/first-fruits-and-tenths#S3V0052P0_18400217_HOC_62|access-date=15 February 2016}}</ref> He supported Poulett Thomson's Bill of 1836 for relaxation of the 1834 Factory Act; he also voted for subsequent government factory regulation bills, but when he spoke in debates on them made it clear that he thought there was no need for them.

===Children and legacy===
His son, [[Edward Baines (1800–1890)|Sir Edward Baines]] (1800–1890), of St Ann's Hill, Leeds, was editor and afterwards proprietor of the ''Leeds Mercury,'' M.P. for [[Leeds (UK Parliament constituency)|Leeds]] (1859–1874), and was knighted in 1880; his ''History of the Cotton Manufacture'' (1835) was long a standard authority, he also wrote a biography of his father ''The life of Edward Baines, late M.P. for the Borough of Leeds''.

An elder son, [[Matthew Talbot Baines]] (1799–1860), went to the bar; he became recorder of [[Kingston upon Hull]] in (1837), M.P. for [[Kingston upon Hull (UK Parliament constituency)|Kingston upon Hull]] in 1847, president of the Poor Law Board in 1849, was returned as M.P. for Leeds 1852, again became president of the Poor Law Board (until 1855), and entered the cabinet as [[Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster]] in 1856.

He had two further surviving sons: [[Thomas Baines (journalist)|Thomas Baines]] (1806–1881) and Frederick Baines (1811–1893); his fourth and fifth sons died during childhood.{{sfn|Baines|1851|p=71}}

The youngest daughter of Edward Baines – Margaret (d. 1891) – married another political figure, [[Charles Reed (British politician)|Charles Reed]], in 1844.

Another daughter, Charlotte, was the mother of South Australian politician and [[List of mayors and lord mayors of Adelaide|mayor of Adelaide]], [[Theodore Bruce]].

==Publications==
* {{citation| first = Edward |last =  Baines |title=History of the Wars of the French Revolution; from the breaking out of the war in 1792, to the restoration of a general peace, in 1815; comprehending the civil history of Great Britain and France during that period | publisher = Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown | location = London }}
:: {{citation|date = 1817| title= (Volume 1) | url =https://archive.org/details/historyofwarsoff01bainuoft}} {{citation| date = 1818|title= (Volume 2) |url = https://archive.org/details/historywarsfren00unkngoog }}
: These became volumes 2 and 3 in an expanded four volume work:
:* {{citation| title = History of the reign of George III, King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland| first = Edward|last = Baines|date = 1820|publisher =  Longman, Hurst; Hurst and Robinson }} {{citation| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=X3PoAAAAMAAJ| title = Volume 1 | last1 = Baines | first1 = Edward | date = 1820 }}{{citation| url = http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015085534702;view=1up;seq=7| title = Volume 4 | publisher = Printed by E. Baines for Longman, Hurst and Hurst and Robinson }}
::: (In 1820, an enterprising American published those parts of volume 2 of Baines' ''"History of the Wars."'' dealing with the War of 1812 as {{citation| title=Baine's History of the Late War between the United States and Great Britain|year = 1820 |url = https://archive.org/details/baineshistoryof00bain }})
* {{citation| first = Edward|last =  Baines |title= History, directory & gazetteer of the county of York.. | publisher = Edward Baines at the Leeds Mercury office | location = Leeds}}: {{citation| title =   Volume I - West Riding| url = https://archive.org/details/historydirector00baingoog|date = 1822}}; {{citation| title=  Volume II - East and North Ridings|date = 1823|url = https://archive.org/details/historydirector02baingoog}}
* {{cite book|first = Edward| last=Baines|title=History, directory and gazetteer of the county palatine of Lancaster. The directory department by W. Parson. &#91;With&#93; Illustrations|publisher=W. Wales & Company | location = Liverpool}} {{cite book|title= Volume I|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LvYNAAAAQAAJ|date=1824|last1 = Baines|first1 = Edward}} {{cite book|title=Volume II|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pIAfAQAAMAAJ|date=1825|last1 = Baines|first1 = Edward}}: later reworked as 
:* {{cite book| first = Edward| last=Baines|title=History of the County Palatine and Duchy of Lancaster. The biographical department by W. R. Whatton| url = https://archive.org/details/historyofcounty01bain|date=1836|publisher=Fisher, son & Company | location = London }} {{cite book|title= Volume I|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZrJCAQAAMAAJ|last1 = Baines|first1 = Edward|date = 1836}} {{cite book|title= Volume II| year =1836| url =https://archive.org/details/historyofcountyp02bain}}  {{cite book|title= Volume III|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8bJCAQAAMAAJ|last1 = Baines|first1 = Edward|date = 1836}}  {{cite book|title= Volume IV|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ncs3AQAAMAAJ|last1 = Baines|first1 = Edward|date = 1836}}

* {{cite book|title=The History of the County Palatine and Duchy of Lancaster|author = Edward Baines; the biographical department by W. R. Whatton, with the additions of John Harland and Brooke Herford |location = Manchester | publisher =John Heywood |edition = New, revised and enlarged  |date =1888–1893 |postscript =  5 vols. An expansion of the author's 'History, directory and gazetteer of the county palatine of Lancaster', 1824–1825. }}

==Notes==
{{notelist}}

==References==
{{reflist}}

===Biographies===
* {{Cite EB1911|wstitle=Baines, Edward|volume=3}}
* {{citation| first = Edward|last=Baines|author-link = Edward Baines (1800–1890)| title = The life of Edward Baines, late M.P. for the Borough of Leeds| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=qYXpz54H6fwC| date= 1851| publisher= Longman, Brown, Green and Longman (London); Reid Newsome (Leeds)}}
* {{cite thesis|title=Mr Mercury - a Biographical Study of Edward Baines with special reference to his role as editor, author and politician| first=David |last=Thornton | degree =PhD |publisher=[[University of Leeds|The University of Leeds]]|date=July 1999| url=https://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/441/1/uk_bl_ethos_269708.pdf}}

== External links ==
{{Commons category|Edward Baines (1774–1848)}}
* {{Hansard-contribs | mr-edward-baines | Edward Baines }}

{{s-start}}
{{s-par|uk}}
{{succession box
 | title  = [[Member of Parliament (United Kingdom)|Member of Parliament]] for [[Leeds (UK Parliament constituency)|Leeds]]
 | years  = 1834 – [[1841 United Kingdom general election|1841]]
 | with   = [[John Marshall (1797–1836)|John Marshall]] to 1835
 | with2  = [[Sir John Beckett, 2nd Baronet|Sir John Beckett]] 1835–1837
 | with3  = [[Sir William Molesworth, 8th Baronet|Sir William Molesworth]] 1837–1841
 | before = [[John Marshall (1797–1836)|John Marshall]]<br />[[Thomas Babington Macaulay, 1st Baron Macaulay|Thomas Babington Macaulay]]
 | after  = [[William Beckett (MP)|William Beckett]]<br />[[William Aldam]]
}}
{{s-end}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Baines, Edward}}
[[Category:1774 births]]
[[Category:1848 deaths]]
[[Category:Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1832–1835]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1835–1837]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1837–1841]]
[[Category:People from Walton-le-Dale]]