The Making of the English Working Class

Chapter 13 returns to the historical narrative of English Radicalism. The government’s counter-revolutionary repression of the late 1790s had crushed organized Jacobinism. The movement remained formidable, but its adherents were scattered and isolated. This chapter, therefore, represents Thompson’s “attempt” at a “coherent historical account of an incoherent presence” (451).

Three important developments illuminate the changing nature of English Radicalism in the first decade of the 19th century. First, Napoleon Bonaparte’s imperial ambitions and assumption of dictatorial powers meant that English Jacobins no longer could look to France for inspiration or support. An English Revolution, therefore, would have to originate with the English people. Second, the Tory polemicist William Cobbett turned his pen against Old Corruption and gave Radicals libertarian rhetoric with which to challenge the English government’s most exploitative and authoritarian practices. In so doing, Cobbett established himself as Radicalism’s most effective spokesman. Third, in 1807, through the tireless exertions of the Westminster Committee, Radicals won two seats in Parliament. This committee ensured that the two London-based Westminster seats would remain reliably Radical throughout the early 19th century.