The new opposition in the house of lords, 1720–3
ABSTRACTThis article looks at the membership and organization of the opposition that emerged in the house of lords between 1720 and 1723 under the leadership of William, 1st Earl Cowper. The origin of this new opposition lay in the political reaction to the extensive corruption exposed by the bursting of the South Sea Bubble, which brought together a coalition of dissident whigs and tones (both Hanoverian tories and Jacobites) who proceeded to attack the ministries of the earl of Sunderland and of Viscount Townshend and Robert Walpole for their supposed corrupt administration. The hallmark of the new opposition was the extensive campaign of protests against the opposition's defeat in votes, protests which were entered (with reasons) into the Journals of the House, and which were then published in the form of broadsheets, pamphlets, and newsletters as propaganda in an appeal to public opinion. This was the first time an opposition had indulged in an extensive and sustained campaign of influencing the public outside Westminster. This campaign required a high level of organization. This Cowper provided in imitation of some of the new management techniques being developed by the ministry to control the house of lords, plus a new feature – the daily pre-sitting meetings of the leadership to concert tactics. The legacy of the new opposition was the preservation of the concept of a loyal opposition as an acceptable part of British political life.