Reign of Queen Victoria1837-1901

Victorian Reforms• 1832 – Reform Act of 1832 gave solid middle

class men the vote and redistributed parliamentary districts (boroughs) to take the rapidly growing cities into account. (Whig)

• 1842 – Mines Act barred women and small boys from the mines. (Conservative)

• 1846 – Repeal of the Corn Laws (Whigs with some high ranking Conservative support including Robert Peel)

• 1847 – Ten Hours Act limited the workday for women and children in the textile industry to 10 hours (Whig)

SUMMARY OFTories and Whigs

(Conservatives and Liberals)Party of the Aristocracy• Scared by the French

Revolution (suspended habeas corpus, controlled the press w/Six Acts, practically ended right to assembly)

• Want to keep making $ after the end of the Continental System (which had helped the sales of domestic corn grown on land they owned) – Corn Laws, 1815

• Did pass major reform with the Mines Act of 1842

Led by aristocrats but more friendly to the middle class

• Made representation in the Commons more reflective of population density, allowed the solid middle class to vote – Reform Bill of 1832

• Supported the repeal of the Corn Laws in 1846 (joined by Tory leader Robert Peel)

• Limited the work day with the Ten Hours Act

Victorian AccomplishmentsBritain at height of industrialization Production increased greatly

Wages for worker climbed after 1850 (though Marx & Engels wrote the Communist Manifesto during Victoria’ reign

Crystal Palace, 1851

Victorian Accomplishments

• British Empire spans the world

Victorian Accomplishments

• Incredible railroad building

Victorian Accomplishments

Elaborate Architecture

Victorian Accomplishments• Electric lights on

London streets• Darwin’s theory of

natural selection• Invention of

photography

Victorian Accomplishments

• Attempts to make education available to all children in England (similar to Prussia)

Victorian Morals

• Stressed hard work and discipline (If you fell on hard times, it was your own fault.)

• Emphasis on public and private responsibility

• Devotion to family life

Victorian Morals

• Emphasis on Christian morality– Drunkenness and

gambling denounced– Sexual purity and fidelity

celebrated (see below)– Dressed conservatively

Augustus Egg’s Untitled Triptych Eventually titled: Past and Present 1-3

When these paintings were exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1858, they had no listed title and, indeed, remained without title at Egg’s premature death in 1863. Instead, the following subtitle was affixed: 'August 4th-Have just heard that B-has been dead more than a fortnight, so his poor children have now lost both parents. I hear she was seen on Friday last near the Strand, evidently without a place to lay her head. What a fall hers has been.’

rrie

Victorian Reality

• Role of women in society diminished (less work, less influence)

• Many people acted morally, but lived immorally (high rates of prostitution, illegal gambling)

• Britain ruled a large empire, but subjugated the people they ruled