Peterloo Massacre

(Aug. 16, 1819) Brutal dispersal of a meeting held on St. Peter's Fields in Manchester, Eng. Called to protest unemployment and high food prices and demand parliamentary reform, the meeting drew about 60,000 people, including many women and children. Alarmed by its size, city officials ordered the city's volunteer cavalry to arrest the speakers. The untrained cavalry also attacked the peaceable crowd with sabres, and professional soldiers were sent to join the attack. After a 10-minute rout, about 500 people lay injured and 11 were dead. The incident (likened to Waterloo) came to symbolize Tory tyranny. 

 

Corn Laws

During the 19th century the demand for the repeal of the Corn Laws became a slogan of the strengthened industrial bourgeoisie, which sought to weaken the economic and political position of the landed aristocracy and to expand its own influence. The anti-Corn Law movement was an integral part of the industrial bourgeoisie’s struggle to introduce free trade. In 1846 the British government, despite opposition from the landlords, carried a bill through Parliament repealing the Corn Laws. The net effect of the Corn Laws was to limit the agricultural products available on the domestic market and to increase the products’ prices; the laws thus served the interests of the big landowners and helped preserve the system of landlordism.