Russell, John Russell, 1st Earl, 1792–1878, British statesman; younger son of the 6th duke of Bedford, known most of his life as Lord John Russell. He became a Whig member of Parliament in 1813 and soon began his long career as a liberal reformer. He worked for Catholic Emancipation, leading the attack on the Test and Corporation acts, which were repealed in 1828. As paymaster general in the ministry of the 2d Earl Grey, Russell helped prepare and introduce the Reform Bill of 1832 (see under Reform Acts Reform Act of 1832, enacted under the Whig administration of the 2d Earl Grey , redistributed seats in the interest of larger communities; it also extended the franchise in the boroughs to those who occupied premises of an annual value of £10 and in the counties to similar
..... Click the link for more information. ). His advocacy of the reduction of Irish church revenues helped bring down the Whig government in 1834, but when the Whigs returned to power (1835), Russell became home secretary and later secretary for war and the colonies (1839). In the meantime he had given the name to the newly emerging Liberal party Liberal party, former British political party, the dominant political party in Great Britain for much of the period from the mid-1800s to World War I.

Origins

..... Click the link for more information. and become one of its chief spokesmen. Russell led the opposition during the second ministry (1841–46) of Sir Robert Peel and, following the repeal of the corn laws (which Russell supported), succeeded him as prime minister. During his ministry Russell used public works, grants, and other relief to help the Irish during the potato famine and supported the bill (1847) that limited the working day to 10 hr for many laborers. In 1851 he demanded the resignation of his foreign secretary, Viscount Palmerston Palmerston, Henry John Temple, 3d Viscount, 1784–1865, British statesman. His viscountcy, to which he succeeded in 1802, was in the Irish peerage and therefore did not prevent him from entering the
..... Click the link for more information. , for his unauthorized approval of Napoleon III's coup in France, and the following year Palmerston helped secure the fall of Russell's ministry. Russell served (1852–55) in Lord Aberdeen's coalition government and represented (1855) England at Vienna in an unsuccessful conference to end the Crimean War. He was reconciled with Palmerston and, as his foreign secretary (1859–65), vigorously advocated neutrality in the American Civil War and supported the Risorgimento in Italy. He had been made an earl in 1861 and became prime minister again on Palmerston's death in 1865. For many years an advocate of further parliamentary reform, he attempted to push through a new Reform Bill, but the bill was defeated and caused the fall of his ministry in 1866. Among Russell's literary and historical writings are a translation of Schiller's Don Carlos and biographies of Lord William Russell (1819) and of Charles James Fox (3 vol., 1853–57).

Bibliography

See his Recollections and Suggestions, 1813–1873 (1875); early correspondence (ed. by R. Russell; 2 vol., 1913) and later correspondence (ed. by G. P. Gooch; 2 vol., 1925); biographies by S. Walpole (2 vol., 1889, repr. 1968) and J. Prest (1972); W. P. Morrell, British Colonial Policy in the Age of Peel and Russell (1930, repr. 1966).

Russell (of Kingston Russell), John Russell, 1st Earl

(born Aug. 18, 1792, London, Eng.—died May 28, 1878, Pembroke Lodge, Richmond Park, Surrey) British politician and prime minister (1846–52, 1865–66). A member of the prominent Russell family, he entered Parliament in 1813. He was a strong advocate of reform and made it a cause of the Whig Party, leading the effort to pass the Reform Bill of 1832. He served in Viscount Melbourne's government as home secretary (1835), reducing the number of crimes liable to capital punishment and beginning state support of public education. In the 1840s he advocated free trade and forced Robert Peel out of office. Russell became prime minister in 1846 and established the 10-hour day in factories (1847) and a board of public health (1848), but party disunity defeated his attempts at wider social and economic reform.