The natural relation of trade and commerce to the general wealth of the people at large was thus disturbed by the peculiar circumstances of the time. The war enriched the landowner, the farmer, the merchant, the manufacturer; but it impoverished the poor. It is indeed from these fatal years that we must date that war of classes, that social severance between employers and employed, which still forms the main difficulty of English politics. But it is from these too that we must date the renewal of that progressive movement in politics which had been suspended since the opening of the war. The publication of the _Edinburgh Review_ in 1802 by a knot of young lawyers at Edinburgh marked a revival of the policy of constitutional and administrative progress which had been reluctantly abandoned by William Pitt. Jeremy Bentham gave a new vigour to political speculation by his advocacy of the doctrine of Utility, and his definition of "the greatest happiness of the greatest number" as the aim of political action. In 1809 Sir Francis Burdett revived the question of Parliamentary Reform. Only fifteen members supported his motion; and a reference to the House of Commons in a pamphlet which he subsequently published, as "a part of our fellow-subjects collected together by means which it is not necessary to describe," was met by his committal to the Tower, where he remained till the prorogation of the Parliament. A far greater effect was produced by the perseverance with which Canning pressed year by year the question of Catholic Emancipation. So long as Perceval lived both efforts at Reform were equally vain; but the advancing strength of a more liberal sentiment in the nation was felt by the policy of "moderate concession" which was adopted by his successors. Catholic Emancipation became an open question in the Cabinet itself, and was adopted in 1812 by a triumphant majority in the House of Commons, though it was still rejected by the Lords.
With social and political troubles thus awaking anew to life about them, even Tory statesmen were not willing to face the terrible consequences of a ruin of English industry such as might follow from the junction of America with Napoleon. They were in fact preparing to withdraw the Orders in Council, when their plans were arrested by the dissolution of the Perceval ministry. Its position had from the first been a weak one. A return of the king's madness made it necessary in the beginning of 1811 to confer the Regency on the Prince of Wales; and the Whig sympathies of the Prince threatened for a while the Cabinet with dismissal. Though this difficulty was surmounted their hold of power remained insecure, and the insecurity of the ministry told on the conduct of the war; for the apparent inactivity of Wellington during 1811 was really due to the hesitation and timidity of the Cabinet at home. But in May 1812 the assassination of Perceval by a madman named Bellingham brought about the dissolution of his ministry; and fresh efforts were made by the Regent to install the Whigs in office. Mutual distrust however again foiled his attempts; and the old ministry returned to office under the headship of Lord Liverpool, a man of no great abilities, but temperate, well informed, and endowed with a remarkable skill in holding discordant colleagues together. The most important of these colleagues was Lord Castlereagh, who became Secretary for Foreign Affairs. Time has long ago rendered justice to the political ability of Castlereagh, disguised as it was to men of his own day by a curious infelicity of expression; and the instinctive good sense of Englishmen never showed itself more remarkably than in their preference at this crisis of his cool judgement, his high courage, his discernment, and his will to the more showy brilliancy of Canning. His first work indeed as a minister was to meet the danger in which Canning had involved the country by his Orders in Council. On the 23rd of June, only twelve days after the ministry had been formed, these Orders were repealed. But, quick as was Castlereagh's action, events had moved even more quickly. At the opening of the year America, in despair of redress, had resolved on war; Congress had voted an increase of both army and navy; and laid in April an embargo on all vessels in American harbours. Actual hostilities might still have been averted by the repeal of the Orders, on which the English Cabinet was resolved; but in the confusion which followed the murder of Perceval, and the strife of parties for office through the month that followed, the opportunity was lost. When the news of the repeal reached America, it came six weeks too late. On the 18th of June an Act of Congress had declared America at war with Great Britain.