and favored a limited reform of the voting system.
The Abolition of the Slave Trade
On entering Parliament, one of Lushington’s immediate major concerns was the slave trade. In 1784, four years after his election as a Member of Parliament, William Wilberforce’s increasing interest in social reform led him to try to use his influence at Westminster to end the traffic in human beings. His campaign was initially directed at the slave trade, and only later at the prohibition of slavery itself. He was supported by the Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade, which had been formed in 1787 by a group of English evangelical Protestants and Quakers.
Although the first Bill to abolish the slave trade, and others that followed it, were defeated, Wilberforce refused to give up his struggle and, in 1806, the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act was eventually passed by the Lords and, the following year carried by the House of Commons. Lushington, still a young parliamentarian, rose to his feet to forcibly support the Bill, expressing his surprise on hearing his opponents “enter into cold calculation of loss and gain” when for his part “he could never stop to balance imports and exports against justice and humanity.”6 Although many believed that the 1806 Bill to would swiftly lead to the end of slavery itself, this did not happen until some years later.
In 1809, Lushington proposed a motion to castigate the behavior of Sir Home Popham, his predecessor as MP for Yarmouth. Such action clearly flew in the face of his sponsor Lord Suffield and following the defeat of the motion, Lushington resigned his seat and devoted his energies to his growing legal practice.
Beyond Parliament
After leaving Parliament, Lushington continued to pursue a wide range of areas of social concern. He was particularly concerned with the plight of working children, and he supported restrictions on the hours of work for children in factories, calling the former system “revolting to humanity, and to every principle of British justice.” In 1818, he spoke to a committee of the House of Lords in favor of the protection of chimney-sweepers’ boys, a cause that he continued to promote wherever possible. The “climbing boys,” as they were known, were small enough to climb narrow flues. They were often sold by their parents to chimney-sweepers for prices ranging from a few shillings to two guineas, the smaller the child, the better the price. Their plight was highlighted in Charles Kingsley’s novel The Water Babies. For some years, Lushington served on the committee of the Society for Superseding the Necessity of Climbing Boys.
In 1819, after his appointment as a Governor of Guy’s Hospital in London, Lushington turned his attention to reform within the medical world. He used his parliamentary connections to help secure the passage of the first Anatomy Acts, which rescued anatomy from being “little better than an alliance with felony to a legitimate branch of medical education.”7 The Lushington family continued their connections with Guy’s into the next generation when Lushington’s eldest son, Edward Harbord, became Treasurer and then a Governor of the hospital. Lushington later established a nursing and convalescent home in the village of Ockham for patients in need of country air which was placed under the supervsion of his daughter Laura.
The University of London
Lushington’s interest in educational reform found the perfect outlet through the creation of the University of London, which was opened in Gower Street in 1828, and known from 1836 to the present day as University College London. The university was founded by what Jeremy Bentham called “as association of liberals” with the object of providing university education to those who were unable to graduate from Oxford and Cambridge because they were not confessing Anglicans. The university insisted that religion should play no part in its admissions policy and subsequently earned the reputation of being “the godless institution of Gower Street.” A wide syllabus was offered which included modern languages, geography, and a number of other scientific and medical subjects that were not available elsewhere.
The prime mover in the development of the new university was the Scottish poet Thomas Campbell. He was supported by Lushington’s old friend and colleague Henry Brougham who regarded himself as a Benthamite, a believer in the utilitarian principle of “the greatest happiness of the greatest number.” Brougham drew Lushington into the project leading to Campbell’s dream becoming a reality. Among the other founders of the university were two other old friends of Lushington's, Zachary Macaulay, with whom he had campaigned against slavery, and the William Tooke MP with whom Lushington had worked on behalf of the climbing boys.
Lushington, as one of the initial proprietors and shareholders in the scheme to build the university, delivered a public address at the laying of the foundation stone in 1827 in which he explained that the principal object of the new university was to make available the advantages of education to those excluded from the ancient universities by lack of wealth and by religious persuasion. The following year Lushington joined the university’s Education Committee and became a member of its governing body.
Mindful that, despite the creation of the new university, education to masses remained limited, Lushington together with Brougham, Lord John Russell and other friends, founded the Society for Promoting the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge which was aimed primarily at the working class and middle class. The Society’s publications were seen as an antidote to some of the more radical output of the popular press at that time. One significant publication was the Library of Useful Knowledge which sold for sixpence and was published bi-weekly. Unfortunately, the Society failed to reach the working-class market, and it was wound up in 1848.
Lushington also supported the establishment of a national educational system, with “separate and adequate religious instruction” for Churchmen, Catholics, and Dissenters.8 In 1849, following an invitation to lay the foundation stone for a new school in London, Lushington composed a hymn for the occasion which expressed his deep religious convictions.
Grant thy blessing, God of truth,
To instruct the rising youth:
Fix their hope on Christ alone,
Christ, the sure foundation stone.
Lushington’s sons, Vernon and Godfrey, were later involved in University Reform and his daughters, Frances and Alice, became leading women educationalists.
The Fight against Slavery Continued
In 1820, Lushington was urged by his friend, the Anglo-Irish Whig politician George Tierney, to return to Parliament. He was reluctant to do and responded:
Some three or four years since I had determined never again to engage in any parliamentary speculation however eligible: this resolution has in a degree been shaken when I have occasionally met with my political friends, and so I may have appeared inconsistent; but upon deliberation I deem it wisest to adhere to it, and to decline making any attempt to re-enter parliament.9
Following continued pressure from friends, Lushington returned to Parliament in 1820 as the member for Ilchester.10 One of his first actions was, once again, to throw himself into the antislavery cause. Although, as far the British Empire was concerned, the trade had been abolished in 1807, the evil of slavery itself remained. Wilberforce and his fellow abolitionists optomisticlly believed that once the trade was abolished, the relationship between master and slave would cease. However, this did not happen and the movement’s faith in the natural benevolence of men was severely shaken by the failure of those involved in slavery reform.
Wilberforce, hindered by advancing years, sought out the active support of young men such as Lushington to take on the mantle and, for a period of about ten years, a number of campaigns were run in attempt to end slavery itself. The Abolition Bill of 1807 had not prevented the transfer of slaves between British colonies, and it was in this area that Lushington chose to
