CHURCHILL, LORD RANDOLPH HENRY SPEN CER (1849-1895), English statesman, third son of John, 7th duke of Marlborough, by Frances, daughter of the third mar quess of Londonderry, was born at Blenheim palace, on Feb. 13, 1849. He was educated at Eton and at Merton college, Ox ford. In 1874 he was elected to parliament in the Conservative interest for Woodstock.
In 1878 he forced himself into public notice as the exponent of a species of independent Conservatism. He directed a series of furious attacks against some of the occupants of the front Ministerial bench. Sclater-Booth (afterwards 1st Lord Basing), president of the Local Government Board, was a special object of attack, and denounced as the "crowning dishonour to Tory principles." In the new parliament of 188o, Churchill began to play a more notable role. With the assistance of Sir Henry Drummond Wolff, Sir John Gorst and occasionally of Arthur Bal four, and one or two others, he constituted himself at once the audacious opponent of the Liberal Administration and the un sparing critic of the Conservative front bench. The "fourth party," as it was nicknamed, was effective in awakening the Opposition from the apathy which had fallen upon it after its defeat at the polls. Churchill roused the Conservatives and gave them a fighting issue, by putting himself at the head of the resistance to Charles Bradlaugh, the member for Northampton, who, though an avowed atheist or agnostic, was prepared to take the parliamentary oath. He continued to play a conspicuous part throughout the parliament of 188o-85, dealing his blows with almost equal vigour at Gladstone and at the Conservative front bench, some of whose members, and particularly Sir Richard Cross and W. H. Smith, he assailed with extreme virulence.
From the beginning of the Egyptian imbroglio Lord Randolph emphatically opposed almost every step taken by the Gov ernment. He declared that the suppression of Arabi Pasha's re bellion was an error, and the restoration of the khedive's au thority a crime. He was equally severe on the domestic policy of the Administration, and was particularly bitter in his criti cism of the Kilmainham Treaty and the rapprochement between the Gladstonians and the Parnellites. It is true that for some time before the fall of the Liberals in 1885 he had considerably modified his attitude towards the Irish question, and was him self cultivating friendly relations with the Home Rule members, and even obtained from them the assistance of the Irish vote in the English constituencies in the general election. By this time he had definitely formulated the policy of progressive Con servatism which was known as "Tory democracy." He declared that the Conservatives ought to adopt, rather than oppose, re forms of a popular character, and to challenge the claims of the Liberals to pose as the champions of the masses. His views were to a large extent accepted by the official Conservative leaders in the treatment of the Gladstonian Franchise bill of 1884. Lord Randolph insisted that the principle of the bill should be accepted by the Opposition, and that resistance should be focussed upon the refusal of the Government to combine with it a scheme of redistribution. The prominent, and on the whole judicious and successful, part he played in the debates on these questions, still further increased his influence with the rank and file of the Con servatives in the constituencies. At the same time he was ac tively spreading the gospel of democratic Toryism in a series of platform campaigns. In 1883 and 1884 he invaded the Radi cal stronghold of Birmingham itself, and in the latter year took part in a Conservative garden party at Aston Manor, at which his opponents paid him the compliment of raising a serious riot. He gave constant attention to the party organization, and was an active promoter and first member of the Primrose League, which owed its origin to the happy inspiration of one of his own "fourth party" colleagues.
In 1884 the struggle between stationary and progressive Tory ism ended in favour of the latter. At the conference of the Cen tral Union of Conservative Associations, Lord Randolph was nominated chairman, notwithstanding the strenuous opposition of the parliamentary leaders of the party. The split was averted by Lord Randolph's voluntary resignation ; but the episode had con firmed his title to a leading place in the Tory ranks. It was further strengthened by the prominent part he played in the events immediately preceding the fall of the Liberal Government in 1885; and when Childers's budget resolutions were defeated by the Conservatives, aided by about half the Parnellites, Lord Randolph Churchill's admirers were justified in proclaiming him to have been the "organizer of victory." Owing to Lord Ran dolph's refusal to serve under Sir S. Northcote's leadership, Lord Salisbury had great difficulty in forming a cabinet in June 1885. Finally a way out of the impasse was found by elevating North cote to the peerage (as earl of Iddesleigh) and giving the leader ship in the House of Commons to Sir M. Hicks Beach. Lord Randolph was given the India Office, where "the India Council would be a check on him." (Letters of Queen Victoria, second series, vol. iii., p. 663.) During the few months of his tenure of this great post the young free-lance of Tory democracy attended to his departmental duties and mastered the complicated ques tions of Indian administration. In the autumn election of 1885 he contested Central Birmingham against Bright, and though defeated here, was at the same time returned by a very large ma jority for South Paddington. In the Home Rule controversy, both in and out of parliament, Lord Randolph again bore a con spicuous part. He was now the recognized Conservative cham pion in the lower chamber, and when the second Salisbury Ad ministration was formed after the general election of 1886 he became chancellor of the exchequer and leader of the House of Commons. His management of the House was on the whole suc cessful, and was marked by tact, discretion and temper. But he had never really reconciled himself with some of his colleagues, and there was a good deal of friction in his relations with them, which ended with his sudden resignation on Dec. 20, 1886. Vari ous motives influenced him in taking this step ; but the only ostensible cause was that put forward in his letter to Lord Salis bury, read in the House of Commons on Jan. 27, in which he stated that his resignation was due to his inability, as chancellor of the exchequer, to concur in the demands made on the Treasury by the ministers at the head of the naval and military establish ments and that a better foreign policy might obviate the necessity for such demands. Although he himself refrained from offering any public explanation of his conduct, nor in any way sought to bring about a reconciliation with Salisbury, Lord Randolph Churchill's prestige was so great that a reconstruction of the cab inet proved a task of great difficulty. At length Goschen was in duced to accept the chancellorship, and Churchill disappeared from any effective part in the leadership of the Conservative Party.
He continued, for some years longer, to give a general, though decidedly independent, support to the Unionist Administration. On the Irish question he was a very candid critic of Balfour's measures, and one of his later speeches, which recalled the acrimonious violence of his earlier period, was that which he delivered in 1890 on the report of the Parnell commission. He also fulfilled the promise made on his resignation by occasionally advocating the principles of economy and retrenchment in the debates on the naval and military estimates. In April 1889, on the death of Bright, he was asked to stand for the vacant seat in Birmingham, and the result was a rather angry controversy with Chamberlain, terminating in the so-called "Birmingham compact" for the division of representation of the Midland cap ital between Liberal Unionists and Conservatives. But his health was already precarious, and he bestowed much attention on so ciety, travel and sport. He was an ardent supporter of the turf, and in 1889 he won the Oaks with a mare named the Abbesse de Jouarre. In 1891 he went to South Africa, in search both of health and relaxation. He travelled for some months through Cape Colony, the Transvaal and Rhodesia, and recorded his im pressions in a book entitled Men, Mines and Animals in South Africa.
In the general election of 1892 he once more flung himself, with his old vigour, into the strife of parties. His seat at South Paddington was uncontested, and when parliament met he re turned to the Opposition front bench to take a leading part in debate, attacking Gladstone's second Home Rule bill with especial energy. He died in London on Jan. 24, Lord Randolph Churchill married, in Jan. 1874, Jennie, daugh ter of Leonard Jerome of New York, U.S.A., by whom he had two sons. In 1900 Lady Randolph Churchill married G. Corn wallis-West.
An authoritative biography of Lord Randolph, by his son Winston appeared in 1906 ; and a brief and intimate appreciation by Lord Rosebery, inspired by this biography, was published a few months later. Lord Randolph's earlier speeches were edited, with an intro duction and notes, by Louis Jennings (2 vols., 1889). See also H. W. Lucy, Diary of Two Parliaments (1892) ; and Mrs. Cornwallis-West, The Reminiscences of Lady Randolph Churchill, (i.e., of the author) (1908) ; The Letters of Queen Victoria, second series, 3 vols. (1926-28).