The period was now approaching when, as the crowning act of his long political life, he was to uudertako the amendment of the repro seutative system, the object for which his earliest energies had been exerted in unfavourable times. Up to 1330 the slightest measure of parliamentary reform had been resolutely denied. The Duke of Wellington, who was prime minister when the parliament met which was elected on the death of George IV., affirmed, in allusion to some thing which Earl Grey had said, that "the legislature and the system of representation possess the full and entire confidence of the country, and deservedly possess that confidence." But the second revolution in France, which had just occurred, had given a great impulse to questions of political reform ; a new reign and a new parliament had commenced under these influences; and the country generally was in a disturbed and excited state. The duke's administration was com pelled to yield to the influence of these circumstances and resigned office. Earl Grey was sent for by William IV. and requested to form a new cabinet. He announced as prime minister that " Peace, Itetreuch ment, and Reform" would be the objects of hie policy. On the 1st of March 1831, Lord John Russell, as the organ of the cabinet, intro duced the first Reform Bill into the House of Commons. A brief history of this measure is given in the notice of WILLIAM IV. On the 7th of May 1832, Lord Lyndhurst carried an important motion, which, it was considered by the cabinet, placed the Reform Bill in peril, and they immediately resigned office. The ministerial inter regnum was terminated on May 17 by the return of Earl Grey to power. The independence of the House of Lords was for the time virtually destroyed, and means were used, with the king's consent, to prevent the peers who were opposed to the Reform Bill from attending in their places to vote against it,. This may have been au inconsistency in Earl Grey, who had so lately pledged himself in favour of the indepeudence of the House of Lords ; but he had to choose between successfully carrying out his plan of parliamentary reform and a violent political convulsion. On the 4th of June the Lords passed
the bill by 106 to 22, and three days afterwards it received the royal assent.
The first Reformed Parliament met on the 29th of Jan. 1833, and its c rat measures were the abolition of colonial slavery, the abolition of the East India Company's monopoly, the reform of the Irish Church, and the reform of the poor law. The cabinet was early shaken by some personal changes. In March 1833, Lord Durham was com pelled to reaign from illness. At the end of May 1834, Mr. Stanley (now Earl of Derby), Sir James Graham, the Earl of Ripon, and the Duke of Richmond, left the ministry on account of differences with their colleagues. Earl Grey had considered a Coercion Act necessary for Ireland, and a misunderstanding arose with Mr. O'Connell on the subject, which in July led to hie lordship's resignation and that of Lord Althorp. Lord Althorp returned to office in about a week, but the cabinet, which no longer possessed the confidence of William IV., was dismissed in the following November, when Lord Althorp, by the death of his father Earl Spencer, was removed to the House of Lords.
For one or two years after his retirement from office Earl Grey occasionally attended the House of Lords, but the last ten years of his life were passed in retirement surrounded by a numerous family and honoured by the general respect of his countrymen. He died at his seat, Howick House, in Northumberland, July 17, 1845, in his eighty-second year. The personal appearance of Earl Grey was stately and commanding ; his action graceful and animated; and his voice strong, flexible, and sonorous. As a speaker his style was pure and his manner free from affectation. He was married on the 18th of November 1784, to Mary Elizabeth, only daughter of the Right Honourable William Brabazon Pousonby, and by her ho had ten sous and six daughters. His widow, eight of his eons, and four of his daughters, survived him.