Radical

Radical, in English politics, is often used to denote the advanced wing of the great Liberal party. The name seems to have been first used in the reign of George III. in the phrase 'radical reform' (Anti-Jacobin, 1797 and 1798), though one instance at least occurs much earlier in the Remains of Archbishop Leighton, written in the reign of Charles II. (see ROOT AND BRANCH MEN). But the modern radicals are descendants of the French Revolutionists of 1789. The principal objects of the men so designated have been chiefly concerned with parliamentary reform, the extension of the franchise, the enlargement of the public privileges of the people, and with endeavouring to weaken and curtail the exclusive privileges and prerogatives of the oligarchical ruling classes. In a word, the radicals of England have been the pioneers of the democratic movement, and have sought to achieve their ideals almost exclusively through the agency of parliamentary government. The word is meant to indicate the thoroughness of the reforms advocated, being derived from the Lat. radix, 'a root.' Inseparably associated with the great reform movements of the 19th century, the radicals began to be generally so called about 1816; and the name figured prominently in the movements in which Orator Hunt (q.v.), Thistlewood, Watson, and others played the chief parts. A clever poem setting forth the aims of these men, entitled The White Hat (1819)—i.e. the hat of Hunt, nicknamed King Harry the Ninth—and written by E. L. Swift, will be found in Notes and Queries, series 3, vol. x, p. 436. See also W. Harris, History of the Radical Party in Parliament (1885); and S. Bamford, Life of a Radical (1842).