Constituency : Hull 1818-20, St Ives 1820-1, Carlisle 1826-9, Cumberland 1829-32, Cumberland East 1832-7, Pembroke 1838-41, Dorchester 1841-7 ( Conservative ), Ripon 1847-52, Carlisle 1852-61
Sir James's career is a good illustration of the confusion and shifting loyalties that characterised the politics of the mid-nineteenth century. He was the son of a Tory baronet from Cumbria educated at Westminster and Oxford. He first entered Parliament for Hull at a cost of £6,000 in 1818 but switched to the less expensive seat of St Ives in 1820. He was forced out of there by electoral petition in 1821. His switch from Carlisle to Cumberland was voluntary. In 1826 he published his Free Trade pamphlet Corn and Currency and he soon became a prominent advocate of Parliamentary Reform. He joined Grey's cabinet as First Lord of the Admiralty but resigned in 1834 following Lord Stanley over the proposals to reform the Irish church and becoming a prominent member of his "Derby Dilly". By 1837 he had followed him into the Conservative party which cost him his seat. He was back in for Pembroke in 1838. He became Peel's Home Secretary in 1841 but was unpopular over the Scottish church question , coercion in Ireland and for authorising the opening of mail for diplomatic purposes at the post office. He does however have the 1844 Factory Bill to his credit.He backed Peel over the Corn Laws and went into political exile with him in 1847. He became the unofficial leader of the Peelites in the Commons after Peel's death. He was not afraid of courting unpopularity; he made a fierce attack on the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill in 1851.He returned to Carlisle and the Cabinet in 1852 when he became Aberdeen's First Lord of the Admiralty. He resigned with the other Peelites over the commission of inquiry into the Crimean War in 1855 although in his own case his health was poor as well with frequent heart spasms.
James was initially an intimate friend of Palmerston's but later became seriously critical of him and in 1840 introduced a censure motion on his China policy which was only narrowly defeated. In 1851 Russell tried to bring him into his ministry as President of the Board of Control but declined, partly on the grounds that he could not sit at the same table as Palmerston with " his crooked policy, his headstrong waywardness and his dangerous artifices". However a year later they were collaborating on the Free Trade amendment which effectively buried Protection as a viable policy. He thought Palmerston had threatened his way into Aberdeen's government and backed Russell in the struggle between the two on parliamentary reform. He also voted for the China motion which prompted Palmerston's dissolution in 1857 and was thought to have instigated the Conspiracy Bill revolt the following year.
However James did not share Gladstone's predilection for a rapprochement with Derby pointing out to him in 1856 that the conversion of the Tories to financial retrenchment would take longer than Palmerston's remaining lifespan. He also warned Gladstone against being too precious about Peel " The policy of Peel is still one to which I adhere. But this confession of faith is no valid security for practical conduct. Most of Palmerston's administration would make this same profession". However by May 1858 he was urging Gladstone to accept Derby's overtures : "your honest liberal tendencies would soon leaven the whole lump."He played an ambiguous role in the formal creation of the Liberal party in 1858-9 first playing on Russell's jealousy of Palmerston and describing the latter as "an old Tory of the deepest dye" and then bluntly telling Russell that he was less indispensable than Palmerston after the 1859 election . He did not take office in 1859 on grounds of age ( despite being considerably younger than Palmerston himself ) although he encouraged Gladstone and Herbert to do so.
In 1860 James helped dissuade Gladstone from resigning over the fortification issue : "The will of the nation is in favour of military preparation , quite regardless of expense.. the attempt to struggle against it is in vain". He also sat on the select committee considering the Lords rebellion on the paper duties backing the more anodyne report against the wishes of Gladstone and Russell.
James had a reputation as a poor speaker in Parliament with a stiff and pompous manner that was better appreciated on the hustings. He could also be haughty and sarcastic. He was an able administrator and probably believed that political success should follow from that alone.
He died in 1861 aged 69.
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