League of Free Liberals

The League of Free Liberals (in Dutch: Bond van Vrije Liberalen) was a Dutch classical liberal political party and a predecessor of the Liberal State Party which is historically linked to the VVD, the major Dutch liberal party. The party's name League of Free Liberals was supposed to convey that the party was not a classical political party, with party discipline and a centralized organisation but a league of independent MPs. The conservative liberals were called free liberals before they had founded a separate party.

The League of Free Liberals was the first official organisation of old, free or conservative liberals, who had been elected on individual tickets since the 1870s. They held a considerable number of seats in the late 1880s and 1890s. The conservative classical liberals were opposed to the progressive politics of liberal politicians like Kappeyne van de Coppello. After the 1877 elections the first signs of a real conservative tendency were visible. They were led by Gleichman and where therefore called Gleichmannians, as opposed to Kappeynians (who supported Kappeyne van de Coppello). In 1885 however all liberals united in the Liberal Union.

In 1894 the conflict between the progressive and conservative or classically liberal tendencies heated over the proposed relaxation of the census. A group of prominent conservative liberals left the Liberal Union. They lacked real leadership, they had no official chairman for their parliamentary party in the House of Representatives. Instead charismatic politicians gathered like-minded MPs around them. After the 1894 elections many classical and conservative liberals were represented in the cabinet, led by the liberal conservative Roëll. The conservative liberals had good relations with the Liberal Union and two political groups cooperated in many electoral districts and some prominent conservative liberals were minister in progressive liberal governments, like De Beaufort, who served as minister of Foreign Affairs in cabinet led by Van Tienhoven (1891–1894). The Meester Cabinet also had several liberal conservative ministers.

...
Wikipedia