The Labour Party in the Coalition government also improved, the new leader Arthur Henderson had a dramatic effect of the party’s future. Henderson held the position of Minister of Education in the Coalition government, this was an important office and many other top Labour members held official positions in cabinet. The experience gained from being in government is not to be underestimated. The Coalition government was also socialist, and in that respect the Labour Party gained experience of a social structure never before used in Britain and the one which the Labour Party wanted to implement if they were to ever get into power. Henderson also changed the membership to the Labour Party. Before Henderson the only way to join the Labour Party was through a Trade Union; Henderson opened membership to anyone who wished to join and this not only gave the party more numbers but also opened it to distinguished politicians. Henderson’s leadership affected the Labour Party to the extent that it was transformed from a small party to a large party that could compete with the Liberals and Tories.
The Labour Party also benefited from the major change in Britain’s social structure. The Webb sisters Beatrice and Sidney wrote a pamphlet entitled ‘Labour and the New Social Order’ in 1918. This pamphlet described the way in which Britain had changed from a country ruled by a minority to one which now took notice of the working class. The New Social Order was the rise in working class-consciousness and the rise in importance of the working class. In the war the country relied on the working class for industry and for the war, this resulted in strikes for better conditions and a two fold rise in trade union membership. Eventually the Representation of the Peoples Act in 1918 gave the working class the representation they wanted. For the first time there was no property qualification for the vote; all men over twenty-one and women over thirty were enfranchised regardless of where they lived. The Working Class realised their position; they were the controlled before, but now they had the power to change Britain socially. Other classes recognised the distinguished effort of the working classes in the First World War and thus there was a change in attitudes; the working class were given a better image than that of slaves and they were given more rights. Whichever party was to follow World War One in power was going to have to give the working class what they wanted because for the first time they were conscious of what they wanted. The Labour Party served their needs.
After the war the newly enfranchised working class and not to mention women had fought for something. One might say they fought for their country or the imperialists who started the war; but truly it was for a better world. After time the debate over whether or not to enter the war was forgotten and the people thought about finishing it more so than the war’s beginning. In this period of contemplation the people realised that once it was over the world had be a better place. David Lloyd George used the phrase ‘Brave New World’ and that perfectly describes the hopes and dreams of Britain. The Representation of the Peoples Act had made it so that whoever gave the people this ‘Brave New World’ would win the working class’ support. The Conservative/Liberal Coalition which continued after the war did not ideologically believe in giving the working class a better life, the only vote which would bring them their ‘Brave New World’ was the Labour Party. Therefore after 1918 the Labour Party was transformed into the official opposition due to the change in class consciousness, the newly enfranchised people and from the works of distinguished individuals. It could be argued that class consciousness was bound to change, but you could also say that it might not have happened so soon had the war never happened.
Another major historical event which attributes it’s occurrence to changes in social ideology is the death of Liberalism. George Dangerfield, a major historian, believed that the Liberal Party was doomed to failure due to a number of causes before the war even began, but it is commonly believed that the war put enough pressure on the Liberal Party to kill it completely. The leader of the Liberal Party, Henry Asquith, was an old Gladstonian Liberal at heart, whereas ‘the man who won the war’, ‘the goat’ David Lloyd George was an extravagant radical. This chalk and cheese relationship had worked well in the years before the war as they were able to agree to success. With war came pressures and Asquith, being an old Liberal did not believe that the government should intervene, especially not force people to go to war; whereas Lloyd George had a strong interventionist attitude and wanted conscription. The two great leaders of the Liberal party fought over conscription and the debate came to a head in the December of 1916. Lloyd George proposed an idea to Asquith about a war cabinet running the war while Asquith remained Prime Minister, though not part of the war cabinet. This proposal seemed a good idea to Asquith until the next day when Asquith would not agree to the war cabinet. Lloyd George resigned, not getting what he wanted, as did Asquith subsequently. The King was in the position to choose a new prime minister; he asked Bonar Law, leader of the conservatives in the Coalition government, who declined and recommended David Lloyd George as the best candidate. Lloyd George accepted and headed a new ‘war socialist’ government with his war cabinet including Bonar Law. It is believed that Lloyd George and Bonar Law had planned this trickery to get Lloyd George into power, and it is certainly not out of Lloyd George’s character to lie his way to power. The effect of this was a bitter hatred between the two leaders of the Liberal Party. The Liberal Party was now split between Lloyd George and Asquith (who had the lesser support and left the coalition government). Asquith was seen to be working against the war effort by leaving the government and got much ‘bad press’ for this. Asquith took a stab at Lloyd George when he miss-quoted an amount of soldiers. Asquith accused Lloyd George of being a liar and called for a vote of no-confidence in 1918. Lloyd George won outstandingly and Asquith was further alienated from parliament. Just to rub salt into the wound Lloyd George asked Asquith to be part of a Conservative/Lloyd George-Liberal Coalition party in the ‘Coupon Election’ in 1918. Asquith of course declined and lost his last chance to ever repair the Liberal Party. Dangerfield did not believe that this was a consequence of the war but an on going crack which would have opened in time. It is more acceptable to believe that the war was far too much pressure for two such personalities so strongly opposed. It was not so much the personalities which determined who won but the attitudes of the country; Liberalism was an old ideology now overshadowed by much more interventionist politics which Lloyd George had shown worked before and during the war. Liberalism could not live up to the ‘Brave New World’ and indeed the war which fought for it.
The dramatic change in popular attitudes towards politics, class and the justification of the working class’ genuine right for political power changed Britain socially. The change created heavy pressures on the old Liberal doctrine and thus in a great war such as this only the strong survive. Liberalism was not strong enough to survive the war and with it died Liberalism’s last real master. The ‘Brave New World’ which the war had created and Lloyd George had coined was to be the era of Labour; the Great War transformed not only the Labour Party but transformed British society in the Labour Party’s favour.
Bibliography:
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/TUwebbB.htm
