Parliament was effectively split into three parties. The Peelites, although the smallest of the three groups, held the balance. It was the Peelites support for Sir John Russell that helped the Whigs form a government in 1846. The Whigs won the election of 1847, but with a majority of only 100, they still needed Peelite support to get anything accomplished. As a group, the Peelites began to dwindle following the death of Peel in 1850, but their support was still vital to the Whigs and to secure power in the 1852 election, they formed a coalition government with the Whigs under the leader of the Peelites' Lord Aberdeen. They eventually merged with the Whigs and began to be known as the Liberal Party with the ex-Foreign Minister Lord Palmerston forming the first Liberal government in 1855.
The origins of Gladstonian Liberalism and Disraelian Conservatism
After the destruction of Peel’s Conservative party the whole nature of mid Victorian politics changed. By the mid 1850’s the Peelites had joined the Whigs and the Radicals to form the new Liberal party. This party dominated the 1850’s and the 1860’s. Between 1855 and 1865, Palmerston led the Liberal government. Palmerston’s government did not introduce any further parliamentary reform. During Palmerston’s ministry Gladstone was Chancellor of the Exchequer. After 1864 Gladstone “Pale of the Constitution Speech” showed that he came to believe that a further extension of the vote to the respectable male working class was desirable. After the death of Palmerston in 1865, the issue of Parliamentary Reform became top of the Liberal agenda.
In the early 1850’s the ‘protectionist’ wing of the Peel’s party, reclaimed the name Conservative. Now being led by Derby and Disraeli, they remained in opposition of the Liberal party. However, they did not use this time to rebuild their image.
The debates over and the passing of the Second Parliamentary Reform Act
After the passing of the 1832 Parliamentary Reform Act, many people thought that this was the end of the matter, however the situation of the country changed and several influence both internal and external brought about a widespread need for further reform. Aspect such as changes in the population, and Radical and trade union pressure from inside and outside parliament were all argument in favour of the passing of more reform. The visit of Italian nationalist leader, Giuseppe Garibaldi to London in 1864, and Gladstone and the Conservatives finally accepting that reform was needed were major steps in the passing of the Parliamentary Reform Act.
There were three main stages which led to the passing of the reform Act. In 1866, the Liberal leaders Russell and Gladstone introduced a moderate reform bill which was expected to bring in an extra 400,00 voters and there was no mention of re-distribution of seats. Many of the Conservatives and even Liberals thought that bill went too far. Led by Liberal MP Robert Lowe a section of the Liberal Party (named the Adullamites) joined which the Conservatives to defeat the bill.
When Disraeli and Derby came into power in 1867, pressure for reform had reached its peak and so the Conservatives decided to make a play for popularity and introduce reform while “dishing the Liberals”. Derby and Disraeli were both willing to introduce a more drastic bill than Gladstone if it would give them a long spell in power. After a series of drastic amendments put in by the Liberals and threats of resignation from the Conservative party if the bill was passed, the bill was passed in August 1867 and became known as the Second Parliamentary Reform Act
The 1867 act redistributed seats from corrupt and small boroughs to the counties and large urban areas. It also extended the franchise in boroughs to adult male heads of households, and in counties to males who owned, or held on long leases, land worth £5 a year, or who occupied land worth £12 on which they paid poor rates.
1868 -1886Principles and policies of Gladstone’s government 1868 – 74, 1880 – 85, 1886
There were three main policies that followed during his time in office. These came under his party slogan ‘Peace, Retrenchment and Reform’. ‘Peace’ was Gladstone belief in ‘Equality of Nations’ and his desire for peaceful, isolationist foreign policy. ‘Retrenchment’ was a desire for efficiency and a wish to preserve the good institutions of the state. ‘Reform’ was a wish for both social and political change as well as religious tolerance. Gladstone also had a desire to increase his aim of ‘Equality of Opportunity’ by attacking privilege and injustice. Gladstonian Liberalism is often seen as progressive and forward thinking.
Principles and policies of Disraeli’s government 1868, 1874-80
Disraeli principles during his ministries were centred on 4 main ideas. The first was a wish to maintain the key institutions of the state, the Crown, the Church of England and the existing Class system. Disraeli and his party also had a wish for and active and imperial policy, which was the unifying theme of the party. This was demonstrated in Disraeli’s second ministry with his great involvement in foreign activities.
Disraeli did, like the Liberals, have a commitment to social reform but it was in a paternalistic approach. He felt that this would curb working class revolution. Within the party there was an intense dislike towards political reform although they passing the 1867 Parliamentary Reform Act contradict this. It is thought that them passing this act was simply due to opportunism rather than principle.
The Secret Ballot Act 1872
After passing the 1867 parliamentary reform act, the working class were now the majority of the franchise. However, this did not mean that they had the majority of the power and so employers and landlords were able to use their influence on their employees and tenants due to the open voting system. In parliamentary elections people had to mount a platform and announce their choice of candidate to the officer who then recorded it in the poll book. Therefore employers and landlords knew whom people voted for and could punish them if they did not support their preferred candidate. In 1872, Gladstone introduced the Secret Ballot Act which gave people the right to vote in secret for who they wanted without fear of intimidation.
The Corrupt Practises Act 1883
By introducing the Secret Ballot Act in 1872, corruption in parliamentary elections was reduced somewhat. However, some politicians had vast sums of money which meant that they could use this to persuade people to vote for them. Gladstone under his aim of ‘Equality of Opportunity’ saw this as unfair and so passed the Corrupt Practises Act in 1873. This specified how much candidates could spend during election and banned certain activities such as buying food and drink for voters. By doing this Gladstone stopped representatives from using their wealth to win elections.
The Third Parliamentary Reform Act
The Third Parliamentary Reform Act consisted of two pieces of legislation which came together. The first of these was the Franchise Act of 1884. In this act the Franchise was extended to all male householders. This increased the size of the Franchise from 3.1 million to 5.7 million. However, this does not mean that all that all male householders got the vote as not all males owned homes.
The second part of the act was the Retribution of Seats Act of 1885. In this Act boroughs with less than 50,000 people lost one MP, while those with less than 15,000 lost all MP’s. The remaining seats were redistributed so that 647 out of 670 constituencies had only one MP. The exceptions were really large cities in excess of 50,000 and the major universities.
1886 – 1903
Salisbury and the Conservatives
After Disraeli's death (1881), Salisbury led the Conservative opposition in the House of Lords. He became prime minister during the brief Conservative administration from June 1885 to January 1886. Ireland and imperial problems were then the chief issues. Henry Herbert, Earl of Carnarvon, the new lord lieutenant of Ireland, was a convert to Home Rule and followed a more liberal policy than his predecessor. At the subsequent general election of November 1885 Irish nationalists secured every Irish seat but one outside Ulster and urged Irish voters in British constituencies to vote Conservative. The result of the election was a Liberal majority of 86 over the Conservatives, almost exactly balanced by the Irish group, who thus controlled the balance of power in Parliament. The Conservatives stayed in office, but when in December 1885 the newspapers reported a confidential interview with Gladstone's son, in which he had stated (rightly) that his father had been converted to Home Rule; Salisbury made it clear that he himself was not a convert, and Carnarvon resigned. A few weeks later, in January 1886, after the Conservatives had been defeated in Parliament on a radical amendment for agrarian reform, Salisbury resigned and Gladstone returned to power.
The partition of Africa largely preoccupied Salisbury's second ministry (1886-92) and remained a source of serious Anglo-French conflict until 1898. Salisbury was an imperialist: he believed a phase of European, preferably British, rule indispensable for the advancement of the "backward" races and had no hesitation in imposing this rule by force. His foreign policy was directed toward the defence and enlargement of the British Empire. Salisbury attempted but failed to gain the co-operation of the European powers to intervene against Turkey to bring to a halt the Armenian massacres (1895-96). He refused to be frightened either by U.S. threats over Venezuela (1895) or by the Kaiser's telegram (1896) to Paul Kruger, president of the Transvaal, congratulating him on repelling a raid from the British-controlled Cape Colony. During the last decade of the 19th century, when the principal powers grouped into alliances, Salisbury maintained a free hand for Britain. He was opposed to alliance commitments, fearing that when the time came a democratic electorate might refuse to go to war; he also regarded alliances for Britain as unnecessary and dangerous. During the last two years of his ministry, old age and ill health forced him to give up the Foreign Office, though he continued as prime minister. With Lord Lansdowne as the new foreign secretary, he saw his principles of diplomacy partially abandoned. Later that year, in July, Salisbury retired. Salisbury was the last aristocratic statesman to head a British government while in the House of Lords and not the elected Commons. He represented a tradition that passed away with him. His contemporaries recognized his greatness as a statesman. He combined a realism and clarity of view with a fundamentally ethical approach to diplomacy, which sought to conciliate and pacify while maintaining important national interests.
The growth of new unionism and socialism
In 1880’s ‘ New Unionism’ emerged – unions for unskilled workers. The success of the Dockers’ Strike showed that the lowest paid worker could make a difference by organising a successful strike in support of reasonable demands. The ‘New’ unions had lower subscriptions than the ‘New Model, unions and did not provide unemployment benefits or sickness pay. They also tended to be more militant and many of their leaders tended to be socialists. But in the 1890s the ‘New’ unions had limited success mainly because of the economic depression. By the 1900 only about 10% of all union members belonged to ‘New Unions’.
The origins of the labour party
The Labour Party has always been seen as a working class socialist political movement. It grew out of public discontent at the rising unemployment, poverty, and starvation that was prevalent in Britain at the end of the 19th century. In 1884, the Social Democratic Federation was formed to push for a revolution to overthrow the corrupt Capitalist system. The Fabian Society was also set up in the same year, but instead opted for peaceful persuasion to get people to accept the idea of Socialism. However, it would probably be an understatement to say that their ideas did not go down too well with either the Liberals or the Conservatives. Dismayed at this, James Keir Hardie who became the first Labour MP in 1892 then formed the Scottish Labour Party in 1888. It was here that the foundations were laid for an independent political group fighting for the needs of working people. In Yorkshire, the situation was especially bad, mainly due to a slump in the woollen Industry, so in 1893, the Independent Labour Party was formed. However, it was a northern working class group, and political reformers had learned by experience that for it to work, any political group needed national and middle class support. Following a 1900 conference in London with the TUC, the Social Democratic Federation, the Fabians, and the Independent Labour Party, the Labour Representation Committee was formed to fight the General Election; their aim was to represent working class interests in Parliament. They were able to win two seats in the election. After this, working class and trade union support grew, and they were able to win more seats in by-elections. However, the real breakthrough came in 1906 when they won 29 seats in the General Election. They had made a deal with the Liberals, who agreed not to contest Labour candidates in certain seats, mainly because they didn't want to risk losing three horse contests where Conservative support was weak and where splitting the support against the Conservatives may have actually let that party win. It is from then on that the party became known as the Labour Party.
Keir Hardie
Keir Hardie was born in a Lanarkshire hamlet in August 1856.
With a working life spent at the ‘coalface’, together with an exposure to the cruel and brutal regimes that were often operated by the pit owners, would have a profound effect on the adolescent Hardie. By the time he was a young man his experiences had convinced him that the only fair way to organise society was using socialist principles.
He put this belief into practice by attempting to organise his own and other pits in the Scottish coalfield where he worked into a union. In 1886, at the age of twenty he became the Secretary of the Scottish Miners Federation. The failure of the miners in an industrial dispute the following year led Keir to the belief that what was needed was a more rounded, political formation that would campaign for the rights of working people.
Initially, he believed that this would come about through a coalition with the liberals. By 1888 however, he became disillusioned with this. For Hardie the path forward was clear, what was needed was a party that above all else, would represent the interests of labour.
This notion taken its first physical form in April 1888 when Hardie stood as a candidate in the Mid Lanark by-election. Hardie’s failed bid showed that Britain was not yet ready for an independent labour party – indeed as many as nine MPs served purporting to represent labour on the liberal benches already. These would vote independently on matters thought to relate to workers, but on all other issues would vote in the same fashion as their Liberal compatriots. A step towards an independent party for workers would come four months after the by-election, with the formation of the Scottish Labour Party. With his founding of the newspaper Labour Leader in 1889, Keir would play an increasingly important role as an organiser of, an agitator for and a figurehead of the young movement. This work would reap rich political dividends in 1892 when he was elected the first Labour MP for West Ham South. Self educated and proud of his working class origins, when Keir Hardie entered Parliament for the first time he refused to remove his cloth cap – he wished this act to be symbolic of the fact that he would never forget the people who elected him.
In 1893 the MP was one of the founders of the Independent Labour Party (ILP). The new political formation did not do as well as anticipated in the General election of 1895 - all of its candidates, including Hardie, lost. A return to the polls by the nation the following year yielded an even worse result, a working Tory majority. It was this hostile political environment that led the ILP to attend a meeting with other socialist political groups in 1900.A motion by the TUC passed a year earlier had prompted the conference. This had a political umbrella group which could represent the interests of unions in Parliament. A group that would seek to encompass the TUC, the ILP and other socialist and friendly societies. The result of the meeting would be the formation of the Labour Representation Committee (LRC) – out of which the modern Labour Party would eventually emerge.
Though its birth did have its problems, the LRC was successful in returning Keir Hardie to Westminster in 1900. The 1906 General Election was a great success. A grand total of twenty-nine socialist MPs had been returned to Westminster. As part of the twelve person executive who oversaw the Committee’s affairs, Hardie had the foresight and vision to realise that what was an umbrella group of disparate individuals and organisations was now ready to become a fully-fledged party. He was instrumental in shaping the Labour Party which the LRC transformed itself into after the victories of 1906.Keir Hardie would represent Merthyr until his death in 1915. His entire life had been spent guided by a profound sense of social justice. As a pacifist he had opposed the Boer and First World Wars. He was also a strong advocate of sexual equality, always speaking and voting in favour of votes for women.
The development of the women’s suffrage campaigns
1903-1918
The impact of the Suffragettes
In 1903, Mrs Emmeline Pankhurst, together with her two daughters founded the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU). Mrs Pankhurst had long been associated with the suffrage movement in Manchester and the Independent Labour Party. The Pankhurst, impatient with the failure of the suffragists at achieving results, advocated more militant tactics to draw attention to their demands.
Both political parties were divided on the issue. Among the Liberals Lloyd George favoured it but Asquith opposed it. The Liberals, however, were more sympathetic than the Conservatives. This was even more complications by the fact that only 60% of men had the vote because they had to living in constituencies for one year to qualify for the vote. If the vote were given to all women, they would out number men. A solution was put through of giving the vote to all men and women was too radical for most, but not for a minority of Liberal and Labour MPs. However, the Conservatives then thought that giving the vote to women who property would benefit them. There were attempts at put through Private Members Bills between 1907 and 1912, but none succeeded. Frustrated, the suffragettes became increasingly militant. They began by disrupting political meetings and progressed onto breaking windows and chaining themselves to the railings of Buckingham Palace. In 1903 they began their campaign of arson and physical attacks on ministers. Emily Davidson threw herself under the King’s Horse at the Derby in the same year. When imprisoned for their crimes, the suffragettes would go on hunger strikes. Their tactics had some success at first. They gained much publicity and ensured that the issue would be faced. By 1912 even Asquith accepted that women must be given the vote. However, the increase in their violence between 1912 – and 1913 made government reluctant to give them the vote, as they did not want to be seen as yielding to violence. They countered the hunger strike with the Cat and Mouse Act (1913). This is seen as hindering the quest of votes for women. When war broke out the suffragettes called off their campaign and the Pankhursts’ urged women to help with the war effort. Women worked in factories, farms, offices and transport and nurses. Their contribution during the war played a large part in why women got the vote in 1918 as it showed that women had more maturity than men had given them credit for.
The growth of New Liberalism
The policies of the Liberals were much influenced be ‘ New Liberalism’ New Liberalism", differing slightly to Gladstonian Liberalism (individual liberty and self-help), was essentially state intervention in order to reduce poverty and therefore improve living and working conditions for the working classes financed by higher taxes on the wealthy. New Liberals argued that individual liberty had little meaning to the poor, since poverty restricted what they could do, and self-help could not lift them out of poverty. Intervention by the state was necessary for both national efficiency and social justice. There was a political motive for their way of thinking: The New Liberals saw it as a way to attract working-class votes and to avoid being outflanked by the Labour Party. By 1905 The New Liberals had won over the majority of their party, although there were some who still believed firmly in the Gladstonian approach. This was the source of the weakness in the Liberal party. The main New Liberalists were Lloyd George and Churchill.
The growth of the labour party
Labour supported the Liberal government which came into power in 1905 and succeeded in persuading it to reverse the Taff vale judgement by the Trade Disputes Act of 1906. This enabled the party to win further Trade Union support including the mineworkers in 1909. The Osborne judgement was a set back for the Labour p[arty as it made it illegal for Trade unions to charge a political levy. Labour MP’s depended on Trade union support, as MP’s were not yet paid. However, this was turn around in 1911 when payment for MP’s was introduced and in 1913 when unions were allowed to charge a political levy, but members were allowed to opt out.
When World War One broke out in 1914, Ramsey MacDonald was apposed and so resigned as leader of the Labour party. The new leader, Henderson was both a member of the Asquith coalition and the George War Cabinet, but he too resigned in 1917 in protest over what he saw as George’s dictatorial methods.
Career of Asquith
Herbert Henry Asquith was the son of a Yorkshire clothing manufacturer. He was educated at City of London School and Balliol College Oxford, where he became President of the Union, and was later called to the Bar.
In 1886 Asquith was elected as the Liberal MP for East Fife, despite the constraints of being a young widower with five children. He was a strong believer in free trade, Home Rule for Ireland, and social reform, all vital issues of the day. With his intellectual and oratorical gifts he was quick to make his mark on the Commons. Despite the lack of previous ministerial experience, he became Home Secretary under Gladstone in 1892, and then again under Rosebery. Out of office for a decade from 1895, he returned to his barrister's practice, but also toured the country making influential speeches in favour of free trade.
In 1905 Asquith became Chancellor of the Exchequer in the new Liberal government. He introduced higher taxes on unearned income, which helped pay for another innovation - pensions for senior citizens over 70. In 1908 he became Prime Minister following the death of Henry Campbell-Bannerman.
Asquith now took on the House of Lords, which often blocked reforming Liberal bills, preventing them becoming law. The Lords unwisely rejected his Chancellor's (Lloyd George) budget of 1909, despite the Salisbury convention that the Lords did not reject money bills. The 1910 election was billed as a referendum on this Lords vs. Commons issue. The election reduced Asquith's majority but it gave him the public support he needed. He introduced the Parliament Bill, which stripped the Lords of any veto over money bills. The Bill became law in 1911. The Lords were forced into passing the bill by the threat that hundreds of new Liberal peers would be created if they did not approve the bill.
As Prime Minister, Asquith presided over a period of national upheaval, with the issues of Irish Home Rule, and women’s suffrage dominating the era. Asquith also brought Britain into World War One. To maximise government support he formed a coalition government in 1915. But this government was unsuccessful and unpopular for the war was going badly. The press blamed the deadlock on the battlefields on Asquith's procrastination.
Asquith appeared sidelined when he accepted Lloyd George's suggestion that a small cabinet committee direct the war, to the exclusion of the PM himself. His subsequent change of mind led to a rift with Lloyd George which forced Asquith to resign in December 1916, on the same day as his Chancellor's resigned. The success of Lloyd George's government consigned Asquith to the political wilderness a situation compounded by the loss of his seat and those of many of his allies in 1918. He had a very odd position, as he stubbornly remained Leader of the Liberal Party, despite lacking a seat.
Two years later he won a seat in a by-election in 1922 but he would not govern again. In 1924 Asquith was elevated to the House of Lords, and died in 1928 of a stroke.
Career of Lloyd George
David Lloyd George was one of the 20th Century's famous radicals. He grew up in Caernarvonshire, under the care of his uncle, a cobbler. Partly self-taught, he excelled in his studies at the village school, learning Latin and, later, French, in order to qualify for legal training. After school he worked for a Liberal lawyer who encouraged his political activity. On starting his own legal practice, most of his cases were against landlords, reflecting his championship of the underprivileged. In 1890 he was elected Liberal MP for Caernarvon, aged 27. His scathing wit made him a dreaded but respected debating opponent in the House.
His opposition to the Boer War made Lloyd George very unpopular, albeit well known. Indeed, one public meeting at which he spoke even ended in riots and deaths. Lloyd George was forced to escape the meeting in disguise.
In 1906 he was made President of the Board of Trade, and became recognised as a very able politician. Asquith later promoted him to Chancellor. He became one of the great reforming chancellors of the 20th century. He introduced state pensions for the first time and declared a war on poverty. He also passed laws making insurance against ill health and unemployment compulsory. To pay for wide-ranging social reforms as well as naval expansion, he intended, controversially, to tax land. He responded to the resultant outcry with passionate denunciations of landowners and aristocrats. His reforming budget only passed after the 1911 Parliament Act greatly weakened the power of the House of Lords to block legislation from the Commons.
During the war, Lloyd George threw himself into the job of Minister for Munitions, organising and inspiring the war effort. He later resigned in protest at the direction of the war, and on the later resignation of Asquith, Lloyd George accepted an invitation to form a government in December 1916. His dynamism ensured he was regarded as the right man to give Britain's war much needed impetus. Despite his success at centralising the government machine, however, the army remained beyond the reach of his reforming efforts.
With the end of the war in 1918 on Armistice Day he declared, "This is no time for words. Our hearts are too full of gratitude to which no tongue can give adequate expression." Lloyd George was acclaimed as the man who had won the war, and in 1918 the coalition won a huge majority. It was the first election in which any women were allowed to vote.
In 1919 Lloyd George signed the Treaty of Versailles, which established the League of Nations and the war reparations settlement.
He was troubled, however, by domestic problems. His agreement to the independence of the South of Ireland was reluctant, and he presided over a period of depression, unemployment and strikes. There were also concerns that Lloyd George was war mongering in Turkey, and serious allegations that he had sold honours. As a result of the many scandals he had attracted his popularity faded. When the Conservatives broke up the coalition, Lloyd George handed in his resignation. He remained a very controversial figure. His own party could not decide whether to support him or abandon him. He largely disregarded the problems facing the party, preferring to work for him. As a result, one of the greatest Liberal leaders was also largely responsible for the party's downfall. The Liberal party never ran the Government again.
Lloyd George later precipitated the fall of Neville Chamberlain by attacking his wartime failure in Norway in 1940. In the meantime, he had occupied the 1930s with journalism and travel, and the writing of his memoirs. In 1944 he was made Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor, and died the following year aged 82. He is buried on the banks of the River Dwyfor.
1918 – 1931
The Representation of the people Act 1918
The last major act passed in the period was in 1918, a representation of the People Act which not only gave the vote to adult males over 21 with a 6 month residency, but gave it to women for the fist time providing they were over 30 years old, and were householders, married to one or had a university degree. This Act also made voting a one-day affair instead of over several weeks and ended the old division of the Boroughs and Counties. This act also meant that party agents no longer decided who was on the register as now local government officials made up lists of voters annually. Public funds now paid back election expenses under this act, not the candidates, which allowed even the poorest people to stand. Although this act limited plural voting, this was a direct limit on the level of democracy being introduced as the wealthier were still regarded as being superior. This act did limit the plural voting to two votes, but the second vote only counted as university or business premises. The fact that conscientious objectors were banned from voting for 7 years, as were the insane, prisoners, or members of the House of lords limited the democratic system being implemented here. This seems undemocratic as new limits were being added against peoples right to vote, not taking limits away to lead Britain towards democracy.
Ramsey MacDonald
MacDonald was the first Labour Prime Minister. He came from a working class family and grew up in Lossiemouth. He worked as a pupil teacher at the local board school he attended, and at 18 moved to Bristol as a clergyman assistant, where he joined the Social Democratic Federation. He was employed as a Liberal candidate's assistant in London for three years, where he joined the Independent Labour Party in 1893. He stood unsuccessfully as a parliamentary candidate in 1895, meanwhile working as a journalist. But with the encouragement of his new wife, Margaret, he rose through the party ranks.
Elected for Leicester in 1906, MacDonald established a reputation as a distinguished thinker. In 1911 he became chairman of the parliamentary Labour group. As the Labour Party grew, however, he was criticised as being too moderate. His opposition to the Great War made him more unpopular still, and the press mercilessly attacked him. He lost his seat in 1918, but later returned to represent a Welsh mining constituency. Back in Parliament, he became party leader and therefore Leader of the Opposition, and in 1924 was asked by George V to form a government when Stanley Baldwin's small Conservative majority proved ungovernable.
In the first ever Labour government the survival of MacDonald's small Commons majority depended on the good will of opposition parties. This difficult situation prompted him to call an election. During the campaign a newspaper published the notorious 'Zinoviev' letter. Although later accepted to be a fraud, the letter ruined MacDonald's anti-Communist credentials. His Labour administration was then heavily defeated in the election.
In his second minority government in 1929, MacDonald set an historic precedent by appointing Margaret Bondfield as the first female minister. Economic crises, including the doubling of unemployment levels, persuaded him to include the opposition leaders in a cross-party National Government. However, this step lost him the support of his own party and he resigned in 1935. The coalition was considered by many party members to be a cynical betrayal of their hopes. MacDonald subsequently lost his seat. He then fought to return to Parliament, winning a by-election two years before his death in 1937.
Labour, Liberals and Conservatives 1918 – 1928
Following the break-up of the wartime coalition government, the Liberals went into freefall, split in half between supporters of Asquith and Lloyd George.
In 1922, the Conservatives won the election under Andrew Bonar Law, with the Labour Party finally making the breakthrough and finishing second, relegating the Liberals to third, a position that becomes familiar to them in the years to come. This meant that the Labour Party was able to finish second in the 1922 elections to the Conservatives, establishing Labour as the major opposition party in Britain.
Another election was called only a year later, and in January 1924, Labour actually formed a government under James Ramsay MacDonald, but they failed to get a majority and needed Liberal support. The position proved unworkable, and there was increasing criticism like at the dropping of a case of seditious libel against a Communist journalist and Labour's apparent willingness to open up talks with Russia, leaving the party open to accusations of Communist leanings. Things came to a head with the publication of the Zinoviev letter; a forgery that claimed the Labour Party had Communist links. Labour lost Liberal support, and decided to call a new election in October 1924. This time, the Conservative victory was decisive, and they were in power for the next five years. It was in 1924 when Stanley Baldwin and the Conservatives won the election that the wheels really came off for the Liberals. No one had any confidence in them and they slumped badly and have essentially remained in free fall ever since.
Rising unemployment and post-war economic depression would put a severe spanner in the works for the Conservatives, and in 1926, the famous general strike took place. This ultimately failed and convinced many that the only way to achieve effective change was through political debate. Labour support increased, and widespread disillusionment with the way the Conservatives handled the economic situation helped Labour to victory in the 1929 elections
The 1928 Equal Suffrage Act
After the passing of the in 1918 the NUWSS and WSPU disbanded. A new organisation called the National Union of Societies for Equal Citizenship was established. As well as advocating the same voting rights as men, the organisation also campaigned for equal pay, fairer divorce laws and an end to the discrimination against women in the professions.
In 1919 Parliament passed the which made it illegal to exclude women from jobs because of their sex. Women could now become solicitors, barristers and magistrates. Later that year, Nancy Astor became the first woman in England to become a MP when she won Plymouth in a by-election.
Other women were also elected over the next few years. In 1923 Margaret Bondfield was elected as Labour MP for . When Ramsay McDonald became Prime Minister in 1924 he appointed Bondfield as parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Labour. Five years later Bondfield became the first woman in history to gain a place in the British Cabinet.
A bill was introduced in March 1928 to give women the vote on the same terms as men. There was little opposition in Parliament to the bill and it became law on 2nd July 1928. As a result, all women over the age of 21 could now vote in elections. Many of the women who had fought for this right were now dead including Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, Barbara Bodichon, Emily Davies, Elizabeth Wolstenholme-Elmy, and Emmeline Pankhurst. , the leader of the NUWSS during the campaign for the vote, was still alive and had the pleasure of attending Parliament to see the vote take place