Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. SATURDAY, AUGUST 9, 1924. MR RAMSAY MacDONALD.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XLV, Issue 10179, 9 August 1924, Page 4

Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. SATURDAY, AUGUST 9, 1924. MR RAMSAY MacDONALD.

When, a few months ago, for the first time in history a Labour Government assumed office m Britain and the seals of the office of First Lord of the Treasury were handed to the Prime Minister Mr Ramsay MacDonald, it • was felt that a revolutionary | change in British politics had 1 been brought about. That belief 3 —expressed as satisfaction and fear according to one’s political views—has not so far been a very marked feature of the legislative acts of the Government at Home, and possibly this is due to the peculiar position in which the Government is placed. It lias not a majority in the House, and its programme can at best only he one of compromise. The advent of Labour to administrative office in Imperial affairs, and the elevation of Mr Ramsay MacDonald to . the position of Prime Minister, • shows so far as the latter is concerned, that he has great personal qualities, enabling him to triumph over the economic and social handicaps of the class into which he was horn. Mr MacDonald’s career touches _ the imagination. He has" the mind of a scholar with the temperament of an orator and a leader of men. He is that contradiction — a thinker (as his hooks on socialist theory and method attest) and a man of action. He is at once subtle and forcible, cautious in forming his judgments and ardent in expressing them. He belongs by native right to that little group of scholar-statesmen which has figured so prominently in British politics. But his scholarship, acquired by hard reading, lias been concentrated in a mind that thinks politically, and in terms.of movements and men as the often unconscious instruments of great social forces. On the platform he is an artist; in the study he is a workman. As an orator Mr MacDonald possesses physical attributes of high value. He has a fine, distinguished appearance, a singularly well-formed head and strong dark face, lit by brown eyes that have in them a quick and challenging look. The years have taken their toll, private griefs and public censure have played their part and left their mark upon I him. His best asset as a speaker j is a clear and vibrant voice, with a strangely moving note in its lower tones. His talk in conversation is animated, copious, and wide-ranging. No man who has risen to high place, as Mr Mac- ; Donald has done, can escape criti- , cism, hut it is notable that his ■ critics never assail his character, : hut only his policy and sometimes , his methods. _ : Mr MacDonald was horn in < 1866, and spent.the early years of 1 his life in the little fishing village of Lossiemouth, in the 1 Highlands of Scotland, far. from ’ the centres of intellectual and \ political disturbance. • There was ‘ nothing in his birth to suggest | that the social forces that were ( about that time bursting their r harriers would carry him forward ' on the crest of the wave that | swept away the Victorian landmarks. Later he went to London, where for the first 10 years * poverty and obscurity were his h lot. His political apprenticeship t is a long story. In the general ® election of 1895 he was one of 28 a candidates placed in the field by t the Independent Labour Party. It was his first political contest, j] and he polled 866 votes. He was c< first elected to Parliament in»vi

1906 as member for Leicester. Hie story of Mr MacDonald’s parliamentary career, wliicb fills the years from 1906 .to the present date, with the exception of four years —from 1918 to 1921 n hen he was out of Parliament —is largely the history of great controversies. So far as Mr MacDonald is concerned, it is the story of a leader who could not always command the allegiance of his followers, and often found himself assailed not only by his enemies in other parties , # but also by his friends in his own party. But he lias proved that lie has the gift of statesmanship, and his rise from lowly beginnings to his present exalted position is an evidence of a remarkable personality and a natural fulfilment of process whereby political power has been secured by the people, for the people, through centuries of growth.