BRITAIN’S ROLE

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXVI, 10 June 1935, Page 5

BRITAIN’S ROLE

TRUSTEE FOR DEMOCRACY MR BALDWIN’S SPEECH TRIBUTE TO FORMER PRIME MINISTER (United PreHH Association—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright) LONDON, Bth June. Delivering his first speech as Premier, Mr Stanley Baldwin at a National Government demonstration at Worcestershire, paid a glowing tribute to Mr MacDonald’s courage in carrying on despite failing eyesight: and insomnia. He added that he and Mr MacDonald had merely exchanged places and collaboration would continue. . After referring to the conditions of < other great countries, Mr Baldwin said' Britain enjoyed stability which must be jealously guarded. Referring to the Italo-Abyssinian dispute, Mr Baldwin said it was causing anxiety to the remainder of Europe, but tliere was no current opinion thereanent. “We are suddenly \nfronted with these difficulties,” possibly dangerous, rendering more imperative stability and strength of other governments,” continued the Prime Minister “We cannot elect the Government of other countries, but we can elect our own, which is an additional reason for maintaining. the Government. Even if its majority is reduced it should be sufficiently strong to show the world that the mass of Britons is behind the Government. _ It is. to strengthen the power dealing with those events that I made certain changes in the Foreign Office, strengthening the Ministerial personnel and rendering collaboration with . the League and Geneva easier than hitlieitoThe Prime Minister concluded: “I hope it is not insular pride, but I feel that Britain more than any country is the guardian and trustee for democracy. We must push forward with maintaining the security of our own people while fighting for_ the limitation of armaments, bringing _ Europe either piecemeal or .wholly into collective security. Those are the ends I desire, and in that spirit I accepted from His Majesty the weightiest burden that can be laid on the shoulders of an Englishman.” new Cabinet OPINION OF LONDON PRESS LABOUR LEADER’S VIEWS LONDON, Bth June. . “The Telegraph” says Mr Baldwin is the embodiment of the spirit of j national union. His cabinet will not , escape criticism. The infusion of new j blood is very comparatively small. Many had hoped Mr Eden’s success j would have secured his reversion to ! the Foreign Office. j 1 The “News-Chronicle” sees little, difference between th e new and the j old Governments, except that Conser- . vative domination is slightly more de- | finitely acknowledged. . | “The Times” says Mr Baldwins new i Government maintains the national | principals to the full extent of its predecessor, and it is definitely stronger in detail. “The ending of the farce,” is how • Mr Geo. Lansbury, Labour Leader, describes the new Government, adding, “I am glad it is now acknowledged . that the country is really ruled by a. Tory Government.” THE CHANGE OVER REMARKABLE EXPEDITION PROMOTION OF YOUNG MEMBERS (British Official Wireless] (Received 10th June. 10.40 a.m.) V RUGBY, Bth June. The reconstruction of the Cabinet was effected with remarkable expedition and a minimum of excitement. During the afternoon Mr Ramsay MacDonald was addressing the House of Commons on defence questions as Prime Minister. On leaving the House he drove to Buckingham Palace and within the next two and a-half hqprs all formalities in connection with the change over were completed and the new Prime Minister had issued his Cabinet list. The National Liberals have an additional seat owing to the advancement of Mr Ernest Brown to be .Minister of Labour, and the Conservatives also have one additional Cabinet Minister. The average age of members of the Cabinet is 54 years, compared with 57 of the late Cabinet. The reduction is due mainly to the promotion of three members who are in their thirties. The youngest member is Mr Malcolm MaciDonald (33). Mr Eden is 38 and Mr Oliver Stanley 39. In the new Cabinet for the first time for 70 years, are father and son. Mr Ramsay and Mr Malcolm MacDonald. It is understood that the late Prime Minister, whose office of Lord President of the Council is a sinecure, will have special responsibility for the co-ordina-tion of the activities of the Defence Forces and will he chairman of a subcommittee of the Committee of Imperial Defence. Lord Zetland (Secretary for India) has issued the follow in rr statement on taking office as Secretary for India: “I am naturally gratified at the opportunity of being associated once more in so intimate a manner with the destinies of India. I realise that the future constitution is already in shape and that the task which falls to my lot is not to draft a measure but rather to aid m piloting the existing Bill through the final stages in the statute book, and thereafter to join with Lord Willingdon (Yiceroy) in bringing the new form of government into operation. Credit for the Bill will remain for all time Sir Samuel Hoare’s. Perhaps I should add that if has always been my view that reasonable continuity of policy is essential in the relations between Britain and India. In this case continuity will be easy and natural for "my views and those of Sir Samuel Hoare on the question of the Indian constitution have been formed in almost complete sympathy with one another during the long process of investigation at the Round Table Conferences and by the Joint Select Committee in which he and I have taken part. I do not underestimate the difculties of the task before me, but from the sympathy of many personal friends whom I am fortunate enough to possess in India I shall hope to derive encouragement and strength. MR BALDWIN A CHARACTER SKETCH The first thing to remember about Mr Baldwin is that he is not a party man on the old lines, and does not owe his rise to power to the old conditions (wrote Mr J. St. Loe Stracliey in the “Spectator” some years ago). He does not owe any .part of liis political

status to great wealth, to any connection with one of the ruling families of old days, or, like Air Austen and Air Neville Chamberlain, to being tbe son of a great Parliamentary father. Again, he does not belong to any of the great Interests, nor can he be regarded as one of their annexed representatives. He is a man of considerable private means, but though experienced in business he is no great financier or millionaire. Neither the landed interest, nor the coal interest, the brewing interest, nor the distilling interest looks to him for special guidance or support. Next, Air Baldwin is not one of the men who have risen to prominence because of his oratory. Mr Baldwin is not eminent, as a platform speaker; he is not one of the people who can go round the country winning men’s hearts and votes and making for themselves a devoted dan of personal adherents. Nor does he belong to the I type of politician who studies some particular question, or group of questions, and makes himself their mastei. Mr Baldwin has not made his name i connected with any special legislative 1 proposals. The only region in which he seems to approach this type of politician is that of Imperial Preference. But even here he has done nothing of the kind that was done by Air Bonar Law. Air Bonar Law took up Imperial Preference and made it his own in such a special degree that it was impossible to dissociate his name from it. Finally, Air Baldwin is not a coterie politician! He has not formed a little band of admirers and supporters round pim—men who become first admit eis and then devotees of their chief and are willing to*'die in the last ditch Svith him. To have such a band of followers' is a great advantage to a politician. but Mr Baldwin has not got them. Nor has he attempted to get them. Though he is greatly liked and respected in the House of Commons, he cannot be called a magnetic man in the sense that that word was used in regard to Disraeli, or. Gladstone, or Lord "Randalph Churchill. In a word. Air Baldwin cannot be said to have got his great position by any of the ways in which our statesmen usually reach prominence. How. then, has he achieved greatness? The answer is, I think, a double one—partly by good luck, and partly by the fact that, without using any of the politician’s arts, he has impressed the House of Commons and the country generally with the belief that lie is a man of the highest political character and a man who can be trusted in any and every circumstance to run straight. Burke said of Lord Rockingham that “his virtues were his arts.” The very same thing might be said of Air Baldwin. Though he has never consciously tried to use his political virtues as levers, and has never allowed other people to use them foi that purpose; yet these political virtues have acted quite as efficiently as if they were the arts of the self-adver-tiser. Air Baldwin lias always been felt jby his colleagues in Governments and I by his associates in the House of Comi mons to be a man who could be trusted not to catch at a personal advantage, not to make his country’s difficulties stepping-stones to his own eminence, and not to push others aside in order to advance himself. Nobody lias ever felt in regard to him what politicians so often feel about each other: “If I leave my chair for a moment somebody else will come up and sit in it, and I shall never be able to get back. If I don’t stake out my claim, stick to it, and defend it at all costs, it will be jumped by ■ somebody else. Therefore I must use eternal vigilance, and must be always ready to drive out the intruder. In a word, I must compete, and compete to win.” Air Baldwin has never shown tendencies of this kind: but it happens (I am quite sure that Air Baldwin has never thought of this himself) that, when there is fierce competition amongst men •on these lines, no one in fact advances so quickly as the man who is genuinely uncompetitive —the man who does not ride jealously, or fight jealously, or write or speak jealously, but is quite,genuinely content to see other men succeeding and advancing. Such an attitude disarms competition and gives the uncompetitive man an extraordinary advantage. When once he has won the confidence of others as the man who does not want to step into your place, or to pull you down, or push you aside in order to advance himself, he may find himself so little hustled and crowded that he is able to stroll to the front. I have up till now made my analysis of Air ; Baldwin’s political character somewhat negative; but he has a very positive side. In the first place, he is a man of the best and most intense form of patriotism. To me this means, and I hold ought to mean to others, a man who is a convinced upholder of Democracy—a man who believes that the will of the majority must prevail, though, of course, it must prevail, not by force, but by persuasion ; not by arbitrary or tyrannical methods, but ‘by The due process of law. Air Baldwin is no doctrinaire who would say that it was his business to give the people what was good for them and to deny them by all t/he means in his power what he would consider injurious. He has, of course, his own ideas of what is right, and lie wants to see them carried out for the benefit of his fellow-countrymen; but he is not going to use any arbitrary means io attain his ends. If he cannot convert his country men at once, he will acquiesce in their, decisions till he is able to move them with the lever of persuasion. He no more thinks that the man of so-called-knowledge, education, and culture has a Heavensent mandate to rule his fellows than he believes that any set of oligarchs should rule by inheritance—e.g., by being the grandsons of their grandfathers. In a word. Air Baldwin is felt to be a constitutional, popular and democratic statesman in the very best sense of the words. He has a real and a genuine sympathy with the mass of the population, and does not look upon them as an uneducated herd which has to be managed, controlled, and cajoled by people, of greater ability. Though a man of intellectual force’ and of no small culture, lie is by no means the kind of person whose mind finds it very difficult to get on rapport with the uneducated man. Air Baldwin finds himself at home with plain people and really understands their point of view, and that is why, of course, in the long run they understand him and like him. They feel that, though he is essentially the instructed man, he is not always looking over their heads. That is in a very wide measure why the country has given liiiii its confidence in so marked a manner. While playing up manfully for his own side, lie never takes mean , or unfair advantages. Yet this virtue ’ is one that must be admitted to have : its dangers in leadership. A leader ; must be a bit of an egotist to'be suc- ! cessful. I will not say that lie must i claim a monopoly of the power to do 1 the right thing—but, at any rate, ho

must believe in himself to some extent, as did Chatham when he insisted that the country needed saving and that he was the man who could save it. Mr Baldwin has not quite this ex- i tremity of heroic egotism, but lie has j all a man’s proper confidence in his. own views. I sometimes wonder, however, whether he lias in sufficient quantity a particular quality which no statesman in troublous times can afford to be without. A Victorian statesman of great insight and great power of expression said of the late Duke of Devonshire, one of the soundest English statesman of recent time. “What 1 like about him is his ‘You-be-damned-ness.’ ” Whatever happens, Mr Baldwin will never be hated, or despised, or even disconsidered by his fellow-country-men. If he falls, he will fall with his honour and his dignity untarnished. Mr Baldwin joined the National Government in August, 11)31. under Mr MacDonald taking office of Lord President of the Council, and retained that office in the new Ministry formed in November, 1931, He led the British deputation at the Ottawa Conference in 1932. JAMES RAMSAY MACDONALD GREAT SERVICES TO THE NATION It has been said of Ramsay MacDonald (wrote the “Argus’s” correspondent) that Continental extremists look upon him" as a ruddy Socialist, while his constituents regard him as a mild Labour member, and his record in the House of Commons suggests a sturdy Liberal. In any case, MacDonald reached the proud position of Prime Minister because of his House of Commons qualities. There we're a score of men in the House of Commons who had better claims to speak for trade Unionism, including Mr Clynes, whom Mr MacDonald superseded. But none of the Labour leaders had the education and political experience of Ramsay. MacDonald, and none had prepared himself for the task of impressing the House of Commons as Ramsay MacDonald. Platform oratory is of little value at St. Stephens’s, whereas acquaintance with Parliamentary tactics is all-important. MACDONALD OF LOSSIEMOUTH Sixty-nine years ago Ramsay MacDonald was born at Lossiemouth, a Scottish fishing village on the Moray Firth, which has the place in MacDonald’s career which Crosshouse, Kilmarnock, had in the career of “Andy” Fisher. The Labour Leader’s first home was a two-roomed cottage, which still exists. MacDonald spent his Christmas holiday at Lossiemouth, but the home was one which he built for himself in 1911, and includes a house within the house, which he devised for his aged mother, now dead. Perhaps the earliest influence in the boy’s life was his grandmother, a woman of considerable beauty in youth, who developed into a matron of rare strength of character. From her Ramsay learnt the folk songs and legends which nourished his boyish imagination. To his mother, he owed the strict discipline which made his first schoolmaster describe Ramsay as “an extremely well-brought-up boy.” If the two-roomed house of his birth was cramped for space, it was spick and span as scouring could make it. “I well remember,” wrote MacDonald in later life, “the half-hour that used to precede kirk. Everybody was carefully scrutinised by everybody else, so that each .speck was removed and every ruffled surface smoothed down.” The description of the Sunday inspection might apply to the whole' boyhood of this model son. For the rest, there was the sheer beanty of the countryside, with the River LossTe running under a bold headland to the sea, and, behind, the rich farm lands with their potato fields, and, lastly, the moors which stretched to the blue of the Grampians and melted into the azure and white of the wind-wept sky. The romance of the sea, its mingled beauty and cruelty, also came as an Inspiration to the boy. At twelve years of age circumstances in the MacDonald family forced the boy to leave school and work in the potato fields, but he continued to attend school each day, going up to the dominie- for an hour’s tuition before the rest of the boys came. Later Ramsay rejoined the school as a pupil teacher. So he reached the age of 18, always proving himself a great reader and an earnest student. MACDONALD IN LONDON But Lossiemouth was too cramped for a Scot who felt that he had powers which were not given to every youth, even in Scotland. He made up his mind to grow at the expense, of the accursed Englishman over the border. Already he had done some newspaper writing and public speaking, and, at IS, he went to Bristol in the hope that he could establish himself there in social politics. The hope proved vain. During a recent election MacDonald was speaking to a mass meeting in Bristol, and recalled this early effort. “In 1885,” he said, “I spoke in another public place in Bristol, and three people came to hear me.” Looking round the crowded Colston Hall, with 5000 packed in the floor and galleries, it is small wonder that MacDonald went on to ask if the finger of Providence was not in these things? Denied this opening at Bristol, MacDonald went to London, and earned 12s (id a week as a clerk in the city, reading Darwin and Spencer during his lunch hours, at the Guildhall Library, as many other ambitious youths have done before and since, nc attended classes at the Birkbeck College in Holborn, one of the leading working men’s colleges in London. For some months, too, he studied for a Queen’s scholarship at the South Kensington College of Science, but he broke down owing to the strain of night work added to day work, and, on the eve of the examination, had to abandon the effort to become a science teacher. Recovering, he joined that sturdy Radical, the late Thomas Lough, who was attempting to become a member of Parliament for Islington. Lough paid MacDonald £75 a year as private secretary, and MacDonald worked with him for four years, from 1888 to 1891, supplementing his income by contributions to such papers as the “Echo,” the “Weekly Dispatch,” and the “Daily Chronicle,” even more ambitious efforts being sundry contributions to the Dictionary of National Biography. For the rest, there were politics. MacDonald became honorary secretary of the New Fellow-

Ifthip, in which lie was associated with such men as Edward Carpenter, Patrick Geddes, aiul Havelock Ellis. Even I earlier lie had joined the London Trades ! Council, and helped to edit the journal ■of the Socialist Union. When the ln- | dependent Labour Party was formed by Keir Ilardie, Kanisay MacDonald olfered himself as a speaker to the movement, and was accepted. At the General Election in 181)5, he contested Southampton as an Independent Labour Party candidate, and came in at the bottom of the poll with 897 votes. MARRTAGE AND SUCCESS Not much evidence of a budding Prime Minister as yet. The abidingvalue of the Southampton contest to Ramsay MacDonald, however, proved to be the influence of his future wife, Margaret Gladstone. She was a daughter of Dr. Hall Gladstone, a wellknown scientist, who had succeeded Faraday as professor of chemistry at the Royal Institution. Miss Gladstone had been converted to Home Rule for Ireland in spite of the objections of her friends and relatives, and then discovered that she had sympathies with the women’s side of the Labour movement. She introduced herself to Ram- j say MacDonald by sending a subscription to his election fund. MacDonald answered the letter with a formal expression of thanks, and Miss Gladstone made a note in her diary: “First letter from .T. R. MacDonald, May 29, 1895.” Just below came another entry: “First saw him, Pioneer Club, June 13, 1890. • Fifteen months later the two were married. Never was a union happier or more fruitful in results. The MacDonald’s rooms in Lincoln’s Inn Fields became a recognised resort of the intellectuals of Socialism, and some of the best aspects of the movement were framed under the guidance of Mrs MacDonald. There is a public memorial to her in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, surrounded with dancing children, erected bv her admirers in the Labour Party, after her early death in 1911. Mrs MacDonald was the mother of two sons and three daughters, and a well-loved comrade to her husband. In 1931 Mr MacDonald presided over the conference of Ministers which considered Germany’s financial crisis in July, 1931. In consequence of the sudden crisis in financial affairs he formed the National Government in August, 1! 31, and became its head. His action in this respect will live in history. He presided over the Lausanne Conference and signed the Treaty in July, 1932. He had a most strenuous time as head of the National Government and owing to overwork he was ordered to take three months’ rest in July, 1934, and went to Canada. He presided over the World Economic Conference in June-July, 1933. MR ANTHONY EDEN At the age of 17 when the World War broke out, Mr Anthony Eden, Minister in Charge of League of Nations Affairs, joined the King’s Royal Rifle Corps in 1915, became a captain and won the Military Cross, and saw a good deal of service in the Near East, where he became interested in Oriental languages. Back to civil life in 1919, he entered Oxford University, where he specialised in these languages, winning first-class honours, the highest possible scholastic attainment. He immediately turned to politics upon receiving his degree, was elected a member of Parliament as a Conservative, and made his debut in international affairs when he became Parliamentary Private Secretary to the then Foreign Secretary Sir Austen Chamberlain. When the National Government swept the polls, he became Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and made distinctly more of the position than any of his predecessors. He accompanied Sir John Simon, Foreign Secretary, on many missions to Geneva, and when Sir John was not able to leave London, the task of representing Great Britain was shifted to the shoulders of Captain Eden. His reputation increased swiftly. His Parliamentary training served him in good stead, he has become known as one of the best debaters in Geneva, and lie has shown himself as a patient negotiator and a hard worker. Speaking adequate French, he is a good mixer with foreigners, and his friendly and informed manner has heightened his prestige. SIR SAMUEL HOARE I Sir Samuel Hoare, the new Foreign Minister, was born in 18S0 in London. He took a first class in history at Oxford, and sat for Chelsea as early as 1910, in his thirtieth year. He served as captain in the Norfolk Yeomanry during the war, and became Secretary of State for Air in the Conservative Cabinet of 1922, after the fall of the Lloyd George Coalition. He was not at first a member of Cabinet, but his work attracted the attention of the leaders, and he was given a seat in Cabinet early after, in 1923. For a short spell he was out of oilice while the Labour Ministry held the reins, and he was welcomed back heartily on all hands in 1924 when Mr Baldwin, after the General Election, again came to power. In 1931 he became Secretary of State for India. He has done his 'full share to bring the Royal Air Force !to the remarkable all-round efficiency which now marks it. LORD EUSTACE PERCY One of the outstanding figures in education circles in England is Lord Eustace Percy, who was president of the Board of Education in 1924-29, after serving in Mr Baldwin’s previous Ministry as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health. He has been a member of the House of Commons since 1921. He is a scion of the house of Percy, one of the most famous in English history, the head branch of which are the Dukes of Northumberland, a title which has existed for centuries and which links these modern years with those of the Middle Ages. Included among the famous' names of the family are those of Sir Henry Percy, commonly known as “Hotspur,” who was killed at the battle of Shrewsbury in 1403, while many others have also died on the field of battle. As a family they were staunch to the Lancastrian cause during the War of the Roses, for which reason Edward IV. took away the title and estates and gave them to Lord Montagu, a brother of Warwick the King-maker. Lord Eustace Percy has published a number of books on education and polities. THE MARQUESS OF ZETLAND The Marquess of Zetland was educated at Harrow and Trinity College, Cambridge, and travelled widely before entering polities as Conservative member for the Hornsey Division of

Middlesex in 1907. In 1917-22 lie was Governor of Bengal and he was a member of the Round Table Conference of 1930-31, and of tbe Select Committee, on India of 1933. He has been a president of many societies relating to Asia and India and has written on sport, politics and travel. Ho is chairman of the National Trust and a Governor of the National Bank of Scotland. MR MALCOLM”MacDONALD Mr Malcolm MacDonald is the son of Mr Ramsay MacDonald and was born in 1901. He was educated at l’ctcrslield and at Oxford and twice contested a seat before he was elected to the House of Commons in 1929. In 1931 he remained with his father when the Labour Party went into opposition and became Parliamentary Under-Sec-retarv of the Dominions Office. He visited New Zealand last year. MR A.TbROWN Mr Alfred Ernest Brotvn, the now Minister of Labour, was born at Torquay in 1.981. He is the Liberal M.l’. for Leith. He began to speak on 'Liberal platforms while still at school and was a Baptist lay preacher when fourteen years old. In 1914 he enlisted in the Sportsmen’s Battalion and received a commission in the Somerset Light Infantry in 1910. He was mentioned in dispatches and received the Military Cross and the Italian 1 Silver Stud for Valour. In November, 1931, he was appointed Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health, and was made Secretary of the Mines Department in 1932.