Stanley
Baldwin, the son of the industrialist, Alfred Baldwin, was born in
Bewdley on 3rd August 1867. After being educated at Harrow
and Trinity College, Cambridge, he joined
the family iron and steel business.
In the 1906 General Election, Baldwin was
elected as Conservative MP for Bewdley.
In December 1916, Baldwin became Private Parliamentary Secretary to
Andrew Bonar Law, the Chancellor of the
Exchequer. In the government led by David Lloyd
George, Baldwin served as Junior Lord of the Treasury, Financial
Secretary to the Treasury and President of the Board of Trade.
In October 1922 Baldwin organised the plot that ousted David Lloyd
George as Prime Minister of the coalition government. The new Prime
Minister, Andrew Bonar Law, appointed Stanley
Baldwin Chancellor of the Exchequer in October 1922. When ill-health
forced Bonar Law to resign in May 1923 Baldwin became the new Prime
Minister.
In 1925 Baldwin had to deal with the crisis in the coal industry.
When the mine-owners announced that they intended to reduce the miner's
wages. The General Council of the Trade Union
Congress responded to this news by promising to support the miners
in their dispute with their employers. Baldwin decided to intervene,
and his government supplied the necessary money to bring the miners'
wages back to their previous level. However, Baldwin stated that this
subsidy to the miners' wages would only last 9 months. In the meantime
he set up a Royal Commission under the chairmanship of Sir
Herbert Samuel, to look into the problems of the Mining Industry.
The Samuel Commission published its report in March 1926. Samuel recommended
that the Government subsidy should be withdrawn and the miners' wages
should be reduced. The Trade Union Congress
called a General Strike but continued to negotiate with the government.
The main figure involved in these negotiations was Jimmy
Thomas. Talks went on until late on Sunday night, and according
to Thomas, they were close to agreement when Baldwin broke off negotiations.
The reason for his action was that printers at the Daily
Mail had refused to print a leading article attacking the
proposed General Strike.
On 3rd May the Trade Union Congress called
out workers in the key industries - railwaymen, transport workers,
dockers, printers, builders, iron and steel workers - a total of 3
million men (a fifth of the adult male population).
Baldwin arranged for Sir Herbert Samuel
to meet the leaders of the Trade Union Congress.
Without telling the miners, the TUC negotiating committee met Samuel
and worked out a set of proposals to end the General Strike. These
included: (1) a National Wages Board with an independent chairman;
(2) a minimum wage for all colliery workers; (3) workers displaced
by pit closures to be given alternative employment; (4) the wages
subsidy to be renewed while negotiations continued.
However, Samuel warned that subsequent negotiations would probably
mean a reduction in wages. These terms were accepted by the TUC negotiating
committee, but were rejected by the executive of the Miners'
Federation. On the 11th May, at a meeting of the Trade
Union Congress General Committee, it was decided to accept the
terms proposed by Herbert Samuel and to
call off the General Strike.
On 21st June 1926, Baldwin's Government introduced a Bill into the
House of Commons that suspended the miners'
Seven Hours Act for five years - thus permitting a return to an 8
hour day for miners. In July the mine-owners announced new terms of
employment for miners based on the 8 hour day.
In 1927 Baldwin's Government passed the Trade
Disputes and Trade Union Act. This act made all sympathetic strikes
illegal, ensured the trade union members had to voluntarily 'contract
in' to pay the political levy, forbade Civil Service unions to affiliate
to the TUC, and made mass picketing illegal.
Baldwin lost the 1929 General Election but
was invited to join the National Government formed by Ramsay
MacDonald in August 1931. Baldwin became President of the Council
until he replaced MacDonald as Prime Minister in June 1935.
Baldwin was criticised for his policy of non-intervention in the Spanish
Civil War and his reluctance to rearm against the growing threat
from Adolf Hitler and Nazi
Germany. It has also been claimed that his policies were also
partly responsible for prolonging the economic depression in the 1930s.
In
1936 the Conservative government feared
the spread of communism from the Soviet Union
to the rest of Europe. Baldwin shared
this concern and was fairly sympathetic to the military uprising in
Spain against the left-wing Popular
Front government.
Leon
Blum,
the prime minister of the Popular Front
government in France, initially agreed to
send aircraft and artillery to help the Republican
Army in
Spain. However, after coming under pressure from Baldwin and
Anthony
Eden in
Britain, and more right-wing members of his own cabinet, he changed
his mind.
Baldwin
and Blum now called for all countries in Europe not to intervene in
the Spanish Civil War. A Non-Intervention
Agreement was drawn-up and was eventually signed by 27 countries including
the Soviet Union, Germany
and Italy. However, Adolf
Hitler and
Benito
Mussolini openly
ignored the agreement and sent a large amount of military aid, including
troops, to General Francisco
Franco and
his Nationalist forces.
The Labour
Party originally supported the government's non-intervention policy.
However, when it became clear that Hitler and Mussolini were determined
to help the Nationalists win the war, Labour leaders began to call
for Britain to supply the Popular Front
with military aid. Some members of the party joined the International
Brigades and fought for the Republicans in Spain.
Of the
2,000 British citizens who served with the Republican
Army, the majority were members of the Communist
Party. Although some notable literary figures volunteered (W.
H. Auden, George
Orwell,
John Cornford, Stephen
Spender, Christopher Caudwell),
most of the men who went to Spain were from the working-class, including
a large number of unemployed miners.
To stop
volunteers fighting for the Republicans, the British government announced
on 9th January, 1937, that it intended to invoke the Foreign Enlistment
Act of 1870. It also passed the Merchant Shipping (Carriage of Munitions
to Spain) Act.
Praised for his handling of the abdication crisis in 1936 and resigned
from office following the successful coronation celebrations of George
VI in May 1937. After retiring from the House
of Commons he was granted the title Earl Baldwin of Bewdley. Stanley
Baldwin died on 14th December 1947.
(1)
Henry
(Chips) Channon,
diary entry (28th November, 1936)
The
Battle for the Throne has begun. On Wednesday evening (I know
all that follows to be true,
though not six people in the Kingdom are so informed), Mr Baldwin
spent one hour and forty minutes at Buckingham Palace with the King
and gave him his ultimatum that the Government would resign, and that
the press could no longer be restrained from attacking the King, if
he did not abandon all idea of marrying Mrs Simpson. Mr Baldwin had
hoped, and thought to frighten the Monarch, but found him obstinate,
in love and rather more than a little mad; he refused point blank,
and asked for time to consult his friends. 'Who are they?' Mr Baldwin
demanded. The audience was not acrimonious, but polite, sad and even
affectionate, I am told.
(2)
Resolution passed by the British
Battalion on 27th March 1937.
We the members of the British working class in the British Battalion
of the International Brigade now fighting in Spain in
defence of democracy, protest against statements appearing
in certain British papers to the effect that there is little or
no interference in the civil war in Spain by foreign Fascist Powers.
We have seen with our own
eyes frightful slaughter of men, women, and children in Spain. We
have witnessed the destruction of many of its towns and villages.
We have seen whole areas which have been devastated. And we know beyond
a shadow of doubt that these frightful deeds have been done mainly
by German and Italian nationals, using German and Italian aeroplanes,
tanks, bombs, shells, and guns.
We ourselves have been
in action repeatedly against thousands of German and Italian troops,
and have lost many splendid and heroic comrades in these battles.
We protest against this
disgraceful and unjustifiable invasion of Spain by Fascist Germany
and Italy; an invasion in
our opinion only made possible by the pro-Franco policy of the Baldwin
Government in Britain. We believe that all
lovers of freedom and democracy in Britain should now unite in a sustained
effort to put an end to this invasion of Spain and to force the Baldwin
Government to give to the people of Spain and their legal Government
the right to buy arms in Britain to defend their freedom and democracy
against Fascist barbarianism. We therefore call upon the General Council
of the T.U.C. and the National Executive Committee of the Labour party
to organise a great united campaign in Britain for the achievement
of the above objects.
We denounce the attempts
being made in Britain by the Fascist elements to make people believe
that we British and
other volunteers fighting on behalf of Spanish democracy are no different
from the scores of thousands of conscript troops sent into Spain by
Hitler and Mussolini. There can be no comparison between free volunteers
and these conscript armies of Germany and Italy in Spain.
Finally, we desire it
to be known in Britain that we came here of our own free will after
full consideration of all that this step involved. We came to Spain
not for money, but solely to assist the heroic Spanish people to defend
their country's freedom and democracy. We were not gulled into coming
to Spain by promises of big money. We never even asked for money when
we volunteered. We are perfectly satisfied with our treatment by the
Spanish Government; and we still are proud to be fighting for the
cause of freedom in Spain. Any statements to the contrary are foul
lies.
(3)
Hugh Dalton, diary
entry (18th December, 1940)
Stanley Baldwin desired only not to be troubled with foreign affairs
at all. He left his successive Foreign Secretaries completely free.
(There was, I recall, though I do not mention it tonight, the famous
case of Hoare proceeding to Paris to negotiate the Hoare-Laval Pact,
and Baldwin, asked in Cabinet by some of the younger Tories whether
all was well, and whether there should not be some discussion now
before irrevocable decisions were taken, said, 'I think we all have
confidence in Sam; we can safely leave it in his hands.'
Halifax relates that Baldwin,
in the year of the Abdication, took three months' holiday (repeat
three months), at the end of which he asked Eden, then Foreign Secretary,
"Have you had many telegrams about the King?" Eden said
no. Then Baldwin said, "I have had a great many, some from the
most extraordinary people. I foresee that I shall have a lot of trouble
over this. I hope that you will not bother me with foreign affairs
during the next three months." Yet these were mois mouvementes
in foreign affairs. Hitler was arming, arming, arming, day by day.
But Baldwin was focused on the tactics of the
Abdication.
(4)
Henry
(Chips) Channon,
diary entry (15th
December, 1947)
The death of Lord Baldwin is announced. He died in his
sleep at his Worcestershire
home. He was a grand old man, humane, and remarkably tolerant of human
weakness ... He looked like a stalwart old oak, seemed unapproachable
and seldom talked to anybody in the House of Commons. He had an odd
habit of tearing up his Order Papers, and of grunting. Lazy and ill
informed about anything outside England, he was in a way typical of
his age, and accurately reflected the English people. Smuts once told
me-one night he was dining at Belgrave Square - that probably the
world had rated Baldwin too high when he was at the zenith of his
power, and certainly in more recent years had rated him too low. History,
he said, would surely restore the balance. Later, in the House, many
tributes were paid to Lord Baldwin - the most impressive, because
it was so unexpected, came from the comic Communist Gallacher; an
emotional hush fell on the Chamber as he sat down, and the House adjourned
as a mark of respect to the dead Prime Minister.
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