ANNUAL REGISTER FOR THE YEAR 1924. PART I. ENGLISH HISTORY. CHAPTER I. THE FIRST LABOUR GOVERNMENT. THE opening of 1924 found England still under the Conservative Government of Mr. Baldwin which had been defeated at the polls a few weeks earlier. As the Conservatives formed the largest party in the new House of Commons, Mr. Baldwin, acting strictly within his constitutional rights, decided not to resign office till the verdict of the election had been confirmed by a vote in Parliament. The situation was one for which English history afforded no precedent. Never before had a Prime Minister been called upon to resign in favour of the leader of a party smaller than his own. Yet this seemed to be the fate in store for Mr. Baldwin, unless some means could be devised of altering the balance of parties before Parliament met. Speaking at the National Liberal Club on December 17, Mr. Asquith had announced his intention not to lift a finger to keep the Conservative Government in office. These words were universally taken to mean that the Liberals would support a Labour vote of censure or no-confidence to be moved as soon as possible after the opening of Parliament, and so bring about the fall of the Government. In that eventuality Labour, as the next largest party, would be called upon to take office. Both the Labour and Liberal parties had declared unequivocally that they would enter into no entangling alliances. A Labour Government, therefore, if formed, would be a minority Government a new departure in British politics. Such was the A THE FIRST LABOUR GOVERNMENT. THE opening of 1924 found England still under the Conservative Government of Mr. Baldwin which had been defeated at the polls a few weeks earlier. As the Conservatives formed the largest party in the new House of Commons, Mr. Baldwin, acting strictly within his constitutional rights, decided not to resign office till the verdict of the election had been confirmed by a vote in Parliament. The situation was one for which English history afforded no precedent. Never before had a Prime Minister been called upon to resign in favour of the leader of a party smaller than his own. Yet this seemed to be the fate in store for Mr. Baldwin, unless some means could be devised of altering the balance of parties before Parliament met. Speaking at the National Liberal Club on December 17, Mr. Asquith had announced his intention not to lift a finger to keep the Conservative Government in office. These words were universally taken to mean that the Liberals would support a Labour vote of censure or no-confidence to be moved as soon as possible after the opening of Parliament, and so bring about the fall of the Government. In that eventuality Labour, as the next largest party, would be called upon to take office. Both the Labour and Liberal parties had declared unequivocally that they would enter into no entangling alliances. A Labour Government, therefore, if formed, would be a minority Government-a new departure in British politics. Such was the A anomalous situation which had been created by the 1923 election. The prospect of a Labour-or, as it was generally termed, Socialist Government was viewed with boundless alarm by large and influential sections of the community, and frantic cries were raised that it must be prevented at all costs. Movements were accordingly set on foot to unite all the anti-Socialist forces in the country, either by creating a new party, or by engineering a coalition between the Liberals and Unionists. The Daily Mail made itself the mouthpiece of this endeavour, and in spite of a stinging rebuff administered to it by Mr. Asquith in his speech at the National Liberal Club, continued to call on the Liberal leader to become the "saviour of society' by joining forces with the Conservatives. The London Conservative Association sought to attain the same end by the opposite means. Soon after the election its president had written to Mr. Baldwin begging him to come to some kind of agreement with Mr. Asquith, and on January 2 the Executive of the Association held a meeting at which it decided to make public statement of its view that the formation of a Labour Government would be directly contrary to the will of the people, and if the Liberals would not support a Conservative Government, then Conservatives should support a Liberal administration "in order that the government of the country might be carried on.” Mr. Baldwin paid no more heed to the London Conservative Association than Mr. Asquith to the Daily Mail. His own view, and that of the bulk of his party, was more accurately reflected by The Times, which protested emphatically against any log-rolling between Unionists and Liberals for the purpose of depriving Labour of the prize to which it was properly entitled by constitutional usage, and insisted that that party should be given what it called a "fair chance." A number of intrigues were set on foot to oust Mr. Baldwin from the leadership of the Conservative party, but they came to nothing, and he remained the director of its policy. And if the Conservative rank and file was prepared to tolerate a Labour administration, a large number of Liberals looked forward to Mr. MacDonald's premiership with positive satisfaction, feeling no doubt that the causes which they had at heart would be safer in his keeping than in that of their own leaders, so few of whom could show clean records from the Liberal point of view. That Labour would not budge from the position taken up by it in the Declaration of December 12 (vide ANNUAL REGISTER, 1923, p. 141), which announced its readiness to assume office, was made abundantly clear at a great demonstration held on January 8 at the Albert Hall to celebrate the Labour victory at the polls. Nearly all the Labour members of Parliament were on the platform, and it was taken for granted by every speaker that Mr. MacDonald would in a short time become |