Unitarians

"[Chamberlain delivered] two remarkable speeches in [1885], that at Glasgow on September 15, and that at Inverness three days later. I still remember, as though it were but yesterday, the thrill of pleasure which went through Radical Scotland when the first speech was delivered. Its bold audacity struck the imagination of the country. We waited with interest and at a high tension for the Inverness pronouncement. The earnest candour of the man who based his politics upon the fact that one in every thirty people in the country was on the parish, that one in every ten was on the border of starvation, as he had done in Glasgow, and was flaunting the classes with cavalier indifference whilst declaring that for the increase of the material resources of the poor there was "no hope whatever except in the radical revision of the laws which affect the tenure of land," touched the imagination of Radical Scotland... Mr. Chamberlain's speech at Inverness was therefore no ordinary pronouncement. People flocked to the town from far and near—and they were rewarded. Never was the crofter position better put. He reiterated his doctrines about land ownership. A volcano of fury shot up next morning from the Conservative press, but thousands of hearts were stirred for the coming contest by the joy that at last a man had appeared who really meant business."

"Mr. Chamberlain is unquestionably the future leader of the people... He is a Radical and doesn't care who knows it as long as the people do."

"The collapse of employment in the great "staple" industries after 1920 provided protection with its historic opportunity. In effect what happened was what Joseph Chamberlain always said would happen; though before 1914 it never did."

"From his boyhood up, Joseph Chamberlain has been consumed with a passionate longing to benefit the lot of the common people. Not Burns, nor Keir Hardie is more constantly preoccupied by the necessity for doing something to make the cottage of the labouring man less of a hovel and more of a home."

"Mr. Chamberlain is at this moment the most popular and the most trusted man in England. He is the most popular of British statesmen throughout our Empire. To our kin beyond the seas he, more than any other man, stands for Imperial unity and consolidation."

"Throughout his career, as it seems to me, there were two principles which were at the basis of his political action...a desire to improve the condition of the people, and an intense, and perhaps almost aggressive, national pride."

"I recognise that Mr. Chamberlain's historic agitation has rendered one outstanding service to the cause of the masses. It has helped to call attention to a number of real crying evils festering amongst us, the existence of which the governing classes in this country were ignorant of or overlooked... He has committed the party which, by temperament, tradition, and interest, is opposed to great changes—he has committed it to propositions which social reformers of other schools of thought have hitherto in vain sought to convert them."

"The loss of Chamberlain alone was immeasurable disaster; his influence with the democracy had for some time past exceeded Gladstone's; I found of late that if audiences cheered Gladstone's name for two minutes, they cheered Chamberlain's for five... In any case, the energy of a Parliament created for social reform was to be spent on prolonged struggle over a subject which had formed no part of the election programme. Working men would find that their devotion had been thrown away, their confidence abused, the promised reforms to which they gave their votes postponed indefinitely, if not altogether sacrificed, to a measure which no one among them had ever heard."

"I believe that the people of this country have decided this matter in their minds, and have determined that they will take their full share in the disposition of these new lands and in the work of civilisation they have to carry out there. I think they are justified in that determination—justified by the spirit of the past, justified by that spirit which has shown that the spirit of travel and adventure and enterprise distinguishing the Anglo-Saxon race has made us peculiarly fit to carry out the work of colonisation."

"If we are not going to give up this mission—to use a word I do not much like, but it has been previously employed—let us look the matter courageously in the face, and be prepared, if need be, for sacrifice of life and money, which, in the first instance, we may have to make in order to carry it out. We have come to the point at which we do not consider life so sacred that it may not be sacrificed to save life. For my own part, I hold that, both in matters of life and money, we may sacrifice both, if we see before us a prospect of good and a satisfaction for the sacrifice we may make. The people of this country, in my opinion, have by large majorities declared that it is our duty to take our share in the work of civilisation in Africa... They know that an omelette cannot be made without breaking eggs, and I do not believe that they are prepared to count the cost."

"Mr Chamberlain views everything through the wrong end of a municipal drain-pipe."

"A vein of self-sufficient obstinacy in the new Minister contributed to the difficulties that baffled all our endeavours ... The machinery which Mr. Chamberlain created showed itself incompetent to deal even with volunteer recruits, and certainly too unreliable to be entrusted with the administration of dictatorial powers ... Mr. Neville Chamberlain is a man of rigid competency. Such men have their uses in conventional times or in conventional positions, and are indispensable for filling subordinate posts at all times. But they are lost in an emergency or in creative tasks at any time."

"He is opposed to expansion of the Empire and to any expense, on the ground, as I understand, that we have enough to do at home. Now, suppose this view...had been put 50 or 100 years ago, and suppose it had been accepted by the Parliament of that day, I ask myself what would now be the position of this country, what would be the position of persons in the slums for whom my hon. Friend has so much sympathy and feeling? Does my hon. Friend believe, if it were not for the gigantic foreign trade that has been created by the policy of expansion, that we could subsist in this country in any kind of way—I do not say in luxury, but in the condition in which at present a great part of our population live? Does he think that, we could support 40,000,000 of people in these small islands? Is it not the fact that the great proportion of the 40,000,000 people of this country earns its livelihood by the trade brought to the country in consequence of the action of our ancestors 50 or 100 years ago who did not shrink from making sacrifices, and who were not ashamed...to peg our claims for posterity? We are the posterity who enjoy the result of that policy; and are we to be meaner and more selfish than those who preceded us? Are we to do nothing for those who come after us? Are we to sacrifice that which those who went before have gained for us? Why, if this idea of closing all the doors through which all new trade is to come to us is to be accepted by this House, we must adopt some means or other by which our population can be kept stationary. And I venture to say that when our ancestors pegged out claims for us, as they did in many parts of the world, they were not at the time more promising than the claims which are now under consideration."

"I was never able to discover what passed through Mr. Chamberlain's mind in this fleeting negotiation which he conducted entirely alone without, so far as I am aware, warning anyone in advance. Did he believe in Hitler's sincerity? Or was he carried away by the emotion of relief that war had been averted? Or did he believe that the best chance with Hitler was to try to bind him by a public declaration and then to proclaim the belief that Hitler would keep his word? I am inclined to think that the last is the most likely hypothesis. One thing is certain. The subsequent seizure of Prague was a bitter blow to Mr. Chamberlain, which provoked a personal resentment against Hitler. I noticed that whenever Hitler's name was mentioned after March 17th [1939], the Prime Minister looked as if he had swallowed a bad oyster."

"What calibre of Conservatism Chamberlain would have sought to impose is open to conjecture, since he never properly had an opportunity to impose one. He was kept cramped in the wings for so long that he reached the centre stage only moments before the intermission. Yet there is a strong impression that he would have tried to impose something: his politics was a doctrine of action because that was the sphere where he knew himself to be at his best and because that was what he thought he was there to do. It is far from clear, on the other hand, in which direction he would have gone. His own introduction of tariffs in 1932, with suitable acknowledgement to "name and blood", had blocked one path. It may be that he would have extended the moderate collectivism towards which Conservatism, in its "national" guise, had been moving; certainly he took pains to rebut the charge that the National Government was a sterile administration. His view that British government in the 1930s was reformist may have been heartfelt for his achievement, as much as his propaganda, suggests that he pursued a measure of social reform as an end in itself. To that extent the European imbroglio to which Chamberlain was heir has masked the degree to which he was a radical democrat. He was closer to a compassionate understanding of "the people" than any other leader examined here. He understood the urban poor, as Baldwin did not, and he had the organizational equipment to direct those who agreed with him."

"Be as Radical as you like, be a Home Ruler if you must, but be a little Jingo if you can."

"The fact is, that in social questions the Tories have almost always been more progressive than the Liberals, and the Conservative leaders in their latest legislation have only gone back to the old Tory traditions. Almost all the legislation dealing with Labour questions has been initiated by Tory statesmen, and most of it has been passed by Tory Governments. The Factory and Workshops Acts, the Mines Regulation Act, Merchant Shipping legislation, the Acts relating to sanitation, artisans' dwellings, land purchase, allotments, small holdings and free education are all Conservative, and it is therefore historically inaccurate to represent the Tory Party as opposed to socialistic legislation."

"Few men had a more real enjoyment of all things of beauty and art, whether in the world of nature or of men, which make life colourful and rich, and few had his knowledge and deep appreciation of all that is greatest in music. No one was a truer lover of the countryside. He shared with Lord Grey the love of birds, and like him had learnt as a fisherman the art of patience, so essential to the trade of politics. Anyone who worked with him, and I suppose I worked as closely with him as anybody, was bound to be impressed by two things. One was his complete disinterestedness and disregard of any lesser thoughts of self; and the other his unfaltering courage and tenacity, once he had made up his mind that a thing was right. These are qualities of signal value for a democratic leader, and all who have the vision to appreciate how close they lie to the roots of health in a democratic state will feel a debt to Neville Chamberlain for his practical demonstration of them."

"Things don't happen just because Prime Ministers are very keen on them. Neville Chamberlain was very keen on peace!"

"Being very efficient, Chamberlain had, as he said himself, "no capacity for looking on and seeing other people mismanaging things." Of his planning there is no better example than the programme that he made for the Cabinet in November 1924, for the reform of local government. It was a five-year plan to cover the whole field of health, housing, local taxation and rating, and to be carried out methodically by twenty-five Bills neatly spaced over each succeeding session of the five-year Parliament. No previous Minister of Health or President of the Local Government Board had ever contemplated so ambitious a task. Chamberlain not only convinced a doubtful Cabinet of its advantages, but passed the whole programme through Parliament in little more than four years. Without his remarkable grasp of detail, his achievement would have been impossible. From start to finish it involved an almost interminable series of administrative problems. The result was to display the remarkable talent for administration that had already made his reputation on the Birmingham City Council. The Ministry of Health and the Exchequer provided an unlimited opportunity for still further applying it. His critics sometimes thought that this grasp of detail made him undertake work that ought to have been left to his permanent staff. I am sure, however, that his reforms between 1924 and 1929 would never have been carried through if it had not been for his knowledge of detail and the use that he made of it."

"I and those who agree with me believe in the expansion of the Empire, and we are not ashamed to confess that we have that feeling, and we are not at all troubled by accusations of Jingoism."

"Above all else, whether you agreed with him or not, there could be no other verdict but that "This was indeed a man," for in an age of great debaters he stood out as a born fighter with an uncompromising mind and burning faith... One meets only two or three people in life who at first contact make one feel "command me and I will follow" and Chamberlain was one of them... The great test is surely whether a man's influence lives on after he has gone and in this respect Chamberlain must be unique. He was never Prime Minister, and yet if you want to raise a certain cheer with any ordinary British audience you have only to mention his name... Go overseas and you will find that across Canada, in every part of British Africa, Australasia or the East...if British statesmanship is discussed, the name of Chamberlain always crops up. This is not so much for what he did...but because through him there breathed something new, a fresh outlook, a creed to inspire, a new hope in unity and union. We have never seen his like again—may I leave it at that."

"As I passed through England and the United States, and again when I crossed the boundary of the Dominion, there was one idea impressing itself upon my mind at every step, indelibly written upon the face of two vast countries, and that was the greatness and importance of the distinction reserved for the Anglo-Saxon race—(cheers)—that proud, persistent, self-asserting and resolute stock which no change of climate or condition can alter, and which is infallibly bound to be the predominant force in the future history and civilisation of the world. (Cheers.)"

"I have never supposed since the days of "Ransom" that Mr. Chamberlain would be in the least unwilling to enter into a discussion regarding the unequal distribution of wealth, and I think it is extremely probable that in the course of this and ensuing sessions he may find many opportunities of discussing this problem with some of the newly-returned Members of Parliament. But in all the discussions on this momentous subject which he may enter into with the Labour Members, I venture to express the opinion that he will find among the projects and plans which he will be called upon to discuss none containing a more Socialistic principle than that which is embodied in his own scheme, which, whether it can properly be described as a scheme of protection or not, is certainly a scheme under which the State is to undertake to regulate the course of commerce and of industry, and tell us where we are to buy, where we are to sell, what commodities we are to manufacture at home, and what we may continue, if we think right, to import from other countries."

"The interest of true democracy is not towards anarchy or the disintegration of the Empire, but rather the uniting together kindred races with similar objects. You have a portion in the great path that lies before us. It may yet be that the federation of Canada may be the lamp lighting our path to the federation of the British Empire. (Cheers.) If it is a dream—it may be only the imagination of an enthusiast—it is a grand idea. (Hear, hear.) It is one to stimulate the patriotism and statesmanship of every man who loves his country; and whether it be destined or not to perfect realisation, at least let us all cherish the sentiment it inspires. Let us do all in our power to promote it, and enlarge the relations and goodwill which ought always to exist between sons of England throughout the world and the old folks at home. (Prolonged cheering.)"

"I would like to testify that you did more than any former British Statesman to make a true friendship between the peoples of our two countries possible, and, if the task has not been completed, that it has not been for want of goodwill on your part. I hope that you may still be able to work for, and that we may both be spared to see, the realisation of our dreams,—to see our two peoples living side by side with a deep neighbourly sense of their value one to another, and with a friendship which will make possible whole-hearted co-operation between them in all matters of common interest."

"I hope we may be able sooner or later to federate, to bring together, all these great dependencies of the British Empire into one supreme and Imperial Parliament (cheers), so that they should be all units of one body, that one should feel what the others feel, that all should be equally responsible, that all should have a share in the welfare and sympathize with the welfare of every part. That is what I hope, but there is very little hope for it if you weaken the ties which now bind the central portion of the Empire together. (Cheers.)"

"When I was twenty-two I saw the great Joe Chamberlain for the first time... I was immensely impressed from the first moment with Mr. Chamberlain's remarkable personality... What impressed me most about him was his decisiveness and the fact that he always knew exactly where he was going... He asked me to stay with him at Highbury, which was like a pilgrim going to Mecca... [H]e...said—"Why do the people not realise that Germany is making war upon us, that her economic attack is just as surely an act of aggression as if she had declared hostilities? She will never rest until she dominates the world and before ten years are over, mark my words, she will be using her terrible military machine and nothing can prevent our being involved." ... On another occasion he said—"Tariff reform is our defence. It is just as vital as the navy. We must arm if we are not to be beaten without striking a blow.""

"What a Chamberlain government would have done had there been no war in 1939 will never be known, but an election was due in 1940, and the manifesto proposals outlined by the Conservative Research Department embraced family allowances and the inclusion of insured persons' dependants in health cover—about half the advances usually attributed to Beveridge. As Lady Cecily Debenham wrote to Chamberlain's widow, Anne, after his death: "Neville was a Radical to the end of his days. It makes my blood boil when I see his ‘Tory’ and ‘Reactionary’ outlook taken as a matter of course because the Whirligig of Politics made him leader of the Tory party.""

"Very shortly after his return from Munich Neville Chamberlain asked me to lunch quietly at No. 10. I put the question straight to him: "What really is your impression of Hitler?" He answered that he "believed that no man, much less the accepted leader of a great nation, could have sworn to me his will for peace unless he meant it. Hitler's words rang absolutely sincerely, never from anyone have I had assurances so emphatic." I immediately asked the Prime Minister: "Then why...did you start the very day after your return to do everything possible to speed armaments all round?" He answered, that although he believed Hitler he had felt that he was "in the presence of a man of intense cruelty and I was obsessed with the fact that if in a year or two he changed his mind he would be so ruthless that he would stop at nothing.""

"We have secured for Uganda the pax Britannica which has been so beneficial in India... What existed in Uganda at that time were anarchy and civil war of the worst kind. If we had not been there thousands and perhaps hundreds of thousands of people would have been cruelly massacred; and after the victory of one party or the other what remained of the minority would have been cruelly tortured to death."

"All those months of acute anxiety that heralded and followed the French collapse while I was at the War Office, Neville was so unvaryingly sympathetic and helpful, that I feel I could never thank him enough for all he did. His faith in final victory never wavered at the darkest hour; I am confident that he will still share with us the happier days that must come."

"Duncan: I'm sure we've got everything under control."

"Hacker: Chamberlain thought Hitler was under control."

"Duncan: Ah, well, Chamberlain."

"Hacker: Eden thought Nasser was under control."

"Duncan: Are you suggesting the Foreign Office doesn't know what it's doing?"

"Hacker: No, I am suggesting that they are not telling us what they're doing!"

"Neville Chamberlain was determined to go to extreme lengths in the cause of peace ... That was why he flew to Germany ... I may recall that after thirty years in Parliament I never saw a House of Commons so unanimous in its apparent goodwill to a national leader and never before did Socialist Members of Parliament open their hearts so fully to a traditional opponent such as myself. At least five of them told me spontaneously how fine they thought Chamberlain's action, and one of them, a famous extremist from the North, rushed up to me with tears streaming down his cheeks, put his hand on my shoulder and exclaimed, "Isn't it marvellous how God has found a man to save us from all the misery of war?""

"At 8 p.m. we listened to the Prime Minister's broadcast... It was a most depressing uterrance. There was no mention of France in it or a word of sympathy for Czecho-Slovakia. The only sympathy expressed was for Hitler, whose feeling about the Sudetens the Prime Minister said that he could well understand, and he never said a word about the mobilisation of the Fleet. I was furious. Winston rang me up. He was also most indignant and said that the tone of the speech showed plainly that we're preparing to scuttle."

"No man could have done more to save the world from this war. Your efforts to secure peace gave to our cause a moral strength that can never be disregarded. For this all who have regard for Britain's honour must be profoundly grateful. You have saved us from a war at a moment when we were unready, and if others had been sincere and faithful to their pledges would have prevented hostilities in Europe perhaps for generations. You will surely receive the reward of those who are promised the blessing of peace-makers."

"If ever that silly old man comes interfering here again with his umbrella, I'll kick him downstairs and jump on his stomach in front of the photographers."

"A mentality such as his was equally far apart from the easygoing quietism of Baldwin and the introspective hesitations of MacDonald. Although a man of great personal modesty, Chamberlain was not tolerant. His likes and dislikes were even stronger than Baldwin's, so strong, in fact, that they sometimes led him to mistaken decisions, and when he became Prime Minister, to some bad appointments to responsible posts. He had none of Baldwin's appeal to other men's feelings. "I like your old man Baldwin," Lloyd George once said to me. "I could work with him." He could never work with Chamberlain. Whilst it was the humanist's touch that made Labour hang on Baldwin's words, it was the analyst's accuracy that, reacting against Labour's reluctance to face unpleasant facts, made the Trade Union leaders regard Chamberlain as a bitter enemy, when in practice he was a pronounced radical reformer far to the left of many of them and most of his own party."

"My reliable informants in the German camp had already made it clear to me that Hitler regarded the Prime Minister [Neville Chamberlain] as an impertinent busybody who spoke the ridiculous jargon of an out-moded democracy. The umbrella, which to the ordinary German was the symbol of peace, was in Hitler's view only a subject of derision."

"There was something else in the example of my father's life which impressed me very deeply when I was a young man, and which has greatly influenced me since I took up a public career. I suppose most people think of him as a great Colonial Secretary and tariff reformer, but before he ever went to the Colonial Office he was a great social reformer, and it was my observance of his deep sympathy with the working classes and his intense desire to better their lot which inspired me with an ambition to do something in my turn to afford better help to the working people and better opportunities for the enjoyment of life."

"I cannot but add that I have always been a supporter and defender of your policy when you were Prime Minister. I am sure that it was right. In view of the attitude of France and of the unreadiness of this country for which you were in no way to be blamed, it would have been folly to precipitate then a war with Germany. It was your strength of will and purpose and self-restraint that saved us from that mistake. When the time to meet the challenge of Hitler came, you had made it plain to the whole impartial world that you had done everything possible to keep Europe from war, and to fix the blame for that calamity on the unbridled ambition of Hitler. You enabled your country to enter the war with a clear conscience and a united will."

"Personally I believe that Hitler has cast a spell over Neville. After all, Hitler's achievement is not due to his intellectual attainments nor to his oratorical powers, but to the extraordinary influence which he seems able to exercise over his fellow-creatures. I believe that Neville is under that influence at the present time. "It all depends," he said, "on whether we can trust Hitler." "Trust him for what?" I asked. "He has got everything he wants for the present and he has given no promises for the future." Neville also said that he had been told, and he believed, that he himself had made a very favourable impression on Hitler, and that he believed he might be able to exercise a useful influence over him."

"The Prime Minister then told us the story of his visit to Bechtesgaden. Looking back upon what he said, the curious thing seems to me now to have been that he recounted his experiences with some satisfaction. Although he said that at first sight Hitler struck him as "the commonest dog" he had ever seen, without one sign of distinction, nevertheless he was obviously pleased at the reports he had subsequently received of the good impression that he himself had made. He told us with obvious satisfaction how Hitler had said to someone that he had felt that he, Chamberlain, was "a man." But the bare facts of the interview were frightful... After ranting and raving at him, Hitler had talked about self-determination and asked the Prime Minister whether he accepted the principle. The Prime Minister had replied that he must consult his colleagues. From the beginning to end Hitler had not shown the slightest sign of yielding on a single point. The Prime Minister seemed to expect us all to accept that principle without further discussion because time was getting on."

"[T]he Parliament of 1924–9 was a great constructive Parliament. It marked some of the greatest advances in social and administrative reforms that have ever been made. For these, Baldwin relied on Neville Chamberlain and on Churchill... [Chamberlain] moved firmly along a clearly marked course. He was associated, above all, with the Widows, Orphans and Old Age Pensions Act—one of the foundations of the modern Welfare State—and with the great reforms of local government... Neville Chamberlain in this Parliament, as in previous ones, proved himself a true successor to the reforming tradition of England. Some of his ideas went back to those of Disraeli; others to the unauthorised programme of his great father, Joseph Chamberlain. Others followed naturally on the work of social reform which made the Liberal Governments of 1906 onwards so outstanding. His heart was in all this work, which he thoroughly understood. But he did not wear his heart upon his sleeve; on the contrary, he kept it so closely buttoned up behind his formal morning-coat that he was not suspected of anything except a desire for efficiency. In fact, he was inspired by a deep sentiment and feeling for the poor and suffering. Neither the Opposition who disliked him, nor those of our party who admired him, could see behind the mask. Yet in this Parliament he stood out. If Baldwin was by nature indolent, Neville Chamberlain was the most hard-working of men. The troubles of later years should never be allowed to obscure the great achievements of this period."

"If we fail, let us try again and again until we succeed."