RAMSAY MacDONALD-First Labour Premier

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 391, 24 March 1937, Page 3

RAMSAY MacDONALD-First Labour Premier

Leaders Of World Affairs

“Became thou art neither cold nor hoc will ‘I spew thee out of my mouth.” (Quoted by the late Lady Houston at Seahaia Harbour i.

James Ramsay Macdonald, one of the founders and one of the destroyers of the British Labour Party, by many regarded as one of the most heroic men of the are—by others at despicable and a traitor of the meanest character, was born in Scotland of obscure parentage. His earliest years were a constant struggle against grinding poverty.

He left Scotland at 14 and found himself penniless and in London. Working as clerk in a warehouse for 12/6 a week he spent the evenings studying science and economics. Elected to the Commons, he had the courage to stand up and denounce the War before the whole House. He asked to resign from his golf Wlub at Lossiemouth; large bodies of police were required to protect his meetings; and most of his party drifted away from him.

On at least two occasions hie political progress was the result of good lucfc' When he was first elected secretary of the Labour Representation Committee, which later became the LaboUr’Party, many of the voters believed that they were voting for another J. Mlacdonald. Many years later he was elected to the leadership Of the party by only two votes over Mr J. R. Clynes and his success was largely due to the votes of the Clydetide Radicals who believrd that he would adopt a genuinely Leftist policy.

When Macdonald first reached the Premiership he was a picturesque, and an arresting, figure. His vivid Scottish eloquence,* his poise and ability in debate, his unerring tkill as a Parliamentarian and his unquestionable courage all combined to make him a world figure of the,first magnitude. With Harriot, the French Socialist, he set out to inaugurate a new and happier policy towards Germany.

But it seems that even from the earliest days Macdonald was not really popular within his own party. He never seemed at ease in the World he had conquered. Excessively proud and vain, his attitude was by no means cordial, and was at times even Icy, towards his subordinates. It has been said of him that “No Prime

(Written for the ‘Central press' by W.J,H.)

Minister of modern times has been on less intimate terms with his colleagues.” Like Wooflrov,' Wilson, he was never able to take criticism in the right spirit, and his followers soon began to complain bitterly of his insufferable superiority.

Macdonald unfortunately has little sdnse of humour; and he is. a man of the most obstinate desires. With something of the mystic, his moods are those of the Scotch mitts and tempests. What he demanded more han anything else was adoration and this was the one emotion he seemed unable to inspire in his supporters.'. His wife, whom he worshipped, died in 1911, and ever since then he has been a very lonely man. When the great financial crisis occurred in 1931, Macdonald decided to knuckle under to the City of London. The crisis v'dt basically due to the shrinkage of British exports and the decline of British shipping and overseas investments. The City of London, having borrowed money on short term at low rates of interest, had lent it out on long term at high rates. When the crisis appeared imminent, the London bankers thought to save themselves by a loan from Ne*w York; but Wall Street would advance no credits until the British Budget, which had been expanding rapidly a® a result of very necessary and overdue expenditure upon social services and the “dole,” should be balanced. Macdonald went to the country and, promising to prune down expenditure, Was given an immense majority by a country which was, by this time, becoming rapidly frightened.

Most of the Labour Party decided against Macdonald, and of his old colleagues, only Snowden, Thomas, Jowett and his son, Malcolm, followed him into the Coalition Cabinet. Having helped to form the Labour Party Macdonald h'ad effectively wrecked it for a decade, and nothing that his former colleagues could find to say v'as too bitter to be applied to their former chief who is regarded by the Labour movement ar? a traitor of the deepest die. He wis howled down by those who were once his friends during the debate on the Mehns Test, and referred to as “a

mountebank” and a “sv/ine” and “a low, dirty cur who ought to be whipped out of public fife’.” Some years before Trotsky had referred to him ae being a man of ‘ complete mental bankruptcy” and had called him “a sober and timorous curmudgeon, in whom there is as much poetry as in a square inch of felting.”

The National Government of which Baldwin, and not Macdonald, soon became the leading spirit, had a run of failures. Having helped to kill the Disarmament Conference, it repudiated the American Debt and then called the World Economic Confer-

ence which was a complete fiasco. However, there were corresponding successes. Soon Macdonald’s health began to fail, and his eyesight especially gave a great deal of trouble. About this time hie speeches became both prolix and redundant —a mass of teeming words' that meant positively notElhg, so that Winston Churchill referred to him as? “the boneless wonder.”

What is the truth a'bout Macdonald? The student of current history is forced to certain conclusions. In the first pliace his success it due in large measure io his ability as Parliamentarian, negotiator and orator. Of his courage there is no question. But he bat been cramped 'all his life by a stubborn pride and an inability to mix on equal terms with his fellows. He has been too tenacious of office, and his judgment Was probably astray when he surrendered to the great financial interests in 1931—and ent the “dole” so as to pauperise and s tarve millions of people whom he had sworn to serve. Snowden and a few othert thought he was right; most of the Party was convinced that he had capitulated to the financial magnate's. In November, 1935. he Was bitterly heckled, insulted ami abused in his electorate of Seaham during - the general election. His constituents, mostly miners who had been suffering from extreme poverty and every conceivable' form of wretchedness for years, believed, rightly or wrongly, I that he had betraytd them, and he was defeated —to the intense relief of many millions of hie countrymen. Since then he has been elected as one of the representatives of the Scottish Universities and is again in the Cabinet—this tinie *a<s Lord President of the Council.