Liberal Imperialists
The Liberal Imperialists were a grouping within the British Liberal Party, the most prominent of whom were R. B. Haldane, H. H. Asquith, Sir Edward Grey and Lord Rosebery.[1]
The Liberal Imperialists believed that under the leadership of William Ewart Gladstone the Liberal Party had succumbed to "faddists", sectional interests and the "Celtic fringe" which prevented it from being a truly national party.[2] Furthermore, the Liberal Party should include people of all classes, along with promoting working-class MPs in the Liberal Party.[3] They also argued that the Liberals had lost the centre vote because the party had distanced itself from "the new Imperial spirit".[4] Instead, they argued for a "clean slate", that the Liberal Party must change if it is to succeed. The old, classical Liberalism must give way to the new ideas of "National Efficiency" and imperialism.[5]
Notes
References
- H. C. G. Matthew, The Liberal Imperialists. The Ideas and Politics of a Post-Gladstonian Élite (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1973).
Further reading
- Viscount Grey of Fallodon, Twenty Five Years. 1892-1916 (1925).
- R. B. Haldane, An Autobiography (1929).
- Robert Rhodes James, Rosebery (1963).
- J. A. Spender and Cyril Asquith, Life of Herbert Henry, Lord Oxford and Asquith (1932).
- Peter Stansky, Ambitions and Strategies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1964).
