Dundee by-election, 1908

There was a by-election in the dual member constituency of Dundee in 1908.

Vacancy

The Liberal MP Edmund Robertson was elevated to the peerage as 1st Baron Lochee.

Electoral history

Edmund Robertson

General Election 1906: Dundee (2 seats)

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Liberal	Edmund Robertson	9,276	31.7	+1.5
	Labour	Alexander Wilkie	6,833	23.3
	Liberal	Henry Robson	6,122	20.9	-6.4
	Liberal Unionist	Ernest Shackleton	3,865	13.2	-6.8
	Conservative	A. Duncan Smith	3,183	10.9	-9.2
Majority			5,411	18.5
Majority			711	2.4
Turnout			29,279	81.9	+12.4
	Liberal hold		Swing
	Labour gain from Liberal		Swing

Candidates

Churchill in 1904.

Thirty-four-year-old Winston Churchill was selected by the local Liberal Association to be their candidate. Churchill had been elected Liberal MP for Manchester North West at the 1906 General Election but had lost his seat at the Manchester North West by-election, 1908 on 24 April. Churchill had been appointed to the Cabinet by H. H. Asquith as President of the Board of Trade. Under the law at the time, a newly appointed Cabinet Minister was obliged to seek re-election at a by-election. So he was looking around for a seat to allow him back into parliament.

Sir George Baxter, a 55-year-old local man was chosen by the Dundee Unionists. He was a linen and jute owner and Chairman of Dundee and District Liberal Unionist Association, ever since its creation in 1886. He contested Montrose Burghs in 1895. Baxter was the son of the former Liberal MP for Montrose Burgh's William Edward Baxter and a great-nephew of the philanthropists Sir David Baxter and Mary Ann Baxter.

Stuart in the mid 1900s

The local Labour Party selected 38-year-old G. H. Stuart as their candidate. He was born in Oldham, became a postman and an activist in the Postmen's Federation. He also became active in the Labour Party, and stood unsuccessfully in York at the 1906 UK general election, His candidature was endorsed by the Scottish section of the party, but the National Executive refused to back him, as the party already held the other Dundee seat, and was concerned that it would over-reach itself.

Forty-two-year-old Edwin Scrymgeour stood as a Scottish Prohibition Party candidate. He was a native of Dundee, and a pioneer of the Scottish temperance movement and established his party in 1901 to further this aim. He had previously been a member of the Independent Labour Party. He was elected to Dundee Town Council in 1905. He had not stood for parliament before.

Campaign

File:Bundesarchiv B 145 Bild-F001100-0001, Bonn-Beuel, Jutespinnerei und Weberei.jpg

raw Jute

The issue of Free trade v Protectionism featured prominently in the campaign. This was because the Jute industry was significant in Dundee and it relied on importing raw Jute, mainly from India. The Unionist, Sir George Baxter, stood on a protectionist platform, focusing his protectionist demands on Germany rather than India. However, James Caird, a prominent local jute proprietor actively supported the free-trader, Churchill, by funding his pro-Free Trade propaganda.

On 14 May (after the poll), Churchill gave a significant speech at Kinnaird Hall [see external links, below].

Despite Stuart not being officially endorsed by the Labour party, the party leader, Keir Hardie sent him a letter of support in which condemned Churchill for "shameless prevarication" over the Right to Work Bill. He also spoke on Stuart's platform, and the Dundee Courier enthusiastically reported his criticisms of the Liberal Party candidate, Winston Churchill. Stuart was criticised for speaking too little about socialism and for not holding membership of the Independent Labour Party.

Scrymgeour described himself as a "Prohibition and Labour" candidate. As a strict Wesleyan, he urged electors to "vote how you pray".

The Women's Social and Political Union were active in the campaign with Mary Gawthorpe, Emmeline Pankhurst and Christabel Pankhurst holding meetings in the town. However, they were upstaged by the non-violent Women's Freedom League member Mary Maloney who came up from London for the campaign. Whenever Churchill spoke, Maloney produced a swinging dinner bell which drowned out what he was saying. The ding-dong exchanges were taken in fun initially, but some meetings had to be cancelled because of the uproar.

Result

Dundee by-election, 1908

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Liberal	Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill	7,099	44.0
	Liberal Unionist	Sir George Washington Baxter	4,370	27.1
	Labour	George Harold Stuart	4,014	24.9
	Scottish Prohibition	Edwin Scrymgeour	655	4.1	N/A
Majority			2,709	16.8
Turnout			16,138
	Liberal hold		Swing

Aftermath

General Election Jan 1910: Dundee (2 seats)

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Liberal	Rt Hon. Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill	10,747
	Labour	Alexander Wilkie	10,365
	Conservative	John Hall Seymour Lloyd	4,552
	Liberal Unionist	James Glass	4,339
	Scottish Prohibition	Edwin Scrymgeour	1,512
	Liberal hold		Swing
	Labour hold		Swing

Churchill continued to represent Dundee until 1922. Baxter re-appeared as candidate here at the December 1910 General Election, his last electoral contest. Stuart made one further unsuccessful attempt to enter parliament, otherwise he concentrated on his Trade Union career. Scrymgeour continued to contest elections in Dundee and was eventually elected here in 1922.

See also

• Dundee by-election, 1917
• Dundee by-election, 1924

External links

Churchill's Kinnaird Hall speech: http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=vBHrEAuKNV4C&pg=PA73&dq=Dundee+by-election,+1908&hl=en&sa=X&ei=1V8PUvCHCtT30gXjg4CgCw&ved=0CDkQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=Dundee%20by-election%2C%201908&f=false