Leaders
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The afterlives of former Liberal prime ministers
A look at the lives in retirement of Russell, Gladstone, Rosebery, Asquith and Lloyd George.
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‘He would not stoop, he did not conquer’
Review of Robert Rhodes James, Rosebery (Phoenix, 1995).
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The legacy of Gladstone
The Grand Old Man’s record.
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Leaders Good and Bad
Robert Maclennan MP, himself a former leader of the SDP, and Professor Peter Clarke, leading expert on the New Liberals, looked at leaders of the Liberal Party and the SDP over the last hundred years, using analysis and anecdotes to illustrate the strengths and weaknesses of the two parties leaders. The audience was polled to…
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Campbell as Leader
Interview with Menzies Campbell, Leader of the Liberal Democrats 2006-07, on his political career.
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Gladstone 1809-1874
Review of H.C.G. Matthew, Gladstone 1809-1874 (Oxford University Press, 1988).
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Sir Archibald Sinclair (Viscount Thurso), 1890-1970
Archibald Sinclair was the Liberal leader from 1935 to 1945. He was a leading figure in British politics in that period, first as an outspoken critic of appeasement, and then as a minister during the war. For Liberals, his importance lay in his belief in the possibility of a Liberal revival, which was crucial in…
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Herbert Samuel (Viscount Samuel), 1870-1963
Herbert Samuel was a leading figure in the Liberal Party for over fifty years, from its zenith before the First World War to the nadir of its fortunes in the mid-1950s. With Sinclair, he was the last independent Liberal to serve in the Cabinet. A respected statesman, formidable mediator and administrator, and notable political thinker,…
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William Ewart Gladstone, 1809-1898
As Roy Jenkins concluded in his masterly biography, ‘Mr Gladstone was almost as much the epitome of the Victorian age as the great Queen herself’. He was the political giant of his lifetime and even at the end of the twentieth century the principles and aspirations he brought to public life are still inherent in the…