Baldwin Papers: A Conservative Statesman, 1908-1947 (review)

Stanley Baldwin was the most successful and significant figure in British public life between the two world wars. He came to prominence in the fall of the Lloyd George coalition in October 1922, and in May 1923 succeeded Bonar Law as prime minister and leader of the Conservative party. He retained the latter post until he retired at a time of his own choosing, handing over a firmly-established National Government to Neville Chamberlain in May 1937. During these 14 years he fought five general elections, winning three of them. His periods in opposition were troubled but brief: the nine months of the first Labour government in 1924, and the 25 months of the second in 1929-31. He served three terms as prime minister (May 1923 to January 1924, November 1924 to June 1929 and June 1935 to May 1937), and his loyal service under Ramsay MacDonald as the second figure in the National Government from August 1931 to June 1935 was integral to its formation, survival and success. In the 1920s, concerned to moderate the rise of Labour and encourage the new democratic electorate into constitutional paths, he won praise for his handing of the General Strike of 1926; in 1936 his conduct of the abdication crisis ensured that he retired at a pinnacle of public approval. However, in the following years his reputation fell to the lowest depths, as after 1940 he bore much of the blame for the failure of appeasement and the military deficiencies which contributed to the defeats at the start of the Second World War.

Whilst Baldwin's importance is unarguable, his character, ability, achievements and failings have been the subject of debate ever since the appearance of the controversial and hostile official biography by G. M. Young in 1952.¹ One reason for this is that Baldwin has always been a difficult figure to pin down. He spent most of his career in non-departmental posts; he was interested in the broad picture rather than detailed policy, and concerned with the general atmosphere of public life rather than partisan manoeuvre — areas that are as insubstantial as they are important. Baldwin left little trail in the sources that have been most valued by historians of British politics — the government archives and the collections of private papers. He wrote no memoirs, kept no diary, and his correspondence was characterized by its brevity and informality (whilst the Baldwin papers at Cambridge University Library have long been a major source, they consist almost entirely of the items that he received). His biographers have struggled with this lack, and have had to depend upon the comments of others — with the inevitable problems of bias, whether critical or uncritical.

As Philip Williamson has earlier shown in the most revealing study of Baldwin to have been published thus far,² the greatest understanding can be attained through examining the form of which Baldwin was the acknowledged master — his oratory. The speeches that he made, in parliament and to public meetings (often to nonpolitical audiences), were where he set out his ideas and purpose, and were the means by which he sought to move his countrymen and shape the atmosphere of politics and the morality of popular opinion. This present volume does not run counter to that fact, but rather adds a counterpoint to it by showing how Baldwin's public persona was founded in his private interactions. In this collection, Philip Williamson and Baldwin's grandson Edward explore the least-known Baldwin of them all — the letter-writer. They have searched a vast range of archives, including those of minor politicians and a number of religious and literary figures. This has not been limited to British sources, and of particular interest are the accounts of meetings with Baldwin by some of the dominion prime ministers, especially Mackenzie King of Canada. The latter are part of the other strand in the volume: Baldwin the conversationalist. As the introduction observes, most...