Herbert Asquith 1908-1916
Herbert Asquith was born in Morley, Yorkshire in 1852. Educated at the City of London and Balliol College, Oxford, he became a lawyer in 1876.
In the 1886 General Election Asquith was elected as the Liberal MP for East Fife. He was a member of the opposition for his first six years in the House of Commons but after the 1892 General Election, William Gladstone formed a new Liberal administration. Gladstone had been impressed by Asquith and appointed him as Home Secretary. Asquith held the post until the Marquees of Salisbury and the Conservatives took power in 1895.
The Liberals were out of power until the 1906 General Election. The new Prime Minister, Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, gave Asquith the important post of Chancellor of the Exchequer. Asquith's strong opposition to women's suffrage made him extremely unpopular with the NUWSS. Suffragists were particularly angry that the man who was responsible for deciding how much tax they paid, should deny them political representation. Several times in 1906 members of the WSPU made attempts to disrupt meetings where he was speaking.
In April, 1908, Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman resigned and Asquith replaced him as Prime Minister. Working closely with David Lloyd George, his radical Chancellor of the Exchequer, Asquith introduced a whole series of reforms including the Old Age Pensions Act and the People's Budget that resulted to a conflict with the House of Lords.
The Conservatives, who had a large majority in the House of Lords, objected to this attempt to redistribute wealth, and made it clear that they intended to block these proposals. David Lloyd George reacted by touring the country making speeches in working-class areas on behalf of the budget and portraying the nobility as men who were using their privileged position to stop the poor from receiving their old age pensions. After a long struggle with the House of Lords Asquith and the Liberal government finally got his budget through parliament.
With the House of Lords extremely unpopular with the British people, the Liberal government decided to take action to reduce its powers. The 1911 Parliament Act drastically cut the powers of the Lords. They were no longer allowed to prevent the passage of 'money bills' and it also restricted their ability to delay other legislation to three sessions of parliament.
When the House of Lords attempted to stop this bill's passage, Asquith, appealed to George V for help. Asquith, who had just obtained a victory in the 1910 General Election, was in a strong position, and the king agreed that if necessary he would create 250 new Liberal peers to remove the Conservative majority in the Lords. Faced with the prospect of a House of Lords with a permanent Liberal majority, the Conservatives agreed to let the 1911 Parliament Act to become law.
Although several leading members of the government favoured granting women the vote, Asquith still opposed the measure. However, during the 1910 General Election campaign Asquith announced that if he was returned to power he would make sure that women with property would get the franchise. When Asquith changed his mind in November 1911 and instead announced legislation that would enable all adult males to vote, the WSPU organised a window breaking campaign including an attack on Asquith's home.
After the outbreak of the First World War Asquith made strenuous attempts to achieve political solidarity and in May 1915 formed a coalition government. Gradually the Conservatives in the cabinet began to question Asquith's abilities as a war leader. So also did Lord Northcliffe, the powerful newspaper baron, and his newspapers, The Daly Mail and The Times led the attack on Asquith. In December, 1916 David Lloyd George agreed to collaborate with the Conservatives in the cabinet to remove Asquith from power.
Lloyd George's decision to join the Conservatives in removing Asquith split the Liberal Party. In the 1918 General Election, many Liberals supported candidates who remained loyal to Asquith. Despite this, Lloyd George's Coalition group won 459 seats and had a large majority over the Labour Party and the Liberal Party.
Asquith lost his seat in East Fife in 1918 and William Wedgwood Benn led the groups opposed to Lloyd George's government. John Benn, who was also opposed to Lloyd George, gave the group the name, Wee Frees, after a small group of Free Church of Scotland members who refused to accept the union of their church with the United Presbyterian Church.
The Conservative members of the coalition government decided to replace David Lloyd George with Andrew Bonar Law in October, 1922. In the General Election that followed, the Conservatives won 345 seats. Only 54 Liberals in the House of Commons supported Lloyd George whereas Asquith had the support of 62 MPs.
Asquith returned to the House of Commons after the 1923 General Election when he was elected to represent Paisley. Herbert Asquith, who was granted the title, the Earl of Oxford in 1925, died in 1928.