Churchill Prime Minister 1931

cumbria

Banned
An idea I was looking into for my next timeline was Churchill toppling Baldwin of Indian devolution in early 1931 and getting selected as Conservative leader and leading them to election victory in late 1931.
What does everyone think of this?
 

Thande

Donor
What would happen with the National Liberals and National Labour?

In 1931 though a dead dog with a blue rosette could have led the Conservatives to victory so that at least seems reasonable...
 

cumbria

Banned
What would happen with the National Liberals and National Labour?

In 1931 though a dead dog with a blue rosette could have led the Conservatives to victory so that at least seems reasonable...

With an outright Churchill Conservative victory they would be no national government and thus no National Liberal or Labour parties.
Lloyd George would stay leader of the Liberals.

May see Lansbury v Churchill in 1935 or 1936.
 

Thande

Donor
With an outright Churchill Conservative victory they would be no national government and thus no National Liberal or Labour parties.
But in OTL Baldwin won what would have been a Conservative majority by itself, but Ramsay MacDonald still remained PM of a National Government.

In order to get a Conservative-only setup you would need Churchill to become leader and then decide to fight the election as a party rather than as a National Government in OTL.
 

cumbria

Banned
But in OTL Baldwin won what would have been a Conservative majority by itself, but Ramsay MacDonald still remained PM of a National Government.

In order to get a Conservative-only setup you would need Churchill to become leader and then decide to fight the election as a party rather than as a National Government in OTL.

The 1931 election was fought as a National Government not as just Conservatives.
I would think Churchill would not do this had he been Conservative leader.
 
I'm not sure Stanley Baldwin really wanted a National Government, Roy Jenkins (in his biography of Churchill) seems to think that he would have preferred a Tory-only government so as to keep the Liberals in competition with Labour for the centre-left vote. He was in the South of France at that moment on holiday and thus left negotiations in the hands of Neville Chamberlain. At the time most thought that a Conservative-Liberal coalition was the most likely outcome of the fall of the MacDonald Government.

With regards to Churchill being opposed to a coalition, I'm not sure how true that is - Churchill was never particularly tribal and was quite happy to work with certain Liberals. Like other aristocratic politicians of the period he bounced around the centre and right wing of the political spectrum quite a lot during the inter-war years.
 

cumbria

Banned
I'm not sure Stanley Baldwin really wanted a National Government, Roy Jenkins (in his biography of Churchill) seems to think that he would have preferred a Tory-only government so as to keep the Liberals in competition with Labour for the centre-left vote. He was in the South of France at that moment on holiday and thus left negotiations in the hands of Neville Chamberlain. At the time most thought that a Conservative-Liberal coalition was the most likely outcome of the fall of the MacDonald Government.

With regards to Churchill being opposed to a coalition, I'm not sure how true that is - Churchill was never particularly tribal and was quite happy to work with certain Liberals. Like other aristocratic politicians of the period he bounced around the centre and right wing of the political spectrum quite a lot during the inter-war years.

It would be the Right of the Conservative party that would put Churchill in power over the India issue plus the support of the Mail and Express would mean tariffs making coalition with a lot of liberals or socialists very unlikely and at that time maybe unnecessary.
 
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