Britain was slow to adopt the constitutional device of a referendum – the practice of referring political issues directly to the judgment of the people without recourse to Parliament. It was only in the late twentieth century that referendums were held to decide important issues that cut across party lines, such as devolution for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and Britain’s membership of, or exclusion from, the European Union.  But in the early twentieth century some prominent politicians and political theorists advocated the use of the referendum as a means of ending the constitutional deadlock between the two Houses of Parliament. The 1906 general election resulted in a large Liberal majority in the House of Commons, which soon came into conflict with the even larger Conservative majority in the House of Lords. In 1909 the Lords, in an unprecedented action, rejected Lloyd George’s Liberal Budget. The Prime Minister, Asquith, contemplated holding a referendum on the issue but instead called a general election, in January 1910, on the theme of ‘the peers versus the people’. The result left the Liberals and Conservatives with the same number of seats but the Liberals remained in office due to the support they received from Irish Nationalists and Labour MPs. The government then introduced a Parliament Bill to abolish the permanent veto that the House of Lords had over legislation passed by the Commons. The peers were desperate to preserve their veto power and some of them advocated a referendum on the question, which they hoped would be a democratic way of retaining their traditional authority.

Prominent supporters of the referendum included members of the Cecil clan – the family of the late Victorian Prime Minister, Lord Salisbury. He had advocated submitting divisive issues, such as Irish home rule, to the direct judgment of the people. His views were endorsed and developed by other members of his family.

Other influential Tories, however, were wary of the referendum proposal. They feared that the referendum, once adopted, would be extended from constitutional to financial measures, which might result in confiscatory legislation against the rich. A constitutional conference between the leaders of the two main parties did not endorse the referendum proposal. Nevertheless the House of Lords passed resolutions proposing that a referendum should be held when there was a dispute between the two Houses on a matter of gravity not adequately submitted to the judgment of the people.

In December 1910 the Liberal government called another general election at which the Conservatives had two major objectives: to defend the powers of the House of Lords and to advance the cause of tariff reform. At the earlier 1910 election the Conservatives had lost seats in Lancashire – the citadel of free trade – due to their support for tariffs on food imports. To allay the fears of free traders, Arthur Balfour, the leader of the Conservative party, promised a referendum on tariff reform if the party won the general election. Balfour’s declaration angered many tariff reformers and did not secure many more seats for the Conservatives.

In March 1911 a Scottish peer, Balfour of Burleigh, introduced a ‘Reference to the People Bill’ in the House of Lords. It was supported by peers who objected to what they termed ‘single chamber tyranny’ and by peers who had experience of the successful use of the referendum in Britain’s self-governing colonies, notably Australia. But other peers were much less enthusiastic about the proposal and the Bill was suspended. Nevertheless when the peers tried to amend the 1911 Parliament Bill they specified that a referendum might be held on issues relating to the Crown, the Protestant succession and devolution. In the event, however, most supporters of the referendum – except the Cecils – abandoned their opposition to the Parliament Bill in order to prevent the Lords being swamped with new Liberal peers. The subsequent passage of the Parliament Bill ended attempts to adopt the referendum in order to resolve constitutional disputes between the two Houses of Parliament. In 1912, moreover, the Conservatives abandoned their pledge to hold a referendum on tariff reform. An attempt by Winston Churchill to have two referendums on the issue of female enfranchisement also failed.

There were various reasons why the Edwardian referendum movement proved barren of achievement. Although touted as a democratic measure, such an appeal to the people would have been restricted to a minority because at that time all women and 40% of adult males were without the vote. Furthermore it was far from clear that one issue could be singled out from a raft of interrelated measures. There was, moreover no agreement over who exactly should call a referendum, who should draft the question and what should happen if the referendum result was at odds with government policy. Most Edwardian political leaders adopted an opportunistic partisan stance on the issue – they would only contemplate its adoption if it was likely to strengthen their partisan position. There was little discussion about how the adoption of  the referendum would undermine parliamentary sovereignty. In this and in other respects, there are some clear parallels between the referendum movement before the First World War and that before, during and after the 2016 EU referendum.

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At the declaration of war in August 1914, Herbert Asquith had been Liberal Prime Minister for six years. Together with his ‘fiery’ Chancellor, David Lloyd George, his government had passed the ‘People’s Budget’, introduced old age pensions and had reformed the House of Lords, in spite of troubles over Irish Home Rule, industrial unrest and electoral reform (in particular the campaign for votes for women). The government’s two leading figures were very different characters: Asquith the accomplished legislator, Lloyd George the populist, radical Welshman. By the end of the war, Lloyd George was Prime Minister leading a coalition government and Asquith head of a group of Liberals in opposition: the party had split in two. The details of this clash of personalities and politics have also divided historians ever since.

Political differences between the two men, both in substance and style, were exposed during the first years of the war. Asquith’s initial approach was similar to that followed during the Napoleonic era: Britain’s role would largely be at sea and in funding operations on the continent. For Lloyd George, modern warfare required the total mobilisation of British society and its economy. When the creation of a coalition government with the Conservatives and the Labour party in 1915 moved Lloyd George to a new post as Minister for Munitions, he wasted no time in using sweeping powers to boost production – including deals with Trade Unions and limits on alcohol sales. The clash of ideas came to a head over the issue of conscription: for traditional Liberals, directly ordering men to the front was against basic civil liberties; for Lloyd George and the Unionists, the war effort needed increased government planning in both the armed forces and the economy. Asquith’s attempts to implement a compromise during 1915 were eventually rolled back as conscription was introduced for single, then married, men in 1916. In some ways this was a success for Asquith: his efforts at compromise ensured only one Liberal resigned from the cabinet over the issue. However, by being forced to ‘give in’ he appeared weak, and faced criticism for hesitation.

Differences in style only underlined this split. Asquith’s ‘business as usual’ and ‘wait and see’ politics came under increasing criticism in the face of military setbacks in the Dardanelles and the Somme. His reluctance to change the mechanisms of government to allow for quick decisions and increased control over the military came under attack from the more dynamic Lloyd George (whose own style would later be criticised for being too authoritarian). In November 1916 a Conservative back bench rebellion threatened the government, and Lloyd George (with Conservative leader Andrew Bonar Law and Lord Beaverbrook) decided to act. They proposed Asquith set up a three-man ‘war council’, chaired by Lloyd George, which would retain control of war policy. Asquith would remain Prime Minister, but he would not have a seat on this committee. After first acquiescing, Asquith later rejected the deal, and offered his resignation. On 7^th December Lloyd George became Prime Minister.

Historians have long debated whether Lloyd George treacherously plotted to grab the premiership, or whether his frustrations over the war caused him to seize his chance. Either way, the consequences for the Liberals were disastrous. Asquith was left with a ‘permanent sense of affront’ [H. C. G. Matthew, ODNB, ‘Asquith, Herbert Henry‘] at his usurpation, but he remained leader of the Liberal party, and many resigned with him from the government. Although Lloyd George was Prime Minister, supported by a group of younger Liberal MPs, he was reliant on the support of the Conservatives – a strange position for the man behind the ‘People’s Budget’.

Before the end of the war the split grew deeper. Following the German spring offensive in 1918, Lloyd George was accused by General Sir Frederick Maurice of denying British generals the troops they asked for on the Western Front. Lloyd George strongly denied this politically-explosive accusation, even if there was some truth in it (he did not always approve of his generals’ tactics and may have limited troop numbers as an attempt to influence them). Asquith proposed a vote of censure against Lloyd George in the Commons, and despite Lloyd George’s barnstorming speech and – probably massaged – troop figures denying the claims, 98 Liberals voted with Asquith. Although Lloyd George won the vote convincingly, this division proved decisive at the general election held after the armistice.

Without the full backing of the Liberal party, Lloyd George declared he would fight the 1918 election on behalf of the governing coalition. Government-approved candidates were given a ‘coupon’ of approval, and very few of those Liberals who voted against him in the Maurice debate received this approval. Standing against the coalition were the Asquith Liberals and the Labour party – the latter going it alone for the first time in their electoral history. The result was decisive. The government won by a landslide, in a coalition of 380 Conservatives and 133 Lloyd George Liberals. Asquith’s Liberals were out-performed by the Labour party, and Asquith himself lost his seat.

When Lloyd George fell in 1922 after the Conservatives pulled out of the coalition following a backbench revolt (which gave its name to the party’s powerful committee of MPs), the divided Liberals were soon eclipsed even in opposition by Labour. Both men remained in the party in an uneasy arrangement, but it never recovered from the disastrous battle of two leaders.

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Further Reading:

• Liberal History Group website: Resources, 1910-1929
• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: ‘Asquith, Herbert Henry‘
• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: ‘George, David Lloyd‘

The History of Parliament’s annual lecture for 2016 will be given by our Trustee Lord Morgan, and focus on David Lloyd George. Details will follow on our website shortly.

For the rest of the post in this series on internal party wrangling, click here. Watch this space for more!