Prime Ministers of Great Britain and Ireland
1922 - 1927: Ramsay Macdonald (Labour-Irish Parliamentary coalition)
The coalition narrowly edged out the Tories (wounded by the Home Rule squabbling, economic doldrums, and party infighting) and was born out of the promise that Macdonald would finally deliver the long-delayed Home Rule - other than this issue and on increased house building (because Parliamentary could get some built at home), Labour and Parliamentary were at odds and Dublin was allowed to have autonomy on whether new British law would come in. This working arrangement was harmed by the Campbell Case, where Parliamentary were split on backing Labour and felt this showed the party was too radical - even as Macdonald was criticised by Labour for not being radical enough!
Housing, state pension, disarmament, foreign works, and the beginning of state healthcare were all brought in but the weakness of the government proved more of an issue for voters than its alleged radicalism, and it was clear the Parliamentary's weren't going to back Labour any more. Tory revival seemed assured...
1927 - 1930: Austen Chamberlain (Conservative-Liberal coalition)
Well, good enough. At least Chamberlain could say he was back in power and also PM, eat it Stanley.
And both parties agreed on the economy to get reforms through, with a brief boom nicknamed "the Mewing Twenties" after the more glamorous, longer American period it was aping. The collapse of the Parliamentary party as the more radical Sinn Fein grabbed seats was to their benefit as well, turning a once-big powerblock of Irish seats into smaller rivals. Chamberlain also continued the general trend towards peace between 'civilised' nations and achieved the Bonn Treaties that was meant to finally secure peace between France and Germany.
All was going well until the Great Depression. The Tory-Liberal harmony was ripped asunder (as well as inter-Tory harmony) and the government fell hard.
1930 - 1934: Arthur Henderson (Labour)
Panicked British workers turned to Labour - and panicked Irish workers turned to Irish Labour, a sister party that had achieved meagre gains in the Dublin parliament. Even the British middle classes had people thinking Labour had been far more stable than the last year & maybe it'd keep the unions in line - and the Irish middle class thought that too. (Sinn Fein lost ground, independence seeming risky in the current climate)
Henderson threw money around on big projects and welfare and bribing unions, which ballooned the country's debt but nudged the country into recovery. He also grew concerned over the growing tensions in Europe and after Hitler became chancellor, Henderson flew to Berlin, Warsaw, Prague, Paris, and anywhere he needed to try and get Germany talking about its territorial interests rather than building up an arsenal. The stress of this may have contributed to "Uncle Arthur's" death in 1934.
1934 - 36: Arthur Greenwood (Labour)
The popular Secretary of State for Health won a party election and inherited a country just doing okay, and a European situation just on a knife-edge. "Arthur Junior" won Labour's third election on promise of Recovery, of Calm, of Jobs. What he got was Mussolini invading Abyssinia. Britain used its clout and contacts to get peace - at the cost of half the African country. This crisis made Greenwood's alcoholism worse as he realised Mussolini could try something again and so could Hitler, or Japan, or...
A cautious rearming plan went through parliament thanks to Tory votes, which didn't help Greenwood's mood much either. The Rhineland Crisis then finished him off: Hitler's bellicose demands and sabre-rattling was, in retrospect, more mouth than trousers, but it had Greenwood panicked and he got the French panicked and all ended in British troops fighting German ones. The humiliation threw Germany into chaos and saw Greenwood forced to resign.
1936: Herbert Morrison (Labour)
Greenwood's great rival, he shoved his way through and declared a snap election. He had big plans.
What he got was a massive Sinn Fein surge - "Irish Troops In Britain's Wars" ran the posters (four Irish soldiers had died in a battle in the Rhineland), and independence was back on. That combined with British losses knocked Labour out and brought back...
1936-8: Anthony Eden (Conservative minority)
Eden was looking set to get away from all that rotten socialism and to continue the slow buildup due to distrust of Mussolini & Japan. He had his cabinet bring in a period of social and economic conservatism as he focused on foreign affairs, hoping to isolate Italy and Japan with alliances overseas. And he was in China doing just this when Hitler tried to regain control with a wave of state terror against Jews and caused Germany to explode into violence.
With Eden absent, Britain was headless as the streetfighting ran rampant - Mussolini and Austrian allies moved in to "restore order". Emboldened, Mussolini did the very same when Spain's military attempted their coup, sending Italian forces to back up the nationalists; Eden told him to back off, seeing a threat to British control of the Med and access to Suez.
Britain won the war after a year of intense fighting. In the aftermath, the Dublin government - now majority Sinn Fein - condemned the loss of more Irish lives due to British foreign policy screwups. A general strike, Commons filibustering, protests, riots: Ireland was demanding out, and Britain didn't have the ability or will to force them to stay, and so a referendum was held in the hope Westminster could sway just enough people.
They could not. Eden became the Prime Minister of Great Britain by Easter 1938, the government was knocked off its axis, and everyone is left wondering what happens next...
Prime Ministers of Great Britain
1938: Anthony Eden (Conservative minority)
Eden attempted to keep governing despite the loss of Ireland but a large minority of his party blamed him, personally, for the referendum defeat and so did King Edward. Knives were out. His situation became untenable and he resigned...
1938: Samuel Hoare (Conservative minority)
He'd been a minister in three successive governments, most crucially Eden's Foreign Secretary in trying to isolate Italy and Japan, and seemed the safe pair of Tory hands. He was not. A chunk of Eden loyalists rebelled on principle at the "Judas" - hadn't Eden won them the Mediterranean War? - and a chunk of others defected to the Liberals. The government ground to a halt and Archibald Sinclair of the Liberals saw his chance:
1938-9: Archibald Sinclair (Liberal-headed coalition)
1939 - 1949: Archibald Sinclair (Liberal)
With the promise of some extra powers for the National Hospital Service, Sinclair got Labour to support his coalition of Liberals and ex-Tories and began an election in early 1939. With the Tories in disarray, he won.
Social liberties were in, big amounts of free trade and economic liberalisation were in (which meant thousands of redundancies were in), and a big focus on Asia was in: Japan's ambitions would be restricted and, squeezed between several European empires, America, and the USSR, it limited its (open) conquests to 'liberated' Manchuria. Technology was advancing in fits and starts worldwide, and British industry tried to keep up, being pioneers in jet engines and the development of television - not all of this was down to Sinclair but he kept the government involved, making televised speeches to the nation (filmed from Downing Street) to keep the Liberals associated with this progress.
Some lost out, others gained, and in 1944 a majority considered they'd gained. After the chaos of the 1930s, it seemed the Empire was back to stability. The biggest challenge was a move towards "Home Rule" in several of the more developed/controlled economies, including Cyprus, Malta, Singapore, Hong Kong, and India - and India was the supreme challenge here, with riots breaking out over the limited suffrage and the way it was designed to keep the British Governor in control. (However, most of the British electorate were fine with that!)
During Sinclair's time in office, Europe became a growing issue. Italy, Spain, Austria, and Germany had seen socialists take control post-war, and Germany would go communist in 1941. France was the main counterweight to this, waging a cold war of influence across Europe against the USSR, and Britain naturally gave support to France's alliance - but then in Sinclair's second term, socialists won the French election as well. Which in practice meant France was
still opposing the USSR but meant Britain hurriedly had to switch a lot of its backing to new countries. The markets got spooked.
And meanwhile:
Taoiseachs of the Kingdom of Ireland
1938 - 1943: John J. O'Kelly (Sinn Fein)
O'Kelly had deposed the former leader, Michael O'Flanagan, after the latter was caught between support for the Spanish republicans and the fact this would mean supporting a British war. O'Kelly thought little of the republicans and so it was him & his allies that used the war to gain the referendum, and then won that referendum, and then won the immediate election. He would've liked to declare a republic as well but the King had married a woman from the north & duly visited the country a lot, and it wasn't worth the fight with monarchists and the fractious northern Protestants.
With the new powers of independence, O'Kelly continued his conservative nationalist reforms of the country and the establishment of a new Irish Army (to save money it did not have an independent air force) & Navy, with national conscription brought in for this in the face of the socialist uprisings on the continent. Ironically, despite his views of Britain and his distaste for the liberal social order there, he and Sinclair would work closely together on trade & worked with Paris against the 'reds'.
Problem for him as the Irish voters were increasingly fed up of pious conservatism and a stagnating economy (and dark talk from the north of gunmen preparing for "imminent conflict"), and the result was:
1943 - 1948: Dan Spring (Labour)
While still more socially conservative than its British counterpart had drifted to,
especially under the safe hand of Spring, it wasn't as dour as O'Kelly's brand of nationalism, and it promised an expansion of worker's pay & power, and furthermore it was a deliberately non-sectarian party and Spring was from a rural background & could calm those voters.
To Sinclair's shock and dismay, Spring pivoted Ireland towards Paris once that elected a socialist government. Both countries became uneasy with each other, even as trade and family ties and the King kept them bonded; and in practice, a lot of the new worker's rights and union powers Spring was bringing in was reversing O'Kelly and getting Ireland back to what Britain had as an ongoing legacy of the "Two Arthurs". We can say all that but now the Taoiseach was in Paris, the Taoiseach was in Madrid, the Taoiseach was being listened to in foreign lands more than the Irish believed he was in Dublin, and boats & planes from the socialists countries would come in more and bring 'exotic' culture with them.
But not everyone liked the socialist turn, and some thought the country needed more 'modern' reforms to keep up with the world, and some didn't think much of Spring as a person. But Sinn Fein was starting to look 'old', and more and more people wanted a non-sectarian politics.
One figure in one party promised exciting new changes, and charisma, and a lack of sectarian ties, but c'mon, it couldn't be, obviously they wouldn't--
1948 - : Oswald Mosley (Cumann na nGaedheal)
He'd moved to Ireland in the late 1920s, his political career seemingly stunted after 1927, but fallen back into politics in his new country - one that remembered his fiery condemnation of brutal police-militia action against pro-Home Rule agitators in the early 1920s and his equally fiery support for Home Rule. He'd already flipped Tory to Labour, and his political evolution saw him end up in CnG and, thanks to his work ethic and charisma and sneaky acts, climb up to power. He promised corporatism and a country that was great, and when his national origin came up, said he wasn't living
there but in
Ireland: "a man must behave himself as a fit member of the State, in his every action he must conform to the welfare of the nation."
And so in 1948, to global bemusement, he stood for photos outside the Dail in his smart blue shirt...