And with it fell that whole in-and-out, Whig-and-Tory, Eton-and-Harrow, Tweedledum-Tweedledee structure of British political culture that had lasted for over two centuries. The radical legislation of the pre-war decade should have enabled the Liberal party, like FDR's Democratic party twenty years later, to keep its grip on the working-class vote. Religious non-conformism had long been a powerful force. But Liberalism in Britain had had deep roots. How, people asked, did it happen? How, within ten years, could the triumphant Liberal party of the pre-1914 era, the reforming party of Lloyd George, Asquith, Haldane, Grey, and Winston Churchill, have lost out to the Labour party as the main champion of the British Left? There were, of course, reasons to hand: the bitter feud between the Lloyd-Georgeites and the supporters of Asquith, and the general increase in socialist strength and militancy in Europe that followed on the First World War. A generation ago, in an interesting book, George Dangerfield told the sad story of what he called “The Strange Death of Liberal England.” The collapse of a great political tradition is a solemn thing.
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