Labour and the Empire
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 23432495 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Henry Pelling (corresponding author) |
| Year | 1984 |
| Pages | 147-163 |
| Publication date | 1984-01-01 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | CHAPTER |
| Venue | Labour Governments, 1945-51 (SOURCE_BOOK) |
| Publisher | Palgrave Macmillan UK (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1007/978-1-349-17431-7_8 |
| OpenAlex | W2478612193 |
| ISBN | 9781349174317 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 3 |
Churchill’s emphatic statement, made in the flush of victory in November 1942 after the Battle of El Alamein, that ‘I have not become the King’s first Minister in order to preside over the liquidation of the British Empire’1 may not give a true impression of the extent of wartime attempts at constitutional progress both in India and in the Colonies. Oliver Stanley, the Colonial Secretary from that month onwards, was notably liberal in encouraging advance, particularly in Ceylon, which was regarded as the most ‘mature’ of the colonies; and even in India the Viceroy whom Churchill himself appointed in 1943, Field-Marshal Lord Wavell, turned out to have distinctly progressive ideas and early in 1945 managed to revive constitutional discussions with the major Indian parties. He was, however, thwarted by the deadlock between Congress, the major party pressing for independence, and the Muslim League, which claimed to represent the enormous minority of Muslims — perhaps 90 million out of the total Indian population of about 400 million. The Muslim League, by this time led by the cold and uncompromising lawyer M. A. Jinnah, demanded complete separation for the Muslim-dominated provinces in the North-West and North-East and the creation of a separate state, to be called ‘Pakistan’.
Ancient history · Battle · British Empire · Ceylon · Colonialism · Economic history · Empire · Independence (probability theory) · League · Political science · Politics · Population · Sociology · State (computer science) · Victory · African history and culture studies · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Demography · Global Maritime and Colonial Histories · History · Law
| Highly cited | No |
|---|