National Government (United Kingdom)
In the United Kingdom the term National Government is an abstract concept referring to a coalition of some or all major political parties. In a historical sense it usually refers primarily to the governments of Ramsay MacDonald, Stanley Baldwin and Neville Chamberlain which held office from 1931 until 1940.
The all-party coalitions of Herbert Henry Asquith and David Lloyd George in the First World War and of Winston Churchill in the Second World War were sometimes referred to as National Governments at the time, but are now more commonly called Coalition Governments. Churchill's brief 1945 "Caretaker Government" also called itself a National Government and in terms of party composition was very similar to the 1931–1940 entity.
Read more about National Government (United Kingdom): The Crisis of 1931, The Early Days, MacDonald's National Government 1931-1935, Baldwin Takes Over, The Government of Neville Chamberlain, The Outbreak of War, The Caretaker Government of 1945
Famous quotes containing the words national and/or government:
“We want, and must have, a national policy, as to slavery, which deals with it as being wrong.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“Any man knows when he is justified, and all the wits in the world cannot enlighten him on that point. The murderer always knows that he is justly punished; but when a government takes the life of a man without the consent of his conscience, it is an audacious government, and is taking a step towards its own dissolution.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)