The Election of 1963
After half a decade of Liberal rule 1963 offered Britain its first opportunity to cast verdict on Jo Grimond’s government.
Although there were no seismic shifts in the vote comparable to the rise of the Liberals in 1954, 1963 saw three key shifts. Losing votes for the first time since their 1954 breakthrough, the Liberals fell to their worst share of the popular vote since the 1940s, even as they were able to hold on to the vast majority of their constituencies their majority fell by the wayside. The Conservatives, powered by a highly active membership base that was energized by the prominence of Rightists like Enoch Powell during the campaign, gaining just under 5% of the vote and nearly 100 seats as the Tories overtook the Liberals but fell just short of an absolute majority. Finally, the long suffer Labour Party offered first green shoots of recovery as its vote rose by a respectable level and 11 further seats were won with the party offering a stern challenge in dozens of others. Elsewhere, the National Liberals, whose vote had plumbed the same depths as Labour in 1958, failed to show any signs of recovery and instead lost 6 further seats – the party dropping below the Ulster Unionist Party in terms of parliamentary representation. Finally, the Communists suffered the misfortune of seeing 23 of their MPs unseated by the narrowest of margins as a very slight drop in their vote saw their parliamentary group suffer serious losses.
1963 saw the East London seat of Shoreditch and Finsbury witness the last hurrah of Britain’s most famous Fascist – Sir Oswald Mosley. The ex-British Union of Fascist leader, and MP for both the Conservatives and Labour prior to his far-right turn, had left Britain in disgust during the early 1950s. Becoming an esoteric far-right Paris-based intellectual he returned to Britain for the last time in 1963 in order to challenge for parliament one last time. Capturing an impressive share of the vote in Shoreditch and Finsbury he in avertedly allowed the incumbent Liberal candidate to hold on to what had been a key Tory target seat. Incidentally, Mosley’s impressive challenge represented the highest share of the vote won by any candidate independent of the major parties in constituency during a General Election for 14 years.
Bristol South-East did not only see the Labour Party make its only gain that did not come at the expense of the Communists, it also saw Tony Benn make his return to the House of Commons. Benn had originally been elected in 1949 (making him the ‘Baby of the House’ at the time) before losing his seat in 1954 and then failing to make his return in 1958. However, Benn’s career became notably more interesting in 1959 when his father, Viscount Stansgate, passed away – seeing Benn become a member of the House of Lords as a hereditary peer and disqualifying him from returning to the Commons. After 1959 Benn fought avidly against his peerage – in December 1962 his campaigning got the reward it had sought when the Liberals passed legislation making it possible for hereditary peerages to be renounced. As he won election in Bristol South-East, Tony Benn became the ex-peer to be elected to the Commons.
Wolverhampton South-West was notable for one thing and one thing alone, the power of Enoch Powell’s popular appeal. Having first won the seat in 1949 as a National Liberal by a very slim majority Powell had gradually transformed his seat into a highly secure one with his majority steadily rising to an impressive level. However, in 1963 he surpassed himself by winning a shade under 3/4s of all the votes cast in his constituency – the announcement of the result in Wolverhampton rapidly transforming into a Rightist Tory rally as large crowds amassed to show their support for the man who was rapidly overtaking his part leader as the face of the Conservative Party.
1963 produced a parliament dominated by twin Tory and Liberal behemoths with both parties holding more than 40% of the chamber yet with neither capable of bringing together enough seats to form a stable majority. However, the election had in fact produced a result extremely favourable to the leaderships of the two leading parties – Grimond and Macmillan having far more in common politically with each other than with substantial elements within their own party.
In the immediate aftermath of the election Grimond and his Liberal government remained in office. However, this government could only be sustained by either a politically poisonous alliance with the Communists, whose leadership had openly expressed willingness to support a Liberal minority government, or some form of cooperation with the Conservatives. Either move would result in a short lived and neutered government that would only likely galvanise Tory Rightists and cause discord within the Liberal Party. Instead, Grimond resigned from office and offered Macmillan the opportunity to form a government on the understanding that he would be force to govern in the same manner as the 1950s Alliance minority administrations – in close cooperation with the Liberal Party.
At 69 Harold Macmillan was Britain’s oldest Prime Minister since Churchill. Having already started to grow frailer during his years in opposition the new PM was faced in an undesirable position – squeezed between men in Jo Grimond and Enoch Powell with substantially greater powerbases than himself as he sought to find a middle course that could retain the loyalty of Tory Rightists without alienating the Liberals who had the power to end his government at any time.
Left to Right: Rab Butler – Chancellor of the Exchequer, Enoch Powell – Home Secretary and Deputy Prime Minister and Alec Douglas-Home – Foreign Secretary
Macmillan’s choice of cabinet ministers saw him strive desperately to hold together the broad coalition of political forces that were necessary to perpetuate his government. Rab Butler, who had slowly recovered from his humiliating, forced resignation from the Exchequer in 1957, was restored as Chancellor with the inferred promise that Macmillan’s government would not bow to the Rightists but would instead maintain its commitment to the post-war economic consensus. As Foreign Secretary, the aristocratic but lacklustre Douglas-Home was appointed. Douglas-Home could be best described as a ‘moderate’ Rightist – favourable of a change in direction from the Conservative Party but willing to stand unquestionably behind Macmillan. He had been chosen as a figure that would not cause trouble for the new government but would be regarded by the Rightists as one of their own. Finally, and most importantly, the party’s rising star – Enoch Powell – was made Home Secretary and Deputy Prime Minister. Denied the more prestigious of Foreign Secretary and Chancellor that he had craved, the appointment was a blow for Powell just as it soothed the Liberals’ fears of Tory radicals having too great an impact on either economic or foreign affairs. However, despite the grumbles, Macmillan had kept the Rightists from openly rebelling and formed and admittedly worryingly fragile government.
