Talk:Winston Churchill in politics, 1900–1939

message: This is a spin off from the main Winston Churchill article. The concensus is that page is too long and to preserve the information there- and to expand it- subpages covering different facets and periods of his life needed to be created. See  Winston's talk page Lord Harris has started one on Later life of Winston Churchill. This is another subpage.The foundation of the material here is from the original Churchill article to which I was a contributor.
Please add and modify.
I have deleted some matters which seemed off topic or of very marginal relevance such as 
In 1910, Churchill commented to Asquith that
The unnatural and increasingly rapid growth of the feeble minded and insane classes, coupled as it is with a steady restriction among all the thrifty, energetic and superior stocks, constitutes a national and race danger which it is impossible to exaggerate...I feel that the source from which the stream of madness is fed should be cut off and sealed up before another year has passedBacknumber1662 (talk) 00:14, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Explanation and rationale

message: Darkfells deleted 
at the time Churchill was seen as an alternative leader. As Lord Beaverbrook wrote "he has emerged as a leader of a big armaments anti-German movement in politics, hostile to the Government". letter to G Ross cited in A J P Taylor Beaverbrook Hamish Hamilton 1972 p. 372. . I want to revert  this. my reasons for doing so are 
* its true, and its verifiable (appropriate source supplied)
* it adds to a reader's understanding of Churchill, at that time many people distrusted Churchill. One reason was he was seen to be 'on the make' and here (as per quote from Alistair Cooke given in the article) he was seen as making a Kings party and using the Crisis to further his own ambition.
* it further explains his isolation from the Conservative mainstream
* it aids in understanding why the Commons was so anti Churchill when he tried to address it on the King's behalf
I wont revert till noon Sunday Eastern Australian time to give people time to commentBacknumber1662 (talk) 10:13, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: for the explanation. There's no need to revert, I've done that myself. — DarkFalls talk 10:35, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Abdication Crisis

message: As per User:Backnumber1662 request I have done a review of the article, with some suggestions for improvement. Firstly may I say well done on all you have done, your contributions have been substanative and excellent. Good work! As the article is long, I agree with your suggestion Backnumber that it should be split. My other suggestions are as follows:
* Per WP:Lead Expand/rewrite the lead section. I think the lead section is mainly a list of Churchills positions. This is important to state but I also feel you could introduce more of his controversies during this period. The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview of the article. It should establish context, summarize the most important points, explain why the subject is interesting or notable, and briefly describe its notable controversies, if there are any.
* Expand the Entry into politics section - for example start the article with why Churchill went into politics, mention the impact of his father, of his friends of other MPs etc who encouraged him to stand. Also explain why was Churchills election not successful? Given the figure he was about to become, his early electoral failure is an interesting historical fact. 
* Expand the section on Churchills crossing the floor - what are historians views on thius subject, what did his contemporaries think, what were the major reasons for why he did this? Was it over tariffs or was it to do with helping the deserving poor? 
* Reference - Churchill had become one of the most prominent members of the Government outside the Cabinet
* Why did Churchill loose his seat? Churchill lost his Manchester seat to the Conservative William Joynson-Hicks but was soon elected in another by-election at Dundee constituency.
* Incorporate the following into prose: His direct achievements at the Board of Trade and later as Home Secretary were considerable:
    * Mines Act 1908, providing an 8 hour day in all mines.
    * Trades Boards Act 1909 which established the first minimum wage system in Britain mandating rates for both time- and piece-work for 200,000 workers in several industries. Churchill was able to get Conservative support for this and the Bill "passed without a division."[19]
    * Labour Exchanges Act 1909 setting up offices to help unemployed people find work.[20]
    * National Insurance Act 1911 providing sickness and unemployment benefits.[21]
This should be rewritten at prose and his impact on these acts could be expanded. Bullet points should be avoided.
* Reference - He arranged for 50 London buses to be used to give extra mobility and the troops were used in general operations for a few weeks until the "Circus" was wound up.
* Dardanelles- please reference and expand on The concept was flawed. I think this section could benefit from the opinions of historians, more on the reasons of why the campaing was termed as a failure etc.
* Churchill was widely blamed for the fiasco. Examples of who blamed him, editorials/paper references etc?
* Make the Indian Independence section more concise. Why a major and important aspect of his early political career it is given far too much weight. Try a rewrite, shorten some paragraphs, are the full quotes necessary or can they be summarised?
* Reference - Churchill later sought to portray himself as an isolated voice warning of the need to rearm against Germany. Did he say this? Or have some historians?
My biggest criticism is that the article is somewhat messy, there are loads of full stops, commas where they shouldnt be. Also some sentances do not follow on to the next. I suggest you ask the league of copyeditors for help or get someone to go through the whole article to correct the grammar and structure. I have tried to remove some of the more obvious errors. The most important thing to remember is that where possible, references go at the end of the sentance, after the full stop. 
However overall a very good article and very authorative. It is certainly well on its way to becoming a featured article. You have put a lot of effort in and it shows so again well done. If I can elaborate on any more of my points then please ask. Once you have responded to my suggestions, your next steps should be a peer review, GA review and finally an FA review.   LordHarris 14:59, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Review

message: I noticed a comment that one of the resons he became a liberal was to obtain a salary as a minister. There's a ref, so presumably it does support this. However, as it is written now, it  rather suggests this was his only reason for doing so. At least one biographer didn't mention such a reason (money), but instead gave various political explanations. Both this and the (i think originating) article, Winston Churchill, allude from time to time to his doing things for money. While he certainly needed money, I do not think, and I don't think the biographers think, this was ever his main motivation for anything. There was one example I read where he turned down a ministerial post in favour of another with half the pay but which suited his interests better. My inclination would be to expand on the reasons for his change of party, and drop the suggestion he did it for money entirely. User:Sandpiper
:Although backbench MPs earned nothing until Edwardian times, and only a modest salary until a few decades ago, Cabinet ministers in this era earned 5-10k a year, the equivalent of many hundreds of thousands a year in today's money. Churchill, FE Smith and Asquith were all accused, entirely seriously, by their political opponents of clinging to office for the money. I agree it probably wasn't his main motivation. He had to ramp up his "writing" activities when out of office to cover his extravagant spending.Paulturtle (talk) 06:56, 14 March 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  motivation 

message: the article states that Churchill suggested machine guns be used on striking miners. Hmm. Anyone got a ref for this, or should I delete it? I have seen some mention  on the net about machine guns being installed at coal pits, but that is hardly what is implied by the wording here. Sandpiper (talk) 22:26, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  machine guns 

message: In the last revision I edited, I found duplicate named references, i.e. references sharing the same name, but not having the same content. Please check them, as I am not able to fix them automatically :) 
* "centre-710" :
** 
** 
DumZiBoT (talk) 12:49, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I renamed the second ref. However, it really wants replacing with a biographical ref to Churchills statement about re-ratting rather than a contemporary politics one which just mentions it in passing. Sandpiper (talk) 08:18, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bot report : Found duplicate references ! 

message: I'm afraid this section contains a number of small inaccuracies. Churchill funded the Landships Committee out of the Navy Budget, not "research funds." He didn't "head" the Committee, but formed it; its Chairman was Eustace d'Eyncourt, and it reported to Churchill, but he was not a member. The Committee was formed before any demonstrations to Lloyd George or anyone else. The Committee developed the (arguably) first tank, not the first tank corps. The tank was not seen as as misappropriation of funds. Its development was kept secret for some time, in case it be thought a waste of money, but it was given official support at the highest level from February 1916. The cited website is highly inaccurate, and, in my view, not a suitable source. Hengistmate (talk) 11:48, 27 March 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Early development of the tank 

message: (Mentioned in section War and Air Secretary)  The riots at the Peace celebrations at Luton Town Hall in 1919 were not the doing of serving soldiers - as this article seems to imply - but discharged soldiers and civilians disenchanted at unemployment and also (according to a documentary presented by Ian Hislop I recall) the fact that the town hall dinner did not include veterans.Cloptonson (talk) 20:50, 1 June 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Seeing this unchallenged I have changed 'Soldiers' to 'Ex-servicemen' as this is the consensus among Wikipedia articles about Luton, History of Luton and Luton Town Hall, and have added a citation lifted from the latter article.Cloptonson (talk) 22:31, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
thread_title: Luton Peace Riots

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just added archive links to  on Winston Churchill in politics: 1900–39. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add  after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add  to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/20071211235729/http://www.naval-history.net:80/WW1AreaMed1915.htm to http://www.naval-history.net/WW1AreaMed1915.htm
When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.
Cheers.—cyberbot IITalk to my owner:Online 21:31, 22 January 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Churchill had brought a successful libel action against Lord Alfred Douglas who had accused Churchill of giving a deliberately false account of the Battle of Jutland at the request of Sir Ernest Cassel. During the trial it emerged that Cassell, whose company remained Churchill's publisher, had paid for some of the furnishings of Churchill's London residence.
Cassell & Co is a British book publishing house, founded by John Cassell, not Sir Ernest Cassel. Valetude (talk) 19:49, 7 March 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks, well spotted. I checked in Roy Jenkins's Churchill, which is used as the ref, it does not support the claim about Cassel being his publisher. I have removed the false claim, and corrected the date, and added the detail that Lord Alfred was sentenced to 6 months. It is deeply concerning that someone should have introduced such a falsehood into the article. DuncanHill (talk) 21:12, 7 March 2019 (UTC)

text: Rather appallingly, the error has been in the article since 2008! The editor who introduced it is no longer active. DuncanHill (talk) 21:19, 7 March 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: The statement was originally referenced to David Cannadine's The Aristocratic Adventurer, not to Jenkins. DuncanHill (talk) 21:32, 7 March 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wrong Cassell 

message: The photo is captioned "Churchill in Damascus in 1912". Are we absolutely sure of this? What was he doing there when he was First Lord of the Admiralty and it was still part of the Ottoman Empire? I think he did visit the region when he was Colonial Secretary in 1921-2, so maybe it's misdated?Paulturtle (talk) 18:56, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: I've removed the photo. I don't think he was in Damascus in 1912, it's not mentioned by Randolph in Volume 2 of the multi-volume biography, nor is it mentioned by Gilbert in A Life. It also doesn't look like Damascus, and the other chaps don't look like Arabs or Ottomans. I'd say he looks too young for it to be post-War. DuncanHill (talk) 06:25, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Damascus 1912 

message: The article presently states, under 'War and Air Secretary':- 'Churchill was responsible for establishing both the Auxiliary Division and the Black and Tans during the Irish War of Independence.' This is unsourced (the source note only covers the final quotation in the paragraph) and appears to be counter-factual. The Black and Tans article itself certainly doesn't support it. The RIC did not report to Churchill as Secretary of State for War. They reported to their own Inspector-General, to the Lord Lieutenant (French) and to the Chief Secretary for Ireland and hence the Cabinet. RIC recruitment does not seem to have been in Churchill's remit. Khamba Tendal (talk) 14:45, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Black and Tans 

message: Citations in this article are formatted in various ways that will confuse readers. One of the styles is the deprecated rp. Given the inconsistency, I think it is debatable if WP:CITEVAR can apply here but I will in any case propose a way forward to try and gain consensus.
I propose implementation of sfn, aligned with harv, for major book sources and full utilisation of cite web, cite news, etc. for online sources. This would align the article with the styles used in its parent and sister articles. Would anyone seriously object if I do that? If there is no response to this request by next Sunday 28th, I will assume consensus and make a start. Thanks. No Great Shaker (talk) 12:07, 21 June 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Is rp deprecated? As both a reader and an editor I find sfn/harv unhelpful at best, prone to error, and very prone to decay as the article changes over time. DuncanHill (talk) 17:41, 21 June 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, Rp is not recommended "unless necessary": see :Template:Rp#Notice. I see what you mean about sfn/harv because I'm always fixing errors where it isn't linking to the bibliography. It's fine if done right but that depends on the editor and, as you say, tends not to be the case. No Great Shaker (talk) 18:44, 21 June 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Citation style