Scottish Labour Party founded

Historical Context Note

Litencyc Editors (Independent Scholar - Europe)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.3: Scottish Writing and Culture, 400-present.
Vol. editors: Kate Ash-Irisarri (University of Edinburgh), Daniel Cook (University of Dundee), J. Derrick McClure (University of Aberdeen)

Domains

Political Parties

Dates

Date of occurrence 1888-05-19

Places

Scotland (Location)

The impetus for the Scottish Labour Party was initiated after Keir Hardie stood for election as an MP in the Mid-Lanarkshire by-election of April 1888. Although he had tried to stand as a Liberal candidate, the Liberal Party refused to support him, and so he had been forced to offer himself as an independent candidate, and won only 617 votes. This led him, and others including Robert Bontine Cunninghame Graham, to realise that perhaps the labouring classes in Scotland would be better served by having their own party to represent them. An initial meeting was held on 19 May in Glasgow, and was followed up by a founding conference in August. Although the Socialist organisations (the Social Democratic Federation and the Socialist League) …

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151 words

Citation: Editors, Litencyc. "Scottish Labour Party founded". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 30 August 2013 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=5335, accessed 23 November 2024.]

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Scottish Labour Party founded

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