''The Left Was Never Right'' was a book published in June 1945 by
Quintin Hogg, the
Conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...
MP for
Oxford
Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...
, which examined the speeches and policies of politicians from the
Labour Party and the
Liberal Party
The Liberal Party is any of many political parties around the world. The meaning of ''liberal'' varies around the world, ranging from liberal conservatism on the right to social liberalism on the left.
__TOC__ Active liberal parties
This is a li ...
concerning armaments and
appeasement. These were contrasted to quotes by Conservative MPs such as
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 during the Second World War, and again from ...
and Sir
Austen Chamberlain
Sir Joseph Austen Chamberlain (16 October 1863 – 16 March 1937) was a British statesman, son of Joseph Chamberlain and older half-brother of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain. He served as Chancellor of the Exchequer (twice) and was briefly ...
supporting
British rearmament
British re-armament was a period in British history, between 1934 and 1939, when a substantial programme of re-arming the United Kingdom was undertaken. Re-armament was necessary, because defence spending had gone down from £766 million in 1919 ...
and against appeasement of Germany. The books dust-jacket quoted
Jesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label= Hebrew/ Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religiou ...
' remark: "Out of thine own mouth will I judge thee" from
Luke 19:22.
Hogg stated that the
Gollancz books were "morally wicked, unpatriotic and factually incorrect. ''The Left Was Never Right'' was an attempt to set the record straight and to establish that unpreparedness before the war was largely the consequence of the policies of the parties of the Left". It was the only book published which specifically countered Gollancz publications such as ''
Guilty Men
''Guilty Men'' is a short book published in Great Britain in July 1940 that attacked British public figures for their failure to re-arm and their appeasement of Nazi Germany in the 1930s. A classic denunciation of the former government policy, i ...
''. In his memoirs, Hogg wrote that although the book was "a success ... it was too little too late to counteract the impression made by the earlier Gollancz publications".
[Hailsham, p. 230.]
Notes
References
*Lord Hailsham, ''A Sparrow's Flight'' (London: Collins, 1990).
1945 non-fiction books
Books about politics of the United Kingdom
Books about World War II
1945 in British politics
1945 in the United Kingdom
Faber and Faber books
{{UK-poli-book-stub