John Smith (politician, 1938)

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John Smith (born September 13, 1938 in Ardrishaig , Argyll and Bute , † May 12, 1994 in London ) was a British politician who was chairman of the Labor Party from July 1992 until his unexpected death in May 1994 .

Life

Smith was in Scotland born and attended in Dunoon school before he attended the University of Glasgow Law studied. During his time at university, he won the Observer 's debating contest. He worked as a lawyer until he was elected to Parliament in 1970 as MP for North Lanarkshire .

During the Labor reign in the 1970s, he steered the highly controversial decentralization proposals for Scotland and Wales through the House of Commons . Between 1978 and the fall of the Labor government in 1979, he served as Minister of Commerce.

Despite his calm, modest demeanor and his politically moderate stance, he was considered a funny, often biting speaker. In 1988 he suffered a heart attack while serving as shadow finance minister and then lost weight to reduce the risk of further health problems.

Smith represented the traditional wing of Labor. During the 1992 election campaign, he took the position of one more heave (“just one more effort”), which critics polemically interpreted as “wait and see and do nothing” ( relying on the weakness of the conservatives). (The term one more heave originally comes from Jeremy Thorpe (1974); it was also applied to the politics of Jeremy Corbyn with pejorative intent in 2017. ) The so-called modernizers like Tony Blair and Gordon Brown were anxious to prevent the party from doing this Took a stand.

For the surprising defeat of Labor in the elections on April 8, 1992 , Smith in particular was held responsible, although he was elected to succeed Neil Kinnock as chairman. In the end, Smith failed in the election because of the demand to raise the top tax rate from 40 to 50% (so-called Labor's tax bombshell ), while the Conservatives wanted to cut income tax by 20% amid the severe recession. Blair and Brown had questioned this demand of their own party and later cautiously did not touch the question of the tax rate.

During his brief tenure as leader of the Labor Party, Smith abolished the union block vote at Labor Party conventions and replaced it with the principle of "one member, one vote". During his tenure, Labor achieved a remarkable lead over the Conservatives in opinion polls . He determined a future Labor government to establish a Scottish Parliament , which Tony Blair , who was elected as his successor as party leader in July 1994, implemented.

Smith's sudden and premature death from a recent heart attack paved the way for Blair (then Shadow Secretary of the Interior ); he became British Prime Minister in 1997 and remained so until 2007.

Smith's grave on Iona

Smith was buried on the "holy" island of Iona with special permission. In honorable memory, Labor renamed its party headquarters on Walworth Road to John Smith House .

Aftermath

Although Smith had suffered a serious heart attack as early as 1988, after his death there was a great emotional shock in parts of the British population, which, to a lesser extent, corresponded to the public sympathy that followed Lady Diana's sudden death three years later . Sometimes the MPs in the lower house wept. Because of this emotionality, a discussion of Smith's politics and legacy was difficult in the years that followed. German media took little notice of Smith.

Since Blair Smith's successor in the party presidency, Smith has become an icon of the left because of the contrast between his traditional approach and Blair's claim to leadership in "New Labor". The question of whether Smith Labor could have led to such a brilliant election victory as Blair remains a matter of debate.

After Smith's death, the John Smith Memorial Trust was established, which, together with the British Council and the Department of Constitutional Affairs, administers the John Smith Fellowship Program . The scholarship enables young executives from abroad to do an internship in British politics.

Others

After Smith's death, Margaret Beckett temporarily took over the party leadership. On July 21, 1994, the Labor Party held a leadership election . The 'one member, one vote' principle adopted in 1993 was applied for the first time. Blair won this election by an absolute majority over John Prescott and Margaret Beckett.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Brian Wheeler: Election countdown - 1990s style , in: bbc.co.uk, July 21, 2017th
2. ↑ www.johnsmithmemorialtrust.org