Scotland in Modern Times by William H Marwick

Author:William H Marwick [Marwick, William H]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Political Science, General
ISBN: 9781136935572
Google: YUddAgAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 20309935
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2013-12-16T00:00:00+00:00

4

The Twentieth Century

THE PRE-WAR YEARS

THE years 1901–14, sometimes dubbed the Edwardian Era, form an epilogue to the Victorian Age, but at the same time were the period of development of forces revealed or intensified by the War of 1914–18 and subsequently active. They were years of the growth of commercial rivalries, especially between Great Britain and Germany—a psychological and perhaps economic factor contributing to armed conflict. They witnessed the revival of the Protectionist agitation which triumphed in the ‘thirties. They experienced the introduction of a policy of social reformism, pioneered by Lloyd George’s insurance schemes and redistributive taxation, which has now culminated in the welfare state. They were years when the rise in the general level of prices, which has continued almost unabated, became again manifest. One result was the accentuation of industrial strife, associated with the rise of the Labour Party, at the expense of Liberalism, which gained so striking but ephemeral a triumph in 1906.

Most of the prolific social legislation of these years was common to Great Britain; but among enactments peculiar to Scotland were the Small Landholders Act of 1911, which extended to all small tenants the Crofters’ Act provision of fair rent, etc., and substituted a Land Court for the Crofters’ Commission; the institution in 1913 of special Medical Services for the scattered population of the Highlands and Islands; and the Scottish Temperance Act of 1913 which provided for local option by popular vote on the sale of alcoholic liquors. The Education (Scotland) Act of 1908 pooled various grants in the Education (Scotland) Fund, and made provision for the physical welfare of pupils. Andrew Carnegie founded his Trust for Scottish Universities in 1901.

Another event of considerable bearing on Scottish social history was the union of the Free and United Presbyterian Churches in 1900. The dissentient minority in the former had their claim to the properties of their church upheld by the House of Lords, reversing the verdict of the Scottish courts. The obvious inequity of the verdict was repaired by retrospective legislation (Scottish Churches Act, 1905), in terms of which a fair distribution between majority and minority was achieved.

The Scottish economy on the whole progressed, though there were years of depression. The Scottish output represented approximately one-seventh of the coal, one-third of the steel and one-fourth of the ships of Britain. Dependence on world markets was accentuated, four-fifths of tweeds, one-third of coal, two-thirds of locomotives being sold abroad. There was about 1906 a boom in company promotion; in that year 84 were launched with nearly £4 million capital; 71 were private, i.e. not issuing shares for public subscription.

The mining of coal expanded in the Lothians; shipbuilding attained a record output in 1911, the Parsons turbine was introduced by Dennys in 1901, the first ocean motor-ship, the Jutlandia, was launched by Barclay Curles in 1912; Yarrows transferred their yards from the Thames to the Clyde (Scotstoun) in 1904. There was an increase in naval orders, especially to Beardmores, Browns and Fairfield; the Agamemnon, then the largest

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