The Flag in the Wind by John MacCormick

Author:John MacCormick [MacCormick, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780857907417
Publisher: Birlinn

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

NOW THAT Scottish Convention was set free from the restrictions of wartime we resumed our full-scale campaigning all over the country and wherever we went our meetings were well attended and new members in ever-increasing numbers were enrolled. It was clear that one of the effects of the war had been to heighten national consciousness in Scotland and, especially among the young men who were by now returning from the Forces, we found it easier than ever before to win converts to our cause. The deliberate moderation with which we stated our case and the fact that we demanded no sacrifice of party loyalties made our propaganda far more acceptable to the public than it had been in the days of our National Party membership and we became more and more assured that the drastic steps we had taken in 1942 were now being justified.

We were campaigning with a definite and immediate object in view. Our intention was to create enough public interest to enable us to bring together a fully representative conference which would discuss the future of Scotland and, if possible, agree on a minimum programme of demands. With a Labour Government in power and remembering all the promises which had been made, we hoped that if we could show widespread agreement on a measure of reform the Government would take appropriate action.

By the beginning of the year 1947 we were ready to put our plans into operation. On a close parallel to the old Conventions of Estates which had so often guided Scotland’s destiny in moments of crisis in the past, we summoned a Scottish National Assembly to be held in Glasgow on 22nd March that year. Invitations were sent to every local authority in the country, to the Presbyteries of the Church of Scotland, to trade unions, chambers of commerce, trade associations and every kind of public organisation. The result astonished even the most optimistic of us. Applications for delegate cards poured in from every corner of Scotland and when finally the Assembly met there were more than 600 delegates present representing so many local authorities and public bodies that we might claim with justice that this was a meeting which could speak for the whole nation. The Scotsman went so far as to describe the Assembly as the “most representative gathering of its kind ever brought together in Scotland”.

It was the policy of Scottish Convention, having brought the Assembly together, to give the widest possible scope to the delegates in the discussion of Scotland’s problem. We had, therefore, prepared an agenda consisting of a graded series of resolutions. The first expressed general satisfaction with the present set-up, the second demanded a number of fairly modest administrative reforms and the third requested the establishment of a Scottish Parliament within the framework of the United Kingdom.

We expected that each of these resolutions would obtain a fair amount of support and, although we naturally hoped that the third would win the majority, we took no active steps to influence the result.

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