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Opposition techniques in British politics (1867-1914)
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 July 2017
Extract
When Walter Bagehot first published his English Constitution in 1865, it was already possible to regard ‘Her Majesty’s Opposition’ as an established part of the constitution. Indeed, Bagehot regarded it as an essential concomitant of cabinet government, and remarked that a ‘critical opposition is the consequence of cabinet government’. Already the folklore of politics was full of apposite quotations from statesmen of the old school about the virtues of an opposition, although perhaps only Disraeli and Derby were prepared to accept the doctrine, attributed to George Tierney (1761-1830) that ‘the duty of an Opposition was very simple – it was to oppose everything and propose nothing’.
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References
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