Andrew Bonar Law and the fall of the Asquith coalition: The December 1916 Cabinet crisis

70 See Chamberlain, Down the Years, p. 118, and, more specifically, Cecil to Chamberlain, 30 May 1932, Chamberlain Papers, AC 39/5/39. 71 Asquith, p. 435.

72 Beaverbrook wrote that Bonar Law summoned F.E. Smith, another high powered lawyer, back to Edwardes Square after the Unionist chieftains had left, in order to get his opinion on the paragraph in question. Apparently he also dismissed all protest, and the note went forward as drafted. Politicians and the War, pp. 318-19. No mention of this appears in either of the two major biographies of Smith by Lord Birkenhead (1959) or John Campbell (1983). 73 BL 85/All. 74 Asquith, p. 440.

75 Politicians and the War, p. 426.

76 Blake, Unknown Prime Minister, pp. 318-19; Spender and Asquith, Asquith, Vol. II, pp. 258-59. 77 BL 85/All.

78 Ibid., emphasis added.

79 Vincent, ed., Crawford Papers, diary entry of 3 Dec.1916, p. 371. Bonar Law offered the same explanation to Robert Donald in his interview of 29 Dec. 1916. H.A. Taylor, Donald, p. 131. 80 Lord Robert Cecil gave Asquith a copy of the resolution on 5 December. The prime minister expressed no surprise, and it changed nothing.

81 See H.A. Taylor, Donald, pp. 143-45. 82 Chamberlain to Chelmsford, 8 Dec. 1916, AC 15/3/8

83 There seems to be no doubt that Asquith was told the main burden of the Unionist message contained in the resolution. See the memorandum "The Break-Up of the First Coalition," by Lord Crewe, the Prime Minister's closest friend in the Cabinet, printed in Asquith's memoirs, Memories and Reflections, Vol. II, pp. 156-57. See also Casser, Asquith as War Leader, p. 218, who notes: "from what Asquith himself admitted to his intimates, it is clear that in due course Bonar Law explained the significance of the resolution. . ." 84 BL 85/All

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