Viscount Templewood on Ramsay MacDonald

“As one of the founders of the Parliamentary Labour Party, he was chiefly responsible for winning a place for Labour in the great world of politics and public opinion. If he had not possessed remarkable qualities, he would have irrevocably lost any influence that he ever possessed by his pacifist opposition first to the South African War, and subsequently to the War of 1914. Yet, within a short time of each of them, he was back again in public life, a leading figure and a politician of growing importance... Having become Prime Minister, he showed both tact and judgment. In particular, he succeeded in lowering the international temperature. The détente that followed the end of the Curzon–Poincaré wrangles gave him the chance of improving Anglo-French relations, whilst his love of tradition was a valuable antidote against the irresponsible anarchism of some of his followers.”

“[H]e was...the romanticist. As sensitive as Fergus McIvor in Waverley, his vivid imagination made him see all the difficulties that beset any course of action. If it sometimes confused his arguments, it none the less kept him responsive to the needs of the time, and gave him an engaging touch in all his dealings with his Ministerial colleagues.”

“It is to MacDonald's credit that he came out strongly against this one-sided attitude, and in an article of April 27 [1935] in the News Letter, the weekly paper of the National Labour Party, severely criticised the Germans for their intransigent militarism, and the Germanophiles in this country for their blindness in swallowing the German case.”