This collection of speeches in support of free trade by the future Prime Minister tracks his early rise in British Parliament.
Throughout his career—as both a Conservative and a Liberal—Winston Churchill was a strong supporter of free trade. As a Conservative, this position was sometimes controversial; early in his career, Churchill opposed Joseph Chamberlain's strategy of imposing tariffs to protect Britain’s economic dominance. When he defected to the Liberal Party in 1904, Churchill continued to be a fierce free trade advocate.
Originally published in 1906, For Free Trade was an influential political pamphlet that made Churchill’s speeches on the subject available to the British people. This collection contains speeches delivered in Manchester or The House of Commons between 1902 and 1905.
Sir Winston S. Churchill was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1953 "for his mastery of historical and biographical description as well as for brilliant oratory in defending exalted human values." Over a 64-year span, Churchill published over 40 books, many multi-volume definitive accounts of historical events to which he was a witness and participant. All are beautifully written and as accessible and relevant today as when first published. During his fifty-year political career, Churchill served twice as Prime Minister in addition to other prominent positions--including President of the Board of Trade, First Lord of the Admiralty, Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Home Secretary. In the 1930s, Churchill was one of the first to recognize the danger of the rising Nazi power in Germany and to campaign for rearmament in Britain. His leadership and inspired broadcasts and speeches during World War II helped strengthen British resistance to Adolf Hitler--and played an important part in the Allies' eventual triumph. One of the most inspiring wartime leaders of modern history, Churchill was also an orator, a historian, a journalist, and an artist. All of these aspects of Churchill are fully represented in this collection of his works.