Robert Cecil, 1st Viscount Cecil of Chelwood - Wikipedia

1/30/22, 5:00 AM Robert Cecil, 1st Viscount Cecil of Chelwood - Wikipedia
Robert Cecil, 1st Viscount Cecil of

Chelwood
Edgar Algernon Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 1st Viscount
The Right Honourable
Cecil of Chelwood, CH, PC, QC (14 September 1864 – 24
November 1958), known as Lord Robert Cecil from 1868 to The Viscount Cecil of
1923,[1] was a British lawyer, politician and diplomat. He was one Chelwood
of the architects of the League of Nations and a defender of it, CH PC QC
whose service to the organisation saw him awarded the Nobel
Peace Prize in 1937.
Contents
Early life and legal career
Unionist free trader
Minister during First World War
Formation of League of Nations
League of Nations Union
Possible party realignment
Traditional Tory in a modernizing world
Cecil and appeasement
Later life Chancellor of the Duchy of
Lancaster
Honours
In office
Legacy 10 November 1924 – 19 October

Works 1927
Notes Monarch George V
References Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin
Further reading Preceded by Josiah Wedgwood
External links Succeeded by The Lord
Cushendum
Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal
Early life and legal career In office
28 May 1923 – 22 January 1924

Cecil was born at Cavendish Square, London, the sixth child and
third son of Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, Monarch George V
three times prime minister, and Georgina, daughter of Sir Edward Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin
Hall Alderson. He was the brother of James Gascoyne-Cecil, 4th
Preceded by Austen
Marquess of Salisbury, Lord William Cecil, Lord Edward Cecil
Chamberlain
and Lord Quickswood and the cousin of Arthur Balfour. He was
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Cecil,_1st_Viscount_Cecil_of_Chelwood 1/16
educated at home until he was thirteen and then spent four years Succeeded by John Robert
at Eton College. He claimed in his autobiography to have enjoyed Clynes
his home education most. He studied law at University College,
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of
Oxford, where he became a well-known debater. His first job was State for Foreign Affairs
as private secretary to his father, when commencing in office as In office
prime minister from 1886 to 1888. In 1887, he was called to the

30 May 1915 – 10 January 1919
bar by the Inner Temple. He was fond of saying that his marriage
to Lady Eleanor Lambton, daughter of George Lambton, 2nd Earl Monarch George V
of Durham on 22 January 1889, was the cleverest thing he had Prime Minister H. H. Asquith
ever done. David Lloyd

George
From 1887 to 1906, Cecil practised civil law, including work in
Chancery and parliamentary practice. On 15 June 1899, he was Preceded by Neil Primrose
appointed a Queen's Counsel.[2] After the outbreak of the Second Succeeded by Cecil Harmsworth
Boer War, he enrolled as a recruit in the Inns of Court Rifles in
Member of the House of Lords
February 1900,[3] but he never saw active service. He also Lord Temporal
collaborated in writing a book, entitled Principles of Commercial
In office
Law. In 1910 he was appointed a member of the General Council

28 December 1923 – 24 November
of the Bar, and a Bencher of the Inner Temple. He was already a
Justice of the Peace when he was raised the following year as 1958
Chairman of the Hertfordshire Quarter Sessions. Hereditary peerage

Member of Parliament
for Hitchin
Unionist free trader In office
23 November 1911 – 6 December

Cecil was a convinced believer in free trade, opposing Joseph
1923
Chamberlain's agitation for Tariff Reform, denouncing it as "a
rather sordid attempt to ally Imperialism with State assistance for Preceded by Alfred Peter Hillier
the rich".[4] In February 1905, he compiled for party leader Succeeded by Guy Kindersley
Arthur Balfour a memorandum on 'The Attack on Unionist Free Member of Parliament
Trade Seats' in which he quoted a letter to The Times by a for Marylebone East
member of the Tariff Reform League that stated it would oppose In office
free trade candidates, whether Unionist or Liberal. Cecil argued

12 January 1906 – 15 January 1910
that he had identified at least 25 seats in which such attacks had
taken place.[5] At the 1906 general election, Cecil was elected as a Preceded by Edmund Boulnois
Conservative Member of Parliament representing Marylebone Succeeded by James Boyton
East.[4] Personal details
In January 1908, Cecil wrote to fellow Unionist free trader Arthur Born 14 September
Elliot: "To me, the greatest necessity of all is to preserve, if 1864
possible, a foothold for Free Trade within the Unionist party. For, Cavendish Square,
if not, I and others who think like me, will be driven to imperil London
either free trade or other causes such as religious education, the
Died 24 November 1958
House of Lords, and even the Union, which seem to us of equal
(aged 94)
importance".[6] In March 1910 Cecil and his brother Lord Hugh,

unsuccessfully appealed to Chamberlain that he should postpone Danehill, East
advocating food taxes at the next election in order to concentrate Sussex
on opposing Irish Home Rule.[7] Political party Conservative
Spouse(s) Lady Eleanor
Lambton (1868-
He did not contest the Marylebone seat in either general election 1959)
in 1910 as a result of the tariff reform controversy. Instead he Education Eton College
unsuccessfully contested Blackburn in the January election and

University College,
Wisbech in the December election.[8] In 1911, he won a by-
Oxford
election in Hitchin, Hertfordshire as an Independent
Conservative and served as its MP until 1923.[8] Profession Lawyer
Awards Nobel Peace Prize
Minister during First World War (1937)
At 50 during the outbreak of the First World War, too old for military service, Cecil went to work for
the Red Cross. He was made Vicar-General to the Archbishop of York on account of his deep religious
convictions and commitment to pacifism. Following the formation of the 1915 coalition government,
he became Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs on 30 May 1915, on 16 June he
was sworn of the Privy Council,[9] promoted to Assistant Secretary in 1918–19. He served in this post
until 10 January 1919, additionally serving in the cabinet as Minister of Blockade between 23
February 1916 and 18 July 1918. He was responsible for devising procedures to bring economic and
commercial pressure against the enemy forcing them to choose between feeding their occupying
military forces or their civilian population. After the war, in 1919, he was made an Honorary Fellow,
and granted his MA of University College, Oxford, as well as an Honorary Doctorate of Civil Law, apt
for a university chancellor.
Formation of League of Nations

In September 1916, he wrote and circulated a Memorandum on
Proposals for Diminishing the Occasion of Future Wars in the
Cabinet. Cecil noted the suffering and destruction of the war,
along with the threat to European civilisation and the likelihood of
postwar disputes. He urged an alternative to war as a means of
settling international disputes and claimed that neither the
destruction of German militarism nor a postwar settlement based
on self-determination would guarantee peace. Cecil rejected
compulsory arbitration but claimed a regular conference system
would be unobjectionable. Peaceful procedures for settling
disputes should be compulsory before there was any outbreak of
fighting. Sanctions, including blockade, would be necessary to
force countries to submit to peaceful procedures. If overwhelming
naval and financial power could be combined in a peace system,
"no modern State could ultimately resist its pressure". He hoped Lord Robert Cecil by Sir William
that America might be willing to "join in organized economic Orpen
action to preserve peace".[10][11] He later said that it was the "first
document from which sprang British official advocacy of the
League of Nations".
In May 1917 Cecil circulated his Proposals for Maintenance of Future Peace in which the signatories
would agree to keep the postwar territorial settlement for five years, followed by a conference to
consider and, if necessary, to implement necessary or desirable territorial changes. Countries would
also agree to submit their international disputes to a conference and they would be forbidden to act
until the conference had made a decision. However, states would be allowed to act unilaterally if, after
three months, the conference had failed to make a decision. All decisions made by conferences would
be enforced by all the signatories, "if necessary by force of arms". If a country resorted to war without
submitting the dispute to a conference, the other countries would combine to enforce a commercial
and financial blockade.[12][13] Cecil had originally included proposals for disarmament but these were
deleted from the final draft after a diplomat, Sir Eyre Crowe, submitted them to a "devastating
critique" that persuaded Cecil they were impractical.[14]
In November 1917, Cecil requested from Balfour the creation of a committee to consider the proposals
for a League of Nations. Balfour granted it and in January 1918, a committee, chaired by Lord
Phillimore, was established.[15] In May 1918, with the Cabinet's permission, Cecil forwarded the
Phillimore Report to the American President Woodrow Wilson and his advisor Colonel House.[16]
In October 1918, Cecil circulated a paper on League proposals to the Cabinet after their request for
advice. He argued that "no very elaborate machinery" would be required as the proposals rejected any
form of international government, but the League would be limited to a treaty binding the signatories
never to go to war until a conference had been called. If a country went to war unilaterally, the
signatories would use all the power at their command, economic and military, to defeat the aggressor.
Cecil viewed the three months' delay before countries resorted to war as the principal role of the
League as that would give public opinion time to exert its peaceful influence.[17] The Cabinet received
the paper "respectfully rather than cordially" and made no decision upon it. Cecil used the paper as
the basis for a speech on the subject of the League delivered at his inauguration as Chancellor of the
University of Birmingham on 12 November. On 22 November Cecil resigned from the government due
to his opposition to Welsh disestablishment. He wrote to Gilbert Murray afterwards, saying that he
hoped to do more for the establishment of a League of Nations outside the government than within
it.[17]
In late November 1918, Cecil was appointed the head of the League of Nations section of the Foreign
Office.[18] A. E. Zimmern had written a memorandum elaborating the functions of the League and
Cecil selected it as a base to work from. He ordered that a summary of the actual organisation
involved in implementing its proposals be written. On 14 December, he was presented with the Brief
Conspectus of League of Nations Organization, which would later be called the Cecil Plan at the Paris
Peace Conference. The Plan included regular conferences between the signatories, which would be
"the pivot of the League" and that they would have to be unanimous. Annual conferences of prime
ministers and foreign secretaries would be complemented by quadrennial meetings between the
signatories. A great power could summon a conference, with all members being able to do so if there
was a danger of war. The great powers would control the League, with the smaller powers exercising
little considerable influence.[18] On 17 December, Cecil submitted the Cecil Plan to the Cabinet. The
Cabinet discussed the idea of the League on 24 December, with Cecil being the leading pro-League
speaker.[19]
The Paris Peace Conference included a League of Nations Commission, which was responsible for
creating a scheme for a League, including the drafting of the Covenant of the League of Nations. Cecil
viewed Wilson's draft for the League and in his diary, he wrote that it was "a very bad document,
badly expressed, badly arranged, and very incomplete". On 27 January Cecil and American legal
expert David Hunter Miller spent four hours revising Wilson's proposals in what became known as
the Cecil-Miller draft. It included granting more powers in the League to the great powers, granting
the Dominions their own seats, a revision of Wilson's arbitration proposals and the inclusion of a
permanent international court.[20] In further negotiations, Cecil was successful in retaining important
parts of the British draft. When Wilson tried to amend it, House warned him against alienating Cecil,
as he "was the only man connected with the British Government who really had the League of Nations
at heart".[21] Cecil was disappointed in Lloyd George's lack of enthusiasm for the League and
repeatedly threatened resignation because of some of Lloyd George's tactics.[22]
Cecil was greatly concerned at Republican opposition to the League and sought to concede some of
Wilson's demands to secure American acceptance of the League. That included protecting the Monroe
Doctrine in the Covenant.[23] On 21 April, the British Empire delegation met Cecil, who assured them
that Dominion criticism of the draft Covenant had been considered and that the new draft avoided
"the impression that a super State was being created". The Canadians objected that while the risk of
Canada being invaded was unlikely, the risks to France or the Balkans were much more likely but had
not been taken into consideration. Furthermore, the League loaded Canada with more liabilities than
it had by being a member of the Empire. Cecil argued that the Council of the League would determine
when that obligation would be fulfilled and that its requirement for decisions to be unanimous
allowed a Canadian delegate to object, which would cause the end of the matter.[24] George Egerton,
in his history of the creation of the League, claimed that Cecil "more than anyone else, deserved credit
for the successful outcome of the second phase of the work of the League of Nations Commission".[25]
After the Treaty of Versailles was first presented to Germany, Cecil argued strongly that it should be
made less harsh on Germany and that Germany should be allowed to join the League. Cecil left Paris
on 9 June, his hopes of a revision of the treaty disappointed.[26]
League of Nations Union

Upon returning to Britain, Cecil eagerly planned the activities of
the League of Nations Union. Cecil's public life from then on was
almost totally devoted to the League; he was its president of the
Union from 1923 to 1945. He chaired a reconstruction committee
of the Union in July 1919, his primary aim being to ensure that the
Union built a powerful pro-League lobby in Britain to make sure
that the government put the League at the centre of its foreign
policy.[27] Cecil also sought to broaden the membership of the
Union, which had largely consisted of Asquithian Liberals, by
soliciting the support of Conservatives and Labour.[28]
Cecil was an Esperantist, and, in 1921, he proposed that the

League of Nations adopt Esperanto as solution to the language
problem.[29]
Encourage Home Industries.
From 1920 to 1922, he represented the Dominion of South Africa Lord Robert Cecil. "I trust that after
in the League Assembly. In 1923, he made a five-week tour of the all we may secure at least your
United States, explaining the League to American audiences. qualified support for our League of
Nations?"
He believed that "the war ha[d] shattered the prestige of the U.S.A. President-elect: "Why, what's
European governing classes" and that their disappearance had the matter with ours?"
created a vacuum that needed to be filled if disaster was to be
averted. The primary solution was the construction of a European Cartoon from Punch magazine, 10
order on the basis of Christian morality, with a machinery of legal November 1920, depicting Cecil
conciliation by which "Junkerism and Chauvinism" would be advocating a design for the League
of Nations to Warren G. Harding
destroyed. The Treaty of Versailles had failed to create that.[30]
His belief in free trade and the League were part of his Cobdenite
vision of a world where trade, self-sacrifice and international cooperation went together, along with
international adjudication and mutual guarantees of peace. The League was not just a solution to war
but also guaranteed that civilisation would be preserved within each member state, including in
Britain where "the League point of view [ran] through all politics - Ireland, Industry, even Economy...
[involving] a new way of looking at things political - or rather a reversion" to Victorian morality.[31]
Possible party realignment
Cecil regarded "class war, whether the class attacked be

landowners or Labour, [as] the most insidious form of national
disintegration".[32] From 1920, Cecil wanted to bring down Lloyd
George and his coalition government by forming a progressive
alliance between anti-coalition and anti-socialist forces.[32] He
had been an enemy of Lloyd George for longer than any other
major politician.[33]
He wanted to create an anti-socialist centre party led by former

Foreign Secretary Viscount Grey, regarding him as the
embodiment of "justice" which had been Britain's "greatest
Viscount (formerly Sir Edward) Grey. National asset...in foreign affairs... for the last two
Cecil wished to replace Lloyd generations".[34] The party would not be anti-working class and
George as Prime Minister with Grey, would include "the best of the Liberal and Labour people" and
whom he greatly admired "some of the old landowning Tories".[35] He supported Asquith in
the Paisley by-election of February 1920 and wanted an electoral
agreement between Labour and pro-League candidates.[36] In
mid-July 1920, Cecil was still keen for a realignment under Grey, who was keener on the League of
Nations than Asquith, whom Cecil thought still influential in the country but no longer a leader.[37]
With his brother Hugh Cecil, he resigned the Conservative whip in February 1921.[36] In 1921 Cecil
abandoned his attempt to form a centre party but still wanted Grey to return to active politics.[38]
Talks between Grey and Cecil began in June 1921.[39] A wider meeting (Cecil, Asquith, Grey and
leading Asquithian Liberals Lord Crewe, Runciman and Sir Donald Maclean) was held on 5 July 1921.
Cecil wanted a genuine coalition, rather than a de facto Liberal government, with Grey, rather than
Asquith, as prime minister and a formal manifesto by himself and Grey that Asquith and Crewe would
then endorse as the official Liberal leaders. Another Conservative, Sir Arthur Steel-Maitland, later
joined in the talks, and his views were similar to Cecil's, but Maclean, Runciman and Crewe were
hostile.[40] In July Cecil wrote a public letter to his constituency association attacking the coalition
government.[38]
Grey himself was not keen, and his failing eyesight would have been a major handicap to his
becoming prime minister. He made, however, a move by speaking in his former constituency in
October 1921, to little effect.[40] After Grey's speech, Cecil published a second letter in which he
announced he would co-operate with a Grey government. In November, when the Irish situation
looked likely to cause the fall of the coalition, Cecil wrote to the King urging him to appoint Grey as
prime minister.[38]
In April 1922, in another constituency letter, he distanced himself from other anti-coalition
Conservatives by insisting on the importance of not being reactionary, and in May, he claimed that the
dominant force within the Conservatives was a group of men who only cared for "the preservation of
its property". He again announced his willingness to serve under Grey in a government based on
industrial cooperation and support for the League. However Cecil became disillusioned with the
Liberals' opposition to reconstructing the party system and so he declined an invitation to join the
Liberals so long as Asquith remained leader, rather than Grey. With the fall of the Lloyd George
coalition in October and the appointment of Bonar Law as Conservative prime minister, Cecil pledged
to support the new government though he was not offered office.[41]
Traditional Tory in a modernizing world
In Baldwin's Conservative administrations of 1923 to 1924 and 1924 to 1927, he was the minister
responsible, under the jurisdiction of the Foreign Secretary, for British activities in League affairs. On
28 May 1923, Cecil returned to the cabinet as Lord Privy Seal,[42][43] a position held by several
members of his family.[44]
Cecil wrote to Baldwin on 29 October 1923, offering his support on tariff reform if Baldwin would
adopt a vigorous pro-League policy in return. He stated that Britain's economic problems could not be
solved by tariffs, rather by solving the collapse of European credit, war debts and "international
suspicion" and withdrawing support from all international organisations except the League.[45]
Because of his disagreement with the Conservatives' policy of tariffs, Cecil did not stand in the general
election of December 1923. After the Conservatives lost their majority, he was raised to the peerage as
Viscount Cecil of Chelwood, of East Grinstead in the County of Sussex, on 28[46] December
1923.[47] He remained Lord Privy Seal until 22 February 1924,[48] When Ramsay MacDonald's
minority Labour government took office, MacDonald apologised to Cecil for not retaining him as the
government's League minister.[49] But at the period Chelwood was rewarded by being asked to be
Rector of Aberdeen University, when they granted him an Honorary Doctorate of Law.[50]
The Conservatives returned to power at the October 1924 general election and Cecil was asked by
Stanley Baldwin to be Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.[51] He led the British delegation to the
Opium Conference at Geneva in 1925. During a naval conference of 1927 in Geneva, negotiations
broke down after the United States refused to agree that Britain needed a minimum of seventy
cruisers for adequate defence of the British Empire, its trade and communications. Cutting the
number of British cruisers from seventy to fifty was proposed by the US in return for concessions over
their size and the calibre of their guns. Cecil, a member of the British delegation, resigned from the
cabinet because the British government let the conference break down, rather than reduce the
number of Royal Navy cruisers.
Cecil was very concerned about the increasing social problems and public dangers associated with the
growth in popularity of the motor car. In 1929, Cecil accepted the post of president of the newly
formed Pedestrians Association who were to campaign successfully to introduce many new measures
to benefit pedestrians.[52]
Although an official delegate to the League as late as 1932, Cecil worked independently to mobilise
public opinion in support of the League. He was joint founder and president, with Pierre Cot, a
French jurist, of the International Peace Campaign, known in France as Rassemblement universel
pour la paix. Among his publications during this period were The Way of Peace (1928), a collection of
lectures on the League; A Great Experiment (1941), a personalised account of his relationship to the
League of Nations; and All the Way (1949), a more complete autobiography.
The Japanese invasion of Manchuria, which began in 1931, was a flagrant breach of the Covenant of
the League of Nations.[53] The World Disarmament Conference began in February 1932, and
disarmament meant that Britain was powerless to stop Japanese aggression. Baldwin told Thomas
Jones on 27 February, "The very people like Bob Cecil who have made us disarm, and quite right too,
are now urging us forward to take action. But where will action take us?... If you enforce an economic
boycott you will have war declared by Japan and she will seize Singapore and Hong Kong and we
cannot, as we are placed, stop her".[54]
Cecil wrote to Baldwin in July that he found himself "more and more out of sympathy with modern
Conservatism" and he considered the government's disarmament proposals made at Geneva "quite
inadequate".[55] In March 1933, he complained to Baldwin that the technical advisers, especially
British ones, had sabotaged the prospect of abolishing aircraft and of bombing, particularly from
those who wanted to retain it for areas such as the North-West frontier of India.[56]
Cecil's experience at the Geneva Disarmament Conference convinced him that the League was being
jeopardised by "Hankeyism", the idea that the balance of power and national interests of countries
were the only basis of international relations, which was named after the Secretary to the Committee
of Imperial Defence (1912-1938) Sir Maurice Hankey.[57] He admired Anthony Eden, Lord Halifax
and Baldwin but regarded MacDonald as an enemy of the League and disliked Lord Londonderry and
Lord Hailsham and criticised Sir John Simon as "the worst Foreign Secretary since Derby in 1876".[58]
Cecil and appeasement
After Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany in January 1933, Cecil was still hopeful of progress
in disarmament. He favoured "the total abolition of naval and military aircraft, plus the creation of an
international" civil air force along with German equality in aircraft. Later still in 1933 he advocated
"the abolition of aggressive arms" as "the power of the defensive" would mean that "France and the
smaller countries would be safer than...in any other way".[58] In October, a month before the Germans
left the conference, Cecil said in a broadcast that the "rules governing [German] disarmament" should
be "the same in principle as those governing the armaments of any other civilised power" and in a
letter to Gilbert Murray he said "Goebbels [had] made rather a favourable impression at Geneva and
[was] said to be quite pleased with the League". He deplored the Nazis' education policy, however.[59]
In April 1934 Cecil wrote to Philip Noel-Baker that Baldwin had told him that an attempt by Hankey
to find a practical way of internationalising civil aviation had failed to which Cecil replied that he "did
not think Hankey was a very good adviser on such questions as he disapproved of peace and
disarmament".[60] Hankey had been an early critic of the feasibility of a League of Nations: in 1919 he
complained that the British representatives on the League Commission, Cecil and Smuts, were
idealists; Cecil was "not very practical on this particular question. I am afraid their scheme will prove
unworkable for two reasons, first, that it attempts too much, and second, that not enough attention is
given to the machine".[61] In 1923 he wrote that Cecil was a "crank".[62]
In 1934, Cecil criticised the British government for the missed opportunity of gaining French co-
operation at the conference after the electoral victory of the French Radicals.[63] In August he wrote to
Murray that because Baldwin had quoted the "arch-militarist F. S. Oliver" in declaring that Britain's
real frontier was on the Rhine, he was very far from a League frame of mind and that the government
"ought to go" in spite of "the intellectual nonentity of the Labour party".[63] He denounced the
worldwide spread of nationalism and the outbreak of isolationism in Britain, claiming that isolation
was a "principle of anarchy" and that in modern conditions countries could "no more live alone than
individuals".[63] The British government in Cecil's view was so anti-League that he should sever his
connections with the Conservatives and began to favour relations with Labour.[64]
The Stresa Front of 1935 between Britain, France and Italy received Cecil's criticism because it
appeared to be an alliance in which Germany was excluded and condoned their failure to disarm.
Cecil wrote to Baldwin, arguing that Hitler should be given a chance to sign a disarmament treaty,
though he doubted whether this would be effective because everything that Hitler had hitherto done,
along with Prussian practice of the last two centuries, suggested that it would fail. But after its likely
failure, the League would have reason for contemplating the "economic and financial measures which
might be applied to a state endangering peace by the unilateral repudiation of its international
obligations".[65]
In June 1935, Cecil believed that a "collective threat from the League or a breach of British friendship"
would prevent the Italian invasion of Abyssinia of 1935 and 1936. The attempt to prevent it by ceding
a part of British Somaliland to Italy met with Cecil's approval.[65] Later that year Cecil used the Union
to pressure the government into League action against Italy. He also favoured oil sanctions and the
closure of the Suez Canal (even if this breached international law). He became increasingly favourable
towards Labour's attitude to foreign policy and in August he contemplated joining that party. At the
general election held in November, he favoured the Union's policy of advising electors to vote for the
candidate most likely to support the League.[66] The Hoare-Laval Pact of December met with Cecil's
disapproval because it would mean that "as between the League of Nations and Mussolini, Mussolini
ha[d] won" and that Hoare had set back the only hope of showing that aggression did not pay.[67]
Cecil believed that France's suspicion of Germany was the main cause of the Pact and that Britain
should therefore bargain with France possible British co-operation against Germany in return for
French co-operation against Italy.[68]
1935 saw the highest influence that Cecil and the Union had ever possessed. Thereafter, both went
into sharp decline.[69] The remilitarization of the Rhineland in March 1936 was to Cecil the "most
dangerous crisis since 1914", but it could not be resolved by "letting off Italy" since "the security of
France, of Russia and indeed of every country in Europe would now be greater had the League already
proved by its defeat of Italian aggression that the organised community as a whole could stifle
war".[68] In April, Cecil believed that as Italy had to subdue Abyssinia quickly, Britain ought to favour
existing sanctions and even increased sanctions against Italy. When Abyssinian resistance collapsed
in May, Italy should have been expelled from the League to demonstrate that "an effective system of
collective security" was possible. Otherwise, it would become obvious that the League was a "failure",
that the Union was "bankrupt" and that collective security was a "farce".[70]
Cecil tried to prevent Conservative withdrawal from the Union by presenting the League as "an almost
ideal machinery" for the "preservation of the Empire".[69] However, the Union further swung to the
left and received complaints from Neville Chamberlain and Conservative Central Office about the left-
wing tone of Union propaganda.[71] In May 1938 Cecil complained that the government had "allowed
the League to disintegrate" and in August that their "ambiguities and timidities" were failing to ensure
that Hitler understood that further aggression would be a breach of international relations.[72]
In May 1938, he said in a letter that German diplomacy had never in history been founded on honest
dealing: "The Germans really conceive of their country as always under war conditions in this respect.
No one expects a belligerent to tell the truth and, to the German mind, they are always belligerent.
The Germans take the view that war is only intensified peace".[73] Cecil was a critic of the Munich
Agreement, whereby the German-speaking lands of Czechoslovakia were granted to Nazi Germany.
He wrote to the Foreign Secretary Lord Halifax on 20 September 1938 that he "had not felt so bitterly
on any public question since the fall of Khartoum" in 1885.[74] The conduct of the government had
completely alienated Cecil from the Conservatives.[72]
In his memoirs, Cecil wrote that the wife of the Czechoslovak President, Edvard Beneš, telephoned
him on behalf of her husband and asked for advice on the crisis: "I felt forced to reply that, much as I
sympathized with her country, I could not advise her to rely on any help from mine. It was the only
reply that could be made, but I have never felt a more miserable worm than I did when making it. To
me and many others the transaction was as shameful as anything in our history".[75] He further
lamented, "Nothing was more painful in the whole of these... negotiations than the constant threats of
the Germans to enforce by arms any of their demands which were resisted, threats to which we
instantly submitted".[76] He wrote a letter to The Guardian denouncing Munich: "But supposing there
is a German guarantee, of what is its value? It is unnecessary to accuse Germany of perfidy. Not only
the Nazi Government but all previous German Governments from the time of Frederick the Great
downwards have made their position perfectly clear. To them, an international assurance is no more
than a statement of present intention. It has no absolute validity for the future".[77]
After the German invasion of the remaining Czechoslovak state in March 1939, Cecil was opposed to
Eden rejoining the government because such a strengthening of Chamberlain would be a disaster. He
had a low opinion of the Labour Party (except for Sir Stafford Cripps and Noel-Baker), whom he
thought were doctrinaire and unpractical. In his view, Clement Attlee was "not a leader" and would
have to be removed if Labour was to be effective.[72] He wanted a "closer union between European
states" against "nationalism" in the postwar settlement.[78]
In the spring of 1946, he participated in the final meetings of the League at Geneva, ending his speech
with the sentence: "The League is dead; long live the United Nations!"[79]
Later life
He lived for thirteen more years, occasionally occupying his place in the House of Lords, and
supporting international efforts for peace through his honorary life presidency of the United Nations
Association.
In his last speech in the House of Lords on 23 April 1953, Cecil reiterated his commitment to world
peace. He admitted that it is "the essence of national sovereignty that independent nations cannot be
compelled, except by force of arms, to take action of which their Governments disapprove—and that
remains true, whatever may be the terms of any general agreement they may have made. No elaborate
or ingenious organisation will alter that fact".
He added that any plan for international peace must rest on Christian civilisation and "we British
especially insist that in our own country, from the days of King Alfred to the present time, Christian
civilisation has been responsible for every improvement and every advance that has been made". He
said that that system had been attacked by Russian dialectical materialism, "its central tenet is that
there is no such thing as the spiritual nature of man, or, if there is, it should be ignored or stamped
out as speedily as possible". However, "If you ignore or abolish the spiritual nature of man, you
destroy the foundation on which rests all truth, justice and freedom, except such as can flow from the
love of money or what money can buy". He advocated rearmament to prevent a Marxist attack and
claimed that "Christian civilisation is the only real alternative to dialectical materialism". Unless there
was a change in the principle of materialism, "I do not see how we can have any permanent security
for peace".[80]
Honours
Cecil's career brought him many honours. In addition to his peerage,

he was appointed Companion of Honour in 1956,[81] was elected
chancellor of the University of Birmingham (1918–1944) and rector
of the University of Aberdeen (1924–1927). He was given the Peace
Award of the Woodrow Wilson Foundation in 1924. Most
significantly, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1937. He was
presented with honorary degrees by the Universities of Edinburgh,
Oxford, Cambridge, Manchester, Liverpool, St Andrews, Aberdeen,
Princeton, Columbia, and Athens.
Cecil died on 24 November 1958 at his home at Chelwood Gate,

Danehill near Haywards Heath.[82] He left no heirs and his
Viscountcy became extinct.
Legacy
Lord Cecil of Chelwood, 1929.
Lord Home paid tribute to Cecil in the House of Lords two days after
his death:
He was one of the first people, perhaps, in the modern world...to foresee the absolute need
for nations to meet round the table in discussion of their national affairs in the interests of
peace. He was one of the architects of the League of Nations. And your Lordships will
recall the unflagging enthusiasm with which he pursued the cause of peace wherever he
went. His vision of a world disarmed, where conciliation would hold the day, was time and
again disappointed...all since have been convinced of the rightness of his ideal, although
the world has not proved itself yet great enough to match his great conception. In the
United Nations, which was the successor of the League of Nations, there is many a living
monument to Lord Cecil. Many of the committees which do great work in the international
field were the result of his conception and are daily drawing people closer and closer
together in interdependence. I, myself, because my father was very keen and with him did
much in the League of Nations field, remember Lord Robert Cecil coming to stay at home;
and many a time at dinner, when I was a comparatively young man, I would watch him,
with his long figure, slide more and more under the table, until only the distinguished
head was left above his plate, and he would tell us of all his plans for the future peace of
the world. Ever since then I have felt that so long as he was alive there was one among us
who, however bitter the strife and however blind the world, never despaired of finding
peace in our time.[83]
Viscount Alexander of Hillsborough said that Cecil "impressed me by his complete devotion to the
cause which ought to be, if it is not, the main cause in all our lives—to try to secure peace and to
establish the brotherhood of man...I am sure that the whole nation mourns the loss of a great public
figure, to whom and to whose work we are all greatly indebted".[83] Clement Attlee also paid tribute:
"I think the whole world has lost a very great man and a very great friend. Wherever the cause of
peace is mentioned, the name of Lord Cecil will always come up, and the complete devotion that he
gave to that cause for so many years".[83] Lord Pethick-Lawrence said of Cecil that his "life was
devoted not to self, not to his own aggrandisement or some advantage of a personal kind, but to the
well-being of his fellow human beings and the good fortune of this country and the whole world".[83]
Salvador de Madariaga summed up Cecil's character:

The gaunt, stooping, clerical figure of Robert Cecil seemed ever drawn forward by an eager
zest which one fancied sharpened his long pointed nose and flashed in his powerful eye
(only one: in Cecil the other eye did not matter). That cross hanging from his waistcoat
pocket witnessed to the religious basis of his political faiths; but the sharp tongue, the
determined chin, the large, powerful hand, the air of a man used to be obeyed, proud
towards men if humble before God, did suggest that in that tall figure striding with his
long legs the thronged corridors of the League, the levels of Christian charity were kept
high above the plane of fools.[84]
Works
'Lord Salisbury', Monthly Review, xiii, October 1903
Our National Church (1913)
The Way of Peace (1928)
A Letter to an M.P. on Disarmament (1931)
'The League as a Road to Peace', in L. Woolf (ed.), The Intelligent Man's Way to Avoid War
(London: Victor Gollancz, 1933), pp. 256–313
A Great Experiment (1941)
All the Way (1949)
Notes
1. As the younger son of a Marquess, Cecil held the courtesy title of "Lord". However, he was not a
peer in his own right until he was made a Viscount in 1923 and so was eligible to sit in the House
of Commons between 1906 and 1923.
2. "No. 27090" (https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/27090/page/3802). The London Gazette.
16 June 1899. p. 3802.
3. "The War - Volunteers". The Times. No. 36083. London. 7 March 1900. p. 10.
4. Robert Cecil, All the Way (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1949), p. 244.
5. Alan Sykes, Tariff Reform in British Politics 1903-1913 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1979), pp. 90-
91.
6. Sykes, p. 173.
7. Sykes, pp. 215-216.
8. Ceadel, Martin (2008). "Cecil, (Edgar Algernon) Robert Gascoyne – (known as Lord Robert Cecil),
Viscount Cecil of Chelwood (1864–1958)" (http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/32335). Oxford
Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press.
doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/32335 (https://doi.org/10.1093%2Fref%3Aodnb%2F32335). Retrieved
24 September 2008. (Subscription or UK public library membership (https://www.oxforddnb.com/help/subs
cribe#public) required.)
9. Burke's Peerage & Baronetage (106th ed.) (Salisbury)
10. George W. Egerton, Great Britain and the Creation of the League of Nations (The University of
North Carolina Press, 1978), pp. 37-38.
11. The memorandum is reprinted in Robert Cecil, A Great Experiment (London: Jonathan Cape,
1941), pp. 353-356.
12. Egerton, p. 38.
13. The memorandum is reprinted in Cecil, A Great Experiment, pp. 356-357.
14. Egerton, p. 212, n. 48.

15. Egerton, p. 65.
16. Egerton, p. 73.
17. Egerton, p. 89.
18. Egerton, p. 99.
19. Egerton, p. 103.
20. Egerton, pp. 118-119.
22. Egerton, p. 120, p. 125, pp. 161-162.
23. Egerton, p. 147, p. 152.
24. Egerton, pp. 165-166.
26. Egerton, pp. 172-173.
29. Forster, Peter Glover (1982). The Language Movement (https://books.google.com/books?id=5kN
B5YmeNj4C&q=%22robert+cecil%22+esperanto+-wikipedia.org&pg=PA173). Walter de Gruyter.
p. 173. ISBN 90-279-3399-5.
30. Maurice Cowling, The Impact of Labour 1920-1924. The Beginnings of Modern British Politics
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1971), p. 61.
31. Cowling, Impact of Labour, p. 62.
34. Cowling, Impact of Labour, p. 62, pp. 64-65.
36. Cowling, Impact of Labour, pp. 64-65.
37. Koss 1985, p249
39. Koss 1985, p251
40. Jenkins 1964, p491-2
29 May 1923. p. 3741.
19 June 1923. p. 4275.
44. Cecil's grandfather, father, brother, nephew and great great nephew also served as Lord Privy
Seal.
45. Cowling, Impact of Labour, p.313.
46. Burke's Peerage & Baronetage (106th ed.), (Salisbury) - Burke's says the date of creation was 24
December 1923, four days earlier.
28 December 1923. p. 9107.
48. The Conservatives were the largest party following the 1923 election but did not have a majority
of seats. The Conservative administration continued into January 1924, and the Labour Party
organised a government.

50. Other Universities that made him a Hon LLD: Athens, Cambridge, Columbia US, Liverpool,
Manchester, Princeton US, and St Andrews. Burke's Peerage & Baronetage (106th ed.)
(Salisbury).
21 November 1924. p. 8415.
52. "The history of the Pedestrians Association" (https://web.archive.org/web/20100807065046/http://
www.livingstreets.org.uk/index.php/download_file/-/view/872/). Living Streets. Archived from the
original (http://www.livingstreets.org.uk/index.php/download_file/-/view/872/) on 7 August 2010.
Retrieved 27 February 2010.
53. Cecil, A Great Experiment, pp. 222-236.
54. Thomas Jones, A Diary with Letters (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1954), p. 30.
55. Stephen Roskill, Hankey, Man of Secrets: Volume III 1931-1963 (London: Collins, 1974), p. 65.
56. Roskill, Volume III, p. 65.
57. Maurice Cowling, The Impact of Hitler. British Politics and British Policy. 1933-1940 (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1975), p. 18.
58. Cowling, Impact of Hitler, p. 19.
59. Cowling, Impact of Hitler, pp. 19-20.
60. Roskill, Volume III, p. 100. Cecil also complained to the editor of the Manchester Guardian, W. P.
Crozier, that Hankey was "a most dangerous man" because "he believes in war and not in
disarmament. He thinks war is the right and proper process by which things move in the world".
Roskill, Volume III, p. 100, n. 4.
61. Stephen Roskill, Hankey, Man of Secrets: Volume II 1919-1931 (London: Collins, 1972), pp. 60-
61.
62. Roskill, Volume II, p. 349.
73. The Marquess of Londonderry, Wings of Destiny (London: Macmillan, 1943), p. 211.
75. Cecil, A Great Experiment, p. 315.
76. Cecil, A Great Experiment, p. 316.
77. Martin Gilbert, Plough My Own Furrow: The Story of Lord Allen of Hurtwood (London: Longmans,
1965), pp. 416-420.
79. "The end of the League of Nations" (http://www.unog.ch/80256EE60057D930/(httpPages)/02076E
77C9D0EF73C1256F32002F48B3?OpenDocument). United Nations Office at Geneva. Retrieved
20 August 2008.
80. The International Situation, HL Deb 23 April 1953 vol 181 cc1135-218 (http://hansard.millbanksyst
ems.com/lords/1953/apr/23/the-international-situation)
81. "No. 40669" (https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/40669/supplement/27). The London
Gazette (Supplement). 2 January 1956. p. 27.
82. "No. 41608" (https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/41608/supplement/472). The London
Gazette (Supplement). 16 January 1959. p. 472.
83. The Late Viscount Cecil of Chelwood, HL Deb 26 November 1958 vol 212 cc837-42 (http://hansar
d.millbanksystems.com/lords/1958/nov/26/the-late-viscount-cecil-of-chelwood)
84. Jean Smith and Arnold Toynbee (eds.), Gilbert Murray. An Unfinished Autobiography (London:
George Allen and Unwin, 1960), pp. 178-179.
References
Cowling, Maurice (1971). The Impact of Labour 1920-1924. The Beginnings of Modern British
Politics. Cambridge University Press.
Cowling, Maurice (1975). The Impact of Hitler. British Politics and British Policy. 1933-1940.
Cambridge University Press.
Egerton, George W. (1978). Great Britain and the Creation of the League of Nations. The
University of North Carolina Press.
Gilbert, Martin (1965). Plough My Own Furrow: The Story of Lord Allen of Hurtwood. Longmans.
Haberman, Frederick W., ed. (1972). From Nobel Lectures, Peace 1926–1950. Elsevier
Publishing Company.
Jenkins, Roy (1964). Asquith (https://books.google.com/books?id=cKdBAAAAIAAJ&q=asquith+Je
nkins) (first ed.). London: Collins. OCLC 243906913 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/243906913).
Johnson, Gaynor (2013). Lord Robert Cecil: Politician and Internationalist. Ashgate.
Koss, Stephen (1985). Asquith (https://books.google.com/books?id=tBGGAAAAIAAJ&q=Asquith+
Stephen+Koss). London: Hamish Hamilton. ISBN 978-0-231-06155-1.
Londonderry, The Marquess of (1943). Wings of Destiny. Macmillan.
Smith, Jean; Toynbee, Arnold J., eds. (1960). Gilbert Murray. An Unfinished Autobiography.
George Allen and Unwin.
Further reading
Birn, D. S. (1981). The League of Nations Union, 1918–1945.
Brody, J. Kenneth (1999). The Avoidable War, Volume I: Lord Cecil and the Policy of Principle,
1932-1935. Transaction.
Brody, J. Kenneth (1999). The Avoidable War, Volume II: Pierre Laval and the Politics of Reality,
1935-1936. Transaction.
Ceadel, Martin (1980). "The first British referendum: the Peace Ballot, 1934–35". English
Historical Review. 95: 810–839. doi:10.1093/ehr/xcv.ccclxxvii.810 (https://doi.org/10.1093%2Feh
r%2Fxcv.ccclxxvii.810).
Cecil, Hugh P. (1975). "Lord Robert Cecil: A Nineteenth-Century Upbringing". History Today. 25:
118–127.
Johnson, Gaynor. Lord Robert Cecil: Politician & Internationalist (2014), major scholarly
biography.
Raffo, P. S. (1974). "The League of Nations Philosophy of Lord Robert Cecil". Australian Journal
of Politics and History. 20 (2): 186–196. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8497.1974.tb01112.x (https://doi.org/1
0.1111%2Fj.1467-8497.1974.tb01112.x).
Thompson, J. A. (1977). "Lord Cecil and the pacifists in the League of Nations Union". The
Historical Journal. 20. 20 (4): 949–959. doi:10.1017/S0018246X00011481 (https://doi.org/10.101
7%2FS0018246X00011481).
Thompson, J. A. (1981). "Lord Cecil and the Historians". The Historical Journal. 24. 24 (3): 709–
715. doi:10.1017/S0018246X00022597 (https://doi.org/10.1017%2FS0018246X00022597).
Thorne, Christopher. "Viscount Cecil, the Government and the Far Eastern Crisis of 1931."
Historical Journal 14#4 (1971): 805–26. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2638108 online].
External links
Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Robert Cecil (https://api.parliament.uk/historic
-hansard/people/lord-robert-cecil)
Robert Cecil (https://www.nobelprize.org/laureate/502) on Nobelprize.org including the Nobel
Lecture 1 June 1938 The Future of Civilization
"Archival material relating to Robert Cecil, 1st Viscount Cecil of Chelwood" (https://discovery.natio
nalarchives.gov.uk/details/c/F256891). UK National Archives.
Newspaper clippings about Robert Cecil, 1st Viscount Cecil of Chelwood (http://purl.org/pressema
ppe20/folder/pe/003092) in the 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW
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1/30/22, 5:00 AM Robert Cecil, 1st Viscount Cecil of Chelwood - Wikipedia

Robert Cecil, 1st Viscount Cecil of

Legacy 10 November 1924 – 19 October

28 May 1923 – 22 January 1924

prime minister from 1886 to 1888. In 1887, he was called to the

ever done. David Lloyd

Law. In 1910 he was appointed a member of the General Council

Chairman of the Hertfordshire Quarter Sessions. Hereditary peerage

23 November 1911 – 6 December

free trade candidates, whether Unionist or Liberal. Cecil argued

importance".[6] In March 1910 Cecil and his brother Lord Hugh,

unsuccessfully contested Blackburn in the January election and

Formation of League of Nations

League of Nations Union

Cecil was an Esperantist, and, in 1921, he proposed that the

Possible party realignment

Cecil regarded "class war, whether the class attacked be

He wanted to create an anti-socialist centre party led by former

Traditional Tory in a modernizing world

Cecil and appeasement

Cecil's career brought him many honours. In addition to his peerage,

Cecil died on 24 November 1958 at his home at Chelwood Gate,

Salvador de Madariaga summed up Cecil's character:

14. Egerton, p. 212, n. 48.

49. Cowling, Impact of Labour, p. 369.

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?

This page was last edited on 30 December 2021, at 17:14 (UTC).

Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License;

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