George Lansbury,
PC (22 February 1859 – 7 May 1940) was a British politician and
social reformer who led the
Labour Party from 1932 to 1935. Apart from a brief period of ministerial office during the
Labour government of 1929–31, he spent his political life campaigning against established authority and vested interests, his main causes being the promotion of social justice, women's rights and world disarmament. Originally a
radical Liberal, Lansbury converted to socialism in the early 1890s, and thereafter served his local community in the East End of London in numerous elective offices. His activities were underpinned by his Christian beliefs which, except for a short period of doubt, sustained him through his life. Elected to
parliament in 1910, he resigned his seat in 1912 to campaign for women's suffrage, and was briefly imprisoned after publicly supporting militant action.
In 1912 Lansbury helped to establish the
Daily Herald newspaper, and became its editor. Throughout the
First World War the paper maintained a strongly pacifist stance, and supported the October 1917
Russian Revolution. These positions contributed to Lansbury's failure to be elected to parliament in 1918. He devoted himself to local politics in his home borough of
Poplar, and went to prison with 30 fellow-councillors for his part in the
Poplar "rates revolt" of 1921.
After his return to parliament in 1922, Lansbury was denied office in the brief
Labour government of 1924, although he served as
First Commissioner of Works in the
Labour government of 1929–31. After the political and economic crisis of August 1931 Lansbury did not follow his leader,
Ramsay MacDonald, into the
National Government, but stayed with the Labour Party. As the most senior of the small contingent of Labour MPs that survived the
1931 general election, Lansbury became the party's leader. His
pacifism and his opposition to rearmament in the face of rising European
fascism put him at odds with his party, and when his position was rejected at the 1935 party conference he resigned the leadership. He spent his final years travelling through the United States and Europe in the cause of peace and disarmament.