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“Not Churchill. Sixty-five, old for a Churchill.”

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Clement Attlee

Harold Wilson, Memoirs 1916-1964: The Making of a Prime Minister (Weidenfeld & Nicolson and Michael Joseph, London, 1986), p. 54.
At the University College 'gaudy' in Oxford, December 1939, when the dons suggested Winston Churchill should be made Prime Minister.
1930s

“In the ranks of Labour there would be no faltering until victory was won and German and Japanese aggression had been utterly defeated. But they had reached a stage when they could look beyond war to peace. In all our parties there was a firm resolve to build up a world system of security that would prevent our fellow men and women again being subjected to the horror of war. The lesson of the war of 1914–18 was…only half learnt. The idea of the League of Nations was right, but it was not put into practice. This time we must see to it that an international order is established in the world with the power and the will, and not merely the desire, to prevent war breaking out again.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech to the conference of representatives of the British and Dominion Labour parties, Westminster, London (12 September 1944), quoted in The Times (13 September 1944), p. 8.
War Cabinet

“Can't publish. Don't rhyme, don't scan.”

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Clement Attlee

Harold Wilson, Memoirs 1916-1964: The Making of a Prime Minister (Weidenfeld & Nicolson and Michael Joseph, London, 1986), p. 128.
Response to John Strachey who had to ask permission to publish a collection of poems while a Minister.
Attributed

“King George VI was always remarkably well informed, and I made a point of reading the latest telegrams before my weekly audience with him. A conscientious, constitutional monarch is a strong element of stability and continuity in our Constitution.”

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Clement Attlee

Address to the Oxford University Law Society (14 June 1957), quoted in The Times (15 June 1957), p. 4.
1950s

“The evil forces which are now attacking South Korea are part of a world-wide conspiracy against the way of life of the free democracies. Communists…are…engaged in an attempt to mould the whole world to their pattern of tyranny. They seek to sweep democracy and liberty from the world. They are ready to destroy our lives if we don't agree with them. They talk of freedom while they murder it. They talk of peace while they support aggression. They are ruthless and unscrupulous hypocrites who pretend to virtues which their philosophy rejects. The trouble is that quite a lot of well-meaning people are taken in by the Communists and their sham peace propaganda. What is happening in Korea should open their eyes.”

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Clement Attlee

Broadcast (30 July 1950), quoted in The Times (31 July 1950), p. 4.
Prime Minister

“In regard to…action in the South Atlantic, we all desire to join in the tribute paid to the gallantry of our sailors. It is one of the almost inevitable conditions of sea warfare that so much of the fighting is done between adversaries of very different strengths, and the way in which our ships, despite their smaller gun-power, tackled and stuck to this very powerful enemy vessel and forced her to take refuge, is worthy of the highest traditions of the British Navy.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1939/dec/14/the-war#S5CV0355P0_19391214_HOC_265 in the House of Commons (14 December 1939) after the Battle of the River Plate where the German cruiser Admiral Graf Spee was forced to harbour by the Royal Navy
Leader of the Opposition

“Socialists do not propose to substitute the domination of society by one privileged class for that of another. They seek to abolish class distinctions altogether. The abolition of classes is fundamental to the Socialist conception of society.”

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Clement Attlee

The Labour Party in Perspective (Left Book Club, 1937), p. 145.
1930s

“All the major industries will be owned and controlled by the community, but there may well exist for a long time many smaller enterprises which are left to be carried on individually. … the interests of the community as a whole must come before that of any sectional group. … the managers and technicians must be given reasonable freedom if they are to work efficiently, a freedom within the general economic plan. … the workers must be citizens and not wage slaves.”

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Clement Attlee

The Labour Party in Perspective (Left Book Club, 1937), p. 153.
Leader of the Opposition

“I have to inform the House that the present situation is so critical that the Government are compelled to seek special powers from the House by a Bill to be passed through all its stages in both Houses of Parliament to-day. The situation is grave. … The Government are convinced that now is the time when we must mobilise to the full the whole resources of this country. We must throw all our weight into the struggle. Every private interest must give way to the urgent needs of the community. We cannot know what the next few weeks or even days may bring forth, but whatever may come we shall meet it as the British people in the past have met dangers and overcome them. But it is necessary that the Government should be given complete control over persons and property, not just some persons of some particular class of the community, but of all persons, rich and poor, employer and workman, man or woman, and all property.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1940/may/22/business-of-the-house-emergency#S5CV0361P0_19400522_HOC_158 in the House of Commons (22 May 1940) introducing the Emergency Powers Act 1940.
War Cabinet

“Aggression has started again in the Far East. The attack by the armed forces of North Korea on South Korea has been denounced as an act of aggression by the United Nations. No excuses, no propaganda by Communists, no introduction of other factors can get over this fact. Here is a case of aggression. If the aggressor gets away with it, aggressors all over the world will be encouraged. The same results that led to the Second World War will follow; and another world war may result.”

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Clement Attlee

Broadcast (30 July 1950) on the Korean War, quoted in The Times (31 July 1950), p. 4.
1950s

“The nationalist and imperialist delusions that run through all this document are far more wild than any idealist dreams of the future that we hold. But we say that if there is this menace, it is not going to be met by any policy of alliances. It is not going to be met by attack. We loath and detest the military spirit, the tyrannical spirit which has shown itself all over the world. You will never beat this by attack; you will only beat it by putting something far bigger in its place.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1935/mar/11/defence in the House of Commons (11 March 1935) on the National Government's White Paper on Defence
1930s

“May I recall here a thing that is not always remembered, that just as India owes her unity and freedom from external aggression to the British, so the Indian National Congress itself was founded and inspired by men of our own race, and further, that any judgment passed on our rule in India by Indians is passed on the basis, not of what obtained in the past in India, but on the principles which we have ourselves instilled into them.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/1947-07-10/debates/584499a6-8830-4426-be23-7215df06d57e/IndianIndependenceBill#2432 in the House of Commons (10 July 1947)
1940s

“The events of these last few days constitute one of the greatest diplomatic defeats that this country and France have ever sustained. There can be no doubt that it is a tremendous victory for Herr Hitler. Without firing a shot, by the mere display of military force, he has achieved a dominating position in Europe which Germany failed to win after four years of war. He has overturned the balance of power in Europe. He has destroyed the last fortress of democracy in Eastern Europe which stood in the way of his ambition.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1938/oct/03/prime-ministers-statement#column_52 in the House of Commons (3 October 1938) against the Munich Agreement.
1930s

“I returned last week…from visiting the Italian front. I was up with the Eighth Army, that Army which will always seem to me to epitomize the unity of our Commonwealth and Empire. I saw there in Italy Canadians, South Africans, and New Zealanders. I recalled talking with General Alexander the great deeds of the Australians. As I saw our lads from all our countries so fine and gallant, I was thrilled with pride.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech to the conference of representatives of the British and Dominion Labour parties, Westminster, London (12 September 1944), quoted in The Times (13 September 1944), p. 8.
War Cabinet

“The path which the great Dominions were treading…was a path leading not to independence but to interdependence. One of the greatest mistakes made by our enemies—and they made it in the last war, too—was to under-estimate the strength of those invisible bonds uniting the free peoples of the British Commonwealth of Nations. The German was never happy unless he was in a mass. He was happiest of all when they were all performing the goose-step at the same time, whereas the British people, conscious of their unity though the seas might separate them, could march to their goal without rigidly keeping step.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech to the Devonshire Club, London (14 May 1943), quoted in The Times (15 May 1943), p. 2.
War Cabinet

“We never took a vote in the Cabinet that I can remember and the most important of all the Prime Minister's functions is to give a firm lead in Cabinet so that decisions can be taken quickly. The Prime Minister musn't always listen to those who talk most.”

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Clement Attlee

Address to the Oxford University Law Society (14 June 1957), quoted in The Times (15 June 1957), p. 4.
1950s

“I take it to be a fundamental assumption that whatever post-war international organisation is established, it will be our aim to maintain the British Commonwealth as an international entity, recognised as such by foreign countries. … If we are to carry our full weight in the post-war world with the US and USSR, it can only be as a united British Commonwealth.”

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Clement Attlee

'The Relations of the British Commonwealth to the Post-War International Political Organisation' (June 1943), quoted in Correlli Barnett, The Lost Victory: British Dreams, British Realities 1945–1950 (Pan, 1995), p. 51.
War Cabinet

“We have absolutely abandoned any idea of nationalist loyalty. We are deliberately putting a world order before our loyalty to our own country.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech to the Labour Party Conference in Southport (2 October 1934) , quoted in Talus, Your Alternative Government (London: Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1945), p. 17 and D. M. Touche, Britain's Lost Victory (London: The Individualist Bookshop, 1941).
1930s

“In choosing people for specific jobs previous experience should not be a guide. I never put a man in the job which he thought he knew. Often the 'experts' make the worst possible Ministers in their own fields. In this country we prefer rule by amateurs.”

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Clement Attlee

Address to the Oxford University Law Society (14 June 1957), quoted in The Times (15 June 1957), p. 4.
1950s

“When we are returned to power we want to put in the statute book an act which will make our people citizens of the world before they are citizens of this country.”

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Clement Attlee

The Labour Party in Perspective (Left Book Club, 1937).
1930s

“The Government has now resolved to enter upon an arms race, and the people will have to pay for their mistake in believing that it could be trusted to carry out a policy of peace. … This is a War Budget. We can look in the future for no advance in Social Legislation. All available resources are to be devoted to armaments.”

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Clement Attlee

Broadcast (22 April 1936), quoted in "Mr. Attlee on a war budget", The Times (23 April 1936), p. 16.
1930s

“The League of Nations fell, not because its principles were wrong, but because they were not practised. A new world organization must be created. Its nucleus was in the United Nations, and its foundation stone the close cooperation of the British Commonwealth of Nations, the United States, and the U. S. S. R. … They wanted an organization embracing small as well as great nations, but on the three, on account of their strength, the greatest responsibility for preserving the peace of the world must fall. A world organization to preserve peace must have power at its disposal. So long as there was a danger of wolves the sheep-dog must have strong teeth. It was time that the nations of Europe should settle down as good citizens in a world of States. In the British Commonwealth of Nations it was shown how freedom was compatible with unity. If peace was to be preserved there must be some cession of sovereignty, but membership of a large organization did not conflict with the reasonable claims of nations to live their own lives.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech to the Labour Party Conference in Caxton Hall, London (12 December 1944), quoted in The Times (13 December 1944), p. 2.
War Cabinet

“The Question of sovereignty is often raised. I am one of those who believe that in a modern world one has to give up a great deal of sovereignty. I am prepared to give up sovereignty to the world, but not to a selected number of European countries. That is not giving up something for world security; it is giving something up to sectional interests.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/lords/1962/nov/08/britain-and-the-common-market in the House of Lords on the British application to join the Common Market (8 November 1962).
1960s

“You will not find much about what the Prime Minister does in the text-books. What he does is partly made up of convention and custom, but the nature of the office depends a great deal on the person who holds it. … Make it [the Cabinet] as small as possible. Democracy means government by discussion, but it is only effective if you can stop people talking. Some of my early Cabinets were very small, but I arrived at the conclusion that 16 is the right number.”

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Clement Attlee

Address to the Oxford University Law Society (14 June 1957), quoted in The Times (15 June 1957), p. 4.
Later life

“Attlee: I'm one of those people who are incapable of religious feeling.
Harris: Do you mean you have no feeling about Christianity, or that you have no feeling about God, Christ, and life after death?
Attlee: Believe in the ethics of Christianity. Can't believe in the mumbo jumbo.
Harris: Would you say you are an agnostic?
Attlee: I don't know.
Harris: Is there an after-life, do you think?
Attlee: Possibly.”

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Clement Attlee

To his official biographer Kenneth Harris two years before his death. In Kenneth Harris, Attlee, pp. 563-4.
1960s

“…our geographical position put us in the centre of markets. That was one of the great strengths of our position. We did not have to look merely into Europe; we could look outside. We had our relationships with the Colonies overseas, later the Dominions; with the United States; with all continents, just because we were not tied up with the Continent of Europe. Now we are to be tied. It might be right, it may be wrong; but do not make any mistake: it is entirely different from anything we have had before. We are to become part of a larger whole, an appendage to Europe. It may be right now, but, historically, that has not been our position. We may have been at the centre of markets, but we have not been in one market and out of the others. We have had to fight against hostile tariffs; we have had to keep our end up. We have never put ourselves into a position in which we were inside a ring-fence with a number of Continental Powers. Make no mistake: it is an entire change.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/lords/1962/aug/02/britain-and-the-common-market in the House of Lords on the British application to join the Common Market (2 August 1962).
Later life

“Here in this country, although our political divisions were deep, in time of need we were able to transcend them in the interests of the whole community. Throughout the British Commonwealth and Empire there were immense diversities of race, colour, creed, and degrees of civilization, yet the links that united all together, though often intangible, proved strong as steel in the day of trial. This was because, despite many shortcomings and failures to implement fully the ideals which we held, the British Commonwealth and Empire had stood for freedom and justice, and because we had learnt through long centuries the lesson of how to live together without attempting to exact regimented uniformity.”

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Clement Attlee

Speech in Carmarthen, Wales (3 September 1943), quoted in The Times (4 September 1943), p. 2.
1940s

“…nothing short of a world state will be really effective in preventing war. As long as you rely for security on a number of national armaments you will have the difficulty as to who shall bell the cat in case of need, while you will have general staffs in all countries planning future wars. I want us to come out boldly for a real long-range policy which will envisage the abolition of the conception of the individual sovereign state. … A united navy to police the seas of the world could be attained and would incidentally bring enormous pressure to bear on Japan. The next thing would be an international air force and an international air service. … The basis of such a move would have to be a frank recognition that all states must surrender a large degree of sovereignty and that the Peace Treaties must be revised. On this basis one must then proceed to build up a world structure politically and economically. … This may sound very visionary but I am convinced that unless we see the world we want it is vain to try to build a permanent habitation for Peace and that temporary structures will catch fire very soon if we wait any longer.”

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Clement Attlee

Letter to Tom Attlee (1 January 1933), quoted in W. Golant, 'The Emergence of C. R. Attlee as Leader of the Parliamentary Labour Party in 1935', The Historical Journal, Vol. 13, No. 2 (Jun., 1970), p. 323
Deputy Leader of the Opposition