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Charles Anthony Raven Crosland (29 August 1918 - 19 February 1977) was a member of the Labour Party and an important socialist theorist. He served as the Member of Parliament for South Gloucestershire and later for Great Grimsby. Throughout his long career he occupied the cabinet positions of Secretary of State for Education and Science, President of the Board of Trade, Secretary of State for Local Government and Regional Planning and Foreign Secretary.
Early life
Crosland was born at St Leonards-on-Sea, Sussex. His father Joseph Beardsall Crosland, was a Senior Official at the War Office.
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Quotations
I do not believe there is a long-term future for the privately rented sector in its present form.
Speech in Eastbourne (20 November, 1975).
As a democratic Socialist profoundly committed to the rule of law, I could not condone, let alone encourage, defiance of the law.
Speech in the House of Commons (Hansard, 6 November 1974, Cols. 1076–7).
Encyclopedia
Charles Anthony Raven Crosland (29 August 1918 - 19 February 1977) was a member of the Labour Party and an important socialist theorist. He served as the Member of Parliament for South Gloucestershire and later for Great Grimsby. Throughout his long career he occupied the cabinet positions of Secretary of State for Education and Science, President of the Board of Trade, Secretary of State for Local Government and Regional Planning and Foreign Secretary.
Early life
Crosland was born at St Leonards-on-Sea, Sussex. His father Joseph Beardsall Crosland, was a Senior Official at the War Office. Both his parents were members of the Exclusive Raven Taylor Plymouth Brethren. His maternal grandfather was Frederick Edward Raven (1837-1903), founder of the Raven Exclusive Brethren and secretary of the Royal Naval College at Greenwich. He grew up in North London and was educated at Highgate School, and Trinity College, Oxford. After obtaining 2nd class honours in 1939 in Classical Moderations, Crosland served as a paratrooper in Europe during the Second World War, reaching the rank of captain. A formative incident during this period was the death of his closest friend, Captain Mark Wickham-Jones, who died in his arms at Arnhem.
After the war, Crosland returned to Oxford University and obtained a First Class Honours degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics; he also became President of the Oxford Union. He then became an Oxford University Don tutoring Economics. Notable names Crosland taught at Oxford included Tony Benn and Norris McWhirter and Ross McWhirter.
Member of Parliament
Crosland, who had been talent-spotted by Hugh Dalton, was chosen as a Labour candidate in December 1949 to fight the next general election. He entered Parliament at the February 1950 general election, being returned for the South Gloucestershire constituency. He held that seat until the May 1955 general election, when he was defeated.
Return to Parliament
Crosland returned to the House of Commons at the 1959 general election when he was elected for the Great Grimsby constituency, which he would represent for the rest of his life. He was, like Roy Jenkins and Denis Healey, a friend and protegé of Hugh Gaitskell and together they were regarded as the "modernisers" of their day.
1963 leadership election
Even though they were from the same wing of the party, the thought of the Labour party being led by the very effective, but volatile George Brown appalled Crosland, but he also was a critic of Wilson for his apparent lack of principles. Just over two years earlier Wilson had challenged Gaitskell for the party leadership. Crosland nominated, and voted for James Callaghan in the leadership contest caused by Gaitskell's death on 18 January 1963. He rationalised his decision to back Callaghan on the basis that "We have to choose between a crook (Harold Wilson) and a drunk (George Brown)". However, Callaghan was eliminated after obtaining 41 votes, the margin in votes between Wilson and Brown in the final ballot. With Callaghan eliminated, Crosland's second wife wrote in her 1982 biography that he voted for George Brown in the second ballot, although with zero enthusiasm, and with little interest about the result, as he was opposed to both of the candidates who were now standing for the party leadership. Wilson won the election by 144 votes to Brown's 103 on 14 February 1963.
Although critical of Wilson, Crosland respected him as a political operator. Under Harold Wilson, Crosland was first of all appointed George Brown's deputy in October 1964. In November 1964 Crosland and Brown told Wilson and Callaghan that ruling out devaluation was a mistake with regards to the economic crisis. However, Crosland would not be Brown's deputy for long.
In government
On 22 January 1965 Wilson appointed as Secretary of State for Education and Science. The ongoing campaign for comprehensive education in England and Wales gained a major boost with Circular 10/65, which as a statute rather than a Government Bill was controversial at the time, although a government motion in favour of the policy had been passed in January 1965. It seemed to be an urgent personal crusade for him, reflected in the famous quotation "If it's the last thing I do, I'm going to destroy every fucking grammar school in England. And Wales and Northern Ireland". The outcome has been a source of controversy ever since. Close associates such as Roy Hattersley have denied the probable authenticity of the quote, but the original source is Susan Crosland's biography of her husband. Another major educational change was that presaged by his speech at Woolwich Polytechnic establishing a 'binary system' of higher education, in which universities would be joined by polytechnic institutions which concentrated on high level vocational skills.
Following on from this Crosland served as President of the Board of Trade from September 1967 to October 1969. He was deeply disappointed not to have been made Chancellor of the Exchequer after the November 1967 cabinet reshuffle which followed the devaluation of the pound. That job went to Roy Jenkins instead. Then he became Secretary of State for Local Government and Regional Planning until the election defeat of June 1970.
Crosland was seen as a leader of the right wing of the party in the 1970s. In April 1972 he stood for the deputy leadership of the Labour Party after Roy Jenkins resigned, but polled 61 votes of the Parliamentary Labour Party and was eliminated in the first round. The contest was eventually won by Edward Short who defeated Michael Foot. Crosland was embarrassed by the national press in January 1973 when it emerged he had been given a silver coffee pot that was donated by disgraced corrupt architect John Poulson, when opening a school in Bradford in January 1966.
After Labour's return to power in early March 1974, Crosland became Secretary of State for the Environment. He contested the leadership in March 1976 following Wilson's resignation, but polled only 17 votes and finished bottom of the poll. After his elimination, he switched his support to the eventual winner James Callaghan, who duly rewarded Crosland by appointing him Foreign Secretary on 8 April 1976.
Personal life
Crosland married Hilary Sarson in November 1952, divorcing after five years, though that marriage effectively ended after a year. Crosland had numerous affairs with other women. He remarried on 7 February 1964 to Susan Catling, an American from Baltimore whom he had met in the late 1950s, and, in contrast to his first marriage, this was very happy and content. Susan Crosland, his wife was a successful writer. There were no children of either marriage, although Crosland's second wife had two daughters from a previous marriage.
Crosland was a keen football fan and an avid viewer of the television show Match of the Day. He insisted on taking Henry Kissinger to Blundell Park to watch Grimsby Town play Gillingham in late April 1976 when the two met for the first time. In December 1976, when Kissinger bowed out after the Republican defeat, he went with Crosland to watch a football match at Stamford Bridge between Chelsea and Wolverhampton Wanderers.
Author
For Crosland losing his seat at the turned out to be a blessing in disguise, as it allowed him to write the book The Future of Socialism published in the Autumn of 1956. In the publication he outlined the need for traditional socialism to adapt to modern circumstances — a context from which the use of the term "revisionism" has its origins in Britain, despite the gradualism associated with the Fabian Society since the end of the nineteenth century.
Crosland was himself an active member of the Fabian Society, contributing to the New Fabian Essays, which saw the emerging generation of Labour thinkers and politicians attempt to set out a new programme for Labour following the Attlee governments. In particular, Crosland wished to challenge the dominance of Sidney and Beatrice Webb in Fabian thinking, challenging an ascetic top down Fabianism with a more liberal vision of the good society and the good life, writing in the Future of Socialism that 'Total abstinence and a good filing system are not now the right signposts to the socialist utopia. Or at least, if they are, some of us will fall by the wayside'.
Death
Crosland and his wife bought a converted mill at Adderbury in 1975 as well as having a home at Lansdowne Road in London. It was at Adderbury where he suffered a massive cerebral hćmorrhage on the afternoon of 13 February 1977 whilst working on a paper on the Rhodesian situation. That evening, Crosland had intended to complete a major foreign policy speech on détente. He never had the chance to do so. Instead, the speech was subsequently delivered by his successor David Owen to the Diplomatic Writers Association on 3 March 1977.
Tony Crosland died in the Radcliffe Infirmary Hospital on 19 February 1977 after being in a six-day coma. On 4 March 1977, his ashes were scattered at sea near Grimsby.
His papers are held at the .
See also
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