British politician (1906?1990)
Robert Michael Maitland Stewart, Baron Stewart of Fulham
,
CH
,
PC
(6 November 1906 ? 10 March 1990) was a British
Labour Party
politician,
life peer
and Fabian Socialist who was a
Member of Parliament
for 34 years, and served twice as
Foreign Secretary
in the first cabinet of
Harold Wilson
.
Early life
[
edit
]
The son of Robert Wallace Stewart, author and lecturer, and Eva Stewart nee Blaxley, Robert Michael Maitland Stewart was born in
Bromley
.
[1]
He was educated at Brownhill Road Elementary School,
Catford
,
Christ's Hospital
and
St. John's College, Oxford
, where he graduated with a first class
BA
in
Philosophy, Politics and Economics
in 1929.
[2]
[3]
Whilst at Oxford he was involved in student politics and was elected as President of the
Oxford Union
for
Michaelmas
Term 1929. He was also the president of St John's Labour Club that same year.
[1]
Stewart began his career as an official in the Royal Household during 1931. He worked for a short period with the Secretariat of the
League of Nations
, before becoming a schoolmaster, first at the
Merchant Taylors' School
in London, then at
Coopers' Company's School
,
Mile End
, and then at
Frome
,
Somerset
. During
World War II
, Stewart served in the
Middle East
, joining the
Intelligence Corps
in 1942, before transferring to the
Army Educational Corps
in 1943. He was promoted to captain in 1944.
On 26 July 1941 he married
Mary Birkinshaw
, later Baroness Stewart of Alvechurch; they had no children.
[4]
They were one of the few couples who both held titles in their own right.
Political career
[
edit
]
Stewart had contested the
Lewisham West
constituency in 1931 and 1935, and
Fulham East
in 1936; after the war he became MP for Fulham East 1945?55, then for Fulham 1955?74, and
Hammersmith, Fulham
1974?79. Soon after his initial election, he was made one of the
Lords Commissioners of the Treasury
(more commonly known as a junior whip),
[5]
then a junior minister, as
Under-Secretary of State for War
(1947?51) and later as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Supply (May?October 1951). Following Labour's defeat in the
1951 election
, Stewart was a rising figure on the shadow front bench, serving as Shadow Minister of Education (1955?59) and then as Shadow Minister of Housing and Local Government (1959?64).
Stewart was Fabian Summer School director in 1952 and lecturer in 1954. He was Fabian New Year School lecturer in 1954?55 and publicist in 1956. He is listed as a member of the Fabian Society International Bureau Committee during 1957?58 and was mentioned in
Fabian News
November ? December 1964 as a former member of the Fabian Executive Committee.
[1]
Government 1964?70
[
edit
]
When
Harold Wilson
became Prime Minister in 1964, Stewart was appointed
Secretary of State for Education and Science
. He was promoted to
Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs
in January 1965 after his predecessor
Patrick Gordon Walker
's bid to regain a
House of Commons
seat in the
1965 Leyton by-election
failed.
[6]
He was described by the press as relatively unknown to the public but was extremely well known within
Fabian socialist
circles. He became
Secretary of State for Economic Affairs
in 1966. From 1966 to 1968, he was
First Secretary of State
. He returned to the
Foreign Office
from 1968 to 1970. As foreign secretary, he was instrumental in supplying arms to support the
Nigerian military dictatorship
's crushing of the secessionist
Republic of Biafra
in the
Nigerian Civil War
(when up to one million people died), later saying "It would have been quite easy for me to say: This is going to be difficult ? let's cut off all connexion with the Nigerian Government. If I'd done that I should have known that I was encouraging in Africa the principle of tribal secession ? with all the misery that could bring to Africa in the future."
[7]
Post-Government
[
edit
]
A committed
pro-European
, Stewart was leader of the Labour Delegation to the
Council of Europe
in June 1970, and joint president of the Labour Committee for Europe with
George Brown
and
Roy Jenkins
. He served as a
member of the European Parliament
from 1975 to 1976.
[1]
Stewart was a supporter of a
United Ireland
, supporting a peaceful resolution to the
partition of Ireland
.
[8]
Stewart was made a member of the
Privy Council
in 1964. He was appointed a
Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour
(CH) in the
1969 New Year Honours
.
[9]
He retired from the House of Commons in 1979. He was elevated to the
House of Lords
, being created a
life peer
with the title
Baron Stewart of Fulham
, of
Fulham
in
Greater London
, on 5 July 1979.
[10]
Brian Harrison
recorded an oral history interview with Stewart, in March 1978, as part of the Suffrage Interviews project, titled
Oral evidence on the suffragette and suffragist movements: the Brian Harrison interviews.
[11]
Stewart discusses his teaching career and his connection with the Association for Education in Citizenship.
He died at a hospital in London on 10 March 1990, at the age of 83.
[1]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
Dalyell, Tam
(2004). "Stewart, (Robert) Michael Maitland, Baron Stewart of Fulham (1906?1990), politician".
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
(online ed.). Oxford University Press.
doi
:
10.1093/ref:odnb/39862
.
(Subscription or
UK public library membership
required.)
- ^
Oxford University Calendar 1932
, Oxford : Oxford University Press, 1932, p. 282.
- ^
Lane, A.T. (1995).
Biographical dictionary of European labor leaders
(Volume 2 ed.). Greenwood Press. p. 931.
ISBN
0313299005
.
- ^
Duncan Sutherland, 'Stewart , Mary Elizabeth Henderson, Baroness Stewart of Alvechurch (1903?1984)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, May 2005
accessed 1 April 2017
- ^
"East Fulham M.P. in Government Too ? Junior Treasury Post For Captain Michael Stewart"
.
Fulham Chronicle
. No. 2993. 17 August 1945. p. 3
. Retrieved
10 July
2019
– via
British Newspaper Archive
.
- ^
Thorpe, Andrew (1997).
A History of the British Labour Party
. London: Macmillan Education UK. pp. 158?159.
doi
:
10.1007/978-1-349-25305-0
.
ISBN
978-0-333-56081-5
.
- ^
"By Nigeria correspondent Barnaby Philips"
.
BBC News
. 13 January 2000.
Archived
from the original on 15 December 2013
. Retrieved
16 May
2008
.
- ^
"A United Ireland"
.
RTE Archives
.
- ^
"No. 44740"
.
The London Gazette
(Supplement). 1 January 1969. p. 24.
- ^
"No. 47900"
.
The London Gazette
. 10 July 1979. p. 8714.
- ^
London School of Economics and Political Science.
"The Suffrage Interviews"
.
London School of Economics and Political Science
. Retrieved
12 December
2023
.
Bibliography
[
edit
]
External links
[
edit
]
Media related to
Michael Stewart
at Wikimedia Commons
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