Edward Heath

Prime minister of the United Kingdom (1970-1974)

• Born: July 9, 1916
• Birthplace: Broadstairs, Kent, England
• Died: July 17, 2005
• Place of death: Salisbury, England

Rising through the ranks of the Conservative Party to become British prime minister, Heath led the British into partnership with Europe by achieving the United Kingdom’s admission to the European Economic Community.

Early Life

In a sense Edward Heath’s early life was a preparation for high office. At every turn at university, in the civil service, in journalism, and in banking he readied himself to lead the nation. Careful preparation was always his forte, and this characteristic helped carry Heath to the prime ministership. Once there, though, he experienced difficulties that forced him from office in less than four years. So much time and so much effort were devoted to acquiring power; so little time was permitted to exercise it. This is the irony of Heath’s professional life.

Heath was born in Broadstairs, Kent, the first of two sons. Heath’s forebears, originally from the West Country, had moved to Kent at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Heath’s grandfather was first a dairyman, then a porter. Heath’s father, a carpenter by trade, eventually acquired his own business as a local builder; his mother was a former lady’s maid. At Broadstairs, Edward attended a free primary school and later, at age ten, won a scholarship to Chatham House, the area’s leading grammar school, and then for his final year he attended the King’s School, Canterbury, where he was chosen as head boy. Heath was a good student, though not exceptional. His reputation was based primarily on serious-mindedness and hard work. Indeed, in his final year at Chatham House, Heath received the school’s most prestigious prize, awarded for personal character.

In 1935 Heath was admitted to Balliol College, Oxford, where he read philosophy, politics, and economics. Above average height, Heath was a handsome young man whose sensitive eyes revealed intelligence and alertness. Once at Balliol, he won in open competition the Balliol organ scholarship and was soon active in university concerts and dramatic productions. Love of music notwithstanding, Heath’s passion was politics. Already he was a self-proclaimed Tory. It was not long before he became a significant figure in college politics. Eventually, he was elected president of the junior common room at a time when Balliol boasted some of Oxford’s brightest political stars. He also joined the Oxford Union, distinguished himself in debate, and made a name for himself by backing an anti-Chamberlain, antiappeasement foreign policy.

Academically Heath performed respectably, but only a notch above average. He took a solid second-class degree, more a sign of industry than of brilliance. Unlike many students, though, Heath seemed to know precisely what he wanted out of Oxford. These were exciting times in Europe for a student of politics. Heath visited troubled Spain, and during one summer vacation, he lived in Germany as an exchange student. There he witnessed for three days Adolf Hitler and the Nazi demonstrations at Nuremberg, an experience that strengthened his opposition to totalitarianism. In his final year, Heath achieved his crowning glory at Oxford, the office of president of the Union, which afforded him administrative experience and knowledge of how to handle others. At Oxford, Heath was neither particularly popular nor was he a sportsman, an important part of Oxford life. Yet he was politically successful and, what is more, a person of consequence.

Life’s Work

Heath won a scholarship to study law in Gray’s Inn, London, when World War II broke out. He spent the war as an artillery officer, rising to the rank of lieutenant colonel and serving in the European campaign of 1944-1945. Afterward, he returned home eager to prepare himself for a political career. He passed the civil service exam and spent a year at the Ministry of Aviation. For two years he worked as a church journalist, after which he trained for another year in the city, learning the intricacies of merchant banking.

In 1947, the Conservative Association at Bexley, Kent, selected Heath as its candidate; Heath was pleased. Since Bexley was near his hometown, he would be viewed as a local boy. Further, Bexley was composed largely of white-collar workers, many of whom owned property. Heath’s belief that the Conservatives could unseat Labour was confirmed in February, 1950, when he defeated the incumbent, Ashley Bramall, a contemporary of Heath at Oxford, by a slender margin of 133 votes. He stood for his maiden speech to the House of Commons on June 26, 1950, arguing that the government should support the Shuman Declaration, which was intended to stabilize western European politics by sharing strategic industrial resources. He thereby inaugurated his political career by touching on a theme that would dominate it: European unification.

By February of the next year, Heath had been selected as an assistant whip at a time when Clement Attlee’s Labour government was on the verge of collapse. A new election in October, 1952, resulted in both a Conservative victory under Winston Churchill and an increase in Heath’s majority at Bexley. Churchill made Heath a member of government, a lord commissioner of the Treasury. From this junior position, Heath rose steadily to become leader of the party and would not return to the back benches again for another twenty-two years.

Sir Anthony Eden replaced the aging Churchill in 1955, and Eden appointed Heath chief whip. Here Heath became known as a thorough organizer with a taste for administrative detail. As chief whip, more so than if he had been a cabinet member, Heath enjoyed personal contact with every Tory member of Parliament.

Eden’s early resignation, owing to the Suez debacle, cleared the way for a happier period for Conservatives. Under the leadership of Harold Macmillan , Heath’s position improved as well. He became Macmillan’s confidant, meeting with the prime minister each weekday. His office at 12 Downing Street was connected to that of Macmillan’s by a passage. Over the next seven years, Heath’s loyalty and competence were rewarded with promotion. His appointments included minister of labour, Lord Privy Seal, secretary of state for Industry, Trade and Regional Development, and president of the Board of Trade. During these years, he distinguished himself, especially when, in 1964, Heath, against opposition within his own party, abolished resale price maintenance, by which manufacturers fixed the prices of their goods. Heath believed that this practice stifled competition and thus undermined a free market. Economics aside, Heath’s battle to pass his Resale Prices Act was viewed, not least of all by himself, as a test of his prime-ministerial ability. It was a test Heath was determined to pass.

Macmillan’s retirement in 1963 created uncertainty within the party at a time when Labour was becoming more assertive and confident under Harold Wilson’s leadership. In 1964, Wilson sent the Conservatives to defeat. Tory partisans felt the need for a vigorous leader who could match Wilson. Macmillan’s aristocratic successor, Lord Home, stepped down under pressure. Heath, with characteristic efficiency, mounted a determined campaign that led to a slender victory over his nearest rival, Reginald Maudling, a former Chancellor of the Exchequer.

On his accession as Tory leader, Heath set about revitalizing the party. Despite a chilling Labour victory in 1966, Heath pressed forward, creating a specialized Shadow Cabinet and encouraging more than thirty study groups to formulate policy. At the Selsdon Park Hotel conference in 1970, Heath summarized his philosophy: belief in the European Economic Community, incentives for industry, legislation on industrial relations, and reduction of taxation. In 1970, despite lagging far behind in the polls, the Conservatives won the general election, surprising the pollsters, Wilson, and perhaps Heath himself.

Heath served as prime minister for nearly four years. His personal triumph in entering the European Economic Community (EEC) came despite repeated vetoes from the French. It was only his personal negotiations with French President Georges Pompidou, which whom he was on friendly terms, that won England’s admission. Perhaps more remarkable still, Heath won approval of for EEC membership in Parliament on October 28, 1971. Formal entry into the EEC took place early in 1973.

Within Great Britain, however, social and economic conditions degenerated. Oil prices increased fourfold, driving up the cost of living. Industrial disputes threatened the government. When the coal miners went on strike for more pay, Heath was forced to return to the statutory incomes policy of Wilson’s Labour government. This reversal, the famous “U-turn,” made him vulnerable to criticism from all sides. Moreover, Heath’s government had to contend with the worst violence yet in the bloody battle for Northern Ireland . Attempts to negotiate a peaceful settlement failed, and Heath lost the support of key political groups in Ireland, which contributed to his electoral defeat later. In addition, the Irish Republican Army tried to assassinate him with a bomb in December, 1974.

By October, 1973, against the backdrop of the Arab-Israeli War and rising oil prices, the miners’ demands resulted in another strike. This time Heath went to the country. In 1974, he was defeated. Wilson seized the initiative later in the year by calling another election to increase his majority. Heath struggled to survive politically by calling for a coalition, a government of national unity, to combat the national emergency facing Great Britain. This was a risky, desperate maneuver, and one which, in the end, failed badly.

Wilson’s victory in October, 1974, returned Labour to power for nearly the rest of the decade, and it removed Heath from power for the remainder of his career. By February of the following year, an election for leadership of the party was held in which Heath finished second, eleven votes behind Margaret Thatcher, a woman he had never considered seriously as a rival. Thatcher later passed over Heath for the position of shadow foreign secretary, which he very much desired. Because of it, his bitterness toward her intensified, and he thereafter referred to her contemptuously as “that woman.”

Heath remained a popular politician among rank-and-file party members until he openly attacked Thatcher’s economic policies in a 1981 Conservative Party conference. Thereafter, he became an isolated figure within the party, relegated to the back bench in the House of Commons. He did not act entirely as a gadfly, however. In 1990, for instance, he helped negotiate the release of thirty-three British hostages in Iraq, meeting personally with Saddam Hussein. He did not resign his seat until 2001. By then he was the longest-serving member, dubbed “father of the House” in 1992. In that position he oversaw the election of the speaker to the House of Commons. He also was knighted in 1992, receiving the Order of the Garter.

Heath was a hale man and an ardent sailor he won the Sidney-to-Hobart, Australia, yacht race in 1969 and was captain of England’s winning Admiral’s Cup team in 1971 but by the time of his retirement his health was in decline. A pulmonary embolism in August, 2003, and obesity drastically limited his public appearances. He died of pneumonia on July 17, 2005, at the age of eighty-nine. Two thousand people attended his memorial service at Westminster Abbey on November 8. His grave is in Salisbury Cathedral. A lifelong bachelor, he left his estate largely to a foundation charged with preserving his house, Arundells, next to the cathedral.

Significance

There have been several Conservative prime ministers who did not come from the privileged orders of British society Robert Peel, Bonar Law, and Stanley Baldwin come to mind. Yet the rise to power of Edward Heath does seem something of a turning point as the Conservative Party approached the twenty-first century. For nearly a quarter of a century, Conservatives were led by a man and a woman whose backgrounds were similar, each well educated, industrious, and ambitious. Both came from self-employed, property-owning families: Heath’s father owned his own business; Thatcher’s father was an independent grocer. Both Heath and Thatcher were the first leaders of the party to be elected by Tory Members of Parliament. Heretofore, leaders emerged mysteriously from what has been called the “magic circle.”

Heath’s politics of consensus as evidenced by his “U-turn” and his strategy for “national unity” was superseded by Thatcher’s more uncompromising version of conservatism. This was difficult for him to accept, and for years Heath refused to concede defeat. Heath never was a popular statesman, even during his most successful years. A disdainful attitude toward his successor did little to enhance his reputation among many of the party’s faithful. As his obituary in the Economist put it, he was an obstinate, often rude man who was nevertheless strictly honorable and usually sensitive.

Still, Heath’s single-minded pursuit of British entry to the European Economic Community remained a great achievement. From the outset of his career, Heath remained a committed European. Europe fired his imagination. Great Britain’s future, he believed, lay with Europe. Once a great island power, Great Britain had to reach outwardly. In a changing world, Great Britain needed to think in Continental terms. In this way it will find a new role and new meaning; of this he was convinced. The wisdom of Great Britain’s marriage to Europe is the final question on which Heath is to be judged.

Bibliography

Buckley, William F. “There’ll Always Be an England.” National Review 39 (March 27, 1987): 63. An interesting assessment of the contest for chancellor of Oxford in which Heath was a candidate.

“Edward Heath.” Economist 376 (July 23, 2005): 80. A succinct appraisal of Heath’s political career and character, including a review of his deep bitterness toward his successor.

Heath, Edward. The Course of My Life. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1998. Heath recounts his rise to power, providing along the way portraits of the many world leaders with whom he dealt. He also discusses his nonpolitical passions, music and sailing.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. Old World, New Horizons. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1970. An important book by Heath in which he discusses the political situation in Europe before Great Britain’s entry into the European Economic Community. It also conveys his enthusiasm for British participation in the community.

Holmes, Martin. The Failure of the Heath Government. Basingstoke, England: Longman, 1997. An unsympathetic analysis of Heath’s tenure as prime minister that seeks to refute the revisionist view that he was a tragic, but heroic figure by focusing on his management of the economy and electoral politics.

Hutchinson, George. Edward Heath:A Personal and Political Biography. London: Longmans, Green, 1970. A colorful account of Heath’s early life and rise to power in the Conservative Party, although it stops short of his actual victory in 1970.

Laing, Margaret. Edward Heath: Prime Minister. New York: Third Press, 1973. Laing’s approach is chronological; she provides a critical analysis of Heath’s career and concentrates on Heath’s rise to power rather than his administration.