British Labour and The Hague ‘Congress of Europe’: National Sovereignty Defended

Abstract

As post-war hopes for three-power co-operation faded and the threat of Russian expansion westward into Europe grew more ominous the demand for a politically united Europe increased. As a result of their war experiences continental Europeans increasingly began to question whether the sovereignty of the nation-state was capable of providing the basis for a peaceful society. Many survivors of Hitler's concentration camps, together with many members of the war-time resistance movements, had reached the conclusion that some form of European union' capable of restraining the actions of its component parts was the only sure way to prevent a repetition of the horrors which they had survived.2 This article will examine the British Labour party's reaction to the demand for political integration, a demand which was crystallized in the I 948 'Congress of Europe'. That assemblage was the forerunner of the Council of Europe and symbolic of the aspirations of those who saw European political integration as the most viable alternative to continued unrest and hostility among the states of Europe. Equally, the party's reaction was indicative of its subsequent response for almost two decades to all efforts aimed at European political integration. In I 945 the British general election resulted in a Labour government which, based upon outward appearances, might have been expected to look with favour upon efforts aimed at reducing the absolute independence of national governments. The party's I 9 I 8 constitution pledged it to aid in forming a federation of nations in order to preserve peace and freedom3 and for years the party had demanded the transfer of a degree of national sovereignty to some supranational organization. However, Ross McKibbin has written that the constitution 'embodied not an ideology but a system by which power in the Labour Party was distributed '. His view is that the trades unions were interested only in securing a political arm which they controlled; once this aim had been incorporated into the organization socialist