The British Movement, Duncan Sandys, and the Politics of Constitutionalism in the 1930s

Abstract

Duncan Sandys formed the British Movement to propagate a progressive form of constitutional Conservatism, which was meant to ‘reform’ the National government and neutralise Oswald Mosley's British Union of Fascists (BUF). The ambiguous nature of its propaganda was meant to appeal to would-be fascists, as well as national-minded Conservatives. Constituency responses to the British Movement reveal why it was always unlikely that Conservatives would desert the party en masse for the BUF, even before the outcry over Olympia. Sandys, like Mosley, was genuinely moved by the distressed areas and unemployment, and yet was also ambitious in his attempts to exploit such issues to achieve political power and influence. Unlike Mosley, however, Sandys remained loyal to the parliamentary system of government and offered sufficient conditional loyalty to the Conservative Party not to jeopardise all hope of future career advancement. The British Movement represented an internal strategy in the party game rather than an attempt to break the mould.