Churchill was against Tariffs and Anti Aliens Bills

Christmas break is a good time to start pleasant books. It was a very positive surprise to read in “Churchill, Walking with Destiny” by Andrew Roberts how enlightened and ahead of times was Churchill’s opinion. The Tory Democrat at the beginning of 20th Centuries was opposing to his own party the raise of Tariffs: “High protective tariffs, although they might increase the profits of capital, are to the poor and the poorest of the poor a cursed engine of robbery and oppression”. On immigration, Churchill, with accurate facts demonstrating that only 1 out of 140 Brits were not born in UK and that allowing 1,700 Jews entering the country escaping from pogroms in Tsarist Russia would not have caused any harm: he proclaimed his dislike of “insular prejudices against foreigners, racial predjudice against Jews and labour prejudice against competition”.

Raising barriers, we know from those times, increases conflicts, confrontation and prejudice. Churchill’s lesson should be relaunched in these times of increasing barrier building. 

Andrew Roberts is a great historian who is always relevant to contemporary thinking and contemporary problems.’ Dr Henry Kissinger