David Lloyd George, the Man and the Statesman, signed in both volumes by former British Prime Minister David Lloyd George and in Volume I by U.S. Senator and Secretary of Labor James John Davis.
New York: J. H. Sears & Company, Inc., 1929. First U.S. edition. Hardcover. This is the first U.S. two-volume edition of this biography of First World War Prime Minister David Lloyd George, signed twice by David Lloyd George and further signed by the author of the Introduction, U.S. Senator and Secretary of Labor James John Davis. Lloyd George signed in black ink on each front free endpaper. Davis signed below Lloyd George’s Volume I signature: “John J. Davis | U.S.S. Pa.”
This two-volume set is in near fine condition. The yellow cloth bindings remain square, clean, and tight, with only mild spine toning and trivial bumps to a few corners. Differential toning to the endpapers consistent with dust jacket flaps indicates that this set was long protected by dust jackets. The contents remain crisp with no spotting and no previous ownership marks beyond the signatures of Lloyd George and Davis. The brown-stained top edges remain clean with unfaded color, the fore and bottom edges likewise notably clean with light age-toning.
Together, the author, Davis, and Lloyd George make an interesting Welsh political troika. Iconically Welsh, David Lloyd George, first Earl of Dwyfor (1863-1945) was born in Manchester, but moved to Wales at an early age. Lloyd George had an early interest in politics, leveraging a law career and compelling speaking skills to win his first seat in Parliament in 1890. He represented his Caernarfon Boroughs constituency for the remaining 55 years of his life. The difficult task of Lloyd George’s Liberal Party was trying to chart a progressive course between reactionary conservatism and radical socialism. As Chancellor of the Exchequer (1908-1914) Lloyd George introduced the 1909 progressive and reformist ‘People’s Budget’, which won passage, helped the Liberals win an election, and proved “The main landmark of Lloyd George's social programme” and “an immense constitutional landmark as well.” During the First World War, Lloyd George excelled as Minister of Munitions, becoming Secretary of State for War following Kitchener’s death. As Churchill would do in the Second World War, Lloyd George succeeded his own party’s weak Prime Minister during the First World War, replacing Asquith in 1916. Though he ended the war quite popular, Lloyd George’s postwar efficacy was eroded by a fractious coalition, a series of political miscalculations exacerbated by post-war circumstances, and the rise of the Labour Party. He left the premiership in October 1922 and by 1924 his Liberals were reduced to a weak third party.
The author of this biography, John Hugh Edwards (1869-1945) was a Welsh congregational minister and politician with “considerable skills as a speaker and preacher”. His first book was a 1908 biography of David Lloyd George. Edwards accompanied Lloyd George during much of the January 1910 general election campaign and by year’s end became a Liberal M.P. Edwards wrote a further biography of Lloyd George – The Life of Lloyd George with a Short History of the Welsh People – between 1913 and 1916 and supported Lloyd George in Parliament until his 1929 defeat by a Labour candidate. While Edwards was “mocked for his ostentatious identification” with Lloyd George, “This closeness lends importance to his published work on Lloyd George.”
Edwards’ two-volume biography of Lloyd George was published in the U.S. in 1929, with an introduction by James John Davis (1873-1947). A son and grandson of Welsh iron workers, Davis emigrated to Pennsylvania when he was eight. After early work in a steel mill and as an ironworkers’ union leader, Davis was appointed in 1921 by President Harding as Secretary of Labor. Davis kept his cabinet post under both President Coolidge and President Hoover, becoming the only U.S. Labor Secretary to serve three presidents. He resigned in 1930 to serve as U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania (to which the “U.S.S. Pa.” he penned beneath his signature attests) and remained in the Senate until 1945.
References: ODNB; U.S. Department of Labor. Item #008335
Price: $750.00