Henry Labouchere
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Henry Du Pré Labouchere (9 November 1831 – 15 January 1912) was a prominent British politician and writer/publisher in the late 19th century.
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[edit] Life and career
Labouchere was born in London, into a family which had made a fortune in finance. He was the nephew of Whig politician Henry Labouchere, 1st Baron Taunton, who, despite disapproving of his rebellious nephew, helped the young man's early career and left him a sizable inheritance when he died leaving no male heir.
The younger Labouchere married the popular actress Henrietta Hodson in 1887 after a long relationship. Their one child, Mary Dorothea (Dora) Labouchere, had been born in 1884.
[edit] Early career
After being educated at Eton and Cambridge University, Labouchere (without his prior knowledge) was found a place in the British diplomatic service by his family. Between 1854 and 1864, Labouchere served as a minor diplomat in Washington, Munich, Stockholm, Frankfurt, St. Petersburg, Dresden, and Constantinople. He was, however, not known for his diplomatic demeanor, and after several acts of impudence over the years, he was finally dismissed from the service for refusing a posting to Buenos Aires.
The year after his dismissal, Labouchere was elected MP for Windsor, as a Liberal. In 1867, he moved to a seat in Middlesex. In the 1868 election, he lost his seat, and did not return to the House of Commons for 12 years.
[edit] Journalist and writer
During the break in his Parliamentary career, Labouchere gained renown as a journalist, editor, and publisher, sending witty dispatches from Paris during the siege in 1870. His style and fearlessness gained a large audience for first his reporting, and later his personal weekly journal, Truth (started in 1876), which was often sued for libel. Labouchere's claims to being impartial were ridiculed by his critics, including W. S. Gilbert (who had been an object of Labouchere's theatrical criticism) in Gilbert's comic opera His Excellency.
[edit] Return to Parliament
Labouchere returned to Parliament in the 1880 election, when he and Charles Bradlaugh, both Liberals, won the two seats for Northampton. (Bradlaugh's then-controversial atheism led Labouchere, a closet agnostic, to refer sardonically to himself as "the Christian member for Northamption".)
In 1885, Labouchere drafted the Labouchere Amendment, outlawing "gross indecency," a euphemism for sodomy. This amendment allowed for the prosecution, in 1895, of Oscar Wilde, who was incarcerated for the crime.
During the 1880's, the Liberal Party faced a split between a Radical wing (led by Joseph Chamberlain) and a Whig wing (led by the Marquess of Hartington), with its party leader, William Ewart Gladstone straddling the middle. Labouchere was a firm and vocal Radical, who tried to create a governing coalition between the Radicals and the Irish Nationalists that would exclude or marginalize the Whigs. This plan was wrecked in 1886, when, after Gladstone came out for Home Rule, a large contingent of both Radicals and Whigs chose to leave the Liberal Party to form a "Unionist" party allied with the Conservatives.
Between 1886 and 1892, a Conservative government was in power, and Labouchere worked tirelessly to remove them from office. When the government was turned out in 1892, and Gladstone was called to form an administration, Labouchere expected to be rewarded with a cabinet post. Queen Victoria would not allow Gladstone to offer Labouchere an office, however; and the new Foreign Secretary, Lord Rosebery, was a personal enemy of Labouchere who would not offer him an ambassadorship.
After being snubbed for a second time by the Liberal leadership after their victory in the 1906 election, Labouchere resigned his seat, and retired to Florence. He died there seven years later, leaving a fortune of some two millions sterling to his daughter Dora, who was by then married to Carlo, Marchese di Rudini.
[edit] Trivia
Labouchere's nephew was George Musgrove (1854–1916), theatre producer.
[edit] References
- Davis, H. W. C., and J. R. H. Weaver. Dictionary of National Biography, 1912-1921. London : Oxford University Press, 1927.
- "Henry Du Pre Labouchere". The Twickenham Museum.
- Russell, George W. E. Portraits of the Seventies. New York : Scribner, 1916.
