# Radical Action

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{{For|the King Crimson album by this name|Radical Action to Unseat the Hold of Monkey Mind}}
'''Radical Action''' was a political group within the British [Liberal Party](/source/Liberal_Party_(UK)). It advocated for Liberal candidates to stand in elections despite the [war-time electoral pact](/source/war-time_electoral_pact).

The organisation was founded in 1941 as the '''Liberal Action Group'''. It included some prominent members of the Liberal Party who disagreed with the war-time electoral pact in which the Liberals, [Conservative Party](/source/Conservative_Party_(UK)) and [Labour Party](/source/Labour_Party_(UK)) agreed not to stand candidates against each other. Initially, its leading figures were [Lancelot Spicer](/source/Lancelot_Spicer), [Honor Balfour](/source/Honor_Balfour) and [Everett Jones](/source/Everett_Jones_(politician)), while [Philip Fothergill](/source/Philip_Fothergill) became treasurer and [Donald Johnson](/source/Donald_Johnson_(British_politician)) was the first chairman.<ref name="cook">Chris Cook, ''A Short History of the Liberal Party: 1900 - 2001'', pp.268-269</ref><ref name="barberis">Peter Barberis, ''Encyclopedia of British and Irish Political Organizations'', p.316</ref>

The group supported a wide range of policies; it was more [radical](/source/radical_(politics)) and less [libertarian](/source/libertarian) than much of the Liberal Party and accepted the need for government intervention. It strongly opposed the [National Liberal Party](/source/National_Liberal_Party_(UK%2C_1931)) and any possible merger with it, and called for more internal party democracy, new party structures to revitalise the party, and for the party to stand as many candidates as possible at the [next general election](/source/1945_United_Kingdom_general_election).<ref name="barberis" /><ref>Henry Pelling, ''Britain and the Second World War'', p.185</ref>

By 1943 the group had the support of 23 Liberal [Prospective Parliamentary Candidate](/source/Prospective_Parliamentary_Candidate)s. Johnson resigned from the Liberal Party to stand unsuccessfully in the [1943 Chippenham by-election](/source/1943_Chippenham_by-election) and was replaced by Spicer as chairman, then Balfour followed suit and only lost the [1943 Darwen by-election](/source/1943_Darwen_by-election)  by 70 votes.  The group endorsed [Margery Corbett Ashby](/source/Margery_Corbett_Ashby) as an independent Liberal at the [1944 Bury St Edmunds by-election](/source/1944_Bury_St_Edmunds_by-election). Support for the group only increased within the party, with five MPs joining, including [Megan Lloyd George](/source/Megan_Lloyd_George), [Clement Davies](/source/Clement_Davies), and newly elected [William Beveridge](/source/William_Beveridge).<ref name="cook" /><ref name="barberis" />

The group dissolved in 1945 after [World War II](/source/World_War_II) ended and the electoral pact was discontinued.<ref name="barberis" />  Several former members assumed leading positions in the party; Davies became leader, Fothergill treasurer, and Lloyd George was later appointed as deputy leader.<ref>Jorgen Scott Rasmussen, ''The Liberal Party: a study of retrenchment and revival'', p.15</ref>

==References==
{{reflist}}

{{Liberal Party (UK)}}

Category:Liberal Party (UK)
Category:Organizations established in 1941
Category:Organizations disestablished in 1945
Category:Political advocacy groups in the United Kingdom

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Radical Action](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_Action) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_Action?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.