Sir Charles and Lady Henry invited us to luncheon at their beautiful town house in Carlton Gardens, to meet Lloyd George, who was then Chancellor of the Exchequer. The other guests were: Sir Alexander Ure, solicitor-general for Scotland; Dr. Thomas J. MacNamara, parliamentary secretary to the Admiralty; Robert Donald, editor of the "Daily Chronicle," a leading labor daily.
Lloyd George explained the important Liberal measures to me, particularly the National Insurance Act of 1911, amendments to which were then being considered in the House. He declared that it was necessary to curb or reform the House of Lords before social justice measures, such as this insurance act, legislation for old age pensions, etc., could be put through. He asked about Roosevelt and the status of the Progressive Party, and whether the newspapers were favorable to the cause; it seems that the newspapers did not give him adequate information regarding the Progressives. I had to tell him that many of our leading dailies were not with us. I explained to him that I thought the Progressive movement could hardly be regarded as a party, but that I believed its influence in liberalizing both of the old parties would be considerable.
When I was in London shortly after the outbreak of the World War, I remember a humorous incident at another meeting with Lloyd George, at a small dinner. For emergency use there had been issued one-pound treasury notes that looked more like a "shinplaster" of our Civil War days than like a dignified British pound. One of the guests brought in a number of these, for which some of us exchanged gold. As I took one up I remarked about the appearance of it and added that before I accepted it I would require the endorsement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Lloyd George quickly answered, "That can be done," and promptly took the note and wrote his name on the back of it. It remains in my possession as a souvenir.
The following Sunday, Sir Charles and Lady Henry again invited us to luncheon, this time to their country home near Maidenhead, to meet Sir Rufus and Lady Isaacs. Sir Rufus is now Lord Reading, and it was then quite well understood that he would be appointed Lord Chief Justice. He expressed great interest in our parliamentary system as compared with that of Great Britain, but thought the British method had an advantage over ours in that members of the Cabinet were at the same time members of Parliament and could advocate their own measures, and that in England a Cabinet member must be not only an administrator, but a parliamentarian as well. He was very anxious to know how administrative measures in our country are brought forward and enacted into laws. I explained our system to him and told him I thought the system of questioning in Parliament members of the Cabinet left very little opportunity for the Cabinet members to devote themselves to the administrative work of their departments.
During this stay in London, I again had several pleasant meetings with Postmaster-General Herbert Samuel, whom I had visited when I passed through London on my return from Constantinople in 1910. He informed me that within a month he intended visiting Canada and then the United States. Later in the year I met him in my own country, where he delivered several public addresses and made a fine impression.
While we were at tea one afternoon on the terrace of the House of Commons with Mr. and Mrs. Samuel, the Right Honorable John Burns, president of the Local Government Board, joined us. He knew both my brothers and was pleased to meet me. He asked me to accompany him to his department, which is only a short distance from Westminster Hall. As we passed the entrance to Westminster, he said to me:
"Let us stop here and let me give you a graphic page of British history."
So we halted for about ten minutes under the scaffolding of the men who were doing some repair work on the edifice, while Burns discoursed eloquently on the well-known facts of British history. I was as much interested in the man as in the great Gothic structure, and my mind went on to review the march of democracy from the booted and spurred Cromwell to the radical labor leader John Burns. The radicalism of Burns was at one time considered dangerous, but on entering the Cabinet he became conservative and reliable, proving the effect of responsibility upon even the more radical minds when in office.
Across the Thames Burns pointed to some factories, saying: "There is where my father worked as a day laborer, and where I worked." And I was indeed impressed with the democracy of Great Britain in our day.
We spent a charming evening with Mr. and Mrs. Harry Brittain, now Sir Harry and Lady Brittain, in their cozy home on Cowley Street. The only other guest was Earl Grey, former Governor-General of Canada. Earlier in the year I had met both Sir Harry Brittain and Earl Grey in New York, when they came over respectively as chairman and secretary of the British committee for the Celebration of One Hundred Years of Peace.