SHERWELL ARTHUR JAMES 1863-1942 MP AND TEMPERANCE CAMPAIGNER

This material is held atLSE Library Archives and Special Collections

Reference
- GB 97 COLL MISC 0811
Dates of Creation
- 1910
Language of Material
- English.
Physical Description
- Four folders and one volume

Scope and Content

Papers relating to a survey by the Temperance Legislation League of the influence and activities of the drink trade on the 1910 General Election:

1. Returns from constituencies and a summary of the returns.
2. Letters to Sherwell from MPs and candidates.
3. Press cuttings, prints, an anti-temperance handbill.
4. A photograph of a display of election posters.
5. A scrapbook containing press cuttings on temperance.

Administrative / Biographical History

Arthur James Sherwell 1863 - 1942

Sherwell was born in London and privately educated. Prior to entering Parliament he was occupied in sociological and politico-economic studies and literary work. From 1906 to 1918 he was Liberal MP for Huddersfield.

His publications include:

The Drink peril in Scotland (1903)
Life in West London: a study and a contrast (1897)
The Russian vodka monopoly (1915)
State purchase of the liquor trade (1919)
The temperance problem and social reform (1899)
The taxation of the liquor trade (1906)
Public control of the liquor traffic: being a review of the Scandinavian experiments in the light of recent experience (1903)
British 'Gothenburg' experiments and public-house trust (1910)

The Temperance Legislation League

During the early 20th century some temperance reformers became involved in the trust house movement as a means of controlling the nation's alcohol consumption, buying public houses and running them in ways to discourage drinking. Other reformers, mostly Liberals, organised the Temperance Legislation League to lobby for legislation to permit local experiments in which all public houses in a district would be run on the principle of disinterested management. At one time the League was almost entirely financed by the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust until after 1946, when the Trust effectively gave up efforts to promote temperance reform. After World War II the Home Office committee liaised with the League on post-war reconstruction, and pressed for the creation of community centres on new estates where liquor would be controlled.