The Conservatives: A History by Robin Harris

If David Cameron and his friends wish to know why they and their policies are so despised by some Conservatives of high intellect and principle, they should read Robin Harris. His book is a marvel of concision, lucidity and scholarship, with penetrating things to say about Peel, Disraeli, Salisbury, Baldwin, Churchill, Macmillan and the rest. But much of its savour derives from Harris’s disgust — the word is not too strong — with the various forms of bogusness, including intellectual cowardice veiled by complacent politeness, which recur so often in the history of the Conservative party.

Harris recognises the ‘note of genius’ in Disraeli, but scorns the pious, posthumous ascription to him of an overriding concern for social reform: ‘What really mattered to Disraeli in the course of his career were the monarchy, the landed interest and, above all, national prestige.’ As Salisbury said in the Lords in tribute to his old chief: ‘Zeal for the greatness of England was the passion of his life.