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The 1928 Scottish (Commonwealth) Referendum was a referendum on Scotland's political future within the Union of Britain scheduled to be held on Scotland on 2nd September 1928. The referendum question asked "Should Scotland become a Commonwealth in association with the Union of Britain?", which voters answered with "Yes" or "No" as had been set out in the Scottish Referendum Act 1927. Campaigning officially began on the 8th January when unorganised members of the Unionist side began publishing pamphlets within Edinburgh. The NPS organised the following month and the 'Unionist Council' was organised later as well. Throughout Scotland, the campaign was known for its high spirits, abundance of violence and political intrigue.
Despite an initially quiet start, campaigning soon turned turbulent due to antagonistic relations between the Unionist and Nationalist factions. Various civil war era paramilitaries had not been properly disarmed, leading to violent confrontations between rival armed groups affiliated to either side of the divide, made worse by the presence of still active Scottish Loyalists. The escalating political violence culminated in the assassination of the Scottish syndicalist activist and TUC member, Tom Bell in August during Newcraighall Train Bombing. The Scottish Council suspended the referendum on security grounds the following day with anti-government riots breaking out across the country. Chairman of the Scottish Council, Campbell Stephen, faced calls to resign though he survived an ensuing vote of no confidence.
To resolve the situation, the central government ordered a special convention of the Scottish Assmebly be held to discuss the feasibility of the referendum, with the members meeting at Falkirk in October. The Assembly members declared it would be in the best interest of the nation for the referendum to go ahead and it was eventually held on the 2nd December. The winter polling attracted considerable controversy and nationalist groups criticised the government's handling of affairs with members of fringe groupings threatening to boycott the referendum though turnout remained high. The referendum resulted in a poll of 68% for the No vote, a decisive unionist victory.
Background[]
Scottish nationalism and separatism had historically been an obscure and largely irrelevant political force within Great Britain since the Union of Scotland and England in 1707. While calls for an independent Scottish state existed, these were either fringe or attached to other, more wider causes such as Jacobite restorationism or historical Radicalism. Into the 20th Century, the movement began to see a gradual resurgence, forming part of the radical fringe of the burgeoning Scottish home rule movement, itself a reaction to its Irish counterpart. This Scottish nationalism did become a serious political position until roughly 1919 with the devastation of the Great War igniting political radicalism at home. Some academics have claimed that the closing days of the Red Clydeside period were marked by a fledgling Scottish nationalist bent due to the influence of John Maclean.
Any hopes that the Government of Scotland Bill 1913, which would have created a Scottish legislature, would come into force were crushed when in 1919, the Conservative government under Scottish Unionist, Bonar Law, declared that it would oppose any form of Scottish Home Rule. Organisations such as the Scots National League an Scottish National Movement, nevertheless continued campaigning and activism for Scottish home rule and self-determination, raising awareness of the issue. Smaller organisations such as the Scottish Party and John Maclean's various attempts at founding a new political parties also marked a growing surge in the issue of Scottish nationalist sentiment.
But Scottish nationalism did not truly break to the surface until the outbreak of the civil war, when amid the wave of revolutionary enthusiasm, many rebellious Scots saw the opportunity for Scotland to break away from England. Numerous pro-independence militias formed and following its takeover by rebel forces, the city of Glasgow held a crude plebiscite on independence returning a victory for the nationalists. Following the Battle of the Railways, the Scottish nationalists mixed with the left-wing front and following the convocation of a provisional congress in Edinburgh, the Scottish Provisional Republic was declared until the nation's place in the revolution could be established. A powerful nationalist faction had formed within the Provisional Republic's congress around John Maclean, later coming under the control of R. B. Cunninghame Graham. When the Union of Britain formed, the Union's government (many of who were Scottish) had laid claim to Scotland but also declared it would only seek to annex the nation if the Republic consented to join, which it did by majority vote soon thereafter. While Scotland was assured home rule under the conditions of the new federal structure of Britain, the Constitutional Convention of the next year debated the issue of Scottish independence and on the impetus of many Scottish delegates, passed into law the Scottish Referendum Act 1926 which bound the post-convention government to hold a referendum on the matter within 5 years. After forming a new government in 1927, Chairman Cook convened with members of the Scottish TUC after it had been formed and declared that the referendum would be scheduled to take place on the 2nd of August in 1928.
Factions[]
Unionists[]
The first, and nominally larger, of the two political camps was the Unionists - supporters of the status quo and Scotland's continued membership in a union with England, and now Wales. Unlike like their pre-revolutionary counterparts, these Unionists now had to contend with the notion that Scotland had, even if briefly, been a nominally independent state. Instead, Unionist concerns were largely levelled at the viability of an independent Scottish state in the long-term on concerns such as the economy, defence, trade and foreign relations. Unionist advocates likewise campaigned on the shared history and cultural ties between Scotland and England, with a sense of shared "revolutionary solidarity" that had emerged within the Scots' republic, often invoked by socialist campaigners.
Initially the Unionist campaign was unorganised and largely conducted at the initiative of local groups. By late March, this had become politically inconvenient for two reasons: the Unionist campaigners could not provide uniform answers or rebuttals to their opposition and right-wing 'Tory Unionists' were entering the campaign, proving an embarrassment to left-wing unionists. No centralised leadership had emerged and none of three parties (Labour, ILP and the Liberals) were prepared to commit themselves to supporting the Unionists publicly. While each party's leadership tacitly supported the campaign, neither Labour or the Liberals wished to antagonise potential nationalist voters with both parties fearful of losing their prior strongholds in the country or worse, splitting their parties. The ILP held a different issue in that a sizable degree of its membership either held regionalist sympathies or outright supported independence, particularly among the dominant Wheatleyite wing. Fearful he would split his supporters and allow Snowden to take control, Wheatley had no choice but to join his comrades in declaring that only Scotland could decide its future and remained out of affairs.
Tom Johnston - Architect of the Unionist Council
However, it was agreed this could not go on and a central organisation was needed to organise the Unionists. On the 16th March, Tom Johnston, a Labour TUC member and Scottish journalist, met with Wheatley to discuss the creation of a 'central committee of Unionists' that could campaign independently of the government and the parties. Johnston was a fellow Red Clydesider and a proponent of Scottish Home Rule, but opposed to the nationalist rise. Wheatley was supportive of the proposal and William Adamson, a former Leader of the Labour Party and Secretary for Scotland, was nominated to lead this new organisation. Adamson agreed with the proposals and took up the posting, with Johnston being selected to serve as Secretary to the new organisation. After some discussions, with much impetus from Johnston, the "Unionist Council" was convocated on the 25th March in Kirkcaldy with various members of each of the major parties in attendance. The Council was organised to be heavily decentralised and anti-partisan. It officially held no political loyalties outside of "advocating the Unionist cause" though much of its leadership were affiliated to the Labour Party or ILP in some form. The organisation was loose-knit, with each county-area electing a delegate to the overarching council. Beneath these, existed autonomous "Clubs" that organised the day-to-day grassroots activities. A club could cover a single city district or entire towns. The overarching leadership provided funds, electoral materials and a general consensus of Unionist policies.
An early debate in the organisation's existence was whether or not the remnants of the Conservative-aligned Unionist Party, de facto led by John Craik-Henderson, should be permitted to join the new Council. Both Adamson and Johnston were initially opposed, but Edwin Scrymgeour, leader of the Scottish Prohibition Party, warned that allowing Craik-Henderson to operate unsupervised could backfire. In a majority vote, Craik-Henderson and his 'Tory Unionists' were not permitted to join, leading to some criticism of the Council for being "implicitly partisan". Craik-Henderson and his comrades continued to organise in support of the Unionist side while some individuals were permitted to join. However, all were expelled in the summer of 1928 following Craik-Henderson's brief arrest for seditious libel. The Council was disbanded in the January of 1929 as it no longer needed to exist though Craik-Henderson "re-founded" a new Unionist Council in 1932.
Nationalists[]
The smaller but more vocal of the two political camps was the Nationalists - Scots' who wished for Scotland to leave the Union and establish an independent, sovereign state. Nominally, the more "concentrated" of the two factions, the Nationalists initially had a small advantage in that they had a simple political basis and were largely united around one organisation: the National Party of Scotland. The Nationalists were faced with having to argue for the viability and benefits of an independent Scottish state. Nationalist activists heavily utilised the example of the Irish Republic, which had won its independence half-a-decade earlier and had since emerged as a relatively stable democracy. The "Irish Example" proved both a boon and a hindrance, with critics noting that Ireland was a capitalist state and Scotland would be unlikely to see the same prosperity if independent. As the campaign progressed, the exact nature of what this sovereign state would look like and what place it would take in the world proved a major division within the increasingly fractious Nationalists.
John MacCormick - influential nationalist
Like their Unionist counterparts, the Nationalists were not initially organised but instead split between multiple organisations across the country which had all operated and lobbied independently since 1926. In January, Robert Bontine Cunninghame Graham and John MacCormick aligned their respective organisations: the Scottish Worker's Republican Party and the Glasgow University Scottish Nationalist Association and signed the 'Scottish National Covenant', calling for an independent Scottish state. The next month on the 7th February, the two men formed the National Party Scotland, heavily modeled on the Labour Party, as a "federation of supporters of Scots' nationhood." William Gillies' Scots National League, Lewis Spence's Scots National Movement and a breakaway faction of the Scottish Home Rule Association, led by Roland Muirhead, quickly joined the NPS as affiliates. Graham was elected its first President and MacCormick its national secretary. MacCormick had also courted John Kevan McDowall's 'Scottish Party' but McDowall declined. The two instead opted to simply cooperate. A splinter faction later defected to the NPS.
During its brief history, the NPS (and the wider Nationalist campaign) suffered from internal splits over how the party should be organised, what an independent Scotland would take and to what degree should the party condone the political violence that had overcome the nation. No concrete plans were ever provided by the Nationalist campaign for what an independent Scotland would look like, but many NPS leaders proposed that it could be established along similar lines akin to the Union of Britain and take a neutral stance in foreign affairs. The Nationalist movement split the late Autumn of 1928 between those who wished to remain within the Union for at least the next decade to build state institutions and those who wished to leave the Union immediately. The NPS was dissolved in 1931 after successive splits.
Timeline[]
The Campaign Begins (January-March)[]
As early as July of 1927, Chairman Arthur Cook, had expressed his desire to hold the referendum within the next year though no formal announcement was made until the 6th December. Despite much excitement for the referendum, no formal campaigning began until early January when activists affiliated to the Unionist side encouraged voters to support remaining in Britain for: "Peace, Prosperity & Solidarity." Nationalist activists began their own campaign later in the month when the SWRP-GUSNA's 'Scottish National Covenant' hosted its first "Civil Assembly" in Aberdeen to discuss the benefits that a sovereign Scotland, "able to draw up its own destiny" would grant. At these early events, Cunninghame Graham dominated and produced much of the campaign's oratory backbone.
For the Unionists, their campaign had a poor start owing to a lack of coordination or organisation. Activism was undertaken solely at the local level by independent activists or associations that had formed in the area, very rarely operating beyond the town level. Traditional "Unionists", associated to the Conservatives, undertook their own campaigning as - according to Arthur Henderson - "the notion of Scotland separated from England, even an England draped in the red flag, was so unthinkable and horrifying that they could not stomach it. Britain had to remain united so as not to give any credence to the notion of a poverty-stricken and rabble-rousing Scotland left to her own little corner of Great Britain." Other individuals associated with the labour movement, such as Edwin Scrymgeour of the Scottish Prohibition Party, undertook their own campaigning. None of the major parties were prepared to outwardly support independence and the Scottish Home Rule Association found itself in the throes of an internal schism as to whether it should stand by the recently acquired federalism or lobby for outright independence. No decision was forthcoming, but individual politicians undertook some personal campaigning.
By February, the Nationalists had been making major moves towards uniting their efforts wholly. The Nationalist camp had already been better organised but it still remained divided among various separating groups and parties. The Scottish National Covenant proved the blueprint for the future Scottish nationalist and delegates from various societies convened in Stirling on 7th February to establish the National Party of Scotland. The founding affiliates of the SWRP and GUSNA were quickly joined by William Gillies' Scots National League and Lewis Spence's Scots National Movement. Earlier in the year, Roland Muirhead had split the SHRA and led his more nationalist supporters into the NPS under the banner of the Reformed-SHRA. John Kevan McDowall and his Scottish Party also attended the talks but opted not to join on account of McDowall being distrustful of such a left-ward party. Cunninghame Graham, who had presided over the meeting, became the party's president; Gillies was elected the Chairman of the National Executive Committee and MacCormick became the party's National Secretary. Moving forward, nearly all Nationalist politics revolved around the NPS with only the right-wing Scottish Party serving as the most notable holdout, among other minor groups. While this all-encompassing organisation was initially beneficial in uniting the Nationalists, it soon found itself racked by internal factionalism and disagreement.
Into March, MacCormick had spent excessive effort working with Gillies and Muirhead to organise an effective political machinery. The NPS controlled much campaign material and under Muirhead's initiative, with Cunninghame Graham's blessing, sought to establish its own "true Scottish" trade unions. This courted little success but nevertheless did steal away some left-wing Scottish activists. Now growing increasingly concerned by the NPS' growing dominance, the Scottish journalist, Tom Johnston, sought to establish a Unionist equivalent. With Deputy Chairman Wheatley's blessing, the "Unionist Council" was founded on the 25th March in Kirkcaldy with representatives from each party and from Scottish home rule groups. While nominally anti-partisan, it was marked by its left-ward tilt and close ties to the Independent Labour Party who provided many members in the early days. The Unionist Council dominated all Unionist political efforts across the country, soon agreeing to allow the entry of 'Tory Unionists' - right-wing Unionists who would have identified with the pre-revolution Unionist Party - into its ranks. Johnston was critical of this move nevertheless agreed a "Popular Front" was a necessary endeavor.
Black Summer (April-September)[]
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The Newcraighall Bombing[]
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Betrayal at Falkirk (October-December)[]
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Aftermath & Legacy[]
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