“Some of you would prefer a Tory Government. We know our enemies. I have come across a coalition of Conservatives and Communists before. Tories have a very warm place in their hearts for Communists and so have the Communists for the Tories.”

The Times, 4 November 1930, quoted in Bernard Donoughue and George Jones, "Herbert Morrison: Portrait of a Politician" (Phoenix Press, 2001), p. 236.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Some of you would prefer a Tory Government. We know our enemies. I have come across a coalition of Conservatives and Co…" by Herbert Morrison?
Herbert Morrison photo
Herbert Morrison 10
British Labour politician 1888–1965

Related quotes

Henry Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston photo

“Lord Palmerston: Then you did not vote for me, friend Rowcliffe; you preferred voting for a Tory.
William Rowcliffe: I did not vote for you, my Lord, for if I had, I should have voted for a Tory.”

Henry Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston (1784–1865) British politician

During the general election of July 1865 where the Chartist Rowcliffe voted for a Conservative and another Liberal in order to oust Palmerston from the two-member constituency; quoted in F. J. Snell, Palmerston's Borough (Tiverton, 1894), pp. 107-112.
1860s

Enoch Powell photo

“Of course I am very proud of being a Tory. Yes, in my head and in my heart I regard myself as a Tory. As I have said, I was born that way; I believe it is congenital. I am unable to change it. That is how I see the world… [The EEC] is the most un-Tory thing that can be conceived.”

Enoch Powell (1912–1998) British politician

Interview by Brian Walden (29 January 1978), from Simon Heffer, Like the Roman. The Life of Enoch Powell (Phoenix, 1999), p. 800
1970s

Sherrilyn Kenyon photo
Margaret Thatcher photo
Denis Healey photo

“No. Absolutely not. I think that the Russians are praying for a Labour victory…praying is perhaps an unfortunate choice of words. I think that they would much prefer a Labour government and that the idea that they would prefer a Tory government, I think is utter bunkum, and they [the Soviets] authorized me to say so.”

Denis Healey (1917–2015) British Labour Party politician and Life peer

Answering a suggestion that the Soviets would prefer a Conservative government led by Margaret Thatcher than a Labour government headed by Neil Kinnock at a press conference in Moscow after a meeting with Anatoly Dobrynin (11 May 1987), quoted in E. B. Geelhoed, Margaret Thatcher: In Victory and Downfall, 1987 and 1990 (Greenwood, 1992), pp. 120-1.
1980s

Boris Johnson photo

“I'm having Sunday lunch with my family. I'm vigorously campaigning, inculcating my children in the benefits of a Tory government.”

Boris Johnson (1964) British politician, historian and journalist

"2-minute interview: Boris Johnson", The Guardian, 11 April 2005, p. 7.
Asked whether he was canvassing at Sunday lunchtime.
2000s, 2005

George Fitzhugh photo
Karl Dönitz photo
Georges Clemenceau photo

“My son is 22 years old. If he had not become a Communist at 22, I would have disowned him. If he is still a Communist at 30, I will do it then.”

Georges Clemenceau (1841–1929) French politician

On being told his son had joined the Communist Party, as quoted in Try and Stop Me (1944) by Bennet Cerf
A statement similar in theme has also been attributed to Clemenceau:
A young man who isn't a socialist hasn't got a heart; an old man who is a socialist hasn't got a head.
As quoted in "Nice Guys Finish Seventh" : False Phrases, Spurious Sayings, and Familiar Misquotations (1992) by Ralph Keyes.
W. Gurney Benham in A Book of Quotations (1948) cites a statement by François Guizot as the earliest known expression of this general idea, stating that Clemenceau merely adapted the saying substituting socialiste for republicain:
N'être pas républicain à vingt ans est preuve d'un manque de cœur ; l'être après trente ans est preuve d'un manque de tête.
Not to be a republican at twenty is proof of want of heart; to be one at thirty is proof of want of head.
Variations on this general idea have also been attributed or misattributed to many others, most commonly Winston Churchill, who is not known to have actually made any similar statement.
Post-Prime Ministerial

Franklin D. Roosevelt photo

“I do not believe in communism any more than you do but there is nothing wrong with the Communists in this country; several of the best friends I have got are Communists.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945) 32nd President of the United States

Reported by Representative Martin Dies as having been said in a conversation at the White House, in the Congressional Record (September 22, 1950), vol. 96, Appendix, p. A6832. Reported as "exceedingly dubious" in Paul F. Boller, Jr., Quotemanship: The Use and Abuse of Quotations for Polemical and Other Purposes, chapter 8, p. 361 (1967); Boller goes on to say that "it is most unlikely that FDR would have said anything like it, even flippantly, to the zealous HUAC chairman, though he may have told Dies that he was exaggerating the size of the American communist movement".
Misattributed

Related topics