“The two main parties feared the SDP more than they feared each other. Their narrow dogmas had alienated more and more people and would never achieve a widening appeal across classes, regions and occupations. They had replied by trying to pretend that the SDP was all things to all men and women. It was not true. … It had no place for class warriors or for those who wanted to fight outdated ideological battles; no place for little Englanders; for those selfishly concerned with their own problems and not with those of their neighbours and the nation as a whole. The Labour Party went increasingly into its chauvinist bunker and the Conservative Party showed little or no concern for the problems of the developing and poor nations.”

—  Roy Jenkins

Speech in Kensington (14 February 1982), quoted in The Times (15 February 1982), p. 4
1980s

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 "The two main parties feared the SDP more than they feared each other. Their narrow dogmas had alienated more and more p…" by Roy Jenkins?
Roy Jenkins photo
Roy Jenkins 51
British politician, historian and writer 1920–2003

Related quotes

John Stuart Mill photo

“On these grounds I was not only as ardent as ever for democratic institutions, but earnestly hoped that Owenite, St. Simonian, and all other anti-property doctrines might spread widely among the poorer classes; not that I thought those doctrines true, or desired that they should be acted on, but in order that the higher classes might be made to see that they had more to fear from the poor when uneducated, than when educated.”

Autobiography (1873)
Context: I thought the predominance of the aristocratic classes, the noble and the rich, in the English Constitution, an evil worth any struggle to get rid of; not on account of taxes, or any such comparatively small inconvenience, but as the great demoralizing agency in the country. Demoralizing, first, because it made the conduct of the government an example of gross public immorality, through the predominance of private over public interests in the State, and the abuse of the powers of legislation for the advantage of classes. Secondly, and in a still greater degree, because the respect of the multitude always attaching itself principally to that which, in the existing state of society, is the chief passport to power; and under English institutions, riches, hereditary or acquired, being the almost exclusive source of political importance; riches, and the signs of riches, were almost the only things really respected, and the life of the people was mainly devoted to the pursuit of them. I thought, that while the higher and richer classes held the power of government, the instruction and improvement of the mass of the people were contrary to the self-interest of those classes, because tending to render the people more powerful for throwing off the yoke: but if the democracy obtained a large, and perhaps the principal, share in the governing power, it would become the interest of the opulent classes to promote their education, in order to ward off really mischievous errors, and especially those which would lead to unjust violations of property. On these grounds I was not only as ardent as ever for democratic institutions, but earnestly hoped that Owenite, St. Simonian, and all other anti-property doctrines might spread widely among the poorer classes; not that I thought those doctrines true, or desired that they should be acted on, but in order that the higher classes might be made to see that they had more to fear from the poor when uneducated, than when educated.

Francis de Sales photo

“Those who love to be feared fear to be loved, and they themselves are more afraid than anyone, for whereas other men fear only them, they fear everyone.”

Francis de Sales (1567–1622) French bishop, saint, writer and Doctor of the Church j

The Spirit of Saint Francis de Sales, ch. 7, sct. 3 (1952)
Quoted by Bishop Jean-Pierre Camus in L'esprit de Saint François de Sales, Part 3, ch. 5 http://books.google.com/books?id=XdDvTZWjR_sC&q=%22Ceux-l%C3%A0%22+%22qui+aiment+%C3%A0+se+faire+craindre+craignent+de+se+faire+aimer+et+eux-m%C3%AAmes+craignent+plus+que+tous+les+autres+car+les+autres+ne+craignent+qu'eux+mais+eux+craignent+tous+les+autres%22&pg=PA194#v=onepage (1650)

“And nobody had more class than Melville.”

Ken Kesey (1935–2001) novelist

The Paris Review interview (1994)
Context: Kerouac had lots of class — stumbling drunk in the end, but read those last books. He never blames anybody else; he always blames himself. If there is a bad guy, it’s poor old drunk Jack, stumbling around. You never hear him railing at the government or railing at this or that. He likes trains, people, bums, cars. He just paints a wonderful picture of Norman Rockwell’s world. Of course it’s Norman Rockwell on a lot of dope.
Jack London had class. He wasn’t a very good writer, but he had tremendous class. And nobody had more class than Melville. To do what he did in Moby-Dick, to tell a story and to risk putting so much material into it. If you could weigh a book, I don’t know any book that would be more full. It’s more full than War and Peace or The Brothers Karamazov. It has Saint Elmo’s fire, and great whales, and grand arguments between heroes, and secret passions. It risks wandering far, far out into the globe. Melville took on the whole world, saw it all in a vision, and risked everything in prose that sings. You have a sense from the very beginning that Melville had a vision in his mind of what this book was going to look like, and he trusted himself to follow it through all the way.

Anatole France photo

“Those who produced the things necessary for life, wanted them; those who did not produce them had more than enough.”

Book VII : Modern Times, Ch. IX : The Final Consequences
Penguin Island (1908)
Context: Penguinia gloried in its wealth. Those who produced the things necessary for life, wanted them; those who did not produce them had more than enough. "But these," as a member of the Institute said, "are necessary economic fatalities." The great Penguin people had no longer either traditions, intellectual culture, or arts. The progress of civilisation manifested itself among them by murderous industry, infamous speculation, and hideous luxury. Its capital assumed, as did all the great cities of the time, a cosmopolitan and financial character. An immense and regular ugliness reigned within it. The country enjoyed perfect tranquillity. It had reached its zenith.

Slobodan Milošević photo
Adolf Hitler photo

“When our party had only seven men, it already had two principles. First, it wanted to be a party with a true ideology. And second, it wanted to be the one and only power in Germany.”

Adolf Hitler (1889–1945) Führer and Reich Chancellor of Germany, Leader of the Nazi Party

1930s, From the film Triumph of the Will (1935)

Samuel Butler photo
Richard Pipes photo
Oliver Cromwell photo

“If the remonstrance had been rejected I would have sold all I had the next morning and never have seen England more, and I know there are many other modest men of the same resolution.”

Oliver Cromwell (1599–1658) English military and political leader

On the passing of the revolutionary Grand Remonstrance of November 1641 listing Parliament's grievances against King Charles I, as quoted in A History of the Rebellion (first published 1702 – 1704) by Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon (1609 - 1674)

Related topics