Background
Robert Stevenson Horne was born in February 1871 at Slamannan, a south Stirlingshire mining town in Scotland, where his father was minister of the Presbyterian church.
politician statesman Chancellor of the Exchequer
Robert Stevenson Horne was born in February 1871 at Slamannan, a south Stirlingshire mining town in Scotland, where his father was minister of the Presbyterian church.
He was educated at George Watsons College and at Glasgow University, where in 1893 he gained a first- class honors degree in mental philosophy. From there he moved on to teach philosophy for a year at the University College of Wales at Bangor. He then returned to Scotland, was admitted to the Faculty of Advocates, and built up a Glasgow-based commercial and shipping legal practice.
During World War I, he worked with Sir Eric Geddes in organizing the railway network behind the front line in France. After the war, he handled labor relations in the dockyards for the Admiralty.
In March 1920 he became president of the Board of Trade, succeeding Eric Geddes, and in April 1921, chancellor of the exchequer, succeeding Austen Chamberlain.
When Andrew Bonar Law formed a Conservative government in October 1922, replacing the coalition government of David Lloyd George, Horne felt obliged to remain loyal to his coalition associates—particularly to Austen Chamberlain, who had stood down as Conservative leader in response to the removal of Lloyd George. Horne was offered the opportunity of being chancellor of the exchequer again when Stanley Baldwin replaced Bonar Law as prime minister in May 1923, but he refused the offer. He thus became a backbencher in the House of Commons until he retired from Parliament in 1937, when he was raised to the House of Lords as the first Viscount Horne of Slamannan. For the rest of his life he was involved in business as well as politics, becoming a director of the Suez Canal Company, and in 1934, chairman of the Great Western Railway Company. He died in 1940.
He was responsible for two budgets but delivered only one. The 1921 budget was delivered by Austen Chamberlain as Horne’s budget, although it largely had been prepared by Chamberlain for Horne, who was engaged in dealing with various industrial disturbances and strike threats at that time. It mattered little in any case who prepared and presented the budget, for it contained few changes in taxation. The only significant item was the creation of the Geddes Committee, which would report on government expenditure.
Hornes second budget was presented on 1 May 1922. Because of the depression, government expenditure was £57 million below the anticipated level; but government inland revenue tax receipts were also down, by the more substantial sum of £111 million. Given this situation, Horne decided that there would be no attempt to reduce the national debt through repayment via the Sinking Fund, which he proceeded to give away by reducing the standard rate of income tax from six shillings (30p) to five shillings (25p) in the pound. Despite this, the budget was poorly received, particularly by those who saw attempts to pay back the national debt as evidence of financial prudence, and those who felt that he had achieved his budget surplus by financial trickery. Philip Snowden, the great advocate of balanced budgets, and Labours shadow chancellor, was vehement in his criticism. Indeed, Horne’s critics proved correct, since the 1922 budget was among the least financially accurate of all British budgets.
Horne’s interest in politics began when he became president of the University Conservative Club. That interest revived in 1910, when he ran twice—unsuccessfully—in the general elections for the seat of Stirling. In December 1918 he won the Glasgow constituency of Hillhead for the Conservatives. He was immediately made minister of labor, and he became one of the few M.P.s to make their first parliamentary speech from the dispatch box on the government side.
He would barely be remembered today were it not for Stanley Baldwins memorable description of him as “that rare thing, a Scots cad.” However, others among his contemporaries considered Horne debonair and something of a high-society person.
Although he never married, he enjoyed the company of smart, fashionable women.
