The Scottish (Self-Government) Party was a Scottish nationalist

political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular area's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific political ideology, ...

formed in 1932 by a group of members of the Unionist Party who favoured the establishment of a

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Scottish Parliament The Scottish Parliament ( ; ) is the Devolution in the United Kingdom, devolved, unicameral legislature of Scotland. It is located in the Holyrood, Edinburgh, Holyrood area of Edinburgh, and is frequently referred to by the metonym 'Holyrood'. ...

within the

British Empire The British Empire comprised the dominions, Crown colony, colonies, protectorates, League of Nations mandate, mandates, and other Dependent territory, territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It bega ...

. The Scottish Party differed from the existing National Party of Scotland (NPS) on the grounds that the NPS and the form of

Scottish independence Scottish independence (; ) is the idea of Scotland regaining its independence and once again becoming a sovereign state, independent from the United Kingdom. The term Scottish independence refers to the political movement that is campaignin ...

it advocated was ambiguous about the Empire, and they also disagreed with the left-of-centre platform of the NPS.

Origins

The Scottish Party emerged in November 1932 as a breakaway from the

Cathcart Cathcart (; , )
is an area of

Unionist Association in

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. In June that same year, members of the Association had set up an 'Imperial Committee', which was a pro- Scottish Home Rule front. The committee arranged meetings, made statements in support of Home Rule, and produced a manifesto which proposed replacing the Westminster Parliament with an Imperial Parliament, containing representatives from the British Empire, and establishing

dominion A dominion was any of several largely self-governance, self-governing countries of the British Empire, once known collectively as the ''British Commonwealth of Nations''. Progressing from colonies, their degrees of self-governing colony, colon ...

Parliaments for Scotland,

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, and Wales. This provoked outrage amongst the leadership of the Unionist Party, who were opposed to the establishment of a Scottish Parliament. John Kevan McDowall, a Glasgow

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and the chairman of the committee, was accused by the Glasgow Unionist Association of disloyalty and unconstitutional practices. McDowall, Andrew Dewar Gibb, and around thirty other pro-Home Rule rebels resigned from the Unionist Party and founded the Scottish Party.

Activities

McDowall and Gibb were able to enlist the support of James Graham, 6th Duke of Montrose (who became the party's chairman) and Sir Alexander MacEwen, both champions of moderate Home Rule. Broadly, the Scottish Party consisted mainly of Unionist and Liberal elements (a mixture of

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s, provosts and business people). The party also included some distinguished figures in Scottish public life, such as John Bannerman, Sir Henry Keith and Sir Daniel Stevenson. The Scottish Party functioned more as a

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than as an active political party. Its membership was less than 1,000, and it fielded one candidate, MacEwen, only in the 1933 Kilmarnock by-election. He was backed by the National Party of Scotland (NPS) but came fourth with 6,098 votes.

Merger

By 1933 the Scottish Party had received overtures from John MacCormick, secretary of the NPS, who sought to negotiate a merger between the two parties in order to unify these two elements of the Scottish independence movement. Gibb was especially enthusiastic about the merger, but it was met with scepticism from McDowell. In 1934 the NPS and Scottish Party merged to form the

Scottish National Party The Scottish National Party (SNP; ) is a Scottish nationalist and social democratic party. The party holds 61 of the 129 seats in the Scottish Parliament, and holds 9 out of the 57 Scottish seats in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, ...

Origins

Activities

Merger

References

Further reading