In Memoriam: Margaret Thatcher 1925 - 2013

This week marks the passing of Margaret Thatcher—the British Prime Minister during the Reagan Administration. 

Seldom has there been such a fruitful partnership between the leaders of two nations. Both Reagan and Thatcher realized the inherent impossibility of creating prosperity with socialism.  Their combined efforts were the death blow for the Soviet empire. Thatcher’s reforms ultimately pushed Great Britain’s economy ahead of Germany, though subsequent leaders in the U.S. and Great Britain managed to neutralize, and, lately, dismantle most of the gains that were realized.

She was born in Grantham, a small town in eastern England, into a family of staunch Methodists who emphasized personal responsibility and charity towards others. Her father was a grocer and also served on the town council. He often discussed politics with his children, which no doubt lead to Thatcher’s early involvement, starting from her college days at Oxford where she was the President of the Conservative Student Association.  Her view were influenced by writers such as Friedrich von Hayek's work The Road to Serfdom (1944), which condemned government economic intervention as a precursor to an authoritarian state. She graduated from Oxford with a Bachelor's Degree in Chemistry, but politics dominated much of her subsequent adult life.

In her 20’s she ran twice as a Conservative Candidate for Parliament in a strongly Labor district of working class families.  As such she was the youngest women ever to run. She lost both times, but gained a lot of experience and enjoyed the challenge of campaigning.

She trained as a lawyer in the late 1950s, specializing in taxation.  She was elected to Parliament in 1959, and later served in Conservative British administrations—in a junior office under Harold Macmillan, and as Education Minister in 1970 under Harold Heath.

Although the Heath Administration promised to rein in the labor unions and establish more free market policies, it made a series of U-turns including negotiations with the unions to establish detailed control of wages, prices, and dividends. The result was a legacy of inflation and industrial strife. That, combined with the general unrest of the early 1970s resulted in defeat for Heath in 1974.

Thatcher opposed many of Heath’s policies and ran against him for leadership of the conservatives. To her own, and other’s surprise, she defeated Heath on the first ballot and ultimately won the leadership of the party against several senior opponents. She became the first woman to ever lead a Western political party, thus trumping liberal efforts for women to break the “glass ceiling”.

Thatcher strongly opposed Socialism, as seen in these comments from a January, 1976 speech:

"The Russians are bent on world dominance, and they are rapidly acquiring the means to become the most powerful imperial nation the world has seen. The men in the Soviet Politburo do not have to worry about the ebb and flow of public opinion. They put guns before butter, while we put just about everything before guns"

This statement led the Red Star, the newspaper of the Soviet Defense Ministry,  to christen her the "Iron Lady", a name which stuck with her throughout the rest of her political career.

The Labour Government of 1974 to 1978 saw the country in a state of virtual bankruptcy that forced it to secure credit from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).  Later, trade union demands led to a large series of strikes that swung public opinion against Labour, and the Conservatives won the elections in May 1979. Thatcher became Prime Minister the following day. Her time in office (1979 to 1990) exceeded that of Ronald Reagan (1980 to 1988). 

Once in office her policies emphasized deregulation, reducing the power of the labor unions, and the privatization of government-owned companies.

Reagan and Thatcher were an ideal team in counteracting the influence of liberalism in government. One author described them as “political soulmates”.  As a result of their efforts, Great Britain and the United States ultimately experienced a heightened prosperity to the extent that Great Britain’s economy eventually exceeded that of Germany.

Their efforts were also instrumental in the death blow to Communism in the Soviet Union and greatly strengthened the pro-Democracy efforts in former Communist Bloc countries such as Czechoslovakia, and the Baltic States.

As with the death of Ronald Reagan, I mourn her passing.

Chriss Street paid this tribute to her:

"For the last three decades, the more capitalist U.K. has been the fastest growing economy in Europe.  The communist Soviet Union she opposed collapsed and has been remade into a semi-capitalist society.  The euro communalism she fought against is now on the verge of collapse.  After all the flowery speeches about the Iron Lady, the British people should honor her: “Well done, my good and faithful servant.”

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