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The Peace Ballot of 1934–35 was a nationwide questionnaire in Britain of five questions attempting to discover the British public's attitude to the
League of Nations and
collective security. Its official title was "A National Declaration on the League of Nations and Armaments." Advocates of the League of Nations felt that a growing isolationism in Britain had to be countered by a massive demonstration that the public demanded adherence to the principles of the League. Recent
failures to achieve disarmament had undermined the credibility of the League, and there were fears the National government might step back from its official stance of supporting the League.
The Ballot was run by the "National Declaration committee" set up by the
League of Nations Union and spearheaded by the LNU's president,
Lord Cecil of Chelwood. It was not sponsored by the government and was only an
unofficial expression of opinion of about
half the electorate. The main opposition came from
Lord Beaverbrook, whose Daily Express newspaper repeatedly ridiculed the ballot; however most major newspapers were supportive.
According to Dame
Adelaide Livingstone who wrote the official history of the ballot, the first objective of the Peace Ballot from the outset, even before the questions had been posed, was to prove that the British public supported a policy of the League of Nations as the central determining factor of British foreign policy. Starting in
1933 plans for polls were discussed and local polls were taken in
1934 to test the questions and the canvassing process. for nothing remotely on the same scale had ever been attempted in Britain.
Half-a-million supporters went door-to-door starting in late 1934, asking all those
registered to vote in parliamentary elections. From February 1935 onwards through to May there was a rapid rise in the numbers of people voting in the Ballot. The poll was completed in
June 1935 and the final results were announced on
27 June 1935, at a huge rally at the
Royal Albert Hall in London. The Archbishop of Canterbury took the Chair and Lord Cecil announced the results. The total number who voted was 11.6 million, 38% of the adult population and over half the 21 million who voted in the
general election five months later.
1) Should Great Britain remain a Member of the League of Nations?
Yes, 11,090,387. No, 355,883.
2) Are you in favour of all-round reduction of armaments by international agreement?
Yes, 10,470,489. No, 862,775.
3) Are you in favour of an all-round abolition of national military and naval aircraft by international agreement?
Yes, 9,533,558. No, 1,689,786.
4) Should the manufacture and sale of armaments for private profit be prohibited by international agreement?
Yes, 10,417,329. No, 775,415.
5) Do you consider that, if a nation insists on attacking another, the other nations should combine to compel it to stop—
(a) by economic and non-military measures:
Yes, 10,027,608. No, 635,074.
(b) if necessary, military measures:
Yes, 6,784,368. No, 2,351,981.
The Ballot has been criticised by historians for the questions being apparently
loaded and designed to elicit the response wanted. It has also been criticised for
not asking the public if Britain should re-arm if other countries continued to re-arm.
listen)) were antisemitic and racist laws that were enacted in Nazi Germany on 15 September 1935, at a special meeting of the Reichstag convened during the annual Nuremberg Rally of the Nazi Party. The two laws were the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honour, which forbade marriages and extramarital intercourse between Jews and Germans and the employment of German females under 45 in Jewish households; and the Reich Citizenship Law, which declared that only those of German or related blood were eligible to be Reich citizens. The remainder were classed as state subjects without any citizenship rights. A supplementary decree outlining the definition of who was Jewish was passed on 14 November, and the Reich Citizenship Law officially came into force on that date. The laws were expanded on 26 November 1935 to include Romani and Black people. This supplementary decree defined Romanis as "enemies of the race-based state", the same category as Jews.
