DERIVATION, PROCESS AND PRACTICES OF DEMOCRACY

( DERIVATION, PROCESS AND PRACTICES OF DEMOCRACY )


Ideas : Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill

Date of birth : 30 November 1874 Blenheim Palace, Woodstock, Oxford-shire, Date of death : 24 January 1965 (at the grant age 90) 28 Hyde Park Gate, London, England

Honorary degrees :

• University of Rochester (LLD) in 1941
• Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts (LLD) in 1943
• McGill University in Montreal, Canada (LLD) in 1944
• Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri 5 March 1946
• Leiden University in Leiden, Netherlands, honorary doctorate in 1946^[227]
• University of Miami in Miami, Florida in 1947
• University of Copenhagen in Copenhagen, Denmark (PhD) in 1950

INTRODUCTION :

Churchill, Sir Winston Leonard Spencer, KG, OM (1874-1965), British war leader, statesman, painter and writer. Churchill was born into the aristocratic family of the Dukes of Marlborough. His father, named Lord Randolph Churchill, was a charismatic politician who served as Chancellor of the Exchequer; his mother, named Jenny Jerome, an American socialite. As a young army officer, he saw action in British India, the Sudan and the Second Boer War. He gained fame as a war correspondent and through books he wrote about his campaigns.

Some have called Churchill the greatest man ever to speak the English language; many more think him the greatest Englishman of the present century. But for him, Britain, Europe, and possibly the rest of the world, might have given way to dominion by Hitler and his hordes of conquering Nazi soldiery, who in any case invaded and destroyed a large part of Europe during the Second World War.

Description :

Churchill was also a descendant of the great Duke of Marlborough. Like many men destined for greatness, Winston was not good student in school, did badly at it, and only just managed to ensure into a career, in his case the army with a degree from Sandhurst. He fought in Cuba, in India and with Kitchener in Egypt. Then he went to Sough Africa i the Boer War as a war correspondent. He had, while in India, taught himself to write good prose, and he had developed a grant, masterly style which captured the greatness fothe times in which he was living or about which he was writing. In South Africa he was captured, escaped on a train with a price on his head and returned to England a hero.

Then he went into Parliament, and by 1906 was a junior minister. In 1911 he became first lord of the admiralty and it was largely due to hi energy, foresight and persistence that the British fleet was ready, in 1914, to face any comers in the First World War. During the war, Churchill put up several ideas for shortening it, one of which was the bold scheme to take a fleet up the Dardanelles, capture Constantinople and so knock Turkey out of the fighting. It failed, but not through his fault; he was blamed, and was driven from office. So he went to the trenches in France as a colonel.

Churchill returned under more favourable conditions when Loiyed Georage was prime minister, and he held various offices over the next few years. But he felt himself increasingly at variance with his colleagues over several matters, particularly over India, and then later, in the middle of the 1930s, over British failure to re-arm against Hitler and his aggressive policies. Time and again he warned Britain to be ready to deal with the Nazis, but no one listened.

In 1939, Britain declared war over Hitler's invasion of Poland. Churchill was brought back as first lord of the admiralty and again he organized the fleet so that it would play its rule. Then in May 1940, when France was about to collapse before the Germans, Chamberlain, the prime minister, was compelled to resign for his lack of leadership, and Churchill was sent for by the king, Georage VI, to form a government. His hour had come.

By his stirring inspiration and his magnificent speeches invoking all the best qualities of the British people, and his more practical direction of the nation's war effort, from grand strategic plans down to the smallest but still important details, he took the country through five years of hardship and loss to ultimate victory. Without his leadership, the British might well have given way and surrendered to Hitler.

After the war, Churchill was in opposition for six years. Then the Conservatives were returned to British parliament and he was prime minister again, until 1955. by this time he was 80 and he knew it was time to go. He had a wonderful innings and had left his mark not only on politics and soldiering, but also inquite different fields. His authorship developed enormously. His memoirs of the Second World War, in six volumes, earned him the Nobel prize for literature. He had also been painting for many years, with vigour and a strong sense of colour, and he had been elected an honorary academician extraordinary by the Royal Academy.

Loaded with honours and revered throughout the world, Winston Churchill died at the grand age of 90, and was given a solemn state funeral; the funeral procession was led by the Queen.

Churchill as artist, historian, and writer :

Winston Churchill was an accomplished artist and took great pleasure in painting, especially after his resignation as First Lord of the Admiralty in 1915. He found a haven in art to overcome the spells of depression, or as he termed it, the "Black Dog", which he suffered throughout his life.

CONCLUSION :

Churchill thought that democracy was worse but he accepted it gracefully as there was no alternative to democracy.