The fight for this programme made Lloyd George the best known and most detested man in England. To hate him was one of the accomplishments of titled folk to whom his very name was a hissing and a by-word. Massed behind him were the common people whose champion he was: arrayed against him were the powers of wealth and rank.
In this campaign Lloyd George used the three great weapons that he has always brought to bear. First and foremost was the force of his personality, for he swept England with a tidal wave of impassioned eloquence. Second, he unloosed as never before the reservoirs of ink, for he used every device of newspaper and pamphlet to drive home his message. He even printed his creed in Gaelic, Welsh and Erse. Third, he employed his kinship with the people to the fullest extent. The Commoner won. As the great structure of social reform rose under his dynamic powers so did the influence of the House of Lords crumble like an Edifice of Cards. Democracy in England meant something at last!
The tumult and the shouting died, the smoke cleared, and Lloyd George stood revealed as England's Strong Man, a sort of Atlas upholding the World of Public Life and much of its responsibilities.
Now for the first time he was caught up in the fabric of the Crimson Net that a few years later was to haul nearly all Europe into war. In 1911 Germany made a hostile demonstration in Morocco. Although England had no territorial interests there, it was important for many reasons to warn the Kaiser that she would oppose his policy with armed force if necessary. A strong voice was needed to sound this note. Lloyd George did it.
Hence it came about that the Chancellor of the Exchequer stood in the Mansion House on a certain momentous day and hurled the defi at the War Lord. It called the Teuton bluff for a while at least. In the light of later events this speech became historic. Not only did Lloyd George declare that "national honour is no party question," but he affirmed that "the peace of the world is much more likely to be secured if all the nations realise fairly what the conditions of peace must be."
Persistent pacifist propagandists to-day may well take warning from that utterance. He still believes it.