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Scotland's Hall of Fame - Politics

HARDIE, James Keir (1856-1915)

Politician. Founder of the British Labour Party. He worked as a coalminer in Lanarkshire until his dismissal for agitation in 1878. Self-taught he took up journalism and formed the Scottish Labour Party in 1888. He became the first Labour MP in 1892 standing for the English constituency of South West Ham. He campaigned for women's suffrage and espoused the principle of Scottish Home Rule. He was an opponent of both the South African War (the Boer War) and World War I - it is said that he died of a broken heart after his disillusionment at the failure of the international socialist movement to prevent the war. Registered as James Kerr, the son of Mary Kerr and William Aitken. Mary Kerr or Kear subsequently married David Hardie in 1859 in Holytown.

MacDONALD, Sir John Alexander (1815-1891)

Canadian statesman. He was instrumental in bringing about the confederation of the North American provinces and became the first Prime Minister of the new Dominion in 1867. He held office again from 1878 until his death in 1891. He died in Ottawa, the city which through his efforts had been made the Canadian capital.

MacDONALD, James Ramsay (1866-1937)

Statesman and Prime Minister. He was a British Labour politician from 1900 and became an MP from 1906. In 1911 he succeeded Keir Hardie as Labour's parliamentary leader, though his pacifist stance at the outbreak of World War One lost him this position. MacDonald finally became the first Labour Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in 1924 and again between 1929-1935. During the Depression years, he split with the party and was leader of the National Government in the crisis of 1931, as part of a Conservative - backed coalition, an arrangement for which he was vilified by contemporary socialists.

Registered as James McDonald Ramsay

MUIR, Thomas (1765-1798)

Advocate, radical reformer and adventurer. Thomas "Citizen" Muir was the son of a wealthy trader, a great Scottish Radical who advocated universal suffrage and corresponded with French revolutionaries. Viewed as a traitor by his comtemporaries, when war broke out with France in 1793 Muir was tried for exciting disloyalty and sentence to 14 years' transportation to Australia. George Washington, first President of the United States, dispatched the USS Otter to rescue Muir from Botany Bay and bring him back to America. Muir survived the shipwreck of that vessel, arrest by the Spanish in Panama and the loss of an eye before making his way to France where he was made a Citizen of the Republic. He lived at a chateau in Chantilly and died there in exile aged 33.

He was born on 24 August 1765.

SMITH, Adam (1723-1790)

Author of 'Inquiry into the nature and causes of the Wealth of Nations' (1776) which laid the foundation of the science of political economy,and is regarded as one of the greatest works in political philosophy the world has ever produced. He also held the Chair of Moral Philosophy at Glasgow University and was Commissioner of Customs for Scotland until his death.

WITHERSPOON, Reverend John (1723-94)

Statesman. He was a minister in Yester, Beith and Paisley before his appointment as president of Princeton College in the United States. He was a delegate at the convention that drew up the Republican Constitution in 1776. He also supported and signed the famous Declaration of Independence and made a stirring appeal for other delegates to do likewise.