1891 - 1892

Arthur Balfour (1848-1930) was the nephew of the third Marquess of Salisbury, who guided him towards a political career. He entered Parliament in 1874 as a Conservative, and with Lord Randolph Churchill undermined Stafford Northcote's Leadership of the Commons, helping to ensure that the Leadership of the party would go to Salisbury after Beaconsfield's death. Appointed chief Secretary for Ireland in Salisbury's government of 1886, he became first Lord of the Treasury and succeeded W.H. Smith as Leader of the House of Commons in 1891. After defeat at the 1892 general election, the Conservatives returned to power in a landslide election in 1895, and Balfour regained the Leadership. On Salisbury's resignation in 1902, at the conclusion of the Boer War, Balfour formally took over as prime minister. During his premiership, his party was split by the tariff reform plans of Joseph Chamberlain, and the Conservatives were consequently trounced at the polls in 1906. Balfour returned to government in the wartime coalition as first lord of the admiralty and foreign Secretary, forming a close association with David Lloyd George, and defending it against his Conservative colleagues until its collapse in 1922, following which he took a peerage as Earl of Balfour.