Arthur Balfour

The Right Honourable The Earl of Balfour KG OM PC FRS FBA DL
Portrait by George Charles Beresford, 1902
Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
In office 12 July 1902 – 4 December 1905
Monarch	Edward VII
Preceded by	The Marquess of Salisbury
Succeeded by	Henry Campbell-Bannerman
Senior political offices Leader of the Opposition In office 27 February 1906 – 13 November 1911 Monarchs Edward VII George V Prime Minister Henry Campbell-Bannerman H. H. Asquith Preceded by Joseph Chamberlain (Commons Leader) Succeeded by Bonar Law In office 5 December 1905 – 8 February 1906 Monarch Edward VII Prime Minister Henry Campbell-Bannerman Preceded by Henry Campbell-Bannerman Succeeded by Joseph Chamberlain (Commons Leader) Leader of the Conservative Party In office 11 July 1902 – 13 November 1911 Preceded by The Marquess of Salisbury Succeeded by Bonar Law
Ministerial offices 1915‍–‍1929 Lord President of the Council In office 27 April 1925 – 4 June 1929 Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin Preceded by The Marquess Curzon of Kedleston Succeeded by The Lord Parmoor In office 23 October 1919 – 19 October 1922 Prime Minister David Lloyd George Preceded by The Earl Curzon of Kedleston Succeeded by The 4th Marquess of Salisbury Foreign Secretary In office 10 December 1916 – 23 October 1919 Prime Minister David Lloyd George Preceded by The Viscount Grey of Fallodon Succeeded by The Earl Curzon of Kedleston First Lord of the Admiralty In office 25 May 1915 – 10 December 1916 Prime Minister H. H. Asquith David Lloyd George Preceded by Winston Churchill Succeeded by Edward Carson
1885‍–‍1903 Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal In office 11 July 1902 – 17 October 1903 Prime Minister The 3rd Marquess of Salisbury Preceded by The 3rd Marquess of Salisbury Succeeded by The 4th Marquess of Salisbury Chief Secretary for Ireland In office 7 March 1887 – 9 November 1891 Prime Minister The 3rd Marquess of Salisbury Preceded by Michael Hicks Beach Succeeded by William Jackson Secretary for Scotland In office 5 August 1886 – 11 March 1887 Prime Minister The 3rd Marquess of Salisbury Preceded by The Earl of Dalhousie Succeeded by The Marquess of Lothian President of the Local Government Board In office 24 June 1885 – 1 February 1886 Prime Minister The 3rd Marquess of Salisbury Preceded by Charles Dilke Succeeded by Joseph Chamberlain
Parliamentary offices Member of the House of Lords Lord Temporal Hereditary peerage 5 May 1922 – 19 March 1930 Preceded by Peerage created Succeeded by The 2nd Earl of Balfour Member of Parliament for the City of London In office 27 February 1906 – 5 May 1922 Preceded by Alban Gibbs Succeeded by Edward Grenfell Member of Parliament for Manchester East In office 18 December 1885 – 8 January 1906 Preceded by Constituency created Succeeded by Thomas Horridge Member of Parliament for Hertford In office 17 February 1874 – 18 November 1885 Preceded by Robert Dimsdale Succeeded by Constituency abolished
Personal details
Born	Arthur James Balfour (1848-07-25)25 July 1848 Whittingehame House, East Lothian, Scotland
Died	19 March 1930(1930-03-19) (aged 81) Woking, Surrey, England
Resting place	Whittingehame Church, Whittingehame
Political party	Conservative
Parent	James Maitland Balfour (father)
Alma mater	Trinity College, Cambridge
Signature

Arthur James Balfour, 1st Earl of Balfour KG OM PC FRS FBA DL (/ˈbælfər, -fɔːr/,^[1] 25 July 1848 – 19 March 1930) was a British statesman and Conservative Party politician who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1902 to 1905. As foreign secretary in the Lloyd George ministry, he issued the Balfour Declaration of 1917 on behalf of the cabinet, which supported a "home for the Jewish people" in Palestine.^[2]

Entering Parliament in 1874, Balfour achieved prominence as Chief Secretary for Ireland, in which position he suppressed agrarian unrest whilst taking measures against absentee landlords. He opposed Irish Home Rule, saying there could be no half-way house between Ireland remaining within the United Kingdom or becoming independent. From 1891 he led the Conservative Party in the House of Commons, serving under his uncle, Lord Salisbury, whose government won large majorities in 1895 and 1900. An esteemed debater, he was bored by the mundane tasks of party management.

In July 1902, he succeeded his uncle as prime minister. In domestic policy he passed the Land Purchase (Ireland) Act 1903, which bought out most of the Anglo-Irish landowners. The Education Act 1902 had a major long-term impact in modernising the school system in England and Wales and provided financial support for schools operated by the Church of England and by the Catholic Church. Nonconformists were outraged and mobilised their voters, but were unable to reverse it. In foreign and defence policy, he oversaw reform of British defence policy and supported Jackie Fisher's naval innovations. He secured the Entente Cordiale with France, an agreement that paved the way for improved relations between the two states and their predecessors. He cautiously embraced imperial preference as championed by Joseph Chamberlain, but resignations from the Cabinet over the abandonment of free trade left his party divided. He also suffered from public anger at the later stages of the Boer War (counter-insurgency warfare characterised as "methods of barbarism") and the importation of Chinese labour to South Africa ("Chinese slavery"). He resigned as prime minister in December 1905 and the following month the Conservatives suffered a landslide defeat at the 1906 election, in which he lost his own seat. He soon re-entered Parliament and continued to serve as Leader of the Opposition throughout the crisis over Lloyd George's 1909 budget, the narrow loss of two further General Elections in 1910, and the passage of the Parliament Act 1911. He resigned as party leader in 1911.

Balfour returned as First Lord of the Admiralty in Asquith's Coalition Government (1915–1916). In December 1916, he became foreign secretary in David Lloyd George's coalition. He was frequently left out of the inner workings of foreign policy, although the Balfour Declaration on a Jewish homeland bore his name. He continued to serve in senior positions throughout the 1920s, and died in 1930, aged 81, having spent a vast inherited fortune. He never married. Balfour trained as a philosopher – he originated an argument against believing that human reason could determine truth – and was seen as having a detached attitude to life, epitomised by a remark attributed to him: "Nothing matters very much and few things matter at all."