QuotesCosmos
Speech to the Labour Party conference (1 October 1935), quoted in Labour Party Annual Conference Report 1935, p. 178. Bevin was criticising George Lansbury. Lansbury, a pacifist, was publicly agonising about the need to confront fascist Italy over Abyssinia; Bevin's speech convinced the conference to back sanctions, and when the vote went against him, Lansbury resigned as Leader of the Labour Party.
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It is placing the Executive and the Movement in an absolutely wrong position to be taking your conscience round from body to body asking to be told what you ought to do with it.

— Ernest Bevin

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "It is placing the Executive and the Movement in an absolutely wrong position to be taking your conscience round from body to body asking to be told what you ought to do with it." in the context of "Speech to the Labour Party conference (1 October 1935), quoted in Labour Party Annual Conference Report 1935, p. 178. Bevin was criticising George Lansbury. Lansbury, a pacifist, was publicly agonising about the need to confront fascist Italy over Abyssinia; Bevin's speech convinced the conference to back sanctions, and when the vote went against him, Lansbury resigned as Leader of the Labour Party." to mean that wisdom is timeless.

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Source: Wikiquote: "Ernest Bevin" (Quotes, 1930s) The 'What it means' explanation text was generated by Google Gemini Flash (accessed January 18, 2026). https://gemini.google.com/app

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#Ernest Bevin#body#absolutely#conscience#executive#movement#position#placing#taking#asking#wrong#round
Ernest Bevin

About Ernest Bevin

Ernest Bevin (9 March 1881 – 14 April 1951) was a British statesman, Labour politician, and trade union leader. He co-founded and served as general secretary of the powerful Transport and General Workers' Union from 1922 to 1940, and as Minister of Labour in Winston Churchill's coalition government during World War II. He succeeded in maximizing the British labour supply, for both the armed services and domestic industrial production, with a minimum of strikes and disruption. His most important role came as Foreign Secretary in Clement Attlee's post-war Labour Government of 1945–51, when the Cold War was beginning and when the United Kingdom had been weakened by World War II. He gained American financial support, strongly opposed Communism, and aided in the creation of NATO. Bevin's tenure also saw the end of the Mandate of Palestine and the creation of the State of Israel.