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# Winston Churchill had been a Member of Parliament, Home Secretary and First Lord of the Admiralty when Prince Edward was still a child, later Colonial Secretary and Chancellor of the Exchequer, and by the time of his reign he had already spent several yea
- URL: https://theparnassian.com/en/uinston-cherchill-byl-chlenom-parlamenta-ministrom-vnutrennikh-del-pervym-lordom-admiralteistva-kogda-prints-eduard-byl-eshche-rebenkom-pozdnee-ministrom-po-delam-kolonii-i-kantslerom-k/
- Published: 2023-07-14T08:02:53.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-01T05:36:15.000Z
- Author: Alexandr Radayev
- Tags: London, Monarchies, Society, People

Winston Churchill had been a Member of Parliament, Home Secretary and First Lord of the Admiralty when Prince Edward was still a child, later Colonial Secretary and Chancellor of the Exchequer, and by the time of his reign he had already spent several years in political isolation. He returned to politics only in 1939.

Churchill held that King Edward VIII had no grounds for abdication:

“*There was no conflict between the sovereign and Parliament. Edward's personal life had not been discussed with Parliament, and Parliament had no right to express its attitude to the conduct of the monarch. This is quite unlike the cause that gives rise to a confrontation between Parliament and the King. The question of the marriage to Wallis could have been settled in the ordinary course of debate in Parliament. No ministry has the right to demand, or even to advise, that a sovereign abdicate. Even in the most serious parliamentary proceedings, the question might have been decided in Edward's favour. The Cabinet has no right to decide anything without the prior consent and permission of Parliament. Had Edward indeed been forced to abdicate, it would have been a very gross breach of the law and would have cast a black shadow over many centuries of the British Empire's existence*.”

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