John Wheatley between socialist Christianity and laborism

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In this article we recover an interesting figure between socialist Catholicism and Laborism and who had responsibilities in the British Administration . We're talking about John Wheatley . On May our protagonist died a character of Irish origin although deeply linked to Scotland . The Spanish socialists honored his memory in  El Socialista briefly glossing his career and reporting his burial in Glasgow . Wheatley was an interesting character in the sphere of British socialist Christianity and independent Labour. In this work we briefly approach his figure and work. Indeed our protagonist was born in Ireland but at the age of seven his family moved to Scotland where he began to work as a miner at the age of twelve since as we well know child work was very common in the British mining sector.

But it is also true that he soon abandoned this hard work to sell Catholic publications door to door although he managed to become a printer editor and head of a commercial company. Wheatley was Catholic and combined his intense beliefs with social and UAE Phone Number political commitment influenced by social Christianity. In or he would join the Independent Labor Party being a key figure in the labor movement and labor in Scotland. On the other hand he contributed to the creation of the Society of Catholic Socialists. The Socialist affirmed that this organization would fail due to the opposition of the ecclesiastical hierarchy.Faithful to his religious and political beliefs he stood out for being against the entry of the United Kingdom into the Great War . He was also against conscription and participated in the rent strike movement in Glasgow.



We must remember that the Independent Labor Party was eminently pacifist. When the war broke out the Labor Party ended up supporting entry into the conflict compared to the position of the independent Labor Party who remained faithful to their ideas about peace although some members in favor of participation would end up leaving the party. . Returning to our protagonist we know that he was a councilor in Glasgow and in he entered the Commons. Wheatley would be Minister of Health in Ramsay Macdonald 's government in . In that year he made his great contribution with a housing law which allowed a massive construction of social housing.