A
Liberal in politics, Milnes became Assistant Private Secretary to
Lord Granville in April 1883 when Granville was
Foreign Secretary. In 1884 he was the chosen as the prospective Liberal candidate for the new seat of
Barnsley, but never contested the seat as in August 1885, before the general election in November, he succeeded to his father's peerage and seat in the House of Lords. As Baron Houghton, he was made a Liberal
whip in 1885. In January 1886 he was made a
Lord-in-waiting to Queen Victoria during the
Third Gladstone ministry, and remained a
Home Ruler. Prepared for ministerial success, a severe blow was struck to a burgeoning political career: his wife Sybil Marcia, daughter of
Sir Frederick Ulric Graham, 3rd Baronet, of Netherby, whom he had married on 3 June 1880, died suddenly in September 1887, still only thirty years old. He was determined to get over this personal tragedy by studying agriculture at the
Royal Agricultural College. However, he was prevented by illness from pursuing his studies. Leaving England, he travelled to Egypt, where he wrote
Stray Verses in a mournful lament at his great loss. Further melancholy hit hard when his eight-year-old son and heir Richard died in 1890. Returning to Houghton in 1892, he was appointed as
Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in the
Liberal government, 1892–1895, in which his old friend
Lord Rosebery eventually became prime minister. On the death of his uncle,
Hungerford Crewe, 3rd Baron Crewe, he inherited vast estates of nearly 50,000 acres in four counties, and assumed the same year
the additional surname of Crewe by
royal licence on 8 June 1894. On 17 July 1895 he was created
Earl of Crewe, in the
County palatine of Chester. On 20 April 1899, Crewe married secondly an eighteen-year-old society beauty, Lady Margaret Etrenne Hannah Primrose, daughter of the former Prime Minister Lord Rosebery. The
Second Boer War broke out only months later in October. Crewe remained a leader of the conciliators who to the last tried to find a negotiated settlement with President
Paul Kruger. He began to grow apart from his father-in-law's Liberal imperialism, advocating a gradualist "step-by-step" policy of containment of the situation. But the war soon escalated, with Crewe finding himself isolated. He was not much of an
orator, but had skills in administration, proving an efficient organizer. He became increasingly influential with
Henry Campbell-Bannerman and the Radicals. He made a personal friend out of
H. H. Asquith, who was his political mainstay in the round of intrigues that intensified during the lead-up to the
First World War. A close confidante, he was appointed as an aide on almost every committee. From 1905 to 1908 he was
Lord President of the Council in the Liberal government. The
House of Lords, dominated by Tory peers, was hostile to Asquith's proposed reforms. It wrecked the Education Bill of 1906, while Crewe stood out as the main defender of the Cabinet's policy. In response to pleas from Campbell-Bannerman, he assumed the role of cross-party convenor. Crewe was moderate in all things. He deplored
David Lloyd George's
Limehouse Speech in the east end of London in support of the
People's Budget. By the same token, he found it unacceptable for die-hard Tories and Unionists to continue to block legislation. Although
Lord Elgin reassured him of
Winston Churchill's friendliness among Liberals, Crewe was in for a rude shock: he had succeeded the orientalist Elgin as
Secretary of State for the Colonies, and in May 1908 he had an angry exchange of letters with Churchill, who had intervened in a colonial debate in the Commons. Crewe could be haughty and coldly disapproving: like Grey, he took a dim view of Lloyd George's People's Budget, He sat on the Constitutional Conference Commission set up on 16 June 1910 during the crisis following
Edward VII's death. He was further honoured in 1911 when he was created
Earl of Madeley and
Marquess of Crewe. but other ministers, like Churchill, were more thrusting at pushing themselves forward for promotion. Crewe was widely respected for his administrative competence, efficiency and personal intelligence. Crewe served as
Lord President of the Council again from May 1915, coming second in Asquith's rankings and working closely with Lloyd George on currency and exchange rate stabilisation in the budget. His Westminster base, Crewe House,
Curzon Street, Mayfair, became a centre for war propaganda. In 1916, Crewe was appointed briefly as
President of the Board of Education, and may have been useful in the post-war educational sector, but the
Asquith coalition split in December. He remained as ever, an Asquithian, declining office under Lloyd George, and after his resignation he continued to lead the independent Liberal opposition in the House of Lords. Crewe himself tended to hesitate too long with "pregnant pauses", as his speech became stilted. He was above all fastidious, in the royal tradition of
Charles I.
Edwin Montagu claimed, somewhat sardonically, that one of his female constituents died of boredom listening to the Marquess of Crewe. His father-in-law, Lord Rosebery, had been Liberal Leader six years before he himself became Leader in the House of Lords of that party. Rosebery thought Crewe a reliable politician but a poor speaker. When it was announced to him that his daughter, the Marchioness of Crewe, was in labour, Rosebery is said to have quipped "I hope that her delivery is not as slow as Crewe's". Always at ease in London High Society, Crewe hosted the dinner party at which
Winston Churchill met
Clementine Hozier.
Political positions Crewe voiced his support during his time in Parliament for numerous reforms, including the creation of old-age pensions, an eight-hour day for miners, and meal provisions for schoolchildren. In November 1905, Crewe had written to then party leader Henry Campbell-Bannerman of the need for innovative reform on the part of the Liberals, noting that More than ever before, the Liberal Party is on its trial as an engine for securing social reforms, – taxation, land, housing, etc. It has to resist the
I.L.P. claim to be the only friend of the workers. Can it do this and attempt Home Rule as well? During the Liberal party crises of 1886, 1909–11, and 1916, Crewe stayed loyal to the party. He was also said to have acknowledged the damage the First World War did to liberalism. When he died, the Tory
Lord Salisbury described Crewe as "the best of the
whig statesmen". One historian believed his whiggery was more temperamental than ideological. Reserved and stiff upper-lipped by nature, he sought compromise by mediation, attempting to negotiate a middle way. His meetings were often spontaneous and informal, but dominated by an aristocratic clique: Lloyd George recalled how in 1912 Crewe had tried at Deeside to resolve Ulster's longstanding problems with Bonar Law over a round of
golf. ==Literary work==