, who offered Birkett a place in his chambers based on his performance in the
Green Bicycle Case. After qualifying as a barrister, he moved to
Birmingham in 1914, choosing the city because he had some connections there thanks to his association with Cadbury, and began work at the
chambers of John Hurst. Birkett became a popular defence counsel, something that on occasion caused him trouble; he was once forced to refuse a defendant's request to act as his representative because Birkett was expected in a different court. He impressed the Bench in Birmingham so much that, in 1919, he was advised by a local Circuit Judge to move to London to advance his career. Although he was initially hesitant, saying that "competition in London is on quite a different scale, and if I failed there, I would have lost everything I have built up here", a case he took in 1920 changed the situation. He acted as a
junior for the prosecution in the so-called
Green Bicycle Case against
Edward Marshall Hall. Although he lost, he sufficiently impressed Marshall Hall for the latter to offer him a place in his chambers in London. He had no connections with the solicitors in London, and the clerk at his new chambers got around this lack of contacts by using him as counsel in cases involving Marshall Hall, who as a
King's Counsel could appear in court only when accompanied by a junior barrister such as Birkett.
Member of Parliament His father had been a supporter of the Liberal Party, and Birkett had helped campaign for them during the
1906 general election. He had been invited to become the Liberal candidate for
Cambridge in 1911, but he refused because he had no income; he did, however, help his employer George Cadbury, Jr. get elected as a Liberal Councillor in Birmingham and helped start a branch of the
National League of Young Liberals in the city. Birkett's political career took off in 1923. He ran for
Nottingham East in the
1923 general election, and was elected with a majority of 1,436 votes, a feat that was described as an "overwhelming victory" since the
Conservative Party had held the seat since 1910 and had a majority of 4,000 at the previous election. Birkett's maiden speech in Parliament responded to a proposal by
Charles Dukes, a
Labour Party Member of Parliament, in favour of state pensions for widows with children, and wives whose husbands were unable to work because of injury. Birkett went further than the proposed change and suggested that pensions should be provided to unmarried mothers, deserted wives and divorced wives. Because of his focus on his career as a barrister rather than as a politician, Birkett rarely appeared in the House of Commons, but he worked hard when he did attend. On one occasion, he spent all night in a Parliamentary session that ended at 6 a.m. and then attended a court session the next day. He was accepted on 15 April 1924 and sworn in on the same day. His promotion was met with approval from several noted judges, including
Arthur Greer, later a
Lord Justice of Appeal, who wrote that "unless my judgement is very much astray, you will quickly acquire a leading place in the front row", a feeling which was echoed by other justices including
William Finlay, who wrote that "I am confident that you will rise to the top of the profession, and I shall very greatly rejoice when my confidence is justified." In his first year as a
King's Counsel Birkett earned £8,600, double what he had taken the previous year as a junior brief. In 1924, the
Campbell Case brought down the Labour
minority government and forced a
general election. Birkett returned to Nottingham East to campaign for his re-election, though he faced a much more difficult job than he had in 1923. The Conservative candidate,
Edmund Brocklebank, was much stronger than in the previous election, and the left-wing vote was split because he was also campaigning against
Tom Mann, a noted Communist. A few days before the election, the
Zinoviev letter, allegedly addressed to the
Communist Party, was published that mentioned organising uprisings in British colonies; fear of the "socialist menace" drove many voters to the right, and in the election on 29 October 1924, many Liberal members of parliament, including Birkett, lost their seats to Conservatives. When the Dennistouns divorced, Mr. Dennistoun could not pay
ancillary relief. He instead promised that he would provide for his ex-wife in the future when he had the money. and an illness made him irritable and short-tempered. On the advice of his clerk, he asked Birkett to make the closing address before the court, Birkett's performance made the front pages of many evening newspapers, including
The Daily Mail which described Birkett as "the greatest legal discovery of the year" and called his speech "a brilliant piece of advocacy". In that year he made £12,000 overall, an amount which rose to £16,500 in 1926 and peaked in 1929 when he earned £33,500. On meeting
Miles Malleson, an old friend from his time at Cambridge, he said in surprise "did you know, Miles, that I am making more money than I thought existed in the world!" Birkett represented publisher
Jonathan Cape in the 1928 obscenity trial against
Radclyffe Hall's novel
The Well of Loneliness. Birkett arrived two hours late to court on the first day of the trial, and performed poorly. During a recess, Hall insisted that Birkett retract his early argument that the romantic relationships depicted between women in the trial were merely platonic.
Return to politics Birkett was returned as MP for Nottingham East at the
general election on 31 May 1929 in which he won 14,049 votes, taking the seat with a majority of 2,939. , who offered Birkett the position of
Solicitor General if he would defect and join the
Labour Party As the largest single party, the Labour Party formed a
minority government and set about filling the ministerial posts. The Labour Party had few experienced lawyers in the House of Commons, so Labour Prime Minister
Ramsay MacDonald attempted to lure prominent Liberal lawyers to fill the positions of
Attorney General and
Solicitor General for England and Wales. His attack on a clause of the
Finance Act 1930 drew much praise from both Liberal and Conservative politicians, including
Winston Churchill, who said that "I have rarely heard a speech more precisely directed at the object under debate, more harmoniously attuned to the character of Committee discussion, than the excellent statement the Honourable and learned Gentleman has just made". The speech was a particularly well-received one and led MacDonald to again offer the position of Solicitor General to Birkett, as the incumbent postholder
James Melville was about to resign. Again Birkett refused, and
Stafford Cripps was appointed. Birkett was offered a non-legal office but said that he "could not contemplate a post that meant giving up my practice". After an economic crisis in 1931, the King dissolved parliament and Birkett returned to Nottingham East to defend his seat; his main opponent was the Conservative,
Louis Gluckstein, who had challenged him in the 1929 election. The Conservative Party's support of
protectionism met with approval from the electorate, as most were employed in industries which had suffered after the institution of
free trade. Gluckstein won the
general election on 27 October 1931 with a majority of 5,583 votes. On 3 November, Birkett was informed that if he had been returned, the Prime Minister intended to make him Solicitor-General. He was invited to become a Liberal candidate two more times; once in 1931 for
Torquay and once in 1932 for
North Cornwall.
Return to the Bar In 1930, Birkett was involved in the so-called
Blazing Car murder case. On 6 November 1930, two men returning home in Northampton noticed a bright light in the distance and saw a man come out of a ditch at the side of the road, glance back toward the light and say "looks like somebody has had a bonfire". The two young men ran toward the light, saw it was a burning car and fetched a policeman. Rouse was damned by a series of events. When arrested, he made statements such as "I'm very glad it's over" and "I'm responsible" and that the car engine had been off at the time of the fire, ruling out the possibility of accidental ignition. When he appeared as a witness, the defendant claimed that after giving an unknown man a lift, he had found that he was running out of petrol and had asked the passenger to take the spare can in the car and fill up the fuel tank. While he was doing this, Rouse testified that he went to the side of the road to urinate, and while there heard a large explosion. He said he saw a large flame and became convinced the petrol tank would explode. As such he ran away as fast as possible, at which point he ran into the two young men on the road. After his appeal had been rejected by both the Court of Appeal and the Home Secretary, Rouse admitted that he had in fact committed the murder – although he never gave a reason – it was theorised that he had done so in an attempt to fake his own death. Despite his admission of guilt the identity of the victim has never been discovered. In June 1934, a woman's torso was found in a suitcase in
Brighton railway station. The legs were discovered at
King's Cross station the next day, but her head and arms were never found, and the case is still unsolved. A woman by the name of Violette Kaye had disappeared, and the appearance of the first woman's body prompted greater scrutiny on Kaye's case. While Mancini was in prison, his solicitor phoned Birkett and asked him to work as counsel for the defence, which Birkett agreed to do. Birkett also emphasised the affectionate nature of the relationship between Kaye and Mancini before Kaye's death. Despite strong evidence that he had committed the crime, including marks on the victim's skull believed to be from a hammer and marks of blood on Mancini's clothing, the jury found Mancini not guilty after two and a half hours of deliberations. Mancini confessed to the murder before dying. In March 1936, Birkett defended Dr
Buck Ruxton over the infamous Jigsaw Murders. Ruxton was found guilty of murdering his wife, Isabella, and their children's nanny, Mary Rogerson, before dismembering their bodies and disposing of the parts in a ravine at
Moffat, in the
Scottish Borders. Ruxton was hanged at
Strangeways Prison in May 1936. In May 1937 Birkett was appointed Chairman of the Inter-Departmental Committee for Abortion set up by the
Minister of Health and
Home Secretary, preparing a report "to inquire into the prevalence of abortion, and the law relating thereto, and to consider what steps can be taken by more effective enforcement of the law", During the summer of 1937, Birkett was asked to represent the English Bar at the annual meeting of the
Canadian Bar Association in Toronto, where he was a popular speaker. In January 1938, he was asked to act as a Commissioner of Assize to open the
Assize Court in Aylesbury, dealing with an average of 10 cases a day. After the outbreak of
World War II in 1939, he became a member of a committee advising the
Home Secretary on the detention of suspected enemy agents. The committee dealt with more than 1,500 cases in two years. Although the work was unpaid, he was
knighted (as a
Knight Bachelor) on 6 June 1941 as a reward for his work. He also delivered weekly radio broadcasts after the Friday night news to counter the broadcasts of
William Joyce, known as
Lord Haw Haw. The first broadcast took place on 9 February 1940, and they were considered to be a morale boost during the so-called
Phoney War. ==Judicial work==