Fifty years ago today, Enoch Powell made perhaps the most famous speech in British politics, the "Rivers of Blood" speech, warning against the dangers of mass immigration.
The speech ended Powell's career as a top-flight politician, but elevated him to a higher status, that of a prophet to his people. Far from being the rantings of a "racist" bigot, as depicted by the Leftist establishment, the speech grew out of Powell's humane erudition and his analysis that Britain was no longer an empire, something that British elites—leftist and otherwise—are still in denial about today as we see with the UK's pointless hostility towards Russia and its participation in the pointless US intervention in Syria.
The speech ended Powell's career as a top-flight politician, but elevated him to a higher status, that of a prophet to his people. Far from being the rantings of a "racist" bigot, as depicted by the Leftist establishment, the speech grew out of Powell's humane erudition and his analysis that Britain was no longer an empire, something that British elites—leftist and otherwise—are still in denial about today as we see with the UK's pointless hostility towards Russia and its participation in the pointless US intervention in Syria.
In this speech, delivered to the Property and Freedom Society in September 2014, Sean Gabb gives one the best accounts of the man and his politics available on the internet.
