Plane Introductin

2.Early politicaly career.

in July 1900,^[91] Churchill rented a flat in London's Mayfair, using it as his base for the next six years.^[92] He stood again as a Conservative candidate for the seat of Oldham at the 1900 general election, securing a narrow victory.^[93] At age 25, he was now an MP.^[94] MPs were not then paid a wage and, to earn money, Churchill embarked on a speaking tour focusing on his South African experiences; after touring Britain in late October and November he proceeded to the US, where his first lecture was introduced by the writer Mark Twain.^[95] In the US, he met President William McKinley and Vice President Theodore Roosevelt;^[96] the latter invited Churchill to dinner, but took a dislike to him.^[97] Churchill gave further lectures in Canada,^[98] and in spring 1901 gave talks in Paris, Madrid, and Gibraltar.^[99] In October 1900, he published Ian Hamilton's March, a book about his South African experiences.^[94]

In February 1901, Churchill took his seat in the House of Commons, where his maiden speech gained widespread press coverage.^[100] He associated with a group of Conservatives known as the Hughligans,^[101] although was critical of the Conservative government on various issues. He condemned the British execution of a Boer military commandant,^[102] and voiced concerns about the levels of public expenditure;^[103] in response, Prime Minister Arthur Balfour asked him to join a parliamentary select committee on the topic.^[104] He opposed increases to army funding, suggesting that any additional military expenditure should go to the navy.^[105] This upset the Conservative front bench but gained support from Liberals.^[106] He increasingly socialised with senior Liberals, particularly Liberal Imperialists like H. H. Asquith. In this context, he later wrote, he "drifted steadily to the left" of British parliamentary politics.^[102] He privately considered "the gradual creation by an evolutionary process of a Democratic or Progressive wing to the Conservative Party" or alternately a "Central Party" to unite the

By 1903, Churchill was increasingly dissatisfied with the Conservatives, in part due to their promotion of economic protectionism, but also because he had attracted the animosity of many party members and was likely aware that this might have prevented him gaining a Cabinet position under a Conservative government. The Liberal Party was then attracting growing support, and so his defection in 1904 may have also have been influenced by personal ambition.  In a 1903 letter, he referred to himself as an "English Liberal ... I hate the Tory party, their men, their words and their methods".^[110] In the House of Commons, he increasingly voted with the Liberal opposition against the government.^[111] In February 1903, Churchill was among 18 Conservative MPs who voted against the government's increase in military expenditure.^[112] He backed the Liberal vote of censure against the use of Chinese indentured labourers in South Africa, and in favour of a Liberal bill to restore legal rights to trade unions.^[111] His April 1904 parliamentary speech upholding the rights of trade unions was described by the pro-Conservative Daily Mail as "Radicalism of the reddest type".^[113] In May 1903, Joseph Chamberlain, the Secretary of State for the Colonies, called for the introduction of tariffs on goods imported into the British Empire from outside; Churchill became a leading Conservative voice against such economic protectionism.^[114] Describing himself as a "sober admirer" of "the principles of Free Trade",^[115] in July he was a founding member of the anti-protectionist Free Food League.^[116] In October, Balfour's government sided with Chamberlain and announced protectionist legislation.^[117]

Churchill's outspoken criticism of Balfour's government and imperial protectionism, coupled with a letter of support he sent to a Liberal candidate in Ludlow, angered many Conservatives.^[118] In December 1903, the Oldham Conservative Association informed him that it would not support his candidature in the next general election.^[119] In March 1904, Balfour and the Conservative front bench walked out of the House of Commons during one of his speeches.^[120] In May he expressed opposition to the government's proposed Aliens Bill, which was designed to curb Jewish migration into Britain.^[121] He stated that the bill would "appeal to insular prejudice against foreigners, to racial prejudice against Jews, and to labour prejudice against competition" and expressed himself in favour of "the old tolerant and generous practice of free entry and asylum to which this country has so long adhered and from which it has so greatly gained".^[121] On 31 May 1904, he crossed the floor, defecting from the Conservatives to sit as a member of the Liberal Party in the House of Commons.^[122]

In December 1905, Balfour resigned as Prime Minister and King Edward VII invited the Liberal leader Henry Campbell-Bannerman to take his place.^[123] Hoping to secure a working majority in the House of Commons, Campbell-Bannerman called a general election for January 1906, which the Liberals won.^[124] Having had a previous invitation from the Manchester Liberals to stand in their constituency,^[125] Churchill did so, winning the Manchester North West seat.^[126] January also saw the publication of Churchill's biography of his father;^[127] he received an advance payment of £8000 for the book, the highest ever paid for a political biography in Britain to that point.^[128] It was generally well received.^[129] It was also at this time that the first biography of Churchill himself, written by the Liberal Alexander MacCallum Scott, was published.^[130]

In the new government, Churchill became Under-Secretary of State for the Colonial Office, a position that he had requested.^[131] He worked beneath the Secretary of State for the Colonies, Victor Bruce, 9th Earl of Elgin, and took Edward Marsh as his secretary; the latter remained Churchill's secretary for 25 years.^[133] In this junior ministerial position, Churchill was first tasked with helping to draft a constitution for the Transvaal.^[134] In 1906, he helped oversee the granting of a government to the Orange Free State.^[135] In dealing with southern Africa, he sought to ensure equality between the British and Boer.^[136] He also announced a gradual phasing out of the use of Chinese indentured labourers in South Africa; he and the government decided that a sudden ban would cause too much upset in the colony and might damage the economy.^[137] He expressed concerns about the relations between European settlers and the black African population; after Zulu launched the Bambatha Rebellion in Natal, he complained of Europeans' "disgusting butchery of the natives".^[138]

In August 1906, Churchill holidayed on a yacht in Deauville, France, spending much of his time playing polo or gambling.^[139] From there he proceeded to Paris and then Switzerland—where he climbed the Eggishorn—and then to Berlin and Silesia, where he was a guest of Kaiser Wilhelm II.^[140] He went then to Venice, and from there toured Italy by motorcar with his friend, Lionel Rothschild.^[141] In May 1907, he holidayed at the home of another friend, Maurice de Forest, in Biarritz.^[142] In the autumn, he embarked on a tour of Europe and Africa.^[142] He travelled through France, Italy, Malta, and Cyprus, before moving through the Suez Canal to Aden and Berbera.^[143] Sailing to Mombasa, he travelled by rail through the Kenya Colony—stopping for big game hunting in Simba—before heading through the Uganda Protectorate and then sailing up the River Nile.^[144] He wrote about his experiences for Strand Magazine and later published them in book form as My African Journey.