An Ancient Strife

by Michael Phillips

  The farrier trade continued to be passed down through the family to Gachan’s grandchildren and to a certain great-grandson, who would still be plying the art in Strathbogie a hundred years later.

  Love for horses continued in the family. One of the grandsons, rather than being known as MacDarroch—as were Gachan and the rest of Darroch’s descendents—took for himself the name Killop, called by some Philop, or “lover of horses.”

  The many generations of his descendents, in after years, would be known by both the names MacKillop and Philops.

  1. Motte—the mound upon which a castle tower was built.

  2. Bailey—a palisade or enclosure surrounding the motte in which were constructed outbuildings associated with the castle itself.

  10

  Northward Toward the Future

  One

  Prime Minister Richard Barraclough may have been an idealist during his youthful political career. What Labourite wasn’t? The Labour Party had been founded on idealism and change.

  But he was also a realist, Barraclough realized as he looked up from his desk at Number Ten Downing Street. He had become more so since occupying this office.

  The fact was, reaching the pinnacle of political power changed one. Suddenly there were no more mountains to climb. All his life he had imagined what it would be like to get to the top. He had worked and struggled to get here. But then everything changed. Now he found himself looking down the slope on the other side, wondering what course his life might take after he left the summit.

  What permanent legacy would he leave behind?

  Would there be any lasting change in this great nation for which people would look back and say, “Richard Barraclough was responsible for that. He had courage to move the country in a bold new direction”?

  The prime minister rose and walked slowly about the office. The hour was late, and most of the city was quiet.

  He glanced toward the framed mirror on the opposite wall, then approached more closely to take stock of the face looking back at him. The lines of age had begun to show more noticeably around his eyes. His hair had certainly grayed since he had taken office. Reaching this summit of political power not only changed your outlook, he thought. It aged you!

  Barraclough smiled pensively. One thing was certain—he would not last forever at the top. No one did. He was at the apex, but how long would it be his to enjoy? Margaret Thatcher had had eleven years. But not all PMs were so lucky. Wilson and Macmillan had both served for six. Even the great men Disraeli and Churchill had only been PM for nine years, and many of Barraclough’s predecessors had served terms of five years or less. There were no guarantees . . . except that one day you were sure to be gone.

  Political cycles came and went. He had ridden into this office on a wave of anti-Tory sentiment. But that wouldn’t last, either. The Tories would come to power again, and Labour again after them, and on it would go—up and down, cycle following cycle. That’s how a free democratic system worked. It was the same in America, with the reins of control passing back and forth between Republicans and Democrats over the years.

  He turned from the mirror back toward his desk. His eyes fell on the framed copy of the Magna Carta on the wall behind it, one of the greatest documents of freedom in the history of the world. Even though its intended meaning in 1215 may have been less idealistic than once thought, its symbolic meaning provided the foundation for the growth of democracy itself. Beside it hung a portrait of President Reagan and Premier Gorbachev—a remnant from his predecessor he had decided to keep—another fitting image of the triumph of liberty in this new age.

  He considered the implications of the two eras of history depicted on that section of wall—the thirteenth and the twentieth centuries.

  What an astounding thing it was, as both reminded him, to relinquish power rather than fighting tooth and nail to hold it.

  How distinct was that principle, as represented by the two images on his wall, from the force that drove such men as Alexander, Caesar, Napoleon, and Hitler. It was the difference between trying to grasp and seize and maintain power versus giving up power for the sake of a greater good.

  Gorbachev was truly one of the heroes of the twentieth century, thought Barraclough. His genius lay in recognizing the need to lay down power and let go of the Soviet behemoth in favor of its smaller constituent states. The basis for his standing in history was not in gaining power, as so many autocrats perceived their destiny, but in yielding back independence to those very regions his predecessors had conquered. And in so doing, he might well have single-handedly prevented another world war and holocaust.

  Barraclough turned again and walked slowly across the floor to the window, where he stood gazing out into nighttime London.

  The decision facing him was not one of such epic proportions as encountered by Gorbachev in the 1980s. But perhaps in its own way it was similar. The USSR had been an accumulation of separate states, each with its own individuality, history, and ethnicity. The Kremlin held it together for seventy years. But Gorbachev and Yeltsin after him ultimately recognized that to continue doing so was futile. They saw the future. They recognized that progress required the relinquishment of that centralized power. In Gorbachev, for the first time, a Soviet premier saw the necessity of freedom. As a result, he stepped to the front rank of history, insuring his legacy as one of the truly great men of the last century.

  It had been the same recognition of the need for freedom of indigenous peoples throughout the world that led to the breakup of the British Empire during the last century. As a result, dozens of former colonies—from India and Nigeria and the Gold Coast to Rhodesia and the Sudan—were now sovereign and independent nations.

  Funny, thought Barraclough—in this modern era of the late twentieth and now twenty-first century, two seemingly opposite trends were manifesting themselves throughout the world.

  On one hand, power and autonomy were being granted to small states previously included in larger conglomerates and to colonies that had been part of larger empires. The world’s new nations over the last fifty years were too numerous to count—from those of the British Commonwealth to those of the former USSR and even the new Balkan countries that had resulted after the breakup of the Soviet Union. In every instance, power was being returned, or, as they said in Britain, devolved, to smaller levels of autonomy.

  Yet at the same time, the joining of states into larger units, as the United States had paved the way for more than two centuries earlier, was now coming even to Europe. Who would have guessed, even in the days that the Soviet Union was breaking up, that the European Union would have developed so far?

  Barraclough paused in his thoughts as he continued to stare out into the dark London night. He knew it wasn’t because of Rhodesia, the Balkans, Belarus, or Kazakhstan that he had been unable to sleep on this night.

  What was really on his mind was this nation whose center was located in this very city, even this very room.

  What of Britain’s future?

  That was the question most heavily on his mind, and which had been keeping him awake lately.

  What of their own nation, this accumulation of islands just off the western shores of the European continent known as the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland? Because the UK was a democracy, did that reduce the imperative to look toward the future with less idealism and realism?

  Then came the question that had been nagging at him: Was their collection of states in its own way just as diverse as those of other nations whose separate parts were now independent?

  If Britain was the world’s first and primary democracy from which had sprung all the world’s democracies—from the United States more than two centuries ago to the most recent explosions of democratic nationhood around the globe—what role ought Britain to play to insure that no people is coerced into the submission of an artificial nationhood?

  And in that light, was Britain’s democratic foundation, example to the free world t
hough it was, actually faulty?

  Which model ought to serve as beacon for the future of the United Kingdom and its four disparate parts: England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland?

  And just as important, Barraclough wondered, what ought to be his role in determining that future?

  It was an uncomfortable question.

  How many politicians had the guts to do what Gorbachev had done—relinquish their standing even in their own countries and parties to do what the future required?

  Might he be such a one? Did he have that kind of guts if it came to it?

  Barraclough sighed, turned from the window, and walked back to his desk.

  He needed someone to talk to . . . someone who could help him put all this in perspective.

  But who? His own party colleagues would doubtless only be able to see the politics of the thing. They were still on the way up, many of them still hopeful of someday occupying this same room where he was alone with his thoughts. Because of that, how objective could they possibly be? Perhaps it was inevitable that vision was clouded by politics until one reached this point.

  But however he did it, whomever he talked to, he had to look beyond politics . . . to posterity.

  If history was beckoning, he had to make sure he was hearing what it was trying to tell him.

  Two

  The request to visit Number Ten was not altogether unexpected, in that they were now the two leaders of a coalition government for a new session of Parliament. But from the tone in the PM’s voice on the telephone, Andrew Trentham had the feeling that something other than politics as usual was on Richard Barraclough’s mind.

  He was shown into the prime minister’s private study. The door closed behind him. No one other than Barraclough was present.

  “Thank you for coming, Andrew,” said the PM as they shook hands.

  “Of course, Prime Minister,” replied Andrew. They took seats.

  “It’s a terrible shock about Miles and all the others,” said Barraclough. “I would never have expected such a thing possible.”

  “Nor I,” rejoined Andrew.

  “It just shows, I suppose, that power does corrupt as they say, and that we cannot be too careful. Always vigilant, and all that.”

  “The Americans had their wake-up call with Nixon and Clinton,” remarked Andrew. “I guess now it’s our turn.”

  A brief pause followed.

  “I know we have spoken with one another many times in the past, Andrew,” the prime minister began in a new vein, “as all politicians do. I am sure you and I will become much closer in the coming session, as you are now the leader of Labour’s coalition partner. But that is not what is on my mind today.”

  “I had that feeling,” smiled Andrew.

  “I asked you here,” the prime minister continued, “because I need someone to talk to on another level, as a colleague . . . or a friend, perhaps, but also as one who understands the stakes of what I am facing. I think you do, because what I am contemplating may in the end rest as much upon your shoulders as on mine.”

  “I’m not sure I follow you, Prime Minister.”

  “These days I find myself reflecting on the trends and tides of history, Andrew,” Barraclough continued seriously, “and on what may be required of us at this juncture—particularly with respect to the furthering of home rule and devolution. I suppose, in a way, I need your help as I try to come to terms with this very complex issue.”

  At the words, Andrew realized that the PM was talking about the same questions he had been grappling with for months. He listened as Barraclough went on briefly to recount the nature of his quandary.

  “So, which is the case in the UK?” the PM asked at length. “Is this another Rhodesian situation, a USSR, in which independence and autonomy truly belong in the hands of distinct cultural entities—namely, in our case, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland? Or are we like the United States, where our future lies in the unity of our smaller parts? Which is the appropriate model, Andrew? Do you see my dilemma? They point to very different futures.”

  “Yes, Prime Minister, I think I understand what you are wrestling with,” replied Andrew. “These very questions have been a great deal on my mind as well in recent months.”

  “Oh?” intoned Barraclough. “I am curious to know your thoughts.”

  “It is a long story,” Andrew said. “You may find, as I have, that Scottish history contains at least some of the answers we’re looking for.”

  “The past holding the key to the future, as they say.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because Scotland’s history is like no other, Prime Minister. I know we’ve all studied it in school. But we are taught about Scotland from an English perspective, almost as if—and there we come to the nub of it, I suppose—as if Scottish history isn’t as important. I’m not sure we ever really get to the essence of what makes a Scot a Scot.”

  “An interesting phrase. What does make a Scot a Scot?” asked Barraclough.

  “In a word, I would say it is their heritage, their history.”

  “And why is that?”

  “Because it is a very distinctive history, one that in a way I find more fascinating than the history of the English. It is in that history one discovers—at least I feel I have begun to find such—answers to some very important contemporary questions, such as the issue of sovereignty.”

  “All right then, Andrew,” said the prime minister, “you have succeeded in getting my attention. Give me a history lesson. Tell me what makes a Scot a Scot and why a Scot is different from an Englishman . . . and what that distinction ought to mean to us now, today.”

  Andrew went on to recount his pilgrimage into the history of Scotland, touching on his own personal roots, finally explaining how his search had come to influence his thinking on the issue his election to the leadership of the Liberal Democratic Party had so amplified—that of how far devolution ought to go in Scotland, and even of whether it should progress all the way to home rule and complete independence.

  The discussion that followed was spirited and enlightening and left both men on far more intimate terms than when they had begun. Most of their discussion centered around the philosophical distinction between the two opposite trends: one, the distribution of power into smaller sovereign entities, and two, the coalescing of power into larger governmental units.

  “I am absolutely fascinated with all you have told me, Andrew,” Barraclough said at length. “I have never before seen the thing with such clarity. Your explanation of Culloden and its aftermath puts everything in such a different light. I do not think it insignificant that in the case of the United States, notwithstanding its civil war, in the beginning the states chose to come together into a larger national framework. As you make clear, that was certainly not the case in our own country. In the case of Scotland in particular, we—or England, I should say—forced unity by conquest.”

  “Right,” rejoined Andrew. “Though Scotland’s Parliament technically voted for the union in 1707, it was a vote coerced by bribery and the sword. I think the argument could be made that the choice was never really put fairly into Scotland’s hands—or, if it was, it has never been revisited in light of modern times. In other words, do we not owe Scotland the same consideration that was given India, say, or the many other Commonwealth nations that now rule themselves—reexamining the situation for a new era?”

  “A persuasive argument. You do know your Scottish history.”

  “As I said, I’ve been studying it a great deal recently,” smiled Andrew. “If we are going to make an important decision about Scotland’s future, I want to know as much as I can about its past. I feel I have to. We must do what is best for Scotland—not, as our predecessors did, what is best for England. So as I said before, in my opinion Scotland’s history is the key to this whole issue, from Bannockburn to Culloden.”

  “The implication, then,” Barraclough went on, thinking as h
e spoke, “seems to be that our situation actually more parallels that of the Soviet Union than the U.S. Would you agree?”

  “Perhaps, in that England conquered Scotland and subdued its people rather than giving it the same level of choice that the American states exercised at the beginning of their democracy . . . yes, I see what you mean.”

  “It certainly casts the history of our union into a new light,” said Barraclough, shaking his head.

  Another twenty or thirty minutes of discussion went by.

  “If it is true,” Barraclough was saying, “that our union is based on conquest rather than choice, it hardly seems a fit foundation for the world’s leading democracy, does it, Andrew?”

  “No, it really does not.”

  “Well then,” the prime minister said after a silent moment, “I wonder if it is not time to rectify that wrong in light of the twenty-first century.”

  “What are you suggesting, Prime Minister?”

  “That perhaps it is time to let the nation’s representatives decide the future of our constituent parts. Perhaps it is time we redress that conquest you spoke of and give Scotland the choice we denied it centuries ago.”

  “Specifically . . .” said Andrew, letting his voice trail off. He did not want to put words in the prime minister’s mouth, but his heart immediately began to beat more rapidly. He had sensed it might come to this eventually, but he hadn’t anticipated its happening so soon.

  “I know most thought the statement in the King’s speech about home rule was a mere token gesture to the SNP on my part,” Barraclough went on. “Perhaps it was at the time. The SNP was on my back, and I felt I had to do something. But lately I’ve been thinking . . . and talking with you has helped clarify my thoughts in so many ways. I wonder, therefore, if perhaps we ought not let it languish, but bring it to the forefront. The history, as you’ve been saying, makes a compelling case for Scottish freedom—a case that I think we can no longer ignore.”