ABSTRACT
In 1903 Joseph Chamberlain launched his frontal assault on the tribal god of free trade, setting in train the tariff reform crusade, which would divide the Conservative Party as well as families, firms and friends for a generation. The depth of public engagement in the tariff reform issue belies any simple interpretation in terms of rival economic interests. If the tariff battle in Edwardian Britain was decided as a popular electoral issue, its ramifications were also imperial. Arguably Chamberlain's leading concern in 1903 was to use tariff reform combined with imperial preference as the basis of an imperial strategy, which would mobilize the resources of the empire as a whole, so helping Britain to counteract the growing power of the states based on large land masses, Germany, the United States and Russia.
