Ban on Publishing Chamberlain Diary Assailed in Britain
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LONDON — Historians and members of Parliament assailed the British government on Friday for halting publication of former Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s private diary notes about the abdication of Edward VIII.
Birmingham University, whose library houses the diary, had planned its release next month in accordance with what it thought was a 50-year ban on Chamberlain’s documents. The 50th anniversary of the abdication passed on Wednesday.
Cabinet Secretary Robert Armstrong has reversed an earlier decision and ruled that the diary cannot be published before 2037, a century after Edward VIII gave up the throne to marry American divorcee Wallis Warfield Simpson.
Several members of Parliament presented questions in the House of Commons asking about the need to suppress the diary, written while Chamberlain was chancellor of the exchequer and a member of the Cabinet of Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin.
Baldwin refused to allow Edward VIII to marry Mrs. Simpson and remain king.
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