Book Description

Private Property, Government Requisition and the Constitution, 1914-1927 ranges widely over different types of property, including aerodromes, ships, hotels, pubs, alcoholic drinks and foodstuffs, the history of whose requisition by the wartime state is carefully documented. It shows how the state, in this as in many areas, was forced to act by immediate pressures, often improvising rights over areas of life previously outside the power of government; by doing so it documents a key stage in the growth of centralised power in modern Britain.