If the period between 1912 and 1939 found ‘nationalist unionism’ in the ascendancy, and 1940–51 saw it evolve into the more robust ‘Scottish Control of Scottish Affairs’ agenda, then the final phase, between Churchill's 1951 general election victory and a belated shift in Conservative constitutional thinking in 1968, were two decades in which it rose – achieving a majority of seats and votes in 1955 – and fell, losing electoral ground to both Labour and the SNP, a decline which continued until 2014.

Even then, most of the standard tenets of nationalist unionism remained in place: promises of further administrative devolution, patriotic appeals and use of Scottish myths and symbols. But back in office, this no longer resonated as strongly as it had between the wars and in the context of the early 1950s, when popular support for some sort of legislative devolution had reached its height. If nationalism, to return to Smith's definition, required a ‘political project’, then it was during this period that it became subject to the law of diminishing returns.

There were also external pressures, a ‘wind of change’ abroad and halting attempts to find an alternative European role at home. Not only did these weaken the multi-layered Scottish/British/imperial Unionist identity, but what Bulpitt identified as the Union's ‘territorial code’ began to break down. The Scottish ‘periphery’ was increasingly viewed from the ‘centre’ as organisationally inept and an electoral headache, while other unionist parties, particularly Labour, became more confident in their own nationalist unionism.

‘Ancient Traditions’

‘Politicians concerned with Scotland are almost nationalistic when they are out of office’, observed Paton, but ‘when they form a government they become obstinately and even blindly unionist’ (Paton 1968: 10). Although he overstated the point, a comparison of the period covered in the previous chapter and that surveyed in this illustrates that phenomenon, for although the measures set out in Scottish Control of Scottish Affairs and subsequent 1950 and 1951 Conservative Party manifestos were honoured to some degree, the approach of Churchill's first (and only) peacetime government was certainly less ostentatiously Scottish.

In 1951, James Stuart began a long tenure as Scotland's man in the Cabinet (or the Cabinet's man in Scotland), although perhaps more significant given his future career trajectory was the appointment of Lord Home as Minister of State at the Scottish Office, effectively Stuart's deputy.