(Redirected from Imperial Conference)'Imperial Conferences' were gatherings of
British Empire government leaders in
London in
1887,
1897,
1902,
1907,
1911,
1921,
1923,
1926,
1930 and
1937. In
1894, a
Colonial Conference was held at
Ottawa,
Canada dealing mostly with matters of communications. The 1907 conference changed the name from "Colonial Conference" and agreed that the meetings should henceforth be regular rather than taking place while overseas statesmen were visiting London for royal occasions (jubilees, coronations).
The conferences were a key forum for
Dominion governments to assert the desire for removing the remaining vestiges of their colonial status. The conference of
1926, agreed the
Balfour Declaration, which acknowledged that the Dominions would henceforth rank as equals to the
United Kingdom, as members of the British Commonwealth of Nations. The conference of
1930 decided to abolish the legislative supremacy of the British Parliament as it was expressed through the
Colonial Laws Validity Act and other
Imperial Acts, and recommended a declaratory enactment of the United Kingdom Parliament, passed with the consent of the Dominions, although some Dominions did not ratify the Statute until some years afterwards. The
Statute of Westminster 1931 was enacted by the Imperial Parliament in pursuance of that recommendation.
The
1932 British Empire Economic Conference held in Ottawa discussed the
Great Depression.
After
World War II, with the transformation of the British Empire into the
Commonwealth of Nations, Imperial Conferences were replaced by biennial
Commonwealth Conferences, renamed
Commonwealth Heads of Government Meetings in
1971
See also
★
Imperial War Cabinet