Margaret Thatcher "The Downing Street Years" Signed Limited Edition No. 1425 of 2000

Personally signed by the former Prime Minister of England, Lady Margaret Thatcher, often referred to as "the iron lady". Her impact on economics, society, and global politics marks her as a pivotal figure in the late 20th century.

Easton Press. Norwalk, CT. 1993. Margaret Thatcher "The Downing Street Years". Signed Limited Edition. Luxuriously bound in full genuine leather with 22kt gold accents and gilded page edges. No Jacket as issued. A handsome dark blue leather limited edition SIGNED by the author, Margaret Thatcher, former Prime Minister of England. A beautiful leather bound collectible book that would make an elegant addition to your political library.

Born in 1925, Margaret Thatcher rose to become the first woman to lead a major Western democracy. She won three successive general elections and served as prime minister for more than eleven years, from 1979 to 1990, a record unmatched in the twentieth century.

This is number 1,425 of only 2,000 produced.

Margaret Thatcher is an important figure in history for several reasons:

First Female Prime Minister of the UK: Serving from 1979 to 1990, she was the first woman to hold this position, breaking significant gender barriers in politics.

Economic Policies: Known for her neoliberal policies, Thatcher championed deregulation, privatization of state-owned industries, and reducing the power of trade unions. Her economic reforms reshaped the British economy and influenced global economic policies.

Cold War Stance: Thatcher was a staunch ally of the United States during the Cold War, particularly under President Ronald Reagan. Her strong anti-communist stance and support for NATO were significant in the geopolitical landscape of the time.

Social Change: Her tenure saw significant social changes, including a shift towards individualism and away from collectivist policies. This created a lasting impact on British society and politics.

Controversial Legacy: While some praise her for revitalizing the British economy, others criticize her for increasing inequality and social division. Her legacy remains contentious and is widely debated.

Influence on Global Politics: Thatcher's policies and leadership style have inspired conservative movements around the world, making her a significant figure in the broader narrative of modern political history.

The Downing Street Years

The Downing Street Years is a memoir by Margaret Thatcher, former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, covering her premiership of 1979 to 1990. It was accompanied by a four-part BBC television series of the same name.

The Downing Street Years were published on 18 October 1993, timed to coincide with the Conservative Party conference. It was serialized in The Sunday Times on the Sunday after the conference closed. There were rumors the book would not be helpful to her successor, John Major, and these were confirmed when the Daily Mirror leaked her views that Major had "swallowed ... the slogans of the European lobby ... intellectually ... [he] was drifting with the tide". The editor of The Times, Simon Jenkins, denounced her criticisms of Major. However at the conference Thatcher tried hard to be loyal to Major and she was even seen greeting Michael Heseltine. After Major made a speech saying he was going "back to basics", Thatcher praised him for returning to "the true path of Conservatism".

Thatcher was interviewed with David Frost on Breakfast with Frost about her memoirs, and she promoted her book with radio and television interviews, book signings, a question and answer session at the Barbican chaired by Jeffrey Archer and a four-part BBC television series.

Geoffrey Howe reviewed the book in the Financial Times, Nigel Lawson in the Evening Standard, Douglas Hurd in The Spectator, Norman Tebbit in the Daily Mail and Bernard Ingham in the Daily Express.

One of her biographers, John Campbell, wrote of the book:

The book has its longueurs, but it is still by far the most comprehensive and readable of modern prime ministerial memoirs: partisan of course, but generally a clear and vivid account of her side of the arguments. Of course it aggrandizes her role, exaggerates the degree to which she knew where she was going from the beginning, slides over her moments of doubt and hesitation and diminishes the role of most of her colleagues, aides and advisers. It is a shockingly ungenerous book, shot through with gratuitously withering comments not only about people like Michael Heseltine and Geoffrey Howe whom she had some cause to feel bitter about, but also about other inoffensive colleagues who had served her well. Only Willie Whitelaw, Keith Joseph and Denis are beyond criticism, plus of course Bernard Ingham and Charles Powell. Other officials are barely mentioned. Nevertheless The Downing Street Years is a good record.[16]

Lady Margaret Thatcher

Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, LG, OM, DStJ, PC, FRS, HonFRSC (13 October 1925 – 8 April 2013) was a British stateswoman and Conservative politician who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990. She was the longest-serving British prime minister of the 20th century and the first woman to hold the position. As prime minister, she implemented economic policies known as Thatcherism. A Soviet journalist dubbed her the "Iron Lady", a nickname that became associated with her uncompromising politics and leadership style.

Thatcher studied chemistry at Somerville College, Oxford, and worked briefly as a research chemist before becoming a barrister. She was elected Member of Parliament for Finchley in 1959. Edward Heath appointed her secretary of state for education and science in his 1970–1974 government. In 1975, she defeated Heath in the Conservative Party leadership election to become leader of the opposition, the first woman to lead a major political party in the UK.

On becoming prime minister after winning the 1979 general election, Thatcher introduced a series of economic policies intended to reverse high inflation and Britain's struggles in the wake of the Winter of Discontent and an oncoming recession.[nb 2] Her political philosophy and economic policies emphasized greater individual liberty, the privatization of state-owned companies, and reducing the power and influence of trade unions. Her popularity in her first years in office waned amid recession and rising unemployment. Victory in the 1982 Falklands War and the recovering economy brought a resurgence of support, resulting in her landslide re-election in 1983. She survived an assassination attempt by the Provisional IRA in the 1984 Brighton hotel bombing and achieved a political victory against the National Union of Mineworkers in the 1984–85 miners' strike. In 1986, Thatcher oversaw the deregulation of UK financial markets, leading to an economic boom, in what came to be known as the Big Bang.

Thatcher was re-elected for a third term with another landslide in 1987, but her subsequent support for the Community Charge (also known as the "poll tax") was widely unpopular, and her increasingly Eurosceptic views on the European Community were not shared by others in her cabinet. She resigned as prime minister and party leader in 1990, after a challenge was launched to her leadership, and was succeeded by John Major, her chancellor of the Exchequer. After retiring from the Commons in 1992, she was given a life peerage as Baroness Thatcher (of Kesteven in the County of Lincolnshire) which entitled her to sit in the House of Lords. In 2013, she died of a stroke at the Ritz Hotel, London, at the age of 87.

A polarizing figure in British politics, Thatcher is nonetheless viewed favorably in historical rankings and public opinion of British prime ministers. Her tenure constituted a realignment towards neoliberal policies in Britain; the complex legacy attributed to this shift continues to be debated into the 21st century.