Douglas Young (judge)

Sir John Douglas Young (7 April 1883 – 13 April 1973), was a British judge and Liberal Party politician.

Background

Young was born in Helensburgh, Argyllshire. He was educated at Merchiston Castle School, Edinburgh and Pembroke College, Cambridge, where he received a BA. In 1912 he married Joyce Macewen Smith of Glasgow. They had two sons. He was knighted in 1935.^[1]

Political career

Hendon in Middlesex, 1922

He was Liberal candidate for the Hendon division of Middlesex at the 1922 General Election. He was Liberal candidate for the Southend division of Essex at the 1923 and 1924 General Elections. Southend was a safe Unionist seat which Young nearly gained in 1923;

Southend in Essex, 1922-23

General Election 1923: Southend [2]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Unionist	Rupert Guinness, Viscount Elveden	15,566	50.2	-11.7
	Liberal	John Douglas Young	15,453	49.8	+11.7
Majority			113	0.4	-23.4
Turnout				69.3	+1.3
	Unionist hold		Swing	-11.7

In 1924, a difficult election for the Liberal party, Southend returned to being a safe Unionist seat;

General Election 1924: Southend [3]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Unionist	Rupert Guinness, Viscount Elveden	23,417	62.5
	Liberal	John Douglas Young	10,924	29.1
	Labour	Sydney Alexander Moseley	3,144	8.4	n/a
Majority			12,493	33.4
Turnout				79.3
	Unionist hold		Swing

He did not contest the Southend by-election in 1927 and instead was Liberal candidate for the Linlithgowshire by-election, 1928. This was a Labour/Unionist marginal that no Liberal had fought in 1924. The party had finished a distant third in 1923, so the seat was not promising. He came third as expected but did poll the highest Liberal vote since 1910;

By-election, Apr 1928: Linlithgowshire[4]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Labour	Emanuel Shinwell	14,446
	Unionist	Margaret Henderson Kidd	9,268
	Liberal	John Douglas Young	5,690
Majority
Turnout

He did not stand for parliament again.^[5]

References

1. ‘YOUNG, Sir (John) Douglas’, Who Was Who, A & C Black, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing plc, 1920–2015; online edn, Oxford University Press, 2014 ; online edn, April 2014 accessed 26 July 2015
2. British Parliamentary Election Results 1918-1949, FWS Craig
3. British Parliamentary Election Results 1918-1949, FWS Craig
4. The Times, 7 April 1928
5. British parliamentary election results 1918-1973, Craig, F.W.S.