Jeremy Thorpe 1,166. After the 1966 election, Grimond confided to senior party officials that he wished soon to step down from the leadership. Thorpe was now the senior Liberal MP after Grimond, and the party's highest-profile member, although Timothy Beaumont, chairman of the party's organising committee, noted in his diary: "I am pretty certain that he has little popularity within the Parliamentary Party". When Grimond finally resigned, on 17 January 1967, an election to replace him was arranged to take place within 48 hours, leaving little time for manoeuvring. The 12 Liberal MPs formed the whole electorate; after the first ballot, Thorpe
Michael Ramsey the debate club and spoke at various places in the United States. Then upon return, he heard a Liberal Party leader, Lord Hugh Cecil remark that the Church was the place to go if you wanted to help people, and he heard that as his vocation from God. He remained a Liberal, and became close friends with Jeremy Thorpe, leader of the Liberal Party from 1967 until his sudden resignation in 1976. Ramsey and Joan, his wife, were godparents of Thorpe's son Rupert whom Ramsey baptized in 1969, and Ramsey officiated at Thorpe's second marriage to Marion, after his first