Political career of Rab Butler: 1929–1941 Political career of Rab Butler: 1929–1941 Richard Austen Butler, Baron Butler of Saffron Walden, (9 December 1902 – 8 March 1982), generally known as R. A. Butler and familiarly known from his initials as Rab, was a prominent British Conservative politician. Butler was elected to Parliament for Saffron Walden in Essex at the 1929 General Election, and soon became a parliamentary assistant to Samuel Hoare, the leading Conservative politician associated with Indian policy. Butler attended the Second Round Table Conference and early in 1932 he visited India on Lord Lothian's Franchise Committee, which recommended an increase in the Indian franchise.
Rab Butler 18 February 2009, at the age of 101. In his autobiography, "The Art of the Possible", Butler attributed his political gifts to his grandmother Mary Kendall of Pelyn, Lostwithiel, Cornwall. He wrote a lengthy paragraph on the Kendall family, who had served in Parliament since 1368 and had been active in politics for many generations. It has been remarked of this family that they have perhaps sent more members to the British Parliament than any other in the United Kingdom. Butler spent a brief period as a don at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge from 1925, and gave lectures on the