Remilitarization of the Rhineland 1935. On 7 June 1935, MacDonald resigned as British Prime Minister due to ailing health and was replaced by Stanley Baldwin of the Conservative Party; the leadership change did not affect British foreign policy in any meaningful way. On October 3, 1935, Italy invaded Ethiopia, and thus began the Abyssinia Crisis. Under strong pressure from a moralistic British public opinion, which was very much in favor of collective security, the British government took the lead in pressing the League of Nations for sanctions against Italy. The decision of the British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin to take a strong line in
Stanley Baldwin no other party leader would have served as the Prime Minister under this King, with the Labour Party having already having indicated that it would not form a ministry to uphold impropriety. Baldwin told the Cabinet one Labour MP had asked, "Are we going to have a fascist monarchy?" When the Cabinet refused the morganatic marriage, King Edward decided on his own volition to abdicate. The King's final plea, on 4 December, that he should broadcast an appeal to the nation, was rejected by the Prime Minister as too divisive. Nevertheless, at his final audience with King Edward on 7