Unionist government, 1895–1905 Unionist government, 1895–1905 A coalition of the Conservative and Liberal Unionist parties took power in the United Kingdom following the 1895 general election. Conservative leader Lord Salisbury was appointed Prime Minister and his nephew, Arthur Balfour, became Leader of the House of Commons, but various major posts went to the Liberal Unionists, most notably the leader of the House of Lords, the Liberal Unionist Duke of Devonshire, who was made Lord President, and his colleague in the Commons, Joseph Chamberlain, who became Colonial Secretary. It was this government which would conduct the Second Boer War from 1899 to 1902, which
Lords Commissioners of the Treasury government as a whole. Indeed even after decades of the emergence of the Prime Ministership William Pitt the Younger proferred that the Prime Minister "ought to be the person at the head of the finances." The two exceptions were Lord Chatham and Lord Salisbury. During Chatham's ministry of 1766-68 he occupied the office of Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal instead. Lord Salisbury became First Lord neither during his first term (1885-1886) nor his third (1985-1902), though he did become First Lord for the first two years of his second ministry (1886-1892). Since Salisbury, the two roles have become completely