The formation of the Young Scots Society in 1900, with its motto of ‘Scotland for Liberalism’, held out the hope that there was the possibility of Liberal revival after the jingoism of the Boer War. Hector Macpherson at the Edinburgh Evening News ensured that every aspect of its activities was covered. Liberal-leaning weeklies welcomed the appearance of local branches. The formation of the Peterhead Branch was, in the eyes of the Buchan Observer, ‘the first encouraging sign that a living interest is returning for Liberalism, and that younger men are tired of their affiliation to a party that has done little else but mark time for a decade’. For others it was the campaign to defend free trade against Joe Chamberlain's protectionist policies that mattered. Not everyone agreed. Among letters to the Daily Record was one from ‘A True Scot’ suggesting that the new movement was no more than the ‘Old Cranks’ Society’, comprising of ‘Pro-Boers, United Irish Leaguers, Single Taxers and all other obscure faddists who are to be found in the backwaters of West of Scotland Liberalism’.

Despite the anti-Liberal Party sentiments in so many newspapers after 1886, Scottish voters returned to their traditional Liberal loyalty in the election of 1906, ‘due to the gross misrepresentations and reckless promises of the Radical leaders’, according to the Perthshire Advertiser. To many papers, Campbell-Bannerman and many of his Cabinet were Radicals. In spite of the large majority, the Scotsman believed that the government was in hock to the Labour Party and, therefore, Liberalism equalled Socialism. It denounced the defence of free trade as an outdated shibboleth. The Arbroath Guide also feared creeping socialism, ‘impracticable because it is at variance with the instincts of our nature’. The Lloyd George Budget of 1909 confirmed such suspicions. While not ‘revolutionary Socialistic’ according to the Arbroath Herald, it was ‘really based on practical Socialistic lines’. To the Scotsman what was being proposed, with taxes on land and a super-tax, was ‘class legislation’, and to the Dundee Courier these were ‘rapacious demands’. The Aberdeen Daily Journal saw the blame for the planned increase in spirit duty as due to the Scots themselves: ‘English constituencies are too rebellious to be further provoked. But, Scotland, though with a feebler voice and increasing doubts, still declared its liking for radical candidates; therefore, the whisky-drinking elector [Scottish] is fleeced, while the beer-drinking elector [English] goes free.’