Editing Zinoviev letter (section)

=== Publication ===
The document was published in the conservative  ''[[Daily Mail]]'' newspaper four days before the election and then picked up by other right-wing newspapers.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://cdm21047.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/russian/id/2595|title=Trades Union Congress|website=cdm21047.contentdm.oclc.org}}</ref> The letter rankled at a sensitive time in relations between Britain and the Soviet Union, owing to vehement Conservative opposition to the parliamentary ratification of the Anglo-Soviet trade agreement of 8 August.

The publication of the letter was severely embarrassing to Prime Minister MacDonald and his Labour Party.<ref>Gill Bennett, "'A Most Extraordinary and Mysterious Business': The Zinoviev Letter of 1924", Historians LRD No. 14. London: Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Jan. 1999. p. 1.</ref> Although his party faced a high likelihood of losing office, MacDonald had not given up hope in the campaign. Following the letter's publication, any chance of an upset victory was dashed, as the spectre of internal unrest and a government oblivious to, or even complicit in, the alleged peril thereof dominated the headlines and public discourse. MacDonald's attempts to cast doubt on the authenticity of the letter were in vain, hampered by the document's widespread acceptance among government officials. He told his Cabinet that he "felt like a man sewn in a sack and thrown into the sea.".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Naylor |first1=John F. |title=A Man and an institution: Sir Maurice Hankey, The Cabinet secretariat and the custody of Cabinet secrecy |date=1984 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |isbn=0-521-25583-X |page=150}}</ref>