Imperialism and Mr. Gladstone

THE NEW ELECTORATE (1885)

From a carefully prepared statistical abstract of the election it appears that in the English counties, out of a total electorate of 2,303,133 voters, 1,937,988 votes were recorded, in the proportion of 1,020,774 Liberal votes to 916,314 Conservative.

THE OPENING OF THE RIFT (1886)

What Mr. Gladstone called the basis of his new government was set out in a short memorandum, which he read to each of those whom he hoped to include in his Cabinet: "I propose to examine whether it is or is not practicable to comply with the desire widely prevalent in Ireland, and testified by the return of eighty-five out of one hundred and three representatives, for the establishment by statute of a legislative body to sit in Dublin, and to deal with Irish as distinguished from Imperial affairs, in such a manner as would be just to each of the three kingdoms, equitable with reference to every class of the people of Ireland, conducive to the social order and harmony of that country, and calculated to support and consolidate the unity of the Empire on the continued basis of Imperial authority and mutual attachment." No definite plan was propounded or foreshadowed, but only the proposition that it was a duty to seek a plan. The cynical version was that a Cabinet was got together on the chance of being able to agree. To Lord Hartington Mr. Gladstone applied as soon as he received the Queen's commission. The invitation was declined on reasoned grounds (January 30th). Examination and inquiry, said Lord Hartington, must mean a proposal. If no proposal followed inquiry, the reaction of Irish disappointment would be severe, as it would be natural. He could not depart from the traditions of British statesmen, and he was opposed to a separate Irish legislature. At the same time, he concluded, in a sentence afterwards pressed by Mr. Gladstone on the notice of the Queen: "I am fully convinced that the alternative policy of governing Ireland without large concessions to the national sentiment, presents difficulties of a tremendous character, which in my opinion could now only be faced by the support of a nation united by the consciousness that the fullest opportunity had been given for the production and consideration of a conciliatory policy…" The decision was persistently regarded by Mr. Gladstone as an important event in English political history. With a small number of distinguished individual exceptions, it marked the withdrawal from the Liberal party of the aristocratic element…

Mr. Goschen, who had been a valuable member of the great Ministry of 1868, was invited to call, but without hopes that he would rally to a cause so startling; the interview, while courteous and pleasant, was over in a very few minutes. Lord Derby, a man of still more cautious type, and a rather recent addition to the officers of the Liberal staff, declined, not without good nature. Most lamented of all the abstentions was the honoured and trusted name of Mr. Bright.

"ULSTER WILL FIGHT" (1886)

Lord Randolph crossed the Channel and arrived at Larne early on the morning of February 22. He was welcomed like a king… That night the Ulster Hall (in Belfast) was crowded to its utmost compass. In order to satisfy the demand for tickets all the seats were removed, and the concourse – which he addressed for nearly an hour and a half – heard him standing. He was nearly always successful on the platform, but the effect he produced upon his audience at Belfast was one of the most memorable triumphs of his life… "Now may be the time," he said, "to show whether all these ceremonies and forms which are practised in Orange lodges are really living symbols or only idle and meaningless ceremonies; whether that which you have so carefully fostered is really the lamp of liberty, and its flame the undying and unquenchable fire of freedom… Like Macbeth before the murder of Duncan, Mr. Gladstone asks for time. Before he plunges the knife into the heart of the British Empire, he reflects, he hesitates… The Loyalists in Ulster should wait and watch – organize and prepare. Diligence and vigilance ought to be your watchword; so that the blow, if it does come, may not come upon you as a thief in the night, and may not find you unready, and taken by surprise. I believe that this storm will blow over, and that the vessel of the Union will emerge with her Loyalist crew stronger than before; but it is right and useful that I should add that if the struggle should continue, and if my conclusions should turn out to be wrong, then I am of opinion that the struggle is not likely to remain within the lines of what we are accustomed to look upon as constitutional action. No portentous change such as the Repeal of the Union, no change so gigantic, could be accomplished by the mere passing of a law. The history of the United States will teach us a different lesson; and if it should turn out that the Parliament of the United Kingdom was so recreant from all its high duties, and that the British nation was so apostate to traditions of honour and courage, as to hand over the Loyalists of Ireland to the domination of an Assembly in Dublin, which must be to them a foreign and an alien assembly, if it should be within the design of Providence to place upon you and your fellow-Loyalists so heavy a trial, then, gentlemen, I do not hesitate to tell you most truly that in that dark hour there will not be wanting to you those of position and influence in England who would be willing to cast in their lot with you, and who, whatever the result, will share your fortunes and your fate. There will not be wanting those who, at the exact moment, when the time is fully come – if that time should come – will address you in words which are perhaps best expressed by one of our greatest English poets:

… A few weeks later, in a letter to a Liberal-Unionist member, he repeated his menace in an even clearer form: "If political parties and political leaders, not only Parliamentary but local, should be so utterly lost to every feeling and dictate of honour and courage as to hand over coldly, and for the sake of purchasing a short and illusory Parliamentary tranquillity, the lives and liberties of the Loyalists of Ireland to their hereditary and most bitter foes, make no doubt on this point – Ulster will not be a consenting party; Ulster at the proper moment will resort to the extreme arbitrament of force; Ulster will fight, Ulster will be right; Ulster will emerge from the struggle victorious, because all that Ulster represents to us Britons will command the sympathy and support of an enormous section of our British community, and also, I feel certain, will attract the admiration and the approval of free and civilized nations."

SALISBURY ON HOME RULE (1886)

Lord Salisbury: … The great result which I hope from the brilliant debates that have taken place is that the conviction will be carried home to the British people that there is no middle term between government at Westminster and independent and entirely separate government at Dublin. If you do not have a Government in some form or other issuing from the centre you must have absolute separation. Now I ask you to look at what separation means. It means the cutting off from the British Islands of a province tied to them by the hand of Nature. It is hard to find a parallel instance in the contemporary world, because the tendency of events has been in the opposite direction. In every country you find that consolidation, and not severance, has been the object which statesmen have pursued. But there is one exception. There is a State in Europe which has had very often to hear the word "autonomy," which has had more than once to grant Home Rule, and to see separation following Home Rule. The State I have referred to is Turkey. Let anyone who thinks that separation is consistent with the strength and prosperity of the country look to its effect, its repeated effect, when applied to a country of which he can judge more impartially… Turkey is a decaying Empire; England, I hope, is not. But I frankly admit that this is not the only reason which urges me. The point that the Government have consistently ignored is that Ireland is not occupied by a homogeneous and united people. In proportions which are variously stated, which some people state as four-fifths to one-fifth, but which I should be more inclined to state as two-thirds to one-third, the Irish people are deeply divided, divided not only by creed, which may extend into both camps, but divided by history and by a long series of animosities, which the conflicts that have lasted during centuries have created. I confess that it seems to me that Whiteboy Associations, and Moonlight Associations, and Riband Associations, and murder committed at night and in the open day, and a constant disregard to all the rights of property – these things make me doubt the angelic character which has been attributed to the Irish peasantry. I do not for a moment maintain that they are in their nature worse than other people. But I say there are circumstances attaching to Ireland – circumstances derived from history that is past and gone through many generations – which make it impossible for us to believe that, if liberty, entire liberty, were suddenly given to them, they would be able to forget the animosities of centuries and to treat those who are placed in their power for the first time with perfect justice and equity. You must not imagine that with a wave of a wand by any Minister, however powerful, the effects of centuries of conflict and exasperation will be wiped away… My belief is that the future government of Ireland does not involve any unmanageable difficulty. We want a wise, firm, continuous administration of the law. We want a steady policy. But you must support it, or it will not take place. There has been a great contest between England and the discontented portion of the Irish people. It is a contest that has lasted through many generations past, through many vicissitudes, and now you are asked to submit to a measure which is placed before you, and to end that contest by a complete and ignominious surrender. It is not a surrender marked by the mere ordinary circumstances of ignominy. It is a painful thing for a great nation to lose a battle and have to acknowledge defeat. It is a painful thing if defeat involves loss of territory, and the nation has to be content with a restricted Empire. But these things do not represent the depth of infamy to which you will descend. There is something worse than all this, and that is when defeat is marked by the necessity of abandoning to your enemies those whom you have called upon to defend you, and who have risked their all on your behalf. That is an infamy below which it is impossible to go; that is an infamy to which you are asked to submit yourselves now. Your enemies in every part of the world will be looking on what you do with exultation. Your friends, your supporters, your partisans, will view it with shame, with confusion, and with dismay in every quarter of the globe.

MR. GLADSTONE'S APPEAL (1886)

Ireland stands at your bar expectant, hopeful, almost suppliant. Her words are the words of truth and soberness. She asks a blessed oblivion of the past, and in that oblivion our interest is deeper even than hers. You have been asked to-night to abide by the traditions of which we are the heirs. What traditions? By the Irish traditions? Go into the length and breadth of the world, ransack the literature of all countries, find if you can a single voice, a single book, in which the conduct of England towards Ireland is anywhere treated except with profound and bitter condemnation. Are these the traditions by which we are exhorted to stand? No; they are a sad exception to the glory of our country. They are a broad and black blot upon the pages of its history, and what we want to do is to stand by the traditions of which we are the heirs in all matters except our relations with Ireland, and to make our relation with Ireland conform to the other traditions of our country. So we treat our traditions, so we hail the demand of Ireland for what I call a blessed oblivion of the past. She asks also a boon for the future; and that boon for the future, unless we are much mistaken, will be a boon to us in respect of honour, no less than a boon to her in respect of happiness, prosperity, and peace. Such, sir, is her prayer. Think, I beseech you; think well, think wisely, think, not for the moment, but for the years that are to come, before you reject this Bill.

LIBERAL UNIONISM (1886)

The Conservative leaders will do well to say plainly that they will not attack any Liberal seats held by representatives who have voted against the Home Rule Bill, whatever prospect there may have otherwise been of displacing the sitting members, or whatever provocation may have been given in former contests. By this course Conservatives can insure the return, with very few exceptions, of all the Liberal members who have declared against the Bill. It is open to them to assail the seats held by Gladstonian Liberals, and on the principle of conjoint action they will be entitled, in assailing those seats, and in defending those they at present occupy, to the support of all Liberal Unionists.

THE UNEMPLOYED RIOTS (1886)

There is serious work before the new Home Secretary and his working-man colleague, Mr. Broadhurst. Yesterday there occurred the most alarming and destructive riot that has taken place in London for many years, or perhaps we may say the most destructive that has taken place within living memory. The destruction of the Hyde Park railings in 1866 was in some respects a more threatening affair, as being the work of a bigger mob; but that, unlike the present business, was not accompanied by the wholesale destruction of property and the looting of shops. Yesterday a mob some thousands strong marched along Pall Mall, St. James's Street, and Piccadilly to Hyde Park, then broke into several sections, and returned by South Audley Street, Oxford Street, Regent Street, and other routes, smashing windows, wrecking private carriages, and robbing jewellers' and other shops, utterly unchecked by the police, and leaving only one or two of their number in the hands of the authorities… The occasion of all this lamentable affair was the great meeting of the unemployed which took place in Trafalgar Square. As our readers are aware, this meeting was but the culmination of many attempts that have been made lately to attract public attention to what is a very real difficulty and hardship. At last the time came for the men to gather in Trafalgar Square. But unfortunately there was not that perfect harmony in their proceedings which might have been desired. Some groups were simply unemployed labourers, come in all honesty of purpose to hear what could be said for them, and their chances of finding work. Some were fair-traders, anxious to impress on the Government that foreign bounties and other tariff enormities were at the root of the mischief. But with these moderately pacific bodies were the more dangerous element brought into the meeting by Messrs. Hyndman, Burns, and Champion. The Revolutionary Social Democrats were there, with the express object of breaking up the meeting called by Mr. Kenny and his friends, and of "preventing people being made the tools of the paid agitators who were working in the interests of the Fair Trade League." It cannot be too clearly understood that it was to the proceedings of these men – of Mr. Burns and Mr. Hyndman and their colleagues – that all the subsequent destruction was due… Already on several occasions the fanatic Hyndman has done his best to break the peace, from the time when, a year or two ago, he told the crowd on the Thames Embankment that their principle should be a life for a life – the life of a Minister for that of every working-man who starved – down to the time when at the Holborn Town Hall he offered to head "the Revolution." Burns is as vehement, and his voice carries further. He yesterday told the mob that "the next time they met it would be to go and sack the bakers' shops in the West of London," and that "they had better die fighting than starving." He and his red flag led the mob yesterday in their march.

BIMETALLISM AND LABOUR DISPUTES (1886)

Some portion of public attention ought to be given to a subject of very pressing importance – that of the "scarcity of gold." The share which the enhancement of the value of gold has probably had in producing these disastrous strikes seems not to have attracted sufficient notice. The fall of prices from the growing scarcity of gold has necessarily made the same wages for labour really higher than they formerly were, while at the same time this fall of prices has diminished the total return from labour and capital employed in production… Probably this has not been sufficiently well understood by either masters or men, but the masters have practically felt that they could no longer afford to pay the same money wages they used to do, while the men have not understood the necessity for such a reduction. What I would propose is that £1 notes, payable in silver bullion, should be issued, but only in exchange for the same bullion after a certain fixed amount of them had been sent into circulation. But this bullion I should propose to give or receive in exchange for notes, not at any fixed price for silver, but at the market price of the metal, which should be published weekly in the Gazette. By this arrangement it will be perceived that silver would be largely used as an instrument for carrying on the business of exchange, without incurring the inconvenience which seems to be inseparable from the scheme of the bimetallists, who would establish by law a fixed price for silver and for gold. As the cost of producing these metals is liable to variation, I cannot understand how the bimetallists can expect that fixing their comparative prices by law could prevent that which could at the moment be most cheaply produced from driving the other out of circulation, since all who had to pay money would naturally make use of the cheapest money they could get.

PASTEUR AND HYDROPHOBIA (1886)

We may here refer to the momentous work of M. Pasteur in connection with hydrophobia. That he has discovered a remedy for one of the most terrible afflictions to which humanity is liable it would probably be premature to say; but that he has taken every precaution against self-deception must be admitted, and so far as he has gone it is difficult to discredit his results.

THE FINAL HOME RULE RUPTURE (1886)

As it happened, all this [Randolph Churchill's resignation of the Exchequer, and Goschen's appointment] gave a shake to both of the Unionist wings. The ominous clouds of coercion were sailing slowly but discernibly along the horizon, and this made men in the Unionist camp still more restless and uneasy. Mr. Chamberlain, on the very day of the announcement of the Churchill resignation, had made a speech that was taken to hold out an olive-branch to his old friends. Sir William Harcourt … thought the break-up of a great political combination to be so immense an evil as to call for almost any sacrifices to prevent it. He instantly wrote to Birmingham to express his desire to co-operate in reunion, and in the course of a few days five members of the original Liberal Cabinet of 1886 met at his house in what is known as the Round Table Conference (Sir W. Harcourt, Mr. Chamberlain, Lord Herschell, Sir George Trevelyan, and myself)… Mr. Gladstone gave the Round Table his blessing, his "general idea being that he had better meddle as little as possible with the Conference, and retain a free hand." Lord Hartington would neither join the Conference nor deny that he thought it premature… On the other side, both English Liberals and Irish Nationalists were equally uneasy lest the unity of the party should be bought by the sacrifice of fundamentals… Mr. Parnell, though alive to the truth that when people go into a conference it usually means that they are willing to give up something, was thoroughly awake to the satisfactory significance of the Birmingham overtures.