B M D71 2b5 w^i I ^8- ^^ - LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. Accessions No.. O O'J'3 b Shelf No. SPEECHES OF THE MRQUIS OF SALISBURY (Mitb a Sftctcb of bis Xife) EDITED BY HENRY W. LUCY ^^^ OP THR university; LONDON GEORGE ROUTLEDGE AND SONS BROADWAY, LUDGATE HILL NEW YO^K: 9 LAFAYETTE PLACE 188.:; ^v^ i^^ r5<6 d COiNTEiNTb. The Growth of the Radical Party Words of Warxi.xg .... TuE Dl'ke of Bcccleuch Centralization The Irish Difficulty .... The Danger of a Parxellite Alliance Liberal and Conseryaiiye Policies The Conservative Eevival . House of Lords The House of Lords on the Franchise Bill One-man Power The Joint Reform Bill Some Home Questions .... Defence of the Government Lord Hartington and Mr. Chamrerlaln" Ministerial Achievements . 29 43 47 53 62 84 106 no 128 145 168 171 204 226 242 'UNI7ERSIT THE MARQUIS OF SALISBURY. The Marquis of Salisbury enjoyed the great advantage, not common to his order, of passing his early manhood with- out being subjected to the enervating influences that sur- round an heir-apparent. Born a second son^ he had not, up to his thirty -fifth year^ looked forward to anything more than being the brother to a great peer, himself holding the cour- tesy title of Lord Robert Cecil. As such he was known up to the year 1865, when his elder brother, the heir to the marquisate, suddenly died, and Lord Robert's prospects in life underwent an extensive change. Lord Robert Cecil sat in the House of Commons as member for Stamford, for which borough he was elected in his twenty-third year, and which he represented till he was removed to the Upper House on the death of his father in April, 1868. With the portion of a younger son he essayed to add to his income by work in the field of journalism. At one time, it is understood, he was pretty regularly engaged as a leader writer on the Times. His connection with the Quarterly 8 The Marquis of Salishiry, Review is practically avowed, and was not intermitted when he became marquis. He spoke frequently in the House of Commons, and speedily earned a reputation as a dangerous debater. His style is a little mellowed now, but the speeches of Lord Robert Cecil and Lord Cranborne were calculated to make an adversary writhe. Oddly enough, at this period, Mr. Disraeli was a principal object of the withering sarcasm and thunderous indignation of his future colleague. The venomous assaults which Mr. Disraeli had made upon Sir Robert Peel were sometimes equalled by the fury and scorn poured over his own head by the young member for Stamford. Mr. Disraeli probably remembered this when, towards the close of the session of 1874, he apologised for some strong language used in the other House by Lord Salisbury, and complained of by Sir William Harcourt. "As the House knows," Mr. Disraeli said, with an apologetic shrug of his shoulders, " my noble colleague is a master of the art of jeers and flouts and sneers," and on the whole indicated his opinion that the House might safely disregard the remarks of the noble mar- quis as those of a gentleman who occasionally permitted himself to be led away by a faculty for saying bitter things for no other reason than that they were smart. In 1866 Lord Cranborne was appointed Secretary of State for India in Lord Derby's third Administration. He did not SPEECHES MARQUIS OF SALISBURY UNIFORM WITH THIS VOLUME. THE RIGHT HON. W. E. GLADSTONE'S SPEECHES. THE RIGHT HON. JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN'S SPEECHES. LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL'S SPEECHES. The Alarquis of Salisbury. 9 hold the post long. In the following year the ancient adver- sary and then colleague, Mr. Disraeli, brought in his Reform Bill, and Lord Salisbury resigned in company with General Peel and Lord Carnarvon, with whom in later years he had further experiences of resignation.' The Reform Bill of 1867 was very narrow in its scope compared with the Bill passed in 1880, and the fact that Lord Salisbury personally co-operated in the drafting of the latter marks a long stride in compulsory political education. In 1868, as already noted. Lord Cranborne's father died, and he took his seat in the House of Lords as Marquis of Salisbury, with promise, since abundantly fulfilled, of proving himself the most able and illustrious holder of the title. Lord Salisbury has always shown himself a man of considerable business capacity. He has a natural leaning towards chemistry, and if he had not been a marquis might have become a scientist. At Hatfield he has his laboratory, where he spends some of the happiest hours of a long and busy life. Although by hereditary influences a Conservative, he was one of the first to accept so new a thing as the electric light. Skilfully taking advantage of the river that runs through his park, he constructed a system of w^orks which supply Hatfield House with a cheap and constant supply of illumination. In 1871 he turned his business talents to an unusual account. In conjunction with the late Earl Cairns he I o The Marquis of Salisbury. entered upon a long investigation into the complicated affairs of the London, Chatham, and Dover Railway. In 1874, on Mr, Disraeli being returned to ofBce at the head of a great majority, a complete reconciliation was effected between the old adversaries. The Marquis of Salisbury accepted office at his former post as Secretary of State for India, and there sprung up between him and his chief a close friend- ship, evidences of which sometimes touched members of either House who remembered what had been. When Mr. Disraeli was first transferred to the House of Lords it was noted that Lord Cranbrook usually sat as a buffer between him and the black-bearded Secretary of State for India. Before Lord Beaconsfield's first session was over Lord Cranbrook had withdrawn, and the two ancient foemen, each worthy of the other's steel, sat side by side in perfect amity. In 1876 Lord Salisbury proceeded to Constantinople, where he presided at the abortive conference which followed upon the close of the war between Turkey and Servia. In 1878, when Lord Derby resigned his post at the Foreign Office, Lord Salisbury succeeded him, commemorating his accession to office by the issue of a despatch in which, with the trained hand of a gentleman of the press, he clearly and forcibly set forth the policy of the British Government on the Eastern Question. In the same year he proceeded to Berlin in company with Lord Beaconsfield as representative The Marquis of Salisbury. 1 1 of Great Britain at the Congress which framed the famous Berlin Treaty. For his services on that occasion Lord Salisbury received the Order of the Garter from the Queen and the Freedom of the City of London from the Lord Mayor and Corporation. When Lord Beaconsfield died there was some dispute as to who should be his successor. Lord Cairns was men- tioned, and the Duke of Eichmond actually took up the reins fallen from the hand of the dead leader. But after Lord Beaconsfield was gone there was no place in the Con- servative Party for the Marquis of Salisbury save that of leader. Into this he was, in the spring of 1881, formally inducted, and has since, with undisputed sway, led the Con- servative Party in the House of Lords. As a speaker. Lord Salisbury is without an equal in the Upper House. His style has the polish of the literary man but never slips into the style of the essayist. It would be easy to quote scores of happy things uttered by him. They will be worth seeking in the speeches contained in this volume. But I may cite one of an earlier date which is an admirable specimen of his style. Speaking at a Conser- vative banquet given at Hertford towards the close of Mr. Gladstone's first Administration, and referring to the Minis- try as one of heroic measures, he said : " Far be it from me to accuse them of heroism. They keep their heroism 12 The Marqziis of Salisbury. to the Home Office. They don't Jet it transgress the thres- hold of the Foreign Office. They offer to us a remarkable instance of Christian meekness and humility; but I am afraid it is that kind of Christian meekness which turns the left cheek to Russia and America, and demands the utter- most farthing of Ashantee." Born in 1830, Lord Salisbury is still in the prime of life, as statesmen are reckoned, and may be expected long to adorn the Senate and illustrate the highest development of the culture and vigour of the Conservative Party. HENRY W. LUCY. KovemMr, 1885, SPEECH E^fUNIVEHSITT OF THE %iIFOB. MARQUIS OF SALISBURY. THE GROWTH OF THE RADICAL PARTY, (At Edinburgh, November 23, 1882.) I thank you most sincerely for the very kind manner in which my health has been proposed by Lord Dalkeith, and received by you. It is encouraging to all who are engaged in the arduous duties which now fall on those who fight in the Conservative ranks to feel that they are sustained and animated by the support of powerful and influential meetings such as this. It has been thought, perhaps, something of an intrusion that we should come to this metropolis of Liberal- ism at all. But we have benevolent views with regard to this metropolis of Liberalism, and we hope soon to clothe it with a fairer name. It is thought still more an intrusion that we make this unwelcome exhibition of our zeal at a time when the Government imagine that their opponents are a scattered and defeated party, crushed to the earth by wonder at their marvellous achievements in diplomacy and war. TVell, perhaps an event that happened in Wiltshire two days ago may have pointed out to them that the English people do not necessarily hold precisely the same exalted estimate of what has taken place that they do. I think they 14 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. find that, however keen we may all be in unison with the views which we have heard from my gallant friend to-night, and however ready we may be to tender the homage of our iinrestrained admiration for the valour shown in Egypt and the skill with which that valour has been guided, we cannot undertake to transfer bodily to Her Majesty's Government the whole of the merit acquired by our army. I think before that takes place this country will require to examine — and examine by the light of those feelings which are pro- duced by the process of paying the bill — the policy by which the war in Egypt was rendered necessary, and later on to examine the results to which this expenditure of blood and tx'easure had led. DUAL COKTROL. Now, in speaking of the policy which has led to this war in Egypt, I do not think it necessary to notice the attempts which have been made by some minor organs of the Government to infer that what has happened at the end of 1882 was the neces- sary result of what was done in 1879. They will find that the system of government — or the system of financial administra- tion I should rather say — we counselled the Khedive to set up, was one which Her Majesty's Government when they succeeded to ofiice expressed their approval of, and was one which they could have altered or abandoned if they disapproved of it. The system of dual control, say some of the advocates of Her Mnjesty's Government, was one which it was impossible for the Government of Egypt to manage — it would neces- sarily overthrow them. You will have often noticed that if a horse and his rider unfortunately part company, it is always afterwards found to be the fault of the horse. But any such imputations are not, to do them justice, authorized by the heads of Government themselves. It was perfectly open to the Government to have abandoned the system if they found The G^'oiuth of the Radical Party. i 5 it fraught with either inconvenience or danger. It is notorious that they approved of it from the first. I am not myself so far enamoured of it that I should now propose its restoration, but it was an expedient perfectly suited to the circumstances under which it was set up, and it might have been main- tained for a very considerable time if there had been applied to it those qualities which are necessary to sustain any Oriental system of administration — namely, that the authority which was vindicated should be vindicated by force so soon as it was vindicated by Avords, and that no time should elapse between the utterance of defiance and its justification. That is the condition of the maintenance of authority in every Oriental country. If in India you were to deal with a rising against your authority by telling them in January you treated them as foes, and waited and took no action till May- or June, you would speedily compromise your power of taking any action at all. THE GOODWILL OF TURKEY. But this lack of promptitude and vigilance, chough, no doubt, it was one of those qualities which made the maintenance of the previous arrangement impossible, is not to my mind the only contribution which Her Majesty's Government have made to the catastrophe which we saw last summer. You may remem- ber that when we had to deal with difficulties in Egypt our immediate course was to appeal to the suzerain Power, and we w^ere able, by earnest appeals, no doubt, to influence the suzerain Power so far that necessary measures were taken for modi- fying the conditions of government, and that being done by the authority of the Sultan it commanded the assent of the Mussulman world. When Her Majesty's Government came into office they came weighted with the unlucky pledges which were delivered in this county. They came bound to shew hostility to the Government oi TurV.ey, and 1 6 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. with the first diplomatic occasion tliat arose we were forced to fulfil the pledge. The difficulties of Montenegro and the difficulties of Greece were not matters that interested this country very largely. They could have been settled ; it was easy to settle them at any moment you chose to do so, dis- regarding the wishes of the Sovereign of Turkey. But we never could venture on that course, because we knew that there were other problems and difficulties behind, which, if you made the Sovereign of Turkey your enemy, must lead you into formidable embarrassments. The key of this question of Egypt lay in those previous diplomatic com- munications with respect to Montenegro and to Greece. At the time it Avas thought a great triumph that those questions were settled so easily and so much to the satisfaction of the tribe and nation with whom many people in this country deeply sympathize. It was not sufficiently seen that the Government were setting against them the only Power that could help them to a pacific solution of any difficulties that might arise in Egypt. THE JINGOES JUSTIFIED. Well, then, look at another peculiarity of this Egyptian cam- paign. The first thing that strikes you when you look at it as a whole is wonder that Arabi Pasha, with his force and with his opportunities, should have defied as he did the power of such a country as Great Britain. How was that mystery to be solved ? If any nation suffers itself to get into war with a weaker nation which is sufficiently civilized to know the great difference that exists between them, you may depend upon it that there is something in the conduct of that stronger nation which induces the weaker nation to believe that the larger country will never exert its strength. We have heard a great deal about prestige, I detest the word. It does not really express what we mean. I should rather The Growth of the Radical Party. \j say " military credit." Military credit stands in precisely the same position as financial credit. The use of it is to represent a military power, and to effect the objects of a military power without the necessity of a recourse to arms. You know that the man possessed of great financial credit can perform great operations by the mere knowledge of the wealth of which he is master, and that it is not necessary to sell him up and ascertain if he is solvent and can pay 20s. in the pound in order to have the benefit of all the wealth he can command. It is the same with a military nation that is careful to preserve its military credit. If it does so, it may, without shedding one drop of blood or incurring one penny of expenditure, effect all the objects which, without that military credit, can only result in much waste of blood and treasure. Now we were in a position of a financial operator who had ruined his own credit by doubtful and dangerous operations. We had squandered our military credit at Majuba Hill, where we had taken up the position of a Power that was willing to submit to any insult that might be placed upon it. We had proclaimed to the world that we were not ready to fight for our military renown, and the tradition of our ancestors was lost in us. It was a false pro- clamation — a proclamation that the Ministry had no mandate from the nation to make, and which the nation, at the first opportunity, forced them to disavow. But the disavowal has cost blood and treasure which, if they had been more careful of the reputation of this country, need never have been expended. You know, gentlemen, that in times past, three years ago, those who maintained such doctrines and insisted on the necessity of the maintenance of your military credit as one of the most precious inheritances of the nation were denounced as "Jingoes." But these Jingoes are justified now. They have Her Majesty's Government for converts. They have forced Her Majesty's Government to I § Loi'd Salisbury s Speeches. demonstrate in action that whicli is their principal con- tention, that if you suffer military credit to be obscured tlie fault must be wiped out in blood. A LAST CHANCE FOR MR. GLADSTONE. I feel how inadequate I am to deal with a question of this kind in such a place as this. I know it has been occupied by a much greater artist ; and I feel that there has been a loss to the world of splendid specimens of political denuncia- tion, because the misdeeds of the Ministry of 1882 are, un- fortunately, not subject to the criticism of the orator of 1880. What magnificent lessons, what splendid periods of eloquence, we have lost! Just think that if Mr. Gladstone, Avhen the spirit of 1880 was upon him, could have had to deal with the case of a Ministry professing the deepest respect for the Concert of Europe and the deepest anxiety to obey its will — a Ministry which, with those professions upon its lips, assembled a conference and kept it for months in vain debate, and, under cover of its discussions, prepared arma- ments, asked for leave to invade a country, and then, when a refusal was given and the armaments were ready, calmly showed the Conference to the door, and took, in despite of Europe's will, the country which they had asked the leave of Europe to take ? If the orator of 1880 had had such a theme to dwell upon, what would he have said of disingenuous- ness and subtlety ? Or, take another case, supposing that un- equalled orator had had before him the case of a Govern- ment who sent a large fleet — a vast fleet — into a port where they had no international right to go, and when that fleet was there had demanded that certain arrangements should be made on land which they had no international right to demand, and Avhen these demands were not satisfied had forthwith enforced that by the bombardment of a great com- mercial port, would you not have heard about political brig- The Grozijth of the Radical Party. 19 andage ? What sermons you would have had to listen to with respect to the equality of all nations ; of the weakest and the strongest before the law of Europe ; what denuncia- tions would you not have heard of those who could for the sake of British interests expose such a city to such a catas- trophe, and carry fire and sword among a defenceless people. A REMARKABLE COINCIDENCE. That great artist drew a picture of Sir Frederick Roberts. I cannot help wishing that he had to draw a picture of Sir Beauchamp Seymour ; but, allow me to say in passing, that if my poor pencil could be employed it would be drawn in nothing but the most flattering colours. I think if we can imagine anything so impossible as the orator of 1880 having to describe and comment on the events of 1882, that he would have noticed one of the most remarkable coincidences which the history of this country furnishes. It is a very curious fact that we have only had one member of the Society of Friends — commonly called on the Statute Book " Quakers," so that I may use the word without offence — in the Cabinet. "We have only had one Quaker ; and only once in the his- tory of the world, so far at least as this hemisphere is con- cerned, if [ am not mistaken, has a great commercial city of the first class been subject to bombardment. It is a very remarkable fact that when the order was given to bombard that commercial city that Quaker was in the Cabinet. At all events, grave as these events have been, I think they will furnish some good fruit, at least, for the future. I hope we have taken a new departure in Liberal politics. I trust that for the future any Minister who cares about British interests and thinks it right to go to war in their defence will not be .subject to denunciation on the part of the Liberal party for doing so. I am quite aware British interests were treated with scant respect in 1880. I am quite aware that Mr. 20 Lord Salisbury's Speeches, Gladstone denounced as monstrous the idea that we could claim to control a country, simply because it lay on our route to India. But if ever there was a war — I do not know what to call it — I believe it was not a war ; but if ever there were sanguinary operations undertaken purely for the sake of British interests, undoubtedly these recent operations in Egypt have deserved the character. Well, then, again I trust that something has been added to our knowledge of the doctrine of national self-defence. You may remember that in the case of the Afghanistan and Zulu wars, we were denounced as un- worthy of the slightest moral consideration ; in fact, very much stronger words were used, because we maintained that it may be necessary, purely for purposes (;f self-defence, for a Power itself to strike the first blow and be technically the aggressor. If a preparation is being made in a foreign country that is by the side of your own, a preparation which threatens the security of your possessions, you are, we main- tain, by the law of national self-defence, justified in using forcible means to bring that preparation to an end. That was the justification of the Zulu war. That was the justifi- cation of the war which we undertook in Afghanistan, because the Eussian representative was admitted to the Court of Cabul while our own was driven back. But what was the justification of these operations which ended in the utter des- truction of Alexandria ? Why, that preparations were being made on land not belonging to us — preparations which, if prosecuted, might have compromised the safety of our fleet which chose to lie in the harbour, but which might have gone out of it if it pleased. After this precedent, it will be impossible for any Liberal Government to limit, as they have done in the past, the rights of national self-defence. The Growth of the Radical p/^ ^ ^2 f ^'^^ ^ |TJ3STIVBRSIT PREDOMIxXATE IN EGYPT. ^^^ZjpQ U'^'V^ With respect to the end of that Avar we have yet to w! do not know what the present negotiations may bring forth. We must suspend our judgment until we see what the result will be. I confess that I should be inclined to look on all these circumstances to which I have adverted with a very indulgent eye, if the result of the negotiations which are pending should be to extend tlie strength, the power, and the predominant influence of Great Britain — for I am old- fashioned enough to believe in that Empire and believe in its greatness. I believe that wherever it has been extended, it has conferred unnumbered benefits upon those who have been brought within its sway, and that the extension of the Empire, so far from being the desire of selfishness or acqui- sitiveness, as it has been represented to be — deserving to be compared to acts of plunder in private life — is in reality a desire, not only to extend the commerce and to strengthen the power of our Government here at home, but to give to others those blessings of freedom and order which we have always prized among ourselves. Let us therefore in the negotiations which are before us not be ashamed of our Em- pire. We are now the predominant Power in Egypt — the valour of our troops has made us so. Let us observe with rigid fidelity every engagement we have made with the amiable and respectable Prince who rules in Egypt, but as regards the other Powers of Europe let us follow our position to its logical result. We are the predominant Power. Why should we cease to be so? Why should We allow diplomacy to fritter away what the valour of our soldiers has won? If the Government act in that spirit there will be little inclination to scrutinize the steps of the policy by which the result was reached, but if they allow themselves to be made the mere tools of others, 2 2 Loi^d Salisb7irys Speeches. if they act the part of mere thief takers to the Khedive of Egypt, and are satisfied with bringing this unlucky Arabi Pasha to trial ; if no greater or more solid benefit than that accrues from the loss of so many valuable lives and the spending of so much treasure, severe indeed will be the judg- ment of the people of this country on the Government to whom the result is due. BENEFITS OF COERCION. This matter of Egypt is in suspense, and so also is the other great difliculty with which the Government had to contend. They are proud of what they speak of as the improved condition of Ireland. I wonder whether it does not occur to them that both with respect to Egypt and Ireland, if there is an improved condition, it is due to the fact that they have repudiated and cast out the doctrine that " force is no remedy," and that they have listened to the advice which their political opponents have not ceased to tender them. We have maintained that no good could be done in Ireland, no matter what grievances you have to redress, unless the primary duty of Government was first discharged of maintaining order and performing justice. Now, they will tell you that the comparative quietude of Ireland is due to their remedial measures. Their remedial measures were introduced in the spring of last year. Ever since their introduction the outrages in Ireland have gone on in an increasing ratio until they culminated in the lamented death of Lord Frederick Cavendish and Mr. Burke. Then came the other policy ; then came a real genuine attempt to re-establish order and to enforce the administration of justice, and no sooner was that passed by Parliament and executed with even moderate firmness by the admin- istration of the day, than at once outrages diminished, and the peace of Ireland began to amend. In the iacc The Groivth of tJic Radical Party. 23 ot these facts it is ridiculous to tell me that it is what they call the remedial measures of the Government that have produced the improvement of which they speak. I do not at all deny that it was very desirable to introduce remedial measures, but I should not have counselled the trying of remedial measures which have only had the effect of destroying all confidence in the country, and of driving capital from the land ; I should not have counselled mea- sures which destroy the confidence of every landholder in the security of his own property, and introduce causes of dispute between landlord and tenant. If you were to do anything which should be in the direction of an effort — no matter of how small a kind, because in such a matter you could not move fast — an effort to have bound to the fortunes of the Empire a larger proportion of the population by the links of ownership, I should have counselled such an effort. But, unfortunately, the hope of that has been dissipated by two causes. The fund from which it could have been done — the Irish Church Fund — has been sacrificed to an absurd Arrears Bill, and the tenants have been prevented from any effort to become owners by purchase by being offered a far more eligible fate. Nobody who can get his land by bullying will care to take it by buying. They have learnt the lesson that agitation will bring them what they want, and it will be a long time lefore they will unlearn that lesson and take a more humble and more honest course. MR. Gladstone's promises. We have before us those two difficulties of Egypt and Ireland which have not reflected much credit on the Government, and they have had to adopt modes of action borrowed very much from their political opponents, and that necessity will necessarily affect their policy in other matters. We have heard it said by distinguished authorities that there are Liberals and Liberals. 24 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. I should prefer to say that the Liberals are not a party, they are an alliance or a confederation, and it is necessary that each member of the alliance should have something in order to bind him to the common standard. Now, hitherto it has been one of the great merits of the present Prime Minister that he has been able, by vague and mysterious language, to insinuate promises which may go as far as your imagination pleases to wander, and yet if grammatically tested bind him scarcely to anything at all. Now, we have before us the instance of the unfortuate Quaker. I suppose if the election of 1880 conveyed any lesson at all, it was to assure members of the Soc-iety of Friends that they were safe for the future from all wars waged for the purpose of securing British interests or leaving open the route to India, and we see, by the secession of their eminent representative how deep their disappointment has been. I have no doubt if you examine the language of Mr. Gladstone you will find nothing in it which absolutely binds him to the construc- tion of the Quakers. But that is the marvellous skill and cleverness of the man. He can '' keep the word of promise to our ear, and break it to our hope." You remember what class of being it was said was capable of that performance. There are others who have been fed upon the same food, but have not yet been subject to that same disenchant- ment; we do not know what is reserved for them, whether that word of promise is to be kept to the ear or to the hope. For instance, there are those who desire the dis- estriblishment of the Church of Scotland. Read over the speeches of Mr. Gladstone, and they will certainly convey to you the idea that although he undertook that which it was not necessary he should undertake — not to disestablish the Church without a Parliamentary majority for the purpose of enabling him to do so — though he undertook expressly not The Grozvth of the Radical Party. 25 to smuggle the Church of Scotland out of existence, still his general intention was to accomplish that desirable reform whenever he had an opportunity. I have not a notion which of the two interpretations he intends in practice to give to his words, and 1 have a shrewd suspicion that he does not know any more than I do. He is perfectly ready to sail north or to sail south, but he cannot tell you what he will do until you tell him which way the wind will blow. Well, then, there is the case of the farmer. He used lan- guage which may mean the rankest Communism, or may mean merely such mitigations of the law as few Conservatives would refuse to consider. It is impossible to know which of the two alternatives he will ultimately decide upon. But I am told that within the last few weeks the Government have shown a strong inclination to get up a small Ireland in the west of Scotland. I am not in the least surprised that they should do so. Ireland had been very useful to them, and if they can only multiply a country in which they might first say force was no remedy, and then afterwards, when it was quite evident that nothing would succeed but force, pass coercion measures, such countries will tend to the longevity of an administration, and will be multiplied by every Minister who respects the prospects of his own colleagues. I have no doubt that by refusing to the arm of the law and the desire of the Court of Session the necessary force, efforts will be made to get up that sort of question in the west of Scotland which, may bring landlords generally into contempt, and may give the Government an opportunity of making those alter- nate displays of leniency and vigour which have conferred so many benefits on the Empire. LOCAL COURTS IN IRELAND. Well, then, the last specimen of this vague and myste- rious language is a much more serious matter. It is 26 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. with respect to the future legislation for Ireland. When- ever there is a Parliamentary hitch, whenever the calcu- lations of the whips have become nervously uncertain, Mr. Gladstone is always throwing out hints of his devo- tion to the cause of local government in Ireland, which his advocates in this country have interpreted to mean nothing but County Boards, but which the Irish mem- bers themselves have always taken as an encouragement to agitate for the disintegration of the Empire. And when the moment of decision comes, when it has to be determined whether it is County Boards or the disintegration of the Empire which has been promised, I will engage to you that Mr. Gladstone's Avords are so carefully poised, so judiciously vague, that no one should be able to say that he has been misconstrued. But is not that a cruel Avay to deal with the interests of that great land ? In the firm belief of the Irish that the inhabitants of these islands mean to maintain the link betvfecn the two countries, unbroken and unimpaired, depends all hope of the restoration of order or the return to prosperity of that unhappy land. There is no worse service that Mr. Gladstone has performed to the future of the Empire over which he rules than the persistency with which he has used language to persuade the Irish that nothing is fixed, nothing is determined ; that if they agitate enough, anything may be gained ; that no question is ever fixed, that fatality is perpetually ad- journed, and that if they will only press hard enough, the deepest interests of the Empire, the laws which concern its very existence, are matters for legitimate discussion. I confess I do not often envy the United States, but there is one feature in their institutions which appears to me the subject of the greatest envy — their magnificent institution of a Supreme Court. In the United States, if Parliament passes any mea- sure inconsistent with the constitution of the country, there The Grozvth of the Radical Pa^^ty, 27 exists a Court which will negative it at once, and that gives a stability to the institutions of the country which, under the system of vague and mysterious promises here, we look for in vain. DRIFTING INTO SOCIALISM. I have detained you a long time, but I am only trying to impress upon you this — you must not suppose that because in this matter of foreign policy the doctrines we have urged have been to a great extent accepted that there is no danger to be guarded against. In internal matters of legislation we do not know what the future may bring forth. We have no guide to enable us to interpret Ministerial promises. All that we know is that hitherto they have been restrained by no scruple with respect to ancient institutions, by no reverence for private right. They have freely abolished what was old. They have rendered nugatory rights which had existed from a far antiquity. They have cancelled contracts which were signed only yesterday. They have determined that rights which men had acquired in con- fidence of the promise of Parliament are of no avail, and are not to be respected ; and only the other day they have made this further innovation upon our constitutional tradi- tions, that for the first time they have limited the freedom of the councils of the nation. With these warnings before you, you would be indeed unwise if you relaxed your efforts or weakened your organization. Do not imagine, as many are forward to tell you, that those efforts have no hope and are a vain beating against the inevitable. I cannot admit that either with respect to the Conservative party generally or the Conservative party in Scotland. Generally we have this consolation, that we know that since Mr. Gladstone intro- duced his Land Bill we have won several seats, and we have not lost one ; and we also know that in important matters of 2 8 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. i-'C'Iicy the Government have found it necessary to borrow the principles of the Opposition. With respect to Scotknd, I am told, and my noble friend beside me has repeated it, you are fighting an uphill fight. There is no doubt it is the case. It is a fight v.-hicli will tax all your energies and claim all the efforts you can give to it ; but it is not a fight without hope. Depend upon it, although you have to deal with a people Vv'ho are singularly tenacious of an adverse proposition when they have once conceived it, yet you have also to deal with a people, probably above any other in Europe, shrewd and penetrating in their judgment. You must not believe that they will continue indefinitely to hold opinions in a changed condition of things, because those opinions were formed when matters were very different. They are quite keen enough to see that politfcal names have altered their meanings, that political parties have changed their standpoints. The Liberal party is forced on by the very law of its existence. It is its constant boast to march constantly onwards. They call it progress, but they have not made up their minds to what goal Liberalism leads. Already they have traversed the field of the older Liberalism. They have passed from the land where they were under the shadow of the older doc- trines of political economy and of freedom of contract. Before them lies the wide expanse of Socialism towards which they are drifting. By an inexorable law they must march onwards. Those who appeal to revolutionary in- stincts can do many things, but the one thing they cannot do is to halt. They must go on, they have already passed the border on many points. Their legislation in respect of Ireland, for instance, suffers from the Socialist venom. It v/ill take some time, perhaps, before the people of Scotland are persuaded that the party which was their old favourite is so degenerated; time must elapse, perhaps generations must change, but in the long run I feel confident that the I iVords of Warning, 29 people of Scotland will not accompany them on this dangerous enterprise. Already, from all I hear, there are signs of change. There is that most pregnant sign of all that the young are Conservative where the old are not — that is to say, that the men who are bound by their pledges and ante- cedents remain Liberal, and the men free to judge become Conservative. You may be sure that process will continue. It may not happen rapidly ; it may happen slowly ; but it will happen. They will tui'n from the party which is leading them to revolutionary projects inconsistent with the indus- trial well-being of society, and they will turn to that party to whom has fallen the defence of individual liberty and the rights of property, of the sacredness of religion, and of those institutions by which liberty, property, and religion have hitherto been so marvellously preserved. WORDS OF WARNING. (At Edinburgh, November 24-, 1882.) I have to express my sincere acknowledgments for the address which has jus£ been presented to me, to 2vlr. Murray for the kind manner in which he has introduced the address of this city, and to you, ladies and gentlemen, for the very kind manner in which you have received me. It is a matter of great satisfaction to me to receive these evidences of Con- servative activity and exertion in various parts of this populous and influential country, at a time which appears to me to be singularly important in our political history, and to engage, more, perhaps, than any time that I can remember, the sympathies and the earnest effort of every Conservative. It is said that the Ministry of the day are in the flood-tide of their foituae. I am a little sceptical of the confident assertion ; but, be it true or false, it is a transitory phenomenon, having 50 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. little effect upon the deep political changes which are going on by the side of it. When parties are changing their character, political names are altering their significance. New ques- tions are coming to the front, and new calls are being con- sequently made for Conservative self-devotion and activity. It is a very common thing for Liberal speakers to try to commend their cause to-day by references to what they are pleased to call the history of the success of their party in the past. That history is a littiC legendary. They are apt to claim for themselves the advantage of every good thing that has been done by anybody, and to ignore any mistakes or mishaps that may have happened to them in their career. THE TWO PARTIES, I am not going minutely to compare the performances of the two parties in the past. I am well satisfied with the record that we should have to show. In the matter of all the important legislation which affects the well-being of the community directly and the comfort and happiness of the individual we have no small performances to show, if we had nothing else to quote but the relaxation of the Criminal Code and the passing of the Factory Acts, the most beneficent act of legislation of this century. These things were the work of the Tory party^ and on them alone I should be content to repose our claims. With respect to the great political changes both parties are very much on the same level. Up to the moment when a change became, for good or for evil, inevitable, both parties retained their preference for the state of things as it then existed. Neither party wdshed to abandon the system of protection or to accept the system of household suffrage till just on the eve of the change. It was imposed upon both of them simultaneously in each case by a power superior to their own. In each case the political opinions of the parties were adapted to the circuni" Words of W a lining. 3 1 stances of the times. But the character of the parties in tlie past seems to me, in the present state of our politics in tliis country, to be a wholly irrelevant consideration. What we have to deal with is not the past but the present. The identity of present parties with the parties of past times is a matter with regard to which some curious controversy might be raised. I never quite understand how the Liberal party — of which not only the men have changed, but all the principles have changed — can be precisely identical with the Liberal party of the past. On this matter of identity we know that the distinguished statesman who is at the head of Her Majesty's Government, entertains very curious opinions. He appears entirely to forget that his opinions are not precisely identical with those which he entertained when he was a young man. I remem- ber that on one occasion, in a general denunciation of the Tory party, he quoted w^hat was said of the Tory Govern- ment of 1831: — that the Governments of Russia and Austria rejoiced at its advent to povrer, but that every friend of liberty repined. He entirely forgot that he vras a member of that Tory Government of 1834. And so, I think, when the Land Bill was introduced last year, he denounced with great vigour the wickedness of Parliament in having conferred, as he expressed it, behind the backs of the Irish tenants, the power of eviction on the landlords. They did this in the year 1860, when Mr. Gladstone was Chancellor of the Ex- chequer, and was consequently the dominant authority of the House of Commons. But this identity, which in the course of his constant transformations he seems to have forgotten in his own person, he is anxious to proclaim for the party to which he belongs. THE RADICAL PARTY. I entirely dispute the claim to that identity. The Whigs and Tories in the past have fought with each 32 Lord Salisbury s speeches. other, have criticized and condemned each other. But that was no more than the maintenance of the particular principles of government to which they were attached, and a criticism of the acts of the party to which they were opposed. Solely or greatly under the influence of the Prime Minister, a change has come over the action of English parties. The Radical party has come to the front, a party whose power feeds and depends on the existence of discontent. And as the power depends upon the existence of discontent, so they are not only quick to find it out, but eager to encourage and to promote it when it does appear. If they find anywhere a crack that is tending to divide two classes in the community, they hasten to drive in the wedge and to split it into a chasm. Their office, their function, seems to be to exasperate every animosity between class and class, to fan it into flame, and derive for it that electoral support which is the object of their industry and their action. Of course, I have no doubt they will tell you that their mission is to hear of grievances and to obtain their redress. Yes ; but a party whose mission it is to live entirely upon the discovery of grievances are apt to manufacture the element upon which they subsist. It is very good that crimes, if they exist, should be informed against and public justice should act against them ; but still the common informer is a common nuisance. Some time ago in London there was a man brought up for the crime of arson, and he was discovered to pursue this curious industry. It was the practice of the police to g-ive every man half-a- crown who should be the first to inform them of any fire that might occur. The practice of this man was first to set fire to a building and then to rush off to the police and earn half-a- crown for informing them of the fire. Now, that is precisely the position of the Radical party in this country. It is, no doubt, their function to detect and redress grievances, but if you watch them you will observe that their entire industry is Words of IVarJung. 3 3 devoted to the aggravating and inflaming of any animosities or grievances that may exist. Now, gentlemen, this party is a very different thing from the old Whigs and Tories. It is a party whose action cannot in any State be continued for any length of time without seriously compromising that unity between the various classes of the State, on condition of which alone a great Empire can be sustained. And let me say to those who are liable to suffer b;y this peculiar form of political activity, which has been developed into the foundation of a party in our time, that it tells more severely against the humbler classes of society than against the richer. Among their favourite topics are those subjects which may tend to inflame the poorer and the well-to-do against each other. The gi-eat man who is at the head of the Ministry is not entirely above this weakness. I remember that wlicn the issue of the last election was announced, he very assiduously took credit to himself because he was opposed in London, where, he said, wealth was produced, and in Westminster, where wealth v;as expended. PEACE AND CONFIDENCE. Now, it is quite right for a statesman to be forward in defence of the poor, and no system of political opinion which is not just as between rich and poor can hope to survive in this country. But it does not follow that a man is doing any service to his country, or is in any way serving the interest of the poorer class, by setting rich and poor against each other. Consider what it is that really concerns the industrial members of the society, whether they are workmen or whether they are tradesmen. Great political measures touch them little ; even if the pro- perty of the rich could be divided with the poor, how little value would it be to each individual workman or shopkeeper in this great country ! What is of all things important to B 34 Lord Salisbziry s Speeches, them is that capital should flow, that employment should exist, that wages should fertilize the channels of commerce. But capital will not flow unless there is confidence, and every system of political doctrine which tends to create animosi- ties between the various classes of society is directed full against that confidence which is vital to the existence of industry. In order that capital may flow, in order that enter- prise may exist, enterprise must be free and enterprise must be secure. There are plenty of people who are willing enough to spend money in idle luxury, instead of investing it in such a way as to cause employment of labour and the general growth of the wealth of the community ; and in pre- cise proportion as the free flow of capital is discouraged that tendency will gain strength. Look what it is in other countries — Asiatic countries, where government is notoriously insecure. There you find the greatest possible luxuries and the absolute absence of enterprise. Men who possess capital only hasten to enjoy it, because they know they cannot trust their government, and that if they were to try and increase their capital by remunerative and profitable employment, they would run a great chance of losing all. Now, of course, I am only indicating to you a dangerous tendency. We know very well that our social forces in this island are as yet too strong to allow any such dangerous results to follow to any perceptible degree ; but if you wish to see what is the real tendency of such treatment look at the sister country — look at the state of Ireland. Whenever the Liberals ask you to listen to them on the ground of their present achievements, just consider the case of Ireland. Ireland as it is is a Liberal creation. I know there is a popular belief that Oliver Cromwell and William of Orange were Tories ; but it is not true. The Whigs imposed those restraints upon the industries of Ireland of which we have heard so much complaint. The Liberals during the past Words of JVarning, 3 5 century have had the control of ahnost every measure de- signed for the improvement or the alleviation of the condition of Ireland. It was the Liberals who passed the Encum- bered Estates Act, which expropriated the old families of the land and drew the commercial investor in land — that very man whose misdeeds they now profess to denounce and whom they have calmly deprived of his property. FREEDOM OF CONTRACT. Well now, in Ireland you have had a policy which, in my belief, was objectionahle from two very different points of view, and in very different degrees. The land policy of the present Government is objectionable in the first instance because it interferes seriously with freedom of contract. Do not understand me to say that that of itself is necessarily a fatal objection. I am quite aware that Parliament claims, and must always claim, a right to interfere and dictate the circumstances of contracts if it thinks fit. But though it has done so — sometimes wisely, sometimes foolishly — the ten- dency of modern science and experience has been to dis- courage the exercise of that power to the utmost possible extent. That very law to which I have just referred — the Factory Act — -was an interference with freedom of contract ; a most beneficial and wise interference ; but, on the other hand, you have such an interference as the Usury Laws, which were abandoned by universal consent because they had not fulfilled any of the ob- jects for which they were set up. I think it may be said generally — but of course there are exceptions — that when the questions of life or limb or health are at issue, Parliament does wisely to interfere with freedom of contract. But when it is a question of money, when it is a question of what men should commer- cially gain or lose by a bargain, Parliament had better let b2 36 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. grown-up men settle with each other their own bargains, and that any interference on which it ventures is likely to be in- jurious to both parties. Of course, the chief evil — that is, the result of interference Avith freedom of contract — is to discourage the industry which these contracts aiTect. Men will not invest iheir money and they will not run the risk or give their labour if their efforts are thwarted in this direction or in that by the ignorant interference of a power which frequently does not understand the condition of the industry with which it meddles ; and the other evil is that there will be a constant effort to evade the interference of Parliament, or rather there will be a constant effort to get out of the conditions to which the law applies. Now, see what Par- liament has done for Ireland. It has laid down a Land Law, which settles on what conditions the people are to take the land, settles for the tenant, and settles for the landlord by a number of minute and, in my judgment, very vexatious regulations. But, of course, it was impossible to carry that prohibition, that restriction, to the largest class of holdings. The theory was that the Irish peasant was a mild, gentle, exceedingly simple individual, who was perfectly unable to take care of himself, and who required the interference of these gentlemen at Westminster to settle on what terms he was to pursue his industry. Even if that were true, it ob- viously was not true of the grazier who held land to the value of £-150 or £200 a year or more. Parliament has had to allow those who hold on that level — I think the limit is £150 a year — to contract themselves out of the Act. Now mark the result of that, because it is an in- structive instance of the danger of interfering -with freedom of contract. Every landlord knows that if he could got his land into blocks forming farms worth £150 a year, he could get himself out of the vexatious restrictions of the Land Act. AVell, of course there will be Words of Warning. 37 many landlords who will not take any advantage of the law and will be kindly to their tenants, though it be to their own hindrance; but you must not count on sentiment of that kind. The only wise legislation is the legislation that assumes that every man will act according to his own interests, and so in a great many instances — in the instances of weaker and poorer men who are struggling for their lives and who depend on their estates for the maintenance and the education of their families — you will find that they will take advantage of every relief that the law can give them. If a man of that kind were to go to his man of business and say, " What should I do to get out of the restrictions and privations that this Land Act imposes upon me ? " the man of business would reply, " AVhy, you will watch your tenants carefully, and the moment a man is in arrear with his rent, you will get rid of him. You should evict him without mercy, and then, when you have brought together a sufScient number of holdings to make up farms of £150, you will be free from the operation of this Land Act." I do not hold up such conduct to^you as humane or laudable^ but I point out to you the effect of this Act, judging it upon those principles of human conduct — those principles of self-interest which legislation must take as its guide. The effect of it is to make it the direct and imperious interest of the landlords of Ireland to insist upon those very evictions to which -we are told the whole misery of the population is due. That is the effect of interfering with the natural freedom of contract. SPOLIATIOX, But there is much worse than this in the legislation of Irish land. To interfere with the freedom of future contracts is well within the jurisdiction of Parliament ; but to take a contract that already exists, and say that one side of it shall keep all the advantages and the other shall have all the sacrifices of 38 Loi'd Salisbury s Speeches. advantages, that is not -witliin tlie competence of Parliament to exact. What do you imagine the effect Avould be ? Sup- pose you bought a cow, and Parliament comes down and says, " You have bought that cow. You shall keep your cow, but only pay one-third or three-fourths of the price." What do you suppose the effect of that enactment would be upon the man who sold the cow ? Very naturally he Avould never care to trouble himself with soiling cows again, and would keep himself well out of the way of the spoliating action in Parliament. That is what has happened with respect to the land in Ireland. Parliament invited men to come into the land. By the passing of the Encumbered Estates Act and other Acts it avowedly encouraged men to come and invest their savings in the purchase of land, and tlien, when they bought that land, it says, " The tenant shall keep the land, but you shall only have one-third or three-fourths of the rent." The effect of that, for which present expediency may be pleaded in its behalf, must be fatal to the future pros- perity of the country. Every man knov/s this action of the Government is not the limit to which those under whose influence it is acting would wish it to go. While the Govern- ment is taking a third or a quarter, Mr. Davitt is going about preaching that it ought to take the whole. Well, in these circumstances, do you think that men are likely to invest their money in the improvement of land ? Do you think they are likely to carry their capital to a country where such things occur? I lately saw a letter from Mr. Mitchell Henry, a Liberal gentleman, but a very philanthropic one, pointing out the enormous wealth that might be made by the application of money to the improve- ment of Irish bogs. Mr. Bright is very fond of dwelling on the water-power of Loch Corrib, and the wonderful results that would come to Ireland if that water-power could be utilized. Well, we had the other day a letter from a Words of Warning. 39 gentleman in the West of Ireland, giving a piteous account of the misery of whole districts, and one of the causes that he assigned Avliy there was now no remunerative employ- ment for these was the natural penalty which follows upon a land that is so afflicted when a Government, whose first duty it is to protect property, instead of that, becomes the spoliator of property in its turn. The agitators may tell you that it is the rich man, or comparatively rich man, who is in question, and that it is he who will suffer from the effect of such laws ; but commercial laws are pitiless in their action. It is not the rich man who will mainly suffer. AVhen confidence is destroyed capital will not flow, enterprise cannot be created, wages must fall, and commerce must stagnate ; and when the Government, under pressure of electoral motives, commits a breach of the rights of property, depend upon it in the long run the class which lives by industry will be the sufferer, because the Government has departed from the right way. THE STATE CHURCH, There is another matter to which I should like to refer because it is a question which justifies, I think, the activity and the energy of these associations whose addresses have been kindly presented to me, and which is likely to occupy in a very early time the attention of Scotchmen — I mean the Established Church of this country. Now, remember, you are constantly told that the distinction between the Conservative and the Liberal party is that the Liberals are the party of progress and the Conservatives desire to stand still. We know very well we live in a changing world, but all that we say is, before great changes are made in the fundamental laws and institutions of this country, and the principles which have been handed down for a long time, let us be certain that the chano-e 40 Lord Salisbtirys Speeches. commends itself to the settled uill and judgment of the people of this country, and la not adopted in obedience to the wishes of a chance majority. But when the Liberals tell you they are the party of progress, is it impertinent to ask them where they are progressing to ? K. man may tell you that he is a great walker, and is going on a profitable journey ; but if you asked him where he was going to and he was unable to say, you would think he was a very odd sort of undertaker. Where is the point to which this progress is to lead? I suppose there is some fixed point at which everybody, accord- to this hypothesis, would be a Conservative. What we wish to know is the point to which the Liberals desire to go, and there is no matter in respect to which this frankness would be more desirable than in regard to this question of the Established Church. Now, how has the question arisen ? Some 30 or 40 years ago, owing to a very unfortunate decision on the part of a nobleman to whom Conservatives did not look with much affection, the great schism of the Free Church occurred. But in the first instance it was a matter of purely religious concern, with which politicians were not required to trouble themselves. The Free Church fully recognized that it was the duty of the State to maintain an Established Church, but then came into the agitation the missionaries of discontent. Then came in that party who live by creating division between various classes of Her Majesty's subjects. They have turned this religious issue into a political one, and now the political con- flict in Scotland threatens the subversion of the most ancient institution of Scotland — one closely bound up witli all the vicissitudes of fortune of the country. It is not necessary that I should dilate to you upon the advantages of an Established Church. You know that it is at once the great security for the presence of religious ministrations Words of Warning. 41 alike in rich and in poor districts^ and at tlie same time, it is a security that the great influence of the Church shall be ex- ercised in a manner that is advantageous and in harmony with the welfare of the State. I do not for a moment say that the Church cannot exist Avithout the State. I know well that it is otherwise. But a Church divorced from the State runs two risks. There is always the risk that the individual ministers will be tempted, perhaps forced, to excite the zeal and to secure the support of their particular congregations by the constant administration of unwholesome spiritual stimulants; and there is another danger — that the Church itself will not be subject to that modifying influence of the laity, so favourable to toleration and to breadth, which is the result of the in- fluence which the Establishment confers upon the State. The loss of connection with the State will be the loss of great power for good and the loss of a security that the influence of the Church will be constantly exercised with wisdom and wdth moderation. I am more concerned to call your atten- tion to the dangers which these great and venerated institu- tions may run at this time. You were told again and again at the last election that the issue of disestablishment was not immediately before the country, and that the country would be consulted again before such an issue could be dealt with, but the point that I think was not sufficiently considered by those to whom the Established Church is precious in this country is that if you place in power the enemies of the Established Church, even though they may not at once proceed to the exercise of that power to its detri- ment, you place in their powder the opportunity of so modify- ing and manipulating electoral arrangements that at a future time the Church would be at their mercy. 42 Lord Salishtry s Speeches. ELECTORAL UXITV AND ACTIVITY. I can see tliat those desiring disestablishment, both in this country and across the border, are supporting the present Government in spite of many discouragements, in spite of being compelled very often to eat their principles and to approve of that which they should denounce. They hope that from this Government may proceed some manipulation of the machinery by which Parliaments are elected which enable them in the future to attain tlieir ends. It is against that you have to guard ; that is the necessity to guard against. The result of any particular election is the great danger which requires the constant attention of Conservatives. To those who consider the state of our institutions at this time, and the spirit which now dominates the conduct of affairs, it is alarming to see how great their insecurity and iusta- bility are. Everything depends on the results, Avhatever they may be, of the chance humour or the pleasing caprice of that one day on which a general election is held. You know what a general election is. You know the kind of questions which affect this or that constituency. You know how one constituency votes this way or that way because a particular harbour has not been made ; another constituency is animated by the temperance movement ; another by the anti- vaccination movement ; a fourth by a fondness for some local dignitary; and a fifth by the unpopularity of some particular local dignitary. And there are a thousand other secondary motives or transient motives, even be they of momentary importance, which go to make up the decision on which the proudest of your institutions may depend. You never know when the danger may be upon you. You never know when the moment for exertion may arise ; but you know that great institutions, such as your ancient Church of Scotland, are in the hour of an election com- The Dick e of Bucclcttch. 43 mitted to your keeping ; that if you then neglect your trust, evils follow that you cannot repair ; and I know no stronger incentive to that energy and activity of which these addresses I have now received bear such distinguished evidence than the consideration that upon the industry with which they pursue the means with which they achieve the great objects for which they exist will depend the averting of the danger that we all of us dread to look upon — the saving of institutions which gene- rations have looked upon with respect, the prevention of results which the latest generation of their descendants may regard with deep regret, but which no subsequent efforts shall have the power to reverse. Gentlemen, I feel that on this side of the border the exhortation to electoral union and to electoral activity is invested with even more importance than any words that could be uttered in England, because here the danger is more immediate and greater interests are at issue. When you are asked to help, when you are asked to join in the efforts which other Conservatives are making, remember that upon your refusal or upon your cordial acquiescence depends whether or not you will bear a worthy part in defending that institution which all Scotland is bound to honour and revere. THE DUKE OF BUCCLEUCH. (At Dalkeith, November 'i^^ 1882). [On the occasion of the presentation to the Countess of Dalkeith of a portrait of her husband, the defeated candidate at the Midlothian Election, 1880.] As an old friend for many years of the noble duke, and as a member of the Conservative party, I have been permitted to say a few words — and they shall be very few — in support of this motion [complimentary to the 44 Lord Salisbury s Speeches, Duke of Biiccleuch] which has been -now submitted to you. In appearing before this audience it is difficult not to remember that this particular hall has within the last two or three years acquired a historical reputation in reference to enterprises that were undertaken in this county against the influence and family of the Duke of Buccleuch, and in reference to certain very re- markable, and striking, and influential sentiments which were addressed to audiences here. They were shown to me this morning. If I were to repeat them here, I am afraid you might think they were so incongruous with the present state of affairs that I was laughing at you. MR. Gladstone's Midlothian speeches. I remember noticing that it was in this hall that the most thrilling, the most pious denunciations were levelled against those who pointed the terrible implements of modern artillery against uncivilized races. I wonder if it crossed the mind of the distinguished orator who uttered these sentiments that within three years he would be directing those who served the Queen to point far more terrible implements of artillery against the uncivilized races in another part of Africa. And there was also a sentiment about burning villages which took very much at the time — an appeal to the ladies of this county to think of the fearful sufferings of those who were turned out of their villages and of the guilt of those whose warlike operations led to the destruction of those villages. I wonder if it occurred to him that it would be his fate within three years to direct military operations which would have the effect of burning, not villages, but one of the proudest cities of the earth, and to initiate operations of which the effect would be the appalling misery that results from turning on the world the inhabitants — the peaceful in- habitants—of a vast city. I do not, of course, refer to these ^, r. , UNIVEES The Duke of JhuclcHch\^rt. 45 things for the purpose of insinuating that any nio>at:g»ik- hes upon the right hon. gentleman. I do not think so, but T tliink tliat events will prove to him and to you, and possibly ■will prove to others in this part of the county, that those pious and noble sentiments ^vcre uttered a little recklessly and hastily, that they were not really a just foundation for the measureless denunciations which were delivered at the time against the Government that then ru'cd in this country and at those who, like my noble friend and the noble duke, supported it, and that men will learn not to trust entirely to the effusiveness and the seeming religiousness of political denunciations, but to measure their just application to the facts before them. However, the matter which I wish to press upon your attention is of a more peaceful kind. I desire rather to dwell, not upon the defects of his assailants, but upon the individual merit of the noble duke himself. As a politician, he occupies a remarkable and very dis- tinguished position. His career, if you will examine it, has a remarkable merit of judgment and moderation, and far- sightedness which few of the passing generation of statesmen have imitated. At the great crisis of the Corn Laws in 1845, it was given to him, I think almost alone among the Ministry of Sir Eobert Peel on the one hand, to see that the position of agricultural protection was not tenable and w^as one which ought not to be defended, and on the other hand to see that the difference from his party in that respect was no sort of justification for changing all his other opinions on all other political matters whatever. And, therefore, it was he, 1 think, alone, who, wdiile joining the Ministry of Sir liobert Peel in that which Avas a right and necessary act, when that controversy was over quietly took his place in the ranks again by the side of those to w^hom his former opinions had ahvays united him. iMany, too many, of his colleagues, and Mr. Gladstone at their head, appeared to find 46 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. in that one difference of opinion a justification for renouncing all that they had ever supported and supporting all that they had formerly opposed. It is no slight merit in a statesman that he was able to resist the alluring example of so many distinguished colleagues, and to draw the line between adhering to doctrines that were obsolete and untenable and the opposite excess, to which so many of his friends rushed, of throwing over and changing their political convictions altogether. What he has been in public he has been in pri- vate — the same calm, moderate, equable, just, and energetic man. I need not dwell upon his private virtues to you, for they are well known to you by personal experience ; but it is impossible not to see in the influence which through a long life he has maintained a testiinony to the virtues by which that influence has been deserved. In some other lands it might be said his rank and his great wealth were of some account in the power he had obtained and the attachment that was tendered towards him ; but in modern Scotland, at least, that is not the case. Here, I believe, in this thriving and busy population, where the constant creation of wealth tends to stimulate the sentiment of equality ; here, I believe, if we have a man who has great wealth and rank, and at the same time preserves a vast influence and popularity, it is a conspicuous proof of the personal merits by which that popularity was earned. Through a long life he has devoted himself with unflagging and ungrudging labour to the various and complicated duties which his high position has imposed upon him, and he has obtained as his reward a widespread attachment which it has been given to few to obtain, but fewer still to deserve. Centralisation, 47 CENTRALIZA TION. (On Receiving the Freedom of the City of Edinburgh, November 27, 1882.) In expressing my most deep and sincere gratitude for the great honour which has just been conferred upon me, I feel that if anything could have added to its value in my eyes it is the kind words with which the Lord Provost lias accom- panied it. It is no slight satisfaction to me that at such a time he should have recalled to my mind that my family is associated with much that is dearest to Scottish memory, and that those who love Scotland best may look back to the work of my ancestors for no inconsiderable portion of the blessing of the heritage which she enjoys. It is, indeed, no slight honour to be associated with the distinguished men who have received, and received with gratitude, the recog- nition of this great city, for this city occupies a position un- paralleled in the world in its peculiar character. It is not only its splendid external aspect, it is not only that it is associated with the most historical associations, that it occu- pies a chief place in a nation, and that it has left its work so deeply graven on the world's history, but by the side of all this political and historical eminence it has an unexampled position in history and philosophy. The Lord Provost read over to you a list of names which certainly no other capital in Europe could surpass in the peculiar lines of thought and literary industry to which they devoted themselves, and the reflection of their intellect and their glory sheds a lustre on this city, and communicates a value to all the honours that it confers. The Lord Provost was kind enough to refer to my political past. I am well aware that he did so in a neutral and indulgent spirit, and that I will not obtain from him or from you an agreement on 48 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. many, perhaps, as it may seem to them, peculiar views that I entertain ; but I should be sorry if it were believed — indeed, I think it is utterly untrue — that the contentious matters in party politics exhaust the public questions on which citizens may feel a common interest. No doubt, the very vehemence of our contests seems to lend an extreme importance to them in our eyes — an importance which very often we may foresee that posterity will wonder at. But, however important they may really be, there are side by side with them questions not less important, questions not less dear, movements to nations not less momentous, upon which all parties may think together and work together. We are all divided on questions of property, on questions of religion ; but,, deeply as we contest these, perhaps we hardly notice the changes that are constantly going on, not im- pelled by the force of political movement or the strength of any political party, but working as naturally in the body politic as changes going on in tlie natural body, and changes Avhich may import more to the future life of the nation than matters that are anxiously contested. TWO AKTAGONISTIC FORCES AT WOKK. Among them it seems to me there is one question, one matter, with regard to which the city of Edinburgh holds a special position, and, like all who hold the foremost position, incurs thereby a special responsibility and duty. There are two forces — two antagonistic forces — at work in our body politic, changing its character and affecting its destiny. There is the old local liberty and old local self-government, in which men, each in their own localities, decide the vast mass of the ques- tions in which their lives are interested ; and there is against that the constant tendency to the aggregation of power in the central place of rule, that which, in the language of the day, wo call centralization, which in other countries has worked Centralization, 49 more powerfully than in our own, and has worked witli baneful effect, but which in this country is ever at work, and is j reducing consttint modifications in the relations of citizens to each other and the various parts of the country to the Government of the centre. Now, it seems to me that in this matter a city like PMinburgh — a city that in the past represented an independent kingdom, and now re- l)resents an independent kingdom, but in which the great majority of the governing actions of the community are no longer carried on — has a particular responsibility and duty. This process of centralization i3 not the fault of any one party ; it goes on, apparentl}', in spite of both parties. The way in which it works is not observed. The statescien who take office under any Government are naturally actuated by a desire to mark their term of office by measures bene- ficial to their country, and in order to frame those mea- sures they must take the advice and accept the assist- ance of the permanent officials who constitute the central department. It is in the nature of every human being to think that he himself is the best person to decide on the questions which have to be decided upon. That is a failing from which even those distinguished men who constitute our permanent and official Government staiF are not entirely free. The result is that the measures, as they come forward, contain in some of their details, not very generally conspicuous, provisions which subsequently tend to diminish the independcEce and self-government of the localities distant from London, and, in fact, of London itself, and to increase the amount of power which is placed in the hands of the central Executive Government. The effect is not much in each individual measure, but it all tends the same way. Each successive statesman, each successive Minister contributes his little mite to the heap, till it attains at last a tovrering proportion, and the result is that in 50 Loi'd Salisbury s SpeecJies. many matters — in the expenditure of public money, in the supervision of public works, in the administration of local justice, in the management of local, sanitary, and other affairs, there is a constant tendency to increase the power of those who are at the centre and diminish the power of those who are in the locality. Now, this, apart from any party question, is a very serious evil. The evil is of two kinds. In the first place, the work in the long run is not so well done. It is done more scientifically at first, no doubt. But it is done in formulas. Your case must fit formula A, for- mula B, or formula C ; if it does not fit into one of those three formulas so much the worse for you. There is no elasticity about it. You are handed over to that great modern dictator who is spread over the world under the name of " inspector " — a power whom I should describe, if I were to set up a temple, by setting up an image made in wood and clothed in red tape — and the result is that there is much less freedom and elasticity in the application of general rules when they are applied on a vast scale from the centre than if they were to be applied each according to their particular circumstances in a locality. THE POWER BEHIND THE MINISTER. But there is in my mind a greater evil ; the loss of the power of government in small local affairs is a loss in the education of the people* Unless men are trained by some work touching the government of their fellow-men, no matter in how humble a fashion, unless they have something of that training, they are likely to be swayed by any theory that may be offered, and public opinion becomes worthless. They are of no use to control those who are over them. They are cf no use as a tribunal of final appeal. We live in an age when the land is full of wild teachers, and our only security that the Centralization. 5 1 calm commonsense view of extravagant theories shall be taken is that the people shall be practised — no matter in how limited a capacity — in their daily life in the govern- ment of their fellow men. It is only on the condition that the education is kept up living and constant, that the reality of our institutions can be maintained. I have re- ferred to foreign countries before. You have only to look to France, where it has been the eifort of statesmen to diminish the power of the provinces and increase the power of the central Government. The consequence is that the establishment of free institutions is accompanied by constant risk and the greatest instability and danger. I have thought I might make these remarks as the first specimen of my ser- vices as a guild brother, because I feel that it is on commu- nities such as this that the foremost duty of defending local independence and local self-government should fall. It is vain for you to appeal to your political machinery, it is vain- for you to ask either party of the State to help, as we find that every statesman who holds a particiLlar Bill is in the hands of a permanent official. He, by the etiquette of poli- tical life, is master of his department, and his colleagues cannot interfere with him. If he has a m.ijority in the House of Commons, that majority blindly follows him; but at the end of the day, although not seen, the permanent official wields the whole power of the State. If you mean to resist his well-intentioned and beneficent, but most in- sidious and dangerous iufiuence, you must take that duty upon yourselves, and insist that, as our State grows, as new functions are created, as new and beneficial laws are passed, the first duty of assigning the management of those laws and the control of those new institutions shall be reserved to the population in the locality, and that the principle of local self- government, which lies at the base of our old institutions, shall be at the base of our new institutions also. I have only in 5 2 Lord Salisbury s Speeches, conclusion to repeat how deeply 1 feel the kindness with which this honour has been bestowed upon me by you, and the kindness of the language in which it has been conveyed to me by the Lord Provost, and to add that I shall deeply cherish the recollection of this day to the end of my life. THE IRISH DIFFICULTY, (At Hitchin, December 7, 188J.) I thank you most sincerely for the heartiness with which you received the toast of " The House of Lords/' and me as its representative. I hope that in time to come the House of Lords may fulfil the auguries which have been formed of it and prove a valuable bulwark to the Constitution. There is no doubt that times of trial are in store for it. There is a probability of greater activity of legislation on the part of the Lower House — legislation in a direction which we have too much reason to fear will be subversive ; and the circum- stances which that legislation will cause to arise will furnish a severe trial for the pl'udence and courage of the House of Lords, to which let us hope it will be equal. Of course, it is difficult to foresee the precise course which in the im- pending session legislation may take. We have passed three sessions of Parliament, and if you ask what we have done, the answer can be given in the one word, Ireland. Ireland has occupied practically the whole time of Parliament since this Parliament assembled, and for what I can see Ireland will occupy the whole time of Parliament until is is dis- solved. At all events, 1 am unable to join with thoso who see such a remarkable improvement in the condition of the country as to hope that it will free the Imjierial Parliament from the necessity of further concerning itself with its The Irish Difficulty. 53 affairs. A short time ago the Government were disposed to boast of the diminution of agrarian crime, but only two days back we have heard from a Judge upon the Bench tliat the diminution is more apparent than real and has taken place merely in the item of threatening letters, which a few months ago Mr. Gladstone assured us were not serious offences, but that was when they were numerous ; and other indica- THE rROSECUTION OF MR. DAVITT. We have been in State prosecutions before, and we have now one on hand — a State prosecution of a most remarkable character. That Mr. Uavitt should be pro- secuted for seditious language is certainly one incident of which no patriotic citizen can complain. But though the particular language littered by him seems to be very worthy of the notice of the Executive, the mode in which the prosecution has been brought to bear does appear to me singularly unfortunate and circuitous. We have had a Coercion Act in which it was perfectly possible to intro- duce any provisions necessary for punishing seditious speeches made in Ireland. Mr. Davitt was not a man who had at all concealed the nature of his opinions and his mode of political action, and it was easy enough to foresee the kind of language which he and his companions would be likely to use. It appears, however, that this Act of last session is of no use for the purpose of suppressing seditious speeches such as Mr. Davilt has made, but they had been obliged to disinter a statute passed in the 10th and 11th of the reign of Charles I., by which they can require a man to give security for his good behaviour, and if he does not give it, imprison him for an unlimited time. I have not made any particular researches with regard to the matter, but if I remember right the 10th and 11th of Charles I. was passed during the viceroyalty of 54 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. Strafford. It is generally said by historians — and indeed he lost his head partly for that reason — that Strafford's govern- ment of Ireland was slightly arbitrary ; but now that the most Liberal Government that ever existed have shown this marked preference for his methods, I suppose historians will revise their judgment. At all events, it must be confessed that this mode of keeping the peace by way of antiquarian research is likely to give a stimulus to a very interesting study. If you once set antiquarian lawyers to work there is no knowing what precedents you may find in the Statute Book, and, I daresay, among many other precedents that come down from Charles I., there are some which the Govern- ment would find most useful in the control of Ireland. It is my impression, and I believe, that the power of the Star Chamber has never been abolished in Ireland, and if that be the case the Government, no doubt, in the full integrity of their conscience, may find an admirable weapon at hand, and, if they use it, we shall be told that though in a Tory Government it would be the depth of wickedness, in a Liberal Government it is only the inspiration of genius and philan- thropy. This Government came in as the champions of peace, liberty, and retrenchment. We have seen them already this year as the champions of peace ; we see them now as the champions of liberty ; and next April many persons will receive a small bit of paper which will show them in the character of champions of retrenchment. UNCERTAINTY IN IllELAND. But I cannot help thinking that there is another lesson to be drawn from the persistence of this evil state of things in Ire- land. All these efforts that are made with various descriptions of refinement or brutality by those who affect to improve the condition of the Irish people have but one object in view. Whether it be the murderer on the hill-side, the utterer of The Irish Difficulty. 5 5 seditious siDeeclies, or the more prudent and cautious organiser of obstruction in Parliament, they all have this one object in view — to make England so weary of Irish connection that Irish independence shall be conceded. That is .the point at which they aim. But what is it that has given them this encouragement of late years? What is it that has encouraged them to believe that an object so deeply hostile to the inte- rests of this P]mpire, so contrary to the pledges o{ English statesmen, is attainable ? It is that they have found that upon matters which seemed at one time even more unchange- able, the application of agitation has effected a marvellous change in the convictions of English statesmen. My friend, Mr. Heathcote, referred in just terms to the land legislation with regard to Ireland. I do not wish to refer to it as a pri- vate wrongs tliough there is a great deal to be said on that subject; but I want to call attention to its effect on public policy. For centuries the English Government has stood steadily by the rights of private property. It has shown up to a very recent time no faltering or hesitation upon that subject. * Five years ago any one who accused the Liberal party of the possibility of such legislation as that recently sanctioned would have been treated as a libeller. Nothing whatever has entered more deeply into the convictions of English statesmen and legislators than that you must not use Parliament for the purpose of transferring property from one set of men to another set of men without compensation. But if this has been changed, wdiat is likely to be the eiFect upon men outside, men who do not know the particular char- acters of English statesmen and the springs which work English Parliaments? On the (question of the connection of England with Ireland, England has altered her mind tvro or three times. On the question of private property she has never altered until this time. " If, under the influence of agitation, seditious speeches, murders, tactics of obstruction, 56 Lo7'd Salisbury s Speeches, England has yielded up her convictions in matters as to which she Avas hitherto unshaken, is there not hope," these men Avill sa}^, " if we are only consistent and unscrupulous enough, that we shall force her to yield in a matter upon which we know from history that she has not always held so unfaltering a course ? " And if this feeling has been entertained, it has been greatly stimulated by the language proceeding from the Prime Minister indicating that the account was not closed ; that there was still something to be done ; that upon points indefinitely indicated the Government were still open to con- viction from Irish agitators. Why, even in this matter of the valuers, which is not a large matter — it is merely an arrange- ment for informing by skilled testimony those to whom the property of their fellow- subjects was given over by form of law — even in this matter, having allowed the valuers to be appointed, they waited until the pressure of agitation came, and then, without pretending that their opinions were altered, they dismissed them at the bidding of agitators. That is a small thing, though I believe it to be unjust to a class, but it is far more dangerous when one step after another is a proclamation to Irish agitators that the Government of England is in a yielding mood, and that the amount of concession depends upon the amount of pressure. THE LAWYER FLOURISHES AND THE FARMER DECAYS. As to Other matters we have no very clear intimation what the course of business will be. Two or three days ago a member of the Government Avho is credited with large influence in its councils, ]\[r. Chamberlain, in a letter to the electors of Wigan, with whom he had no par- ticular concern, informed them that the object of electing a Liberal candidate was for the purpose of reviewing our land system. I suppose that such words addressed to the artisans of Wigan were intended to convey no small or tech- The Irish Difficulty. 57 nical information, but to hold out to tlieni the prospect of a general scramble ; but the bait did not take, and a Conserva- tive candidate was returned. But as for the question itself, of course the language is vague, and you may attach to it various meanings. There are several changes in the Land Laws which many people, and I among them, would witness with- out dissatisfaction — changes such as those indicated by the Commission which recently sat. There is no doubt there is dissatisfaction as to the security which tenant farmers possess for the improvements they make in their land, and this is a dissatisfaction which it is very proper to examine and to remove. But those are matters in the eyes of politicians of secondary importance, though probably in the eyes of those interested they will be a great deal more important than subjects which occupy a larger share of public attention. The only caution Avhich I should wish to give with respect to legislation of that kind, which, however comprehensive in its general principles, must be carefully examined in its details, is that the danger which faces you is the increase of litigation. If you introduce a system Avhich is generally accepted by all reasonable men concerned in it, whether landowners or occupiers, it is a good system and it will work harmoniously, and good will result to the community. But if you force on any particular arrangements to which either side objects the inevitable result must be an in- crease of litigation and the only consequence of your legislation will be, not that the landlord or tenant will benefit, but that the lawyer will become exceedingly rich. I have the greatest possible respect for the lawyers and I always desire that they should get rich, but I wish them to do so at anybody's expense but my own. With respect to the matter of litigation it w^ould not be unwise to cast your eyes in the direction of Ireland, to which we have just referred in connection with this very matter. Apart from 5 8 Lord Salisbmys Speeches, the merits of the Land Act, which have already been con- demned in this room, it had this undoubted feature, that it was deeply distasteful to one of the parties concerned in its operations. Has not that taken place in connection Avitli it which I mentioned just now ? The result of it has been a vast overwhelming increase of litigation, so that they now say that the vocation of lawyer is the only one whicli flourishes in Ireland. THE LAND QUESTION. There are one or two other lessons which we may draw from the state of Ireland with respect to this ques- tion of the land. We hear a great many people strongly denouncing what may be called the system of old family estates, and urging legislation which should establish estates of a far more commercial character, having for their sole object the manufacture of corn. But this very scheme was tried by a Liberal Government some 30 or 40 years ago in Ireland. A measure was passed, having precisely for its object to get rid of a considerable number of old family estates which, for many reasons, were then supposed to be unsuitable to the country, and to induce the purchase of land by investors who should look upon it in a purely commercial spirit. But what has been the result ? These men at the invitation of Parliament came forward in large numbers, many of them being small men who invested the savings of a lifetime. They bought the land, knowing that they had come forward as commercial speculators, and they proceeded to let it at the market price, thinking they were doing no wrong. I cannot say that anybody can blame them for what they did, but of course the result was that many old customs were broken up, that a number of tenants suffered hardships, and that that state of general dissatis- faction and distress was brought about with which the The Irish Diffindty. 59 English Government now in vain attempts to cope. You cannot eat your cake and have it too. Old family estates have their disadvantages; commercial estates have theirs. You cannot, however, have both classes of estates. The same fountain cannot pour forth both sweet water and bitter. If you are asked to bring about a state of things which is to introduce a universal prevalence of the commercial type of estates, you must ask yourselves whether the plan that was followed in Ireland has brought either prosperity to the country or happiness to the class on whose behalf it was introduced. In the same way there are other points of view from which, in the tenants' interests, this proposal should be scrutinized. Mr. Chamberlain's language, especially when you compare it with the language of his supporters looks like an invitation to a sort of war against landowners. He seems to say, '^ Attack them ; they are not strong. You will easily get what you want out of them, and no harm will be done." I venture to prophesy, however, that whatever may be the issue of this campaign which he is opening against the landowners, it will not be the landowners who will be the principal sufferers, for the landowner has many ways of escape. UTOPIA. But supposing that the ideal which is put before you o£ the proper form of agricultural holding, of the right kind of land system, be encouraged- — supposing that it is realized, what will be the result ? People represent the prospect as a kind of Utopia for the tenant-farmer. Well, it may be a Tjtopia for the tenant who will exist some 25 years hence, but is it a Utopia for the tenant-farmer who exists now? There is a most excellent gentleman in this county (Mr. Prout) who published a book showing what in his judgment could be done, if certain very violent 6o Lord Salisbury s Speeches. alterations were made iii tlie land law, by the applica- tion of capital to the land. Now, I am not con- vinced by his calculations, although I readily render tribute to the labour and skill displayed in his work. The basis of his calculations is that the kind of tenant-farmer whom he contemplates is a man having £20 for every acre of land he possesses, and if you will scrutinize all these pro- posals for vast changes in our land system you will see that there is this idea at the bottom of them all — namely, that the mass of the present tenantry are somehow or other to be disposed of, and that in their place there is to exist a system of large capitalists, probably of large capitalist companies, who, no doubt, wlien in possession will draw from the land somewhat more than it now produces. But the first effect of the system must be hostile to the existing c^ass of tenant- farmers. We are told that the first effort of every patriot in agricultural matters should be to increase the produce of the land. Now I frankly deny that, though I admit that increased production is an important thing. It is not, how- ever, the most important. It is not so important as the maintenance in happiness and respectability of a large class of our fellow-subjects, and the undisturbed continuance of arrangements which have existed for a vast number of years. It is a benefit which you may very easily buy too dear, and I confess I am rather surprised to hear from the mouths from which they now issue these exhortations to increase the produce of the land, as if such increase were a matter of primary importance. There must be many here who remember the controversies on the subject of free trade. The defenders of protection argued that by the pro- posed system of free trade the produce of the land would be diminished, and the free-traders replied, " What means all this talk about increasing the produce of the land ? Is not The Irish Difficulty. 6i lius^ia open to you, and America, and from those countries M-ill there not always be plenty for the consumer to enjoy ? " Now, however, the very people who said that seem to forget that all these vast markets are open to the consumer, and they argue that it is a matter of primary importance that tlie land should produce as much as possible. By restoring pro- tection, I would remind them, thoy might perhaps do more towards stimulating production than in any other way. But these things are the excesses and extravagances cf men who have given themselves up with too much enthusiasm to one idea. I believe that if the theories which are put for- ward by land reformers were adopted in their entirety, and hastily, the result would be the most cruel injury to a vast mass of the less fortunate members of the agricultural com- munity. Dissension would be introduced among those w^ho have hitherto been on the whole upon good terms. Men would find themselv^es at daggers drawn who have hitherto agreed well together ; and if even the effect were a slight increase in the produce of the land, in the sum of human suffering which would be produced the benefit would be wholly effaced. THE farmer's friend. I have said these words because I feel there is always danger when exhortations for particular legislative mea- sures are addressed to a particular class who are told that in such or such modes they will find a remedy for all their suffering, and relief from all their difficulties. I feel that there is danger that they may accept without scrutiny the assurances which are made, and be seduced into giving their support to dangerous projects. Now, I hope that the tenant farmers of this part of the country will bear in mind the wisdom of the maxim, " Do not trust to advertisements." Advertisement, as you know, is systematically employed for 62 Lord Salisbury s Speeches, the purpose of making known the virtues of all agricultural implements 'j nevertheless those who are wise try the instru- ments before subscribing to the published records of their merits. I hope that something of the same wisdom "will be applied by you in the case of legislative proposals. Do not accept as a proof of their merits all the assurances which their authors may be inclined to give. My belief is that the worst service that you can do to the agricultural community is to introduce antagonism between its various members, and that if you do so, those who will be chiefly injured will be the weakest, the least fortunate, the least powerful members of the body. Therefore, I believe that the Conservative party Avill before long be recognised, if they are not so already, by all farmers as really maintaining the truo doc- trine, by the acceptance of which the farming as well as the landowning interests should flourish. It is only by adhering to ancient rights, and maintaining, whatever their application to changed circumstances, the accepted principles of law, that you can uphold and continue the harmony that has hitherto existed in the agricultural community ; and depend upon it, it is upon that basis alone, upon the basis of sus- taining ancient and existing rights and principles, that you can continue upon an assured foundation the agricultural prosperity which has marked this country for centuries up to the present time. THE DANGER OF A PARNELLITE ALLIANCE. (At Reading, October 30, 1883.) I have to thank you on behalf of the House of Lords most heartily for the kind reception you have given to this toast, and I believe that your feeling with respect to that The Danger of a Parnellite Alliance. 63 institution, and the necessary part -which it fulfills in the complicated machinery by which we are governed, is shared by the large majority of our countrymen. It is true that of late we have heard some discordant voices and some angry criticism, but I confess that when I read the remarks and the proposals of Mr. Bright in the North, with respect to the House of Lords, I was very much consoled by the reflec- tion that, just half a century ago, O'Connell had made almost the same criticisms and the same proposals, and that nobody was a penny the worse. I dare say that half a century hence some person analogous to Mr. Bright will, on due occasion, repeat those criticisms. Mr. Bright has justly observed, with regard to any measure for sweeping away the House of Lords, unless we suppose the feeling of this country has risen to a revolutionary point — which is not a contingency'' that I apprehend — unless we suppose that any such measure must receive the assent of the House of Lords itself, and that again is a contingency which I find it diflficult to con- template ; that, although it is possible that you may influence the House of Lords to pass other measures upon the threat of its own abolition, you cannot by any threat whatever, induce it to vote its own abolition. Fear of death will induce men to do other things, but it has never yet induced any man to commit suicide. I know that it is said that the House of Lords fails to fulfil its due part in our Constitution, because it is exclusively and invariably a Conservative body. Those who make that criticism commit the common error of spreading the experience of the actual moment over a long period of time. As a matter of fact it has not been so. I do not refer to the last century, but for a long time the Whigs were predominant in the House of Lords. But I do say that the leaning and bias of the House of Lords to the Conservative party, so far as it exists, date entirely from the accession to office of Mr. Gladstone. It was not the case 64 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. under Lord Aberdeen and Lord Palmerston. Undoubtedly the peculiar doctrines and policy associated Avith the admin- istration of Mr. Gladstone have produced a very decided effect on the policy of the House of Lords, and I doubt whether, on calm reflection and in the long run, that this judgment of the House of Lords will be in discord with the judgment of the country. No doubt it is a misfortune that the House of Lords should be confronted with so large a majority as exists on the other side in the House of Commons. It induces a feeling of hostility on the part of the Govern- ment, because they feel that the House of Lords is the only obstacle to the full carrying out of their desires, and they express that hostility in the ingenious but hardly equitable method of deferring as much as they can the submis- sion of all legislation to the House of Lords until both Houses have been sufficiently thinned by the operation of the heats of August upon the temperature of London. But these are mere transitory difficulties. I believe that the dominant position of one party in the House of Commons is a far more transitory phenomenon. No one will maintain, or has maintained, more strongly than I do that it is the duty of the House of Commons to watch, and to adapt itself to the permanent and deliberate judgment of the people of this country ; yet our history warns us that you must not always take the decision of the House of Commons as being an absolute and final declaration of the will of the people. VACILLATION AND IMPOTENCE. IMay I take this opportunity of expressing my satisfaction at the evidences of vigour and activity and of probable success which are presented by the association which I now have the honour to address. It is not ungermane to the toast to which I am replying, because it is on the support of the public opinion Avhich springs from associations such as this TJic Danger of a Parncllite Alliance. 65 that the House of Lords must ultimately rely ; and cer- tainly there never was a position of public affairs in which the activity of all who love the institutions of this country was more loudly claimed. "VYe know that the present Go- vernment entered office as the Government of peace and of repose. They were to counteract what was called the adventurous policy of Lord Beaconsfield. I think I remem- ber Mr. Gladstone charged us Avith ail the disturbances that existed when we were in office — the opening up of the Eastern question, and the upheavals that took place in Eastern countries — and that these occurrences had been produced out of our government, as if out of a virgin soil, and Mr. Bright told us that the result of the entry of the present Government vrould be this — there would be a great calm. Well, what do you think of this calm ? Now, if we are to adopt the rule that all the troubles which arise during the tenure of a Government spring out of a virgin soil owing to the fault of the Government, what shall be said of the virgin soil out of which the troubles of Mr. Glad- stone's Government have arisen ? It seems that the arduous, the delicate, and the critical questions which affect this country and the British Empire have continued to follow Mr. Gladstone's Government. Look at Ireland ; vre are no longer within measurable distance of civil war in that country. Peace is only maintained by the military aid rendered to the civil power. Look at India I It seems as if the Government were so enamoured of the pattern they set up in Ireland that they must introduce it there, and it seems as if the one desire they have is to multiply the difficulties of those who are of English extraction and who are bound to the English nation ; that they should be discouraged and disheartened, and those who are opposed to them filled with wild and unlawful hopes. They are so fond of the splendid results which their interference has produced C 66 Lord Salisbury' s Speeches. between landlord and tenant in Ireland that they are ex- tending it to the Highlands of Scotland and show strong inclinations to extend it further still. If we look to the colonies, what is the state of things which we see there ? I do not propose — I do not care — to follow the fate of the unhappy potentate, Cetewayo. I do not know in what pre- cise vicissitude of his unhappy career he is in at the present moment; but it seems as if Iler Majesty's Government let him out of prison when they saw prospects of peace, and then they let him go when he had destroyed it. So far as I can understand he was sent out to that country for no other reason than because it gave the opportunity of reversing the policy of the late Government, and also of showing the great contempt of those now in power for any promises or pledges given by thor>e who preceded them. We have affronted those who have supported us. We brought Cetewayo back here — I believe in order that by the sight of all that this country has to show he might be deeply impressed with British majesty and power. I should like to enter into his mind now, and see what his conception of British majesty and power is at this moment. We hear to-day that his neighbours, the Transvaal Government, are also in process of having explained to them the reality of British majesty and power. A deputation has come over here to receive the abandonment of the Convention — that Convention Avhich you will remember was adopted in fulfilment of a pledge given by the Government that they would restore the Queen's au- thority in the Transvaal. That Convention is the solitary obstacle that prevents the 40,000 white people in the Transvaal from trampling on the rights and property of the half million blacks who inhabit that country and the numberless tribes on the frontier, and you know that that Convention will be abandoned as readily as the former claims of England were. But what we have to ask is, what the effect of this The Danger of a Parnellite Alliance. 67 vacillation and the impotence of this colonial policy is likely to be on the spirit of the colonists who form so large a part of the power of the British Empire ? They are being told, not by words, but by acts more eloquent than words, that England is powerless to protect her dependencies at the ex- tremities of her empire, and how long do you imagine that their affection will survive when that discovery has been fully made. A KEFOKM AGITATION. At home we are apparently upon the eve of another reform agitation. Whether the precise measures are desirable or not it is difficult to say until we see them ; but this at all events is evident, that it is a change not adopted in pursuance of any great demand on the part of those who are to be admitted to the franchise. It is a change which will be forced on the country in pursuance of the rash pledges which politicians have given. It is not a change which is de- manded by the circumstances of the case or by the wish of those on whose behalf that change is to be effected. But that is not the circumstance about it which alarms me most. What I most fear is the result of a measure which is not produced by a Cabinet which, as a whole, believes in its reality or sufficiency. We have been told by one member, and that not the least powerful, Mr. Chamberlain, that he believes in nothing short of manhood suffrage and the pay- ment of members, and we know that any other alteration of the franchise will be in his eyes merely a transitory arrange- ment — that any moderate sentiments which may be expressed by the Government will be, as far as the whole Government are concerned, an insincere declaration at least in the eyes of one of them. Therefore, we cannot take anything they may offer as representing, on the part of the party that offers it, any sincere settlement of a complicated and delicate and c 1? 6S Lord Salisbury's Speeches. difficult question. Now all these circumstances are matters which should greatly tend to stimulate the activity and the energy of an Association such as this, because, although there may seem to be a wide distance between these great questions and the petty details of the work in which you are constantly engaged, yet nothing can be more certain than that on the manner in which you perform that work will depend the manner in which these great questions are determined. If you wish Ireland to be governed with a firm and just hand, which shall allow no hope of severance from tlie power of this Empire, if you wish our honour and our interests to be maintained in distant lands such as Egypt, if you desire that a sensible as opposed to a sentimental policy shall be pursued in India, if you think it of high importance that our colonies should be jealous of our Empire and be joined to us by ties of constant sympathy and constant co-operation and assistance, if you wish that changes in our ancient Constitution should not be made in obedience to the demands of mere party strategy, but should be the result of calm and deliberate consideration on the part of the people as a whole, your mode of giving effect to the desire would be to work with heart and will to perfect the machinery by which the Con- servative party shall be enabled to strengthen its forces and secure the support of the majority of our countrymen. Addressing a public meeting in the evening he said : It is a great gratification and honour for me to be invited to address an assembly of this kind, and I feel that in commu- ning together to-night upon the political subject of the day we are carrying on the work of the British Constitution and of the British Government as it is more and more shaping itself in these days. A long time ago all was done at Westminster. Now all is done, or mucli more is done, in assemblies of electors such as these. It is from you nov/ that the direct impulses of political power proceed ; it is to you we must now The Danger of a Parncllite Alliance. 69 address our arguments to induce you to look to matters, as we think, in a sound spirit, and to invite you to work toge- ther with us for the happiness of the people and of Ihc country which we love so well. DIFFICULTIES ALL ROUND. I know that a political meeting, as popularly regarded, is a means by which a certain number of men either retain or obtain office. That is the popular assumption, and I ought to play my part to-night in that spirit, and deal with the questions as if the one object was to substitute one set of administrators for another ; but I confess that in the present threatening aspect of public affairs it would be difficult to maintain that spirit. I feel it difficult to desire to occupy the posts of those who are now responsible for the Government of this country. On what- ever side you look, whether you consider foreign or domestic affairs, the future appears to be full of difficulty. Difficulties menace us on every side. Questions of the greatest difficulty are coming up for settlement. Trials are impending which will test the metal and quality of Englishmen to the utmost. I remember that when the late Government was in power Lord Hartington was rather fond of making it a reproach to us that we did not keep up a friendly alliance with the French Republic. I fully admit the importance of keeping up friend- ship with the French Republic. I think we did so. We were conscious of other duties ; we recognized the enormous duty of friendly relations with Austria and Germany in maintain- ing the peace of Europe, and undoubtedly we set a great price on the goodwill which existed between this country and those Powers. But we were at least able to maintain, as it seemed to me, very amicable relations with our friends across the water ; but I doubt if Lord Hartington has been very much more suc- cessful in solving the problem which he wanted us to settle. I see to-day that the awkward question of Madagascar is in 70 Lord Salisbiny s Speeches. some sense adjusted; but we are carefully informed that the French Government has apologized in a stiff and tin- courteous spirit, and it appears that our Government has replied in a similar tone. Well, of course that is a satisfac- tory way of maintaining an alliance. I wish that that was the only subject of difficulty which Lord Ilartington and his colleagues have had to deal with in connection with that country. They have been unable to renew the treaty of commerce, which as they know is of such vast importance to the North of England, and which terminated in their time. They have been unable to contrive to obtain any decent or tolerable terms for the extension of the Suez Canal, which is of such vast importance to this country. From Tonquin to Madagascar, from the Congo to Newfoundland, we hear of difficulties that arise Avith our impulsive neighbours. I am well aware that the course of alliances involves the concurrence of two parties, and you cannot justly, if they fail, lay all the blame on one. I have alluded to it for two reasons — first, in order to indicate to you the hollowness of that species of criticism by which the late Government was destroyed. If there is anything true in the proverb that time brings its revenge it has been fulfilled in the ironical and unkind fate which has involved the present Government in all the difficulties for which they were so forward to con- demn their predecessors. EGYPT. But there is another reason for which I have referred to this Madagascar question. You have, no doubt, read an account of the terrible extremities to which at that time it appeared that our representatives on those coasts were driven. Captain Johnson was a brave and gallant British officer. We are told that at one time he felt the insults to our flag so keenly that he had actually The Danger of a Parnellite Alliance. 71 cleared his decks for action, although the certain result of such action in the presence of the vast superiority of the French forces must have been the destruction of his vessel and all that it contained. Now, do not understand me to blame the French Government for this. I know they were not accomplices in the outrageous course followed by Admiral Pierre. Admiral Pierre has himself passed beyond the reach of human criticism, but the terrible danger into which it brought the relations of the two countries is also fraught with an instructive lesson. The French Government may be, and I believe is, anxious to live on terms of peace and good will with the Government of England ; but the French Government, owing to the plans of its institutions and the perpetual changes of administration which take place, is singularly weak in controlling the distant agents of its power. Men of the stamp and temper of Admiral Pierre are to be found in all parts of the Avorld. This consideration I hope will weigh with her Majesty's Government when they come to decide one of the most momentous of the questions that now await their determination. As you know, the question before them is — Shall they retire from Egypt or not ? I fear that the impression has been created, has gained ground with some minds, that it is possible for us by indirect means, even if we withdraw our forces from the country, by the action of that sublimated ethereal essence called moral influence, to maintain our power in Egypt. I fear if her Majesty's Government adopt any such ideas for their guide they would commit an error fatal for themselves and disastrous for England. Whatever the friendly sentiments of the French Government may be, you may depend upon it the subor- dinate agents of French power, if once material force is entirely withdrawn from Egypt, would spare no pains and shrink from no means for the purpose of ousting English influence and English power, and this would be done, and 72 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. done eiFectually, though the Government of Paris were entirely innocent of any complicity with such a design. I feel assured that, apart from all party politics, and without any relation to the division that separates Liberal from Tory, if the issue of the policy of the Government should be that, after all the efforts that have been made, after all the blood that has been shed, and the treasure that has been poured out, another Power should gain an influence in Egypt superior to, and dominating our own, the Government would meet Avith the almost unanimous condemnation of all parties and all sections. No issue more important for the external power of this country, for the maintenance of that empire of 9 which we are all proud, for the sustenance of our dominion in India, which so largely depends upon the power of free and rapid communication with this country, no issue more important than this has in our time been presented to any Cabinet for decision. This Egyptian question will test the poAver of the Cabinet, and on its issue the judgment of the people will be largely formed. IRELAND. But there is another matter which will greatly affect the opinions of the people of this country as to the manner in which they are governed. We have ISIr. Gladstone's own testimony that up to 1880 Ireland Avas in a healthy and prosperous condition. We know in what condition it stands now. I am not speaking merely of its social condition, or of the relations of landlord and tenant, which have been so often discussed, and upon which I do not now desire to detain you. I am speaking of the Imperial aspect of the Irish question, on the aspect of it as involving the connection of England with a country whose dependence on England is vital to our strategic security, and on our duties towards a large population of men, Protestant by religion The Danger of a Parncllite Alliance. 73 and of British blood and extraction, to whom our acts in tlic past have niade us bound by pledges of honour, Avhich, un- less we are the meanest of nations, we never can forgot. One of the most remarkable events of the present year has been the splendid reception which my friend Sir Stafford Northcote received in various towns in the north of Ireland. Much, no doubt, of that enthusiasm was due to his personal qualities and his services to the Conservative party ; but much of it was also an expression on the part of the Irish of the northern provinces of their unalterable determination that their fate should continue to be linked with that of England. This demonstration of theirs has thrown a new- light — at least a light that to many will be new — upon the Irish question and the question of Home Eule. What docs it mean ? It means giving over the northern province of Ireland to be governed by the other three provinces. It means that those who are kinsmen in blood or co-religionists in faith shall be abandoned to men w^lio have many high qualities indeed, but among w^hom disaiFection to this day has made terrible and fearful progress. If you give them Home Rule, retaining, of course, a nominal connection with this country, an external alliance ; and if these men defend themselves — these inhabitants of the north of Ireland — and if they are oppressed, if any outrageous measures of confis- cation are pressed against them after you have granted Home Rule, the legal right will be in the followers of Mr. Parnell as against them, and you will be called upon to support Mr. Parnell against your own blood and kindred. Is it possible that the people of this country should ever consent to an arrangement such as this ? I am sure it never could be done if the issue is presented to them plainly and openly ; and if ever it is done, it will be a fatal result to the so-called Kilmainham Treaty. It is not a treaty, it is the manoeuvres and the bargains of politicians. Lord Sali shiny $ Speeches. A rORECAST. Sir J. Mowbray has mentioned tliat deed without a name ivhich has been merely an understanding ; it was a mutual ijoincidence of opinion. I am told that such a strange coinci- dence of opinion threatens to happen again, and that there will be an irresistible desire on the part of Mr. Parnell to vote for the Government in all critical divisions, and, on the other side, by a strange coincidence, there will be an irresistible desire on the part of the Government to yield a portion of Home Rule to Mr. Parnell. But this portion of Home Rule, if rumour is correct, will be ingeniously veiled. It will be called a system of county government. You will observe that if the power of taxation and of local government is conceded to those who are hostile to the connection with England, it requires no great foresight to predict that the time must come when the pressure of their action, as against those with whom they differ in their own country, and as against the Government of England, Avill make the relations between the two countries almost intolerable, and, at all events, will give enormous advantage to the clamour for Home Rule. It is absolutely necessary that the people of this country should be alive to the danger that attaches to such apparently innocent propositions, and should insist that sufficient securities are taken that no damage or injury shall be done to the fundamental principle of the Im- perial connection between Great Britain and Ireland. And I iook upon the matter with some apprehension, because I do hot know Avho it is that is governing us in this matter. I know that Lord Hartington has said that it would be madness — madness, mind — to give an extension of local government to Ireland until Ireland has given pledges that she would not use it to weaken the connection between her and this country. It is needless to say that no such pledges are likely to be The Danger of a Parnellite Alliance. 75 given ; but though Lord Ilartington has said this, Mr. Chamberlain has said that no peace could be looked for in Ireland until this local government is given, and starting with these two public declarations of policy. Lord Ilartington and IVIr. Chamberlain are to meet next month in the Cabinet to settle the policy of Ireland. Now, I earnestly hope that Lord Hartington may influence his colleague, but, judging from past experience, I should say that whoever he may induce to follow his opinion, there is one person he never prevails upon to adopt it, and that is himself. THE DANGER OF DELAY. And do not imagine that this is a mere matter of a fight in the Cabinet upon an issue, and that no harm is done. Looking back for a moment to the Egyp- tian question, to which I drew your attention just now, you may remember that there was a system set up by Lord Beaconsfield's Government which, whatever might be said of it^ assured peace^ harmony, and agreement between England and France and the improvement of the condition of the unfortunate Egyptian peasant ; and when at length the present Government succeeded to office they took up the Egyptian question. A military mutiny had broken out, and a military officer of considerable power was at the head of it, and this power and influence grew with the success of the mutiny, and in 1882 the British Government issued the most formal and definite threats that if the existing state o£ things was imperilled they would interfere with force of arms. For six or seven months, however, they did not interfere. Lord Granville, an experienced and shrewd Minister, must have known the result of what was going on in Egypt. If he was unaware of what was going on, there were plenty of men at the Foreign Office to warn him of the acts of the rebels and what was going on, and at that time we now 76 Lo7'd Salisbttry's Speeches, know there was a permanent division in the Cabinet. Now I do not say this to blame ISIr. Bright. The doctrines which he conscientiously holds on the subject are well known. I do not wish to say anything in derogation of his motives, but he holds the strongest opinions against the lawfulness of warlike operations. lie was sitting in the Cabinet from January to July, and at the time the Cabinet was divided by his opposition. The division came to an end. The matter had to be settled. The forts of Alexandria were bombarded, and Mr. Bright was projected out of the Cabinet. But do not imagine that the difference of opinion was a matter of no account. During all the time Mr. Bright was making up his mind, when it was impossible for him, owing to his conscientious convictions, to agree to the policy of his colleagues, the evil Avas growing, and the prestige of England was falling. People were learning to treat her threats as of no account, and before she could make up her mind to interfere the condition of things, and all the guarantees for the progress of Egypt and the improve- ment of its peasantry, w^ere inevitably crumbling into dust. I remind you of this history because we are in danger that the same thing may take place with respect to Ireland. We know there is a profound schism in the Cabinet on the subject. We know that Lord Hartington and his party think one thing and Mr. Chamberlain and his party another, and we know from this Egyptian precedent that the inevitable result of this difference is that the policy of the Government will be paralyzed, and that some feeble compound of both policies will be offered to the country — something that will at once discourage loyal adherents of England and will give further hope to those who desire to separate the two countries, but which will not take a single step towards securing that absti- nence from political agitation, that addition to honest and The Danger of a Parnellite strenuous industry, wliicli is the only ^^^i;^ ^ T^^^l^JWe S^ T Y unhappy Ireland. _ PARLIAMENTAUY REFOKM. ^'^^Zjl.^_JlJ!Z- With respect to oar home affairs, we have lioard from a certain confession at Leeds that another lieforni Bill is impending. This is another matter wliich v/ill require the serious attention of the people of this country. In old times until about sixty years ago nobody thought of altering the Constitution of their country. I do not deny that there were good causes for alterations at that time, but we had no machinery for bringing the people of the country into consul- tation as to the mode in "vvhich these changes should take place. Now, if there is any thing which concerns the people at large more than another it is obviously the process and mechanism by which they are governed. In America there is an established machinery by which everybody who desires to alter the Constitution of the country can bring his plans before the country. In France there is a special machinery for revising the Constitution, but in England no such thing exists, and therefore it becomes us to walk very warily when projects of this kind are made, because the danger we have to face is this — the danger is that the party which is in power and has a majority in Parliament may use that majority for so altering the Constitution as to make its own majority per- petual. In consequence of the absence of any special machinery for revising the Constitution — for apparently our ancestors did not deem it necessary — there is nothing to pre- vent a party which has a large majority in Parliament from using that majority for the purpose of making such arrange- ments as shall in great measure make their own domination permanent. We have had Reform Bills — we have had two of them, and I have no doubt we shall have more. Pro- bably we have a Reform Bill impending now, but before that 7^ Lo7'd Salisbury s Speeches. is passed — the idea of the settlement of any question is an idea that no one will admit in the political vocabulary — I hope we shall arrive at some agreement as to the conditions under which such changes are to be made. On the Reform Bill that took place in 1832 there was a dissohition after the Bill had been produced, which gave the nation a distinct power of deter- mining whether it liked the Bill or not. It did like the Bill, and accordingly the Bill was passed, Again, in 18G7, a Reform Bill was introduced, but it was introduced by a Government in a minority, and therefore there Avas no dan- ger of its being used for such purposes as I have suggested. But you are now presented with a new condition of affairs. You have a Government with an enormous majority in the House of Commons. When there are proposals to change to a very great extent the constitution of Parliament and the mode in which this country is governed, I confess I think it would be far more in accordance with the spirit of our institutions if, before they took so vital a step, they allowed the peojDle of this country to know what their proposals were and to decide upon whether they would accept them or not. REDISTRIBUTION FIRST. "With respect to the mere increase of suffrage, as far as I can judge, though I know the extreme hazard of making political predictions, I do not think that the results would be very great ; but there are more difficulties in that change than perhaps at first sight appear. However, I do not for a mo- ment entertain the idea that the Government will present to us a scheme for the alteration of the suffrage without telling us what "their intentions as to the redistribution of seats may be, and I will tell you why I think that is improbable. In 1866 a similar proposition was made, and a motion con- demning it was introduced in the House of Commons. That motion was seconded by Lord Stanley, who is now the Earl The Danger of a Parnellite Alliance. 79 of Derby, the Chief Secretary for the Colonies, and lie showed in the most convincmg manner the utter impossibility of separating the question of the suffrage from the question of redistribution. I believe his speech, which was then spoken of as unanswerable, would be a perfect mine of argument against any proposal for such a separation, and I do not believe that any Government can commit itself to such a policy. It is such a proposal as though you were to vote the proposals of an architect for making some great change in your town without first seeing the plans on which the archi- tect proposed to go. As to the point of redistribution, it is a matter, I think, that ought not to be decided Avithout allow- ing the people of this country to have their voice in it, because on the arrangement of the redistribution the possession of political power in the future will very largely depend. In America they have a plan of giving to every political idea some forcible name which remains fixed in the memory, and there is a process there called "jerrymandering," It was derived from a Jeremiah Mander, who was a great politician in his day, and by the process they so arranged constituencies that a small one might become a large one. Suppose that this borough of Heading was divided into ten wards, and that there was altogether a very small majority of Liberals over Conservatives, it would be perfectly possible, by judi- ciously arranging your wards, so to spread out your majority that the ten representatives of these wards might be entirely on one side. If you wish to diminish a hostile minority, spread your majority over as large a number of constituencies as you can. If you wish to prevent a hostile majority doing so, concentrate that hostile majority into as few constituen- cies as you can. That is a secret well known to those who have the organization of political arrangements, but the existence of that power makes it a matter of absolutely supreme importance that the Government should not go So Lord Salisbury's Spec dies. behind tlic back of the people in making any arrangements of this kind, but that they should lay upon the table of Parliament any proposal that they make, and that the linal enactment should not take place until the people had been consulted by a dissolution. That, I believe, Avould be in any case a -wise and constitutional policy, but I need hardly point out the extreme importance of this question as it affects Ireland. You cannot separate Ireland from England. You cannot largely interfere Avilh the suffrage in Ireland without very materially affecting the balance of the forces with which you have to contend in maintaining the integrity of the Empire. I am told that sufficient notice Avas given of this matter by the speeches that were made before the last elec- tion. Well, the most important speeches that were then made were, as we all know, made in Mid Lothian. I have read the Mid Lothian speeches, and the only suggestion I can find to enlighten us on this matter is a suggestion, made no doubt in the interests of Scottish constituencies, that distance from the metropolis justified a greater number of members than population would furnish a reason for. That was made to answer the objection that the numerical test would give to London a great preponderance and might leave Scotland rather in the cold. But if that is the only guide that wo have as to the future Redistribution Bill it makes me the more anxious that it should be submitted to the people of this country before it is adopted by Parliament, because what that means is that the counties of Caithness or Sutherlanil — or, rather, say Kerry and Mayo, being the furthest from the centre of affairs — would have the largest number of members. If that principle is impartially applied conceive the condition of the House o^} Commons if there was a largo excess of Irish members over the number that now adorns that assembly. TJie Danger of a Parnellitc Alliance. 8i CONSTANTLY MENDING THE ENGINE. You have probably read much of the difTerent claims of the various parties upon your support. In the eyes of many advocates of the Liberal party it seems to them suffi- cient to detail the victories, or so-called victories, of that party in the past. Such history is of a legendary character. I see that Mr. Bright occasionally and, I think, other great authorities attribute the carrying of free-trade to their political party. Mr. Bright has every reason to be proud of the car- rying of that policy, but he has no right to lend a portion of the credit to the Liberal party. The first free-trader, so far as I remember, -was Mr. Pitt, and Lord Liverpool and Mr. Huskisson were free-traders when nobody else was. Lord Melbourne, the head of the Liberal party fifty years ago, declared that anybody was mad who gave up protec- tion. Yet it was given up afterwards by Sir Hobert Peel, who was then a Conservative. I note, therefore, that the history which would ascribe free trade to the Liberal party is, perhaps, a little tainted with inaccuracy. I demur alto- gether to the principle of this judgment. Would any of you go to an apothecary's shop because the previous tenant was a very good man at curing rheumatism ? You would say, "It matters little to me whether the former tenant was a skilful man or not ; all that concerns me is the ekill of the present tenant of the establishment." It is only the existing party, whether Liberal or Conservative, that really concerns you. Success, wisdom, and justice do not stick to organiza- tions or buildings : they are the attributes of men. It is by their present acts and their present principles that the two parties must be judged. But I will tell you 0:1 what main particulars, at all events as regards domestic policy, the Liberal party are in error. In the first place, instead uf considering measures which are actually required for the 82 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. benefit of the people, they always turn aside to take down or alter some institution, and they give up to whac they call reform the time and energy that should be devoted to improving the condition of all classes of the country. No doubt, in its way, properly accepted, reform is a very good thing. It is a very good thing to have the best locomotive and the best carriages on the railway, but if you perpetually keep the engine in the slied, and never run any trains because you are constantly mending the engine, no one Avill say you are fulfilling the duties which attach to a railway company. If you tell the Radicals there is any abuse, instead of trying to mend the abuse, they begin to mend the body by whom the abuse is to be amended, instead of going straight to the matter; they persist in perpetually taking the machine to pieces. The result is the legislation of Parliament is smitten with a sterility, and we are constantly engaged, not in arguing what ought to be done, but who is the kind of person that ought to do it. SETTING CLASS AGAINST CLASS. But a much more serious evil appears to me to attach to Liberal propositions. At the present time we have great difficulties to contend Avith, we have great evils to remove, we require for the purpose the united efforts of all men of goodwill and of all classes in this country. It is a mistake to say anything merely to produce dissension and bitterness between those who ought to co-operate for the country's good. Take the case of Ireland ; twelve years ago the Liberal Government might have had the opportunity if they had chosen of solving the Irish question without setting class against class, by instituting a system of peasant proprietorship, slowly and zealously, but effectively, wedding the people to the land. But instead of that they have gone into the thorny path of The Danger of a Paniclliie Alliance. 83 creating dissension between landlord and tenant, and putting class against class, and of which this generation may not see the end. Take another question in which I feel a great interest — the housing of the poor in our large towns. I hope that much good may be done in that direction, and that it maybe the privilege of the present generation to assuage a vast amount of human misery. But I see symptoms in many quarters of an inclination to turn men aside from the prac- tical question how to relieve those evils in order to get up a fight between the landowning class and the rest of the country — a question on which I do not desire now to express any opinion, but which will certainly place powerful classes at issue and interfere with the object which we have in view, and may defer for generations the remedy which we seek. There is a peculiar error to my mind which the Radical politician constantly commits in his efforts to ameliorate the condition of the people of this country. He appears to approach every question in order to find out exciting material for hounding on one class against another. I do not believe that this is progress. "We have enormous difficulties to encounter ; we have a great population ; the sources of prosperity are not flowing so abundantly as in the past, and we find that the opportunities of industry are not numerous, and, therefore, the means of keeping the people from great suffering are engaging the minds and thoughts of political men at the present time. It is a great, arduous, and almost superhuman task, and it is a task to which we can only prove equal if we pull together and act together in trying to fulfil it. They are no true friends of progress who persuade you that these objects are to be reached by generating quarrels. If we wish to remove the blots from our Constitution we must do all we can to act together, and it must be your task, yours the constituencies, to discourage the policy which assists in the manufacture of grievances and increases the ^'4 Lord Salisbury' s Speeches. animosities wliicli exist among the various sections of the community. It is a great mission which the present genera- tion has to perform to make tlie conditions of life more tolerable to all Avho exist in these narrow islands. It is only by hearty co-operation, it is only by maintaining harmony and good-will among all classes of the community, that we can make England, not only greatly respected abroad, but happy, prosperous, and contented at home. LIBERAL AND CONSERVATIVE POLICIES. (At the City Carlton Club, November 22, 1883). My Lord Mayor, this has been in many respects a very satisfactory evening — very satisfactory in that it has drawn together members of the principal Conservative clubs of the greatest city of the world, a city on whose shoulders of old lay the burden of defending the liberties of England, a city which now, in its closer inclination to the Conservative party, is still fulfilling the functions which the ancestors ot the present citizens performed. We have heard since we entered this room that a considerable electoral victory, as bye elections go, has been won by the Conservative party, and is has been very naturally a subject for congratulation in the speeches that have been addressed to us to-night. 1 heard it with very great pleasure, not only because it was the addition of another vote on the right side, not only be- cause it was the addition of a very able and excellent member to the House of Commons, but also because it indicated what I hope will be the path of safety through dangers of considerable magnitude. Liberal and Conservative Policies. 85 ONE OF THE GHEATEST DANGERS IN THIS COUNTUV. Yen have heard, 1 have no doubt, tliat just before tliis election the Liberal candidate was interviewed by the representatives of the Irish electors; certain tests were proposed to him, and at the end of the interview the Irish electors pronounced themselves satisfied, and the Irish vote was accordingly given for the Liberal candidate. Now, that process, which at a general election will go on in many a constituency in this country, is one of the greatest dangers of this country. If the offer of the solid Irish vote can purchase the adhesion of a sufficient number of Liberal cmdidate?, it is difficult to foresee how far the danger and perplexities of this country maybe carried. But the remedy is near at hand. Although many Liberals are partisans enough to be willing to sell anything, even the integrity of their country, in order to gain an election, that is not the case with the whole party. I believe that in the present instance a sufficient number were found who disdained any such bargain and any such alliance, and I believe that if such propositions are made in the future you will find that many moderate Liberals will prefer the integrity of their country and their duty to their Queen to any passing victory which a questionable alliance may procure for them. And I cannot help noticing the fact that the member who has been brought in for York was himself, I believe, a Liberal, and was certainly the son of a former Liberal member for that city. He therefore indicates the direction in which the current is flowing. The word '^ Liberal " under the guidance of those who now control the party has entirely lost and changed its meaning, and the more moderate and the more estimable of its followers are beginning to discover the fiict. I cannot pass on without noticing another melancholy piece of news which reached all of us before the commencement of our S6 Lord Salisbttry^ s Speeches. dinner to-night. This event in Kgypt must have caused great sadness in every heart, for there could be no doubt that many English officers had been struck down in the performance of a difficult military duty \ and our sympathy for their relatives and our admiration for the conduct which had led them to this fate could not but be deep. In the presence of this recent news, I should be sorry to go far into the political considerations it suggests, but I cannot avoid connecting it with those sug- gestions which have been made that the time has come for our evacuating Egypt, that the time has come for trusting British interests in Egypt to the support of a native force. I think, at all events, that all those ideas will have disappeared to-morrow morning like an unwholesome dream. THE GOVERNMENT OF LONDON. It is impossible that the speakers this evening should have avoided referring to the peculiar position in which the City stands with regard to the political business which it is supposed will engage the attention of Parliament. We do not know whether the City is to be brought under the harrow or not. The Government prudently refuses to speak. I think the probabilities are that, in the entire absence of any desire for a Eeform Bill, and the entire absence o£ any considerable desire for a change in the arrangements of the metropolis, it will be thought that meddling with the metropolis is, on the whole, the least dangerous process of the two. Well, if that is the case, I can only heartily congratulate the City that the crisis has come upon them at a time when their fortunes are entrusted to so distinguished and so courageous a champion as my right hon. friend the Lord Mayor. He has already let the world know in no indistinct terms what his opinion is, and I think by that declaration of opinion he will probably have decided many doubting minds. At all events, it is a Liberal and Conservative Policies, 87 matter on which you may be sure Parliament will be very accessible to the opinions of those who are principally con- cerned. It is not a matter on which any great political feel- ing can be aroused ; and I trust that the City generally may be animated by the determination which animates their chief magistrate. As for arguments, it would be premature to enter much into the question, as my right hon. friend has in a few words really exhausted what has to be said upon the subject. It is absurd to think of it as if it were a question of self-government. Nobody grudges the various communi- ties which exist in the metropolis the mont complete forms of self-government which they can desire. The question is not between self-government and no self-government, but whether you are to have a vast heterogeneous, ill-compacted area, or whether each community is to have the privilege of governing itself. "\Ve are told that nothing can be done until the pre- sent anarchy of London is relieved ; but if it is anarchy that Finsbury should not be governed by the same municipality as that which governs the City of London, I do not see where the matter is to stop. The metropolis is an enormous aggre- gation of human beings, and no municipality in the country can be cited as a guide for its future organization. It differs from other municipalities in every respect ) even from the largest towns in the country. It has not grown up as they have from a common centre by a common law of growth. Greenwich and London were not originally united, as some people seemed to imagine ; they have grown up separately, and have been included for certain purposes in a common area, but there is no community of citizenship or of social life between them, and there is scarcely any com- munity of interest between those who inhabit the extreme "West and the extreme East of this vast metropolis. What will be the effect of putting them all under one muni- cipality ? There seems to be an idea that you make rauni- 8S Lord Salis bit jy 's Speeches. cipal power in proportion as you make a large municipality. The truth is the other way. If you do make it large, you in proportion diminish its power of doing business. What hinders everybody in doing its work is the abundance of the eloquence which is disj)layed ; it is that which blocks the Courts of Law, it is that which blocks the House of Commons, and I wish I could say it was that which blocks the House of Lords. And there is no doubt that, assuming the most entire patriotism, and the most complete abnegation of self, and the most absolute determination to do its duty on the part of this immense municipality, if the members of it are numerous their debates must in proportion be lengthy and the amount of business transacted must be small. When you rely, as you must rely in the main, on unpaid labour, it is a great mistake to tax it with too vast an area of duty. Men who have other occupations can only devote a certain portion of their leisure to the performance of these public duties. Give them a small amount to do, and they will do it well. Give them an excessive amount to do, and they will delegate it to their professional advisers. And far be it from me to say a word against professional advisers. I know their ability and their integrity, but I have observed that they are animated by the enthusiasm of their profession, and that their government is not the most economical which it is possible for human wisdom to devise. Professional ad- visers when they advise are admirable advisers, but when they govern they are apt to forget that the constable must not be outrun. The real point, however, is to avoid being misted, as we so often are in the present day, by the mere glamour of imagination. There is a kind of luxury in upsetting a corporation which has lasted for 800 years. There is a luxury in setting up the biggest corporation over the biggest city that has ever been known. But we must guard against these intellectual delusions, and I believe that Liberal and Conservative Policies. Zc) London -will be better and more efficiently governed if moderate areas of government are selected than if these dreams of great legislative changes are realized. SUEZ CANAL. There is another matter -which also interests the City of London very mucli just at tliis moment on which I must say a word — it is eminently opportune at the present moment, because M. de Lesseps is in this country noAV — I mean the question of the Suez Canal. And in referring to it I desire to speak, as we all must wish to speak, with the greatest veneration for one whose peaceful victories have placed him in the rank of the greatest men of the age. The gratitude of mankind, and especially of commercial man- kind, to M. de Lesseps ought to be unbounded ; but while Ave desire to entertain these feelings and desire to express them, let us remember this is a question of business. Mr. Goschcn recently, addressing himself to this subject, said he utterly declined to inquire into legal technicality or into the precise claims of M. de Lesseps. These are his words : — " lie would not disregard the claims of M. de Lesseps, because other countries might think worse of us than they do if we did disregard them." This is not business ; but this is the policy of Mr. Goschcn. There is nothing that stands in the way of an arrangement sucli as the citizens of London Avould desire, except the legal claims of M. de Lesseps, and the technicalities which Mr. Goschen despises ; and remember that these are not things to be complimented away. We are the trustees for the commerce, for the prosperity, for the in- dustry of our fellow citizens Avhich depend enormously on the mode in which this difficulty is solved ; and w'e have no right to compliment it away and to give it away as a civility. We have no right to disregard those considerations and those legal technicalities, for they are the only things which stand 90 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. in the way of the establishment of a canal under British guidance, which is that which would really suit the commerce of this country. I said that they were the only things ; but matters, I must admit, have been seriously changed by the unfortunate pledge which Mr. Gladstone allowed himself to give — the unfortunate opinion which he expressed in the House of Commons in favour of the claims of M. de Lesseps before they had been submitted to any general discussion or to any impartial legal investigation. The result is that the feelings of a great people are brought into question, and a settlement may be more difficult than it would have been if that utterance of Mr. Gladstone never had been made. It probably was to the commerce of this day the most costly speech that ever a IMinister uttered. I will only say this, that if, in consequence of the impression which that sjDeech has made, a settlement really satisfactory to the commerce of this country cannot now be arrived at, let it rather be de- layed than that our signature should be given for a long period of years to a settlement which is not satisfactory, llemember that the supposed chiims of M. de Lesseps are not merely to a financial monopoly, but to what I may call a political monopoly as well. If it were merely a financial monopoly — I do not say that his claims are justified even so far as that — but if it were a financial monopoly, something which any sovereign may very fairly concede to any under- taking, still that would be a m.atter that could be arranged by giving compensation. I would be the last to recommend that a man who deserved so highly of the European com- munity should not get a rich and an ample reward for all his trouble. If it has gone far beyond a financial monopoly, he has a serious claim that the government of the canal should be in French hands, and that the administration of it should remain in Paris. I agree with Sir George Elliot, that if that state of things is permanently to continue, it Liberal and Conservative Policies. 91 will produce an amount o£ friction and ill-feeling between the commerce of the two countries that will risk more than the canal is worth. But that political monopoly is not a thing which it is competent for the Government of Egypt, or the Government of Turkey, to give away without the diplo- matic assent of other Powers. It is a matter entirely within the diplomatic field. As for the claim that Frenchmen should control the channel through which English commerce is carried, whether it be this channel or whether it be another, that is a claim which cannot be defended under the ordinary law that applies to decisions of Sovereigns as regards their own country. It is a claim which can only be defended on diplomatic grounds, and without the consent of the Powers concerned it is a claim of no value whatever. THE DEFEXCE OF PKOPERTY. When the last election was declared, Mr. Gladstone con- soled himself for the crushing defeat wdthin this city by saying that the City of London was a place of accumulated wealth, which he seemed to think was the severest reproach he could address to you. Well, 1 believe this is a characteristic of the City ; it is a characteristic Avhich brings with it great power and imposes upon it great duties ; for no one can be so blind to the signs of the times as not to see that, chiefly owing to the conduct of the present Government, the ques- tion of property, in its largest sense, is not in the position in which it was some years ago. I do not for a moment admit that the Conservative party has no other duties than the defence of property. It has many other most important duties, but, undoubtedly, as the institution by which industry is able to work, by which numbers are able to live, by which the power of the empire is sustained, property is the special object and care of the Conservative party, and the defence must be carried there where the attack is strongest. Lord 92 Lord Salisbury' s Speeches. Northbrook was very much scanchilized in a speecli he delivered some days ago, because the recent legislation with respect to Ireland was characterized by iny right hon. friend Mr. Lowther as robbery. Well, I am afraid Lord North- brook must accustom himself to that emotion, because I think that description of it is likely to be very frequently repeated. And do not let him imagine that this is a mere Tory prejudice. I will not give au opinion of my own on the subject. I should, however, like to read to you the opinion of a man Avho is not, and never was, a Tory, and who has expressed his opinion quite clearly as to the character of the recent legislation in Ireland. These are the words of Lord Grey, published two months ago. He says : — " It is clear that under the Acts of 1870 and 1881 confiscation of property has taken place upon a scale unparalleled in any civilised nation in modern times." They are always telling us that the Liberal party has per- formed great things in the past. Well, be it so. Lord Grey was one of the men who performed them. Lord Grey was a Liberal with the same opinions at the time wdien Mr. Glad- stone was a Tory. He has never shown any inclination to change his old opinions, or to desert his old colours, and he now stands in a position of absolute neutrality between the par- ties, and is singularly fitted by his long experience, his great abilities, his unspotted reputation, and his perfect freedom from any partisan prejudice to pass an unbiassed judgment on the events of recent times. As far as man can attain to the impartiality of history in his lifetime, Lord Grey is in that position. A man so placed has given you his verdict that the confiscation of these Irish Land Acts — which they tell you are so innocent — has been unparalleled in any civi- lised nation in modern times. Liberal and Cause rvaiive Policies. 93 MORE CAPITAL OR EMIGRATION. Its effects in Ireland have been bad enough. You have there a population suffering from great misery. AVhat is the remedy for that misery ? Either to bring capital to employ thera, or to induce them to go elsewhere. But that issue is closed by the Government by their un- happy policy with respect to the land. Capital is not deceived by the specious phrases with which the intro- duction of the Land Acts was covered, or by those appeals to justice that have been invented for a purpose and in order to suit the exigencies of the existing crisis. And until the impression of this unhappy legislation has worn away, and till we find by experience that the Government are animated by a better mind, capital will sooner go to Honduras than to Ireland. ^Yell, the other remedy is emi- gration ; but what hope have we to induce men to emigrate as long as they believe they have a fair and specious ground for believing that if they will only squeeze the Government they can obtain a great deal more than they have yet ob- tained. As long as there is more to be got by the practice of agitation and of outrage at home, they will not adopt that which is a healthy remedy for every population that cannot find sufficient exercise for its energies and sufficient support for its members at home — seeking new fields where better opportunities exist. THIS U^■IIAPPY LEGISLATICX. Both these remedies are closed to the Government by the policy they have pursued. This is not the only evil which this unhappy legislation has produced. It has produced an outbreak of those doctrines which are hostile to the existence of property and which we have not seen in our ireneration before — those doctrines 94 Lord Salisbu7^y^ s Speeches. which hitherto have been comparatively confined to a foreign soil. You have heard of them in Scotland ; you have heard of them in England ; you have heard of them from the mouths of the Ministers themselves. You have heard Sir C. Dilke telling you that the whole population of this country were adverse to the rights of property. You have heard Mr. Clhamberlain speaking of the owners of property us people who toil not neither do they spin, comparing them therein to the lilies of the field and bestow- ing upon them a compliment which, I am bound to say, they do not deserve. But the spread of these doctrines has already not been without its evil effects. You know how easily con- fidence is destroyed and investment is discouraged. There have come under my notice cases of important expenditure stopped by the doubt that men entertain as to the course which legislation may henceforth take. To all the many uncertainties which affect every kind of enterprise there is now added the greatest uncertainty of all — what will a Liberal Parliament do ? And this is no slight matter at a time when such numbers of our fellow subjects are suffering from a want of employment. In consequence of this legisla- tion there has been a general indisposition to sink and to advance capital, and in every case where capital is withdrawn from employment that means that the employment and the wages and the living of some working men has ceased, and therefore, it is that the community looks to the Conservatives of the City, because on the conservatism of the City a special responsibility rests. They constantly witness the working of this marvellous mechanism by which capital gives life to industry ; they know better than any that the security of property is not mainly an affair of the propertied classes ; they know that if any serious revolutionary legislation in this island is passed by Parliament, the immediate effect will be a contraction of business, a diminution of enterprise, and a timidity of investment which would practically leave its mark Liberal and Conscrvalii'c Policies. 95 in the starving of multitudes of people. Well, it is for you to watcli over this inheritance which has come clown to you. It is for you to struggle earnestly that tlie doctrines of pro- perty whicli have produced such splendid results in this country shall not receive any serious injury in our time. The result will depend upon the energy and the exertions of those who know the real magnitude of the interests that arc involved, but they may be quite certain that in pursuing their duty, in strenuously resisting any of those specious and seductive proposals Avhich 'are so rife in the present day, they are not supporting any egotistic or sectional interests, but that they are supporting the principle by which alone commerce can be animated, that they are supporting that confidence Avhich is the breath of life to all human enter- prise, and without which we must form the darkest auguries for the future of industry and the well-being of the people. LIBERAL AND CONSERVATIVE POLICIES. (At Watford, Dece^fber G, 1883). I have to thank you very heartily for the great kindness with which you have received the toast of the House of Lords. It is a toast which, I believe, is always kindly received in Conservative assemblies. We have recently had testimony from a distinguished quarter that its popularity is not so great on the other side of politics. Lord Hartington has told us that it has lost ground with those in the country who agree with him in opinion. He intimated, too, that I had said it had lost ground. In that he w^as rather dreaming. But though I believe the House of Lords stands as high as ever in the opinions of Conservatives, and in the opinions of those who have no definite politics at all, I think it is very probable 9 6 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. that in strict ortliodox Liberal ranks its popularity docs not stand very high. THE OFFICE OF SAYING '^ AMEN." Lord Ilartington has a remedy for this. He suggests to us that if we would always do exactly what the Liberal party in the House of Commons wish, he thinks that we shall not meet with any resistance on the jiart of the Liberal party. Well^ I think that is exceedingly probable. But I do not think it requires — without assuming or claiming too much for the House of Lords — I do not think it requires a body of tiieir numbers and ability to perform the office which he designates for us. It is the office of saying " Amen." That office is performed usually to the entire satisfaction of all who hear him by a moderately remunerated clerk. I believe that the clerk deserves the full benefit of the position and never meets with any resistance on the part of the clergyman. But I cannot join in Lord Hartington's advice to the House of Lords. As soon as the House of Lords con- ceives that it is its duty simply to say "Amen " to whatever the House of Commons may be pleased to lay down, then I shall be the first to urge on the people of England that it is time to abolish the House of Lords. I say that not out of any disrespect to the House of Commons, but because, obviously, the only use a second Chamber can be is to correct anything, if there is anything to correct, in the decisions of the other House. Perhaps I should go a step further and say that I think that, without reference to my own political opinions, it is well the leaning of the second chamber should be in a Conservative direction ; and for this reason, that if anything is done in a Conservative sense which the people of this country afterwards do not approve it is very easily remedied ; but if anything is done in a Liberal sense which the people of this country do not approve, it Liberal and Conservative Policies. 97 cannot be remedied. If a thing is improperl^f destroyed no IDower on earth, no good will, and no repentance can ever THE CABINET UNDER A GLASS HIVE. Lord Hartington has been giving iis other contributions to our political instruction. There is a very ingenious instrument secured by bee-keepers, by which you are able to look througli pieces of glass and see how the bees do their work inside. Lord Hartington and Mr. Chamberlain have been putting the Cabinet under a glass hive, and have enabled us to see how the discussions are conducted. "We have long noted the curious phenomena that Mr. Chamberlain always has his way, and that Lord Hartington, in spite of the perfect plethora of wisdom with which he enters into the Cabinet, always in the end submits. But we have never until now seen the bold and high-falutin language with which Mr. Chamberlain treats his colleague, or the bated breath and whispering humbleness with which Lord Hartington responds. I confess I have watched this exhibition with feelings of considerable regret, because I know that there is a great wrestling match coming off in January between these two political athletes on the subject of reform. IMy wishes are all for Lord Hartington, but if I were a betting man my betting would always be on Mr. Chamberlain. You have only to compare the language and the manner of the two men, the splendid audacity of the doctrines which ]\Ir. Chamberlain proposes, his utter indifference to results, how he casts aside as a fraud and a sham and a delusion that Irish representation which Lord Hartington is in feeble language pleading to consider. Lord Hartington, on the other hand, has no opinions of his own. I mean that in his speeches he is always asking you to consider this and remember that. He does not pledge himself to an opinion, D 98 L ord Sa lisbti ry 's Speeches. but he says it is wortli while thinking of this and thinking of that, and then, when he has made a speech in this sense, he becomes frightened with the sound of his own voice, and in the next speech he thinks, perhaps, he has said too much, and hastens to assure the world that it is not the function of the Whig party to lead popular movements, but that it is the function of the Whig party to moderate and to mediate, and, in fact, to mix water with Mr. Chamberlain's wine. These are matters not of personal, but of public concern. You must all remember the last election. It was an election which, although the results ga\"e an enormous preponderance of Liberal votes in the House of Commons, was really won by a very small preponderance of Liberal electors in the country, and I believe that many of these electors were induced to vote on the Liberal side by their trust in the re- markably sensible character of the utterances of Lord Hartington. I do not think that they will commit that error again. The utterances remain as sensible as ever, but we know by sad experience to how little practical result these sensible utterances lead. THE nEFORil BILL. The matter on Nvhich these two great statesmen have exhibited to us the mode in which the counsels of the Cabinet are conducted is in a very doubtful and un- satisfactory condition. It appears probable, as far as I can judge, that we shall have the question of the represen- tation of the people again before Parliament next year. It is not a matter of absolute certainty, for I observe that The Times, in an ai'ticle which has all the air of being inspired, informs the world that IMr. Gladstone has not only kept the decision of this matter to himself, but that he absolutely re- fuses to tell his colleagues till the moment of Parliament assembling which Avay he is going to decide. I think it is Liberal and Conservative Policies. 99 very likely that Mr. Gladstone is prudent in this matter. Perhaps it is a way of avoiding Cabinet dissensions. lie has had reason more than once to lament Cabinet indiscretions and no doubt by this plan lie hopes to obviate both evils. For ourselves, we are at present only spectators in this matter. I hear a good deal of pledges which the Conserva- tive party are supposed to have given. Some people say that they are pledged to support the Suffrage Bill in the House of Lords. Some say that they are pledged to throw out .1 Household Suffrage Bill in the House of Lords. My impression is that neither the Conservative party nor anybody else can pledge themselves what to do with a Bill which they have never seen, and which probably does not exist in the mind of any human being at this mo- ment. But if we pass from the region of pledges to the region of prediction, it is not rash to say tliat if the coming Reform Bill at all resembles the picture which its friends draw of it it is likely to meet with very earnest resistance on the part of the Conservative party. It is very difficult to understand the position which Ministers themselves have adopted in regard to this measure. It is certainly a measure of importance. It v;ill create a considerable shifting probably of the electoral power. Its tendency will be to efface the influence of the farmers, which certainly will be a grave and, I think, a very un- fortunate result in political affairs. Mr. Child ers tells us that it will be a great deal more than this — that it is the chief one of a series of measures which is to have the effect of revolutionizing our arrangements more than anj^thing which has been done since ] G89. Truly, when Cabinet Ministers do not try to explain the changes, the organic changes, which they are going to introduce, this is a formidable picture to receive from the mouth of one v/ho, it would be supposed, knew. And it is not encouraging D 2 100 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. that when Mr. Childers is telling us that this is the most formidable revolution which we shall have had for the last 200 years, Lord Hartington should be at the same time telling us that the subject of Parliamentary representation in one particular, which, by the way, he does not name, has not yet been properly considered. So that we have one Cabinet Minister telling us that the changes in our Parlia- mentary representation are to be the greatest revolution that has been effected for the last two centuries, and another Cabinet Minister telling us that the subject has not been properly considered. And the evident fact is that the essen- tial points appear to require arrangement in the minds of the Cabinet. Is Ireland to be included, or is it not ? Lord Hartington looks upon such an inclusion wdth apprehension. Mr. Chamberlain considers it a fraud and a plain sham to do anything less. Are the 40s. householders — the most ancient franchise in the country — to be abolished ? Nobody seems to know, and Lord Hartington is of opinion that the subject requires a good deal of consideration. Then, as to the dis- tribution plan to be proposed, it is to be proposed at the same time as this arrangement with regard to the franchise. ^Ir. Chamberlain cannot tell us what connection there is between the two, and Lord Hartington is of opinion that there would be great difficulties in the way of separating the two. Per- haps, after all, the most discouraging part of this variety of opinion is that while one Cabinet Minister is telling us that this is a great revolution, and another is telling us that it is in his opinion a subject which ought to be considered, a third is telling us that any plan short of manhood suffrage is not likely to prove a satisfactory settlement of the question, nor to procure any respite from agitation. Under these circum- stances, I confess I look forward to the jDrospect of the dis- cussion in Parliament on the measure with anything but a feeling that it is likely to be very acceptable to the Conser- Liberal and Conservative Policies. loi vative party. But a much more important thing has really been brought to light by these Ministerial dissensions than the lines upon which the measure I have referred to is likely to be framed. RESPONSIBILITY OF THE CABINET. We have tlie right to know whether the old theory or a new theory of Parliamentary government is to prevail. We have a Cabinet which, as a Cabinet, looks upon manhood suffrage as dangerous, and utterly resists the dis- establishment of the English Church. Yet we have a Minister in that Cabinet, wielding the authority of that Cabinet, de- claring that any other solution than that of manhood suffrage would be to deprive millions of their right, and that the property of the Established Church belongs to every section of the nation. Now, it is perfectly true that this is the legal position of affairs. The Queen has, of course, the right to call in any one she wills to her councils. It is perfectly legal that Mr. Chamberlain should be a member of the same Government as that to which Lord Granville and the Mar- quis of Hartington belong. I believe it would be quite legal if Mr. Davitt and Mr. Bradlaugh were also members of the present Cabinet j but we must remember that we live under a system of unwritten law. Your Parliamentary Constitu- tion, of which you are so proud, is written in no statutes; it rests on long tradition and understandings honourably ob- served, and the basis of that Parliamentary government is that while a man who is outside the Cabinet is responsible for himself only and for the words which he himself utters, members of a Cabinet are responsible for each other. That is Parliamentary government — that is the essence of it. What Mr. Chamberlain does and says upon the burning and vital questions of the day is as much the responsibility of Lord Hartington in the eyes of the Constitution, as it has 102 L ord Salts b^iry *s Speeches. been received for a hundred years, as it is tlie responsibility of Mr. Chamberlain himself. If you depart from that sound tradition our Parliamentary government must decay. The exhibition you have seen of Mr. Chamberlain uttering the wildest and most extreme opinions, and yet remaining the colleague of men whose horror of those opinions is well- known— if no measure be taken in regard to it, if they con- tinue quietly to sit by his side in the Cabinet, you may de- pend upon it being the beginning of a sure decay in Parlia- mentary government, of the system under which you have flourished so well. CONSERVATIVES HAVE KG PROGRAMME. NoW; we are often asked whether we have any pro- gramme on these political questions such as those which I have dealt with. We have no programme, because we are very sceptical of the benefit of raising such political questions at all. As a party we do not advocate organic change. Admitting that organic change is some- times inevitable, we regard it as an evil, and we do not desire to give it any assistance w^e can avoid. But we do that, not simply because organic change is in itself a hazardous experiment, but because it occupies time and energies which are wanted for other purposes. Parliament has great duties to perform, and if it is perpetually occupied with the consideration of its own constitution those duties will not be performed. Ever since the fall of Lord Mel- bourne, I think, every Liberal Government has proposed a Reform Bill. They have not always been successful, but they have always had a Reform Bill to propose. Lord Rus- sell's Government of 1846 proposed one before it fell. Lord Aberdeen's Government proposed one. Lord Palmerston's Government during the Crimean war did not, but Lord Pal- merston's Government in 1859 did. Lord Russell's Govern- Libej^al and Conservative Policies. 103 ment in 1865 proposed one. Mr. Gladstone's first Govern- ment proposed and carried the Ballot Bill, and Mr. Gladstone's Government, in 1880, proposed a Reform Bill. What the Liberal party has done, I imagine, it will do again. As far as our experience extends, whenever the Liberal party comes into office it will see what can be done for the purpose of preventing the necessity of leaving office again by mani- pulating the electorate. AVhen they first succeed to office they do not propose reform, but when their popularity aj-)pears to be waning, and the end of their period of office appears to be drawing nigh, then they begin to think what can be done to alter the machinery of the Constitution and so prevent the danger of the Liberal party being driven from office. It is rather unfair to object because the Conserva- tives cannot by their principles play the same game. A much more serious objection to this is that it is a fatal hin- drance to the utility of Parliament altogether. 1 believe there are some ships in our Navy that have never gone to sea at all. The reason is that there has been such a per- petual succession of changes suggested by ingenious persons that they have no sooner gone out of dock than they have gone in to be altered. They much resemble the British Constitution in Liberal hands. No sooner has one change been effected than in their minds the time has come for effecting another. A man who is always under the doctor, a ship that is always undergoing changes, and a Con- stitution that is always undergoing reform are three very useless entities. The result is that a greater part of the time and attention of Parliament is occupied not only by the measures themselves, but by the political passions and political efforts and controversies which precede or are collateral to them, and the main object for Avhich Parliament exists is left comparatively in the background. 104 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. " MY IDEA OF CONSERVATIVE POLICY. My idea of Conservative policy, though I do not exclude the necessity of organic change when that necessity is clearly proved, is to entertain those measures which are directly to the benefit of the nation, and not to be perpetually improving the machine by which these measures are to be passed. I will give you an agricultural instance. There are many things we desire to be passed that cannot be passed because Par- liament has no energy to give to them. There is one question, I will undertake to say, that in the minds of per- sons at all connected with agriculture transcends in import- ance every other, and that is the mode in which disease can be prevented from reaching the herds and flocks upon which our prosperity depends. Tho change that has come over the spirit of agriculture in recent times has tended to drive this question into extreme prominence. Falling prices and variable weather have caused pastoral industry more and more to take the place of the industry of the plough, but both of them are absolutely dependent upon some kind of security against the epidemics by which the capital of the agriculturist is at present menaced. We hear a great deal of the importance of small holdings. We hear a great deal of the hardships which the dwellers in towns undergo. But how are you to expect that beef or milk will become cheap if small capitalists are entirely, or almost entirely, pre- vented from joining in the task of furnishing sustenance to the inhabitants of the great towns ? A poor man knows that if he sinks his little capital in cattle it may all be swept away in a moment, and that he may be absolutely denuded of his property in consequence of the diseases which our legislation hitherto has failed to stop. I only give you this as one example out of many. It is only one, but it is one which presses with exceptional severity on the agricultural Liberal and Conservative Policies. 105 community, and I cannot help thinking if so much of our time had not been thrown avray upon the conflict of classes ; if so much of our time had not been given to these organic changes which are so interesting and so sterile, we should have found some remedy for the great evil which is at pre- sent continuing the depression of the industry by which we live. But do not let me be supposed to have introduced this as anything but an instance. I believe that the duties which are waiting for Parliament to perform are many and widespread. There is no doubt that we stand at a critical point in the social history of our time. For fifty years the prosperity of this country has been borne up by those mar- vellous inventions in locomotion which have done so much to stimulate trade and to give employment. But the railway system is completed ; the effects that it has produced, if not ceasing altogether, are proceeding at a much slacker pace, and it is evident that there is some halting point in the national prosperity which we find it difficult to explain. May it not be that we are taking up the thread of our economic history at the point where it was, or in some degree at the point where it was when the invention of rail- ways came to our aid half a centuiy ago ? Be that as it may, I think no one can look abroad, no one can open his ears and hear the tales of increasing misery and decreasing employment, of the conflicts constantly going on between employers and employed, without feeling that we live in a very grave state of things, and that the most imperative calls are made on the energies of all who love their country to do what they can to ward off the evils that may come upon us if misery should increase, and if the means of sub- sistence should practically be outstripped by the growth of the population. These are very grave and serious dangers. I am quite aware that it is possible for Parliament to meddle too much, that it is possible for Parliament to meddle un- io6 Lord Sail slniry^s Speeches, wisely ; but perhaps the greatest error of all that Parliament could commit would be to treat these symptoms and these evils with indifference and to spend its whole time in the vain conflicts which are raised by the theories of philoso- phers and the ambitions of rival politicians. Depend upon it no real use of the energies of Parliament can be made, no effective remedies can be applied to any of the evils under which we suffer, as long as our exertions and our time are spent in fomenting the differences by which the classes are divided and in sustaining the controversies which furnish you with so much interest for the moment, but which bring no lasting and real relief; which may advance the careers and distinguish the names of individual men, but which have no benefits to confer upon the real needs and necessities of the people. THE CONSERVATIVE REVIVAL. (At Glasgow, October 1, 1884.) It is a great pleasure and honour for one connected with the working of the Conservative party in London to meet those who bear the burden and heat of the day in the coun- try, and to whose exertions whatever prosperity and whatever tenacity may attach to the labours of the Conservative party is really in the long run and by all justice due. This is owing to your patience and resolution and hopefulness in adversity ; and to the display of those qualities on your part, on the part of Yriends joining with you, each in your several locali- ties, we owe it that Conservatism in Scotland has not drooped and died away in the presence of blows which in past times it has received, and at the present moment its prospects are brightening and opening every day. Of course we have an The Conservative Revival. 107 up-hill game to fight. I fancy that this country througliout its existence has had an up-hill game to fight ; but it has always fought it well, and has placed itself in a position very far out of proportion either to its popular or its natural resources solely by the display of those national character- istics throughout every period of its historical career. I am proud to think that the Conservative party in Scotland inherit the full measure of the qualities that belong to their countrymen. Knowing that they are right, they stick to their colours in good report and in evil report, and mean to win at last. Do not let any passing discouragement or any victory of our opponents due to transitory causes dishearten any of those who are joined with us in this great struggle. GROWTH OF CONSERVATISM. No one, I think, can watch the operation of permanent causes without seeing that there is throughout the country a slow but steady drift towards Conservative opinion, especially among the young. The issues which divided men in past times have to a great extent drifted away. They are for- gotten, or some settlement has been arrived at, or they have ceased to occupy the minds and the attention of men. New issues are springing up which present themselves in a very different phase, in a very different complexion to those who have already pledged themselves in the political fight on the one hand, and to those who come up to it new, fresh, and unpreju- diced on the other. But although you will see many also who have called themselves Liberals during their lives who now feel themselves bound with sinking and unwilling steps to follow the lead which is given to their party, those who are not tied by any such pledges, or those who have the courage to pull themselves away, recognise that we are fighting new battles on a new field, and that, if it was possible now to call back into life the Liberals of past times, the most famous io8 Lord Salisbury' s Speeches. of tliem would be ranged upon our side. If you look at the structure of tlie Liberal party you will see that its numerical preponderance is due, not to the fact of the dominance of any set of opinions, but that, by great dexterity, and by the tenacity of an ancient organisation, the two sets of opinions which are in reality diametrically opposed to each other are able to make truce for a time and to pull together. But it depends eutirely how long that dexterity can be main- tained, how long leaders will be found who will have that gift of sophistry that they Avill be able to persuade their fol- lowers on either side, whose interests are really clashing and opposed, that the same measures can be equally favourable to both sides. It depends how long the aristocratic Whig and the violent and advanced Radical can be induced to move in the same line by honeyed words and empty platitudes. It depends upon how long what is called the Liberal party — which is really a confederation of indepen- dent and opposing schools — can be brought to act together in political life. It is a circumstance of disadvantage which must attach in growing measure to your opponents, while the unity of sentiment on our own part is a strength which must tell more and more as time goes on upon our side. Remember that the progress of Conservatism has already been very great. I can remember almost when the Con- servative cause seemed as hopeless in London and West- minster as to some minds it may seem in this city now, or as it was in this city, I should, perhaps, more correctly say, four years ago. THE WAND OF THE GREAT MAGICIAN. But, as I say, issues change, men change, the wand of the great magician cannot be waved for ever. The spell which is due to individual ability and talent can- not obtain more than a transitory triumph for opinions The Co 11 so 'z 'a iii 'c Re i • ii 'a I. 109 wliicli are not really in consonance with tlie feelings of tlic country or with tlie tendencies of the age. But 1 bcHcvc that in Scotland, as in otlier parts of the country, you will see that growth whicli we can already recognize advancing by rapid stages to a mighty and imposing result. You have only to go on working together as you have hitherto done, not allowing yourselves to be discouraged by any temporary reverses, not believing that any evil day, when it comes, must necessarily be permanent, but trying to convince the world that in the steadiness and stability of our insti- tutions lies the great hope of industry and of the working man, trying to impress upon him that any adventurous policy or change at home which sets class against class, and fills all men's minds with disquiet and mistrust, is a dangerous thing for industry, and is the most certain poison which trade and commerce can suffer under. If you can bring these facts before the minds of the working men they will observe as time goes on that a policy which appeals to discontent does not produce internal prosperity. They -will see that a policy which neglects the Empire of England does not open to us the markets of the world. They will see that the path of national prosperity and national dishonour are not parallel, and they Avill recognize with this that the party which sustained the old institutions — institutions under which England grew great — which upholds the tra- ditions under which her name has ever been illustrious abroad — that to that party most rightly belongs, and most safely can be confided, the interests of the complicated industry and commerce on which the existence of so many millions of our countrymen depends. I lo Lord Salisbury' s Speeches. THE HOUSE OF LORDS. [In the evening, Lord Salisbury addressed the Conserva- tive Associations of the West of Scotland in St. Andrew's Hall, which was crowded by an enthusiastic assemblage. The Duke of Montrose occupied the chair, and on the plat- form were many noblemen and gentlemen connected Avith Western Scotland.] Lord Salisbury said, — In thanking you for the hearty kindness of your welcome, I feel divided between two duties. My first duty is to believe what the Prime Minister says at a roadside station — I forget its name, Merlin, I think — where he happened to meet a crowd of enthusiastic people from the country side. He was stimulated into declaring that the whole nation was on his side. On the other hand, if I believe the Prime Minister, how am I to deal with the testimony of my own eyes and ears? It seems to me that I come across a marvellous number of exceptions. In August I had the privilege of speaking to some 50,000 or GO, 000 exceptions at Manchester. My friends were speaking to something like the same number at Nostell in Yorkshire ; and last night I thought I saw a considerable number of exceptions at Glasgow Central Station. Here there is a continuation of the revelation of exceptions to this universal rule of the Prime Minister. It seems that, having taken a railway journey from Wales to Scotland, he has concluded that every person who came to see and cheer him — an honour to which he was justly entitled — in the first place was necessarily on his side, and secondly, represented the whole people of England. It does so happen that he went into parts of Scotland that were very particularly bound to him, and where he had an extraordinary number of adherents. But I mention this calculation of his because I see that he raises the extraordinary contention that, by the The House of Lords, 1 1 1 suffrage of the people of England, gathered in this fashion out of -windows of railway carriages, the powers of the State are to guide their course. He tells us it is certain the people of England are on his side, in consequence of these demon- strations ; and that, therefore, all who hold an opposite opinion are bound to yield. This doctrine, that you can deter- mine the wishes of the people of England by demonstra- tions, or processions, or meetings, or addresses on railway platforms, is utterly new and utterly untenable. It is utterly new that we should accept from such indications as these the opinions which the people of this country have really formed. I say it is not permissible to accept such a test, though not because I desire — as I have been falsely represented to desire — to throw anything like contempt on the opinions of those who take part in such demonstrations. It is not from demonstrations of that kind that you can gather what the opinions of the people are. You know what has taken place in this town. You know there was a great de- monstration here. You know that those who or2;anized it claimed an assemblage of some 75^000 people ; and you know that some ingenious person, counting by means that are certainly not open to challenge, ascertained that 23,000 was the full number of those present. That gives you the correction which you may apply to all the numbers of all the Liberal meetings of which you hear. Divide them by three and you will get approximately the right amount. But just consider what that 23,000 means. These processions are organized with care, and numbers of them are brought from a consider- able distance in a country where the population, within one hour's distance from where v»'e are, numbers no less than one million persons. There are 500,000 in Glasgow alone. Lanarkshire reaches nearly up to a million. Most parts of the shire are excessively populated, and Renfrewshire, w^hich has a quarter of a milJion, would more than finish the tale, 1 1 2 Lord Salishtrfs Speeches. besides what Stirlingshire, Dumbartonshire, and other counties might give. What relation has 23,000 to 1 ,000,000 ? Why, it is 2 J per cent. And do you mean to tell me, when I know the opinion of 2 J per cent., that I know the opinion of them all ? That is the contention of the Prime Minister. The truth is that there is no way of ascertaining who are on one side and who are on the other, except by the elementary process of counting them. There is no other way of ascer- taining it save by summoning them to the poll, where they can be constitutionally counted. The indications, such as they are, do not, in my mind, agree with the bold and boastful assumption of the Prime Minister. We have had some elections since this question was before the public. We have had three elections in the North. The election for Eoss-shire was a small constituency, and as it had not been disputed for thirty years, very little could be drawn from the figures that were the result. But the three that took place in the south of the island were of very large constitu- encies — IMid Surrey, Hampshire, and — what was the other ? Yes, Brighton ; and there you had, by the only test on which you can rely, a proof that the majority of the people who went to the poll did not agree with the contention of the Prime Minister. Well, I have touched on that point for the purpose of dismiss- ing it. I reject as utterly unconstitutional and new the idea 'that by those who come out in processions or who come to meetings, the opinion of the people can be discerned. I have received innumerable addresses from associations in all parts of the country, which, at least, convinces me of this, that the whole Conservative party is thoroughly of our mind in the con- test in which we are engaged, and that a considerable party of the other side of politics are very unwilling to follow their leaders upon this point. Therefore, as you know that it was really a very small majority that carried the last election against the Conservatives — a majority, I believe, consisting The House of Lords. 113 of 2,000 or 3,000 persons — it follows that, as far as the evidence goes, if the Conservative party and a portion of the Liberal party are on our side, it must be a matter of extreme doubt Avhether there is any majority, such as the other side can claim. '^ WHAT IS IT ALL ABOUT ? " Now, putting aside the evidence of demonstrations, which are very useful for bringing the party together, for in- ducing men to work for a common cause, for assuring them that they have co-operation, but which are not useful as a substitute for the constitutional process of election — putting that aside, let us inquire what is all this agitation which the Ministers of the Crown have thought fit to raise. What is it about ? You know they have changed their minds a good deal upon the point. They began by loud professions that opinion should be spontaneous, and that no Minister would take part in demonstrations outside his own constituency. But, somehow^ Lord Xorthbrook was found at Manchester, which is not in his own constituency ; ^Ir. Chamberlain is going to the Potteries and to Wales, and I do not think Mr. Gladstone has strictly stuck to his OAvn con- stituency. He tells, us, of course, that his resolution has been shattered by spontaneous outbursts of patriotism which he witnessed at railway stations ; but I do not think that he should have started north with so fragile a resolution as that. However, what is it all about ; what is it of which these reluctant agitators complain ? They tell us that the House of Lords has rejected this Bill. But what is the effect of that action of the House of Lords ? If we take it at its worst, if we take it as they look upon it, the whole of the evil for which they have thought it necessary to make these great exertions and to break so many promises which they had made to themselves, is that the House of Lords has put 1 1 4 Lord Salisbury' s Speeches. off the enactment of the Franchise Bill. I have to ask what is the exact magnitude of that evil ? What is the heinous- ness of that crime ? I shall not measure it absolutely ; I shall measure it relatively. I shall point out to you that there is a Government which, possessing a large majority in Parlia- ment, has delayed the Franchise Bill, not one year nor two years, but four years, and that the whole of the crime for which the House of Lords is so furiously arraigned is doing precisely, in a much smaller degree, what Her INlajesty's Government have of their own free will done since the last dissolution of Parliament. That question leads me to another. Is this agitation absolutely honest? It seems to me, for the reason I have given you, a little exaggerated. But let us see what defence there is for it. There is a great temptation to be dishonest. It was a very great temptation to Liberal members, who knew that all the miscarriages of the last few years were about to be brought to the bar of the people, and that they would be tried at the bar of their constitu- encies for the disgrace of Majuba Hill, for the utter mismanagement of South Africa, so that that colony is slipping from our hands, for the needless blood and trea- sure that has been poured out in Egypt, with no correspond- ing advantage either to the interests of the British Empire or to the interests, the highest interests, of humanity. They knew that for this and for the disturbed state of Ireland — Ireland worse than she ever was before, for expenditure constantly rising, for trade constantly falling, for the distress that is spreading like a disease into every class of the com- munity — they knew that for all these things the time was coming when they must answer before those who had in- vested them with the mandate they had so ill performed. There were enormous temptations to the Liberal members and to the Liberal Government to avoid that trial if they could. Tliey could not under the law avoid it except in one way. The House of Lords. 1 1 5 Tliey might utterly change the tribunal before which thuy were sent. They might so alter the tribunal, by fastening on the enfranchisement of two millions of people upon the old divisions of constituencies, which were not meant for a uniform franchise — they might so alter the character of the tribunal that, in the ignorance in the newness of these political problems, they might obtain the acquittal which, from experienced guides, it was impossible they could hope for. That was an enormous temptation. What have they to say to show that all this agitation against the House of Lords, all this pretended zeal for the liberty of the people, is anything more than a screen for the device by which they hope their misdoings may be hidden ? PROCEDURE ON THE REFORM BILL. Let us look into and examine the character of their excuse. They tell us that it is impossible to pass a Franchise Bill and redistribution in a single year. In three weeks' time we shall assemble at Westminster. Yvliat do you imagine a Minister would do who had no such terrible record to efface, and could afford to meet his countrymen face to face, assuming that he did not choose to dissolve — which I still think is really the con- stitutional proceeding under the circumstances ? Assuming that he did not choose to dissolve, what do you think that Ministers like Lord Palmerston or Lord Eussell would have done ? They would have passed the Franchise Bill during the autumn session, they would have done that with ease, and when it was passed, or while it was passing, they would have introduced their Redistribution Bill. They would have sent each of those Bills as soon as they could up to the House of Lords. The House of Lords would have been able to deal with them together, and probably the whole controversy would have been solved in a single session. What is there 1 1 6 Lord Salisbury' s Speeches. to hinder a Minister from taking that course? He tells you that redistribution cannot be passed in a single session v.dth enfranchisement, but if redistribution cannot be passed in a single ordinary session, our fate is terrible indeed, for we never can have any redistribution at all. It is after all only a session we have to look to ; and if the question is so complex, that in their peculiar way of managing the House of Commons^ the present Govern- ment cannot pass a Redistribution Bill within the limits of an ordinary session, the chance of getting it is re- legated to an indefinite future. We must assume that they can pass a Redistribution Bill in a single session. Well, then, what possible difference is there between passing a Redistribution Bill introduced this autumn, before next August, and passing a Bill after the Franchise Bill shall have been passed in an ordinary session ? What difference is there between the two processes ? There is exactly the same amount of time at their disposal for passing a Redistribution Bill after this Autumn Session is concluded, as there would be if they approached it under any ordinary circumstances. But supposing that the distance from February to August is too short, it is not the law of the Medes and the Persians, that we should prorogue in August. There is nothing to prevent the Government prolonging the Session as long as they like until the question is settled. That being the state of the case, is it not evident that what they are anxious for is not that enfranchisement and redistribution should pass during the next session, but that they should get their dis- solution with the old divisions. By that unfair device, being masters of the House of Commons, they will pass whatever Redistribution Bill the interests of their party require. The House of Lords. 1 1 7 YEARNING AFTER THE AMERICAN SENATE. It is evident enough that the Prime Minister in his excursion to Scothmd has had something in view beyond the passing of an early Franchise and Redistribution Bill. He has wanted to raise a quarrel as a cloud in which all other ques- tions damaging to his Government might be lost, and if you will observe that the support which he has obtained, such as it is, throughout the island, has been mainly drawn, not from moderate men, not much from the more moderate section of those who supported him at the last election, but it has been drawn from those who wish to go a great deal further and who desire as they put it, that all hereditary jurisdiction and power should disappear. That is the class of allies to whom he has appealed, and in his latest speech on his journey home he was obliged to apologize for the mildness of his language. He said to them, " Don't mind how mildly I draw it now ; after you have got the power you will be able to do with all these things just exactly as you like," and the question that he has really raised before the mind of the British e]"ectors is the question — the momentous question — of the character of your second chamber and what powers it should possess. You will observe that he began in lan- guage apparently moderate. In his two speeches at Edinburgh he seemed to keep his threats somewhat in the background. But as he went on from station to station, more and more excited by every passing crowd perhaps, and possibly stimulated to greater condensation of his observations by the rapidity with which the engineer was in the habit of putting on the engine, these threats became more defined, and his destructive policy became more apparent ; and it has become a matter for you, the electors of Great Britain, seriously to consider the question of the powers and the duty of the second chamber. Some people say that it 1 1 8 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. great folly to raise this question, and that it ought never to be brought to the minds of the public. I do not believe in that policy in the least. Nothing is safe in this country which the public cannot discuss. If the House of Lords is to stand, as I believe it will, it will stand because the British people believe that it is the best arrangement that can obtain, and not because they have forgotten its existence. There are some people— a gentleman at the end of the hall there, I think, is one of them — who think there should be no second chamber at all ; that is the opinion held by a gentleman for whose independence and masculine character of mind I have very great respect, I mean Mr. Cowen, of Newcastle. But I do not believe it is very generally shared in this country. I think there is a general feeling that the despotism of a single chamber would be the most dangerous of all despotisms. At all events this is quite certain — it is an experiment which has never been tried yet on any large scale upon the surface of the earth. The Americans, as you know, have a Senate — I wish we could institute it in this country — marvellous in its efficiency and strength. The French have a Senate, to which perhaps all the same eulogies cannot be applied, but to whose protective character they justly cling; and the Swiss have this remarkable rule — that all laws of any import- ance must be submitted to the vote of the people themselves before they can be adopted into the constitution of the country. So that you see in those who have gone the farthest in the Republican direction there is none that has dispensed with some check or control over the single chamber to which Mr. Cowen trusts, and certainly if a single chamber could be entrusted Avith the destinies of the country it would not be a House of Commons elected for seven years. It would have to be brought much more closely under the purview of the constituencies. It would have to be elected like the American House of Representatives. The House of Lorcr^yy ^ i9 > i V THE FL'^XTIOXS OF THE HOUSE OF LORD But I do not think the question whether we arc to have a second chamber or not is one that has come within the range of practical politics. The vast majority of the people of this country are decidedly of opinion that we ought to have a second chamber. The question then is what powers ought that second chamber to have, and that is the question that Mr. Gladstone has raised on these platform — railway-platform — speeches. I am not surprised that the question has excited some emotion, because undoubtedly it is the question of all others which interests the future of good government in this country, and I am very anxious to draw your attention closely to that view Avhich the Prime Minister has taken up upon this question, for it may bear importantly upon the fate of this country in the future. His view at first was that a second chamber was a very good thing if it never contradicted the first chamber. He said distinctly that it must be in danger if ever it came into conflict with the representatives of the people. All I have to answer is, that the only use of a second chamber is to remedy the defects, mistakes, or what- ever they may be, of the first chamber. If it is never to contradict the first chamber it had better not exist at all. You know that sometimes people put two locks upon their safe, and give separate keys to separate people. K they had the same keys and gave them to the same people you would think they were very absurd persons. But that would be exactly the absurdity of having two legislative assemblies which were bound to follow exactly the prescriptions of the Minister of the day. The one would be no check upon the other. It would be like having a court of appeal of which the first rule should be, that it must never reverse a decision of a court of first instance. What use would such a court 120 Lord Salisbicry's Speeches. of appeal bcj ? I have been taken to task for calling the House of Lords a flywheel. I will go back to an historical simile. I will take the Duke of Wellington's simile. He said it was a way-chain, or, as in these days we should say, a vacuum-brake. Suppose you set up a brake, of which the first condition should be that it never stopped the wheels going round, what would you think of the wisdom of the persons who set up that brake ? That is exactly the wis- dom of those who maintain that the duty of the House of Lords is in all things to submit and say heartily amen to the decisions of the House of Commons. Well, as he went on, I think Mr. Gladstone saw the absurdity of this contention. He was not prepared to admit our contention, which appears to me plain and simple. We say that both Houses of Par- liament are independent of each other, but it is perfectly true that there may arise an occasion in which there is an inso- luble problem, in which the two contradict each other, and it is essentiial that some decision should be arrived at. Who is to decide ? Our answer is simple. The people are to decide. Mr. Gladstone answers that he could never con- sent to so degrading a condition, because, while he is sent about his business and is canvassing Mid Lothian we are sitting easily in our arm-chairs. Of course, if the Constitu- tion of Great Britain is managed for the purpose of the convenience and comfort of those who are at the time mem- bers of Parliament, I quite agree with him that his answer is unanswerable. If the only object is to prevent that in- convenience to the estimable people who may be sent down to canvass their constituents, I quite admit that we cannot admit the proposition we have assumed. But our view is that^ unless the House of Commons acts in accordance with the will of the country it is acting in departure from its true functions and mission, and that it ought not to complain if, upon good and sufficient grounds, especially when a Parlia- The House of Lords. 121 menl has lasted many years and is verging to its close, and is, in fact, almost within twelve months of its close — it ought not to complain if it is called upon to submit to the judgment of those to whose decision its power is entirely duo. But Mr. Gladstone will not admit this theory of the relation of the two Houses. He has abandoned, I think, the idea that the House of Lords is to submit in everything to the House of Commons. Well, then, what has he got to say ? " You are not bound to submit always, but you are bound to submit now." I have no doubt he states that in good faith, but he must see that every succeeding ^Minister, whenever he is in a difficulty, would always make use of the same arguments. Are we to say we are only to submit when the Prime Minister takes the trouble to go to many railway stations making many speeches? Is the House of Lords to fall when, like Jericho, the trumpets have been sounded seven times round their walls ? Mr. Gladstone sounds his trumpet with considerable effect, for I am bound to say he has done more than his stipulated task, for I think he has stopped at a good deal more than seven railway stations. But the weakness of that theory, elegant and original as it would be, is that, I am afraid, in course of time the Prime Minister would find it a bore whenever he wanted to pass a measure to have to go through this railway station ceremonial, and I am afraid he would take to sending a subordinate, and I am afraid the result would be that the House of Lords would have to yield to the peregrinations of a Mr. Chamberlain, or even to the peregrinations of a Mr. Dodson. I do not think that many of the peers would feel that it was worth while for them to give much attention to public affairs if that was the con- dition on which their independence was to be exercised. 1 22 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. A SOLEMN SHAM. Mr. Forster comes forAvard with another ground. He says this is a special occasion — this is the matter which only concerns the House of Commons and the people, and does not concern the House of Lords at all. But it is impossible to look upon the House of Lords as having a power which, as a power, has no interest in the House of Commons, or in the people of this country. My impression is that whatever concerns the people of this country concerns the House of Lords in the highest degree. But is it true that this is a matter in which specially the House of Lords should not interfere ? I think, on the contrary, it is a matter specially requiring their atten- tion. No matter what Second Chamber you have, however you elect it, wherever you get it from^ whatever controlling power there is, this matter of altering the constitution of the House of Commons is the one thing over which a second chamber should exercise a jealous and vigilant eye. Mr. Gladstone says that it is the irresponsible against the responsible power. I maintain that when they are dealing with the alteration of their own constitution and of those who elect them, the House of Commons is just as irresponsible as the House of Peers. Suppose there was a board of directors who had, or assumed, the power of saying, " AVe do not par- ticularly like this body of shareholders that we have got, we will select some shareholders whom we particularly dislike, and we shall see that they shall only have one vote. Others whom we like better shall have two votes, Avhile others whom we like better still shall have four votes." Well now, should you say that that board of directors was a responsible one, a body responsible to the shareholders? If they have that power of altering the character of the masses to whom they appeal, they cease to be responsible to any man at all. A The House of Lords. 1 2 3 servant who may choose his owu master at his will is not responsible to any master at all, and that is the position which the House of Commons are taking. They are changing the tribunal to which they appeal, the master which they serve, the votes on which they depend. They are as much acting without reference to the judgment of those who sent them there as if they had never been elected at all. It is, therefore, so far from the truth that it is a matter with which the House of Lords have no right. It is a matter which, if the House of Lords had neglected to deal with it, it would have been so utterly faithless to its mission, so utterly regardless of the functions it is appointed to perform, that the English people would have justly throv/n it aside with contempt. I have said that there is a certain number of people who wish to dispense with a second chamber alto- gether, I cannot agree with them, but I agree with them infinitely more than vrith the policy with respect to the second chamber which the Prime Minister is pursuing. He is not anxious to alter or get rid of the second chamber, but he is anxious to disgrace and humiliate it. He is anxious to strip it of all power, to deprive it of all consideration, but to leave it there as a solemn sham, a mere masquerade on legislation, in order to screen the uncontrolled power which he and the Caucus will exercise over all matters. He tells us that of all things we ought to beware of the fear of being thought afraid. "Well, I readily admit that in his foreign policy he has been free from the fear of being thought afraid. I will admit that in his dealings in South Africa he has not only incurred the suspicion but something like the reality of being afraid, and those who think that the results in South Africa are eminently satisfactory, will doubtless recommend the following of the same policy with regard to the House of Lords. To my mind there is no danger to liberty greater than that which would be involved in leaving the House of 1 24 Lord Salisbttry's Speeches. Lords destitute of real jiower, but possessed of that pretence of it which would lull the people into security, and induce them to allow the Prime Minister to have sway without supervision or control. THE TEAL DANGER TO FREEDOM. There are some people I regret to say — and the Prime Minister is among them — who so use language as though it was a worthy object of fear on the part of the enlightened and powerful people of this country lest the aristocracy should obtain a dangerous political power. I should have thought any one who had studied the history of the world, and could read the signs of the times, Avould know that if freedom runs any dangers it is certainly not from any possible revival of the power of the aristocracy. It is in no new direction that your fears have to look. If you will study history you will find that freedom, when it has been destroyed, has always been de- stroyed by those who shelter themselves under the cover of its forms, and who speak its language with unparalleled elo- quence and vigour. It is in commencements of individual power that democratic freedom has hitherto invariably ended ; they have always been begun in a pretence that there has grown up an organisation, a power, by which the reality of freedom would be destroyed. I do not say, it Avould be absurd to say, that you are in any danger of such a fate as met Roman freedom under Augustus or French freedom under Napoleon, but I do say that the danger, though very different in degree, is the same in kind. If you have any danger to fear to the free working of our institutions, it is from the growth of the power ot the wirepuller, centred in the Caucus under the direction of the Prime Minister — master of the House of Commons, master of the House of Lords, nay, yielding but apparent and simulated obedience The House of Lords. 1 2 5 to tbe orders of the Sovereign, gathering into his own hands every power in the State, and using them so that when the time of renewal of powers comes, his influence may be over- whelming and his powers may be renewed. That is the real danger which you have to fear. And look in all this discussion how everything centres in the power of the Prime Minister. The Sovereign, he Avas careful to tell us at Carlisle, acts entirely under the advice of the Minister. The House of Lords, in all important matters, is to be under the foot of the Prime Minister. The House of Commons, governed by the Caucus, is absolutely at the disposal of the Prime Minister. The old constitutional remedy was dissolu- tion, if there was any doubt -whether the House of Commons was in accord with the feeling of the people. Who is to decide on dissolution ? Not the Sovereign, not the House of Lords, no one except the very person whose conduct is arraigned, and whose powers are called in question, the Prime Minister himself. Do you expect that under such a system the people will have any real hold over the conduct of affairs ? Everything is to be centred, according to Mr. Gladstone, in this one devouring grasp ; everything is to be sacrificed that the Prime Minister may be supreme. RUSSIAN DIPLOMACY. Gentlemen, in addressing the House of Lords and the country, the Prime Minister has used an argument to which I have not adverted, because I feel it to be humiliating ; but I must notice it in a word. He has always adopted towards the House of Lords very much the language that Eussia adopts in her diplomatic correspondence with any of the smaller countries that she is gradually going to devour. That corre- spondence is marked by the highest moral character. There is the greatest profession of high and disinterested motives. 126 Lord Salisbury's speeches. There is nothing in diplomacy like it, and there is always a regretful indication that the small Power, be it Turkey or any other, should not do exactly what Russia wishes. Then come circumstances which will be far too strong for the vir- tuous Government of Russia, and Russia will be forced — the virtuous Government of Russia — to destroy that small Power. The Prime Minister has been learning much in the Russian school, and he evidently has learned a good deal of the Russian mode of diplomacy; throughout his speeches that is very much the tone he adopts to the House of Lords. He is always the good man, the excellent Conservative driven against his will by the obstinacy of the House of Lords to undertake a crusade for their destruction. Now, my objection to this mode of argument is, that it assumes a moral condition in the House of Lords which I do not think can be worthily imputed to them. He seems to think that the most effective argument to guide us in the course that we, in the discharge of our duties, may think right, is that we may possibly keep our power, or the sem- blance of our power, and that if we do not we shall be destroyed. He seems to think that the whole object for which we exist is for the purpose of keeping up a power, or an appearance of power, in the House of Lords. Now this is not done with any intention of invective or with any in- tention of casting a reproach upon the House of Lords. It is done quietly and simply, as though he thought it was the most natural motive by which human beings could be moved. I am bound therefore to suppose that he and his subordinates are moved by this motive — that when they are in possession of the duties or functions conferred upon them by the Con- stitution of the country, their first thought is how they shall so discharge their duties that they may keep possession of them for the longest possible period. That, at all events, is the measure which he metes out to the House of Lords, and The House of Lord:, . 127 I conclude that it is the ground upon -svhich Lis own mind moves. AN ARROGANT DICTATOR. For myself I repudiate utterly any such motives as a ground for public conduct. I believe that such motives belong to a degraded order of public morality, and that if they guide any large number of our countrymen the fall of our Constitution will be at hand. If the House of Lords now gives way on account of threats of that kind, if it accepts the doctrine that it is to subscribe to any proposition of the House of Commons if it is recommended by some circulating Minister, who goes round the railway stations to denounce them — if the Lords accept that view of their position and their functions in the State, their future condition will be such as to gratify the deepest hatred of their enemies, and to fill with grief all who value their order and its traditions. They will be the possessors of a merely empty povrer and the objects of undisguised contempt. But I cannot admit that it is from motives of the kind the Prime Minister im- putes to them that the action of the House of Lords will follow. They are in possession by the constitution of their eountr}^, not at any request or desire of their ovrn, of func- tions which bring to them much conflict, much opprobrium, no profit or advantage in the way of social condition. They are in possession of these powers, and they exercise them, and value them only in so far as such powers enable them to contribute to the welfare of the country. If they exercise their powers in that sense they may, indeed, be marks of honour, such as any subject of the Queen may value; but if they exercise them in a spirit of timidity and terror, only considering, like some valetudinarian, how, by abstinence from all exertion, they may for the longest prolong the feeble and flickering flame of their life — if that is the spirit in which 128 Lord Salisbury's Speeches, they regard them — if they accept them as a screen to the undisputed, uncontrolled action of an arrogant dictator — if they do that, those powers, instead of being a mark of honour, will be an emblem and a brand of disgrace. My belief is that they will consent to exercise powers of that kind only on the condition of absolute independence of every other power except that of the people of this country. That I believe to be their conception of their duty — a conception which would be the duty of every honest Englishman who was placed in their position ; and in that conception I believe they will be sustained by all classes of their countrymen in all portions of the country. THE HOUSE OF LORDS AND THE FRANCHISE BILL, (At Kelso, October 12, 1884.) I had hoped that on this occasion I might have been able to talk to you on something else besides the franchise, for I confess that the subject is one that is beginning to Aveary me, and it is impossible not to feel that it is obscuring other sub- jects of much greater importance, that it is withdrawing our eyes from dangers which menace the Empire on every side. Even since I have been ia the room there has been put into my hands an item of news calculated to cause us grave reflec- tion as to the condition in which our country stands, and the peril to which its honour is exposed. I saw a telegram to the effect — I know not whether it is true — that in default of Imperial assistance the Canadian Government has offered to the Cape Government to render it some aid in this its ex- tremity. If there should be any truth in such a piece of intelligence it is one of the gravest reflections on the The Lords and the Franchise Bill. 1 29 misconduct of the Engli3h Government that was ever furnished by the goodwill— the happy goodwill — that exists between one colony and another. But the course of our observations must be dictated to a great extent by the course which Her Majesty's Government choose to pursue. We have had within the last week three members of the Govern- ment speak exclusively upon this franchise question, as though there were no other matter of interest in the world, entirely ignoring all the accusations which their poHcy has to meet, and all the mistakes it is their duty to explain, and we must perforce follow them in the argument which they have laid before the country. We are bound to do so the more because they seem to show themselves absolutely blind to the facts that lie before them. They repeat again and again the old fallacies, the old misrepresentations, as if no refutation of them had ever been laid before the world. SIR WILLUM HARCOURT. The latest, perhaps the least important, of these speeches has the peculiarity — I mean the speech of Sir William Harcourt — that it is almost entirely occupied with the merits of the humble person who addresses you. I think that in selecting the range and scope for his eloquence Sir William Harcourt must have been haunted by some of his old memories of the bar, and must have remembered the time when it was his duty to abuse the plaintiff or the plaintiff's attorney. But as you know, the plaintiff's attorney is only abused when there is no case. He makes a great number of quotations from my speeches, and he says that he has read over some speeches that I made 17 years ago. Well, there he has the advantage of me, for I have not read them, and he also says that he has read over an article which he declares was written by me. Whether the sentences which he quotes were written by me it is impossible for me at this distance of time, and at E 130 Lord Salisbury' s Speeches. this distance from all opportunity of reference, to say, but I will only say with respect to those quotations that unless they are more accurate than those which he has made from speeches and writings of this present year they are not of much value for any purpose what- ever, for I think, dealing merely with the matters of the present year, he has hardly — full though his speeches are of quotations — made a single quotation which is not, by the omission of the context, or by the omission of certain words, utterly misleading. As to the meaning of the passage quoted I will only give one or two instances. For instance, he states that I on a certain occasion declared that the House of Lords had rejected the Bill. I w^as discussing the general powers of the House of Lords, and what was to be done in case the Lords did reject the Bill. The Prime Minister made the same mistake two days afterwards. I corrected it publicly in the House of Lords, and yet Sir William Harcourt after that correction again asserts that I stated that the Bill was rejected. Again, he accuses me of having said that the present state of things in Egypt was charming, and that I rejoiced over the mis- fortunes of my country, whereas what I did say was that if I were speaking as a mere partisan I might say that the state of things was charming, but that I looked on such language as ghastly and horrible. So that he actually accused me of having used language which, as I was using it, I said I considered was ghastly. Surely those two specimens are sufficient. Do not accept any quotations which you may see from my speech, or from those of his other opponents, in the speeches of Sir William Harcourt, without first taking the trouble to refer to see whetlier they are accurate. The Lords a?id ihe FrancJiisc Bill. 1 3 i "THE SATURDAY KLVILER. But if Sir William Harcourt is going into -vvhat I may call the archaeology of opinion — if he is going to refer to opinions that were expressed a long time back, I think he Avill have to cast the beam out of his own (^yc before he affects to cure the mote in other people's, lie speaks of Mr. Bright with something like adulation ; but I can remember when articles which were attributed to him on as good authority as that on which anything is attributed to me — I can remember when articles of such vituperation were levelled against Mr. Bright and against the reform which he preached that Mr. Bright named his adversary the '"' Saturday Reviler," the articles having appeared in the Saturday Review. It is now this " Saturday Eeviler " avIio is embracing Mr. Bright, who has the singular courage to revert to opinions expressed in past years, and to try to extract from them the material for political controversy. But, after all, whj'- do not I take the greatest case ? Does not Sir William Harcourt sail under a leader who has navigated every zone of political opinion, who, starting from the extremest Toryism, finds himself in the extremest Eadicalism, and has taken up and advanced every inter- mediate opinion in turn ? But the truth is that such quotations are of very little value for political controversy, and I take leave to say that by forcing the discussion down to this personal level he has degraded the great argument about which we are contending. He says he treats the controversy as one mainly affecting a great cause, and he chooses to attribute to me powers that are absolutely absurd. He says " It was by Lord Salisbury's personal influence that he forced or rather persuaded the majority of the House of Lords to reject the Franchise Bill. I firmly believe that the majority, if they had not been put under pressure, e2 132 Lord Salisbury 's Speeches, would gladly and willingly have passed that Bill," and he goes on to call me the " arrogant dictator of that House." Now he is comparing my position — of which I am very unworthy — with that which Mr. Gladstone occupies in the House of Commons. But Mr. Gladstone is the dictator because he holds the political life of all or the greater part of his following in the hollow of his hand. By a dissolution he could terminate the j^resent tenure of their seats and by the Caucus he could ensure that they shall not as Liberal members go back to Parliament again. They are absolutely at his disposal. If they value their Parliamentary life, they must vote as he bids them to vote. But, compare that position with mine. I have abso- lutely no power whatever over those who are kind enough to act with me. They are as completely independent as it is possible for men to be. I have no power whatever but what I may obtain by argument, by the goodness of my argument, and the soundness of my case, and it is ridiculous and grotesque to pretend that any influence I could have could impose my opinion upon the Peers. Therefore that pretence is wanting for the personal character which he has chosen to give to this discussion. I will not speak of other amenities. He calls me an " old woman," I think ; but if he thinks I have this power over the Peers he must think I am not only an old woman but a witch. Then he goes on to say 1 am exactly like Laud, that I am exactly like Lord Stratford, that I am very like Charles I., and some time ago he said I was exactly like Lord North, so that I must congratulate myself on the possession of a very many-sided character when I think that I am like all those celebrated persons. But I would venture to remind him that Strafford, when he was in Ire- land, had a great weakness for taking away the property of Irish landlords, and I do not know whether that is not rather more like the character of the Government which is in office The Lords and the Franchise Bill. J J than it is like me. I also remember that the other day when the Government wanted to lock up somebody or other in Ireland, and they could find no statute in English legishition that Avould enable them to do it, they were obliged to have recourse to some very despotic statute that was passed by the Earl of Strafford. A ROYSTERING BLADE. However, Sir William Ilarcourt is quite safe from retaliation. I shall not compare him to any eminent states- man in the past. I shall not attribute to him over- whelming influence over any assembly or any man whatever. I fancy that if we spoke in the language of the times to which he refers we should call him a roystering blade, the sort of man whose threats were very formidable, but whose jDerformances were not likely to give anybody very much trouble. He ends by saying, in the first place, that I am rich, which is a crime to which very few landowners can plead in the present times, and then that I am a miser. I cannot find a comparison for that kind of controversy. It seems to me very much like what is going on at the present moment on the other side of the Atlantic. There the w^hole population are settling which of the two parties shall govern the United States for the next four years by exa- mining into the minutest scandals of the private lives of Mr.- Blaine and Governor Cleveland. I think Sir William Harcourt is preparing himself to adopt the most pronounced oratorical methods of the most advanced society. It is from it that I should find an analogy for his speeches. LORD HARTIXGTON. Now, to turn from him, as I do, to speeches more to the purpose, to Lord Hartington, and, as your noble chairman calls him, his Nemesis — Mr. Chamberlain, The first thino^ 1 34 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. I Inye to observe about those speeches is that they go on the idea that there is some bargain ^-hich one of them speaking at Hanley, and the other speaking at Manchester, can make „ith the House of Lords. I do not kno.v that anybody .s m tl>o position to answer for what the House of Lords n=ay choose to do, and I am quite certain that noboay can make ^ bar..ain on their behalf. Whatever Her Majesty s Govern- ment may do I am sure it will receive the most candid con- sideration on the part of the House o£ Lords. But allow me to remind you what the precise contention of the House of Lord- is. It is that no Franchise Bill of this magnitude can te equitable or safe unless it is accompanied by a fair Ee- distr^ution Bill, and that one of those --^^ ^-^^^ come into operative legal effect without the other. That I take to be the contention of the House of Lords. I do not think the House of Lords will recede from it and I am quite sure that they ought not to do so That is the contention of the House of Lords, not .;s but also not more. I Have seen a great many tSgs attributed to the House of Lords with which they have nothing to do. They have been accused of urgmg a dissolution, of forcing a dissolution ; they have been accused of desiring that this or that scheme of redistribution should be accepted. What the House of Lords may wish to do on Se e two points we cannot know, for they ha^^ not spoken. You must not confuse the language of indiv dual members of the House of Lords with the language of the House of Lords itself. We have all of us a perfect right, like other subiects of the Queen, to express our opinions on this ques- tion and we shall do it freely and without restraint, but it would be as foolish to assume that that was the action of the House of Lords as to assume that when Mr. Gladstone insults the House of Lords it is the action of the House of Com- mons. Lord Hartington's speech tindoubtedly deserves The Lords and the Franchise BilL i 3 5 recognition from us, in that it was conceived and uttered in a tone of much greater conciliation tlian any we have heard from any of his colleagues. I do not think he made any very definite or intelligible proposal ; at all events he made no proposal that, so far as I can see, would bring the con- troversy to a close, but I am bound to express my belief that if we had only Lord Ilartington to deal with we should either never have got into this controversy, or we should be able to bring it to a speedy and friendly settlement. But there is always the Nemesis. Whenever Lord Ilar- tington speaks Mr. Chamberlain takes care to engage one or two days afterwards in which he carefully undoes all the good that Lord Hartington may have done. I am surprised that Lord Hartington is not tired of the process. I remember two years ago, when Lord Hartington said it would be madness to give greater local, more local self-liberty to the Irish unless they would give some pledge of their loyalty to the Queen. Mr. Chamberlain immediately followed by saying that the only possible way of bringing the Irish to peace was to give them local liberty, without mentioning any kind of condition whatever. Last year, you will remember, Lord Hartington expended a great deal of eloquence in contending that you ought not to bring in a Franchise Bill that did not include Ireland. He had a melancholy presentiment of his approaching fate ; for he said, " You should not be at all surprised if I should be taking the other side in this question in the spring," and so of course it happened. He was fol- lowed by the fierce denunciations of Mr. Chamberlain, and in the Cabinet Mr. Chamberlain's will has ever prevailed, and so it is now. Mr. Chamberlain followed his more con- ciliatory tone by language more violent and subversive against the institutions of the country than any Minister 136 Lo7^d Salisbury s SpeecJies, has yet employed. Lord Hartington's relations to the Government seem to me to resemble very much what we have seen of an Italian sermon. I do not know whether you know the mode in which an Italian sermon is conducted. A student is put up at one end of the church, and he maintains the side of the devil, and argues for it as best he can. Of course he argues very feebly. As soon as he has done, the preacher gets up and demolishes the arguments of the student with great triumph, and sends him away discomfited. That is very much the way the Government appear to deal with their opponents. They first set up Lord Hartington to argue a case which they look upon as utterly hopeless; which he does in mild and gentle language, in a very despondent and somewhat sleepy manner, and when he has done down comes the fierce denunciation of Mr. Chamberlain, in order, by overthrowing him, to show how utterly the Ministers trample upon the view which he favours. The only suggestion which seemed to fall from Lord Hartington w^as wa-apped up in '^j^erhapses" and " ifs," and depended on other contingencies, as though it came from a man who was pretty sure he was going to be disavowed. The only suggestion he made was that the Government should introduce the Franchise Bill — a fair Franchise Bill — and then the House of Lords should be so charmed with it, that they would forthwith pass it without requiring to know more about the fate of the Redis- tribution Bill. That is a very amiable picture, but it hardly seems to me like business. A Bill is a very interesting study, but until it has passed the House into which it is introduced it is nothing but an interesting study, for it has no value whatever. We have heard a good deal about blank cheques ; but this is not a case of a blank cheque. We are asked to give the Government a blank cheque, and in ex- change for it they will give us a cheque without a signature. Supposing, for instance, you were at market, and had a The Lords and tJic Franc Jiise Bill. 1 17 transaction Avith a gentleman, a stranger, -who said, " You must show your confidence in me. You must not ask me to pay you ; it is a scandalous thing to ask me to pay you." "I cannot," you rr.ay argue, "listen to such a contention for a moment, and I decline to conclude the transaction." lie "vvill say then, " I am an equitable man ; we will have a compromise j I will draw a cheque, I will put in writing the date, and I will fill it up with exactly the proper figures ; but I will not sign it, and I will give it to you." That is exactly the proposal which Lord Hartington seems to think will be satisfactory to the House of Lords. I confess I do not exactly share his anticipation. I think we shall want some- thing more than that. I think that when this fair and equit- able IJedistribution Bill has been introduced we shall ask that the natural result shall follow — that that fair and equitable Bill shall be also passed, and when it is passed and sent up to the House of Lords I hnve no doubt there will be no difficulty whatever in disposing of both Bills to the satisfaction of the country. NO DIFFICULTY ABOUT JU-^IPIXG OVER THE HOTEL. There seems likely to arise some little hitch in the proposals which the Government make as they stand at present before us. If I understand Lord Hartington rightly, this Bill is already in existence. I do not know whether it is the Bill which has recently appeared in the Standard. Probably that is not the Bill of the Cabinet — only the Bill of the Committee which guides the Cabinet. It is a Bill, I may say, in passing, which bears upon it a very strong impress of that party manoeuvring which we have such great cause to dread in the construction of a Redistribution Bill by any Government which is not properly checked and supervised. It is a Bill which will have the effect, as I read it, of utterly effacing those rural 138 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. populations wliich suffer too much disadvantage under the present system, and are not represented at all in comparison with their numbers. But whatever the Bill may be, my impression is, that if the Minister goes into the House of Commons and says to them, " We have got a Eedistribution Bill ; it is already in my pocket, but I shall not show it to you until the Franchise Bill is passed ; and when the Fran- chise Bill is passed, the House of Lords, who are rather more difficult than you to deal with, may have a look at the Bill ; but you shall not see it till you have passed the Franchise Bill " — my impression is that, unless the House of Commons is very much changed since I had the honour of personal acquaintance with it, that ingenious strategy will not succeed. If it does succeed, I can only say that the House of Commons is more utterly subservient and more degraded by the action of the caucus than I could possibly have imagined. But there are some consequences of this offer of Lord Hartington's that I wish you just to consider. It seems to me that it disposes of the argument on which the Govern- ment have hitherto based their conduct. They tell us that it was impossible to pass Redistribution and Franchise Bills in the same year. I suppose that if the}^ are to introduce a Eedistribution Bill they mean to j)<'iss it ; otherwise they would be guilty of dishonesty ; and therefore it appears that after all there is no such impossibility in passing the Fran- chise Bill and a Redistribution Bill, as they were good enough to tell us. You remember tliat in the country — I forget where it was — Mr. Gladstone said that if the Lords said they would pass the Franchise Bill, but assigned to it a condition which Avas quite impossible, he would compare their conduct to that of a man who offered to give a large sum of money, but only on condition that somebody should jump over the hotel under which he was standing ; and now it appears that there is no such difficulty about jumping over The Lords and ihe Franchise Bill. 1 39 the hotel, and tliat when they are properly pressed the Govern ment find no difficulty in bringing forward a Kedistribution Bill in the same year as the Franchise Bill, and in passing it. The only answer they can give — and this is a matter which well merits your attention — is, " We want the passage of the Franchise Bill as a means of coercing, not only the House of Lords, but also the House of Commons, into passing such a Redistribution Bill as we like." Always remember the grounds of conduct which in an imprudent moment Lord Hartington let out at Manchester. *' We know that the passing of any real, rational, and thorough Reform Bill is impossible unless Parliament and parties of all sides are acting under some pressure or compulsion." Now that points to the danger of which the chairman so wisely warned you. There is a constant tendency to exalt the power of the Minister and to bring the Houses of the Legislature under pressure or compulsion. That is a tendency which it is your business as constituents to resist to the utmost of your power ; that is the real, that will be the real cause, if it ever happens, of the power slipping out of your hands and being absorbed by some machinery or Minister elsewhere. This is really a matter of very much more importance than the Franchise Bill. If the Government succeed in the effort that they are making they will effect a very important change in the Constitution of this country, not only by widening the basis of the Constitution in the House of Commons, to which I have no objection, but they will practically efface and destroy for all effective purposes the power of the House of Lords. A VITAL . QUESTION FOE OUR LIEEKTIES. Mr. Gladstone, in the course of his journey in Scotland, two or three times repeated the idea that the House of Lords had no business to resist any action of the House of 140 Lord Salisbury' s Speeches. Commons. Sir William Harcourt renewed that statement. He said that it is for the House of Commons and not for the House of Lords to decide upon the franchise and redistribu- tion. He denounced with great vigour, and perfectly rightl}^ any claim on our part to dictate the time when the Queen shall dissolve Parliament. We have not the power of such dictation, but, to use his own language, it is as rash, as violent, and as unconstitutional to maintain that any measure that passes the House of Commons can rightly become law without the full assent of the House of Lords. He has no precedent for such a thing. The only precedent which he can state — the precedent of the time of the great Eeform Bill — he states, I think, in a manner not perfectly ingenuous. He tells us that the then Government, merely basing their action on the votes of the House of Commons, overawed the House of Lords ; but why did the House of Lords yield ? A dissolution had taken place after the Bill had been introduced — a dissolution following on the vote of the House of Com- mons, a dissolution overwhelming in its character and indicating distinctly what the nation desired. The House of Lords were quite right to yield — I wish they had yielded sooner — the moment the voice of the nation was clearly pro- nounced. It is only on that condition, that the nation shall be supreme, that the various parts of our body politic can pull harmoniously together ; but it is a very different thing to say that the nation is supreme and to say that the House of Commons, elected on other issues — elected four or five years ago — and dominated by a powerful ^linister, under the strong influence of the Caucus, that that House, without check and without control, shall be supreme, not only in the ordinary matters of legislation, but shall be supreme in de- ciding who are the people that shall elect and in what con- stituencies they shall elect the House of Commons for the The Lords and iJie Franc Jiise Bill. 141 future. That is really a vital question for our liberties. We. are tlireatened, in no veiled language, by those Ministers il: we pursue the course which duty marks out to us. Mr. Chamberlain says : — " I think those gentlen.en (referring to the House of Lords) presume on your love of order and your hatred of violence. These are, no doubt, characteristics of the English people ; but unless this generation has lost other qualities which have made the name of Englishmen respected and honoured throughout the world they will show courage and resolution.'' If these words have any meaning they say to the English people that if they still possess the courage and resolution of their race they will part v.'ith that love of order and that hatred of violence which they have hitherto displayed. I only hope that if Mr. Chamberlain incites the people to riot he will head the riot himself. I hope that if he is going, according to his threat, to march on London from Birmingham, we may see him at the head of the advancing column. My impression is that those who will have to receive him will be able to give a very good account of him, and that Mr. Chamberlain will return from his adventure with a broken head if with nothing worse. Then Sir William Harcourt in the same way threatens us that, as our fathers, he says, went within twenty-four hours of revolution, so we shall have revolution actually upon us. Well, Sir William Harcourt has great opportunity of executing the threats which he utters, because he is head of the police. Last summer he employed the police in order to make a procession pass through London, and he brought it, under their guidance and under their protection, up to the very gates of the Houses of Lords and Commons. Though such a proceeding was a distinct infraction of the orders of both Houses, and was contrary to the spirit, if not the letter, of an Act of Parliament, it was done under the authority and by the protection of the police. We may 142 Lord Salisb7try's Speeches. presume, therefore, that if this resolution which Sir Wilham Harcourt threatens us with is really begun, the same power- ful protection w^ll be accorded to its operations. THE HOUSE OF LORDS BLEEDING TO DEATH. But I do not regard these threats as of any value whatever for lis. They have nothing to do with the duty which lies before the House of Lords. If it is indeed possible for the IMinis- ters of the Crown to stir up the people to disorder — and they have done their best — if that is indeed possible, we shall regret very much the condition of the country in which such things can be done, but they cannot alter by one iota the duty v.'hich the House of Lords ow^es to the country, or the manner in which it is right for them to fulfil the func- tions which, by no wish of their own, have been imposed upon them. You know that there has been a talk of having only a single Chamber, and abolishing the House of Lords. I do not think that that has come within the range of prac- tical politics. I see no inclination on the part of the English people to submit to the despotism of a single Chamber ; but I do not regard that as by any means the greatest danger to which we are exposed. I shall deeply deplore it, but I should deplore it less than a course of events which, without abolishing the House of Lords, reduced them to inactivity and impotence, and left them as a mere screen and mask for any enterprise that the Minister might like to undertake. If the House of Lords were abolished, if you can imagine such a thing, the people of England would say to themselves, " This is a tremendous event ; our constitution is an entirely new one ; we are at the mercy of the House of Commons ; we must devise new securities to prevent the power of those gentlemen whom we elect for seven years from being abused." But if any such change takes place, if the House of Lords — if I may so express it — bleeds to deatli, if its The Loj^ds and the Franchise DHL 143 power is allowed to be repudiated and defeated and silently to fade away, the attention of English people will not be drawn to the precarious position in which their liberties are placed ; they will not see that the despotism of a single Chamber, of a single Minister, has taken the place of the old constitution of the Crown, Lords, and Commons. Therefore I regard any issue of that kind as far more dangerous than any abolition of the second Chamber, deeply and profoundly as I should deplore such an issue. "that monstrous concentration of power." Remember that the dangers which affect you in the present are very rarely the dangers by which you were threatened in the past. There is a celebrated simile in one of the Greek orators, Demosthenes, in w^iich he is reproaching the Athenian people that they were like un- skilful pugilists, who, when a blow had been delivered in one place, immediately lifted up their hands to pro- tect that place and never thought that the next blow would be delivered somewhere else. That is really the condition of our modern society. It is idle to cast our eyes back to the constitutional struggles of a past time, to imagine that things which threatened our liberties in the seventeenth century are likely to threaten our liberties to-day. It is mere rubbish to talk of Laud and Strafford. You may as well attempt to frighten the British people with ogres and brownies; you might as well tell them it was their duty to construct nets to catch the ichthyosaurus. Dangers of a totally different kind threaten you now. It is from no aspiring priest, it is from no despotic monarch, that your liberties run any risk at the present time, and do not imagine that any more than any other human blessing they are exempt from danger, or that they do not require con- stant vigilance and protection. The danger at the present 144 Loj'd Salisbury s Speeches. time-— we see it in operation in America — is that your politics may, as they express it, be worked by the machine ; that the power of the caucus, of the wirepuller, of the organization, may become so great, that individual opinion shall find no voice for expression, and that those who are in possession of the electoral machine will practically be in possession of supreme power in this country. And you have not the protection — never forget it — you have not the protection which the Americans possess. With them no law can be altered, no fundamental law of their country can be altered, without a direct reference to the opinion of the people, with- out obtaining a three-fourths majority in favour of the alteration. It is not so with us. Everything is theoretically in the hands of Parliament, and if Parliament is whittled down so that nothing remains of it but the House of Com- mons, everything will be at the mercy of the majority of that House, and if the majority in the House of Commons is really to have its Parliamentary life at the mercy of the Minister of the day and the caucus which he commands, everything will be in the hands of the Minister of the day — all power, executive as well as legislative. That is the real danger — a danger which should make you pause before you are accomplices in any way in weakening the power, already much reduced, of the second chamber, which is the only control left upon an aspiring and engrossing Minister. Nowhere in modern times has such a constitution as they wish to impose upon you prevailed. Nowhere has a single chamber, without check and without control, disposed of legislative and executive power. That is not the constitu- tion under which our empire has grown and our prosperity increased — that is not the constitution which it is our busi- ness to protect. Against the imposition of that monstrous concentration of power in the hands of a single political clique, we at least, so long as strength and authority are One-Alan Poijcr. 145 given to us, ^vill struggle to the end to tlic utmost of our power. ONE-MAN POWER, (At Dumfries, October 22, 1884.) In rising to thank Lord Galloway, the Conservative Associations, and you, for the kind reception wliich has been accorded to me, I cannot, in the first instance, forbear from noting the melancholy fact that if I had addressed you here from this platform a year ago, it is probable that the chair would have been occupied by another person. I cannot wel- come my Eoble friend the Duke of Buccleuch to his new honours and the vast position of influence which they give him Avithout recalling the memory of that splendid Scotch- man and patriot who has passed away. He passed a life far longer in that position than an ordinary life. In the dis- charge, in the sedulous and unfailing discharge, of the highest duties of a subject, he never permitted the privileges and enjoyment which his position gave him to induce him for a moment to forget the obligations under which he lay towards his fellow subjects, or the duties which his position imposed upon him. He passed a life of unflagging exertion in the discharge of social duties of no common importance, and he leaves behind him a memory of sagacity, of patriotism, of public spirit, of equable and calm judgment, which no Scotchman within our experience has surpassed or equalled. A POLICY OF PLASTERING OVER DIFFICULTIES. Gentlemen, I approach the task of addressing you to-night with the somewhat consoling feeling that we are standing on the verge of the close of this autumn campaign. It has been 146 Lord Salisbtiiy s speeches. one of considerable exertion, not only for the speakers but for the hearers, and my impression is that when it passes into history those who have passed through it will dismiss it with the hope that the like of it may never occur again. But from a political point of view, I cannot say that it has left upon my mind a shade of regret for the course which the House of Lords and the Conservative party have thought it their duty to take. It appears to me that it has left the Conservative party more united than ever it was before, and it has given to the country an opportunity of discussing questions deeply affecting the constitutional working of our Government — an opportunity of hearing both sides of the question, and of forming their deliberate judgment thereupon. From all I see and all I hear, I do not believe that that judgment is unfavourable to the existing Constitution of the country. Some people on the other side are constantly telling us that we have not pursued the right course for the benefit of the Tory party. I am always struck with the singular perception which our adversaries have of that which the Tory party in its own interest ought to do, and they have not been tired of impressing upon us that we have made a great mistake in not attacking them in their own way — that we have drawn attention to matters which we had better not have noticed, and that we have committed the great impolicy of bringing, in the first place, the question of the House of Lords before the country ; and in the second place, that we have distracted the minds of the people of this country from the other blunders of the Government. Now, I accept with thankful- ness that admission on the part of our opponents that there are v3onsiderable blunders of the Government to notice, but I do not in the least admit the error which they impute to us, because the imputation of that error rests upon the as- sumption that the people of this country must be treated rather like lunatics, and that it is dangerous to mention any One- Alan Poivcr. 147 matter in their hearing lest it should set up a i^erilous and destructive line of thought. I do not believe in the policy of plastering over difficulties and trying to avoid dangers by reticence. The only chance we have in this country is fair, free, open discussion ; and if I am told that we have brought before the attention of the country subjects which but for us would not have been brought before them, I say all the better. The sooner that they discuss them the better they will be able to judge upon them. The only thing we have to fear is a hasty, uninformed judgment, and the longer they are able to discuss them, the more thoroughly these questions are agitated in their view, with the more perfect confidence may we assure ourselves of the sound judgment that will ultimately be arrived at. THE PARLIAMENTARY DEENCHIXG SPOON. Now, as v/e approach the close of this campaign, let us try to improve our experience, let us try to trace what are the tendencies, what the prospects which the progress and character of this agitation have disclosed before us. I think, if you will examine all that is new in the character of this agitation, you Avill find that the indications point in one particular direction. You will find that there is a tendency, beyond anything that our ftithers have experienced before, to give the power to the jMinistry of the day and especially to the Prime Minister Avho is at at their head ; and in all the arguments that have been urged and the new doctrine that have been impressed upon us that is the tendency, that is the object to which our opponents seem to direct their efibrts, and in my judgment that is the course of events which it most concerns the people of this country to prevent. Now, if you will look at the state of this controversy, which has been thrashed out before you during the last three months, you will see that we stand at 148 Lord Salisbicry 's Speeches. this point. The Government have summoned an early session. They want to pass, so they tell us, the Franchise Bill and a Eedistribution Bill. According to all former precedent, according to tlie ordinary practice of Parliament, what they would do would be to introduce those two Bills together, and to pass them through as quickly as they can. They have an unusually long session in which to do it, because they have begun six weeks earlier than the ordinary session, and there- fore it is presumable that even within the time tliey have before next August they would be able, if they try, to ac- complish this object. But they are not limited to next August. There is nothing which it is more important to remember, when they tell you they have no time to pass these Bills, that the amount of time they will take is absolutely a matter at their own discretion. They can continue the ses- sion ; they have no need to prorogue Parliament, for they can continue it as long as they like ; and, therefore, if they do not get time enough to pass these two Bills which they profess their desire to pass, and which they have called us at this early period for passing, it must be entirely their own decision or their own fault. AVell, you may ask me. Why do not the Government take advantage of this? Why did they not introduce these two Bills at once and pass them together ? They tell us they cannot pass these Bills un- less they can put the Houses of Parliament under com- pulsion — I am not using my OAvn words, that was pre- cisely the word used by Lord Hartington — unless they could put the Houses of Parliament under compulsion they say that they will not be able to pass these two Bills. I need not tell you tliat this is an entirely new pretension in our constitutional history. Never before has a Minister of the Crown assumed to have the right to exercise compulsion upon the free decision of the two Houses of Parliament. They are repeatedly trying to impress upon you that this a One- A/an Power. 149 conflict with the House of Lords, but this idea of compulsion points to the House o£ Commons, because it would be just as easy to agitate against the House of Lords upon the ques- tion of redistribution as upon the question of franchise. Therefore, it is the House of Commons which they aim at when they say that they must be armed with a power of compulsion which they do not now possess — that is to say, tliey must be able to say to the House of Commons, *' Un- less you pass this Bill which we present to you, this Redis- tribution Bill, you will have to submit to the franchise without redistribution, which we know you will regard as a horrible alternative." Well, I said just now that the reti- cence principle riither made you think they Avere treating the people of England as lunatics, but this idea makes me think they are treating the people of England as if they were babies in arms. Those "vvho have domestic expe- rience may know that the way of making a baby take medicine is to pinch its nose and to insert a drenching-spoon into its mouth, and in that way the baby is made to take the medicine to which it would otherwise object. That is precisely the process Her Majesty's Government propose to apply to the House of Commons. They propose, by means of this Parliamentary drenching-spoon, to force down the throats of the House of Commons the medicine which they know very well if the House of Commons had the opportunity of imbiassed judgment it would decline to accept. JERRYMANDEPJXG. I think we have in some of the revelations that have recently been made an explanation why the ordinary mode of taking medicine is to be abandoned, and why the drenching-spoon is to be resorted to. I dare say you have read the clear, forcible, and vigorous exposition of the defects of the Redistribution Bill which appeared in the 1 50 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. Standard from the mouth of Lord Randolj)h Churchill. I need not repeat his demonstration, I should only spoil it by doing so; but it seems to me substantially just and fair. There is one feature of it which I cannot for- bear to notice. About ten days ago Lord Hartington, speak- ing at Rawtenstall, spoke to us with pitying contempt of our unvv'orthy desire to cast up how many we should gain or how many we should lose by any liedistribution Bill. Well, it seemed to me at the time a very dignified appeal, and I was much struck that a day or two afterwards appeared this Bill which had been prepared by a committee of the Cabinet. From that it appeared that somev/hat strange things had been done in Lord Hartington's own county. A certain town called Accrington has 60,000 inhabitants, and, as you know, according to strict numerical calculations, 54,000 inhabitants is enough to qualify for a member, but the town of Accring- ton Avas not to have a member. And vrhy ? Because it was in Lord Hartington's county, and because the urban voters in the tovv^i of Accrington, who vote for Lord Hartington, Avould be made county voters instead of urban voters by that arrangement. Well, wdien that appeared I thought there was something exquisitely humorous in Lord Hartington's deprecation of our unworthy conduct in casting up the amount of seats we should gain or lose. I do not for a moment accuse Lord Hartington of being conscious of what his friends were doing, but no doubt the moment he saw that scheme appear in the Standard he took a cab and dashed down to the office and insisted that Accrington should have a member. The point which I have ventured to bring before you is that all these proceedings go in the direction that I have indicated to you. It is effected by that tendency to give excessive power to the Ministry v/bich I ventured to signalize to you as the great danger of our day. The Ministry reconDuend for their own reasons and purposes One-Man Power. 1 5 1 some scheme to the House of Commons. They are afraid that the House of Commons will not, according to the ordinary l^ractice, pass it, and they require, for the first time in our history, powers of compulsion. They require to be able to put the House of Commons under a penalty, unless it will pass a redistribution scheme which suits their purpose. If they were not actuated by party motives it would involve the most intolerable annoyance, for it would involve the assumption that they are capable of dictating to the Houses of Parliament that which the Houses of Parliament ought to accept, and that their judgment is superior to any that the Houses of Parliament can exercise. DEMANDING A POLL. Take another point. Mr. Chamberlain has been good enough to say, with singular reiteration, that this is a contest between the House of Lords and the people, and hegoesinto a great many- heroics about the duty of some people to resist this intolerable aristocratic tyranny. My impression is, if there is any aristo- cratic tyranny, a very small portion of this free people would know how to get rid of it at once ; but the truth is that there is no conflict whatever between the House of Peers and the people. AVliat the House of Lords desire to know is what the people ' think. They desire to know it in the authorized and regular way. They wish to know it by the counting of opinions at the polls. That is the only way in which it can be really- ascertained. I have no doubt that Mr. Chamberlain would wish us to believe that the hired ruffians who were sent to break into Aston Hall the other day represented the people ; but we decline to accept that species of indication of popular opinion. As for the demonstrations, I can say two things of them. In the first place, one side or the other, I do not believe they have affected two per cent, of the popu- lation J and, in the second place, as far as any fair return 152 Lord Salisbury'' s Speeches. of them will give an indication, it seems to me that opinion is as much in the Conservative as in the Radical direction. But if they dispute our view, the simple resource — a re- source of which they are marvellously afraid — is to consult the people. They tell us they are delighted with this agita- tion^ and that the whole public opinion is on their side. My impression is that if they were so delighted they would not be so mortally afraid of the possibility of an appeal to it. You know, those Avho can remember elections as they were some ten or eleven years ago, that the form was that first a show of hands was taken, and if anybody objected to the show of hands and demanded a poll, then a poll was taken ; but I never heard anybody say that because you objected to a show of hands, and demanded a poll, therefore you were repudiating the authority of the constituency. The House of Lords is in that position. It does not think that the show of hands is any clear indication that the people have decided against the course which they have pursued, and they demand a poll ; and if a poll is not granted to them now they have no wish, according to the common phrase, to force a dissolution. A dissolution will come soon enough. Accord- ing to the constitutional doctrine laid down by Mr. Glad- stone himself, there must be a dissolution within fifteen or sixteen months, and the House of Lords are perfectly content to wait for that time. They have no wish to force a dissolution, but they will not accept a show of hands de- cided by not an impartial authority ; and they insist that this great issue can only be decided by the great national poll. DICTATORSHIP. But now the point I want you to observe is the doc- trine that is held on the other side upon this subject. "We are told that it is an intolerable thing that the House of Onc-Mau Poiuer. i 5 3 Lords should have the power to force a dissohition. As I have said to you, the House of Lords has never pretended to do anything of the kind. All it has pretended to do is to put by a certain question until a dissolution can be had. But who is to have this power of dissolution ? is it the the Crown ? No. ISIr. Gladstone was very careful in his last speech to point out that the Crown in his view meant nothing but tlie decision of the Prime Minister. I do not agree with him. I do not admit that to be constitutional law. In my view, whatever else is surrendered to the dis- cretion of the Prime Minister, this question of dissolution never can be disconnected from the initiative and the will of the Crown. And I will tell you why. A dissolution is the only appeal the people have against a Prime Minister who is not acting according to their wish. That the Prime Minis- ter should have a right of advising an appeal to the people I do not deny for a moment, but I do deny that he has a right to interpose his will and say — The people may storm, and object ; they may think that my course is wrong, but so long as I can control the majority in the House of Com- mons, elected under my auspices, controlled by my machinery, so long I will not permit an appeal to be made to the people against myself. That does not seem to me to be true constitutional law. But whether it is true or not, what I wish to point out to you is the tendency of all these new doctrines that are started now to centre all power into the hands of the Prime Minister alone. Mr. Chamberlain insists that the majority shall have all power, and that the minority shall have no rights, and he says if the majority abuse that power they will soon become a minority. Aye, but there are seven long years to run before the majority become a minority. There are seven long years to run before any abuse of power can be punished, and during that time blows may be dealt against the institutions of the coun- 1 5 4 Lord Salisbury 's Speeches. try wliicli it will be impossible afterwards to repair. In his zeal to control the power of the people against the House of Lords, Mr. Chamberlain has introduced a new way of ex- pressing the opinion of the people. But, as you know, or at least as his friends have thought, the best way to express the opinions of the people is by attacking a meeting at which so moderate and careful a statesman as Sir Stafford Northcote was to express his opinions — by dint of bludgeons and chair backs to make the expression of opinion impossible. Mr. Chamberlain has been pleased to say that this riot at Birmingham was due to some observations which I made. The observations which I made were that if he incited to a riot, I hoped that he would head the riot, when I was pretty confident that his head would get broken. If Mr. Chamberlain means to say that a Minister of the Crown who incites to riot ought not to have his head broken I differ from Mr. Chamberlain. 'To incite to disorder is a grave offence on the part of any- body ; but on the part of a Cabinet Minister, on the part of one of those who are charged with the peace and order of the vast industrial communities in which we live, it is one of the greatest offences that a man could commit. But I do not wish to argue the point with Mr. Chamberlain if he thinks that the penalty of having his head broken for such an offence is too severe. For the sake of argument, I am will- ing to put the question aside. Let us leave Mr. Chamberlain's head alone, and assume that some milder chastisement would be appropriate to the siipposed offence. What I want to point out to you is that they all fall into the same groove, which I have already pointed out to you as the groove in which Liberal opinion is fitting itself. It all implies that despotic imposition of the opinion of the majority which happens to be Liberal upon their opponents, and the use of any means, no matter how repulsive or atrocious, which may seem likely to compass the results at which he aims. One-Ulan Power. i 5 5 In this country of Scotland, you have had some people who have even improved upon Mr. Chamberlain's lessons. Sir George Campbell, who in his time was charged with the government of sixty-four millions of people, and would have disposed of anybody v/ho had incited to disorder, with extreme rapidity, is reported to have said, " I entreat you now to be content with lawful proceedings " — these were his v/ords — " but if the House of Lords does not pass the Fran- chise Bill, why then we will take stronger measures." That is to say, stronger measures than lawful proceedings. That is the kind of result which Liberal doctrine, as preached by Mr. Chamberlain, is producing in this country. THE ONE'JtAN POWER. Now, there are other indications of the same tendency — a tendency against vrhich I think all good citizens should watch ; and there are indications which show at once what danger attends this one-man power. In 1881, as you are aware, there were a series o£ actions, terminating in an action on Majuba Hill, and there were a series of negotiations, terminating in a convention which the Boers have not observed, and which the English Ministry again and again has consented to revise. Well, what w^as our constitutional majority doing during that time ? "Why was it the House of Commons did not interpose to stop proceedings so much at variance with all the traditions of this country ? The House of Com- mons was blameless in the matter. Again and again Sir Michael Hicks-Beach urged upon the Government that some opportunity should be given of discussing the affairs of the Transvaal. Again and again the Prime Minister, contrary to all precedent, refused to give any oppor- tunity for reviewing the conduct of his own Government. Again and again his power over the majority of the House of Commons was used to prevent any such dis- 156 Lo7'd Salisbury's Speeches. cussion. And it was not till the middle of the month of August, till the House was empty, and everyone was ex- hausted, and, what is more, till the false steps had been irrevocably taken, it was not till then that a full discussion was obtained of the policy to which the Government were committing the country. Again, what happened this year ? You know what is the state of things in Egypt. I do not know where to begin in the list of the Government blunders, because it goes so far back ; but after the destruction of poor General Hicks, the Government, in a moment of singular ill-advised- ness, announced their intention to all the tribes, friendly and otherwise, that they were about to abandon Gordon. It was the first piece of practice to which they ever committed them- selves. The result was, of course, the tribes, who always worship the rising sun, turned against us, and the lives of many garrisons to which we were in honour committed became endangered. "Well, then the Government conceived the extraordinary idea of sending one man, v,-ithout forces of any kind, to try and save the lives of those garrisons. It is needless to say that one man did not succeed, and that the garrisons got their throats cut, but that was not all. The one man, the heroic General Gordon, of whose character and efforts it is impossible to speak in language of too high encomium, he in his efforts to do the strange and impossible duty which the Government had imposed upon him placed himself in a position of imminent danger from which he could not rescue himself. And now that the garrisons have had their throats cut, and General Hicks has been butchered, at an enormous cost, something like, I believe, £150,000 or £160,000 a week, we are fitting out a great expedition of the purpose of rescuing the man whom we ought not to have sent on a task which it was impossible for him to perform, in order to save lives of garrisons who have long ago been butchered, and to attain no other object whatever bi^t in One-Man Power. 1 5 7 this way to remedy the pile of blunders which one upon another the Government have committed. This is one very serious matter. We are committed, in a time o£ in- creasing distress and declining trade, to a tremendous expedi- tion which, when it has succeeded, will only result in putting us in the same position iu which we were two years ago, and in which we might have remained if the Government had had ordinary common sense. But that is not all. The Government, which has always been so proud of the concert of Europe, has contrived by an act of illegality — to which they have added fea- tures unnecessarily harsh and repulsive — by an act of illegality they have contrived to unite Europe against them, and cannot now count on the countenance of any European Power in solv- ing this difficult problem which they have made for themselves in Egypt. MUZZLING THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. Again, I ask, where was the constitutional machine ? "Why did not the House of Commons interfere to pre- vent this great absurdity ? The answer is the same. Against all former precedent the Government used its ma- jority to prevent the House of Commons having an oppor- tunity of discussion, and the mode in which the Government used its majority was so peculiar that I must venture to dwell for a moment upon it. It was agreed — they seemed to think that they could not in decency refuse to agree — to give a day for the discussion of the policy upon which the late Conference was initiated, which would have given an oppor- tunity for an explanation of the whole Egyptian policy. The Government had given the day ; the day came ; the mover was there with his motion ; all the speakers were ready ; all the forces were assembled for a division, when there arose a gentleman — and the Government and the gentleman tell us that it was by accident— there arose Mr, 158 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. Gosclien, whose word we are bound to believe, to move that it was not expedient that this discussion should take place, and the Government thereupon took up his motion in the strangest possible way. They did not honestly vote with him ; they voted against him ; but there suddenly spread through their ranks an inconceivable and perfectly unprece- dented paroxysm of disobedience. All the most devoted folloAvers of the Government on that occasion voted against them. It was told to me — it has been denied since, but I suspect there was something in it — that some of those who ordinarily marshalled the forces of the Government stood in the door, and by signs not easily mistakable, showed which way their preference lay. At all events, that strange result was produced that son was set against father and brother against brother on that strange and monstrous occa- sion. Mr. Gladstone's son voted against him. Lord Northbrook's son voted against him. Lord Spencer's brother voted against him. It was a fearful moment for the dominion of the evil powers. The discussion did not take place. The controlling power of the House of Commons was paralysed. No supervision of the Government's efforts was made, and the result is that hopeless imbroglio in Egypt, diplomatic and military, upon which, with so much appre- hension, the people of this island are now looking. Again, I say, you see here what is the result of departing from your old constitutional rules. You see what is the result of leav- ing to the Government of the day this despotic, unquestioned power which they claim as the result of Liberal principles. You see now what is the result of this strange and monstrous conversion which makes the party that professed to defend freedom and progress the champions of the power of one man and the advocates of imlimited submission. One- Man Power, 159 DEPRESSION OF TRADE, I wish before I sit down to turn for a short time from this subject, because I confess I feel, and I have felt in this autumn campaign, that the result of the argumentative con- test to which the Government had challenged us was that a question of importance comparatively secondary was obscuring matters of far greater moment to the country. I will not refer on the present occasion to the great dangers and difficulties which threaten us in connection with foreign affairs, but I will only say this — that it is not by any act of ours if those matters have been pushed back into the second distance, and if the attention of the constituencies and of the people has been concentrated on a matter that is not, speaking comparatively, of primary importance. Lord Hartington reproaches us that in the midst of the dangers which we point out to the Empire we have agitated this question. Our answer is, in the first place, that it was not by our advice that in this particular crisis this question was brought forward at all ; and, in the second place, this Go- vernment have chosen to desert the road which all former Governments in dealing with the reform of the representa- tion had uniformly trodden ; and that if evil results have come from this abandonment of precedent with them and not with us, who point them out, the responsibility must lie. But the matter to which I wish to call your attention — I hardly need to do so — is the condition at this moment in which industries of the country find themselves, and the necessity that your attention and the attention of all who give them- selves to politics, of all who exercise any influence, however humble, upon the management of affairs, should be concen- trated at this crisis. You know that for years back there has been depression, and that it seems to be going on from bad to worse. You know, no one better, what it is in agri- i6o Loi^d Salisbury's Speeches. culture. It used to be thought, the Duke of Richmond's Commission thought so, that there was notliing but the sun to blame, and that when a good harvest came back agri- cultural prosperity would returu with it ; but we have had a year which I imagine is as good as any we can expect to have. We shall not have many such years as we have had last year, and yet I have been told by those to whom the matter is familiar, that the agricultural prospect in many parts of the country was never more gloomy than it is at the pre- sent moment. Why is that ? First, because your prices have failed. And why have your prices failed ? Because your buyers are no longer numerous or keen. And why are your buyers no longer numerous or keen ? Because trade and industry no longer give them the material where- with to purchase. Therefore your inland market is de- stroyed. I know that outside agriculture a cry of distress is rising from one after another of the great industries by which this great country is supported. We have heard terrible accounts from Sunderland of 30,000 to 40,000 being out of work. When I was in Glasgow they told me there were as many as 50,000 people out of work there. I believe that in Newcastle the distress is assuming graver and graver proportions every day. For some reason or other the great mechanism by which the trade and industry of this country have hitherto been worked seems to have failed at some j)oints, and we only ask, What is the cause, and how far is it possible, that by powers which Government possess, by the action of any political force, any mitigation of this evil can be brought about ? THE GOVEKNMENT TO BLAME. Do not let me seem to hold out a hope which I do not myself entertain, that any action of the Government can wholly mitigate the distress under which we suffer. I One-Man Powe,^ ^ know that it is not so, that there are ^^^^^^^i^k&^'^^i^ power of any political machinery wliich impose suffering wliich is now present, and which is, I fear, in the immediate future. But tliough we may not be able to pre- vent, we may be able to palliate and to mitigate, and wc must ask ourselves — Is there anything in the political con- duct of our Goverment which aggravates or has aggravated this evil ? Is there any change of policy by which these disasters can be mitigated or averted ? There is one thing that I have always been anxious to urge upon all assemblies of my countrymen — I feel that it is not sufficiently recog- nized in the legislation of recent years — and that is that industry cannot flow unless capital is confident, and capital will not be confident as long as it fears that Parliament may meddle with it, and balk it of its profits. There is no question of this, that of recent years Parliament has been singularly meddlesome. I do not say that it is from a bad motive ; on the contrary, usually the motive has been philan- thropy — possibly in some cases of ill-guided philanthropy — • but always pure and humane motives have been at the bottom of this meddlesome legislation, but the effect has been not to interfere with periods of prosperity, but in periods of difficulty to make capital shrink from exposing itself to unknown dangers and to deprive the ^vorkman's industry of the only food by which it can be nourished. In acting thus men do not think much of the action of Parlia- ment. They think that, happen what may, be the restric- tions what they may, they can at all events secure profit enough to pay them for the risk and trouble they incur. But -when bad times come, and when the question in every man's mind arises whether he sliall invest his capital in an industry or not, there comes up the doubt — Had I not better desist, seeing the temper that prevails in Parliament? I know they have passed Act after Act^ -with whatever motive, that F 1 6 2 Lord Salisbu ry 's SpcecJics. has dimiiiislied our profits hitherto. How can I know that they will not pass Acts of the same character in future ? And this tendency becomes much more dangerous when the policy of Parliament approaches, in ever so small a degree to the character of confiscation. If there is in the legisla- tion a tendency dishonestly to interfere with the rights of men for the purpose of gaining Parliamentary or electioneer- ing strength^ the evil is not confined to the number of people whom their conduct injures. The evil spreads throughout the community. A feeling of fear attaches itself to all en- terprises upon which the capitalist is invited to embark, and many more industries suffer than those which are affected by the particular legislation to which I refer. THE DISEASE OF APPREHENSION. Now, I will give you an example. There has been a good deal of legislation about land. I do not wish in the least to discuss its character, but it has had the effect of frightening the OAvners o£ land. What has been the result ? I heard in this neigh- bourhood, in this county, of a very great industrial pro- posal, which would have given employment to a vast number of men ; it was laid before wealthy men, who were interested in it as territorial proprietors, but the an- swer was, ''At ordinary times we might have been glad to look upon this undertaking. It might have added to our property and have promoted the welfare of the conmiunity. But with the tendency that has shown itself in Parliament we dare not risk any large sums of money and sink them in improvements which would take many years to realize because we do not know how far the doctrines which now prevail may operate hereafter to prevent us reaping the profits to which we are entitled.^' I want you, if possible, to put aside all consideration of the owners of land altogether. Do not think whether it is just to them or not. What I want you to think One- Man Power. 163 of is whelhor it is good for a commimit}', niul what I say is that this feeling of doubt and appielicnsion is the most dan- gerous disease by which the industry of a community could be affected. It affects a community precisely as cattle disease has affected the industry of cattle breeding in this country. The foot-and-mouth disease was only in a few localities by itself; it did not do an enormous amount of harm, but it filled every man's mind with apprehension, it limited the investment of capital, and as the investment of capital was limited employment was restricted, wages ceased to ilow, and distressed populations had to appeal to the sym- pathy of the public for their support. That is one serious evil of the tendency which recent Parliaments have shown which I should be wrong if I did not impress upon you. FAIR TKADE. There is another matter — a much more serious matter, and one which you must carefully consider — and that is the con- dition of the markets of the world. I am not speaking now of foreign policy. No doubt it is very disappointing that a Ministry which came in on principles of peace should have so conducted its foreign policy that at every step it seems to dry up a market by which the produce of the industry of this country might be absorbed. Egypt, the Cape of Good Hope, China — all these are names familiar to the markets of this country. In all these the operations which have taken place, the political events which have developed themselves under the auspices of the present Government, have dimi- nished the purchasing power, have restricted the exportation, and have consequently added to the volume of distress which threatens us in the approaching winter. But there is another and much more serious question. It is a question which politicians do not like to deal with, but which will grow from year to year, and which invites the attention of the f2 164 Lord Salishtry's speeches. people of this country — I mean the effect whicli obstructive and hostile tariffs have upon the interests of this country. We have undergone as great a disappointment in this re- spect. When free trade was adopted, we hoped that free trade would spread through the world, but we are al- most the only converts after nearly half a century has passed. It is not only so, but matters seem to be getting worse rather than better. I do not know if yon have noticed the fact that in the French Chambers the French Minister has recently announced his intention of putting a duty upon corn and a fresh duty upon cattle. I do not quote it as a case of a tariff which interferes with the exports of this country. I quote it to show you that th(; anticipations which were entertained years and years ago that all nations, when we once set the example, would follow in our footsteps in free trade, have most unhappily not been realized. Mr. Bright is very fond of referring to the achievements of free trade as one that entitles him for ever to the gratitude of his countrymen, I do not differ as to the value of free trade, but I differ very much as to the value of Mr. Bright's ser- vices. When free trade was pressed upon Lord Melbourne just at the close of his administration in 1840 — and Lord Melbourne as you know was a Liberal Minister — his answer was, " I admire free trade exceedingly, but it seems to me absurd to introduce it without some communication with the other nations of the world ; because if we do so, we sacrifice the only bribe that we have to offer them when we admit their produce free to induce them to do the same." That was the opinion of Lord Melbourne. About that time Mr. Bright came into the controversy. He did not deal with it as a matter of scientific -discussion, as a question to be argued out before the tribunal of the people ; he dealt with it as an opportunity of setting cla?s against class. lie seized upon that one question of the Corn Laws, and he tried, and with Onc-MiiN Pozccr. 165 his friends he was successful in liis efTorts, to persuade them that the only obstacle, the only objection, to free trade was the greed which he imputed to the owners and the occupiers of the land. What was the result of this turn to the con- troversy given by Mr. Bright ? He has always loved to treat every political discussion as material for sowing dissension between the classes of which this community i^ composed, lie raised a formidable agitation, and Sir Robert Peel, rightly or wrongly, was of opinion that it was necessary for the in- terests of the country that that agitation should be closed. AVithout waiting for any negotiations with foreign Powers he introduced the system of free trade, which Mr. Gladstone has carried further, and the consequence is that we have now no motive by which we can prevail upon foreign Powers to lower tariffs or open their markets to our industries, which sorely need them. Do not understand me to be blaming Sir Robert Peel. He acted under great difficulties, and there is much to be said for what he did, but that the result of that one-sided policy of free trade has been unfortunate, I for one cannot doubt. It puts us in the position that though we gain by the free importation of corn and other materials so that the prices of them are low to the consumers, we do not gain all that we might have gained. We do not gain an issue for the industry of our own community or for the exportation of goods that we produce. We do not gain an issue to those industries, and therefore those industries languish. Therefore employment is becoming scarcer, wages are becoming smaller, and the distress of the population is becoming larger, and the blessings of free trade, which ought to have been enor- mous, have been robbed of half their value owing to the precipitate and the improvident manner in which the posi- tion of this country as regards other countries was sacrificed. 1 66 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. BROWBEATING. Well now, I have pressed this point upon you precisely because in all this matter of free trade there is a habit on the part of ministerial advocates of what I may call brow- beating. They treat this question of free trade as if it were some revelation from heaven which it would be blasphemy to inquire into. If you suggest that some particular work- ing of it should be examined, if you ask for an inquiry into the eiFect on some particular industry, if you say that, owing to some miscalculation, it has not produced all that was expected of it, they cry out, '' Oh ! you are a mere protec- tionist ; all your protestations are of no avail ; we will not listen to you for a moment." I protest cigainst dealing in that spirit with any question which affects the industry and the livelihood of vast masses of our countrymen. Politics are not an exact science, and if those formulas of free trade in which they trust are not producing the results which they anticipated, and which they promised to us, we, at least, with- out incurring the imputation of any economic heresy^ may press for an inquiry to examine where is the defect, where the shortcoming to which our misfortunes point. I am anxious, in speaking the words which I believe Avill close this autumn controversy, to urge upon you that you should not allow the matters that we have discussed, however im- portant they are, to obscure in your sight the far more momentous questions which surround the industry, the employment, and social well-being of the people. It seems a mere derision to tell men who are starving in Sunderland and Glasgow that we are fighting for the question as to how they shall exercise their privilege at the ballot box ; to offer to men who are without employment, who have muscles to labour, but who cannot with their best will compass the limits of their daily need — to offer to them some extension One- Man Poiuer. 167 of the franchise or arrangement of seats is like offering u stone to those who are asking for bread. I entreat you not to allow these questions to be banished from your minds by the din of the controversy which is now pass- ing away. I do not say that I can put into any formula that can be placed at a meeting like this the remedy that may be required. What I ask is that the best intellect of the country shall be applied to the discovery of what is the cost of the most terrible evil by which the country can be afflicted. I know there are com- plicated ditiiculties. I know that by diplomatic instruments we, in the full confidence in our political orthodoxy, have been winding band afler band round our own limbs, so that in many cases we are not free to move. I know that such a position involves relations unprecedented in the history of the world with our self-governed colonies ; I know it involves our Imperial relations with far- distant lands. I do not ask for a simple remedy or profess to have any compact or ready nostrum by which our difficulties can be dispelled. All I propose to you is, do not allow your- selves to be driven off from the consideration of this mo- mentous question by being told that you are protectionists in disguise, or by being told that this is a thing which has been decided many years ago, and that if you venture to inquire into it you will suggest doubts of the soundness of the opinions you entertain. The interests that are involved are far too large, far too deep, too pathetic, and too perilous for arguments of that kind. This agitation which has taken place during the autumn is in many respects highly bene- ficial to the country. I think it has brought before the minds of the people of the country questions with which they must grapple, facts which they must learn to understand, if they are to be our rulers. I desire nothing better than that they should be thoroughly and perfectly informed. I think 1 68 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. the agitation has bad a tendency to strengthen the House of Lords in the opinion of the people of this country. But the only reason for which I could possibly regret it would be if it should have the effect of diverting your minds and the minds of the constituencies of this country from the far graver and more important questions which are approacliing us in the immediate future. I should regret it deeply if it blinded your eyes to the dark and black clouds which are surrounding our horizon. I should regret it deeply if it diverted your attention from the problems which you as governors of this country must grapple with and must solve. I should regret it deeply if it induces us for a moment to forget that the first function of Government, its most vital and imperative duty, is to care for the industry, the vast industry, whose prosperity or depression means the difference between well-being and misery, between health and disease, between a life of hope and a life of despair to millions of our toiling fellow-countrymen. THE JOINT REFORM BILL. (At Arlington Street, November 19, 1884.) I have to tender to you and to those whose representatives you are my very sincere acknowledgments for the great kindness of the language which has been used, and for the address, so largely signed, which you have presented to me. We have to undertake great responsibilities and considerable labour, and our support and reward in such efforts is the confidence — the iingrudging confidence — which the Conser- vative leaders always receive from those whose cause they represent in the country. Certainly no Conservative leaders have more fully received this than those who now hold this The Join ( Rcfonii Jhll. 169 honourable place. The crisis, or so-called crisis, to which Colonel Riiggles-Brise has referred, is passing away ; and tlie Government have, 1 think, conceded as much in the way of arrangement as might be anticipated if the crisis was to be settled by concession and arrangement with the Govern- ment. It might have been terminated in another way. Jt has been said that Ave were trying to force a dissolution of Parliament, and that we have failed to do so. I can only refer to my own language on the subject, uniformly main- tained, that we have not been trying to force a dissolution of Parliament. We never feared a dissolution of Parliament, indeed, we were perfectly willing and ready to have it, and should have been glad of an appeal to the constituencies. But we have never held out as the function of the House of Lords so to frame its legislative course in respect to the measures brought before It as to force in all cases an appeal to the people. The House of Lords has a right, and it is its first duty, to refuse its assent to whatever it considers to be inexpedient until the opinion of the people can be obtained ; but it is not the duty of the House of Lords to refuse its consent to arrangements which it considers judicious merely for the purpose of bringing about a dissolution. " DEALING WITH ENGLISH GENTLEMEN." The arrangement which has been made no doubt depends for its execution in some of its most important particulars on the pledged word of our opponents. I have heard that fact quoted as a ground for dissatisfaction with what has been done. To my mind it is no ground for such dissatisfac- tion. Though we are dealing with our opponents we are dealing with English gentlemen, and I am quite sure that any paltering with the pledged word Avhich they have passed would be as repugnant to their natural instincts as it would be fatal to the position of any political leaders who could I/O Lord Sal isbitry's Speeches, bring tliemselves so low. I do not think there is the slightest ground for uneasiness or disturbance on that head. I have no d(jubt that our opponents and ourselves will do our best, each according to our separate lights, to secure that the coming measure, if v.'e can agree upon it, shall do justice to all interests, and especially that it shall do justice to the rural interest, which from its geographical position, is always liable, unless care is taken, to be denied its true, proper, and sufficient weight in Parliamentary representation. Wo know that for many generations past it has wanted that proper representation, and now that the principle of numbers is being so much more largely adopted it becomes much more necessary that the balance should be fairly adjusted. We have before us a very arduous task : we shall approach it with the most earnest desire to bring it, if possible, to a successful issue, and to do justice to the interests committed to our charge. Whether we succeed or whether we fail, I hope we shall retain our confidence and the belief you have hitherto entertained, that in any course we are taking we are guided by a strict sense of duty, and a strict anxiety to fulfil the responsible functions which your favour has con- ferred upon us. And, as I have said, the difiiculties in our way will be considerable. But I cannot help feeling that the ample discussion which this subject has received in every part of the country during the past autumn has very much smoothed the way to a satisfactory arrangement, and has forced men to think over the character of the projects sub- mitted to them: and so far from having to regret that the action of the House of Lords has caused an agitation in the country, I should rather say that the House of Lords is to be congratulated on having forced the country to give its mind to this great question, and to treat it with that deliberation which alone will secure that the sound common sense of Englishmen shall prevent any evil which Some Ilonic Qticsiions. i 7 1 may arise from the mistaken ardour of partisans. And now, gentlemen, 1 have only to express to you my very sincere thanks for the kindness of your address and the hope that we shall retain your confidence in the future. SOME HOME QUESTIONS. (At Newport, Octodeii 7, 1«S85). I thank you heartily for this reception given by so magni- ficent a meeting, which in one sense I am most rejoiced to see as indicating the strength of Conservative feeling in this part of the country, but in another sense fills me with appre- hension lest I should not be able to convey to all who sit here the observations which I desire to submit to them. It has already been brought to your notice that our advent to office Avas unexpected, was the result of an action on the part of our opponents which we had no cause to anticipate, and that we took office under many disadvantages. No one who is at all conversant with party tactics would doubt for a moment that it was a great misfortune to us that we were obliged to fight upon a financial proposal which we thought radically unsound^ and the result of that battle was that our opponents retired from office. And now that our official career has lasted a short time, I pray you to notice the kind of criticism with vv^hich it has been received by our opponents. They do not say that we have done wrong. ^Yhat they say — and it seems to them the bitterest reproach that they can address to us — is that we have done like themselves. Do not understand me to admit the fact. I only say that that is what they assert, and they do not reproach us with it on the ground of policy, for of course they maintain their ovrn policy, but they 1/2 Lord Salisbury 's Speeches. maintain that we are guilty of some great immorality and acting contrary to the professions that we have made. Some orators describe our conduct as slavish ; others call it submissive. Lord Hartington says we have been guilty of gross political immorality — he, the great maintainer of prin- ciple, who never yielded an opinion in his life — and Mr. Chamberlain reproaches us in language so categorical that I will quote it. Mr. Chamberlain says this : " What is the complaint that I have to make against the present Govern- ment ? It is that they act and speak in office in absolute contradiction to all that they said and did in opposition." And then he proceeded to single me out. ^yelI now, as he has singled me out, I will speak for myself. I will say that this is an absolute libel ; that it has not a shadow or a shred of truth — and that I defy him to point out the language I used in opposition which in office I am contradicting by my deeds. It is a simple test. If he can prove it, he confounds me; if he does not prove it, the reproach which he makes recoils upon himself and covers with the charge of dishonesty the tactics which he pursues. ("Affidavits.") Unfortunately, Mr. Chamberlain is not very strong on affidavits — at least, he is not strong with affidavits that are of any value. The affida- vits that he has to use, his friends are obliged to purchase. FOREIGN POLITICS. Let me take foreign politics for my illustration ; and you will allow me to say, in touching on foreign politics, that though I can speak to you with perfect freedom on home politics, you will understand that with the particular office that I have the honour to fill it is not in my power to speak Avith absolute freedom when touching on foreign affairs. One of the slavish and submissive things that we have done is that we concluded a loan in Egypt which the late Govern- ment had undertaken to conclude, but which they were Some Home Questions. i ^ }^ unable to issue. They obtained the conveiitiou on which the loan was grounded. Tliey maintained that a loan was absolutely necessary for the pursuance of their Egyptian policy, but somehow when it came to the test they were unable to raise the loan, and we found the matter in a state of absolute deadlock. Well, again, we are pursuing certain negotiations with respect to the frontier of Afghanistan. Those negotiations were not concluded, but we are conduct- ing them to a successful conclusion. What do tliey mean when they say '-this is slavish or submissive conduct"? They mean that it is the duty of statesmen who succeed to office to be false to the engagements and to disappoint the expectations which their predecessors had raised. If that is their view of public duty they are the best judges of it, and I do noi dispute that probably they would do so if they had the chance. But I can only say that it neither is nor ever has been our view of public duty, and that you will search in vain through the speeches of members of the Government for any indication that we thought such disloyalty as that ever entered into our conception as part of the duty of English statesmen. I see that I am reproached because a rising has taken place in Eastern Kouraelia, which is contrary to the provi- sions of the Treaty of Berlin. One of my opponents, Mr. Shaw Lefevre I think it was, said in a tone of loud triumph, '•' Whatever happens, you will see that the present Govern- ment -svould not venture to use a single English soldier in order to repress that rising." Why? When was it the practice of English statesmen of any party to use the military forces of this country to settle disputes that have arisen in the internal affairs of other nations ? It is one of the first principles of English policy that if subjects rise against their ruler, or rulers are severe upon their subjects, we may ex- press our opinions, but we do not interfere by acts — but in 1/4 Lord Salisbury s Speeches. this case 1 deny that the policy of the Berlin Treaty has been frustrated. In the first place, what has taken place has not restored what was called the Great Bulgaria of the San Stefano Treaty. But that is not the only point. Our object in dealing with those new nationalities of the Balkans was that they should be true and real nationalities. It was the policy of Europe ; it was the inevitable result of the progress of events that where there was a homogeneous Christian popu- lation subject to the rule of the Porte, that homogeneous Christian population would by its own progressive tendencies, by its own innate character, necessarily before long free itself from that subjection; and it was an operation of that kind which the Berlin Treaty sanctioned. But it Avas essen- tial that the nations which grew up should represent the real character, and grow by the natural laws of the community to which they belong. Kemember, I must speak with all courtesy, and I am anxious that not a word that can give offence should escape my lips, but remember, that when the Berlin Treaty was signed these Bulgarian provinces were occupied by a conquering army, and that if Eastern Bulgaria had then been handed over to Bulgaria to form part of a united State, its future political growth would not have been that which the character and history of the inhabitants would naturally cause, but it would be that which would arise from the influence of the conquering army which was still bivou- acked in its midst. That conquering army has retired. Seven years have passed away, and a separate, and distinct, and genuine national character has been formed, and though I do not deny that I think it would have been more fortunate for Europe, and for the Eastern Itoumelians themselves that this event should not have happened, still I utterly deny that the provision of the Berlin Treaty has been destitute of the highest beneficent effects. I say that if these two Bulgarias are in the future to develop the strength and Soiue Home Questions. 175 character and idiosyncrasies of a nation, it will 1)g to the care that Europe exercised over their cradle that their future career will be due. I may also say it is not absolutely without precedent in the history of treaties that after a few years some modifications should take place in their provisions. I remember the Treaty of Paris, Avhich approved of the separation of the two Roumanias, but I think before it had been signed two years the two Roumanias united. The Treaty of Vienna provided for the union of the Netherlands and Belgium, but after fifteen years had elapsed the Nether- lands and Belgium were separated. Treaties do not affect to overrule the genuine impulses of population. What they do affect to do is to protect that impulse from being stimulated by force, by armies which may have the opportunity at the time of giving a dangerous turn to the people over whom for a moment they chance to rule. OUR TURKISH POLICY. Our policy, I need not tell you, is to uphold the Turkish Empire wherever it can be genuinely and healthily upheld — but wherever its ride is proved by events to be inconsistent with the welfare of populations, there to strive to cherish and foster strong self-sustaining nationalities, who shall make a genuine and important contribution to the future freedom and independence of Europe. For the moment I hope the Great Powers are agreed that trouble and distiubance ought to go no further, and that their influence will be sufficient to confine within the narrowest possible sphere the modifications of the existing state of things which the impulse of the population has pro- duced. Our object above all things is peace, because if peace is broken you never can be certain, when armies are in the field, that the results to which their efforts will lead will be results favourable to national growth and individual indepen- 176 Lord Salisbury' s Speeches. dence. You never can be certain that the fate of small nations may not be sacrificed by the exigencies Avhich military events may enable large nations to require. LOCAL GOVERNMENT. Now, turning from foreign politics, I again must call your attention, before saying anything of the problems that lie before us, to the peculiar mode in Avhich our opinions are dealt with by our opponents. Their plan is this: They first sketch out to you in brilliant and imaginative colours what they think a Conser- vative policy is. They prove to you that that ought to be a Conservative policy, and then when as is natural it turns out that they know nothing about it, and that the Con- servatives take a very different view, they declare that Con- servatives are the basest of mankind, and have abandoned their own proper ideal for the sake of the sweets of office. I venture to think that Conservatives alone should be ac- cepted as the exponents of Conservative opinions. I don't know anything so comical as a Radical trjang to point out what Conservatism should be. One of the subjects which, by common consent, must occupy the attention of the future Parliament is one which our adversaries would persuade you that we have no right to touch — 1 mean the subject of local government. I see that even Mr. Gladstone — in that long and dreary epistle which, like an emperor of old, he has written from his retirement — even Mr. Gladstone is disposed to deny us the right of entertaining the question of local government. lie is gracious enough to admit that I have expressed very strong opinions in its favour — but he pro- ceeds to point out that I have not the slightest influence over my party — and that my opinions must not be taken as any proof of what they would really think. I was very much struck by this warning on his part, and I thought it So?jie Home Questions. 1 7 7 proper to 2)rovide myself with undoubted credentials, and therefore I did not venture to address you until I had the privilege of meeting the Cabinet. I do not know whether he will say if the Cabinet has any influence over the Con- servative party — but if the sixteen gentlemen who sit there- are to be accepted as any kind of evidence of the opinions of the Conservative party, I will say, that without doubt, without hesitation, without a dissenting voice, they are strongly of opinion that large reforms in our local govern- ment in the direction of increasing the power of that local government are absolutely necessary. Bear in mind what a true reform in local government means. It does not only mean — I quite admit that the local authorities should be popularly elected — it does not only mean that. AVhen you have got at what you want, when you have provided the proper constitution of local authority, you must provide that the local authority has suflScient powers, and that it gets these powers by diminishing the excessive and exagge- rated powers which have been heaped on the central authori- ties in London. That I claim to be a special Tory doctrine, which we have held through good report and evil report for many and many a generation. It has always been our con- tention that the people in their localities should govern themselves — and that the attempt to imitate Continental plans by drawing all authority back on the central power, though it might produce a more scientific, a more exact, and, for the moment, a more effective administration, yet was destitute of these two essentials of all good government — it did not provide a government that was suited to the facts and idiosyncrasies of the particular communities for whom it was designed, and it did not teach the people to take that active interest in their own government which is the only training that makes a man a true and worthy citizen. These are doctrines that we have held for a very long time. We lyS Lord Salisbtiry 's SpeecJies, urged them — that is to say, our fathers urged them — perhaps with undue insistency, when they opposed the introduction of the new poor law. I am not blaming the new poor law. It was a necessary reform in order to meet a tremendous evil \ but it did carry with it this spirit of centralisation Avhich has eaten far too deeply into our institutions. It was opposed at the time by the Tories earnestly and strongly; and though I should be very sorry to undo the beneficent action which may tairly be attributed to the new poor law, still I feel that the education of the country is so far advanced, that the dissemination of men capable of taking a part in local government is so great, that the time has come when many of those powers which are now given to the Local Government Boards and other powers in London ought to be given to local county authorities, who will be able to govern, not necessarily in the most scientific or most accurate fashion, but in a fashion which is liked by the people over whom they rule. THE QUESTION OF RATING. Joined to that reform is one which I have very much at heart, which I have urged so often, that I do not think even Mr. Chamberlain will say that I am trespassing on his copy- right in claiming it. It is that all men, in proportion to their ability, should contribute to the expenses of local government. As you know, now it is done by what are called rates, and rates are not levied on all men according to their ability, but only according to the amount of land or houses that they may possess. They may possess very large resources of other kinds, and yet escape altogether contribut- ing to the administration of local government, which is as advantageous to them as to their fellows. This is not merely an injustice to them, but it does a great deal of harm. Some Home Que si ions, i 79 I have been sitting for two years 011 a coumiidsioii with re- spect to the housing of the poor, which was appointed in answer to a motion that I moved in the House of Lords. I have a strong feeling that the unfair incidence of rates, not in all parts of the country, but in many parts of the country, has materially aggravated the difficulties which the poor find in getting fair and decent lodging. The reason I saw thus stated in a Liberal paper the other day. In some county — I tliink Essex was the one mentioned — the rates had run up as much as 10s. in the pound. That happily is not a very com- mon experience, but we have heard of 5s. and 4s. not un- frequently. What is the reason of that ? A man has a certain amount of money to invest. He says to himself, "If I put this into consols I shall not pay any taxes at all ; if I build cottages for the poor with it I shall have to pay half, or a quarter, or a fifth of my profits, as the case may be, into the local exchequer." Of course he naturally says, " I would rather find some other investment for my property than this unremunerative one of building houses for the poor." I do not say there are not other difficulties when that obstacle is surmounted, but it is rnaking a gratuitous obstacle and an unnecessary difficulty in a reform, the urgency of which we all admit, when you place, as it were, a special penalty upon the men who provide houses in which the poor can live. Therefore I hold it to be an indispensable part of any reform of local government, that it should include the sanction of this great principle — that all men should pay according to their ability for the support of local government. SUNDAY CLOSING. But there is another question on which I think you know something in this, or at least in a somewhat neigh- boui'ing locality, and that is what I may call the burn- ing question of Sunday closing. Sunday closing, looked at i8o Lord Salisbury s Speeches. from a purely impartial point of view — and I am bound to say that those people who do not go to the public-houses are very impartial in the matter — presents this difficulty. Though in Scotland you have unanimity, and in Ireland you have practical unanimity, and in Wales you have an unanimity qualified by a certain amount of recent ex- perience — and I am bound to say that in Cornwall you have what appears to be unanimity — when you get to the more strictly Teuton portion of the country, you find anything but unanimity. One of my earliest Parliamentary expe- riences was the present Lord Ebury, then Lord Eobert Grosvenor, proposing a Bill introducing a very strict Sunday closing, which I think applied to eating as well as drinking in the East of London. "Well, he passed his Bill through the second reading. I think he got it as far as Committee, but the moment that the population of London heard of it, they took very effective measures ; they marched into Hyde Park and broke the windows of the houses of every member of Parliament they could find. But though there was no logical connection between the remonstrance and the evil, the remonstrance had its effect, and the Bill was withdrawn. I don't know that the population of London has altered very much, and my impression is that if you tried Sunday closing on them you would be sure to tire of it before you got very far. Looked at from a perfectly impartial point of view it is impossible not to see that the difficulties of a uniform system for the Avhole country on this question are extreme, and if we had not been afraid of running against some rather anti- quated views and doctrines on the subject, we should have adopted the simjole practice of allowing each locality to decide itself what it liked to do in the matter. I venture to say in the case of most of those who hear me, two words have rushed to their minds when I made that observation. They have said '' he is proposing local option." Well, local option Some Home Questions. 1 8 1 is a thing of wliicli the value differs exactly according to the value of the thing concerning Avhich the local option is to take place. I do not think local option is a had thing where the thing to Avhich it is to be applied is perfectly legitimate, and we have admitted that the closing of public-houses on Sunday where this is according to the views of the popula- tion, a legitimate action to take place. Local option is also used for very different processes, with which I have no kind of sympathy. It is proposed that localities shall have the power where the number of non-thirsty souls exceeds the number of thirsty souls of saying that the thirsty souls shall have nothing at all to drink. Well, that seems to me to trench upon the elementary liberties of mankind. If I like to drink beer it is no reason that I should be prevented from drinking beer because my neighbour does not like it, and that seems to me a simple doctrine which lies at the root of all liberty. If you sacrifice it in the matter of alcohol you will find very soon that you will sacrifice other matters also, and that those doctrines of civil and religious liberty for Avhich we have fought so hard and undergone so much to establish will be gradually whittled away. I should therefore be inclined to entrust the local authority with the settlement of this difficult question of Sunday closing, but always on one condition, that they should not be entrusted with the permanent settlement of it ; that is to say, that after two or three inter- vals if they do not like what they had done they should be at liberty to reverse their steps. I don't understand any per- manent vows on this matter. Perhaps very often the best way of getting a fact into people's heads is to enable them to try it, and I dare say many people who might or might not like Sunday closing would alter their opinions, what- ever they were, if they were subjected to actual experience. I therefore think it important that the local authorities 1 8 2 Lord Sa list u 7y 's Speeches. should liave the power, after some fixed interval, of altering in that resj^ect any resolution to Avhich it might come. LICENSING. For myself, although I am treading on difficult ground, I should be prepared to go one step further, and to place the power of licensing in the hands of local authorities to the extent to which magistrates have it now. I see no reason for thinking that the local authority would exercise it less wisely and less liberally than the magistrates, and I cannot blind my eyes to the fact that special sectional and not always fair opinions sometimes gain ground on the Bench, and really disqualify the magistrates from exercising a perfectly satisfactory juris- diction on the subject. But while I offer that opinion Avith some diffidence, knowing it is opposed to the opinions of many whom I much respect, still it will be necessary to make this observation. One reason why the local authority will be a good authority to manage the licensing question is, that if any unfair encroachment is made on the industry of the publicans or others, fair compensation undoubtedly must be given, and the local authority would have to provide that fair compensation. I believe that the terror of having to provide that fair compensation would furnish no inconsider- able motive to induce the local authority to observe a wise and cautious moderation in the exercise of this important duty. LOCAL AUTHORITY IN IRELAND, You will probably ask me how far I am inclined to carry this extension of local authority, and to say how far are you inclined to make it general ; how far are you in- clined to extend it to Ireland. That is a very difficult question 1 admit. Our first principle on which we have always gone is to extend as far as we can to Ireland all Some Home Questions. i8 o those institutions that we liave established in tliis country. Rut I fully recognise that, in the case of local institutions especially, there is one limiting consideration, which in the pre- sent state of Ireland you cannot leave out of account. A local authority is more exposed to the temptation and has more of the facility for enabling a majority to be unjust to the minority than is the case where the authority derives its sanction and extends its jurisdiction over a wider area. That is one of the weaknesses of local authorities. In a large central authority the wisdom of several parts of the country will correct the folly or the mistakes of one. In a local authority that correction to a much greater extent is wanting, and it would be impossible to leave that out of sight in the extension of any such local authority to Ireland. The fact is that the population is on certain subjects deeply divided, and it is the duty of every Government in all matters of essential justice to protect the minority against the majority. IMPERIAL FEDERATION. With respect to large organic questions connected with Ireland that have been often mentioned, I cannot say very much about them, though I can speak empha- tically. I have nothing to say but that the tradi- tions of our party are on this subject clear and distinct, and that you may rely upon it our party will not depart from them. We look upon the integrity of the Empire as a matter more important than almost any other political consideration that you can name, and we could not regard with favour any proposal which directly or indirectly menaced that w^hich is the condition of England's position among the nations of the world. If I had spoken three days ago I should not have said anything more upon the Irish matter, but I observed, I think it was yesterday, in the news- 1 84 Lord Salisbury's Speeches. papers a remarkable speech from the Irish leader, in which he; referred in so marked a way to the position of Austria and Hungary, that I gathered his words were intended to cover some kind of new proposition, and that some notion of Imperial Federation was floating in his mind. In speaking of Imperial Federation as entirely apart from the Irish ques- tion, I wish to guard myself very carefully. I consider it to be one of the questions of the future. I believe that the drawing nearer of the colonies of this country is the policy to which English patriots must look who desire to give effect in the councils of the world to the real strength of the Eng- lish nation, and who desire to draw all the advantage that can be drawn from that marvellous cluster of dependencies which distinguishes our Empire above any other empire which ancient or modern times record. Our Colonies are tied to us by deep affection, and we should be guilty not only of coldness of heart, but of gross and palpable folly, if we allow that sentiment to cool, and do not draw from it as much advantage for the common weal of the whole of the English race as circumstances will permit us to do. I know that the idea of Imperial Federation is still shapeless and un- formed, and it is impossible for any man to do more than to keep his mind open to a desire to give effect to aspirations which bears the mark of the truest patriotism upon them, and therefore I wish to avoid any language that may seem to discourage the plan in which perhaps the fondest hopes of high Imperial greatness for England in the future may be wrapped. But, with respect to Ireland, I am bound to say that I have never seen any plan, or any suggestion, that will give me at present the slightest ground for anticipating that it is in that direction that we shall find any satis- factory solution of the Irish problem. I wish that it may be so, but I think we shall be holding out false expectations if we avow a belief which, as yet at all events, we cannot enter- Some Home Questions. 185 tain. To maintain the integrity of the Empire mubt undoubtedly be our first policy with respect to Ireland. TUE CRIMES ACT. ButperhajDsyou will say there is more pressing matter — that the elementary conditions of social order are not maintained ; and I have seen plenty of suggestions that the Government was to blame for this because they allowed the Crimes Act not to be renewed. Are you quite certain, in the first place, that the Crimes Act would have prevented what is taking place now ? Are you quite certain, in the second place, that it was in our power to renew the Crimes Act ? Both these questions require to be answered in the affirmative before you can blame the Government. With respect to our power I would remind you of this : You had passed an Act of Par- liament giving in unexampled abundance, and to unexampled freedom, supreme power to the great masses of the Irish people — supreme power as regards their own locality. You had done that, you were at the close of a Parliament elected on the system which was condemned, you were on the verge of the election of a ncAV Parliament. To my mind, that opinion was formed long before the change ot Government occurred. To my mind the renewal of exceptional legisla- tion against a population whom you had treated legislatively to this marked confidence was so gross in its inconsistency that you could not possibly hope, during the few remaining months that were at our disposal before the present Parlia- ment expired, to renew any legislation Avhich expressed on one side a distrust of what on the other side your former legislation had so strongly emphasized. The only result of your doing it would have been, not that you would have passed the Act, but that you would have promoted by the very inconsistency of the position that you were occupying — by the untenable character of the argUE:ents that you were 1 86 Lord Salisbury s Speeches, advancing — you would have produced so intense an exaspera- tion amongst the Irish people that you would have produced ten times more evil, ten times more resistance to law, than your Crimes Act, even if it had been renewed, would possibly have been able to check. The effect of the Crimes Act has been very much exaggerated. While it was in existence there grew up this real danger, out of which the boycotting proceeds. There grew up a thousand branches of the National League all over Ireland ; they grew up while the Crimes Act was in existence, and it is from them that this bo3^cotting proceeds with which you have so much difficulty in coping. The truth is that the provisions against boycot- ting in the Crimes Act were of very small effect. It grew U23 constantly in spite of the action of the Crimes Act, and it grew up for this reason — that it is a crime of that character which legislation has very great difficulty in reaching. I have seen it said that the Crimes Act diminished outrages, that boycotting operated through outrage, and therefore that the Crimes Act diminished boycotting. In the first place the fact is not true. The Crimes Act did not diminish outrages. I have a return of outrages in September, during which the Crimes Act was not in existence, and comparing that with the return in August, during which it was in existence, I find that the outrages which took place in September were considerably fewer than the outrages which took place in August. There is, therefore, no ground for saying that in the present condition — I am not speaking for the past condi- tion of the Irish temper — the Crimes Act was any re- straint on outrage, and it certainly was no restraint on boycotting. Boycotting does not operate through outrage. Boycotting is the act of a large majority of a community resolving to do a number of things which are themselves legal, and which are only illegal by the intention with which Some Home Questions. 1 8 7 tliey are done. For instance, I will give you an example of boycotting. You will tell me whether you think any legis- lation such as the Crimes Act was likely to affect it. Not very long ago a man who was boycotted walked into a Roman Catholic church, when every one of the rest of the congregation got up and left the church. The priest said to the man, " If you like I shall go on with the service and finish it for your benefit alone ; but I would recommend you, on the whole, to go .away." What is the use of Acts of Parliament against a system of that kind ? You cannot indict people because they do not go to church or because they leave chiirch. In truth, it is mnch more similar to the excommunication or interdict of w^hich we have read in the Middle Ages than any other mode of action with which we are familiar. BOYCOTTIXCt. Don't imagine for a moment that the Irish Govern- ment are idle or quiet or inert in putting the remedies of the ordinary law into action. At this moment thirty- five prosecutions for boycotting are pending, and that alone will show you that the Irish Government are doing their best — when you consider the difficulties of getting evidence upon such a subject — are doing their best to meet the evil. I believe the truth about boycotting is this — that it depends upon a passing humour of the majority of the population. I do not believe in any community it is enduring. I doubt whether in any community the law has been able to offer a complete, a perfect, and a satisfactory cure, but I believe it contains its own Nemesis within itself It presents so much irresponsible power, it is used with so much freedom in order to gratify private grudges, and to attain private ends, that at last it falls by its own weight, and is discouraged and stopped by the very persons to whom it owed its birth. That is now, J 88 Lord Salisbinys Speeches. 1 believe, taking place in Ireland, and tbe very National League find that the Frankenstein they have created threatens their interests as much as those of any other interest in the community, and that boycotting is on the decline. But be that as it may, I admit in the fullest and frankest manner that a Parliament possessing a full mandate, and a Government leading that Parliament, are bound above every- thing else to exhaust every possible remedy in order that men may pursue free from illegal molestation their industry each in his own station in life. THE LAND QUESTION. Now, there is another very important question of which you have heard a great deal, and that is the land. Now about the land. There seems to be an idea that it is the act of some very wicked person that tlie land is not split up into a num- ber of peasant proprietorships, consisting of from ten to fifty acres, all over the coimtry. I will say at once that I regret exceedingly the disappearance of the yeomanry in this country. I don't say that under any pressure of present political motives, for I have said the same thing on every opportunity that has served me for twenty years past. I regard it as a great misfortune for this country, but it does not follow because I recognize the existence of a misfortune that I believe that any Act of Parliament will cause that misfortune to come to an end. People seem to imagine that no matter what the evil is, it is in the power of Queen, Lords, and Commons to put a stop to it. I wonder we have not seen brought in an Act of Parliament to stop the occurrence of bad weather on the occasion of political demonstrations. By all means make the land as easily transferable as you can. A proof of this curious travesty of our opinions which we read in our opponents' speeches is the statement that we arc opposed to measures for facilitating the transfer of Some Home Questions. \ 89 land and for cheapening it. Wliy, the land belongs to a great number of people, many of whom are members of the Tory party. Do you imagine that we are possessed by so inconceivable and so monstrous a taste that we like paying lawyers' bills. Lawyers' bills are as odious to the squire as to any other member of the human race, and I will venture to say that there is no squire who would not gladly welcome any measure by which that great evil could be checked. But my experience is, after having seen successively the greatest masters of the law address themselves to this great problem, and having seen my lawyers' bills concurrently increase in a steady ratio, I have become very sceptical ot all promises of remedy in that respect. But you may be quite certain that we, more than any party, desire that the transfer of land should be made cheap and easy. Mr. Goschen has told us that the transfer of land ought to be as cheap and easy as the transfer of Consols, an observation which convinced me that Mr. Goschen knows a good deal more about Consols than he does about land. With respect to land you have two difficulties. You have first to indicate clearly what is the bit of land you want to sell, wdiich is not necessary in Consols ; and secondly, you have to show that you are able to sell the land — that you are the right person to sell it — that it is not burdened by any mortgage or anything of that kind, which would render you unable to sell it. And in these two difficulties lie the whole of the expense of the transfer of land. I have talked over the matter with my noble friend the Lord Chancellor, who I am bound to tell you is more sanguine than I. He says he believes the thing can be done. He is not discouraged by the bones of the knights who have preceded him who have been slain in this great enterprise, and he thinks he still can win the enchanted princess himself. He believes — and there is no man more competent to form such a r 9 o L ord Salisbii ry 's Speeches. belief — he believes that with a complete and compulsory system of registration the transfer of land can be made cheap and easy. With respect to that belief I will only say this — that at all events experiments ought to be tried. We never have had a compulsory registration of titles. There is no reason why we should not, except the expense and the trouble of Avorking out the details. If we set it up and it does not achieve the object we have in view, no harm has been done, and we are able to show that it is no act of ours if the difficulties of land transfer continue. On the other hand, if, as we all must wish, it should be successful, a great evil will have been removed, and not only will the lawyers' bills of landowners have been diminished, but an opportunity will have been given to all those labouring men who desire it, and who are able to purchase, to attach themselves as freeholders to the land. There is nothing I desire more than that, if only it can be achieved. But remember that one of the conditions, one of the absolute conditions of cheap transfer of land is — I must use the technical word — a short law of prescription ; that is to say, that when a man has been registered as owner of the land for a certain length of time his title should be absolute and indefeasible, and there should be no more ques- tion about it. That is a point upon which you will come into conflict with a very important authority named the Court of Chancery. But I hope to overcome it. They have whittled away the doctrine of prescription until they have diminished many of its admirable effects. RESTITUTION. But I wish to draw attention to a less dignified subject, but one more in the view of the public than the Court of Chancery, and that is Mr. Jesse Collings. Mr. Jesse Collingshas a won- derful scheme for providing that anybody who has got land. So})ic Home Questions. 191 which was common land, either a roadside or belonging to big common land in any way within the last fifty years, should be put to the proof, that he or his predecessors in title ac- quired that common land lawfully, and if they have not got that proof they shall lose it. The existing law of the country — mind you, the existing law of the country — is that after twelve years any man occupying a bit of land is the owner of the land. Mr. Jesse Collings says, "No; if within fifty years that land has been common land, this prescription shall not apply." I say, if IMr. Jesse Collings's Act was passed into law% it would have the effect of doubling the cost of the transfer of land from one end of the country to the other. Every man who bought land would have to make himself quite certain that that land had not within fifty years in- cluded any portion that was common land. To prove a negative is proverbially difhcult, and he would have not only to appeal to documents, he would have to obtain the memory of the oldest inhabitant, a gentleman w^hose memory requires to be refreshed by abundant subsidy ; and whenever a transfer of land took place it would, in addition to all the difficulties which it has now to face, it would have to overcome this addi- tional obstacle, that the vendor would have to prove this very difficult point, that no portion of the land that he sold had been roadside land since the year 1836. I will venture to say that the requirement would add quite 100 per cent, to the cost of the transfer of land in every part of the country. I have quoted that in order to show you the recklessness with which these land propositions are made by people who have never gone out of the smoke of a smoky town or the neighbour- hood of a big town-hall. If you want the land to be dealt with — I hope you will not consider it to be the assump- tion on our part — I am afraid it must be dealt with by people who know something about the land. If you hand it over to inventive cockneys, who know nothing but what they 192 Lord Sa lisb u ry 's Speech es. have read in magazines, I am afraid you will only make ten times Avoroe the evil that they affect to cure. THE ECCLESIASTICAL COMMISSIONERS. I am afraid I am detaining you at great length, but there is one change which I should like to advo- cate, which I believe would place a great deal of land in the market j though, mind you, I have my doubts as to who the purchasers of the land would be. I have observed during these years of distress that the position of clergymen who possess glebe lands and of charitable foundations depending upon small bequests of land is pitiable in the extreme. I have known clergymen enjoying large incomes in the good times quite suddenly, by their farms being thrown on their hands, being reduced to absolute beggary. What is a clergyman to do when a farm is thrown on his hands ? As a life- tenant he can raise no capital to work it. As a clergyman he can give no time to attending to it. His time is fully occupied. No farmer will take it, and he is absolutely without resources, and the large income which he enjoyed the day before has vanished like a dream. His case is hard enough, but there is the case of those small charitable foundations, where a number of helpless orphans and widows are dependent upon the solvency of the trust. The solvency of the trust depends upon the land which is thrown on their hands. The farmers will face it no longer, the trustees cannot give their time or capital to it, and it becomes a white elephant that brings them nothing but ruin. I should like to see the greatest facilities placed in the hands of all clergymen and of ecclesiastical and charitable corpora- tions to sell — mind^ always at a fair price and by free contract — to sell the land on which their income depends. They would be much happier and much better off if their income were in Consols. Mind you, I don't wish to apply any sort of com- Sonic Holuc Ones lions. 193 pulsion to them, but at present tlieir liberty is restrained by the demands of a certain private central olHcc, which exists in London, known as the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. I have had some dealings with the Ecclesiastical Commission, and I have vowed that no consideration whatever would in- duce me to have any more. I do not accuse them of any moral fault at all. They are the perfection of spotless integrity, but their integrity is so spotless that they take every conceivable precaution that the most fertile imagina- tion can suggest, and their precautions are so minute arid careful that it is impossible that any transaction, how- ever innocent, can find its way through the meshes they spread before it. I wish to get rid of the consent of the Ecclesiastical Commission. I should like to see each clergyman and patron or the trustees of each charitable society have the right to sell their land and invest the proceeds in Consols, and, except there was a case of manifest fraud, that nobody should have a right to interfere with the transaction. I believe if you did that you would bring into the market a large quantity of land all over the country — land peculiarly suited for gardens and allotments, if such were desired ; land which if there exists this class of agricul- tural labourers desiring to become small farmers would precisely suit their demands ; and land, which at all events, in its present ^condition is ill-i^laced and would be better placed in the hands of any private owner to whatever class he might belong. STRUGGLING AGAINST THE LAWS OF NATURE. I have shown in what way — if I may use a vulgar simile — the wheels of land transfer might be greased. I believe it might be very materially simplified ; I believe it might be very materially cheapened ; but I do not believe you will find any very large number of peasant proprietors G 194 L ord Salisbic ry 's Speeches. spring out of the legislation which you authorize. I do not believe it for this reason, that this country has had numbers of small freeholds from one end of it to the other for a hundred years and more. The steady process has been that the owners of these small freeholds have sold their land, and they have been merged into the land of larger freeholds. Now, setting all prejudice aside, can you interpret the mean- ing of this history ? Supposing you saw a hillside upon which the larch had gradually grown and the beech-tree had gradually died away, what would you say of the wisdom of any man who declared " The beech-tree is the right thing ; the larch ought not to exist there ; I will cut down the larches and plant beeches instead ? " You would know he was struggling against the laws of Nature, and those who cry out for the creation of peasant proprietors, however estimable their motives and however desirable the body they seek to establish, are committing as great an absurdity as the man who would try to force the hand of Nature in the matter of the beech and the larch. The trouble which was prophesied at the time when the Corn Laws were abolished has, after a long delay, come to pass. The growing of wheat has become over a vast extent of the country an unprofitable occupation. On the growing of wheat depends the continuance of arable land, for it is in the knowledge of the farmers that if the wheat crop does not pay, the chance of his arable land paying is very small. The consequences are in every part of the country, but especially in the East, large tracts of land are going into grass. Grass does not pay well, but still it does pay moderately, and the landowner or farmer, be he proprietor or occupier, naturally takes to that form of using his land which is the most profitable to him. The inevitable result is that the number of hands required in agriculture diminishes. Three men to every hundred acres are required for arable land, and only one for pasture land. The irresis- Some Home Qucsiiotis. 195 tible force of economical facts is driving large tracts of tlie country from arable into pasture. Is there any use, is there any -wisdom, in expressing our surprise and trying to resist tlie process, a process dictated by laws and powers far higher than all that the boasted omnipotence of Parliament can exercise ? The result naturally is that large numbers of persons are out of employment, so they seek employment in the towns and diminicih the wages of those who are already there. It is a very grievous process. I would to God we could arrest it, but we shall only make matters worse if we resist it, in spite of the teachings of experience and the knowledge of political economy that we possess. SMALL HOLDINGS. You have heard a proposal for diminishing this evil, for reversing the process that is taking place, for driving back the people who are leaving the country, and of recultivating the land which has passed from arable to pasture. It is proposed that it should be done by the local authority ; that the local authority shall be empowered to take compulsorily the land of whom they please at a price which is not the price given at present ; at a price lower than that price ; and that they should be empowered to let this land in small farms of ten or fifteen or twenty acres to the labourers in each place. Is there anything in your experience of human affairs to induce you to believe that such a process would be successful ? Just consider what it involves. The local authority would have to borrow money in order to purchase the land, and you borrow money at 4 per cent., but nobody ever succeeded in making more than 2 per cent, out of the ownership of land. ■ Well, then, on every acre of land the difference between 2 and 4 per cent, would have to be paid out of the rates. Supposing the price of land to be — I don't know what it is now, it used to be £50 an acre, but let us say it is £25 an G 2 ig6 Lord Sail sbury's Speeches. acre. Well, in order to purchase twelve acres of land you would have to give £300, on which you would get £6, but you would pay £12 for that £300, and the difference of £6 would have to be paid out of the rates. The £6 would be !?imply a present to the mau whom you put in occupation of the land. That would simply be a revival of the old practice abandoned some fifty years ago of subsidizing rent out of outdoor relief — outdoor relief in relief of rent. That is the beginning and end of Mr. Chamberlain's proposal. Well, then, supposing this was profitable and good for the occupants. If it was bad it would come to nothing. But if it was good for the occupants there would be great compe- tition for it, and who would choose among the competitors, Avho would decide Avho was to have this benefit of 2 per cent, on the value of the land given to him out of the rates ? Obviously it must become a matter of choice, a matter of favouritism, a matter depending on the constitution of the local authority, a matter of political corruption. This scheme is the Budget of the caucus. It is the financial proposition by which the machinery of Birmingham is to be kept going. It is the mode of furnishing in each constituency in the country voters who shall be bound by the dearest pecu- niary interests to vote as the Avirepullers of Birmingham shall tell them. That is its side as it affects the persons who take the land. And now let us consider how it affects the persons from whom the land is taken. The local authority is to have the power of taking land compulsorily at less price than he from whom it is taken likes. Do you imagine that that tremendous weapon Avon't be used ? Do you imagine that that will not express the spite, or political antagonism, or animosity, which the majority of the local council may feel ? Do you imagine that they Avill not use it to increase their power, and that where any men resist their will they will not threaten them with a forcible seizure at below cost, and Some Home Questions. 1 9 7 make tliciii feel tlie siipieniacy of local councils? Do not imagine, as Mr. Chamberlain tries to persuade you, that this is merely a question for the rich. You know well there are large holders and .small holders. This power must extend to the small just as well as to the large. A large owner may be able to fight it, to appeal, to resist it in a tliousand wayn. But the small owner threatened with the seizure of his land, if not the absolute slave of the local councils, will be utterly at their mercy, and unable to say a word on behalf of his own honest sentiments. That is the real secret of tliis pro- position. It offers no real relief for the labouring man. Nobody thinks that it will be possible for the occupant of land in small quantities to do what the occupant in large quantities has failed. Men with capital, with horses, with machinery, in many places have failed to make the occupation of land pay. Do you imagine that men without capital, horses, or machinery will be more successful? Again, agriculture is a pursuit of which the remunerativeness depends upon being able to average bad with good. One year you cannot pay anything, you are utterly ruined ; the next if you can hold out will give you a result that enables you to cover the loss of the year that is gone by, and so the man who has capital can pass the bad periods and recoup himself when good periods come. That lies in the very essence of agriculture, which depends upon our changeable climate. But how does the poor man with ten or fifteen acres and no capital stand ? Why the first year of loss drives him to the money-lender and makes him a ruined man for life. Depend upon it, therefore, there is no prospect of relief to the labouring man in this proposal ; there is only the prospect of a most ingenious, most carefully thought-out scheme of political domination and corruption — to which if you retain any of the instincts of freemen you will offer a firm and unwaverinp- resistance. 198 Lord Salisbury' s Speeches. EDUCATION. I have been so long that I am quite ashamed of myself — but I have one matter more to talk of, and that is the question of education. I think, and in this I have the singular and unusual felicity of being very much at the same point of view as Mr. Gladstone. I think that this question cannot be dealt with in the summary way in which Mr. Chamberlain has dealt with it. I have no doubt whatever that the effect of the compulsory cha- racter of education does give to the poorer classes of the community a considerable claim. If they ask for a thing and cannot get it, it is unreasonable to tax the rest of the com- munity to give it to them. But if you say to them, ''You shall have this thing whether you like it or not," and then they cannot pay for it without enormous pressure on their resources, I must say there is a consider- able claim that they should be assisted. But they are assisted under the present law. I do not think that the law is liberal enough. I should like to make it more liberal, but I do not see because I think it reasonable that those who are in very poor circumstances, and to whom a portion of the fee is remitted, that we should therefore make a present of large sums of public money to a great number of people who are perfectly competent to pay for the education of their own children. I should like to see it made more liberal on behalf of those upon whom the present law presses in undue severity, but I should shrink very much before I gave to every subject of the Queen a right whether he was rich, well-to-do, moderately well off, or poor to have his children educated at the public expense. I do not see any reason for adding to that extent to our public burdens, and I believe it will be some time before the tax-payers of this country will accept it. But I cannot help seeing in this proposal (as Some Home Questions. 1 99 indeed Mr. Morley has clearly indicated) a desire to get rid of that which we cherish as one of our most important privileges — the right of religious education. I am not speaking for my own church alone. What I claim I would extend with equal hand to the Nonconformists of Wales or to the Koman Catholics of Ireland. But I do claim that to whatever church or sect of Christianity they belong there should be the utmost opportunity given to educate the people in that belief of Christianity instead of driving them away to the lifeless, boiled down, mechanical, imreal rehgious teaching which is prevalent in Board Schools. Believe me, the essence of religious teaching is that the teacher should believe that which he teaches, and should be delivering as he believes it the whole message of truth that he has received. Unless there is that sympathetic, that magnetic feeling which is established between pupil and teacher by the confi- dence of the people that the teacher is dealing honestly with them, their religious teaching is a farce and a sham, and therefore I would give the utmost freedom that could possibly be given to all the denominations of this country to teach as they believe to the children of their own flocks that which they esteem the highest truths of the Christianity they profess. Much as individually I may differ from many of their opinions, I am convinced that when all differences are allowed for there is a common residue of belief in Christianity which so long as it be taught sincerely will work its magical effect upon the hearts and consciences of the young. You have heard much, perhaps too much, in recent days of crimes and sins and sorrows which it is a shame to mention. You have heard statements of corruption of which you have not dreamt, and you have heard proposals for legislation, by which it was idly hoped that such corruption should be stemmed. There is only one remedy for such corruption, and that is the teaching of the faith of Christianity to the 200 Lord Salisbiti'fs Speeches. young, and therefore I commend to you earnestly to defend, as the most cherished possession, that to which we, as the citizens of a free country, have in this land the right — that our children and the children of those who think with us, should be taught the whole truth of Christianity as we believe it, and that no theories about State interference, no secular doctrines, shall be allowed to interfere with, to diminish, or to frustrate this highest privilege that Chris- tianity can possess. MR. Gladstone's last surrender. And now one word more and I have done. You have read, no doubt, what I have called the long and dreary epistle from the retirement of the leader of the late Ministry. You have seen how amid other things he has consigned to the category of doubtful matters which depend upon the majority of voices, his convictions and his course in reference to the Established Church of these islands. It is his last surrender, it is the last of the opinions of his youth that he has given up, that he has sacrificed upon the altar of party. I could have wished that this crowning abandonment of the convictions of his youth had been spared to us. I confess I never believed that I should see ]Mr. Gladstone among those who would admit the disestab- lishment and disendowment of the Established Church of this land as among the possible measures to which he could be induced to consent. But deeply as Ave may lament this evidence of the power which party ties possess, we must not the less misinterpret the significance of this avowal or the duty that it imposes upon us. It means that the time of ultimate and supreme conflict is at hand ; it means that the danger which we have foreseen for many days is now close to our doors. It may come upon us even in the new Parliament. The language that Mr. Chamberlain has used. Some Ho vie Questions, 201 the fact tluit he has used it without rebuke, the fact that he is being allowed to assume the position of leader of the Liberal party almost without hindrance and without demur — these things now show that even in the next Parliament you may have a proposal for the disestablishment of the Church of this country ; a proposal more fraught with frightful disaster to us as a nation, more fraught with calamitous events than anything in legislation that has taken place since Parliamentary Government was founded. I see it is said that in other churches in other lands the voluntary principle has succeeded. Yes, but there the voluntary principle has grown up side by side with these churches. In America the voluntary prin- ciple succeeded, because from the very first, when the churches were few, when the population Avas small, the voluntary principle was appealed to. Endowments were furnished^ and the American Church is at this time endowed in sufficient measure to meet at all events her absolute neces- sities. Again, look to the Nonconformist bodies ; with them endowments have grown up gradually from their outset, from the beginning when they were small and there was little to provide, and so provision has constantly been poured forth until they have an accumulation of resources which enable them to meet all the necessary claims that are made upon them. But nothing of this can be or will be the case Avith the Church of England. That Church will be stripped and bare — barring the life interest of those who actually hold the livings — the Church will be stripped and bare, and in every part of the land the machinery by which God's "Word has been preached, by which Christianity has been upheld, by which the sick have been visited and com- forted, by which all the ministrations of Eeligion have been carried to suffering humanity in its various stages of need — all this machinery will be by one blow destroyed, and gene- 202 Lord Salisbury's Speeches, rations will be required before it could be replaced. Tliis it is which, with a light heart, Mr. Gladstone is prepared to sacrifice. We can only accept his announcement as a call to greater energy and preparations on our part. AN APPEAL TO LIBERAL CHURCHMEN. We can have no sympathy with those who think that by supporting the Liberal party now they may get better terms when the catastrophe occurs further on. There are Liberal Churchmen whose action I confess in this great crisis astounds me. I can understand men who think that the interests of the Church are of an inferior character; who think that the importance of keeping the party together, and supporting the party funds, and getting the party into office, and paying homage to the party loader — that these things are more important than keeping up aright that provision for the teaching of Christianity which has existed for a thousand years. But to those who are of an ojDj^osite mind to those Liberal Churchmen, who think that the interests of the Church are the dearest matter upon the whole field of j)olitical controversy with which they could have to do — to them I appeal to consider as to the course which they shall pursue now that it is announced in no obscure accents that their leader is prepared to desert them on the first convenient opportunity. They at all events must know the importance of the stake for which the contest is being waged. "^o judge from the letters I see of a church dignitary in these parts, it is to be presumed that they think that by wearing the imiform of the in- vader, and by serving in his ranks, and by shouting his watch Avords, they will acquire some claim to diminish the force of his onset when it takes place. I should not if I were the invader very much value or praise the support of soldiers of that kind. But at all events they are certainly Some Home Questions. 203 betraying the cause which they profess to have at heart. Liberal Churchmen who now suj)port the Liberal party after the declarations that have been made are supporting the machinery which is to destroy that which they hold most dear. They are sharpening the weapons by which the Cliurch is to be struck down ; they are furnishing party strength and giving an opportunity of extended organization to those whom they know are the enemies of the institution which of all institutions they in their heart hold dearest. I cannot conceive what the sophistry is that induces them at such a time to join their hands, to join their efforts with those who are ready to undertake the destruction of the mechanism by which Christianity has been upheld in this country. A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH. At all events we can hold no ambiguous language on this matter. To us it is a matter of life and death. Our party is bound up with the maintenance of the established and endowed churches of this island. We hear many pro- phecies as to what the result of the impending election is to be, and our adversaries hold sanguine language. Perhaps what has recently taken place in France may teach some of the opportunists of this country the wisdom of modesty in prediction. Be that as it may^ we do not look to the result, we look to the principles we uphold, by which we are bound in conscience, by the traditions of our party, and as men of honour to stand or fall. W^e can admit on these matters no comj)romise, no hope that we shall support any proposal for the overthrow or for the injury of that w^hich we hold dear, the maintenance of the framework of our Constitution, the upholding of the rights of property, and more than all, the support of the sacred institution, its support by ancient en- dowments^ and by the recognition of the authority of the 204 Lord Salisbury's speeches. State, which now for generation after generation in Scotland and in England has held up the power of truth, and has maintained the truths of Christianity before the world. To that as a party, as honest men, and as Christians, we are irrevocably bound. DEFENCE OF THE GOVERNMENT. (At Brighton, October 15, 1885.) I thank you most heartily for the kind reception you have given me, and I welcome this large assembly in this hall as a proof that the Conservative cause in Sussex is vigorous and flourishing. Dr. Robertson in his opening address has been kind enough to allude to past history, and to mention that the attainment of an honourable peace Avas one of the highest distinctions of the Government of which Lord Beaconsfield was the head. I only wish to add to his words that the principles and feelings which animated that Govern- ment animate the Government of this day. We are earnestly anxious for an honourable peace, and we believe that as flir as we are concerned it is exposed to no danger at all. I have always earnestly pressed upon every Conservative audience what is the essence of our Conservative principles — namely, that we value peace intensely, but that we hold that peace is best to be attained by a steady foresight in policy, by avoiding vacillation or change, by moderation, undoubtedly, but by steadily asserting and maintaining the rights of this country, and carefully keeping clear of every quarrel in which the rights of this country are not concerned. I will not at a moment of foreign policy which is peculiarly anxious, go more into detail, but 1 only wish in passing to note that our desire of peace will prevent us from Defence of the Goveriuuent. 205 imagining any Britisli interests wlicrc tlioy do not exist, but will animate us to be worthy of those who have gone before us, if ever British interests should be threatened. NOT TRUE. lam afraid that one of the consequences of the political cam- paign that is going forward now is that addresses of the kind I am making to you must assume rather a controversial aspect, and that we must be engaged in pleas and replies and re- butters and surrebutters, meeting the accusations that are made against us, not because we think these accusations are of themselves of much importance, but because, if we pass them by we might be told that we admitted them to be true. It is purely and. solely in that spirit that I wish to notice some kind things which Mr. Chamberlain has said of me. Having a difficulty in establishing an)'- substantial ground of objection to the policy of Her Majesty's Government, he is mainly engaged in showing that we are inconsistent. It does not matter very much whether we are or not, but I desire to show you that his charge of inconsistency is as baseless as most of his political assertions. As his charges are somewhat numerous, I will venture to divide them into two heads. The first head comprises those that are not true ; the second head, those that are founded on the monstrous assumption that it is our duty to break the promises of our predecessors as soon as we get into office. He mentioned them last night, but he did not do so for the first time ; he mentioned them also in a speech he made at Warrington, and perhaps he mentioned them more clearly then. Now the charges that are not true are these. He charges us with having in opposition earnestly pressed the relief of those garrisons which the recklessness of the late Govern- ment had exposed to such danger in the south of Egypt. 2o6 . Lord Salisbury's Speeches. He states at the moment we came into office that no more was heard of these garrisons which had been abandoned to their fate. Mr. Chamberlain's own words were, " No at- tempt had been made to relieve the garrisons of Equatorial Africa, which were of such intense interest to the Tories when in opposition." It is not true. We have been in- tensely interested about these garrisons ; we have given our best attention to meet and relieve them^ and we have given our influence and our help ; and among the officers I would specially mention in connection with this matter is Major Chermside. The Abyssinian army under Ras Alula has re- lieved Kassala, has scattered the hostile tribes that were attacking it, and has quelled the disturbance. To Mr. Chamberlain's statement, therefore, I reply that vre have concerned ourselves about the garrison of Kassala and have relieved them — which the late Government never did — in a most complete and effective manner. In the next place, Mr. Chamberlain says that we have made no attempt to complete the Berber railway. No member of the present Government is insane enough to do that; but if Mr. Chamberlain says we have supported it in opposition that is not true. I my- self expressed in the House of Lords my opinion that that railway could not be completed, and we have not attempted to accomplish that which was impossible. Another thing which Mr. Chamberlain and Sir Charles Dilke declare is that we have entirely "neglected the interests of this country in Burmah, and that, in spite of all our anxiety for the honour of the country, we have allowed the French to establish influence there. It was a rash accusation to make, because, as it happens, we took an early opportunity of calling the attention of the French Government to the things which were being done in their nan:ie, and we gave them an oppor- tunity, of which they availed themselves in the most straight- forward and friendly manner, to disavow any complicity or Defence of the Government. 207 any share in the efforts which were made in Burmah by certain speculators to withdraw a portion of the Empire from the inlluencc which Great Britain alone should exercise. What may happen in Burmah itself I do not venture to prophesy; that is a matter for the Indian Government; but it is a principle from which we cannot depart that no other influence than our own must prevail in a territory so deeply affecting the interests of our Indian Empire. The fourth statement by Mr. Chamberlain is that the retirement from the Soudan, to which we objected, has been carried on by us now. But when we came into oftiee the whole of the Soudan up to Dongola had been evacuated; the whole of- Dongola had been evacuated, and 12,000 of the luckless population, to avoid the vengeance of the Madhi, had fled from their homes and had taken refuge in Upper Egypt. There was left behind one rearguard, at a place called Debbeh, with one week's provisions, and that was all that we found when w^e took office. It is perfectly true that we told that rearguard to go south. It could not have sustained itself with provisions w^hich were exhausted. But the policy of the late Government had decreed that unhealthy and most dangerous evacuation, and we stopped it at the first point at which, on military principles, it was capable of being stopped. THE PLEDGED FAITH OF ENGLAND. I think I have shown you that with respect to these charges of Mr. Chamberlain, they must be met with a complete and absolute denial. Well, now, he has other charges. He says the financial agreement with Egypt, which we condemned as muddled and inadequate, has been carried out. Well, it was muddled, and it was inadequate. I expressed that opinion in opposition, and all that I have learnt in office has only confirmed me in that view. But, imfortunately, it was an agreement to -which England had set her hand, and Mr. 2o8 Lord Salisbicry s Speeches. Chamberlaiu's contention, as I understand it, is tliat we ouglit to have torn up the agreement to which England had set her hand, because our adversaries were in office at the time. I do not like to say what name would be applied to such a proceeding in private life. What would you think of a man, who through his agent had come to a certain agree- ment, and when the agent went away and another agent came, said, '^ I have changed my agent, and therefore I shall treat the agreement as having never taken place % " There is no term of contempt and oi^probrium which you would think too strong for such a man. Yet that is the 'Standard of morality according to which Mr. Chamber- lain desires that the affairs of England should be conducted. AVe do not approve of the principles of the Egyptian loan, but we approve still less of any action that is false to the pledged faith of England ; and if Mr. Chamberlain says that at any time in our career in opposition we have main- tained the doctrine that you may disregard the pledged faith of England because pledged by your opponents, I must again repeat the words " That is not true." And so in regard to the Afghan boundary. Mr. Chamberlain says that we did not approve of the Afghan boundary when in opposition. No, we did not approve of it then, and were we tied by no engagement we should not approve of it now. But we found certain engagements in existence, and these we loyally carried out. There was this difference in our treatment, both of the Egyptian loan and of the Afghan boundary, from that of our opponents, that whereas they were landed in a hopeless deadlock, we were enabled to come to a satisfactory issue. I see that both Mr. Chamberlain and Sir Charles Dilke talk of Zanzibar. I am tempted to believe that Lord Granville never informed them Avhat was going on in the Foreign Office, because the same state of the case exists absolutely there. While the late Government were in office the Em- Defence of the Govermnent. 209 pcror of Germany announced to tlieni that he had taken certain territories in Africa under his protection. Lord Granville not only expressed no ohjection, but said that he was perfectly willing to welcome the German efforts at colonization, and he proposed that a joint commission should be appointed to determine what were the true limits of the Sultan of Zanzibar's dominions. That is precisely what we have carried out, and we have done nothing else. We have carried out the agreement which Lord Granville made during his term of office. In adherence to the principle that the pledges of one Govern- ment must be completely and loyally carried out by its successors, Ave have simply carried out that to whicii our predecessors ])ledged the country, and we have done abso- lutely nothing else. Do not understand me to blame Lord Granville for his action in the case of Zanzibar. 1 think that on the whole any course which would open these great and vast districts of Central Africa to the commerce of the world must indirectly serve the interests of this country. I therefore think that action in British interests was right. But all I am concerned now to show in answer to Sir Charles Dilke and Mr. Chamberlain is that it was the action of their Ministry and not of ours. LIBERAL MEASURES PREPARED IN THE CONSERVATIVE KITCHEN. We have had attacks of a very different kind from a different quarter. There have been three Whig orators endeavouring to bring to light Whig principles which had been somewhat obliterated in this controvers}-. They were in considerable difficulty. The union of the Liberal party at this moment especially is not the most con- spicuous characteristic that belongs to them. In fact, they express their opinions of each other with a freedom which certainly exalts one's opinion of their mutual 2IO Lo7'd Salisbury's Speeches. tolerance. Mr. Chamberlain speaks of Lord Hartington as a Rip van Winkle and of Mr. Goschen as a skeleton at a feast. Under these circumstances the position of Whig orators is a little difficult, and you may observe that their speeches are usually framed upon this model. As a kind of homage to etiquette they always begin by advising me, but when they have got over that necessary point, they proceed to devote several columns to demolishing arguments of Mr. Chamberlain, and their difficulty in attacking us is one with which it is impossible not to sympathize. They cannot attack us because, unfortunately, they agree with us. Lord Hartington fully admits that in many of his opinions he is much nearer to us than he is to the extreme members of his own party. Mr. Goschen objects to Liberal measures prepared in a Conserva- tive kitchen. So that they are prepared in a Liberal kitchen they are all right, but he determines his value of the dinner that is set before him, not by the quality of the meats, but by the nature of the kitchen in which these meats were pre- pared. Controversialists reduced to these straits obviously, if tliey mean to attack us, must have recourse to something else besides mere arguments, and what they have very wisely taken to is the suggestion of interminable suspicions. They cannot say we have done wrong ; they cannot say we do wrong. But they say they are perfectly certain from a knowledge ot our innate character that we shall do wrong, and the neces- sity of producing suspicions of this sort betrays them into indiscretions of a very remarkable kind. Now, I have here a passage, which I confess filled me with astonishment, in whicli Lord Derby describes what may be reasonably ex- pected from a Tory Government. This was on the 10th of October : — " I think I can guess pretty accurately what arc the lines on which they (the Tories) are likely to travel. They require to interest the popular imagination, to distract the public mind from questions of internal policy, and the Defence of tJic Government. 2 1 1 sliortest way of doing that is to engage in a clashing, adven- turous, and costly system of foreign policy, spend freely, swagger a good deal, go as near to quarrel- ing with a foreign State as you can without actual war, and for the moment all the world will look that way." I think if this passage were to fail into the hands of some future historian he would say it was an accurate de- scription by a Tory orator of the conduct of Mr. Gladstone's Government. THE STORY OF THE SOUDAN. Lord Derby seems to imagine that he can recall again the accusations of 1880, and can charge upon us the guilt of adventurous and costly warlike policies; but the bloody record of the Egyptian policy stands between him and that attempt. Political memories are short, and Lord Derby seems to imagine that the history of the late Govern- ment has been forgotten — in three months. But, as he for- gets it, let me remind you for a moment of what the history of the late Government — one of whose principal members denounces swagger^ adventure, and cost — was. When we left office Egypt was flourishing, by the admission of our opponents. The people were never so happy. Public wealth Avas never so great — the taxes never so light. Lord Hartington the other day said — it is a very curious phrase — " The system which we found in Egypt, and which broke to pieces in our hands, was not a system of our own creation." The statement that it broke to pieces in your hands is fami- liar to many of us in our domestic capacity. Many of you must have had a bit of china of which the housemaid told you in sad and self- defending accents that it came in two in her hands. But an evil and suspicious world has always consented to put the blame rather upon the china. Well, having disposed of the happy state of things which we left 2 12 Lord Sail sbury's Speeches. them in this "way, Avhat did tlicy do ? They allowed an insane expedition to be made into the deserts of the South, ^vhich resulted in the destruction of an English commander and a large Egyptian army. Panic-struck by what they had done they forced the Egyptian Government to announce to the world that they would abandon the Soudan. They forgot that there were garrisons in the Soudan which that announce- ment condemned to death. The result at once appeared. All those garrisons were threatened with the utmost danger. The garrisons upon the Red Sea came first. They waited until those gallant men had passed through the utmost horrors of a blockade and had yielded at last to the terrible death which follows defeat in an Oriental siege ; the failure of Tewfik Pacha, unsupported by England, to whom he ap- pealed ; the failure of him and his garrison to maintain Sinkat against the overwhelming enemy that came against him, beaten not in battle but by sheer famine, is one of the saddest and most pathetic incidents of this disastrous history. But when it was done our Government sent out a great expedition, which came to the shores of the Ived Sea, gallantly slaughtered C,000 Arabs, and then dis- covered that it would be better that it should soon return to the place from whence it came. Then there w\as the difficulty of the other garrisons, and particularly that of the garrison of Khartoum. They sent out on the most insane journey, without help of assistance or promise of aid, one of the most gallant soldiers our century has produced. Cheerfully he devoted himself to the duty and gaUantly he threw himself into the dangerous position that had been prepared for him. He received no guarantees, but trusted to the feelings and the honour of Englishmen. "When he arrived and when his danger became evident ; when we never ceased to point out his position and the danger he was in, we were told that he was not in danger, but was only Defence of iJic Goveruinent. 2 1 3 hemmed in. Tliey put the subject off over and over again, and owing to their criminal procrastination the expedition was delayed again and again until it started so late that it was, as we have since learnt, impossible, in fact morally im- possible, it could succeed. It was animated by all the courage that in their best days has shown itself in Britisli soldiers, but it arrived too late. I do not know if any of you have read tlie affecting narrative of Major Kitchener, published in some of the papers a short time ago. It shows that Gordon fell by no treachery, that he fell before pure and simple famine, that the relief expedition was delayed so long that the blockade had time to work, that the wretched men who at last were overcome and slaughtered by the Mahdi had been reduced to absolute impotence by the famine which the blockade had caused. When the news came, what did the late Government do ? They announced the absolute necessity of an expedition to Khartoum ; they sent out large forces, they made great preparations, they arranged for a railway from Suakin to Berber — I think 250 miles — which was to be constructed in three months. They also sent out pipes to supply water as they went on. The expedition went out, the proper number of Arabs was slaughtered, five miles of railway were made, and then the rails and pipes and soldiers were ail ignominiously sent home. It is the man who is responsible for this marvellous and phenomenal exhibition of vacillation, ineptitude, and criminal neglect— it is he who dares to say that it is a characteristic of the Tory party to initiate a policy of swagger and adventure and of cost. I should have thought the recollection of the eleven millions vote of credit w^ould have made these words choke in his mouth as he uttered them. 2 14 Lord Sa lisb it ry 's Speeches TARLI AMENTA RY PROCEDURE. Well, other objections have been made by these Whig orators, not as to what we did say, but as to what we left out. I was very much attacked for not having entered upon the question of j^rocedure of the House of Commons. My impression is that if I had entered upon the question of procedure I should have been equally attacked for having done it. As a peer, T think it is better that the House of Commons should deal Avith their own procedure. But if in the most general way I should be allowed to express an opinion, I would venture to say that there are dangers on two sides. Undoubtedly it is a very great evil if by any abuse of the procedure the legislative activity of the House of Commons is arrested ; but there is a much greater evil, and that is, any infringement of the liberty of debate. I am not surprised that Mr. Chamberlain should insist so much on this matter of Parliamentary procedure. I am not surprised that he should suggest that a Speaker appointed by himself should have dictatorial powers. Considering the nature of the measures he recommends, it would be very satisfactory to him, I m.ake no doubt, so that they might pass with a mere shadow of discussion. But in proportion as you make a body powerful, you must take care that none of its decisions are arrived at without adequate deliberation, and if it is true — as it is true — that the House of Commons is gathering more to itself all the power in the State, all the more jealously should you insist that all the measures it adopts, especially when those measures depart widely from the old traditions of English legislation, should only be adoj^ted after such discussion as may place the nation iu full possession of all that may be said on the subject. Defence of the Government. 2 1 EKTAIL AND SETTLEMENT. Lord Ilartington objected that I had taken no notice of the question of entail and settlement. AVhen I stand on a platform such as this to-night, I am filled with pity for those who have to listen to my re- marks, and I endeavour to avoid such technicalities as may unnecessarily aggravate the horrors of their position, and therefore I have kept very clear of entail and settlement. It is a very complicated question, and though no doubt the great lawyers who undertake it understand Avhat they are talking about, I am very certain that nine-tenths of those from whose tongues these words run with glibness have not the faintest notion of what they mean. The truth is that these two words represent very roughly — I do not say that they do technically, but they do very roughly — two totally different ideas. Entail represents roughly the notion which was very prevalent a hundred years ago, and is to Fome extent prevalent now — the desire of landed proprietors that a particular piece of land, or estate of land, should descend to their children and to their posterity. It was a very natural desire, which is not consistent with the public welfare. I meant this — that if an inability to sell affects a particular bit of land, if anybody owns a particular bit of land and cannot sell or cannot deal with it, all kinds of evil are apt to arise. It cannot be properly culti- vated. Sometimes its owner is embarrassed, and it is very desirable he should be able to sell. At other times he cannot properly improve it without breaking the terms of his settlement. Well, entail of the kind which merely ministers to the very natural feeling of men who desire that particular land which they have acquired should go to their descendants I can approve. I quite agree that in a country of this kind it is to be surrounded with all kinds 2 1 6 Lord Salisbury' s Speeches. of 23recautions, and may be very detrimental to the public weal; but what I maintain is that that has already been done by Lord Cairn's Settled Estates Act, which has entirely dis- posed of the danger. Altogether, setting aside one or two estates which have Parliamentary titles, I believe there" is not an acre in this country which cannot be sold by the will of some person or persons actually living. It was an enor- mous change. I have always been in favour of it, and years ago I tried to introduce a much smaller instalment of it into the Legislature ; but, of course, a great lawyer like Lord Cairns could do what I could not, and all I can claim is that, being his colleague in the Ministry, I earnestly sup- ported the beneficent scheme he had in hand. That has been done, and if you have noticed the meeting of the In- corporated Law Society — people who really know what they are about — you will have seen that the president stated the enormous importance of this Act, and also that people had no notion of the extent to which it worked. But there is a curious thing about English public feeling — that the effect of any great cry against an abuse lasts a long time after the abuse has disappeared. It is like the sea upon your shores here, which beats upon the beach in a heavy ground- swell long after the storm to Avhich the disturbance of the water is due has disappeared. All that has happened in the present case. Years ago the objection to entail had a great deal of meaning in it. Lord Cairns has removed that objection altogether. There may be corrections in detail to be made still, but, speaking roughly, he has removed it altogether. But still the old habit survives, and people drop off their tongue settlement and entail as though they represented all the abuse to which Lord Cairns has put aii end for ever. Settlement represents a totally different idea, and my belief is that it represents an idea which will defy the efforts of Parliament to overcome, if Parliament should be so ill- Defence of the Government. 2 1 7 advised as to attempt it. Wlien a man gives a daughter in marriage, no matter to what class he belongs, if he belongs to any class where there is any fixed property whatever — money or land — he desires that something should be settled 01?- his child, so that she should not be absolutely at the mercy of the character of the husband to whom she is given. That character is undeveloped at the time of the marriage. He may for aught the father can know take to the turf or to unwise proceedings upon the Stock Exchange, or to any course which men take to become rich and become poor. Therefore, it is merely a natural result of paternal instinct that he insists that, so far as possible by marriage settlement, she and her children shall be made secure. Therefore the property, wdiatever it is — be it land or money, it does not matter — is settled upon her for her life, and more or less upon her children after her. But it is a very natural feeling. If you go against it you will go against one of the most deep-seated feelings of human nature. And what good will you do ? What advantage is it tiiat you should favour legislation having for its object ^ OP THE UNIVERSIT7: BALLANTYNE I'RESS, LONDON AND EDINBURGH. LOAN DEPT. . nn the last date stamped below, ot li m 65NK MAY 3 " r i Navjl-J3£2. LOAN rif^r:j;£^lS. 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