THE NEW UNIONIST HOPEFULNESS.
THE two great events of the week, Lord Harlington'', remarkable address to his constituents in Rossendale this day week, and the Unionist Conference and Banquet of Thursday, with the many memorable speeches by which they were distin- guished,bring out the rising hopefulness of the Liberal Unionists in a very emphatic way. And the hopefulness which is 50
observed, is hopefulness for Liberal progress no less than hope- fulness for progress in bringing back the country to the old Unionist frame of mind which was never even disturbed till after Mr. Gladstone's conversion to Home.rule shook the poli- tical creed of the nation to its foundation. Lord Hartington, in his speeches both at Rossendale and at Westminster, dwelt emphatically on this Liberal side of the question, and claimed for the Liberal Unionists, that at the cost even of surrendering all their personal prospects as statesmen, and more than that, even their personal prospects as Members of Parliament, they are steadily promoting not merely the cause of the Union, but the cause of Liberalism, and are rendering Liberal policy possible, and reactionary policy impossible, with an efficiency which it would be very difficult to compass in any other way. The Home- rulers have admitted that "Ireland blocks the way," and that till that block is removed, or all but removed, no substantial progress can be made in the direction of the Liberal programme of 1885. But the Liberal Unionists are, by these sacrifices for the cause of Union, not only securing the Union, bat bringing many of the Liberal measures advocated in 1885 within easy reach, through the Liberal tendencies with which they have inoculated the Conservative Party, and they are at the same time, and by the same means, rendering impossible, or all but impossible, those reactionary aims by which a very considerable number of the Conservative Party are profoundly attracted. Lord Harlington evidently hopes, and hopes far more confidently than he did this time last year, that slowly but surely he and his friends will be able to make, in. the first place, good moderate Liberals,—at least, in practice,—of the Conservatives with whom they are allied ; and in the next place, to restore that dislike to risky and sensational political experiments in the bulk of the nation, by which the character of Englishmen has always been distinguished.
Now, what are the grounds of this new hopefulness I We believe that they are very substantial grounds, and that they are all more or less connected with the growing belief that while the concession of Home-rule, besides being itself a most dangerous change, and the certain cause of an indefinite number of still greater and more dangerous changes which would follow in rapid succession, must postpone any useful change that is really attainable and worth having, to the Greek Kalends, Liberal measures may really be passed by the present Government. The Home-rulers hold out a hope, which is always growing fainter and fainter as men watch the proceedings of the PernaBites, that Home-rule would pacify Ireland. The Unionists not only accumu- late evidence upon evidence that no kind of Home-rule which has as yet been advocated by any great party, would satisfy Ireland, but they show that any Home-rule of the kind contemplated would have to be followed by so vast a revolution in the English Constitution, that for a generation to come our whole attention would be concentrated on the almost impossible transformation in a way to divert us from the feasible and tangible improvements which are really within our reach, and which not only Liberals, bat Conservatives, under the impulse of their recently enlarged constituencies, and under the guidance of the disinterested Liberals with whom they are now acting, are not reluctant to carry out. We hold, then, that the new hopefulness is due to the following causes. First, there is filtering down into the English mind the belief that it is simply impossible to satisfy the Parnellites by any measure of Home-rule that would be safe for England, —or, indeed, by any measure at all, for even a separate and independent national life, which is the confessed object of the extreme party, would not satisfy them unless they could conquer England and impose their own tariff upon us as well as on themselves. Next, the English people are beginning to see, as Lord Derby put it so unanswerably on Thursday, that there is much more content to be produced by convincing the Irish that Home-rule is beyond wishing for, than by entering on the endless task of meeting their ever-enlarging expecta- tions. In the third place, there is slowly filtering down into the minds of the English people the conviction that no kind of Home-rule is possible without a perfectly new departure in the direction of Federalism,—and very, very gradually they are beginning to realise what a tremendous new departure that is ; what a reconstruction of the whole theory of government it implies ; what a lowering of the authority of Parliament ; what a stimulus to the authority -of the Crown, which would then be the true nexus between the various sections of the Federal system, as the Presidency is in the United States ; and even if all these things could be accomplished, what an indefinite postponement of the sort of changes for which men have long been wishing and hoping, it
involves ! The people are beginning to realise that to tell them that "Home-rule blocks the way," and that they are to get a liberal Local Government measure when it is settled, is like telling a child that it is to travel or hunt when it is "grown up." The present generation feel no confidence that Home-rule will ever cease to block the way, except by being firmly voted down as a thing that is not to be. Begin granting it, and the process and its consequences will never come to an end. It is beginning the history of England over again, and that even those who know but little of English history, know enough to dread. In the fourth place, the belief is spreading, though spreading only gradually, that the weakness in yielding to the Parnellite. demands has brought with it weakness in yielding to in- numerable demands of a great many other kinds, which threaten civilisation in London no less than in Dablin. As Lord Derby said on Thursday, "Coercion in some form is only another name for civilisation," the alternative between civilisation and arbitrariness resting on the question not whether there should be coercion at all, but under what con- ditions and with what purpose it should be applied. Now, the alliance between the Liberals and the Parnellites has brought about a great and by no means causeless dread that the new Liberalism is bent on abolishing many forms of coercion which are essential to civilisation, as well! as some forms of coercion which are inconsistent with civilisation; and that is not a prospect which the English householder can view with any satisfaction. In the fifth place, the feeling is growing, and is growing greatly in conse- quence of Lord Hartington's admirable speeches and incessant efforts, that if the Home-rule fanaticism can be kept down, we- shall have moderate but excellent reforms, especially a good Local Government measure, not at the end of an indefinite term of years, but next Session, and that the Conservatives will. themselves introduce and forward that measure. And; furthers. it is growing clear that Lord Hartington's influence with the Conservatives,—or, rather, the necessity of leaning upon him, —is saving us from the follies into which otherwise souse of the Conservatives might only too probably fall, like the folly of Fair-trade. ,An.3 for that, again, a vast number of sober English- men, whetheiConservatives or Liberals, will be truly grateful. No doubt Lord Hartington said on Thursday,—and we respect him heartily for saying it,—that if he had to choose between sup- porting a Government that resisted Irish Home-rule while it attempted some Fair-trade folly, and one that supported Home-rule while resisting the Fair-trade folly, he should prefer the former, as involving less serious and less permanent disaster to the United Kingdom. And we quite agree with him. But he .also spoke no well and so seriously on the subject of the folly of any tampering with Free-trade, that ne one can doubt his power to restrain the Conservatives from any such fatal enterprise, even if it were not also certain to deprivo. them of the invaluable services of Mr. Goschen. Lord. Hartington, then, has managed to make the people feeL that there is far more hope for "durable tranquillity, for temperate freedom," in the immediate future, if Home. rule be negatived, than there would be if it were accepted, and with it the long train of revolutionary consequences which it must involve. Lord Harlington has managed to make a rapidly increasing number of people see that if his policy be accepted, there is hope for good and progressive measures next Session, more hope for the following Session, and even for Ireland much more prospect of speedy tranquillity than OD the path of Home-rule ; indeed, that Home-rule is a Frankenstein, destined to introduce a great many more and much heavier troubles than any which his creator invoked hia aid to remove.
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