MR GLADSTONE AND 111E NEW PARTY.
WE are inclined, for reasons stated below, to attach some importance to the deep fissure which revealed itself on Tuesday night between the Liberal and the Radical sections of the Gladstonian Party. It had been evident throughout the debates on the Royal grants, that Mr. Glad- stone felt a deep interest in the composition and the Report of the Committee appointed to examine precedents and advise as to the principle to be followed. He had defended the course taken by the Government, he had pointed out the reductions already effected in these grants—a reduction of 60 per cent, since the time of George 111.—and he had personally aided Mr. W. H. Smith to draw up the list of the Committee, assenting to the number twenty-three instead of twenty-five, because it enabled the Government to represent more accurately the precise strength of the parties within the House. All this was well known to his followers, yet when the appointment of the Committee came before the House, the Radicals below the gangway mutinied, and in division after division insisted that the Committee was too small, that it was too Royalist—not too Conservative, for Sir H. Vivian, who is a Home-ruler, was specially named as objectionably favourable to Monarchy—and that it was not sufficiently inquisitorial as to Royal savings. Mr. Labouchere, the recognised chief of the new party, did not, it is true, object to the number of the Committee ; but Mr. Dillwyn, Mr. Storey, and Mr. Cremer did, on the distinct ground that the Committee which Mr. Gladstone had helped to name was unworthy of trust. The last-named representa- tive of the workmen was especially furious, and threatened to resist the proposals of the Committee at every stage, they being only appointed to delude the public. This opposition might, of course, be set down as that of a few extreme men, though they were supported by minorities ranging from 80 to 105; but a little later on, Mr. Labouchere, the recognised chief of the new party, moved a still more violent, though innocent-looking amend- ment. It had been forgotten, he said, to insert the usual words empowering the Committee to call for persons, books, and papers, and he moved that they be restored. That amendment, there can scarcely be a doubt, was aimed directly at the Throne, and was intended to enable the Com- mittee to summon General Ponsonby and other managers of the Queen's affairs, and possibly to compel the production of her Majesty's private accounts. It was determinedly resisted by the Government, and Mr. Gladstone, who is still a loyalist, not only sided with the Ministry, but made a strong speech in their defence, alleging that all the pre- cedents were in their favour, and that "these things hai not been lightly done or in bad times, but in times when men of high character, and ability, and statesmanship applied their minds to them ; and so long as nothing more than a speculative objection to the course adopted on former occasions was adduced, he was content to follow in the footsteps of these men until some practical reason was forthcoming for departing from the precedents they had furnished." That utterance brought up Sir W. Lawson, who excited rapturous enthusiasm below the gangway by declaring that he respected no political precedent whatever, because a new heaven and. a new earth had been created since 1837, and so stirred the Radicals, that the heaviest minority of the evening, 136, voted directly and de- fiantly, in the teeth of their nominal leader's speech, for Mr. Labouchere against Mr. Gladstone, who henceforward must be regarded as leader of the Opposition with limits,. tions. The Radical half of that body will take his advice whenever it is acceptable, but when it is not, will go their own way, even if that way should lead them to a crushing defeat.
We shall be told that the incident is meaningless, because the division of feeling is confined to a single question, the support-of Royalty; but does not that fact of itself increase, instead of diminishing, the meaning of the vote ? The tone of the new party suggests very strongly that the fissure between the two wings is even deeper than it looks, for that opinion in the Radical section is ripening towards Republicanism. They do not care to save the taxpayers' money, as they show every year when the Esti- mates are passing ; but they do care to lower the reverence felt towards the Throne by raising the question of Royal allowances, on which the multitude in many districts is full of prejudice and suspicion. They object to grants to Royalty, as the easiest way of hinting their objection to Royalty itself, which their papers meanwhile are always belittling and holding up to a sort of social con- tempt. They tend, in fact, to become a Republican Party, which under favourable conditions would an- nounce itself as one, and perhaps even assume that name. We have no objection to raise on the ground of principle, though we hold England to be the last place, and this the most unfavourable time, to make so enormous a departure from all political tradition ; but it is clear that such a tendency in one wing must help to demoralise the old Liberal Party. It is a great deal more than a " rift within the lute ;" it must cleave the lute in two. A party which holds a dignified constitutional Royalty to be essential to the present condition of the Empire, and a party which considers Royalty an expensive source of social demoralisation, can never be cordially united, can scarcely, from the moment their views are formulated, work heartily together. They may be allied in the House for many purposes—God only knows what alliances are impossible when Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Parnell are fellow- workers—but they can hardly maintain the same policy, and they certainly will not be supported by the same electors. The Radicals think they need not mind that, because the majority of electors are on their side. It is quite curious to see how certain Mr. Labouchere, and Mr. Storey, and Sir W. Lawson, and Mr. Cremer are of that fact ; but they will find themselves mistaken. The body of the people no more realise to themselves an England without a Sovereign than they realise empty-space ; and when they do realise it, will, we believe, shrink back for a time as they would from a leap into air. That view may be incorrect ; but this much at least is certain, that if the Liberals are to cast off one set of leaders on account of Ireland, and another set on account of the Throne, and possibly a third set on account of religion—for there is another bottom- less-fissure there, though it is kept carefully boarded over— there will not for a time be much of a working party left, and the management of elections will over-tax the astute- ness of Mr. Schnadhorst. He is a very able man, but to make Royalists and Republicans, Unionists and Home- rulers, Secularists and. Christians, all pull in one team as English Liberals, would be a task demanding a higher intelligence than his, or that of any human being. It is difficult enough as it is for Liberals to sink existing differences, but to sink such differences would be to sink personality altogether. We very much doubt, in spite of the absurd amount of feeling which Royal pensions appear to evoke, a feeling only rational when the pensioners are beyond any reasonable expectation of succeeding to the Throne, whether Mr. Labouchere and his followers are not making a tactical blunder in throwing down such a new bone of contention. If they are right in their fancy that extreme Radicals—Republicans, in fact—can carry England, they are right in their policy also ; but they are much more likely to find that they have suddenly refilled the Conservative ranks, and lost the whole advan- tage which Mr. Gladstone's adoption of the Irish pro- gramme has hitherto secured for them. An " anti-Glad- stonian Radical" is not a character which an average British elector of Liberal opinions will easily understand, and the members of the " Jacobyn Party," as some punster has called it, promise very soon to develop into anti-Gladstonian Radicals. There are, in fact, at this moment three parties in the ranks of the Opposition- Gla.dstonians, Radicals, and Republicans—and each of them, on some great question or other, fights for its own hand. That is hopeful for Unionism, it may be, but not for the Constitution, which can only be worked when parties are reduced to her Majesty's Government and her Majesty's Opposition.
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