[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."'
Sin,—Your correspondent, C. H. P. M., referring to my letter in your issue of November 23rd, asks, " What good does such a letter do now that the decision as to Tariff Reform and the Referendum is tot fail accompli?" Your correspondent also says, "It is only whole-hearted enthusiasm for our party that will get rid of the present formidable confederacy which is against us." Well, Sir, what have we got now ? Instead of whole-hearted enthusiasm we have dismay, distrust, disgust, and exasperation, accompanied by the questions : " Why has this thing been done ? " " Who have been responsible for tearing up the Referendum pledge P " "Who has dug up the hatchet after it was decently buried ?" &c. If the Referendum had never been promised, the exasperation would not have been nearly so bad; but to promise it and then withdraw it is a big shock to those who consider such a course as not quite " jannock."
If O. H. P. M. would come and spend a few days in Lancashire he would find that my letter of November 23rd was not unduly pessimistic as to the prospects of the party, but rather the reverse. Both wings of the party, Free Trade and Tariff Reform, feel that at all costs our pledges ought to be kept. An enthusiastic Tariff Reformer told me the other day that when he first read my letter he was very angry with me, but on reading it over two or three times came to the con- clusion that what I had stated was correct, and that in the long run it would do good. It would be far easier to keep quiet and pretend all is well, but it is not well. As things stand at present we are going to lose, and the best friends of our party are not those who sullenly acquiesce, but those who protest when they see the ship heading for the rocks. If C. H. P. M. could get all the Unionist agents of the North and Scotland together, and get them to tell him the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, there would be few indeed who could not tell him that our prospects have been dealt a shattering blow. How many Unionist M.P.'s are there who are not conscious of the fact that their seats are by no means so secure as they were a month ago P The suggestion in your leading article seems a very good one. We ought at least to know whether the decision announced represents the views of the majority of the party or only a clique. Are the extremists really in the majority in the Conservative Party ? If so, has the party any title to be called Conservative P Surely we might take warning by what happened in 1908 and 1909. We won seats at by-elections in those years, and lost many of them again in January 1910. So it will be again. We are flogging a dead horse. Who is there who believes that as matters now stand we can hold Oldham, South Manchester, Crewe, North-West Manchester, and Midlothian P Nearly all, if not all, these by-elections were won, not by Tariff Reform, but by keeping Tariff Reform out of sight as much as possible. Tariff Reformers constantly say they have no intention of taxing raw materiaL What is corn but the raw material for the people's food P And that is the banner under which we are to save the Church and Ulster !
This Government is very unpopular, but so was a certain English monarch, and to paraphrase that monarch's words: " They will never kill me [Free Corn] to make you [Taxed Corn] King." The only hope of getting rid of this wretched Government is for the moderate Tariff Reformers to get the upper hand of the extremists. They have lost us quite enough General Elections without losing any more. The place of extremists is in the Radical Party, not in ours.—I am, Sir, &e., E. L. OLIVER. The Waterhouse, Bollington, Macclesfield.
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