AN APOLOGY FOR 'THE NEWEST WHIG POLICY. - Gun most
able and only faithful Whig ocritemporary, the Globe, is "writing up" Lord John -Russell, and, is doing it with an inge- nuity that is really surprising. The process-of writing up is not new:to the press, though,it is more common Jer _unknown artistes than old stagers : you would not look for efforts to write up Mr. Farren, Mr. Turner the landscape-painter, Mr. 13raham, or, any other leading man of our fathers' days ; but we have seen at to write up Turner retrospectively, and the Globe, for the nonce, enacts the Ruskin of politics. " Yes," said a celebrated scavenger, with the candour of greatness in speaking of a junior ; " yes, he is very good at a straight gutter, but—can he sweep, round a post ? " It is in difficulties that the master's hand comes, out, and we see the master's hand and prophet's fire in the Whig, writer's sweeping of the mud round the post of " Reform." The treatment is daring. "I likes to be despised" is accepted. as a canon of art. The apologist accepts, by preference, the most unfavourable contrast for Lord John.
"The late Sir Robert Peel is the favourite type of one system, and Lord John Russell of another.' Now Lord John has done a good deal in his day, • but he has undeniably been rather long about it. We believe that he made some dozen motions on Reform of Parliament before he could get 100 votes in its support. The Reform Bill itself was debated in three successive ses- sions. The Municipal Reform Bill was sadly clipped in the Committee of the Lords. The Irish Corporation Bill went through still more perils. An . Education scheme was drawn and withdrawn two or three times iu the single session of 1839. The Navigation-laws took two years to repeal. And the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill goes on to the statute-book as the joint production of Lord John, Mr. Keogh, Mr. Walpole, and Sir Frederick Thesiger. On the other hand, Sir Robert Peel's new Tariff was no sooner announced than it was hurried into law. The Maynooth grant and the proposal for the Irish Colleges were ratified in the exact shape they wore at their birth. And Sir Robert no sooner took the Corn-laws in hand than he did in a few weeks what other people had been talking of for twice as many years. It is im- possible to imagine a more striking and splendid contrast than that pre- sented by the patient, unassuming industry(!) of one statesman, and the dazzling audacity, the imperious omnipotence, of his rival."
This is the point of departure. The Globe prefers that slow, inefficient, defeat-inviting Minister. "De gustibus ! " However, our ingenious contemporary has reasons for his taste. Sudden victories, he argues, exasperate the vanquished, both because the said vanquished resent the abruptness, and because they have not had time to discover the hopelessness of their own case. Your first years of victory should, so to speak, be years of defeat, in order that the victors, tired of drubbing you, may enjoy a little defeat on their own side, by way of change, and may be grateful to you for undertaking those fatigues of triumph the withdrawal of which they feel as a relief. Sir Robert Peel neglected this rule: he contrived to invest his bill of 1846 with every possible acces- sory that could stimulate resentment and insure perpetual efforts at reaction ; angry, and in hopes of recovering the ground lost by a surprise, the Protectionists still demand the repeal of Corn-law repeal. Now to this Lord Jolm's policy is the exact contrast— "There is no doubt, that if Lord john had been so criminal and short- sighted" as to make unsparing use of the vast popular power at his disposal, the Reform Bill might have been carried 'through Parliament, or over Par- liament,' in six weeks. * * * Bet who ever heard of an agitation for the repeal of any of Lord John. Russell's measures which we have just enn-T narrated ?"- Talking of the "unsparing use of vast popular power" does -- mind us of times when a statesman, still living, was not so slow;, when there were very threatening meetings at Birmingham, and when to an address from an almost revolutionary mob, that states-, man replied something about " the whisper of a faction[the Howie, of Lords] not being allowed to prevail over the voice of a nation.": But that was a long while ago ; our contemporary has evidently; forgotten all about it ; and we are willing to be equally forgetful.- The statesman is older now, and we will concede that he has grown to fit the description given of him—that he has become very slow, and more convenient to his opponents than to his friends. Let us say no more on the historical point. Lord John, then is to be commended for doing the work of the next Ministry, and preparing every convenience for settling their work. This is partly our idea ; and hence is it that we would rather pass to that next Ministry. Oh, no!—our contemporary seems to think that this preparatory stage is the final one : when the Russell-Whig ideal, like the Faun on the antique vase, piping his " ditties of no tune" to the immoveable Nymph, is ever wooing and never " winning near the goal"—that is the perfect state of political bliss: " For ever shalt thou woo and she be fair."
" And therefore," says the Globe, after more about " insult and surprise "—Oh, wondrous " therefore " !— " Ana therefore strong government is all very well for the statesman who exercises it, or for the party that shares its triumph. But if we look to achieving reforms at the least expense of eloinestie division —if ear mea- sures are adapted to direct all existing classes in a straight and patriotic path, rather than to annihilate oome that we may exalt and glorify ass- ther,—then we say that we cannot think auy delay too dearly purchased which serves to mitigate feads and gives passion leisure to subside. And this great blessing we believe to be inseparable from the decried fashion of weak government. '
Strong government is a luxury, selfishly indulged in by the powerful minister ; your true government is 'weak government.
" My wound is great because it is soamalL' —" Then were it greater were it none at *IL" If weak government is so superior to effective 'government, how much superior, -how supreme, no government ! If Russell is greater than Peel, Proudhon caps Russell. You may put it thus, in pe-
litie.al proportion— -
• Reel : Ransil : . Rnasell Ennidlren.
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