LIBELS.
WHEN it became evident that duelling was dead in England, and that a gentleman might refuse to be
killed or to commit murder because somebody else had told a lie about him, men said that it would shortly be necessary to establish Courts of Honour, which would give some sort of redress in cases in which the Courts of Law were powerless. The suggestion was never acted on, for it was found that in the Army a Court of Inquiry was a very fair Court of Honour, and that in civil life it was possible so to use the ordinary Courts as to obtain redress at a price which, if heavy, was lighter than the loss of a limb or a life. The system proved quite endur- able, though the fire-eaters have never been reconciled to it;
but of late it has produced a new social evil of very considera- ble dimensions. Libel trials have become frequent, they are amusing, the public watches them, and the Courts have begun to regard them as causes colithres,—or, so to speak, as State Trials ordered by King Demos. They are, consequently, conducted in solemn form and at vast expense, the greatest Judges select them for hearing, special juries are empanelled, witnesses are summoned in crowds to prove the smallest facts, the trials last for weeks, the newspapers are choked with rubbishy gossip, and real suitors pleading for redress of substantial wrongs are refused a hearing for months. Here is this Belt case, for instance. Somebody, not known at all, said that a little-known sculptor got his work done for him, and immediately a first-rate criminal Judge and a special jury are employed for months in endeavouring to ascertain whether Mr. Belt did or did not convey to some clay busts that impalpable something which makes the difference between a clay figure and a work of art, which is a spiritual rather. than a material difference, and which, to most jurymen, would be as imperceptible as the difference between poetry and rhetorical rhyme. The proceedings have already, it is said, cost nearly twenty thousand pounds, 'and have lasted eight weeks ; and there is no particular reason, in the nature of things, why they should not go on for ten years, and cost an appreciable fraction of the National Debt. Indeed, we should say it was essential to justice that they should, for, if the line of evidence taken is to be pursued to its logical con- clusion, it is essential that all Belgian sculptors should be summoned over to prove the Belgian tone of Mr. Belt's work, that all English sculptors should be called to demonstrate that an English artist might have a Belgian tone and still be original, and that all French sculptors should be sent for to give their opinions as " impartial experts." We suppose there is no help, though we cannot avoid the thought that if the fees failed, help would quickly arrive ; but the whole busi- ness is a reductio ad absurdum of the law of libel, and will be quoted by future historians as evidence of the debility which had fallen upon English justice from over-reverence for forms. Mr. Belt, if he has been libelled, is entitled to justice ; but under any reasonable system, his plaint would have been " referred " to a couple of sculptors with moderately judicial minds, and their report would have been accepted by the Court as full testimony to the facts, under which arrangement the business of the justice-seeking public need not have been interrupted for more than one day.
Before this case is over, we are threatened' with a worse one, —a legal inquiry, in the form of a suit for defamation, into the question whether a Club at the Antipodes did, at some unknown time, declare, in some undefined manner, to persons, whose names are unrecorded, that, but for certain circumstances, it would, for some unknown reason, have expelled two English gentlemen from its society. That is really the apparent griev- ance which Messrs. Chamberlain allege against Mr. Boyd, of the Reform Club, and which Mr. Justice Field has decided ought to be heard. His decision is, of course, final ; and if respectable manufacturers like to spend their money in battles of that kind, there is no more to be said, even if witnesses have to be called from Adelaide ; but we are entitled, in the public interest, to protest against the present method of trial. Any decent committee of experienced members of Clubs, with the parties before them, could settle the whole matter in six hours ; yet the invaluable time of a first- class Court, and of twelve special jurymen, every one of whom may be losing a guinea an hour, is to be occupied for an inde- finite period with what is essentially a private affair, not only of no interest to the community, but entirely outside the fitting limits of public discussion.
We cannot discuss the case, which will shortly be before the • Courts, but we may, we suppose, discuss the action of the Presi- dent of the Board of Trade, upon whom no jury is about to sit.
As we understand the matter, he has made the first consider. able or inconsiderable mistake of his public life. His two
brothers were put up for election at the Reform Club. They ought, in our judgment, to have been admitted, the time having arrived when every Liberal Club must recognise an equality between Radical claims and Whig claims ; but certain members would not see that, and the Messrs. Chamberlain were blackballed, just as Mr. Cobden was many years ago at the Travellers', and, we imagine, for precisely the same reason, namely, political dis- like. Mr. Joseph Chamberlain was not unnaturally annoyed, and if he had quitted the Club, or endeavoured to alter its deci- sion as Mr. Forster and Mr. Bright did on a somewhat similar occasion, no one would have been surprised. Instead of this, his friends proposed, what would, we believe, be a great im- provement in any political club, that the elections should in future be made by the Committee, in supersession of the right of voting now possessed by ordinary members. So groat was the attendance of political magnates in support of this new rule, that the discussion became quite an " affair;" but the older members prevailed, and it was resolved that the ancient custom should continuo. Mr. Chamberlain should have either accepted this decision, or have shaken the club, if he thought the occasion adequate, by inducing his party to with- draw; but he evidently grew angry at the slight to his social influence—which will become quite strong enough one day, if he will only possess his soul in patience—and finding some mali- cious gossip afloat, he fixed on its presumed author, and told him in writing that ho was no gentleman :— " 72 Prince's Gate, S.W., May 26th.
" am in receipt of your letter of the 21th instant, and shall
at once communicate with Sir Robert Torrens. Meanwhile, I am unable to absolve you from conduct unworthy of a gentleman, in circulating, behind the backs of men who have never injured you, calumnious statements, of the truth of which it was impossible that you could have personally convinced yourself.—I am, your obedient servant,
"Mr. Lennox Boyd, Reform Club. J. ClIAMILICSLA1N."
That letter, no doubt, relieved Mr. Chamberlain's feelings ; but then, men in Mr. Chamberlain's position should not relieve their feelings in that way. The merit or demerit of sensitiveness is still an unsettled question, and it is conceivable that the world, especially the political world, has lost somewhat in becoming so thick-skinned ; but on one point opinion is certainly clear. A Judge or a Cabinet Minister should notice no libel which does not impugn his moral character or his official purity, and, above all, should never interfere when relatives able to take care of themselves happen to be assailed. And the reasons for these two rules are clear. Powerful persons, when they defend themselves, always appear to be resenting criticism, instead of repelling attack ; and when they defend others in Mr, Chamber- lain's way, bring too much extraneous weight to bear against the assailant. The public gots an impression, or, at all events, may get one, that he is being borne down,—an im- pression which in England, as we all saw in the Tichborne case, is fatal to cool judgment, and even to common-sense. Nobody blames Mr. Chamberlain for his fraternal feeling, or for being annoyed at the action of the Reform Club ; but he should have concealed his annoyance, and allowed his brothers to fight their own battle, as it is evident they are not only willing, but eager to do. Club gossip, even if somewhat malignant, does not hurt quite so much as people fancy, or the social world would go to pieces ; while the intervention of a Cabinet Minister, and especially of one who represents a great party in the State, in a personal quarrel does positive mischief, by vulgarising, however slightly, the political atmosphere. It is one of the many unintelligible peculiarities of Englishmen that they are not in the least democratic about manners ; that the cabman who swears at his fare is utterly shocked, and that not for himself, if the fare, being a gentleman, swears back again ; and that a certain reticence, stiffness, reserve—call it what you will—is expected of all men in high places. That expectation has been disappointed in this
ease, and Mr. Chamberlain will find that an incident in itself almost without meaning, and carrying no discredit beyond that involved. in a small error of judgment, has done him as much harm as an injudicious political speech. It is very absurd that it should be so, and that we should all make as much of Etiquettes as if this were still a courtly land ; but it is so, be the reason what it may. A Bishop must not waltz, be the temptation never so great or his skill in dancing never so well preserved ; and a Cabinet Minister must not inter- vene publicly in personal quarrels which are not his own, or intervening, must use no weapon less intellectual than polished satire. If Mr. Chamberlain had quizzed Mr. Boyd till the ears of the latter tingled, the public would have sympathised with the castigator, as they do not do when a Cabinet Minister tells an opponent, as his own coachman might do, that he is no gentleman. The dispute is of very little im- portance, except so far as it threatens to interrupt the regular and useful procedure of the Courts ; but we cannot but record an opinion that Mr. Chamberlain has made a mistake, and for the first time laid himself open to that charge of provincialism which his detractors are so ready to fling. After all, the Arch- duke who, when his toes were wilfully trodden on, remarked suavely, "What an awkward person that is !" manifested most completely his position as one of the caste which is too highly placed in the world to conceive itself liable to insult.
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