TOPICS OF THE DAY.
MR. GLADSTONE'S COURSE.
WE need hardly say that we do not attach the slightest importance to the advice tendered by Mr. Labouchere to the Government, as any indication of the manner in which the Government is likely to act. In Truth, we are told that "we Radicals who have been returned as the representatives of the British democracy must not flinch from our duty We must do our best to render it impossible for any Govern- ment to govern so long as Ireland's wrong is not remedied." Mr. Laboucbere himself, writing to Wednesday's Daily News, is not quite so absurd. In that letter, he does not assume that the democracy is limited to a single party, and that party, a party in a very decided minority of the people of the United Kingdom. But he does urge Mr. Gladstone not to resign, and that, appa- rently, on the very untenable ground that there are "a vast number of persons who have abstained from expressing their opinions at the polls." We believe this only proves that a great many electors have changed their residences since the autumn, and not necessarily at all that they have deliberately abstained from expressing their opinions. But even if it did mean that, we cannot conceive what bearing that should have on the course to be pursued. If a certain number of the people declare that they have no opinion on the subject submitted to them, that surely is the best reason in the world for not taking their no-opinion into account. Mr. Labouchere's own reason for advising Mr. Gladstone to meet Parliament appears to be pretty obvious. He wants to gain time. He thinks that a vote of want of confidence would not be supported by the Liberal Unionists. He ignores the fact that it would certainly need to be opposed by them if it were to be successfully resisted, as there is no doubt at all that the Conservatives will outnumber the Ministerialists and the Parnellites combined, and that it would be simply impossible for Liberal Unionists, who have declared their profound dissatisfaction with Mr. Gladstone's Irish policy, to resist a vote of want of confidence proposed in a Parlia- ment especially summoned for the very purpose of declaring the opinion of the people on that policy. Mr. Labouchere's real drift is very evident. He admits that he wants to force a new dissolution. "To secure this would be the aim of the Radical and the Irish Members, and in view of the fact that we" [i.e., the minority] "have already recognised that Ireland is suffering from grave injustice, and that her people have a right to use every measure permitted by law to put an end to this injustice, it is by no means improbable that the efforts would be so drastic that an Election would speedily take place." In other words, the policy of obstruction openly advocated by Truth is implicitly advocated in Mr. Labouchere's own letter.
We need hardly say that we do not think so lightly of Mr. Gladstone as to suppose him capable of lending even a moment's consideration to such ignominious counsel as this. Mr. Gladstone has had, in his own view, a very high purpose at heart. He has appealed to the noblest sentiments in support of his policy. By his advice the Queen dissolved Parliament "in order to ascertain the sense of my people upon the important proposal to establish a legislative body in Ireland for the management of Irish as distinguished from Imperial affairs." The sense of the people has been taken, and it is perfectly clear that it is unfavourable to the proposal made. In Great Britain, a very much greater majority of the people are opposed to it than the Parliamentary majority of the 8th of June would indicate. How is it possible that a Constitutional Minister,—a Minister whose profound belief in Constitutional government has even compelled him to apply its doctrines to a single section of the United Kingdom taken apart,—should be capable of advising the Queen that after solemnly asking for the verdict of her people on a special pro- posal, there is no necessity to take notice of that verdict, unless a positive vote of want of confidence be passed against him ? The suggestion is absolutely monstrous, and shows a singular misconception of Mr. Gladstone's political antecedents and character. He resigned in 1874 without meeting Parliament, in a political situation far less clear and urgent than this. Then Parliament was dissolved merely because the Minister did not think that the existing Parliament was disposed to support him heartily. But it was not dissolved in order to consult the people on any particular issue. A special finan- cial policy was, indeed, submitted to the people,—the abolition of the Income-tax,—but noborryAven imagined that the people intended especially to veto that policy when they returned a Tory majority to Parliament. At that time, too, though the majority of the representatives chosen were hostile to Mr. Gladstone, the majority of the electors who had voted, voted in favour of him. That is not so now. Indeed, in every aspect in which the Elections of 1874 and 1886 can be compared, the reasons which induced Mr. Gladstone to resign without meeting Parliament in 1874 appear to be found in a much stronger form in 1886. The issue presented, and solemnly presented to the people, is much more distinct and much more weighty now than it was then. The answer is, if we except one conceivable though most improbable con- tingency, infinitely more explicit to all sound judgments. The Parliamentary majority against Mr. Gladstone is greater. The popular majority is much greater. We can only conceive one view of the question under which Mr. Gladstone could be in doubt. It is, indeed, just conceivable, though highly im- probable, that Mr. Gladstone, knowing as he does how very much the view of a few of the Liberal Unionists has wavered on the subject of local government in Ireland, might imagine it a duty to suggest to Parliament some fresh form of his Irish measure in order to ascertain whether he could not gain over a sufficient number of the Liberal Unionists to his side to give him a majority. But we do not in the least believe that Mr. Gladstone seriously regards this contingency as practicable. In the first place, he knows that there are quite sufficient Liberal Unionists of Lord Hartington's type to render this course im- possible. In the next place, he knows that Mr. Parnell's party will not support any measure which gives Ireland appreciably less than he himself has offered. There is not, in our opinion, the smallest rational expectation of proposing an Irish measure of the kind which Mr. Gladstone desires, to the Parliament now in course of election, such as that Parliament would accept. And we do not believe it to be possible that on this question Mr. Gladstone's opinion is appreciably different from our own.
It seems to us, then, utterly derogatory to the high and earnest tone which Mr. Gladstone has uniformly taken upon his Irish policy, to suppose for a moment that he will now split hairs upon the interpretation to be given to the verdict of the people, and that he will try to evade the plain outcome of the elections. No; he will say, as he said in his great speech in closing the debate on the second reading of his Irish Bill, that though the temporary verdict of the people has disapproved his policy, "the harvest of the future" will reverse that ver- dict. But if he believes this, as we are quite sure that he does, the very last course for him to take is to raise petty cavils as to the meaning of a very plain popular verdict,—to try to achieve by Parliamentary manceuvring what he has not achieved by the earnestness and passion of his popular appeals. That is, in our opinion, utterly unlike Mr. Gladstone. We have not been able to accept his Irish policy. We believe that it would be as injurious to Ireland as it would be mischievous to the United Kingdom. But we have never for a moment ignored the depth and earnestness of Mr. Gladstone's own belief in the righteousness and the justice of what he has proposed. And. that deep belief seems to us utterly inconsistent with any dis- position to trifle with the subject, or to attempt to do against the wish of the people, what he had invited the people to give him authority to do in their name. We believe that he will act in 1886 as he acted in 1874; that he will declare that though he has failed for the present, his faith is large in time and in the persuasiveness of what he deems a just policy ; and that, with the full dignity of his great position, he will retire from a struggle in which, for the present at least, he has obviously failed. Mr. Labouchere had a great deal more influence in the last Parliament than he deserved. But he has not yet risen so high, even in his own conceit, as to suppose that Mr. Glad- stone has placed his political conscience in the keeping of so singular a monitor.
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