TOPICS OF THE DAY
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THE HISTORY OF MR. LLOYD GEORGE'S FIRST AND LAST (I) ADMINISTRATION.—III.
MR. LLOYD GEORGE AND THE PRESS.
MR. LLOYD GEORGE'S relations with the Press appear at first sight as complicated and as peculiar as his relations with the soldiers. People ask in bewilderment whether he influences the Press, or whether the Press influences him. When Generals or Cabinet Ministers are raised up or pulled down, reared to a giddy eminence or dashed to nothingness, to a prelude, accompaniment, and finale of menacing newspaper " leaders," who can tell what is cause and what is effect ? And yet the mystery, when once the clue is discovered, turns out to be simple enough. Mr. Lloyd George's Administration, like most human institu- tions, obeys the law of its being. Its origin was in a news- paper campaign. It was conceived, brought forth, and nurtured in " leaders," " inspired paragraphs," and " special communications " appearing in the Northcliffe Press ; and it has throughout its history been maintained by all the artifices of political publicity. To begin with, the First Coalition Ministry and its Chief were assiduously 'written down. Then Mr. Lloyd George was cautiously written up. Even though there have been occasional signs of journalistic displeasure, whenever any real danger has arisen the bellows are inserted and the flagging balloon is puffed up to its old size and buoyancy.
In the early summer of 1915 Lord Northcliffe became dis- satisfied with the way in which the war was being conducted, and especially with the insufficient supply of shells. In this agitation for more shells he no doubt did a patriotic work, though unfortunately he coupled his campaign with a violent personal attack upon Lord Kitchener. Just as at the beginning of the war we were told by the Daily Mail that Lord Kitchener was the heaven-sent soldier whom we must employ, so in the summer of 1915 we were told that he must be got rid of. He had suddenly become as useless as nine months before he had been indispensable. It was even hinted, if we remember rightly, that his South African fame rested upon very weak foundations. But Lord Kitchener was not got rid of by this Press campaign. The greater part of the nation stood by him, feeling that even if he had not been as active as he. might have been in the matter of munitions, he at any rate had done, and was doing, magnificent work in raising the New Armies. Anyway, he did not resign ; and, what is more, his Chief, Mr. Asquith, who has never in his career deserted any one in a crisis, refused absolutely to throw him to the wolves. The attack upon Lord Kitchener having failed, it was maintained in increased vigour against Mr. Asquith.
Though we think Lord Northcliffe was entirely mistaken in his policy of driving Mr. Asquith from office, we bring no sort of accusation against him for using the great power of his newspapers to produce the change he desired. Having once convinced himself that Mr. Asquith ought to go, it must be admitted that he could hardly do anything else but use his papers for the purpose indicated. The newspaper proprietor who in such a crisis did not act upon what he believed to be the right course would be anything but a good citizen. The particular methods by which Lord Nor -hcliffe attempted to attain the desired end are another matter, and these we must condemn. Again, if a sense of justice obliges us to admit that, his views being what they were, Lord North- cliffe had no choice but to try to bring about a change of Government, or at any rate a change in its head, we must give a very different verdict in regard to Mr. Lloyd George's action. Mr. Lloyd George apparently shared Lord Northcliffe's views of Mr. Asquith. Did he not in a public speech vehemently repeat the Daily Mail's charge of " Too late " Yet he did not resign, but from inside the Cabinet worked with Lord Northcliffe, or at all events, since it is impossible to prove that there was a working alliance, he acted on parallel lines with Lord Northcliffe's newspapers— the common design being the destruction of the Government. It is obvious that there can be no excuse for such disloyalty. It was Mr. Lloyd George's duty as a good citizen and as a loyal colleague to have resigned as soon as he had convinced himself that the Government were not likely to win the war, and that he could win it if he were given the opportunity. Instead of such plain and straightforward action, he preferred to remain in the Ministry and destroy it from inside. It was as if Lord Curzon were to become convinced that Mr. Lloyd George must go in the public interest, but, instead of telling him so plainly, and then resigning, were to work deliberately against him. Such a thing is, of course, unthinkable. And here we may state parenthetically that, in site of our views about Mr. Lloyd George and the Administration, we can say with conviction that nothing has struck us as more admirable than the perfect loyalty to their Chief shown by such men as Lord Curzon. There must have been many things done of late by the Prime Minister which have grated upon their feelings ; but having formed the conclusion that, on the whole, he is the best Prime Minister, they have treated him with a loyalty which should be, and we hope will be, a model to all our politicians. Not having considered it a duty to sever their connexion with him, they have— witness Lord Curzon's speech the other day—defended him with their whole force. There has been none of the tactics that often disgust one in the politician who is ignorant of the meaning of the word " loyalty." There has been no hinting at faults, no hesitating of dislikes, no remaining in office not to support but to betray and destroy. In truth, the English country gentleman and the man with the Public School instincts is the beat of colleagues and of subordinates. As long as he is with you, he is with you. He will play for the team and the game, and not merely for his own hand. Such loyalty is an essential to sound Cabinet government, and the action of Mr. Lloyd George's colleagues has consoled us at any rate for much that has been profoundly depressing in recent events. We think that the statesman we have named, to whom, among others, we might have added Mr. Balfour, Mr. Boner Law, Mr. Chamberlain, Lord Robert Cecil, Mr. Long, and Lord Milner, has shown a complete want of political judgment in not realizing the dangers of Mr. Lloyd George's leadership ; but at least he has read the country a splendid lesson in political loyalty and integrity. Mr. Lloyd George adopted a standard of political action very different from that of Lord. Curzon and the other statesmen. we have named. He did not resign from office, but remained in Mr. Asquith's Admieistration, and worked as hard from inside as Lord Northcliffe from outside to bring the edifice in ruin to the ground. And the Administration fell. But, as it may be remembered, Mr. Asquith, whose perfect loyalty to colleagues and high sense of personal honour have never been challenged, apparently would not face the fact that his second-in-command had been working against him. He preferred publicly to make the ground of his fall a leading article in the Times. That, in our opinion, was a very great mistake. In the first place, one cannot resist saying with Byron :— " 'Tis strange the mind, that very fiery particle, Should let itself be snull'd out by an article."
But it was still stranger that Mr. Asquith did not see how he was exalting the power of the Press, at a time when it was specially important not to exalt it, by saying that a Times article made it quite impossible for him to go on with a com- promise that had been successfully arranged with the majority of his colleagues. Needless to say, there is nothing that a newspaper proprietot or editor likes so much as the admission that he has brought down a Prime Minister. The joys of tiger- shooting are nothing to such sport as that, and here was the tiger apparently testifying to the deadliness of the sportsman's aim. Is it to be wondered at that after that the power of the Press, or at any rate of the Northcliffe Press, was immensely enhanced ? Mr. Lloyd George had obviously placed himself under the greatest possible obligations to Lord Northcliffe's newspapers, while on the other hand Mr. Asquith had given a certificate of power to Lord Northcliffe which would be immediately " filed for future reference " by al the Tapers, Tadpoles, and miscellaneous time-servers in the country. Quite unconsciously and with the best possible intentions, he had directed their eyes to that for which they are always searching. Here was the man who could make and unmake First Lords of the Treasury. Therefore Lord North- cliffe was the man with whom it was essential to stand well if your political career was to be prosperous I No wonder if ever since December, 1916, we have had a Press-ridden Ministry, and, what is more, a Northcliffe-Press-ridden Ministry.
As far as we can see, there is no reason to suppose, as has been sometimes hinted, that Mr. Lloyd George has been fretted by the tyranny of the man whose aid gave him power. Though there has been every now and then a certain amount of murmuring in the Times, or the Daily Mail, or the Evening News, or the Weekly Dispatch at this or that Ministerial act, it has only been a gentle exercise of criticism. There has never been a serious attack upon Mr. Lloyd George, and whenever there has been any sort of Ministerial crisis, as in the case of the Paris speech, or the recent incident connected with General Maurice's letter, the support given to Mr. Lloyd George by the Northcliffe Press hat been active in a high degree.
But though the Northcliffe Press was the origin of Mr. Lloyd George's Ministry, and has been its chief source of political maintenance, it is interesting to note that the Prime Minister has also had an unusual amount of other Press support. Not only did the Unionist leaders bring in the regular official Unionist newspapers with them, but a great many Liberal newspapers, especially in the North of England, have been as whole-heartedly Lloyd-Georgian as the Daily Mail or the Evening News. Even the Manchester Guardian till a very short time ago proved a loyal supporter, and we should not be surprised if later it once more returned to the attitude which it took up in December, 1916. In a word, though Mr. Lloyd George's Press has complained of newspaper attack upon him, his Administration has in reality received the very minimum of criticism from this quarter. Though Mr. Lloyd George has escaped again and again from difficult places largely owing to the help of the Press, it must not be supposed that a Press-ridden Administration has proved popular with the public. On the contrary, there are abundant signs that the system is very much disliked, even by those who do not find it consistent with their immediate sense of public duty to condemn the Government. They do not mind seeing a great Admiral or a great General got rid of on the ground that the Government think that he is past bis work, or con- sider that for some reason or other his presence at their councils is incompatible with the best conduct of the war. As long as the Prime Minister remains in supreme power he must of course be allowed to choose his instruments. A bad choice ought unquestionably to result in his own dismissal, but while he is Prime Minister he cannot consent to what he believes to be wrong military counsel. But though the wiser part of the public do not dislike to see men removed from high office by the Government, what they do dislike is to read for a week or two beforehand apparently inspired articles in the Press, saying that this or that man has become use- less, or that he is crusty and old and has lost his judgment— witness the attacks on one of our most distinguished soldiers under the alias of " General Non, Non." The next step in these campaigns is usually to have it hinted that public opinion has condemned the soldier or sailor in question, and this process is maintained till he is finally got rid of " in obedience to an overwhelming demand." No wonder that Admirals and Generals are beginning to get the Press on their nerves. They now know the steps so well. First there is a paragraph in a Sunday newspaper about Admiral or General So-and-so's failing health. A day or two after appears in another paper a communicated article, saying I hat the officer is not only suffering from overwork, but that he never was very good at his job ; that he was lacking in " vision," or " imagination," or whatever the last fashionable phrase may be ; that he had never had enough strategic imagination to understand that Trebizond, Erzerune Tabriz, or the watershed of the Anti-Lebanon was a key position which, if promptly seized, would open a door upon world-strategy that would knock the Western Front into a frazzle as a place for beating the Germans. When this sort of article has been written for a few days, the doomed man begins to know that his time has come. The sycophants desert him. Old acquaintances begin to wonder whether, after all, he is as clever as they once thought him. He is defended in Parliament in only a perfunctory way, and he is finally told that he must either take an appointment which violates the whole of his Naval or Military teaching, or else go on the Retired List.
Whether it is the all-powerful newspaper proprietor who is the delator, or whether he is only used as a convenience by the Prim- Minister, who shall say ? Which is cause and which is effect ? Perhaps there is a friendly understanding between the two which makes it impossible to say exactly who is putting the other in motion. But probably these mysteries are too great for us or for any other critic to penetrate. All we can do is to sum up what we have said already. The Press made Mr. Lloyd George's Administration. The Press keeps it in power. When the Press deserts it, it will fall. No doubt at present it looks as if the last thing that the Press would do would be to desert a Premier who has so greatly augmented its powers. Yet the Press can never really fight public opinion. If once the public come to realize, as we have realized, that Mr. Lloyd George is not the war-winner he professes to be, but exactly the reverse, and that he has failed in the absolute test question of Man-Power, and has now, as is to be feared, made it impossible to tap the one great source of that power still available—namely, Ireland—they will ask them- selves with astonishment how it was that they endured so long this obstacle to a really vigorous prosecution of the war.
We have finished our sketch of Mr. Lloyd George's Ad- ministration. Elsewhere—i.e., in our first-page paragraphs— we meet the accusations that have been brought against us for criticizing so strongly the head of the Government in war time.
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