TOPICS OF THE DAY.
LORD HARTINGTON AND MR. GLADSTONE.
IT is the common error of modern politicians to make a great deal too much of the smaller personalities of politics. We do not wonder that the editor of the Speaker was annoyed at the nonsense talked about Mr. Gladstone's vast obligations to the loyalty, generosity, and magnanimity of Lord Hartington. In our opinion, Lord Hartington's great merit has been, not so much in dis- playing these great qualities, which he doubtless possesses in abundance, as in subordinating all such considerations calmly and with no manner of fuss, to the higher con- sideration of the course best fitted to secure the interest of the State, and postponing both what his enthusiastic friends supposed to be his own claims and the claims of others, to what in his own cool judgment the public welfare demanded. He was not in the least anxious to lead the Liberal Party at the time when some of us,—this journal amongst others,—were eager to see Mr. Forster succeeding to the leadership which Mr. Gladstone had re- signed. Lord Hartington accepted it, however, though with obvious reluctance, when it became clear to every one,—to none more distinctly than to Mr. Forster,—that Lord Hartington would secure a more unanimous support than the statesman who had incurred so much resentment by his policy in relation to State Education. Lord Hartington bore the burden and heat of the weary six years of Opposition between 1874 and 1880, with his usual unflinching forti- tude, and never concealed from any one for a moment his conviction that, so soon as Mr. Gladstone threw him- self into the opposition to Lord Beaconsfield's foreign policy, it became inevitable that Mr. Gladstone should return to the leadership of the party,—the more so, indeed, that Lord Hartington had condemned the foreign policy of Lord Beaconsfield in a much more moderate and less vehement manner than Mr. Gladstone. Lord Har- tington saw distinctly that under the circumstances no other leader of the Liberal Party than Mr. Gladstone was possible, and he expressed that conviction consistently, both long before and after the summons which, on Lord Beaconsfield's counsel, he received from the Queen to tender his advice as to the next step to be taken. We are quite sure that Lord Hartington never for a moment laid claim to any exceptional credit for magnanimity and generosity in advising the Queen to send for Mr. Gladstone. He saw that that was the wise and right course to take, and it never occurred to him for a moment that he had established a great claim on Mr. Gladstone's gratitude by taking it. It was the coolness of his judgment, and the decisiveness with which he acted upon his judgment, for which alone he would have taken credit. At the time Mr. Gladstone saw this distinctly, and he coupled Lord Hartington with Lord Granville in the cordial and sufficient acknowledgment which he made to them both at the dinner of the Royal Academy in 1880.
But if it be quite clear that it was a great want of judgment in the Unionists to insist on Lord Hartington's claims to a sort of gratitude from Mr. Gladstone which has really no business in statesmanship, we cannot but deeply regret that our respected contemporary, the Speaker, did not confine itself to protesting against those exaggerated claims, and pointing out that no one would be less likely than the Duke of Devonshire himself to sanction any such claims. To assert that Lord Hartington really did his best to form a Ministry of which Mr. Gladstone should not be the head, was both rash,—for it was an asser- tion for which even Mr. Gladstone's authority, if the editor of the Speaker could have claimed it, was quite insufficient without the Duke. of Devonshire's con- firmation,—and improper. Neither Mr. Gladstone nor the Duke of Devonshire, the only living authorities on the subject, could speak of what happened without the Queen's leave, and this is not a matter on which it is at all desirable that the Queen should be asked to give her leave. We can all of us imagine fairly well what may have happened. The Queen, whose confidence in Lord Beaconsfield was profound, probably asked Lord Harting- ton to form an Administration, and was told by Lord Hartington that, in his opinion, only Mr. Gladstone could form an Administration in which the country would place any confidence. Very probably the Queen may have replied : Well, if it must be so, it must ; but at least satisfy me and yourself that this is so, before you advise me to send for Mr. Gladstone.' We are, of course, only guessing, without any authority at all for our guess, what may have happened, but what cannot possibly be known to have happened without the Queen's permission. But if that did happen, what would have been Lord Hartington's duty ? Why, of course, to go to Lord Granville and Mr. Gladstone, and assure himself that no such Administration as Lord Beaconsfield had advised was possible. Very likely that was exactly what did take place. And the Speaker might, if it pleased, call that an attempt. by Lord Hartington to form an Administration. What we should call it would be an attempt by Lord Hartington to convince her Majesty of what he himself had long ago convinced himself, that no such Administration could be formed. And we conceive our description of the facts to be far more probable than the Speaker's description of them. But, of course, if the Speaker really has had the only inspiration to which its editor's letters point, the facts might have appeared in a very different light to Mr. Gladstone and to Lord Hartington. Mr. Gladstone might very well think that Lord Hartington, in obeying the Queen's command, did try to form an Administration of his own,. whereas Lord Hartington knew that in putting the ques- tions which he conceived himself under an obligation to her Majesty to put, he was only taking the one course necessary to convince the Queen that he could do nothing of the kind, and that his own long-formed judgment was. correct. As we have said before, we write solely on what seems to us the most probable conjecture as to what actually occurred, and from no "information" of any sort or kind. But we think we have said enough to show that all this acrimonious personality has been ex- ceedingly unfortunate, and in all probability,—considering- Lord Hartington's frankness long before he had received her Majesty's summons, and Mr. Gladstone's frankness a few weeks afterwards,—what would better reconcile the various known facts than any other explanation.
We deeply regret the controversy, which has only tended to belittle two of the statesmen on whom the public most justly rely for their high honour, their public. spirit, and their profound disinterestedness, and to belittle them without any show of reason. Though the Speaker may very justly have felt irritated at the sort of nonsense talked about Mr. Gladstone's great debt of gratitude to Lord Hartington, it made a great mistake in this attempt to drag out into the light of day a secret history which is of no real importance to the world at large, and which could not be adequately revealed without hearing the account of it given by all three of the only living witnesses of what happened, of whom one at least is not likely to speak, and the other two could not speak without her leave.
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