THE CONTEST IN LIVERPOOL.
OUR remarks upon the possible conversion of Liverpool have been received on the spot with less disfavour than we expected, and are, indeed, generally admitted to be true, We note, however, in all comments and all the letters we have received, except one, a tone of despondency amounting almost to despair. If, we are told, the Irish, who control 12,000 votes out of the 60,000, abstain from voting, or vote in large numbers against the Liberals, victory is impossible, for no arguments will convince the Orange majority. They are so irritated by the competition in the labour market of Irishmen, who accept less wages and care nothing for comfort, and see no reason why children should wear shoes, that they are practically impervious to reason. The Welsh in parti- cular are fanatically anti-Irish, and in Liverpool, alone in the kingdom, Welsh pastors may be found who sit upon the Tory Committees for municipal wards. The facts are, we doubt not, true, but this despondency seems to us simply weakness, We do not believe in impossibilities when Liberalism is concerned, any more than when any other truth is concerned. An Orangeman in Liverpool is a prejudiced human being, that is all, and can be enlightened like any other man. He is not irritated by Irish competition more than a citizen of Glasgow, where the Irish undersell everybody; does not dislike Catholicism one whit more, and is not so much plagued by Irish disaffection, yet Glasgow is Liberal to the bone. Do our correspondents really mean to affirm that Liverpool electors are more prejudiced against the Irish, more enraged by bare feet, more bigotedly Protestant, more impervious to reason than average money-making Scotchmen ? We do not believe it, but if so, then the work will be the harder ; but that it can be done we have no more doubt than we have that England will one day be as completely Liberal as Scotland, that is, will be Liberal through and through. All that is required to carry Liverpool is courage, the courage which assails "impreg- nable" places, and dares utter, plainly and fearlessly, detested opinions ; some energy, about as much as would be shown if Liverpool were threatened with a loss of trade ; and some faculty for minute and thorough organisation. The object is not to con- ciliate the Irish or rouse the English, but to teach every man in Liverpool, and especially every man in Liverpool who usually avoids voting, that the Liberal policy offers the only practicable means of curing the condition of things in Ireland which is so bitterly disliked. If the Orangemen hate com- petition, the Liberals are making Ireland pleasanter to its people ; if they detest Catholicism, the Liberals are steadily urging education ; if they are irritated by Irish hatred, the Liberals are adopting the only means by which that hatred can be permanently soothed away.
We believe that if the Liberals will but work as if their own fortunes were at stake. they could not have a better chance than at this by-election, They have a most excellent candidate. Mr. Samuel Smith is not only a sound, though very moderate, Liberal, a man who believes in the Constitution, and dreads Republicanism, but is, as he says, " of the party of the wheels, and not of the party of the drags ;" not only a rich man whose interests in the prosperity of Liverpool are identical with his own interests, but he is one of the most successful and clear- headed of practical philanthropists. He has for years worked hard, and spent not only his money but himself to promote every good object in Liverpool, and especially tb save the children of the poor from the misery of the gutter-life by a large and regulated emigration to Canada. The Young Men's Christian Association—a most effective society for good, even if its members do indulge in a little religious conceit and priggishness—owes everything to him, and in all parts of Liverpool, hundreds of men of the most varied opinions will, for Mr. Smith, act as unpaid and eager canvassers. Then Mr. Smith, too, will make, politically, a good Member. Ho can speak well, and ho speaks out, without that nasty attempt to be all things to all men, which we occasionally note in "impossible " constituencies. He tells the Tories that he regards the diffusion of property as essential to public safety, and shall vote for the abolition of primogeniture and entail, and the strict curtailment of the right of settlement. He tells the Ultra-Radicals that to abandon Egypt would have been at once a folly and a baseness, and that Mr. Gladstone will grant as much self-government to the Fellahs as is consistent with good government. He tells the philanthropists with whore he sympathises that if they desire to abandon the Opium trade—as he himself does desire—they must consent to pecuniasy sacrifices, and not throw them all upon the tax-
payers of India, who had rather not give the trade up. And, finally; he tells the Orangemen that he heartily approves Mr. Gladstone's policy in Ireland; that the Land Act is a great act of justice too long postponed ; that there is no policy possible except to go on conciliating until Irish hate dies away, and that a large measure of self-government must yet be con- ceded. He is not for Home-rule. The Union, he declares, is " a marriage," which, " ill-assorted as the partners may be," cannot be dissolved without giving rise to infinitely worse evils, but he will support any measure of self-government con- sistent with the maintenance of the unity of the realm. We have neither hardened nor softened Mr. Smith's expressions, and any one who reads the admirable speech in which he em- bodied them will see that although he believes much more in what is called " philanthropy " than we are able to do, though, that is, he expects too much from benevolent effort, and recognises too little the harshness of earthly circumstances, he is a strong, hard-headed Liberal, who will do good in the House of Commons. If a thousand voluntary agents would devote themselves only for the evenings of one week to explaining, say, to thirty men apiece, what it is he means, and why he means it, he would, we believe, in spite of all the evidence, still carry Liverpool. That city is inhabited, after all, by Englishmen, Welshmen, and Irishmen, who elsewhere understand.
We are not, of course, blind to the evidence heaped up before us. We know quite well how in a city like Liverpool, with its tradition of pro-slavery feeling, with its 175,000 Irish Catholics, holding another ideal of life than either comfort or order ; with its swarms of money-seeking, industrious Welsh, half-crazed by the competition of cheaper labour ; with its great labour-owning Companies, mostly Tory ; and with its clergy, for the most part, inclined to believe that Christ died only for Protestants and savages, a Liberal victory must appear to party managers a hopeless undertaking. Those are, how- ever, the very reasons for trying to storm the place, for so preaching the Liberal creed that every man shall hear it, and be compelled, if not to abandon, at least to recon- sider his own previous convictions. If Liberalism is true, it is as true in Liverpool as in London, and in London, the chosen home of social prejudice, where to proclaim your- self a Liberal is to defy " Society," we return fourteen members out of twenty-two, and could, if men would only work in the true way, instead of trusting so much to com-
binations, carry sixteen. It is of no use to tell us that, although the conversion of one thousand, votes would, in ordinary times, give the Liberals victory, the defection of the Irish means a majority of 10,000 for the Tories. There are 60,000 voters in Liverpool. If we can convince 30,001, and take them to the poll, we shall carry the city ; and it is that number, and not any combination of nationalities, or religions, or interests, or prejudices, which has to be secured in the only possible way,—by showing that the Liberal policy in Ireland, in Egypt, in the House of Commons, allowing for the im- perfection of all human efforts and the cloudiness of all human understandings, is wise and right. Orange prejudice,
indeed I We wonder what sort of Roman prejudice our despondent friends think that the early Christians had to con- tend with ; or, if they hold that victory miraculous, what depth of prejudice for slavery it was which the Abolitionists converted at last into abhorrence ? Has Liverpool never seen a drunkard turn teetotaller, that its best men are so in- credulous of the possibility of intellectual change I
Previous page
