Mr. Gladstone received a large party of Liberals at Hawarden
on Saturday from some places in the immediate neighbourhood of Rochdale, and addressed them on the dis- credit it would be to Rochdale if they allowed a Unionist to displace Mr. T. B. Potter, the present Member. He enlarged on the lesson given by the recent triumphant return of a Home-ruler at Southampton, and for oratorical purposes assumed, with the Times, that the victory was entirely due to the unpopularity of the licensing clauses of the Local Government Bill. He declared his opinion that these licensing clauses are quite "intolerable," because they contain the recognition of the principle of compensation in certain cases, although, as Mr. Chamberlain pointed out on Tuesday at Birmingham, and as we have shown in another column, Mr. Gladstone declared himself, in 1880, cordially favourable to compensation in cases where a licence that had not been forfeited by any abuse was to be cancelled for the public benefit. Mr. Gladstone showed on Saturday, what is perfectly true, that these monopolies frequently give their owners enormous profits. Of course. But the moment you suddenly withdraw a licence for no mis- conduct, you confiscate the chance of these large profits, for which the temporary owner may have only just paid an enormous price ; so that the argument tells quite as strongly in favour of compensation as against it. As Mr. Chamberlain said at Birmingham on Tuesday,—" When any legitimate interest which had been brought into existence with the sanction of the Legislature was interfered with on public grounds, it was the duty of the community to compensate those whose interest was disturbed." That seems to us common sense and common honesty.
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