MR. FORSTER'S EXPLANATION.
THE difference between the tone of the House of Com- mons on Tuesday night, when Mr. Forster's resignation was first announced, and on Thursday night, when he made the dignified statement of his reasons for retiring from the Cabinet, on which we have to comment, was most remarkable, and a difference which can only be explained by the growth of a conviction among the Tories that the new Liberal policy for Ireland, whether it succeed or fail, must be judged by its results, and cannot be effectually attacked till those results have been seen. On Tuesday, passion in the House was at boiling point, above boiling point, almost at the point at which explosions may be expected. On Thursday, in spite of the dramatic character of the situation, in spite of the presence in the House of those Members of Parliament of whom Mr. Gibson persisted in speaking as if their connection with Kil- mainham Gaol were analogous to the connection between Members and their constituents,—in spite of the powerful impression made by Mr. Forster's declaration that, entertaining the conviction which he entertained of the danger of the release of Mr. Parnell and his colleagues, he could not have remained in the Government without personal dishonour, or, as he also in- timated, without feeling that be had paid "black-mail" for the exertion of their influence against the outrages,—in spite of all this, the Tories were quite aware that the new policy must be fairly tried, and that no coup could be made by renewing the scene of Tuesday, even if it had been possible to renew it. The political temperature had cooled down so much that Mr. Forster's speech, manly and impressive as it was, excited no rapture of exultation on the Tory side of the House, but only that natural expression of respect and admiration which the warm sympathy of the Tories with his conduct of course produced. Every one now sees that the Liberal policy must be judged by its fruits. If it succeeds in Ireland, its success will more than justify it. If it fails, its failure will certainly condemn it, in the minds of the English people, and the Government must pay the penalty of a generous, but, no doubt, hazardous resolve.
Mr. Forster's speech was, as the Prime Minister justly said, just such a speech as we should have expected from Mr. Forster,—not an attack upon his colleagues, except so far as his avowal that it would have been a dishenourable act in him to allow his own profound convictions to be over-ruled, showed how deeply he disapproved the policy they had adopted ;—not in any degree whatever an attack on Liberal principles, which Mr. Forster could no more disavow than he could disavow his compassion for Irish suffering,—but a very strong assertion of his own belief that by concession to the Land Leaguers at the present moment, the Government would do more mischief, even if they succeeded in producing a tem- porary lull in the outrages, than even an excess of rigour could produce. Mr. Forster's chief point was this .—If no diminution in the outrages followed the release of the suspects, then the release of the suspects could hardly tell except in one direction ; it would greatly strengthen the feeling that the Government were afraid of the Irish people, and could not keep a firm hold of the reins. But even if a lull did occur as the result of the release of Mr. Parnell and his colleagues, still the Irish people would regard that lull as due to the orders issued by Mr. Parnell, and not to the conduct of the Govern- ment, and that must tend to confirm the Irish people in their conviction that the true Government of Ireland was in the hands of the Land League still.
That was Mr. Forster's real case, for we believe that he did himself some injustice by admitting that if he had had any public avowal on the part of the imprisoned Members that their public policy was to be changed, and changed so as to give support to law and order, instead of to subvert it, he should have been prepared at once to let them go. As a matter of fact, such an avowal of what is tantamount to a distinct change of policy, if not made public till Thursday night, was made on Thursday night., and made publicly enough to satisfy any reasonable man that in the present emergency there is no real danger to law and order, while there may be great additional safety for it, in the release of Mr. Parnell.
What Mr. Parnell said on Thursday night, and what the Prime Minister had the means of knowing that Mr. Parnell thought, and had declared frankly to others, before Thursday night, was this :—" I have stated verbally to more than one of my friends, and I have written, that I believed the settlement of this arrears question, which compels the Government to turn, out into the road tenants who are unable to pay their rents; who
have no hope of being able to pay rents to which they were rendered liable in the bad seasons of 1878, 1879, and 1880, would have an enormous effect on the restoration of law and order to Ireland,—would take away the last excuse for the outrages which have been unhappily committed in such large and increasing numbers during the last six months ; and that if such a settlement were made, I believed that we, in common with all persons who desire to see the prosperity of Ireland, would be able to take such steps as would have a material effect in diminishing those exceptional, those lamentable out- rages." A more complete declaration that Mr. Parnell's influ- ence will be exerted on behalf of the restoration of law and order in Ireland, and that in his opinion it will be effectually exerted, providing that the Government deal adequately with the arrears question, we could not possibly desire. The Government had trustworthy information that Mr. Parnell held previously what on Thursday night he publicly announced. So that we do not see that Mr. Forster had more than the most technical and formal reason on his side, when he complained that the prisoners had been released without any compliance with that condition which would, in his belief, have justified him in so releasing them. We conjecture, indeed, that, in his own mind, Mr. Forster would not really have been satisfied with the fulfilment of this con- dition ; that he wanted to detain the prisoners till there was such evidence as would convince Ireland that they were released because the Government felt strong enough to defy them, and not because the Irish people had demanded their release ; and that, in his opinion, there is no such evidence now,—indeed, something very like what the Irish people may construe as evidence that this step is taken in order to coax Ireland into good-humour. At all events, this is how we interpret Mr. Forster's position. He seems to us to have conceded too much, in conceding that he would have been willing to release the prisoners, on adequate evidence of the fulfilment of his first condition. The fulfilment of that condi- tion, as we understand the whole drift of his speech, could not have satisfied him unless it had been accompanied by a virtual acknowledgment of defeat on the part of the poli- tical prisoners. In a word, he wanted to see the Government win something like a triumph over the lawless party, before lie released the leaders of that party from their confinement in Kilmainham Gaol.
We can qnite understand that position. But we cannot admit that it is justified by the drift of the Coercion Act. As Lord Hartington most truly said on Thursday night :—" We were only entrusted by Parliament with the power of keeping them in prison on reasonable suspicion of being concerned in certain offences, so long as we thought that it was imperatively required for the vindication of the law. That was the question, we had to ask ourselves when the arrests wore ordered. That was the question, day by day, and week by week, we have had to ask ourselves, since that time ; and when the moment arrived when we could no longer say that their continued detention was required for the safety of the country, then we were not only justified, but absolutely compelled, to agree to their release." Mr. Forster, of course, might reply that their continued detention was required for the safety of the country, until either order was re-established, or the Land- leaguers had been so discredited as to render them harm- less. But that reply would be clearly straining the interpreta- tion of the Act, in a way that would be, in our opinion, quite unjustifiable. It was obviously not intended that any man should be kept in prison under the Act, simply because his re- lease would produce a dangerous effect on the imagination of the Irish people. So soon as the Government felt morally convinced that Mr. Parnell free would be more likely to promote the restoration of order than Mr. Parnell in prison, the Government were clearly bound to release Mr. Parnell.
The appointment of Lord Frederick Cavendish as Irish Secretary was a surprise to every one, and has been very bitterly criticised. Lord Frederick is known to be a poor speaker, and is not known to be, what we believe he is, a saga- cious and sensible, as well as most prepossessing politician. Proba- bly the appointment indicates Mr. Gladstone 's intention to keep the settlement of the various Irish questions more especially under his own eye, as well as his high appreciation of Lord Frederick Cavendish's personal capacity for statesmanship of a higher order than any in which he has yet been engaged. As every one had supposed that Mr. Chamberlain was to be- come Irish Secretary, there was naturally some disappointment among the Irish Liberals, who looked to Mr. Chamberlain for measures of more grasp than they will expect from Lord Frederick Cavendish. But as impressions, however false, count for something in such a public as ours, there will be this advantage in the selection actually made, as compared with that which was generally expected, that the name of the new Irish Secre- tary will produce no panic, no fear of revolutionary sympa- thies. In our own belief. Mr. Chamberlain would have shown no more sympathy with anarchy,—no less resolute a purpose to suppress it,—than Lord Hartington himself. But at least Lord Frederick Cavendish will have none of the extra diffi- culties to surmount which might have been created, both in Ireland and England, by the appointment of an Irish Secretary who had contrived to excite such imaginative fears of his dangerous designs as have long surrounded, in the popular imagination, the reputation of Mr. Chamberlain.
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