GOVERNORS v. LIEUTENANT - GOVERNORS.
IT is of little use, we fear, to write upon the subject which in India is called the " Presidency " question. The majority of English politicians will not attend to it, and the few who will have already for the most part made up their minds. Nevertheless, as the question is of vast importance, has been raised seriously by the famine, and seems likely to be decided by the Times in the wrong way, we may perhaps invite our readers to listen to a simple statement of the case.
Owing to historical circumstances of no importance to the issue, the great Provinces or divisions of India are governed on two widely different systems. The " Indian " Government— That is, the Government of the whole Empire—legislates on all important matters for all, and on all matters of finance, foreign policy, and military administration, controls all ; while it claims and sometimes exercises over all, on all subjects, an appellate jurisdiction. But the local Executive Government, which is of immense importance, possessing, as it does, the complete initiative, the total patronage, and an incomplete but very great internal control, is not the same in every great Division, In.Bengal Proper, for example, incom- parably the richest and most important Province, with its sixty millions of people and large surplus revenue, the Viceroy, assisted by the Home Government, selects from among the most experienced Civil Servants a Lieutenant-Governor. This gentleman then governs for five years, just as an English Secre- tary of State governs his department. He is assisted by a vast permanent staff, and he is responsible to the Viceregal Govern- ment as an English Secretary is to Parliament ; but within his functions he acts alone, untrammelled by any Council. This is the model of all the Northern Governments of India, and it is found in practice an excellent one,—the Lieutenant- Governor, or Chief Commissioner, as he is called in some Provinces, having nothing to learn, having a reputation to make, and having a strong desire to work easily with the Vice- regal authority.
In Bombay and Madras the system is a different one. There the Executive power is confided to a gentleman from England selected by the Indian Secretary of State, usually from among the few second-rate politicians whom a salary of £12,000 a year will tempt into an obscure exile. Knowing nothing, and very often caring nothing except for his pay, this Governor must be assisted by experienced councillors, who really govern, but who have very little responsibility, no reputation, and no place whatever in the public eye. The total "government," however, being impersonal, and being appointed from England without the Viceroy's intervention, thinks itself too dignified for subordination, and resents, often with inconceivable bitter- ness and malignity, any interference from the Viceroy's Government. Any such interference is denounced as "Cal- cutta impudence ;" and desperate efforts are made to neutralise it by the direct correspondence with the Office at home, which is allowed to "Governors," but refused— most wisely — to Lieutenant - Governors and Chief Com- missioners. On one celebrated occasion, a " Governor " flatly refused to obey a Viceroy's order essential to the safety of the Empire, and it was necessary to destroy all discipline by Passing orders to troops directly over his head. The inter- ference thus fiercely resented has, however, to be incessant. The Viceroy's Government is House of Commons as regards the purse, Parliament as regards legislation, and Horse Guards as regards the Army, and is besides, as a rule, indefinitely the ablest Government in India—though this is not the case just now-.—and it is bound to interfere at any cost of official friction, and sometimes to interfere in a very aggravating way by making an agent of its own—as it has done in this
Famine—virtually independent of the Government which nominally gives him his orders. Owing to the keenness with which Bombay is habitually watched from England, and some other accidental circumstances, this system has injured Bombay less than the Southern Presidency, though it has injured it, but in Madras it has produced a sort of paralysis of Govern- ment. That splendid Presidency scarcely advances at all ; and it is most melancholy to compare its condition with that of Ceylon, an island which, geographically, is part of it, which is peopled by a far less industrious race, and which actually owes its whole prosperity to the labour of immigrant Madrassees. The Government, being unable to spend, cannot contend with a famine without orders from the Viceroy, and when it receives orders has a traditional inclination to quarrel with, rather than obey them. There is, in fact, a permanent conflict of authority.
Mr. Bright, years ago, exposed and denounced the evils of this system, and years of watchfulness have made us doubt, with excessive reluctance, whether his remedy was not the right one, whether Southern India might not be made a separate Dependency. The Viceroy's Government is fear- fully overweighted, "Madras" is not understood at Cal- cutta, and is detested for its cantankerousness, and there is throughout the Presidency the strangest absence of the vigorous initiative which springs from independence. It takes years to get anything done, till everybody shrinks from doing, or proposing, a great thing, which has ulti- mately to be sanctioned by suspicious, exacting, and unsym- pathetic persons. The system works quietly, but so inefficiently, that Madras is a century behind other Provinces, and the first ordinary product of our rule, personal wealth, is not developed. Nobody has anything, and while each inhabitant of Ceylon takes two pounds' worth of English goods, a Madrassee scarcely purchases two shillings' worth. The financial difficulties in the way of independence are, however, very great, and the military difficulties so per- plexing, that if such a scheme were carried out, we should deliberately recommend the adoption of the French plan, and the garrisoning of Southern India by the Marines, who want a broader career, instead of by the Army. It would be nearly impossible, unless Parliament took the bit for once in its teeth and overruled everybody, to induce the India Office even to consider Mr. Bright's plan ; and failing that, the only remedy is to make subordination com- plete, and extinguish conflict by making the Viceroy supreme. An Act of Parliament should authorise the Government of India to administer Madras and Bombay, like Bengal, through Lieutenant-Governors chosen from among men too experienced to require Councils—which are useful only to dry-nurse the pauper Peers usually selected for such appointments—accustomed to obey the central authority, and deprived finally of any right of communicating direct with London. The new system would still be a bad one, for it would leave the Viceroy even more over-weighted than at pre- sent, and exaggerate the absurdity of asking one man to be earthly providence for sixty nations and tribes ; but it would be better than the present scheme, which in Madras has con- fessedly broken down, and which, in any crisis, will break down again. Unless we are misinformed, the Madras famine cor- respondence, if Lord Salisbury has the courage to publish it in full, will show that one-half of all official energy was wasted in the effort to get rid of inevitable official friction. Suppose Ceylon put under the Colonial Office and the Dominion of Canada, and we have some notion, though a most imperfect one, of the official position of Madras. It is too late, we sup- pose, for Mr. Bright to devote himself to the question again, but he never had such an opportunity.
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