TOPICS OF THE DAY.
MR. GLADSTONE AND THE RIOTS.
MB. GLADSTONE'S letter to the Bermondsey Club on the riot of Sunday is the most satisfactory incident which has occurred since he first sprung his policy of Home-rule upon an astonished world. It not only shows that he remains a statesman—and it is not the interest of Tories, any more than of the country, that the chief of one historic party should become a demagogue—but it proves that the leaders of the two great parties are as united as they have ever been in resisting intimidation by London mobs. The object of the riot of Sunday can only have been the intimidation of the regularly appointed agents of the Executive. If the object was to protest on behalf of Mr. O'Brien, who lies in the infirmary of Tullamore Prison, under a sentence passed on him because he incited resistance to the law, much better lodged and fed than the majority of his sympathisers, the crowds could have protested in Hyde Park or on Primrose Hill much more easily and pleasantly to themselves than in Trafalgar Square. If, on the other hand, it was to test the legality of Sir Charles Warren's orders, a mere deputation could have disobeyed them, and when collared, have summoned the policemen for assault. There is no difficulty in the way of testing a law, and there are quite sufficient rich men on the aide of the rioters—Mr. Cunning- hame Graham, for example—to make payment of any needful expenses perfectly easy. Even if they had wished to hold a great meeting, they could have entered the Square by twos and threes, as thousands of the spectators did, and held their meeting until prevented by the police, when the consequent arrests would at once have tested the law. The truth is, those who organised the "demon- stration" wanted, first of all, to intimidate the Govern- ment ; secondly, to "give the police a lesson ;" and lastly, to test their own strength. And Bo they issued their placards, calling on "the people" to come" in their tens of thousands ;" they prepared for violent rashes ; and when resisted, they fought so that dozens of policemen had to seek hospital aid. For the first time, even the horses of the mounted police were assailed. "Liberty of speech," "Right of meeting," "Property of the people," and the rest of the catchwords, were mere excuses, the hope being to make a riot so formidable that the police would either be beaten, or that the Government, unwilling to use the soldiers, would give way. This purpose was thoroughly understood on both sides, and if the Govern- ment had yielded, it would have yielded to revolt, and would have been false to its trust. Its first business as trustee for the People—who alone place it in power—is to see that the laws are carried out ; and when a mob takes upon itself to interpret them, they are not carried out. The duty of good citizens, as Mr. Gladstone has clearly pointed out, was to assume Sir Charles Warren's orders to be legal until they were shown to be illegal ; and the Government only insisted that they should do their duty. They could not insist without using force, any more than they could insist that there shall be no street-robberies without employing police- men. How anybody who believes that the social organisation is of any value at all can blame them, we cannot understand ; and while we heartily welcome Mr. Gladstone's declaration, we should have expected it from the strongest Radical who had ever felt the responsibilities of power. Whether the crowds who charged the police were composed of respectable workmen or not, matters nothing to the argument. As a matter of fact, they were composed partly of real workmen, misled by the idea of a perfectly imaginary attack on liberty, partly of roughs and criminals zealous for a fight with the police, and partly of hobbledehoys eager for excitement ; but supposing them all working men, their position was equally indefensible. It is not because the workmen control the State, that a small section of their number is to take upon itself to declare the law, and declaring it wrongly, to defy Magistrates and beat policemen for declaring it in another sense. If a mob can do those things with impunity, the People loses all rights, and its sovereignty is superseded by a regime of casual crowds. That is not democracy, but govern- ment by fortuitous concourses of atoms who would speedily make an end not only of prosperity, but of civilisation. The People must rule London, and its agents during approval are the Ministry and the Police. That is the true Radical doctrine, not the absurd one now preached that every one who can gather a crowd is to do exactly what he pleases, even if he interferes with the rights of a bigger crowd than his own. As to the manner in which the authorities did their duty, which for the moment was to protect Trafalgar Square from invasion by organised mobs, the truth appears to be this. The police were admirably commanded and led, and did their duty splendidly so well, that they drove off crowds out- numbering themselves by ten to one without taking a single life, a result which on the Continent would be pronounced incredible. They won the battle in the most complete and yet the most merciful manner. That on some occasions they struck unduly hard, and on others struck men who were per- fectly innocent, or even sympathisers of their own, is not only probable, but, unless the riot differed utterly from every other riot in a great city, may be taken as absolutely certain. Two or three thousand half-drilled men, with no arms but their batons, cannot be engaged in two or three hundred severe skirmishes with men who are as powerful as themselves, and who are intent on maiming them, without getting exasperated by their undeserved blows, without feeling a momentary hostility to their opponents, and without hitting out as hard as ever they can. That is in the very nature of things, and w- are the assaults on spectators who have no business there, who impede the police almost as much as rioters, and who, when hit or roughly used in any way, return blow for blow as readily as the roughs. The rioters are not in uniform that the police should know them at sight, nor can the latter allow their ranks to be broken by sightseers any more than by opponents. It is right that every policeman should feel under discipline, and be as moderate as his duty will allow ; but it is possible to be too squeamish, more especially in a country where no policeman has the smallest exemption from the law, and where every man who is unfairly struck has a full right to prosecute without paying any expenses. The really lamentable thing is not that some innocent men are occasion- ally hit, but that other innocent men—namely, the police— are constantly hit, and elicit scarcely any sympathy at all. The public seem to think that the police come from the clouds, or from beneath the earth, and forget that they are simply decent citizens clothed in uniform, and engaged at moderate wages in their own service. They do not realise that every policeman smashed by a rough is a servant of their own maimed by brutal violence without just cause, and while acting in obedience to their own orders, given by their own appointed executive agents. Many of these men display the heroism of the prayed soldiers, and many suffer cruelly through life from the consequences of a street-fight ; and they are all, when beaten, deeply wronged, as much wronged as a Judge would be who was struck on the Bench. Yet the woes of one gentleman, struck because- he was in the way, will excite more attention and more pity than the sufferings of ten policemen. The tradition that Government is something apart from the people, still we suppose, holds its ground ; but at least it ought not to lead Radicals into their present gross injustice. They send their own servants to resist a mob, and then rejoice if they are wounded. That is the literal troth of the matter, and anti/ they recognise it, they will never recognise how utterly in the wrong they are in sympathising with men like Mr. Cunning- ham° Graham. We declare we cannot recognise the mental position of some of our oldest friends. They arc all for the modern conscientiousness, and the new " tenderness," and the fresh outburst of sympathy ; but if a policeman, whom they authorise and pay, is kicked to death by men who have absolutely no pretext for kicking, they are as callous as vivisectors, and only remark that the police are brutal. They are all for equality ; but they foam if a Member of Parliament in Ireland is forced into prison-clothes, and think it quite right in England that a rich rioter should be bailed, while a poor rioter goes to prison. They have forgotten Bentham and Mill, and if the majority were well-to-do, would declare that " the greatest happiness of the greatest number " was a proverb invented by devils for the guidance of fools. They have been crying for the rule of the majority all their lives, and now because the majority rules, they allege that its agents may justifiably be struck, stoned, and abused for obeying their own orders. There is plenty of pity in the world, but justice, like political economy, seems to have fled to the planet Saturn.
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