TOPICS OF THE DAY.
ASTON MANOR.
WILL Mr. Gladstone enlarge on the significance of the election at Aston Manor as he has enlarged on the significance of those by-elections at which the Glad- stonian candidate has been successful,—for example, the Eccles election and the election at Hartlepool ? If he does, we shall have him calculating what majority the General Election will yield to the Unionist Party, on the assumption that every large working-class constituency gives to the Unionists at the next dissolution three and three-quarter times the majority that it gave in 1886. In 1886, Aston Manor yielded to the Unionist Party a majority, of 782, after the division of the Liberal Party. On Friday week, Aston Manor gave to the Unionist candidate,—and that Unionist candidate a Conserva- tive,—a majority of 2,978, though in 1886, before the division of the Liberal Party, the same constituency carried the Liberal candidate by a majority of 1,153. In other words, what was a thoroughly Liberal working- class constituency in 1885 has been converted by Mr. Gladstone's policy into the staunchest and most unanimous of apparently Conservative constituencies in 1891,—apparently Conservative, we say, but really as heartily Liberal as ever, though showing its Liberalism by its resolute determination to have no parleying at all with the policy of breaking up the integrity of the United Kingdom in order to satisfy the aspirations of a party which has proved itself as hostile to the individual inde- pendence and political rights of Irish Unionists, as it has to the unity and strength of the United Kingdom. If Mr. Gladstone would only enlarge on the lesson of Aston Manor as he has enlarged on the lesson of the Eccles Division of Lancashire, and the lesson of Hartlepool, we should have the hair of English Home-rulers standing on end. For in Aston Manor we have a constituency in which there is every reason to believe that Mr. Gladstone's " abortion" of a party has turned the scales from a vigorous Gladstonianism into a tremendous and unique triumph for Unionism, even though it was necessary, under the terms of the alliance, to entrust a genuine Conservative with the duty of declaring the deliberate and resolute Unionism of the constituency. We are suite willing to admit,—indeed, we should earnestly maintain,—that the result is in a great degree due to the loyal desire of the Liberal Unionists to acknowledge the fairness with which they had been treated when the seat for Central Birmingham was given up by Lord Salisbury's and Lord Hartington's arbitra- tion to the Liberal Unionists rather than to the Conserva- tives, who thought that they had some claim to the seat. Doubtless the Liberal Unionists worked with a will for the Conservative candidate at Aston Manor, in order to repay the fidelity with which the Conservatives had held to their word. And doubtless, too, the result showed how great is Mr. Chamberlain's influence over the constituency, and how completely he is able to rally the hosts of Liberal Unionists among the working men to the standard of Conservatism, whenever he recognises that such a service has been deserved by the Conservatives at the hands of their allies. We not only concede but maintain that this election gives special evidence of the satisfaction of the Liberal Unionists with Lord Salisbury's and Lord Hartington's decision in relation to Central Birmingham, and is an earnest of the hearty and eager co- operation between the Conservatives and themselves. Still, , the more we ascribe the result to the zeal of the Birmingham Liberal Unionists in the cause of the alliance, the more con- spicuous becomes the resolve of the Midlands to have no paltering with the policy of disintegration. In Birmingham and its neighbourhood at least, Unionism, far from being less eager than it was, is growing rapidly in power. And that fact alone will count for a great deal at the General Election. The working men, who are really Radicals, are perfectly indifferent as to what they may seem to be in the eyes of superficial observers, so long as they make it clearly understood that neither Parnellism nor Anti-Parnellism, nor any modification of the Glad- stonian creed about Irish Home-rule, will gain any sort of approval from them. They would rather be thought Con- servative Unionists than get the credit or discredit of any kind of weakness for dissecting,—or rather, vivisecting,— the United Kingdom. A thoroughly Liberal constituency, by a great deal more than a two to one vote, proclaims itself ' Far rather Conservative than Gladstonian.'
We have no doubt that the result is due in a very con- siderable degree to the special identification of local Unionist chiefs like Mr. Chamberlain and Mr. Jesse Collings with a policy which the working classes generally admit to be heartily popular, although not less heartily Unionist. It is not in every part of the Kingdom that we can hope to find Unionist leaders who have taken so prominent a part in securing for the working man allotments on easy terms, and in advocating his claims to free education. Of course that has much to do with the great triumph at Aston Manor. In constituencies where there is no Mr. Chamberlain and no Mr. Jesse Collings, we must not look with the same confidence for great majorities of voters who are deeply convinced that the cause of the Union is the cause of the people. Where the leading Unionists have been conspicuous rather for their indifference to what the working classes think the popular cause, than for zeal in advancing it, we shall hardly have such majorities as that at Aston Manor, and in many such con- stituencies, no doubt, it will be Mr. Gladstone's name, and not the name of any Unionist, which will command the greatest popular confidence. So much we freely admit. But at least Aston Manor has demonstrated that where the Unionist leaders have been genuinely popular politicians, the cause of the Union has taken a deep hold on the enthusiasm of the people, and obliterated even those deep party prejudices which have hitherto 'militated but too powerfully against the efficiency of the alliance with the Conservatives. Now that Aston Manor has set• the example, too, other constituencies will be all the more willing to follow. No working-class constituency will be ashamed to confess the same faith which this great working- class constituency has triumphantly avowed.
And further, a good deal of effect must certainly be attributed to causes which are not local, and which have been working steadily for the Union. The quarrels of the Parnellites and Anti-Parnellites, and the too obvious in- difference to principle which both parties have displayed in the scuffle, have no doubt convinced the great body of English working men of the unreality of the so-called Irish cause, and the hollowness of the Home-rulers' grievances. These are considerations which it takes English working men some time to grasp. But the spectacle which Ireland now presents of so-called patriots like Mr. Healy guarded by long files of Mr. Balfour's " myrmidons " against the violence of a Parnellite mob, must impress even the least studious politician, and con- vince him that Mr. Balfour is not the reckless despot and coercionist that the Gladstonian legend represents. The very men who are now playing Mr. Gladstone's game in Ireland, are really indebted to Mr. Balfour's police for the power to play it. The cruel tyrant of the Gladstonian myth reveals himself as shielding the men who have rejected Mr. Parnell against the wrath of the Par- nellite mob. And it will not be easy for the Gladstonian edition of the political mythology of Ireland to survive the effects of such an object-lesson as that. We are now gradually learning the results not only of Mr. Chamber- lain's and Mr. Jesse Collings's personal influence, in this Aston Manor election, but also 9f the singular tragi-comedy which is enacting on the other side of St. George's Channel. Now this is a cause of Unionist victory which is not local, but which will operate equally in all parts of Great Britain at the General Election,—in Yorkshire and Durham and the South of England, as much as in Birmingham and the Midland Counties.
On the whole, then, the election at Aston Manor cannot fail to put heart and hope into the Unionists, and to inspire all sober Gladstonians with fear and anxiety for the result of the General Election. It demonstrates that the reliance hitherto placed on the drift of by-elections is wholly un- trustworthy, and that causes are actively at work which may turn the General Election into something much better than the popular vote of 1886,—namely, a confirmation of that popular vote after five years' pause and deliberation. That is a result well within our reach, if Liberal Unionists in other parts of the Kingdom will but follow the example of Mr. Chamberlain and Mr. Jesse Collings in working hard for the popular cause ; and if the Irish Home-rulers in all parts of the Kingdom will but follow the example of Mr. Parnell and Mr. Healy in magnifying themselves, and letting the interests of their country go to the dogs.
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