THE UNIONIST PARTY.
• [To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR." J Si,—Public discussion at this juncture of the position to-day of the Free-trade Unionists in the Unionist Party is reg,rettable When the efforts of a united party are so essential to combat successfully the Government's Licensing Bill and their educa- tional proposals. As a Unionist Free-trader, I naturally sympathise with the position Lord Hugh Cecil depicted in his letter to the Times of the 20th, and the suggestion to oust his brother Lord Robert Cecil from his seat is suicidal on the part of the Conservative Party, and discreditable. The greatest enemy that the Protectionist Tariff Reformers have could not wish them a more cruel fate than to afford them the earliest possible opportunity of office, in order to enable them to submit to the country their proposals in a Budget or in some other practical form. Then, indeed, would their troubles begin, and, as a . Unionist Free-trader, I should be quite prepared to pledge myself to do no more than be a passive onlooker at their contortions. Without doubt the duty now of every section of the Unionist Party is to get the present Government out of office as quickly as possible, and then if their successors are willing to court a similar fate let them have the opportunity as soon, sharp, and short as the Government are now receiving on account of their licensing proposals. Let us, therefore, fight the foes immediately in front of us, and at the same time help to their destruction those who have once already brought the Unionist Party to defeat and disaster. Nothing short of this will save the Protectionists from themselves, or clear the Unionist Party from the Millstone that the extremists have hung round its
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