MR. GLADSTONE IN LONDON.
THEprecise political position of the Gladstonians could hardly be better described than it was by Mr. Glad- stone in Farringdon Street on Tuesday. They are making promises of endless "reforms," all in the democratic or socialist direction ; but they acknowledge that they can keep none of them, cannot even try to keep them, until they have settled the question of Home-rule. The rank and file of politicians may evade that question to the delight of their audiences, or may whittle away its im- portance, as was done in Rossendale, or may even speak as if it were a question to be settled, if they gain a majority, after a few nights' debate ; but the leaders make no such blunder. They know that if they win, the next Parlia- ment must be devoted to Ireland, and consequently that the Election now in front of us must turn on Ireland ; and they always end or begin their speeches by admitting that, promises notwithstanding, the one vital question is the question of Home-rule. Not only has it taken possession of their indispensable chief, not only are they all pledged up to the lips to make it their first object, but they know that if they shirk it, their majority will disappear, that the price of the eighty-six Irish votes is the immediate concession of a separate Parliament and a separate Executive Government to the " nation " of Ireland. There cannot even be a Session's delay. If years are wasted in the struggle, and a generation passes away without any advance towards the changes desired by the democracy, still the situation and the pledges hold the Gladstonians fast in an inexorable grip. They must secure Home-rule first, or they must, as politicians, go under : from that dilemma there is no escape. To no one is this so clear as to Mr. Gladstone, and, we are bound to say, in no one is there less desire to blink or hide away the fact. His speech on Tuesday was intended as a grand effort to capture London, to make the Imperial city vote for him, whose first object is, as regards Ireland, to break the Imperial sceptre. To secure this end, he made a hot appeal to what is called Progressive feeling,—that is, the feeling that the capital should be invested with all the powers of a Municipality, and should use those powers steadily to advance what is known as the cause of "Labour." If municipal feeling can be made predominant over national feeling, the Unionists will be beaten in the Metropolis ; and Mr. Gladstone used his best powers to make it predominant. He promised fresh powers to the County Council. He promised to tax the freeholders, whose wealth he described as "of an enormous, almost immeasurable, magnitude," a preposterous exaggeration. He promised to merge the "City," and all its wealth, and all the wealth of its " Guilds " and "Companies," in a fund "to be made available for the entire people of the Metropolis." He promised a reform of the fran- chise, so that voters in London boroughs shall not be overwhelmed by voters from outside, mere owners of property who sleep out of town, quite forgetting that equality of franchise in London involves an increase of its representation from sixty-two Members to more than ninety. He promised a Registration Bill which will allow the London nomads, who are always changing their lodgings, to vote as householders. And above all, recol- lecting the statements that the Labour vote seated the Progressive majority in the County Council, he promised to consider their pet projects with an open mind. Indeed, he went farther, for he expressed himself favourable to the action of that Council in making contracts depend on a high rate of wages being paid to labourers for a short day's work, and would trust for the prevention of extravagance to the efforts of the ratepayers, who have not stopped extravagance such as was shown in the " Boundary " experiment by one farthing. And finally, he thought that Parliament could enforce a similar policy on all Companies invested with monopoly,—that is, in fact, all Railway, Gas, and Water Companies, and all limited liability Companies, say, for ex- ample, those which provide omnibuses or cabs, or popularly needed goods. "They [the limited Companies] exist by virtue of special privileges conferred by Act of Parliament, and that gives a corresponding title to Parliament; it invests Parliament with a certain responsibility for the taking of cautious measures, with the view of checking extravagant demands on labour more than in those cases where no legislative privileges have been given." Those offers, which cover an enormous range, and which would have made men like John Bright turn pale with dismay at the interference they threaten with industrial liberty, will seem magnificent to men of Mr. John Burns's opinions, and if they could only be realised, might heavily affect the vote of London. But then, Mr. Gladstone honestly stated that they could not be realised until Home-rule was carried. Ireland blocks the way, and will block it. One-third of the time of the Legislature is occupied with Ireland, and Home- rule "is associated and bound up with every other ques- tion, and perhaps most of all with the question which we call by the name of the London Question. I believe that in solving the Imperial problem you will likewise find that you will solve your local problems ; and by solving the local problems you will confer upon London an eminence and a glory to which, great as she is, she never yet has attained ; and you will exhibit her before mankind in this great province of municipal government—so intimately associated with the well-being and the power of man—you will exhibit the city which you love as the pattern and the leader of the world." London, in fact, is to be a Paradise when Home-rule has been conceded, and therefore Londoners should vote for Home-rule, the mere discus- sion of which will postpone the realisation of Utopia for an indefinite time !
It is bold, not to say unscrupulous, bidding ; but we do not believe that it will succeed. Apart from the long delay which is to intervene, the inhabitants of a metropolis have always an instinct as to what the surrender of empire must ultimately mean for them, and when a national ques- tion comes fairly before them, consider it, and not municipal advantages. Moreover, Londoners are shrewd, and can see even in Mr. Gladstone's speech how little of reality there is in all these glowing promises, made dependent as they are on such a distant contingency as Home-rule. They will ask, if Mr. Gladstone is so strong a municipal reformer, why he makes all municipal reforms dependent upon the Irish Question ; or why he postpones them to a period when, as he would be the first to acknowledge, he himself will be no longer in power, and the total of Liberal Members will be reduced by at least two-thirds of the Irish vote. They will prefer, we think, to ask what reforms the Unionists, who if they win can fulfil all their pledges at once, will be prepared to grant; and will treat the "magnificent bid" as they treated the offer to abolish the Income-tax, as a bribe not tempting enough to out- weigh high national considerations. A good many people will be alarmed and disgusted by the menace addressed to all railways and all limited Companies ; a good many more will see in "Registration reform" the near arrival of Manhood Suffrage, which in London is certainly not desired, and the Progressives are not so numerous, as the election for North Hackney showed, that they can afford to see thousands of voters seceding from their ranks. The general issue is brought before them with almost cynical clearness,—they are to sell Ireland to the enemies of Great Britain for municipal privileges which could be obtained without the sale ; and we have little doubt that London, fully understanding that issue, will vote for the continuance of that United Kingdom of which it is the heart. Mr. Gladstone under- stands the consciences of average Englishmen almost per- fectly, and can make thereto most successful appeals ; but he does not weigh their judgments in so exact a balance.
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