THE POPULARITY OF FIRMNESS.
WE need hardly say that after Mr. Chamberlain's various speeches on the Merchant Shipping question, the country has the largest confidence in his judgment and impartiality as regards that question. If when he comes to propose his measure to Parliament, he can assure us that no important change has been made in it which was not in his judgment right and just, after hearing the case of the Shipowners, we shall all be satisfied to support it in the modified shape to which he has agreed. In matters so complex and difficult, it is obvious enough that not even the ablest and most impartial of Ministers could foresee every just objection to be raised, without hearing patiently the representatives of the class who consider their interests en- dangered by the legislation proposed. We are not so unreason- able as to find fault because Mr. Chamberlain has been honestly convinced by the Shipowners that what he proposed needed modification. He is a far better judge than the Press can be on such a point, and we are fully convinced that any con- cession which he makes ex animo would be a concession which, whether it eventually proves right or wrong, it would be right, with such light as we now have, to make. But what we want to insist on is this,—that Mr. Chamberlain will do very wrong, if he should be persuaded to introduce a measure which, in his own opinion, is inadequate and muti- lated, and not sufficient for the purpose he has throughout had in view, simply because he does not think that in the present condition of the House of Commons he could pass such a measure as he would really approve. It would be far better, we hold, for the Merchant ServiCe, far better for the Government, far better for the House of Commons, and far better for the people at large, that he should be defeated in the attempt to carry a good and sufficient measure, than that he should be successful with a weak and insufficient one. We insist on it that Mr. Chamberlain would make a great mis- take, if he consented to propose to Parliament any measure of which he cannot say earnestly that it satisfies his own political conscience, and seems to him sufficient for its purpose. If he proposes less than this, he will have languid support in the House and no support out of it, and he will gravely diminish the confidence reposed by the country in his own nerve and public spirit. It is easy to say that if he proposes what he thinks right, he will be beaten. Perhaps he will, but the result of his being beaten will be better, even for the Merchant Service, than the result of success with any measure into which he himself cannot throw his heart. A defeat means nothing but another year's delay, for, considering the power which Mr. Chamberlain's voice has with the people, and the eager in- terest which the people feel in this subject of the fair treat- ment of the sailors, it means the almost inevitable carrying of a better measure in the next Session of Parliament. There are many questions on which it is essential to be beaten first in order to succeed afterwards, and perhaps this may be one of them. Where justice to a great, popular, and ill-used class of men is at issue, we may trust with confidence to the verdict of the people ; and though we should be extremely sorry to see necessity for an appeal to the people in order to judge between a small and wealthy class and a comparatively poor and numerous class, we have enough confidence in Mr. Chamberlain's justice to desire to see such an appeal, if he is himself convinced, that without it he cannot overcome the selfish fears of the shipowners and the ship-insurers. It is, indeed, because we feel sure that Mr. Chamberlain is not, in this case, likely to err on the seamen's side, because we are sure that he will feel very strongly the claims of capital and enterprise to fair treatment, that we feel so absolute a confidence in his own final judgment. But if his final judgment is that he cannot carry a just Bill through Parliament without first appealing to the people, we do earnestly hope that he will not shrink from defeat, and will throw upon the privileged classes who resist him the full responsibility of rejecting his measure.
It may be said, of course, that even if this course were best in the interests of our seamen, it would be a blow to the Government of which they would be very imprudent to run the risk. Even if that were so, we should be sorry to see the Government shrinking from proposing the Bill which they think most just to English seamen and to the Merchant Ser- vice at large, simply out of timidity lest another defeat should impair their prestige. The prestige of a Government is not worth keeping if it be necessary to forfeit the power to do justice in order to keep that prestige. But in this ease, at all events, we do not in the least believe that there would be any risk. An appeal to the people must come soon, and it had much better be made by a firm Government which had been obstructed and foiled at more than one point in the dis- charge of its duty, than by a vacillating Government which had pared down its measures to the passing point. One good point in great democracies, amidst many questionable points, is that they do know firm leaders from weak leaders, and infinitely prefer the former. They rely on their leaders very much more than oligarchies or privileged classes, and will not put their confidence in men who do not appear to know their own minds. It is not true that with such an electorate as we have at present there is any prepossession in favour of unnecessary compromise such as used to be attributed,—whether truly
or not,—to the ten-pound householders. On the con- trary, the democracy loves a strong man, who, having once made up his mind on all the evidence he can hear, will not swerve from his position, even though he suffer a serious reverse in that position. Englishmen are, we suppose, all alike in despising the man who risks a great cause for a mere fancy or crotchet of self-will. They like compromise when compromise is essentially reasonable, and when it affects only the secondary elements of a question, and not fidelity to the principle in- volved. But great constituencies such as those to which we now appeal, like nothing less than timidity and vacillation. They feel extremely their own need of guidance, and judge the men who guide them, chiefly by the character of the aims which they avow, and the tenacity and earnestness of purpose
with which they pursue those aims. Consider only the popular emotion excited by Mr. Plimsoll's devotion to the same cause on behalf of which Mr. Chamberlain is now fighting. Could anything have shown more decisively that when the people see the justice of a cause, and have confidence in the man who has made it his own, it is not any Parliamentary reverse which will alienate them from their leader ? There are but few special political issues in which the electorate at large are profoundly interested. As a rule, they follow their ablest leaders with almost pathetic fidelity. But then, in order to secure that fidelity, the leaders must show that they both understand what they are about, and have resolution enough to insist on carrying out their own convictions. And certainly if there is any case in which the people will insist absolutely on having evidence that this is so, it will be in relation to a matter which excites so much popular interest as the safety of our merchant ships. On that matter the people have a con- viction of their own independently of their leaders, and there- fore on that matter more than any other, their leaders will do well to stand firm, and not to vacillate. We entirely believe that Mr. Chamberlain will concede nothing to the Shipowners which he does not in his own conscience believe that he ought to concede to them. But if he does,—if he produces a Bill for which he cannot himself heartily plead,—he will undermine popular confidence in a politician who is at present one of the most popular of Liberal statesmen.
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