TOPICS OF TIDE DAY.
THE TRUE LESSON OF THURSDAY WEEK. THE more we hear of the scene of anarchy on Thursday week,—and we have heard almost as much of it as a solar-microscope could reveal of the anarchy in a drop of dirty water,—the clearer it becomes that all parties con- tributed their quota to the outbreak. Mr. Justin McCarthy thinks that, whatever others have done amiss, the babes and sucklings, as Mr. Gladstone has termed them, whom Mr. McCarthy (nominally) leads, are as pure and innocent as if they were glistening with bap- tismal dew. But unluckily for that view, mutually destructive arguments have been used to support it. The Gladstonian evening paper says that the cries of "Judas ! " by which the Irish Members tried to howl down Mr. Chamberlain were pardonable, because Mr. Chamberlain had first used an offensive Scripture parallel by dragging in the fulsome adulation of Herod as the nearest parallel he could find for the slavish adulation of Mr. Gladstone. Unfortunately, the same political party have argued that the cries of " Judas !" could have had nothing to do with the outbreak, because they had become so habitual with the Irish party that they had ceased to have any provocative effect. And as that is admitted, it is evident that it was not Mr. Chamberlain's sarcasm which was responsible for a kind of outrage which had become chronic in the House of Commons. In reply to the assertion that Mr. Logan's intrusion on to the front Opposition bench was the origin of the physical violence, it is said that Mr. Carson's per- sonalities to Mr. Logan brought on that intrusion. Again, those who assert that the Gladstonian's disorderliness in standing up on the floor of the House contrary to the rules, commenced the disturbance, are told that that breach of order was produced by the refusal of the Con- servatives to obey the signal for a division until Mr. T. P. O'Connor's breach of order in crying out " Judas " had been called to the attention of the Chair. There is now no doubt that a Conservative Member was the first to use physical force in ejecting Mr. Logan from his seat on the front Opposition bench, nor that the regular fight began immediately after that provocation. Whether Colonel Saunderson first received or first dealt out blows, is not as yet quite clear. But this much at least is clear, that all parties in the House were more or less to blame ; that a Con- servative was the first to use physical force ; that the Chair- man was quite helpless ; that Mr. Gladstone made no effort to use his great authority as Leader of the House in support of the Chair ; and that it was not till the Speaker returned that any serious attempt was made to restore order. Mr. T. P. O'Connor's perfunctory apology on the evening of the scene, and the apologies of Mr. Fisher and Mr. Logan last Monday, pick out the most responsible of the offenders ; but no one can doubt that for many weeks the House had been going from bad to worse, and that the scene of Thurs- day week was but the culmination of a tempest for which angry encounters night after night had been preparing the way. Let us faintly hope that this first open disgrace of the House of Commons may, as the first open transgression of a man who has long been accustoming himself to yield to small temptations often does, lead to real repentance. But if even that hope is to have any chance of fulfilment, the Chairman must learn a more stern and peremptory exercise of authority in putting down wilful interruptions, and the Leader of the House must exert himself more strenuously to support the Chair, even at the risk of offending his most valuable allies. Both Mr. Mellor and Mr. Gladstone have been faint-hearted in the discharge of their most absolute duty,—the maintenance of order in the House.
But we freely confess that that duty has been made enor- mously difficult since the Government thought it necessary mercilessly to apply the gag in discussing a constitutional change of the very first order of importance. If they will pass a great revolution through the House of Commons without even a pretence of deliberation on three-fourths of its pro- visions, it is not to be wondered at that passions grow red- hot, and that Conservatives especially find it all but impossible to restrain their indignation within decent bounds. For our own part, we seriously believe that it would be better to give up the pretence of deliberation in a popular Assembly altogether, than to irritate not only the House but the country by such a farce as that which came to an end on Thursday week, when some twenty-seven out of thirty-seven clauses were carried by mere decree of the Government, and several of the other ten were left only half- considered. All shams are poisonous, and no greater sham was ever palmed-off on a Parliament of great historical traditions than that which closed when the greatest Par- liamentary Constitution in the world was literally riddled by shot and shell without a single word of deliberation on many of the most revolutionary changes. That is not constitutional usage. It is not even a decent pretence of constitutional usage. It would be better by far to take direct power to supersede Parliament, except as coun- tersigning by its vote the measures of a dictatorial Ministry, than to make every Conservative mind smart with this utter mockery of debate,—this reiterated suffo- cating of all protest against the most critical changes which a Legislature was ever asked to approve. We shall soon see whether the democracy intends to abolish Par- liamentary discussion in reality if not in name. If it does, we think it would be not only far more honest, but far loss irritating to the public mind to abolish it, not only in reality, but also in name. It would be a curious thing if Mr. Gladstone, the first orator of his day, and the greatest eulogist of Parliamentary discussion as the best means of bringing home political education to the public mind, were to find himself impelled by the very momentum of his own determination to give a Parliament to Ireland, to abolish virtually the Parliament of England, and transform it into an instrument for the endorsement of Ministerial decrees. That is the real drift and meaning of this licentious use of the gag to silence the Parliamentary discussion of vast constitutional changes. It is evident that Mr. Gladstone would really prefer to silence the Parliament he has led so long, than to allow it to baulk him of the privilege of reviving the Irish Parliament; and now it only remains to see whether the constituencies agree with him. If they do, they would do well to cry out at once that the traditions of the House of Com- mons are more or less obsolete, and that what they want of it is not discussion, but decrees in favour of, or in oppo- sition to, the Minister of the day. If that were well under- stood, we should not need to fear such outbreaks as that of Thursday week. It was the growing sense of insolence and the growing sense of injury which the use of the gag had inspired, which led to that scene, and will, we fear, lead to many more scenes of the same kind, if the same show of deliberation is first to be solemnly inaugurated, and then ruthlessly cut short. It would be infinitely better that the democracy should say plainly, ' We are weary of a deliberating House of Commons ; we want a deliberating Ministry and a decreeing House of Commons. Let us cut short all this solemn farce of debate, and just take the decision of the House whether it will adopt the measures which its Ministers recommend, or will not adopt them. Then we shall have true Ministerial respon- sibility, and shall know whom to blame if things go wrong.' That would be a mighty revolution, but it would be better than a mighty revolution in thin disguise, such as that which produced the physical violence of Thursday week. It would be more straightforward, and not nearly so provo- cative. The irony of fate could, perhaps, hardly go further than that a measure for the purpose of opening Irishmen's mouths in Dublin should result in shutting Englishmen's mouths in London. But fate is ironical, and we should not be surprised if it came to this,—that Mr. Gladstone should succeed in silencing the central Parliament, in his deter- mination to revive one nominally subordinate to it. At all events, the true lesson of the great scene of last week is that the constituencies would do well either to repudiate Mr. Gladstone's policy, or to bestow on his Administration avowedly dictatorial power.
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