THE INCOMING ADMINISTRATION.
AT length we have got at the head of affairs in this country one of the noblest minds and largest hearts which have belonged to any English prime minister since English Prime Ministers were. We do not expect always to be satisfied with what he does, for Liberals cannot help criticizing, while Con- servatives uniformly fall into a trance of admiration before their chief. But whether we criticize or approve what Mr. Gladstone does, we shall never doubt anything but its expe- diency. We shall never have to fear that his attitude towards Ireland will be adopted in deference to the exigencies of a totter- ing administration, or that a great principle will be suddenly conceded while the House is dining, as a sort of after-dinner joke. The country may trust the incoming Administration,—may at least implicitly trust its chief,—for a Liberalism that will not be disfigured by the slightest taint of that jaunty indifference which Mr. Disraeli has anxiously copied from Lord Palmerston ; —for a Liberalism that has its roots deep in sympathy for the whole people, British and Irish, and in respect for their diver- gencies of genius and gifts ; for a Liberalism that will be grave, conscientious, and compassionate ; for a Liberalism broad from equal esteem for the many sides of the popular cha- racter,—broad not through indifference to moral and religious distinctions, but through respect for them ; for a Liberalism founded on the determination to be just to wishes and qualities we do not share, firmly resolved to make the political equality we have accepted as the basis of our Constitution a reality in other spheres besides the electoral, and, moreover, anxious to crown measures of justice with measures of compassion, to sift to the bottom the administrative aggraiations of pauperism, and so far as possible to attack them at the root. This is what we look for from Mr. Gladstone without any misgivings, —an Administration which its enemies may call puritanic, but which will be puritanic in the first instance in its steady resistance to the bigotry of Puritans,—an administration which its enemies will very possibly call rash, and possibly imperious, but which will be admitted by all to show its rashness and imperiousness,—if rash and imperious it should be,—not on behalf of dominant races or traditional privilege, but in opening a new life before the children of the despised Celts, and of the poor, the wretched, and the ignorant in our own kingdom. This is to be, we trust, a middle-class Government earnestly bent on extirpating the worst and rankest growths of the middle-class prejudice and selfishness of these latter days.
How Mr. Gladstone can best construct his Administration in order to adapt it to the great work in hand, is not a matter on which any newspaper can pretend to express a confident opinion. But it is competent to us to point out in what way it should differ widely from, and in what way it should so far as possible resemble, the Administration which is at an end, and to suggest, at least by way of illustration, the names of the men who naturally occur to us as most competent to effect this purpose. Mr. Gladstone, as the head of the ,Cabinet, will undoubtedly secure to the Administration -almost all that is needed for the first work of the Cabinet,— the abolition of the Irish Protestant Establishment. It is a subject which he has made entirely his own, in which from the first he has shown a mastery of detail, and a familiarity with the proper administrative procedure, wherein there was no match for him amongst his opponents ; and the whole course he has taken has satisfied the country that he is as anxious to be moderate and lenient in his methods as to be clear and uncompromising in his end. If he could have secured Mr. Bright as Irish Secretary, we have always held that this appointment would make an impression on the impressible Irish imagination which would probably have doubled the immediate effect of the measure, and of -any alterations in the law of land tenure which may be adopted, and so gained a march at once on the alienated -affections of the people. But it seems to be not only -doubtful whether Mr. Bright will take office at all, — though, of course, he will decide that for himself, as he has a just right to a seat in the councils of the party whose policy he has done so much, and, on the whole, so wisely to shape,—but especially doubtful if he is equal to the labori- -otts and intricate personalities of the Irish Secretaryship. Mr. Chichester Fortescue, therefore, a man whose perfect fairness -and justice are as conspicuous as Lord Mayo's, and whose Intellectual competence for the post immeasurably exceeds Lord Mayo's, who is not only personally popular in Ireland, but whose clear grasp of Irish politics has never been ques- tioned even by his opponents, will in all probability, return to his old post, with, of course, a seat in the Cabinet. His only deficiency is his inability to give to his Irish policy that full popularity of intention and effect, which is, in this Instance, only second in importance to its wisdom and justice. But the Prime Minister will, no doubt, himself know how to drive home the true motive and intent of his adminis- tration to the hearts of the Irish nation. The other subject to which we may hope that Mr. Gladstone will himself devote a large share of his attention is that of finance. He has done all that has been done within the last twenty years to economize the resources, and enlarge the means of the United Kingdom, and it will be his duty, of course, as First Minister, to see that his administration avoids the errors which he has so justly criticized in his pre- decessor. He has himself recommended to the country, in his address to those who should have been his constituents, the organization of a better system of county finance ; and no one would be so well able to second him in the reform of the rat- ing system as Mr. Goschen, who has made it his special study, and who would certainly lend far more efficient help to his chief in the work of economy than it has been Mr. Ward Hunt's destiny to lend Mr. Disraeli in the more invidious but perhaps easier task of showing cause against economy. It is a question, perhaps, whether Mr. Goschen may not be even more needed at the Board of Trade, which is likely to become one of the most important of our public departments if the proposed organization of the great State monopolies, the Railways and Telegraphs, which the State is likely to take upon itself, and the verification of the accounts of those which it leaves in their present independence,—is to be, as it doubt- less will be, carried through. For work of this kind Mr. Goschen would be invaluable ; and Mr. Lowe, who has been sometimes spoken of for it, in some ways very unfit ; for Mr. Lowe does not care to conceal his wish to resist in almost every direction the extension of the intervention of Govern- ment; and we believe he holds, even with respect to the Board of Trade, that the less the department does the better.' If, however, Mr. Goschen should be reserved for the Board of Trade, it seems likely that Mr. Card- well or Mr. Childers would be asked to fill the Chancellorship of the Exchequer. Mr. Cardwell has always been a disciple of Sir Robert Peel's financial school, of which Mr. Gladstone is the head, and, like most of the Peelites, he makes finance interesting, because he finds it so. Mr. Childers, on the other hand, would bring a lucid, masculine, and well-trained mind to the department. He is one of the most effective, laborious, and popular of the financial Liberals, and in rela- tion to the Admiralty especially, his minute knowledge would be of the greatest service in directing him where to press for greater economy. Mr. Gladstone will, too, scarcely overlook Mr. Ayrton's vast practical knowledge, and that cynical strength which seems especially adapted for rooting out departmental abuses in dealing with this class of official appointments. But whatever be decided in relation to them, it is, at all events, certain that there will be nothing of that almost boyish rawness of mind on matters of finance, that recourse to generalities marking profound ignorance of detail, which unfortunately marked the late Administration.
With regard to one of the most important of all the offices, the Office of Foreign Affairs, it cannot be denied that the Liberals will have great difficulty in rivalling, to say nothing of surpassing, their predecessors. And the only remark we care to make is this,—that we hope Mr. Gladstone's aim may be to secure some of those qualities which have gained so much just credit for Lord Stanley. Those qualities seem to us to be not so much adroitness or complaisance in dealing with foreign Governments, as the lucidity which marked out clearly what might reasonably be attempted, what could not be attempted with the slightest hope of success, and the businesslike candour with which Lord Stanley confessed the hostile criticisms to which his own policy was open. Lord Stanley had the good sense always to lay down clearly what he hoped to do and how he hoped to do it, what he did not hope to do and why. And when he did, as in giving the guarantee for Luxembourg, what he himself evidently all but disapproved, he confessed at once and publicly that he had done an act of very doubtful policy to ward off a great war, which he believed could not otherwise have been warded off, and that the guarantee be had given was not one which he should feel it absolutely binding on England to keep. That struck us, and still strikes us, as a cynical and dangerous confession. But it illustrates the admirable frankness and common-senseness, the undiplomatic aboveboardness of his manner. We wish we could have a Foreign Secretary of good sense as cavalier yet as free from discourtesy of manner, as Lord Stanley. Lord Clarendon would certainly not be such a statesman. He is one of the ambassador or plenipoten- tiary class of Foreign Secretaries,—by no means of the kind which appeals to the businesslike sense of nations. As far as we know the incoming Government, the man who could come most nearly to Lord Stanley's type of statesmanship is the Duke of Argyll, who is believed to desire and to be intended for the Indian Secretaryship, which he is no doubt very com- petent to fill. Mr. Lowe, however, has, we believe, had some experience of the Indian Office as Secretary to the Board of Control, and would bring to it at least the Duke of Argyll's ability, while the latter, who is always lucid, always sensible, • and who would be even more likely to promote a cordial un- derstanding with the United States than Lord Stanley himself, would approach nearer to the type of statesman wanted than either Lord Clarendon or even Lord Kimberley,—perhaps the most probable of the suggestions for the post,—who, like Lord Clarendon, has been somewhat spoiled for the Foreign Office by ambassadorial duties. It is true that the Duke of Argyll has never been associated with the department of Foreign Affairs, but that was just as true of Lord Stanley before he took the office, and it was in part the reason of his success.
For one of the most important of all the offices in the new Ministry,—the Education office,--by far the most eligible man seems Mr. W. E. Forster. HD, in conjunction with Mr. Austin Bruce,—who seems designated in most quarters, and very wisely, for the Home Office,—has brought in the only Bill on primary education which seems at all likely to utilize our present imper- fect but valuable educational system, and yet to supplement it by providing good schools for the poor in all districts where they do not at present exist. He was one of the most diligent and influential of the Schools' Inquiry Commission, and put his name to the valuable report on Middle-Class Schools, against which Mr. Lowe has just directed a drastic attack. He has the full confidence of the manufacturing districts, the hearty respect of the voluntaryists,—an important section in thecountry on this question,—and wields a singular influence in the House of Commons. He could not, we suppose, be expected to accept any office which did not give a seat in the Cabinet, and indeed it would be essential for the spokesman of the Govern- ment on this grave question to have a seat in the Cabinet. But it is not impossible that the Vice-President of the Council of Education might be, by way of exception, offered a seat in the Cabinet ; or that the Government might take up the late Ministry's suggestion of creating a new Ministry of Education, and promising it to the ad interim. Vice-President. Lord Granville, who made so admirable a President of the Council of Education in the last Ministry, would be disqualified for the task of carrying a great measure, only by not belonging to the House of Commons, where all the stress of debate must necessarily fall. That he must lead the House of Lords is a matter of course, and indeed there is no man half so well fitted by sagacity, by intellectual tact, by grace of manner, and by largeness of view for that rather delicate task for Liberal Administrations. Mr. Forster, if he is offered and should accept the post of the organ of the Ministry on Education, would not present a greater contrast to the shamblingintellect which made the subject of Education ridiculous during the Presidency of the Duke of Marlborough, than Lord Granville would present to the clumsy and supercilious querulousness of the Earl of Malmesbury.
That the Marquis of Hartington will resume the Secre- taryship at War so soon as he can secure a seat in the House of Commons, if not before, seems most likely If we .Dbject, as we do very heartily, to any cry for Peers or Peers' sons, as such, under the new Government, simply on the ground that the middle-class likes aristocratic rule, it would be absurd to igeore the fact that, other qualifications being equal, strong social connections will lend a great deal of force to the Administration, and especially in relation to the Army, where the Commander-in-Chief's influence is apt to encroach on the policy of Parliament. No one has ever denied that Lord Hartington made a sensible and respectable Secretary at War, and that he has a sound judgment of his own on War- Office questions. He is, no doubt, a somewhat wooden speaker, but speech is not of the essence of administrative ability ; and he has neither the rashness in making political confidences, nor the extraordinary taste for extravagance which have dis- tinguished Sir John Pakington. If it were possible to persuade Lord Carnarvon to return to the Colonial Office, the alliance would in every way strengthen the Ministry and enrich the deliberative force of the Cabinet. He has shown great ability to understand where frank concession is the truest Conserva- tism, great moral courage of a sort which the country keenly appreciates, character of so high a calibre as to constitute almost a new intellectual gift, and a fascinating candour in the confession of the few administrative errors he fell into during his term of office. Should an alliance with him seem impracticable, we suppose Mr. Cardwell would return to his old post. The Administration would be greatly strengthened with the public, and would gain much in itself, if the Presidency of the Poor Law Board were offered to Mr_ Stansfeld. He has shown that intensity of humanity which would be essential to a strong administration of that difficult post, and his ability as a man of business,—it is indeed to him that the era of reform in Admiralty finance is due,— would be of great service in reorganizing a department which must make itself felt far more powerfully than it now does throughout the County Unions.
With an Administration such as we have suggested, or something like it, for of course we cannot know half the- minutias on which Mr. Gladstone's final judgment must turn as to the colleagues he needs, we should assuredly have a strong government, and we believe anything bat a dan- gerous or revolutionary government such as the country seems to fear. Not one of the men we have named,—unless it be- Mr. Lowe, whose political genius is apt to be startling, though by no means democratic,—but is rather remarkable for political caution. Mr. Bright was, at least as regards Reform, far more cautious than Mr. Disraeli ; and as regards Irish land tenure, he utterly abjured Mr. Mill. His very rashnesses in recommending a finance committee and putting out as his financial ideal, a free breakfast-table, are, at least, not rash- nesses of the kind most feared by the country,—rashnesses in the democratic direction. Mr. Chichester Fortescue is sobriety personified. Mr. Childers is a bold speaker, but his boldness is the boldness of true popular caution, which knows the utter folly of timidity. Mr. Forster has that distinct mark of mode- ration upon him, the power to command a uniformly respect- ful attention from the Tory party, who are the least scrupulous of auditors. The Duke of Argyll is Scotch. Lord Granville,— in reality perhaps one of the most radical in the whole Cabinet, —will scarcely be thought a firebrand by any one. What is tobe feared in such a Cabinet is surely not drastic or revolu tionary policy. On the great Irish question it must be firm, and even stern, if it be needful. On all others it will be more- likely to sin in the direction of reserve than in that of action.
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