TOPICS OF THE DAY.
MR. PARNELL'S NOTION OF LEADERSHIP.
MR. PARNELL'S general conception of leadership has been illustrated again during the discussions of the last week. It consists in staying away rigidly from the House of Commons, and letting loose Mr. Sexton and his friends on the Government. Indeed, it is not simply during the last few days or months or years that this has constituted his apparent theory of his duties. Those who remember his cross-examination a week or two ago before the House of Commons, will be aware that it applies as much to his management of the relations between the Land League or the National League and the Irish- Americans who have done BO much to supply the sinews of war to those two Leagues, as it. applies now to his dealings with Mr. Gladstone, who told us all, by-the- way, so very short a time ago that he regarded Mr. Parnell as having been ever since 1882 a very valuable "Conser- vative force" in relation to Irish affairs. If so, we think Rehoboam, whose notion of • policy was to let loose his younger advisers on the people of Israel, and by their help to chastise them with scorpions where his father Solomon had chastised them only with whips, must have been a very valuable Conservative force in the affairs of Israel. And perhaps, as he was the means of obtaining Home-rule for Israel, that is precisely what Mr. Gladstone, if he did not feel himself bound by the statements of Scripture, would be ready to assert. Anyhow, Mr. Parnell has taken care to explain, from the very commencement of his function as so-called leader of the popular party in Ireland, that that function consisted for the most part in not restraining forces which he always claimed the power to restrain. When first he went, in 1880, to the United States to start the agitation, he took care to announce that he regarded it as impossible to carry through a revolution such as he contemplated in Ireland without spilling a drop of blood, though the spilling of blood was not part of his policy ; and from that day onwards, it has appeared that, whether in Ireland or in the House of Commons, except on one occasion only, he has not found it politic to de- nounce the outrage-mongers and obstructors whom he has occasionally disavowed, with anything like warmth and significance. We know that at the end of his term in Kilmainham he assured Mr. Gladstone that if an Arrears Bill could be passed, he would set agencies to work by which the outrage-mongers of the most disturbed districts in Ireland would be controlled ; but the introduction of the Coercion Bill which followed the Phcenix Park murders prevented him from making the attempt he pro- mised, and the "Conservative force" which he has since exerted in Ireland and in the House of Commons has consisted in frigid disclaimers of the more violent party, wholly destitute of that energy and warmth by which alone Irishmen are influenced. His policy may not have consisted uniformly in that endeavour "to mislead the House of Commons" which, as he told the Special Commission, had very probably actuated him in what he said of the secret societies in 1881 ; for his disclaimers of what was unlawful, like his recent disclaimers of the " Plan of Campaign," have been so tepid and so attenu- ated by the friendly co-operation which he has extended on all other occasions to the very men who set on foot the agencies which he said that he disapproved, that we do not think that they were well calculated to mislead the House of Commons at all seriously. But his policy has certainly consisted, and consisted chiefly, in letting men whom he professed to lead do a great many things for which he himself was not prepared to assume the respon- sibility, though he was also not prepared to condemn them. Only the other day, he told the Commission that he knew
nothing about the large fund invested in his and Mr.
Biggar's and Mr. Justin McCarthy's names in Paris. He could not tell whether it amounted to £20,000, or to £50,000, or to £150,000. He knew nothing about it. He was not, and never had been, a man of business. And that laisser-faire policy has marked all his conduct both in and out of the House of Commons. His object has ap- parently been to give his most violent men their head except on the very rare occasions on which he thought that an impression might be produced by exhibiting himself as leader. We have recently had a sample of this rare exer- tion of authority in the support given to Mr. Gladstone's vote on the Royal grants by the bulk of the Parnellite Party. But, as we have seen, that homoeopathic dose of loyal adhesion to the Crown has been followed immediately by his careful absence from the House, while Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy and the rest were doing all they could to obstruct the Irish Estimates. Mr. Parnell's conduct of the Irish popular party reminds one very much of the course taken by,the hero of one of the German fairy-stories for recovering his rights at a certain Court. Fortunately- for himself, in the course of his travels he discovered a. pear the effect of eating which was to cause the nose to grow to enormous length, and he subsequently discovered an apple the consumption of which acted as an antidote to the pear, and restored the overgrown feature to its normal proportions. Armed with these potent drugs, he sought the Court where he had been wronged, and reduced his enemy to a state of extreme misery, and then, boasting that he could undo the mischief done, he showed that he could alleviate the evil, but was extremely cautious not to use it effectually till he had recovered the rights he had lost. In fact, it was by a very free use of the poison and a rigidly homoeopathic use of the antidote that he ob- tained his victory. That is precisely the rationale of Mr. Parnell's leadership. He lets loose the mischief-makers during the greater part of the year on the House of Com- mons, and now and then, on such rare occasions as the prospect of an Arrears Bill, or the dispute as to the Royal grants, he exhibits himself as the physician who can attenuate the violent symptoms which his colleagues have produced. And thus he hopes in the end to obtain the grant of Home-rule for Ireland. Whether that is exhibiting himself as a potent "Conservative force" Ireland, as Mr. Gladstone maintains, we must leave to the judgment of men of sense. But we are far from denying that it is a policy which, besides being a very easy one to carry out, since it requires hardly any personal exertion and self-sacrifice, does unquestionably inspire a good deal of alarm. The man who is supposed to have the power to charm the Irish obstructionists off their aggressive tactics, and who hardly ever uses it, holds a very important place in the mind of the public.
But it is well worth while to observe that whatever credit Mr. Parnell may justly take to himself for inspiring a certain dread in the House of Commons, he can at least take none for having proved his power to govern the Irish Parliament for which he clamours. The Home-rulers aSsume that he could do this ; but nothing is less likely. During the whole of the nine years of his pre-eminence among the Irish agitators, he has applied the charm by- which he has attenuated their disorderly tactics so very seldom, and has allowed the malign influence they exert to be so constantly at work, that we defy any reasonable man. to give the smallest proof that if Mr. Parnell had to reduce his party to order, and work an Irish Legislature and Administration by its means, he could do what he would then be expected to do. For Mr. Parnell's re- puted influence has obviously been greatly enhanced by his not using it. He has permitted Mr. Dillon, and Mr. Biggar, and Mr. Sexton, and Mr. Healy, and the Messrs. Redmond, to do as they please for so long a time, that it is more than dubious whether he could control them if it were his cue to control them, as hitherto he has not thought it his cue to control them. His use of the antidote has been so rare and so homoeopathic, that we are at least not entitled to regard it as established that he has any antidote for the disruptive forces which he has had rather the nominal credit, than the real responsibility, for applying. He has been shrewd enough to see that if he allowed the Irish Party to act as a perpetual blister on the House of Commons, he would at least secure attention for any proposal that might seem to promise us freedom from that blister. But to sanction
the application of a perpetual irritant is not to organise a.
party by which a very difficult and delicate administrative and legislative work could be carried on. Mr. Parnell has not given the smallest evidence that he is even capable of organising such a party. A great portion of his actual influence has been due to his indolence. We believe that he was quite honest when he said that he was not and never had been a man of business, and confessed how very little he knew of the business side of the agita- tion. It is one thing to let a crowd of guerilla politicians loose upon an enemy, and quite another to show that these guerilla politicians can be made to work together in harness at a very complicated and difficult task. Mr. Parnell has shown nothing of the kind. And. so far as he has provided us with evidence bearing on the point, he has provided us with evidence that he has not the power requisite for that task. At all events, his claim of absolute ignorance as to matters with which it behoved. him to be minutely acquainted, and his apparent repudiation of the imputation that he does hold. in his own hands the threads which he was supposed to hold, go far to show that he has prospered, so far as he has prospered as Irish leader, more by letting a host of clever and unscrupulous men do very much as they wished, than by any careful and well- considered. use of his own authority as leader. He has led. effectively, so far as it was effective to make his party feared, and yet to hold himself aloof from their most questionable acts. In other words, he has led well where it was good. leadership not to lead at all. Beyond this, he has shown no evidence of large powers of organisa- tion or leadership.
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