TOPICS OF THE DAY.
LORD SALISBURY AND THE LIBERAL UNIONISTS.
THE most interesting feature in Lord Salisbury's Liverpool speeches was that apologetic anticipation of the coming measures which he delivered at the banquet on Thursday evening. The drift of his remarks was something to this effect. The Conservatives are not in a majority. They can only command a majority by the help of the Liberal Unionists. Hence, Conservatives must not expect measures of precisely the same kind as they might fairly expect if they had an absolute party majority .of their own. A blending of the Conservative true-blue and the Liberal orange must be looked for, and it would be unreasonable for Conservatives to object if the result be a purple of a somewhat reddish cast. Nor ought they to be discouraged if they find their Government holding back from proposing measures in which they are very likely to be defeated. It is of infinite importance to the Conservative cause that the appeal to the country should not be made till there are ample materials for judging the true effect of the Conservative policy in Ireland, and of that it would be impossible to judge till the Acts of last Session have been in force for a longer time than they will have been at any time during the present year. Hence, Conservatives must be both patient and moderate in their expectations, and they must not charge the Govern- ment with cowardice if they refuse to do what may bring a pre- mature defeat and dissolution upon them at a moment when everything depends on tenacity and constancy in their Irish policy. Nor must they charge the Government with undue Liberalism, in case they find some of their leading measures resembling the measures that might be expected from Lord Hartington at least as much as they resemble the measures that might be expected from Lord Salisbury.
It is quite possible that some of the Liberal Unionists may feel disposed to take offence at this apologetic way of speaking of the alliance between the Conservatives and the Liberal Unionists. If so, we think they would be quite in the wrong. We think Lord Salisbury wise in using this rather apologetic tone in Liverpool, and even in using it with some emphasis,—with an air that invites attention to the fact that the Conservative statesmen cannot boast of a completely free hand. Not that we believe that if they had a free hand they could bring in any measure likely to pass the present House of Commons that would be much or at all less Liberal than the measures which have to pass muster with Lord Hartington. The Conservatives have hardly realised as yet how profoundly household suffrage in the counties has altered their attitude. It was Conservative county Members at least as much as Liberal Unionists, who pressed on Mr. W. H. Smith and Mr. Goschen last summer that they must find some way of tempo- rarily lowering Irish rents to meet the lowered price of Irish produce. The solid squirearchical vote of which Tory Governments used to boast, is a thing of the past. Any Tory Government that tried to legislate now in the sense which would really satisfy, for instance, Lord Salisbury's own ideal of a high Conservative policy, would founder in a couple of months. Even those county constituencies which still call themselves Conservative, are Conservative only on points which do not gravely affect the labourer's notion of the best way of improving his position. On points which do come near his heart, the sitting Member knows very well that he cannot afford to be a Tory any longer, but must join hands almost with Mr. Chamberlain. And as that is so, we very gravely doubt whether Lord Salisbury, even if he had a free hand, could carry anything,—say, in relation to Local Government,—at all more really Conservative than he will be able to carry now, with Mr. Goschen to satisfy as a colleague and Lord , Hartington as an ally. But though we doubt whether the Sacrifice to Liberal Unionist principles is at all likely to be as substantial as Lord Salisbury anticipates, there is no reason why the older Conservatives should not smooth over the transition to the popular policy essential for them, by pleading the imperative obligation of the Liberal Unionist alliance ; nay, it is very right and very wise to do so, for nothing else will sweeten effectually to the representatives of the old Tory tradition, the necessity of doing what five years ago it would have been wormwood to them even to contemplate. The truth, no doubt, is that, quite apart from the pressure of household-suffrage constituencies, Lord Hartington and the Liberal Unionists would not support the kind of raeasure,—sayl fcr Local Government,—which an
old Tory would propose, and that there is, therefore, no sort of hypocrisy in pleading the Unionist alliance as an excuse for doing what the Tory Party, if it had a free hand, would at least be very much divided against itself for proposing. Though it may be true, as we think it is, that all the more glaring Tory principles in any Local Government Bill would be struck out by the present House of Commons, and this, even
though a so-called Tory majority were in command of the field, yet glaring Tory principles must undoubtedly make their appearance in any Bill of the kind, if the Tories could com- mand a majority in the House of Commons. "There are very good reasons, then, for saying that, whatever could or could not be carried under household suffrage, the alliance with the Liberal Unionists prevents the Government from making such proposals as they would otherwise make, and compels them to submit to Parliament what may look, to many, a policy such as Lord Hartington might introduce, rather than a policy such as Lord Salisbury would be expected to introduce. It is really a great advantage for the Government that it should be so. The inclusion of unpopular principles in a Bill always greatly pre- judices its chance of passing, and wastes a vast amount of time in the process of elimination. Yet a Tory Government pure and simple could hardly have proposed to Parliament any Bill which would not have attached far more weight to property, as pro- perty, in the organisation of county government than the new county constituencies would have approved or carried. Andy therefore, the Government are really gainers by being able to plead that it is of no use for them to record even their wish to pass a kind of measure which it is pretty certain that a Tory. Parliament of the new kind would never pass, and quite certain. that the Liberal Unionists would not support. Lord Hartingtm is in this case the Mr. Jorkins of the situation, and Mr.. Jorkins's objection will save his political partner from the needless humiliation of proposing what even his own supporters in the constituencies would not approve, though it might be necessary for him, if there were no Mr. Jorkins, in consistency with his previous declarations and his long inheritance of traditions, to make at least a fight for retaining it.
Nor do we in the least reproach Lord Salisbury for the reluctance with which he evidently anticipates the necessity of proposing a Local Government Bill in which property, as property, will not have that weight that he would personally have desired to give it. Of course we believe that reluctance to be perfectly genuine, and in no degree affected, and not only perfectly genuine, but perfectly inevitable. It is true that in giving his assent to the principle of household suffrage in the counties, Lord Salisbury did really abandon the principle that property as well as numbers should determine the character of our legislation ; bat, then, it is one thing to abandon the principle in matters touching chiefly Imperial policy, and quite another to abandon it for matters affecting all the local dispositions of the land, for that will involve practically giving up territorial precedence altogether, except so far as it is voluntarily conceded by the traditional feeling of a neighbour- hood. We feel little doubt that, in fact, the operation of a liberal Local Government measure will involve a greater ultimate revolution in the practice and feelings of the people towards the squires, than any mere political Bill without this corollary in relation to county government, could possibly effect. It is the best omen for the liberal character of the Bill that Lord Salisbury really feels the reluctance he so un- shrinkingly intimates to bring it forward,—for, of course, it must be the Local Government Bill to which he chiefly refers, —and we anticipate, therefore, that we shall receive from the Government a proposal likely to command all moderate Liberals' hearty assent, and to stimulate greatly the disposition of the British people to rely on the guidance of Lord Salisbury's administration.
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