TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE NEW OBSTRUOTIVES.
THE Conservatives have not opened their campaign with tact. During this week, they have openly assumed the attitude of mere obstructives, and have even seemed to take pains to convey to the country the notion that they are play- ing Mr. Parnell's game for him, and with, of course, much greater effect than any with which he could play it for himself. Whether it is wise for the Conservatives to pose in this attitude before the country, to associate themselves openly with the effort to prevent the proper business of the House from being transacted, is questionable enough, though
that is their affair, and not ours. But it is certain that the debates of Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday will produce everywhere the impression that the Conservatives are catching at straws to delay the legitimate work of the day,—the discussion of the Procedure Resolutions, On Tues- day, Lord Randolph Churchill occupied a great part of the sitting with his Constitutional objection, receiving no support except that of the Fourth Party and a dubious sort of semi- encouragement from Sir Stafford Northcote, just sufficient to make it clear that Sir Stafford approved of delay for the sake of delay,—just insufficient to show that he had any Constitu- tional scruple on the score of the particular criticism which Lord Randolph 'had started. By his speech, Sir Stafford Northcote virtually announced to the whole country that he either could not or would not rebuke his own followers when they went in for open obstruction, but that he had quite too much insight into the unmeaning character of Lord Randolph's objections to lend him hearty support. After seeing Lord Randolph's preten- tious Constitutional argument tossed, as it were, in a blanket by Mr. Gladstone, and proved to have no ground at all in reason, while one of the most impressive and weighty of the precedents was absolutely on the other side, Sir Stafford North- cote could hardly nail his colours to such a mast as that. Never- theless, he had not the moral courage to put down his unruly follower as he deserved to be put clown, and so took that Betwixt- and-Between course which is generally described as falling between two stools,—the stool, we suppose, of justice, and the . stool of repentance. He could not bring himself to oppose ; he had not the resolution to condemn ; so he just trimmed,— the very course which the country will view with the most im- patience, knowing, as they do, that every bit of shillyshally at the present moment in the House of Commons is discrediting that House and the whole Representative principle, in the mind of Europe.
The debates of Wednesday and Thursday are even more likely to alarm the country than the debate of Tuesday. There was just enough of Constitutional mystification to give a " colourable " appearance to Lord Randolph Churchill's ostentatious Conservatism, but Sir H. Wolff's barefaced pro- posal to exclude Committees of Ways and Means from the operation of the Closure resolution was one of a kind not to be mistaken. The obstruction from which the House has suffered so much has been far oftener obstruction in Committee than in the House, and for a very good reason, —that in Committee, the same Member may speak as often as he likes ; so that there is no limit to the vexatious ob- struction which any one Member may cause. Sir Stafford Northeote's proposal to divide the whole question of Pro- cedure in Committee, from that of Procedure in the whole House, was essentially, as Mr. Gladstone pointed out, an obstructive motion. What he wanted was to reduplicate every discussion by insisting on a separate debate on identical issues, only because there is a difference in the names of the processes dealt with. No more purely obstructive sugges- tion was ever made by any of the Irish party than this, and yet it was gravely made by the Leader of Opposition, on the second night of the discussion. Sir Stafford Northcote might just as well object that a criticism passed upon the picture presented by one side of a stereoscopic slide, had not been passed upon the picture presented on. the other side, unless the matter had been separately discussed and decided upon. The only real difference between Committee of the whole House and the House itself, is that the former, being less formal, is much more liable to abuse by obstructiv es and bores ; and that, unfortunately, it is hardly possible to give the Chairman of Ways and Means as considerable and dignified a position as the Speaker himself. The result is that the officer who needs these new powers most, is, on the whole, less likely to be implicitly trusted in the use of them than the officer who needs them urgently indeed, but who does not need them quite so much. That is a very excellent reason either for devoting more care to the selection of the Chairman of Ways and Means, and for giving more prestige to his position than it has ever yet had ; or else, what we should greatly prefer, for taking the initiative as regards the closure of debate altogether out of the hands of both Speaker and Chairman, leaving them a veto only, and lodging the responsibility with the Leader of the House. But it is very far, indeed, from a reason for de- priving the Chairman of Ways and Means of the powers which he needs, in the interest of the House of Commons, far more urgently than the Speaker himself needs them. That Sir Stafford Northcote should have formally asked for the redupli- cation of every discussion applicable alike and for the same reasons to the Speaker and Chairman of Committees, is ominous for the Conservative Party. They will not like to go to the country as the confessed apologists of Obstruction. Yet it is difficult to conceive a more frankly obstructive sug- gestion than this.
These are matters of which the country should take care- ful note, and on which it should express its opinion strongly and soon. If this autumn sitting of Parliament be thrown away and no adequate Rules are arrived at, the question of supreme importance before the Constituencies will be a question of life or death for the House of Commons. It is simply intolerable that the discussion of every great reform for which the Constituencies voted in 1880 should be delayed indefinitely, because Irishmen and Conservatives have learned so to manipulate obsolete forms as to render it impossible to work with them to any practical effect. If one day is to be occupied in "making, destroying, and pul- verising" one group of imaginary difficulties, and the next in. similarly annihilating another, the House of Commons will devote all its time to naacadamising a road which it will never be allowed to use. It seems to us the greatest possible mistake for the Conservatives to lend themselves to this sort of factious opposition. They naturally stand up for venerable usage, but usages which have once begun to render an historical Assembly ridiculous, however old, can never he venerable; and the country looks to them to identify them- selves with that which justifies the pride of the House of Commons in its history, not with that which threatens it with destruction. There is nothing historic, nothing grand, nothing that appeals to the imaginations of Englishmen, in an army all whose soldiers have their hands tied behind their backs. Yet that is the exact condition of the political army now assembled at Westminster, and that is the exact condition of things for which the whole Conservative party is now pleading, with obstinacy, with passion, sometimes with rancour. They should not forget that on no issue would a dissolution be more appropriate, than on the question whether the country wishes, or does not wish, to see a stringent remedy applied to this state of things ; and that if such a dissolution occurs, the great Constitutional party would be in the most false position in which it could be placed, supposing it had nothing to say for itself but to recount the flimsy protests of Lord Randolph Churchill, and to excuse the dilatory suggestions of Sir Stafford Northcote.
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