TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE LIBERAL FUTURE.
THERE is no Liberal party. There are plenty of Liberals, many of them able men, many of them convinced to bitterness, and all of them aware that some inner difference of tendency and ideals separates them from Conservatives, but there is no Liberal party, no great bedy,of voters with leaders whom they trust, and who are ready on the first occasion to carry on his Majesty's Government. The differences among Liberals as to policy are too deep, the distrusts as to men too complete, the resentments as to recent action too rancorous, to allow of coherence either in Parliament or outside, and the first condition of party life is coherence. That is the leading, and from our point of view the unhappy, fact of the situa- tion, and though we know that it cannot last, for English Liberalism, rooted as it is in the very natures of at least half our people, cannot die, we wish we could see any immediate prospect of an alteration. The party, it is true, needs only two things to revive it in full strength—namely, a leader whom it will follow, and an idea which all who love progress can accept—but the two seem as one glances round to be almost unattainable. The leader must come, he cannot be made like a queen bee, and where is he to come from ? Where, that is, are Liberals to find the man with the conditions required ? Clearly they have not got him now, or he would be leading, and. we can hardly wonder at it, for immense as the chance is for any man who could seize it, the conditions are severe. He must, in the first plate, show the qualities of a statesman, that is, the power of comprehending and dealing with great affairs, or the able men of his party will not work with him. He must have eloquence of some kind, moving, persuasive, or inspiriting, or he will not be able to secure rapid recogni- tion. He must either be well-off or indifferent as to his mode of life—either will do, the notion that' Englishmen despise all who are not rich being a fallacy—for he will have for four years at least to sustain a contest absolutely inconsistent with success in any profession or any busi- ness by which income can be earned. He must have a large measure either of ambition or sincere patriotism, for if he has not he will never really devote himself to the seizure of that "closely watched slavery mocked with the name of power," as Lord Beaconsfield.bitterly said, which in this country is the meed of successful leadership. And he must above all be a man so filled with convictions, or self-confidence, or inner pride that he is able to tell his party that if he is to lead they must follow, that he will tolerate no indiscipline and make no compromises, that if any one cannot follow he must go, that, in short., whether he himself has Mr. Gladstone 's qualifications or not, he must occupy Mr. Gladstone's position. This attitude, necessary in the last resort for every leader, is indis- pensable in a leader of British Liberals, that party tending from its very nature, its liberty of thought, and its power of attracting, and indeed making, fanatics, to infinite sub- division. It may be said in reply that the party will not bear such treatment ; but they will, for behind the representatives are the electors, whose one cry is for a Commander-in-Chief, a man who knows his own mind, and, though solicitous for their welfare and their success, is not seeking to know theirs. The democracy does not want to lead, but to be led, and the general direction granted, will accept any competent guide who neither falters nor turns back. "I must decide, you know, in the end," said Abraham Lincoln. It follows, if this account of the conditions is accurate, that Liberalism needs a new man, for not one of all those whom the party now criticises with appreciation or acerbity fulfils them to the full. Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman wobbles ; Lord Rosebery sits in his easy chair; Mr. Asquith shows no disposition to risk his position at the Bar by devoting himself day and night to the most arduous and thankless of all tasks, that of compelling mutinous troops to advance to victory ; and Sir E. Grey, though he seems to unite so many of the conditions, is, we fear, deficient in the high self-confidence which enables a leader to shed followers, as Mr. Gladstone did, like leaves, and without which no man in our days, when every regiment has a thousand opinions, can lead a, Liberal party. Even when the man is visible he must be armed with an idea acceptable to the majority, and where is the idea ? In other words, what do the majority of English voters, consciously or unconsciously, feel to be lacking to them ? "Moderate Imperialism" will hardly do, for though the next Liberal leader will probably be a Moderate Imperialist, as the body of the people now are, Moderate Imperialism is rather a policy to be steadily pursued than an ideal to inflame a party, and moreover it lacks distinctiveness. We are all at heart Moderate Imperialists, the madmen who wish us to conquer China, or annex Africa, or "take up the Roman position" being few, and aware in their hearts that their plans require a conscription for foreign service, and that they will never get it. "Economy," though an excellent ideal, is never popular with Englishmen till the lean years come, and though they are inevitable in the process of the suns, they have not arrived yet., and may not arrive while this Parliament lasts. " Efficiency " would be a much better cry, and if the new leader is an administrator by instinct, will probably be adopted, efficiency being the point on which the present Cabinet is most open to attack, but it has two serious drawbacks. Every nation confounds efficiency with success, and success in most departments is for the future to reveal, and only a class can perceive before the time of testing whether efficiency has been made a foremost object. Administration is now as complicated as everything else, and the people can no more tell whether the Mediterranean Fleet is a "phantom," or a "superb instrument of defence "—it is described both ways —than it can tell whether Mr. Alpha's skill in opera- tions is slightly failing him or not. Just look at the question of Parliamentary procedure. Every man in the country of both parties is indignant at the partial paralysis of the great machine, yet there is not even a scheme for oiling Parliamentary works which has the slightest popular hold. The journalists devoted to Liberalism seem to think that "humanity" is the " fetching " pro- gramme, but they are relying on their own skill in using philanthropic words. It is as difficult to find a cruel man in this country as an educated glutton, and though there are different degrees of "hardness," where all are humane inhumanity is a feeble party cry. The present writer would be inclined to predict that when Imperialism has ceased to be so much discussed the successful Liberal leader would try to embody a growing resentment. at the present excessive inequality in economic conditions, which is no doubt the most obvious weak place in our social organisation. in a series of remedial experiments, one being State insurances, and another intended to limit ex- cessive aggregations of wealth ; but then Imperialism may have a long lease, and the remedial measures might be as fiercely discussed as Protectionism was. The only thing certain is that the people are not sure yet what it is they do want, except a little more success, and that the long list of things desirable which Dr. Spence Watson suggests, and the Federated or other Councils adopt, will not arouse in the people any enthusiasm. You cannot make the householder weep because the non-householder has not a vote. The next Liberal leader must have a programme of his own, and must make his party believe it. They have none to give him.
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