SOME LEGISLATIVE REFORMS SUGGESTED BY LECTURE AND ARTICLE
Fifty years ago Newman was cutting and polishing his diamond scheme of
legislative decentralization till its facets flashed to the lighted
intellects of the world a thousand messages--a thousand clear-cut
suggestions for the welfare of his country and the betterment of its
legislation, as he firmly believed. He was never tired of urging it on the
notice of his fellow men, never tired of pleading for it as a solution of
many social difficulties, as a setting of many dislocations of our local
systems. Perhaps there was no more earnest apostle of decentralization
than was Francis Newman. But at the same time, to be fair to him, it
should be said that, first, he threw light upon the old paths, and,
secondly, showed where modern obstructions lay which seemed to him to
hinder true progress. At all costs the fact must be kept well in view, he
believed, that the paths were made for the men, not the men for the paths
--a fact which is not always so well remembered as it should be to-day.
Fifty years ago he published an article in _Fraser's Magazine_ on
"Functions of an Upper House of Parliament." Eight years later he gave a
brilliant lecture [Footnote: In the Athenaeum, Manchester.] on
"Reorganizations of English Institutions." In this last he touched only
briefly upon the former subject because of a notice by the metaphysical
railings of his lecture that he was "to keep to the path," and not speak
trenchantly on the question of the Upper House, because it would not have
found an appreciative audience there!
To begin, however, first upon the article which came out in 1867. He
affirmed that the House of Lords does, by its veto, exercise a very
powerful, though unseen, influence over the administration of the country.
He insisted on the urgent need of its becoming "a real, supreme, judicial
court for maintaining the rights of the princes of India, and an
authoritative expounder of the treaties which have passed between us and
them." It will be seen why this step is called for when we recall the fact
that in 1833 the Home Government signed a treaty in which it was
definitely agreed that the professions in India should be open to the
natives--a promise which has never been kept.
Newman goes on to say, "Until India can have its own Parliament, it needs
to find in England such protection as only our own Upper House can give
it." He places before us the possibility of economizing the time--to-day
so terribly overcrowded--of the House of Commons by letting domestic
legislation, "which is in no immediate relation to executive necessities,"
proceed from the Upper House. That in that House it could be so adapted
and so regulated, that when it came back finally to the House of Commons
no otherwise inevitable delay need occur. Thus "the Commons would have for
their chief business Bills connected with immediate administrative
exigencies, _and private Bills would be cast upon local legislatures_" (a
measure for which he was, as we know, constantly pleading). He reminds us
that the Roman executive was successful and prompt in the methods at which
they aimed, _because_ "the Senate guided and controlled it, _prescribed
the policy and required the execution_."
In his "Reorganization of English Institutions" he insists very strongly
on the great need of such a scheme of decentralization as the formation of
Provincial Chambers--in other words, the dividing the country into local
government centres which should send delegates, chosen delegates of tried
men, "virtually its ambassadors to Parliament, with instructions and a
proper salary, for a three years' term; but reserving the power to recall
any delegate earlier by a two-thirds vote, and to replace him, like an
ambassador, by a successor." Now, here comes in Newman's proposed drastic
change--a change which, in the opinion of those of us who have seen at
close focus the evils of our present system of canvassing for votes, could
not be condemned as a change for the worse.
For each delegate sent up to Parliament "would be elected without
candidacy and without expense ... confusion and intrigue would be
lessened.... There would be no convulsive interruptions of public
business." Many questions very naturally rise in our minds when we fairly
face this plan. Newman feels so confident, besides, that it would "settle
our harassing Irish difficulties."
The "old institutions of the shires are known only to students of ancient
law," says Mr. Toulmin Smith, one of the greatest authorities of his
country's old records, documents, etc. "They have been overridden by
justices of the peace, county lieutenants, and other functionaries....
From this general decay of local institutions centralization has grown
up."
From this "decay of local institutions," Newman points to what he
designates as the "Trades' Union"--the Cabinet (the "Secret Diplomacy"),
which has, he declares, superseded the old Privy Council.
"Since William III became king, parliaments of Scotland and Ireland have
been annihilated, and no subsidiary organs have replaced them.... Our
population is four times as great as William III knew it; yet the people
are more than ever divorced from the soil and cramped into town...." Now,
"Parliament is too busy for domestic local reforms; it has to control the
action of the whole Executive Government, Central and Local.... It has
sole right to direct public taxation.... It has to control the action of
the ministry towards foreign Powers.... It has a similar function towards
colonies ... and the Army and the Navy.... It is responsible for all
India" (population then two hundred and forty millions).... "It is the
only court of appeal to Indian princes who believe themselves wronged" (by
the king's representatives).... "No other authority can repeal bad laws,
or enact new laws for the general public." But were we to _return_ to the
"legislative courts of our shires," Newman protests, which existed before
our present systems of Parliament, all the inevitable delays and
congestions which now occur to prevent the dealing with and passing of
imperatively necessary reforms would be done away with _in toto_.
Long ago Lord Russell said that for any great measure a ministry needs "a
popular gale to carry the ship of State over the bar." "Hence all our
reforms, working against a stiff current, sail over the bar fifty or one
hundred years too late."
This, then, briefly stated, was Francis Newman's plan of dealing with the
accumulation of business, etc., which beset the House of Commons as
matters stand at present.
The whole of Great Britain, he urged, should be divided in provincial
chambers for local legislation. He proposed ten for England, four for
Ireland, two for Scotland, and one for Wales.
These local powers "must be to the central like planets round a sun....
All unforeseen business would fall to the central power, which in all
cases would undertake: public defence, communications with foreign Powers,
principal highways, shores and harbours, Crown lands, national money and
weights, and national taxes.... Our impending Church and State question
will be solved in this island, with least convulsion, if local variety of
sentiment be allowed free play." [Footnote: Perhaps then we should be rid
of the anomaly which allows a Prime Minister, of whatever religious
denomination, to choose Bishops for the Anglican Church.] Newman proceeds
thus to describe further his suggestions with regard to the working of the
provincial courts: "Each electoral district to send one member to the
Provincial Chamber; household franchise, of course, would be the rule, and
I trust women householders would not be arbitrarily excluded." They would
deal directly, and on the spot, with local pauperism in the provincial
courts. That, in itself, would be one great gain. For pauperism cannot
effectively be dealt with except by local legislation. Some system such as
Ruskin's, with powerful local legislation, could not fail to end the
trouble which is at the present moment making a tremendous drain on the
pockets of the law-abiding citizen of this country, in that system of
workhouses, which besides being subversive of the very idea of home-life
amongst our poor, degrades the non-worker, and rankles as a lasting shame
in the hearts of those whom misfortune alone has driven to that last
resource of the unfortunate. Were one able to follow the example set us,
among cities, by Leipsic (where the word pauperism is absolutely non-
existent), we should have effectually turned the corner out of the ill-
kept vagrant road into which Henry VIII first led us, when "pauperism"
began to be a sore in the midst of England's healthy body of citizens.
Now, it is a self-evident fact that "pauperism," which is a living drag on
our social wheel, can _not_ be dealt with other than by rigorous local
government. Cases could then be dealt with personally; the whole area
would not be too gigantic for this; but, of course, it is a moral
impossibility to generalize in dealing with this subject.
After all, this is not, as Francis Newman insists, a new departure in any
way. He points to other countries to show that as a fact, centralization
has been gradually establishing itself in England, though in other times
decentralization was a very potent force in our midst, and a success.
In 1875, Newman quotes the following countries as regards their local
legislatures: "Look ... at Switzerland. Environed by ambitious neighbours
far superior in power, her institutions have well stood the severe trial
of time. She has her Central Diet and Ministry, vigorous enough; but also
in her several cantons she has local legislatures, each with well-trained
soldiers, simply because every man is bound to learn the use of arms, as
Englishmen used to be; therefore they need no standing army.... Italy also
has local legislatures which belonged to independent States--Sicily,
Naples, Piedmont, Tuscany, and so on--besides her National Parliament....
In Hungary notoriously the national spirit has been maintained for three
centuries and a half ... solely by the independent energy of the local
institutions.... The seven united provinces of Holland similarly prove the
vitality of freedom and good order when free local power is combined with
a strong centre.... And on a far greater scale we have... an illustrious
example in the United States--a mighty monarchy and a mighty republic....
The American Union started in that advanced stage. It is a cluster of some
thirty-seven States, each with its own legislature, for all which, and for
the outlying territories, the Federal Parliament also legislates. Contrast
their condition with ours. Only of late has their population outrun ours.
They have thirty-eight legislative systems: we have one only. Surely our
system is a barbarous simplicity. France ... goes beyond us. Nay, our
Indian centralization is worse still. No virtue, no wisdom in rulers can
make up when the defect of organs lays on them enormous duties."
Finally, Newman urges for provincial chambers that they should be on the
"scale of petty kingdoms," and not of mere town populations. "All parts
and ranks of the local community are then forced to take interest in local
concerns. Each province becomes a normal school for Parliament, and a
ladder by which all high talent of poor men may rise."
SHOULD NOT THE CONSENT OF THE NATION BE OBTAINED BEFORE MAKING WAR?
This was a question constantly in Newman's mind. That, and the answer.
Everyone is doubtless aware that he wrote a very great deal upon the
subject, and spoke a great deal also. In the third volume of the
_Miscellanies_ he has four or five articles on this great question. The
first was printed in 1859, the second in 1860, the third 1871, and the
fourth 1877. Then in "Europe of the Near Future" (1871) he treats it at
greater scope, chiefly in regard to the Franco-German War. In
"Deliberations before War" (1859) Newman takes the two points of view from
which the question of war is as a rule regarded--the Moral and the
International. The first considers if a war is a just one or no, and
considers the prosecutor of an unjust war as neither more nor less than a
robber. The International (or second) "looks only to the ostensible marks
which make a war 'lawful'--that is to say, 'regular.'" As Newman very
rightly says, however, there is a third point of view, which he calls the
"National." I shall quote his words regarding this third view. "Inasmuch
as the whole nation is implicated in a war, when once it is undertaken--
inasmuch as we all have the same national disgrace if it is unjust, the
same suffering if it is tedious, the same loss if it is expensive--it is
an obvious principle of justice ... that every side of the nation should
be heard to plead against it by its legitimate representatives."
I cannot forbear saying that at the present moment of writing this last is
impossible, for those who often suffer most from a war--at any rate
longest--are the women, and there is no legitimate representation for this
large body of the community. Thus, even if the men of the nation could
"plead against" a war, the women would have no voice.
Newman urges that there are many among us who firmly believe that a time
is coming when no destructive weapons will be made, and "universal peace
shall reign." He believes himself, he says, that "a time will come when
men will look back in wonder and pity on our present barbarism, a time at
which to begin a war--unless previously justified by the verdict of an
impartial tribunal, bound in honour to overlook what is partially
expedient to their own nation or party--will be esteemed a high and
dreadful crime." These are strong words, but they are not too strong, for,
looked at by any thoughtful man or woman, war is an anomaly. It proves
nothing by reason; it simply acts by brute force, and by sheer superior
strength the victor, at the sword's point, drives defeat down the throat
of the defeated. But the arbitrary destruction of thousands of men on each
side who slay each other at the word of command (often for no reason that
concerns their own welfare, but only on account of some political
quarrel), is, from the point of view of civilization, of morality, of
humanity, without reasonable defence. It throws civilization, land
development, education back incalculably. Indeed, when one regards the
matter _au fond_, one sees that nothing could hinder the _true_
civilization, the _true_ humanity, more than does war. It _is_ barbaric;
there is no other word for it. It _is_ the great flaw that runs throughout
the whole garment of humanity.
Newman reminds us that it is only within very recent years "that the
atrocious system of paying _head money_ to soldiers and sailors for the
numbers they kill, was abolished by us."
John Stuart Mill very rightly said "that our force ought to be as strong
as possible for defence and as weak as might be for offence," only that it
is so very difficult sometimes to tell which is which.
In the _Ethics of War_, Newman argues that "there is nothing more
fundamental to civilized warfare than that no war shall be commenced
without a previous statement of grievances, and demand of redress--a
demand made to the Sovereign himself; and that _only after_ he has refused
redress, and when in consequence war has been solemnly declared, with its
motives and aim, shall hostilities be begun. In dealing with great Powers
we anxiously observe these forms.... But it is our Asiatic wars which have
brought out the formidable fact that the Cabinets claim to discard the
authority of Parliament altogether.... There is no more fundamental
principle of freedom ... than that no nation shall be dragged into a war
by its executive, against its will and judgment.... Nay, if even a
majority of every class in the nation desired war, yet they have no right
to enter into it without first hearing what the minority has to say on the
other side. This is the essential meaning of deliberative institutions."
Mr. Toulmin Smith, whose weighty words bring to bear on the subject the
witness of an England of medieval days, says that in the fourteenth
century it was a positive rule that "_consent_ of the Great Council, and
afterwards _of the Parliament_, _was necessary_ to a war or to a treaty."
In his _Parliamentary Remembrances_ he gives many precedents, both from
the histories of England and Scotland, showing that no peace was made, no
war was made, without Parliament being summoned. Henry V, he says, would
not enter "matters of foreign embroilment" (war with France, for instance)
without the consent of Parliament; and when the French king wished for
peace, Henry replied that peace needed to "be allowed, accepted, and
approved by the three Estates of each kingdom." The same process was gone
through with regard to the French king and his Estates of France. Newman
quotes Rome, whose citizens went through a long formality before making
any war, the King and Senate "consulting the College of Heralds for
erudite instructions as to minute ceremonies. For perhaps four centuries
the discipline of the army was admirable; its decline began from the day
when a general (Gen. Manlius) first took upon himself to make war at his
own judgment, trusting to obtain a bill of indemnity."
Livy tries to force on us the belief that the Romans were never
aggressive; that they only conquered the world in self-defence. And it is
true that here would come in difficulties in the way of carrying out John
Stuart Mill's _obiter dictum_ as regards wars of defence and of offence,
for many plausible reasons have been constantly brought forward for
aggressive wars: to take one only, it is not always easy to say what is
"defence" and what "offence." One may see some other country assuming a
warlike attitude towards ourselves, and it might very possibly be allowed
to come within the bounds of the word "defence" if we were prepared to
strike the initial blow before our enemy--to all intents and purposes,
save for the actual throwing of the glove--were fully prepared as to
armaments, etc. It is well known how earnestly Richard Cobden, the
Manchester Apostle of Free Trade, was one of the most prominent champions
of peace; he who, for championing the cause of the Abolition of corn
duties for the sake of his poorer countrymen, when he and others pushed
forward the "Anti-Corn Law League" (which was passed in 1846), lost all
his own private funds, and his business was ruined, simply because his
time was _all_ given not to his own affairs, but to the service of his
country. Mr. Cobden, as Newman reminds us, "was entirely convinced that
European wars could be stopped by a general agreement to abide by
arbitration." Indeed, he prevailed on the Ministers of his day so far
that, when the Russian War ended in 1856, "Lord Clarendon, in the name of
England, initiated some important clauses, of which one avowed that the
Powers who signed the treaty would never thenceforward undertake war
without first attempting to stay and supersede it by arbitration. England,
France, Russia, Sardinia, and Turkey all signed this treaty, yet in a very
few years the solemn promise proved itself to be mere wind." He goes on
say, "When passions are at work, superior might, not unarmed arbitration,
is needed to control them."
Cobden always declared that no one need fear Russia's strength because of
her climate, her vast wildernesses, her frozen seas, her great
unwieldiness. It is seen, therefore, that the sort of arbitration planned
out by Cobden did not work. It must, according to Newman, be an armed one.
It is clear that it is not possible to agree _in toto_ with the Quaker
method of opposing war, and the most thoughtful Quakers will hardly urge
it perhaps to-day. War, for defence of one's country, is a present
necessity. What, then, are Francis Newman's proposed remedies? For in the
beginning of this chapter I stated that he, very definitely, had his
answer to the great question as regards the nation: its veto or agreement,
whenever war is proposed. First of all, before giving these however, let
us look for a moment at the plan pursued in such case in modern England.
This plan he always set himself against with all the force of personal
conviction: "It is the singular disgrace of modern England to have allowed
the solemn responsibility of war to be tampered with by the arbitrary
judgment of executive officers: ... this same nation permits war to be
made; lives by the twenty thousand or fifty thousand to be sacrificed ...
at the secret advice of a Cabinet, _all of one party, acting collectively
for party objects_, no one outside knowing how each has voted.... The
orders to make or not to make war went out direct from the Board of
Control--that is, really from the Ministry in Downing Street. Two, or even
one resolute man had power to make war without check.... If Earl Grey is
right, and a Cabinet must be a _party_, this is a decisive, irrefragable
reason why a Cabinet must _never_ exercise the function of deciding on
Peace or War. The recent [Footnote: He is writing in 1859.] overthrow of
the East India Company has swept away all the shams which have hidden from
England that the Ministry in Downing Street worked the Indian puppet....
Parliament should claim that public debate shall precede all voluntary
hostilities, small or great ... to protest in the most solemn way that
henceforth no blow in war shall be struck until the voice of Parliament
has permitted and commanded it."
Then, in Newman's article "On the War Power," he goes on to say: "In
regard to the difficulties as regards arbitration, and also as regards the
voice of the people being made a _sine quâ non_, whenever a proposal for
war emanates from the powers that be: When an evil is undeniable, serious,
unjust in principle ... (referring to secret diplomacy), a remedy must
exist. Where there is a will there is a way: nay, many ways."
Then he declares that these (following) measures have commended themselves
to him. The full discussion in Parliament by representatives of the
people; the determination that nothing shall be settled by secret
diplomacy as regards war until the whole matter has been thoroughly
threshed out. In more than a few ways, _Vox populi, vox Dei_ is still
true.
Next he puts before us the advisability of an _armed_ arbitration.
"If we look to a great central European Power as having for one of its
functions to repress wars and enforce arbitration, it is evident that a
large increase of force is necessary beyond all that is at present in
prospect. If wars voluntarily taken up for noble objects must be sustained
out of spare energy, much more does the place of that Power which is to
forbid wars require a great superfluity of energy. To be able to do this
within the limits of a great federation is in itself a mighty
achievement." [Footnote: Europe in the Near Future, F. W. Newman.] And
again: "Apparently the only way in which European wars can be suppressed
is by the successive agglomeration of free men, living under and retaining
their separate institutions, into powers which have no interest in war,
but much interest in peace; until unions reach such a magnitude as to be
able to forbid wars of cupidity, and offer a high tribunal for the redress
of international grievances.... If all parts of a mighty union have their
proportionate weight in questions of war and peace, no partial and vicious
expediency can actuate them in common. Justice alone is the universal good
which can unite their desires and efforts, or make them collectively
willing to undergo sacrifice.... The wider the federation, the more benign
its aspect on the whole world without, especially if the populations
absorbed into it are heterogeneous in character, in pursuit, and in
cultivation.... A federation resting on strict justice, conceding local
freedom, but suppressing local wars and uniting its military force for
national defence, is economic of military expenditure in time of peace in
proportion to the magnitude of the populations federated."