1892-1895
OPPOSITION ONCE MORE
A new situation--General Election of 1892--Lord Randolph
unopposed--Friendly dispositions of Conservative leaders--Lord
Randolph rejoins their councils--Speech on the Home Rule Bill--Fatal
symptoms--His last success--Correspondence with FitzGibbon--Riot
in the House of Commons--Increasing infirmities--A desperate
campaign--Kissingen--Meeting with Bismarck--Preparations for a long
journey--The end.....453
APPENDICES
V. TWO ELECTION ADDRESSES, 1886 AND 1892.....491
VI. PARLIAMENTARY PROCEDURE: THE CLOSURE.....500
VII. POLITICAL LETTERS OF LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL: FREEDOM OF CONTRACT;
TEMPERANCE; HOME RULE.....504
VIII. MR. JENNINGS’ ACCOUNT OF HIS QUARREL WITH LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL:
LORD JUSTICE FITZGIBBON’S NOTE THEREUPON.....512
IX. LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL’S MEMORANDUM ON ARMY AND NAVY
ADMINISTRATION.....517
INDEX.....525
ILLUSTRATIONS
TO
THE SECOND VOLUME
1. LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL, 1886 (_Photogravure_)....._Frontispiece_
.....TO FACE PAGE
2. ‘ULSTER WILL FIGHT AND ULSTER WILL BE RIGHT’ (_Photogravure_).....64
3. THE GRAND YOUNG MAN (_Cartoon from ‘Punch’_).....140
4. LETTER FROM QUEEN VICTORIA (_facsimile_).....154
5. ‘YOUTH ON THE PROW AND PLEASURE AT THE HELM!’ (_Cartoon from
‘Punch’_).....168
6. BELLEROPHON JUNIOR (_Cartoon from ‘Punch’_).....184
7. LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL’S BUDGET (_facsimile_).....192
8. LADY RANDOLPH CHURCHILL (_from a drawing by John S. Sargent_).....438
CHAPTER XII
THE TWENTY-SIXTH OF JANUARY
‘When it was said that the noble lord, the member for Paddington,
had not declared a policy, he pointed, and he was justified in
pointing, not to a sentence, nor even to a phrase, but to a date,
and he said, “Our policy is the 26th of January.”’--_Speech of Mr.
Gladstone, Second Reading Government of Ireland Bill, May 10,
1886._
According to Mr. Morley, the month that followed the General Election
was passed by Mr. Gladstone ‘in depth of meditation.’ The questions
which he revolved were vast and grave. Important and even vital factors
in their decision were hid from him. He saw that the Liberal party was
ripe for schism. He faced the united demand of Nationalist Ireland. He
knew that the balance of power was held by Mr. Parnell. But he could not
know whether the Government would meet Parliament or not; whether they
wanted to be dismissed or not; whether they would seek to gain Whig and
Liberal support, or would try to preserve the combination which had
placed them in power; nor what, in the last alternative, was the Irish
policy Ministers would be prepared to offer or parties disposed to
accept. Yet time was short and the country waited tip-toe on his
deliberations.
The suspense was not prolonged. The results of the elections could not
be estimated till after November 30 and were not determined until
another week had passed. But on December 17, after ten days of
whisperings and rumour, a public announcement of his Home Rule scheme,
apparently authentic in character and circumstantial in detail, appeared
simultaneously in Liberal and Conservative papers. Mr. Gladstone was
prompt to repudiate, as a mere ‘speculation’ upon his opinions, this
premature and unfortunate disclosure. But the next day he was writing to
Lord Hartington, who had asked for explanations, a frank and full
account of his ‘opinions and ideas,’ which shows how closely newspaper
assertion corresponded with the workings of his mind. The process by
which his conversion was effected, has been at length laid bare. His
internal loathing of the Coercive measures he had been forced to impose
during the past five years; his suspicion and entire misconception of
the cold-blooded manœvres by which his Government had been
overturned; his hope of repairing, remoulding and consolidating the
great party instrument which he had directed so long; the desire of an
‘old Parliamentary hand’ to win the game; the dream of a sun-lit
Ireland, loyal because it was free, prosperous and privileged because it
was loyal--the crowning glory of an old man’s life--all find their place
in that immense decision. And then the whole mass of resolve,
ponderously advancing, drawing into its movement all that learning and
fancy could supply, gathering in its progress the growing momentum of
enthusiasm, wrenching and razing all barriers from its path, was finally
precipitated like an avalanche upon a startled world! All has been set
forth. What communications Mr. Gladstone made to his colleagues; how he
addressed himself to Lord Granville, to Lord Spencer, to Lord
Hartington, to Mr. Chamberlain; and how he was variously met, have now
become matters of published fact. An authoritative analysis of the
workings of his mind has been published and may be checked or extended
by a score of conversations, letters and chance remarks, all carefully
recorded. Judgment may be formed of the part he played, upon evidence
perhaps more full and accurate than attaches to any similar transaction.
But a veil of mystery and even suspicion still hangs over the inner
councils of Lord Salisbury’s Government. What were the leaders of the
Conservative party thinking about during these anxious weeks? What plans
did they resolve, what difficulties did they face within the secrecy of
the Cabinet? Their final decision was declared on January 26. But what
alternatives were they weighing meanwhile in conclave or consultation?
How far were they prepared to go in satisfaction of Irish demands? What
purpose lay behind Lord Randolph Churchill’s silence at Sheffield or
lurked in Lord Carnarvon’s ‘empty house’? Upon these much-disputed
matters it may now be possible to cast some light.
Lord Randolph’s view of the policy which the Conservative party should
pursue in Irish matters is described with the utmost candour in a
letter which he had written to a friend of mark before the result of
the General Election was known:--
_Private._
2 Connaught Place, W.: October 14, 1885.
I have no objection to Sexton and Healy knowing the deliberate
intention of the Government on the subject of Irish Education; but
it would not do for the letter or the communication to be made
public, for the effect of publicity on Lancashire might be
unfortunate and might cripple the good intentions of Her Majesty’s
Government.
...It is the Bishops entirely to whom I look in the future to turn,
to mitigate or to postpone the Home Rule onslaught. Let us only be
enabled to occupy a year with the Education Question. By that time,
I am certain, Parnell’s party will have become seriously
disintegrated. Personal jealousies, Government influences, Davitt
and Fenian intrigues will all be at work on the devoted band of
eighty: and the Bishops, who in their hearts hate Parnell and don’t
care a scrap for Home Rule, having safely acquired control of Irish
education, will, according to my calculation, complete the rout.
That is my policy, and I know that it is sound and good, and the
only possible Tory policy. It hinges on acquiring the confidence
and friendship of the Bishops; but if you go in for their mortal
foes the Jesuits on the one hand, and their mortal foes the
anti-clerical Nationalists on the other, for the purpose of
humiliating and beating back Archbishop Walsh and his colleagues,
this policy will be shattered.... My own opinion is that if you
approach the Archbishop through proper channels, if you deal in
friendly remonstrances and in attractive assurances, ... the
tremendous force of the Catholic Church will gradually and
insensibly come over to the side of the Tory party.
Lord Randolph furthermore openly avowed and defended his Irish policy
during these months--in its general scope--on March 4, 1886, in the
House of Commons _after_ the election and after the accession to power
of Mr. Gladstone’s Home Rule Government. ‘I am not going to deny,’ he
said, ‘that at one time I had an idea that the Tory party might
co-operate with the Irish party. I have often worked with Irish members.
I hope to be able to do so again. I have never concealed in the last
Parliament that I thought it possible that on many Irish subjects the
Tory party might co-operate with the Irish National party.... It always
appeared to me that the Tory party were well qualified to deal with many
questions of Irish interest in a manner agreeable to the Irish people
and not in the least dangerous to the general welfare of the British
Empire. I particularly allude to the question of education and to the
question of the land. Judging by past history, I imagined that the cry
of Repeal might be raised as strongly as ever and that Irish members
might say again: “Live or die, sink or swim, we go for Repeal.” Still, I
imagined that might merely turn out to be a sentiment for keeping
together a powerful political party; and that, if Repeal were shown to
be absolutely against the will of the Imperial Parliament, the policy of
Repeal would be dropped.’ Whatever may be thought of the merits of such
a policy, there is nothing disingenuous or obscure either in its private
handling or its public declaration.
Lord Randolph’s Irish opinions were not altered by the verdict of the
constituencies. His natural delight at the Tory victories in the
boroughs led him to form a more sanguine estimate of the mood of the
counties than the event sustained. But even his highest anticipations
did not place the number of Conservative members at more than 300; and
his mind turned at once towards a Whig coalition:--
_Lord Randolph Churchill to Lord Salisbury._
2 Connaught Place, W.: November 29, 1885.
Dear Lord Salisbury,-- ...If we have any luck this week we ought to
number 300 in the House.
I saw Sir Erskine May yesterday--very grumpy. He said the first
trial of strength would be a vote of want of confidence. I said
that did not follow; that the first trial of strength in a new
Parliament often took place on the election of a Speaker. He said:
‘What, oppose Mr. Peel!’ I intimated that, though we were very fond
of Peel, he had no prescriptive possession of the Chair, and that
his election would require something in the nature of a _quid pro
quo_. I also gave him to understand that we have quarrelled with
the Irish, and, having put these and various other false ideas into
his head, left him in a state of exasperated perplexity.
I hope you may be a little in town next week, for the future seems
to require the most careful consideration before any policy is
submitted to the collective luminosity of the Cabinet. I think you
ought to negotiate with the other side, giving Hartington India,
Goschen Home Office and Rosebery Scotch Office. You will never get
Whig support as long as I am in the Government, and Whig support
you must have. I should like to contribute effectively to your
getting it, for my curiosity as to the internal and mysterious
mechanism of Government is completely satiated. Very indifferent
health makes me look forward irresistibly to idleness regained. If
you wanted another bait for the Whigs, ----’s elevation to the
Lords might supply it, for I hear on the very best authority that
chaos and the ---- Office are at present indistinguishable. I
believe that by some process of this kind you could institute a
Government which would keep the Parnellites and Radicals at bay for
years; and, after all, that is what must be arrived at.
Yours most sincerely,
RANDOLPH S. CHURCHILL.
Lord Salisbury’s answer reads strangely in the light of after-events:--
November 30, 1885.
My dear Randolph,--I am afraid your patriotic offer of giving place
to Goschen for the sake of making a coalition will be of little
avail. They hate me as much as they hate you--and if retirements
are required for the sake of repose and Whig combinations I shall
claim to retire with you in both respects.
The time for a coalition has not come yet--nor will, so long as the
G.O.M. is to the fore. But I don’t expect we shall be long in
office this time. I must try and see you some time this week about
our future measures. Are you staying in town? I have not yet had
time to read your Burma papers, but will send them you back, with
any comments that occur to me, when I have.
Yours very truly,
SALISBURY.
Lord Randolph, however, held tenaciously to the idea of a coalition. The
fact that the accession of Lord Hartington to the leadership of the
House would block his own path effectively and that the acceptance of
office by important Whig Ministers must diminish his personal influence,
does not seem to have affected this self-seeking and unscrupulous man;
and about December 4 or 5 he sent the Prime Minister a formal and
elaborate account of his views, which is for many reasons worthy of
attention:--
MEMORANDUM.[46]
Assume that the supporters of the Government will number 300.
Under ordinary circumstances Government would probably resign at
once, there being a clear majority of seventy against them. The 370
opponents of the Government are so singularly disunited that there
is no reason to suppose the Government need be placed in a
minority, and there is every reason to suppose that no other
Government could command so large a following as the present
Government.
CONSTITUTION OF THE 370 OPPONENTS.
It is almost certain that there are in this number some twenty-five
members who without doing any violence to their political
principles would habitually support the Government. It may be
reckoned that 200 will follow the lead of Lord Hartington as long
as he remains leader of the Liberal Opposition. The party more
immediately under the control of Messrs. Chamberlain, Dilke, Morley
and Labouchere may be estimated at sixty-five votes. There remain
eighty Nationalists under the leadership of Mr. Parnell.
It is certain that no Vote of Censure or of Want of Confidence will
be moved at the assembling of Parliament because--
1. Neither Mr. Gladstone, nor Lord Hartington, nor Mr. Chamberlain
could form a Government.
2. Without the support of the eighty Nationalists a Vote, of
Censure or otherwise, would be heavily defeated.
3. The support of the Nationalists would demand a heavier price
than any large portion of the Liberal party would be prepared to
pay.
On what occasion can a trial of party strength arise?
1. On the election of Speaker.
2. On the question of Parliamentary Oath.
SPEAKERSHIP.
The Irish are hostile to Mr. Peel.
The Whigs equally strong in his favour. The Government can displace
Mr. Peel with the help of the Irish. The Whigs will be bitterly
alienated. On the other hand, the Government can support Mr. Peel
and carry his election. The Irish will find their revenge in voting
for Mr. Bradlaugh. The triumph of Mr. Bradlaugh would be a shaking
blow to the Tory Government and party. The alienation of the Whigs
by the defeat of Mr. Peel would certainly in the course of a few
weeks or months destroy the Government.
Which course to choose?
Seeing that the Irish support can never be other than momentary,
seeing that by no possibility can [that] support be clothed with
any elements of stability, seeing that the alienation of the Whigs
from the Government must lead to great evils, seeing that Whig
support, if attained, is honourable, stable, and natural, in my own
mind I pronounce for the re-election of Mr. Peel and for running
the risk of the triumph for Mr. Bradlaugh.
We have proceeded thus far.
The Whigs will not be displeased by the election of Mr. Peel. The
Whigs will not be indignant at the seating of Mr. Bradlaugh. Is it
possible to convert this negative frame of mind of non-hostility
into one of positive co-operation?
Three methods suggest themselves.
1. The offer of places in the Government.
2. The production of a large, genuine and liberal programme.
3. After such a programme has been produced and proceeded with
satisfactorily, the renewal of the offer of places in the
Government.
I think that all these three methods should be honestly tried in
their order. The first must be done with liberality. The leading
members of the Whig party who should be offered places in the
Government are Lord Hartington (with the lead of the House of
Commons), Mr. Goschen, Lord Rosebery and Sir Henry James.
I do not imagine that these offers would be now accepted.
Nevertheless the fact that they have been honestly made may before
long be a powerful weapon in the hands of Lord Salisbury, either as
influencing his own party or the public. The making of these offers
in a generous spirit cannot possibly do harm.
II. THE PROGRAMME.
On foreign questions there does not at present appear to be any
difference of opinion, nor on colonial questions. Attention may be
concentrated on domestic questions. I suggest that the programme
should include:--
1. Parliamentary Procedure }
2. Departmental Reform } Executive.
3. Indian Inquiries. (H. of C. Committee) }
4. Education Inquiries. (Royal Commission) }
5. Local Government }
6. Land Laws } Legislative.
7. University (Ireland) Education }
8. Codification of Criminal Law }
PARLIAMENTARY PROCEDURE.
The following measures might be informally submitted to the leaders
of parties in the House of Commons:--
_A. The Resort to Autumn Sessions._--The session at present is too
long and too short--too long for a consecutive session; too short
for the decent and efficient transaction of executive, financial
and legislative business.
If this is granted, the following reform suggests itself:--
That Parliament should meet not later than the first week in
February, and, with the usual Easter and Whitsuntide holidays,
should continue in session not later than the first week in
August. That an adjournment should then take place to a period not
later than the second week in October, and that the annual session
should formally be brought to an end by prorogation not later than
the first week in December.
_B. The Alteration of Hours of Business._--That the House should
meet four days in the week at 1 P.M., adjourn from 7 P.M., and rise
at midnight.
_C. Clôture._--That, in addition to existing regulations, it shall
be within the right of the Minister to demand a division on the
subject under discussion a quarter of an hour before the
adjournment of or rising of the House.
_D. Questions._--That the Speaker should appoint a Committee of
three, not being Privy Councillors, who shall decide what questions
can be answered in the House, and which in the votes; and that no
question shall be put without notice, other than explanatory
questions, except by the leave of the House on the demand of 100
members.
_E. Adjournment, Motion for._--That the existing rule be altered,
substituting the number 100 members for the present number 40.
_F._ That Grand Committees deal with the report stage of any Bill
referred, as well as with Committee stage; and that all Bills be
referred to Grand Committees after second reading.
_G._ That the bulk of private business relating to local
development and local enterprise be transferred to local boards
whose proceedings must be sanctioned by provisional orders.
_Departmental Reform._--That Committees of the House of Commons be
appointed to examine and report upon the constitution, staff, work
performed, comparative cost of all public departments, with a view
to the effecting of economies and the rearrangement of salaries,
promotions and retirements.
_Indian Inquiry._--This has been agreed upon.
_Elementary Education Inquiry._--This requires no further notice.
LEGISLATIVE.
_Local Government._--Two essentials: (1) purely popular election by
ratepayers; (2) large and liberal measure of executive and local
legislative powers. Workhouse management need not be touched, nor
education arrangements. But all Quarter Sessions business, all
sanitary matters, registration of votes, survey of land and
registration of titles should be among the duties of the local
boards. Also powers might be given, as in Ireland, to local boards
to advance money on security of rates for purchasers of small
holdings and allotments.
LAND LAWS, REFORM OF.
1. Abolition of primogeniture in cases of intestacy.
2. Compulsory registration of title.
3. Enfranchisement of future leaseholds.
4. Enfranchisement of copyholders.
5. Enfranchisement of lands held in mortmain.
UNIVERSITY (IRELAND) EDUCATION.
This should take the form of--
1. The transference of Cork College to a Catholic board of
management.
2. The endowment of the Catholic University College in Dublin.
3. The establishment of a Catholic College in Armagh.
4. The transference of the Belfast College to a Presbyterian board
of management.
CODIFICATION OF AND REFORM OF CRIMINAL LAW.
This can never be attained if it is left to the action of
Parliament entirely. The procedure suggested is:--
1. The proposing and carrying of certain general resolutions
through both Houses.
2. The appointment by statute of jurisconsults with full power
under aforesaid resolutions to codify; and
3. That the code as drawn shall, after lying on the table of either
House for six months, become the criminal code of the United
Kingdom.
This, as above, is my second method for attracting Parliamentary
support from the ranks of the nominal Opposition. Should this
programme, or one more or less closely analogous to it, be
introduced, generously received by the bulk of the Whigs and
honestly supported, a further offer of places in the Government
might with advantage be made.
‘The success of foregoing,’ concluded Lord Randolph, ‘turns upon
Ireland. I assume two facts:
‘1. That Coercion is impossible now.
‘2. That anything in the nature of an Irish Parliament is
impossible always.
‘_Similarity_ of treatment between England and Ireland in respect
of Local Government:
‘_Liberality_ of grants from Treasury towards Irish objects:
‘_Concession_ to the Roman Catholic hierarchy on education
questions:
‘These are the main lines of a policy towards Ireland which will
secure a great amount of Parliamentary and public concurrence and
will, if vigorously and boldly followed, bring about inevitably the
disintegration of Mr. Parnell’s party. The great size of this party
is its chief danger. Its members are open to various
influences--jealousy of each other and of Parnell; want of funds;
Ministerial influences, priestly influences; and last, but not
least, the capricious, unstable and to some extent treacherous
character of the Irish nature. If that party is boldly dealt with
at the outset it will soon dissolve. I do not consider that the cry
for an Irish Parliament now need be more dangerous than was the cry
for Repeal in the days of O’Connell. As that latter danger
altogether disappeared, so may this present danger if the
Government is strong in Parliament, undivided in council and
unwavering in action.
‘I wish to express my firm conviction and belief that if the
general spirit of this Memorandum could be acted up to, the
Queen’s Government might well be carried on with dignity and
efficiency, and the Parliament will have every reasonable chance of
running a normal course and of being the means of benefit to the
people.’
Lord Salisbury did not answer until the 9th:--
_Private._
Foreign Office: December 9, 1885.
My dear Randolph,--Lord Melbourne used to say that if you only
would let a letter alone, it would answer itself. Your very
interesting memorandum is not quite in that condition: but some
important parts of it have been answered by events. After
Hartington’s speech of Saturday, there can be no longer any
question of offering office _just yet_ to the Moderate Liberals;
and, therefore, no question of your or my resigning to facilitate
that operation. He evidently said what he did to prevent his
friends from suspecting him of any intention, under any
circumstances, to join us. His resolves are not eternal, but he has
effectually debarred himself from any such course until some little
time has passed or something new has happened. Then, again, I don’t
think the Irish will expect us to upset the Speaker; but, if they
did, I quite agree with you in thinking that it would be poor
policy to do so.
But we shall have to make a Queen’s Speech--at least, I can hardly
imagine the Cabinet resolving on an immediate resignation. It would
be deliberately excusing the other side from the necessity of
showing their hand.
In making this Queen’s Speech I entirely agree that our leaning
must be to the Moderate Liberals, and that we can have nothing to
do with any advances towards the Home Rulers. The latter course
would be contrary to our convictions and our pledges, and would be
quite fatal to the cohesion of our party.
But in leaning towards the Moderate Liberals we should take note
of the fact that the moment for bargaining with them has not yet
come. Whenever it does come, two results will follow: (1) Our own
people will recognise the political necessity of admitting a
somewhat stronger ingredient of Liberal policy into our measures,
and (2) the Moderate Liberals will require some such concession as
a condition of their joining us and as a proof to their own friends
that they have not been guilty of any _apostasy_ in so doing. That
being so, the extra tinge of Liberalism in our policy will be part
of the bargain when it comes, and must not be given away before
that time comes. If we are too free with our cash now, we shall
have no money to go to market with when the market is open.
In this view I should offer one or two suggestions in revisal of
your programme. The abolition of primogeniture is in itself of no
importance except on strategic grounds--it is not worth the trouble
of resistance. But it is a bit of a flag. The concession would be
distasteful to a certain number of our people now, and it might be
acceptable as a wedding-present to the Moderate Liberals whenever
the Conservative party leads them to the altar. I would not proffer
it, therefore, now; though, if carried against us, I should make no
serious fight over it.
The proposition of Leasehold Enfranchisement in the future requires
more thrashing out. I doubt whether it would effect your object,
which is that more occupiers should be owners of the houses they
inhabit. I quite agree in the object. I should be more disposed to
follow the Irish precedent and give local authorities the power of
advancing (on the security of the tenement) some large fraction of
its value at low interest, limiting the advance to cases where the
occupier was owner of the whole lease--and, of course, confining it
to voluntary purchase. This for existing leaseholds. For future
buildings the most effective plan would be to allow exemption from
the rates and house tax for five years in all cases where the
occupier was also the owner. (3) With respect to Local Government,
I admit that a general ratepaying franchise may be difficult to
avoid; and, on the whole, I think the Local Government Bill should
be mentioned in the Queen’s Speech. But I should mention in the
same sentence, and as part of the same subject, a London Local
Government Bill, which might be drawn in a very popular manner. The
multiplication of municipalities--say eight or nine--would please
the local leaders, who hope to figure in them and become Mayors. I
should introduce this before the big Local Government Bill. If we
are turned out, we shall be able to fight the question better for
not having shown our hand.
I should be disposed--subject to counsel--to introduce a Church
Reform Bill giving an easy method for getting rid of criminous
clergy, and perhaps also of incompetent clergy; but that craves
wary walking. Then a Bill for making the sale of all corporate land
easy; a Bill to enable marriages to take place in Dissenting
chapels without the presence of the Registrar; and, perhaps, a Bill
for dealing with the Scotch marriage law, but that is doubtful.
With respect to the other articles of your programme--such as
Parliamentary Procedure, Criminal Code, and Roman Catholic
Education--I need say nothing, because I generally agree with you.
I have inflicted on you an abominably long letter, but I thought it
better to put my thoughts before you....
Lord Randolph replied:--
India Office: December 9, 1885.
Dear Lord Salisbury,--It will be a great pleasure to me to wait
upon you to-morrow afternoon at three o’clock at the Foreign
Office.
It is very kind of you writing to me at such length; but as this
will require no answer, other than what you may give in
conversation to-morrow, I venture a few additional observations.
As to offer of places to Whigs.
I can imagine a crisis supervening, to deal with which might
require heroic measures and a great appeal to your followers in
both Houses of Parliament for confidence and support. Under such
circumstances the fact of the offer having been made and sulkily or
arrogantly refused would be of great moral value to you. A proper
recognition of two leading features of the situation seems to me
almost to compel you to make an attempt _now_ at such a
negotiation, even though you may be certain that it will fail:--
1. The fact that your Government is in a minority in the House of
Commons.
2. The division in the Opposition, so glaringly and so recently
shown by Mr. Chamberlain’s speech at Leicester and Lord
Hartington’s in Derbyshire.
I submit with great deference that, your task being to carry on the
Queen’s Government, it is incumbent upon you to take advantage of
every apparent circumstance which may be made to contribute to the
efficiency and solidity of the Government; nor ought you, under
such grave conditions as now exist, to shrink unduly from any
reasonable sacrifice of friends or colleagues which might enable
you honourably to attain the end in view. Having put your hand to
the plough under the uninviting conditions of June last, it is
hardly possible to look back, or to act as if the responsibility
for Government was not upon you.
It is very pleasant to me to learn that my suggestions with regard
to Parliamentary Procedure, R.C. University Ireland, Education, and
criminal law reform and codification meet with your general
concurrence; and that being so, I allow myself to risk a few
arguments which seem to me to militate somewhat against the views
expressed in your letter on the question of the programme
generally, and in particular the questions of Local Government and
Land Law reform.
If I apprehended your meaning rightly, you would make your
programme rather rigidly orthodox Tory, with a view of expanding it
into Whig heresy when the time for a fusion should seem to have
arrived. Now I hold very strongly that in that case the moment for
a fusion will never arrive. If the Newport programme is not at once
presented to Parliament in a large and generous measure, the Whigs
will be justified in their contention that it did not signify real
progressive legislation--that they were right and discriminating
when they mocked at it. That has been Lord Hartington’s cry all
along, which he reiterated with emphasis last Saturday. The
difference between the Newport programme and the concrete portions
of the Midlothian address was not easy to be distinguished, and I
doubt its existence. That being so, if you produce the former,
without timidity, skimping, paring, or scraping, and if the Whigs
turn you out, obviously their motive is office, and office only.
The country will not be deceived or edified by such purely party
manœuvres. And as by your administrative record, so with your
legislative programme, you will have laid up for yourself treasure
in the constituencies, you will have cast bread upon the waters
which you will find after many days.
This is indubitably the lesson of 1835.
I do urge as strongly as I may that you should decide in your mind
how far you can go in legislation--not under Whig pressure, not
with a view solely of gaining Whigs, but solely with a view of what
appears to be best for the country without infringement of any
great Tory principle; and that, having so decided, you should offer
the result to Parliament without delay, without stint, without
qualification, and with all confidence. It is, I am convinced, by
‘showing your hand,’ by showing how many good trumps you have in
it, that you will gain support--if not immediate, at any rate in
the near future. It is by hiding your hand--by giving cause for the
belief, or ground for the accusation, that it is a poor hand and
that you have no trumps, that you will lose support now and make it
most difficult to gain later. The boroughs have gone for you so
strongly because they believe in the fulness and genuineness of the
Newport programme. Our task should be to keep the boroughs, as
well as to win the counties; this can only be done by an active
progressive--I risk the word, a democratic--policy, a casting-off
and a burning of those old, worn-out aristocratic and class
garments from which the Derby-Dizzy lot, with their following of
county families, could never, or never cared to, extricate
themselves.
This being so, in my mind, I find the suggested postponement of
rural Local Government a course open to the deepest suspicion; the
preference given to London government an error in tactics of the
largest kind. No one in the country, or in London either, cares a
damn about a London municipality, nor would many municipalities
attract them. But county government, involving as it does a
redistribution and relief of burdens, to which every man of our
party is deeply pledged, is without doubt anxiously expected by the
constituencies, and will not brook delay. So I would say about land
law reform. I am very sure that the feeling of the boroughs is in
favour of extensive changes in our land system, on the ground that
the labour in the towns is depreciated by agricultural migration,
and that this latter is the effect of an antiquated land system.
This, rightly or wrongly, is the notion in the manufacturing minds,
and failure on our part to come up to their legitimate and
reasonable expectations would produce incalculable disappointment
and mortification.
If you decide that the large constructive measures which the times
seem to demand are beyond the capacity of the Tory party, or the
scope of their political principles, though I should regret the
decision I would accept it without demur. But in that case I would
press upon you the advisability of prompt resignation, on the
ground that the country had for the time decided that the function
of the Tory party would be more usefully displayed in Opposition,
in efforts purely critical, in attempts to amend Liberal
legislation and moderate Liberal zeal. If you show your hand at
all, show it fully and show a good one; but if you have no hand
good enough for the game or the stakes, place the cards face
downwards on the table, decline to play, and leave the Downing
Street table. I cannot think there is any safe _via media_ between
these two courses.
Lastly, I will not conceal my repugnance to dealing with Church
reform. Surely the Russell-Gurney-Disraeli Church legislation is a
warning. The time of Parliament will be wasted in furious
ecclesiastical differences, and votes will be lost on every side by
the party responsible for the effort. The Public Worship Regulation
Act was one of my first House of Commons experiences, and I cannot
forget it. The Nonconformists, so powerful, will offer every
opposition; and nothing will be gained except loss of time, of
temper, and of strength. If those ornamental but, on the whole,
rather useless and expensive Lords Spiritual care to justify their
privileges by attempts at legislation, smile on them, beam on them,
give them every encouragement for bringing the Lords Temporal into
a devout and heavenly frame of mind. Some good may possibly issue
from such a source, if such should be the will of Providence. But
Church reform which is the product of a Cabinet checked and
controlled by party Whips and guided by House of Commons lobbies is
surely in its nature a monstrosity, possibly a profanity, certainly
a farce.
Please pardon me this long letter. I feel that my constant and
lengthy epistolary communications to you may lead you to look
forward to resignation of office as an immense relief, but I find
my excuse in your kindness hitherto, and am
Yours most sincerely,
RANDOLPH S. CHURCHILL.
Ireland swiftly overclouded all other projects and puzzles which
Ministers might consider. It was late in July that Lord Carnarvon had
met Parnell. Four anxious months had passed and the Viceroy had now
arrived at definite conclusions. He saw with alarm that the National
League was strengthening and expanding every day. The fall in prices had
affected the payment of rents. Serious social and economic discontents
stimulated the increasing political excitement. Boycottings were
flagrant, pitiless and widespread. Alike by his convictions and his
public pledges he felt himself debarred from asking for special
legislation. Another policy forced itself upon him with crushing weight.
He declared that unless the Cabinet could move in the direction of Home
Rule he could not continue their servant. It became a question for the
Cabinet whether the retirement of Lord Carnarvon on the grounds stated
would be so heavy a blow to the Government and so injurious to their
main political position that, if he persisted, it would be better for
the Government to resign in a body, ostensibly as a consequence of the
election. Lord Salisbury desired his principal colleagues to express
their opinion upon Lord Carnarvon’s views and intentions.
_Lord Randolph Churchill to Lord Salisbury._
December 10, 1885.
Dear Lord S.,--I return you Lord Carnarvon’s memorandum, which was
carefully considered by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Smith,
and myself.
We came to the conclusion that if the Lord-Lieutenant insists on
the choice being made between the adoption of his policy and
resignation, the latter course becomes compulsory on us. If we go
out merely on the ground of our Parliamentary position, we remain
for the purposes of opposition to Home Rule, as a party, _totus
teres atque rotundus_; but if that blessed man sets the signal for
concession flying, our party will go to pieces, as it did on the
Irish Land Act. The only hope for the country is to keep this
present Tory party well together; and unfortunately Lord Carnarvon
has it once more in his power, as on two former occasions, to
disintegrate, demoralise, and shatter.
However, I wish to say for myself--and I feel pretty certain it
will be the view of Sir M. Hicks-Beach and Mr. Smith--that,
whatever course you may finally decide upon, I will gladly see it
through to the best of my ability, no matter what may be the
result.
Yours most sincerely,
R. S. C.
But Lord Salisbury preferred to face the consequences of the Carnarvon
resignation, whatever they might be. ‘The fact,’ he wrote (December 11),
‘that Gladstone is mad to take office, will force him into some line of
conduct which will be discreditable to him, and disastrous, if we do not
prematurely gratify his hunger. The Carnarvon incident is vexatious. I
hope he will be induced to stay with us till Parliament meets. But even
if he does not, I doubt if his retirement will produce any very serious
confusion. He will nominally retire on the ground of health or some
private reason. The truth may ooze out. But we shall not mend matters by
all retiring with him. The true reason will equally ooze out; and we
shall have proclaimed our own impotence very loudly.’
The Irish situation oppressed all minds and from every quarter doubt and
foreboding streamed in upon the Conservative leaders. Was it possible in
face of Mr. Parnell and his United Ireland, in face of Mr. Gladstone
and his ponderous meditations, in face of Lord Carnarvon and his open
sympathies, to remain utterly unyielding? Would it not be well to make
terms while time remained? Could not a joint conference of parties
arrive at some compromise in regard to Irish government? And if not, how
could the land be ruled? Everywhere during this month of December the
sands were shifting underneath men’s feet. Few were firm. Lord Randolph
Churchill was a rock.
_Lord Randolph Churchill to Lord Chief Justice
Morris._
_Very Confidential._
December 7, 1885.
My dear Chief Justice,--I am very grateful to you for your letter,
which I have sent on to Lord Salisbury for his consideration.
In a memorandum on the situation which I submitted to the Prime
Minister a week ago, I laid down as an axiom that with regard to
any policy towards Ireland in the nature of, or containing an Irish
Parliament, the attitude of the Tory Party could only be an
absolutely ‘non possumus’ one. You suggest a Committee of leading
men on both sides to inquire, and you base the suggestion on the
proceedings which took place with regard to the Reform Bill.
Two objections seem to me to arise.
1. With regard to Irish Government the Ministers cannot yet with
honour or even decency shift the responsibility from off their
shoulders on to Parliament. In so great a matter surely Ministers
must take the lead and state their policy or abdicate.
2. The precedent of the proceedings on the Reform Bill does not
yet, it seems to me, apply at all closely. Those proceedings were
taken to extricate Government, Opposition, and Parliament generally
from a deadlock and to avert a great constitutional crisis. In
this matter of Irish Government neither deadlock nor crisis has yet
arisen. In the event of their arising, the co-operation of parties
may well be resorted to, but this machinery would, I think, be
spoilt by premature recourse to it.
This may happen: Mr. Gladstone may persuade his colleagues and
party to a policy which Parnell might think too good to refuse
absolutely. The policy might be embodied in an amendment to the
Address and carried against the Government by a large majority.
What should be the course of Government under such circumstances?
To resign or to dissolve?
I should be strongly in favour of the latter if Royal sanction
could be obtained. If the Government resign, Gladstone succeeds in
forming an Administration and carrying a Bill through the Commons
by great majorities. Then will crop up again the eternal question
of resistance of the House of Lords to the will of the people, and
an appeal to the people on that ground will cause the essential
question of Repeal or no Repeal to be obscured or perhaps
altogether lost sight of. By dissolution, a clear issue is
presented to English and Scotch constituencies, and the House of
Lords is kept out of the battle.
Then there is no reason, it is true, why the agricultural
labourers, revolving many things in their anxious minds, should not
gladly agree to Repeal in order to obtain three acres and a cow,
and therefore no great change in the state of parties might result,
and the Tories would be definitely and decisively beaten on a
distinct issue. Well, what then? We should have fought our battle
as well as it could be fought, and the Repeal of the Union would be
the work of the people, the responsibility resting absolutely upon
them and not upon us.
This is my own way of looking at the situation, and why I adhere to
the policy, which you think will be ‘brushed aside,’ of changes in
County Government, &c. That policy may fail, but at any rate it is
a Conservative policy; the surrender to Home Rule, no matter how
you disguise it, is the reverse of conservative as you will be the
first to admit. The Disraeli epoch of constant metamorphoses of
principles and party has passed away.
Radical work must be done by Radical artists; thus less mischief
will arise.
Yours sincerely,
RANDOLPH S. CHURCHILL.
‘I cannot say,’ wrote Lord Salisbury, to whom this correspondence had
been referred (December 6), ‘how heartily I agree in the tone of your
letter to Morris.’
The whole political situation was considered at a Cabinet Council on the
16th. Decision was taken to go on with the Government, to meet
Parliament and await results. The outlines of the Queen’s Speech were
considered. Lord Randolph was most anxious to assign a foremost place to
the reform of Parliamentary Procedure, as described in his memorandum.
The Cabinet, having listened to long speeches on Irish matters, were
tired and disposed to be irritable. The subject was one with which they
were very familiar and on which many of them had already committed
themselves. One Minister whom Lord Randolph thought he had conciliated
the day before, pronounced absolutely against it. Lord Salisbury
practised what he called ‘the decorous reserve proper to one who had
been so long out of the House of Commons.’ The whole question was
abruptly postponed. This defeat filled Lord Randolph with mortification.
He loved his own plans ardently. He cared too much for the objects at
stake to be skilful in personal diplomacy. He could fight; he could
lead; he could drive; but a stolid junta of Cabinet Ministers--‘holy
men,’ as he called them, vexed his soul. He was grievously disappointed
at what he took to be the summary dismissal of a most important subject.
He wrote in deep despondency to the Prime Minister. Lord Salisbury
consoled him in a letter almost affectionate in character. All would
come right if he drafted his proposals and chose a better opportunity of
taking the sense of the Cabinet upon them.
_Lord Randolph Churchill to Lord Salisbury._
India Office: December 17, 1885.
Dear Lord Salisbury,--I am very grateful for your kind letter, and
intensely relieved to learn that you consider the question of
giving to Procedure a prominent place in our programme as still
quite open. I shall do as you tell me, and place on paper
elaborated proposals for the more efficient and speedy transaction
of ‘business.’ You are, I know, quite right in blaming me for
having been precipitate on Tuesday. I cannot help it, and shall
never be able to attain to that beatific state of chronic
deliberation which is the peculiarity of * * *, * * * & Co., and
also of the Turk.
This I add--that Procedure reform does not necessarily entail rapid
legislation. ‘Business’ includes Estimates, Budget, and Supply. It
is the transaction of this that I am more especially anxious to
promote. Further, assuming that owing to some miraculous exercise
of superhuman control H.M. Government remained in office, I would
suggest that there might be very considerable tactical advantages
from not plunging immediately into legislation, and from gaining
time by setting the House of Commons to work on a difficult
question in the consideration and settlement of which no issue of
party or of confidence need arise.
Yours most sincerely,
RANDOLPH S. CHURCHILL.
The Cabinet did not meet again until the New Year, but Christmas was not
a season of unbroken peace and good-will to Her Majesty’s Ministers. Not
one, however experienced and imaginative, could penetrate the obscurity
of the future or calculate the crisis to which events were hurrying. The
election had left them in a large minority. The Government of Ireland
was rapidly passing into the hands of the National League. The Viceroy
had resigned. Mr. Gladstone was revolving vast and unfathomable schemes.
Parliament was to meet for regular business upon January 21. Meanwhile
the days were disturbed by every kind of rumour and alarm. Lord Randolph
Churchill, who always cultivated the acquaintance of clever men
irrespective of their political opinion, had friends in every camp and
possessed many special channels of information. All he could gather he
wrote to his chief:--
_Lord Randolph Churchill to Lord Salisbury._
India Office: December 22, 1885.
... Now I have a great deal to tell you.
Labouchere came to see me this morning. He asked me our intentions.
I gave him the following information. I can rely upon him: (1) That
there would be no motion for adjournment after the 12th, but that
business would be immediately proceeded with after three or four
days’ swearing. On this he said that, if we liked to go out on a
motion for adjournment, he thought the other side might
accommodate us. I told him that such an ineffably silly idea had
never entered our heads. Then he told me that he had been asked
whether he could ascertain if a certain statement as to a Tory Home
Rule measure which appeared recently in the _Dublin Daily Express_
was Ashbourne’s measure, and if the Tories meant to say ‘Aye’ or
‘No’ to Home Rule; to which I replied that it had never crossed the
mind of any member of the Government to dream even of departing
from an absolute unqualified ‘No,’ and that all statements as to
Ashbourne’s plan were merely the folly of the _Daily News_. Then I
was very much upset, for he proceeded to tell me that on Sunday
week last Lord Carnarvon had met Justin McCarthy, and had confided
to him that he was in favour of Home Rule in some shape, but that
his colleagues and his party were not ready, and asked whether
Justin McCarthy’s party would agree to an inquiry, which he thought
there was a chance of the Government agreeing to, and which would
educate his colleagues and his party if granted and carried
through. I was consternated, but replied that such a statement was
an obvious lie; but, between ourselves, I fear it is not--perhaps
not even an exaggeration or a misrepresentation. Justin McCarthy is
on the staff of the _Daily News_. Labouchere is one of the
proprietors, and I cannot imagine any motive for his inventing such
a statement. If it is true, Lord Carnarvon has played the devil.
Then I told Labouchere that if the G.O.M. announced any Home Rule
project, or indicated any such project, and by so doing placed the
Government in a minority, resignation was not the only course; that
there was another alternative which might even be announced in
debate, and the announcement of which might complete the
squandering of the Liberal party, and that his friend at Hawarden
had better not omit altogether that card from his calculations as
to his opponents’ hands. Lastly, I communicated to him that, even
if the Government went out and Gladstone introduced a Home Rule
Bill, I should not hesitate, if other circumstances were
favourable, to agitate Ulster even to resistance beyond
constitutional limits; that Lancashire would follow Ulster, and
would lead England; and that he was at liberty to communicate this
fact to the G.O.M.[48]
Meanwhile Mr. Gladstone, although embarrassed and forestalled by the
disclosures in the newspapers, was deep in his Irish schemes. A chance
conversation which he had had with Mr. Balfour in the middle of December
had encouraged Mr. Gladstone to make a proposal to Lord Salisbury. He
wrote (December 20) of the ‘stir in men’s minds’ and of the urgency of
the question, how it would be ‘a public calamity if this great subject
should fall into the lines of party conflict.’ Only the Government could
deal with such a question, and on public grounds he specially desired
that the existing Government would deal with it. If Lord Salisbury and
his friends would bring forward ‘a proposal for settling the whole
question of the future government of Ireland,’ he would desire to treat
it in the same spirit as he had shown in respect to Afghanistan and the
Balkan Peninsula.
We are assured that Mr. Gladstone laid great stress upon this proffer of
support. He had told the Queen two years before that the Irish question
could only be settled by a conjunction of parties. He seems to have
imagined that such a proposal would be regarded us a fair and
magnanimous undertaking, and would receive, as some may think it
deserved, the unprejudiced deliberation of the Cabinet. He had received
full information--denied to Lord Randolph Churchill--of Lord Carnarvon’s
interview with Parnell. He believed in all sincerity that the
Conservative Government were seriously considering, even if they were
not already committed to, a policy of Home Rule in some form or other.
He remembered the conferences on the Reform Bill, and the support which
he had lately given to the new ministry. Neither he nor his friends seem
fully to have appreciated the fear and aversion with which his opponents
regarded him. His letter was treated with contempt. No other word will
suffice. ‘A public calamity,’ forsooth! ‘If this great question should
fall into line of party conflict!’ ‘His hypocrisy,’ wrote a Minister to
whom this letter had been shown, ‘makes me sick.’ In the Tory Cabinet
there was but one opinion about him. He was ‘mad to take office’; and if
his hunger were not ‘prematurely gratified,’ he would be forced into
some line of conduct which would be ‘discreditable to him and
disastrous.’
Mr. Gladstone wrote again on the 23rd, pressing for a definite answer.
‘Time,’ he said, ‘was precious.’ Lord Salisbury suavely replied through
Mr. Balfour, in a letter which has since been made public, that a
communication of the views of the Government would at this stage be at
variance with usage. As Parliament would meet for business before the
usual time, it was better ‘to avoid a departure from ordinary practice
which might be misunderstood.’ There, of course, the matter ended; and
thus idly drifted away what was perhaps the best hope of the settlement
of Ireland which that generation was to see. Mr. Gladstone tarried no
longer. On December 26[49] he drafted a memorandum for submission to the
various noblemen and gentlemen with whom he proposed to act, setting
forth with all possible precision his immediate intentions. If the
Government were ready to deal with Ireland in a manner that would
satisfy him and satisfy the Irish Nationalists, he would support them.
If not, he would turn them out at the earliest convenient opportunity;
and if in consequence entrusted with the duty of forming a Government,
he would make the acceptance of a plan of ‘duly guarded Home Rule’ an
indispensable condition.
Ministers meanwhile preserved an impenetrable silence. No one knew in
what spirit, with what intention or with what allies they would meet
Parliament. The Queen’s Speech still engaged the attention of the
Cabinet. Lord Randolph Churchill was indebted to a friend for a happy
suggestion, which he did not delay to forward to Lord Salisbury:--
_Lord Randolph Churchill to Lord Salisbury._
India Office: January 14, 1886.
Mr. Buckle has just been to see me, full of an idea of his own
which struck me as good, and which I persuaded him not to spoil by
bringing it out in to-morrow’s _Times_.
[Sidenote: 1886 ÆT. 36]
He wishes the Queen’s Speech of 1833 to be imitated, when, after
the agitation of O’Connell, the Government declared in the Speech
their intention of maintaining the Union. I send you the paragraph
and also the paragraphs from the Speech of 1834, which seem still
more to the purpose. Mr. Buckle very forcibly argues that some
declaration of such a kind will force on the question at once, and
prevent Gladstonian shuffling being resorted to successfully. The
Irish would be obliged to meet such a challenge, and all parties
would have to declare themselves....
The paragraph which was finally adopted was modelled on the lines of the
Speech of 1834:--
_The King’s Speech, Feb. 4, 1834._
But I have seen, with feelings of deep regret and just indignation,
the continuance of attempts to excite the people of that country to
demand a repeal of the Legislative Union.
This bond of our national strength and safety I have already
declared my fixed and unalterable resolution, under the blessing of
Divine Providence, to maintain inviolate by all the means in my
power.
In support of this determination I cannot doubt the zealous and
effectual co-operation of my Parliament and my people.
_The Queen’s Speech, Jan. 21, 1886._
I have seen with deep sorrow the renewal, since I last addressed
you, of the attempt to excite the people of Ireland to hostility
against the Legislative Union between that country and Great
Britain. I am absolutely opposed to any disturbance of that
fundamental law, and in resisting it I am convinced that I shall be
heartily supported by my Parliament and my people.
But the Tory leader was meditating a more decided challenge. He proposed
to meet Parliament with a declaration of a Coercion policy which should
disperse all doubts as to the relations of his Government with the
Parnellites and should throw upon the Opposition the odium of defeating
a Government upon a measure affecting law and order. He may have been
led to this decision partly by a desire that the armies should face
each other squarely in the coming battle. Partly, no doubt, he was
persuaded thereto by the growing clamour and pressure of those sections
of his own party who are always powerful to urge repressive measures.
Sulky murmurs at the Carlton; loud complainings in the _Times_;
trumpeted advent of Loyalist and Orange deputations claiming the
protection of the Crown--all the storm-signals were flying. But there
was a considerable case upon the merits. When Lord Randolph Churchill
had visited Ireland in October he found the Viceroy anxious and alarmed
by the growing power of the National League, and that organisation was
now greatly extended. Throughout those parts of Ireland where the
National League was supreme, liberty and law were gravely endangered.
There was not, indeed, that kind of treasonable organisation which had
existed in 1865 and 1867; nor was there such an amount of capital crime
as culminated in the Phœnix Park murders; but a sullen, widespread,
and well-organised spirit of resistance to the laws of property had
taken possession of the Irish people and grew worse week by week. ‘There
were in Ireland, and there are in Ireland now,’ said Lord Randolph at
Paddington (February 13, 1886), ‘two governments--there is the
Government of the Queen and the government of the National League--and
the Government of the Queen is not the stronger government of the two in
many parts of Ireland.’
Lord Salisbury first mentions the subject on January 13. ‘I am very
perturbed,’ he writes, ‘about the state of Ireland.’ Three days later
he met the Cabinet with definite proposals. Lord Ashbourne had prepared
a Coercion Bill, and the Prime Minister had drafted a paragraph for the
Queen’s Speech announcing its immediate introduction. The Cabinet was
startled. Lord Randolph Churchill and Sir Michael Hicks-Beach had not
prepared themselves for such a departure, grave as they knew the
situation in Ireland to be. They were not satisfied that a case for
special legislation was disclosed, still less that it could be sustained
in the House of Commons. Both remembered their speeches of the previous
summer. Neither responded sympathetically to the militant and autocratic
temper of the mass of the party. The council was long and stormy and
Ministers separated without having come to any decision. Meanwhile the
resignation of Lord Carnarvon was publicly announced.
The decision of Lord Salisbury’s Administration to introduce a Coercion
Bill in January 1886 has been the subject of much hostile criticism. It
has been censured as a resort to extra-constitutional measures, not for
the sake of public safety, but as a party manœuvre. It has been
denounced as the callous and unscrupulous reversal of a policy of
conciliation so soon as the Irish vote had been cast at the election.
There is a degree of justice and truth in these harsh accusations, but
it is only a degree; and if the Ministers concerned require a defence,
that defence is best supplied by their own secret letters during these
days of perplexity and stress.
_Lord Randolph Churchill to Lord Salisbury._
Carlton Club: January 16, 1886.
Dear Lord Salisbury,--I cannot resist writing to you on Ireland
while the proceedings of to-day’s Cabinet are fresh in my mind. As
far as I could ascertain, the exact difference of opinion between
the view which you hold and the view which I ventured to express
amounts (in the measure of time) to a month at the outside. You
would announce and produce a Bill at once. It appears to me that at
present there is no sufficient Parliamentary case for a Bill,
estimated by the weight of facts adduced; and that the Bill which
you may decide upon now, upon your incomplete grounds, may and will
in all probability be utterly insufficient to meet the facts which
you will have to deal with in abundance in a period of time which
may be calculated by weeks and even days.
What I would like to know, if I am not asking too much, is
this--What influence or information not yet disclosed is compelling
you to lay such a heavy burden on your sadly inefficient colleagues
in the House of Commons? I assume as indubitable that you consider,
and almost entirely guide your action by, the state of parties in
the House of Commons--that is involved in the decision come to in
December to carry on the Government--yet I am certain that you know
that none of us could sustain a case for Coercion. Yet you press it
on us--for we could have come to an agreement to-day on Lord
Cranbrook’s suggestion, only that evidently it was not acceptable
or good in your eyes.
I wish I knew what you really wanted, and how you wished it to be
worked out. I have never thought of anything except the success, or
at least the credit, of _your_ Government; and, knowing how much
depends on the House of Commons, I am at the present moment only
occupied in imagining how the action which you seem to favour could
be effectively sustained from a House of Commons point of view. I
do not think you will accuse me of arrogance or conceit if I avow
my belief that, unless you show me the way very clearly, that
action must fail disastrously. I do not want it to fail so. I know
how very great and high your position is, what a really fine party
you have behind you, how great their confidence in you is (on these
points I do not believe I am capable of making an error), and I am
most anxious that that great instrument on which depends not merely
the item of Ireland, but also the interests of the entire Empire
and home community, should not be damaged or blunted by weak and
inefficient House of Commons action such as the immediate demand
for Coercion will in practice involve.
One word as regards the Government of Ireland. You think the
situation so serious that it demands a Coercion Bill. That
necessitates a strong Irish Government. That Government you have
not got. I think there are three men in the Government who would
answer to the requirements of the position--Lord Cranbrook, Mr.
Smith, and (please don’t be shocked) myself. Of the three I greatly
prefer Mr. Smith. But, assuming that you have decided it is your
duty to carry on the Government until you are turned out, I implore
you not to think of [the arrangement Lord Salisbury had suggested].
No extra laws could make that good or stable. I hope you won’t be
vexed with me for writing so freely. I am only anxious to find
myself on Monday loyally and strenuously supporting whatever you
may think best to be done; but I admit I have not been able
hitherto to refrain from shrinking to take part in an enterprise
desperate in its nature, involving certain and immediate
Parliamentary death, and which, if determined on, will only leave
you without one or two of your most faithful supporters in the
House of Commons. Not that they will refuse to obey what you order,
but that the order itself will be their ruin.
Yours most sincerely,
RANDOLPH S. CHURCHILL.
_Lord Salisbury to Lord Randolph Churchill._
_Confidential._
Foreign Office: January 16, 1886.
My dear Randolph,--I cannot say how much touched I am by the great
kindness and loyalty of your letter. I cannot help feeling how
little I deserve it. I will tell you at once what my dominant
feeling is. It is that we should be a united Cabinet--if possible
with a united party. I have been throughout ready to postpone my
individual opinion to this primary consideration. We have no right
to the luxury of divided councils in a crisis such as this. It is
evident that the great majority of the Cabinet--and, I believe, the
great majority of the party--wish earnestly for a policy which will
show that we do not shrink from the duty of government, and that we
mean to stand by the Loyalists. The disaster I am afraid of is that
we should be driven from office on some motion insisting on the
necessity of a vigorous step, and our position in Opposition would
then be very feeble and we should be much discredited.
I really feel very strongly and deeply all the kindness you have
shown to me, and the great and most successful efforts you have
made to sustain the Government. I should differ from you and Beach
with the most extreme reluctance. But do not let us take any line
which will brand us in the eyes of our countrymen--or will enable
our opponents to do so--as the timid party, who let things float
because they dared not act. The time is coming on us when people
will long for government: do not let us get a character of
shrinking from responsibility.
The question of the _personnel_ of the [Irish] Government must be
considered, but the Speech presses for settlement in the first
instance. I should have thought that the notorious growth of this
‘second government’ throughout Ireland, overshadowing the law and
the Queen’s authority and securing its power by organised terror,
would have sustained a case for such a Bill as Gibson produced. If
you remain of the opposite opinion, let us consider whether some
such phrase as the enclosed could unite us.[50] It is merely a
suggestion. I confess I have a heavy heart in the whole matter. I
have serious doubts whether I am doing my duty. But my train is
going. Perhaps I may write again from Hatfield.
Ever yours very truly,
SALISBURY.
Lord Randolph now surrendered his view altogether. Never before or
afterwards did the two men stand in such cordial relationship. A
comradeship in anxiety had drawn these contrasted natures, each so
vehement and earnest after its own fashion, very close together:--
_Lord Randolph Churchill to Lord Salisbury._
India Office: January 16, 1886.
Dear Lord Salisbury,--I am very grateful for your letter, which
enables me to enter more fully into the position from which you
view things than I have been able hitherto to do. I greatly like
the paragraph suggested, and believe firmly that it meets with
wisdom, tact, and courage the necessities and the possibilities of
the situation. But, _after all_, you are the head of the
Government, and have had a very long experience of public affairs;
and if you think it absolutely incumbent to go further--well,
then, further we must go. A collapse of the Government at the
present moment would be a catastrophe too hideous to contemplate.
I have said all that occurs to me at much too great length and with
far too much reiteration. _Kismet._
Yours most sincerely,
RANDOLPH S. CHURCHILL.
There is a passage in the speech of Sir R. Peel on the Address in ‘33,
where the constitutional position required before a Coercion demand is
very clearly and weightily laid down.
He wrote to Beach accordingly. The Chancellor of the Exchequer was more
unyielding and his letter shows the variety of strong characters arrayed
against Mr. Gladstone:--
_Sir Michael Hicks-Beach to Lord Randolph Churchill._
January 17, 1886.
My dear Churchill,--Of course I should readily accept the sentence
Salisbury suggests. But though his letter touches and influences
me, it does not persuade me to anything more; and I am sorry your
reply goes so far. I do not in the least believe that, with such
Irish paragraphs as we are all ready to accept, any motion
insisting on the necessity of a vigorous step would be ever
proposed, much less carried, against us. I do not think in such a
matter we ought to be governed by the ignorant wish of ‘the great
majority of the party’ or be forced to action we do not approve for
fear of being branded as the ‘timid party.’ If these are
Salisbury’s reasons for Coercion, my opinion remains the same.
But his last sentences require explanation. If by ‘serious doubts
whether I am doing my duty’ he means that he is himself persuaded
that the moment has come when the government of Ireland cannot be
carried on without it, and that he ought not therefore to agree to
delay, that is another matter. I would yield my opinion, strong as
it is, to his convictions, but _only to his convictions_. And in
that case he _must_ have a man to govern Ireland.
Yours sincerely,
M. E. HICKS-BEACH.
Monday’s Cabinet was united upon the Queen’s Speech. Lord Salisbury
decided to entrust the Irish Office to Mr. Smith. Lord Randolph
Churchill, who had acquired much influence with him, was chosen to press
it upon him. The task was thankless and unpromising; the occasion
momentous; but the post of difficulty and peril was also the post of
honour. Gravely and reluctantly Smith accepted, and Lord Cranbrook
became Minister of War in his stead. ‘I saw Mr. Smith this morning,’
wrote Lord Randolph to the Prime Minister (January 20), ‘and used every
argument to persuade him to take in hand the government of Ireland. The
appointment should be settled to-day and announced to-morrow morning
without fail. If there is any weakness in our attitude on Coercion
(which I do not at all admit) it will be more than contradicted by the
appointment of Mr. Smith. This of itself will do much to restore
confidence. Please do not, if possible, allow any delay. On second
thoughts,’ added Lord Randolph mischievously, ‘would Lord Iddesleigh
like to go as Lord-Lieutenant?’
The appointment of the new Irish Secretary was announced on the morning
of the 21st, and that same day formal business, including election of
Speaker, having been previously completed, Parliament was opened in
state and the Session began.
The Government prolonged a precarious existence for five days. Both
parties were in a turmoil. On the one side Whigs and Moderate Liberals
endeavoured, without success, to extract from Mr. Gladstone definite
declarations upon Ireland. In the Tory camp the demand for a Coercion
Bill was loud and insistent. Although the party as a whole had been
beaten in the elections, the bulk of its members came fresh from
remarkable victories in the big towns. Their temper was aggressive. They
welcomed the declaration of the Chancellor of the Exchequer that Mr.
Smith would go to Ireland at once to consider what special measures were
necessary.
We are told that Mr. Gladstone did not resolve to overturn the Ministry
until they definitely declared for Coercion on January 26. That act, he
considered, imposed the responsibility of government upon him. But Lord
Randolph Churchill’s correspondence shows that he had information as
early as January 13 that some independent member would move an amendment
to the Address regretting that no announcement was made of provision for
the wants of the agricultural population. Whether this would fail, or
would gain the support of a united Opposition, could not be ascertained
till the House met. A few hours of Westminster were, however, sufficient
to convince the Tory leaders that the temper of the majority was
adverse to them, that virtual and effective agreement existed between
Mr. Gladstone and Parnell, and that Whig and Moderate Liberal support
would almost certainly be insufficient to sustain them. They had decided
on Coercion; they resolved, if possible, to place the details of their
policy and the case in support of it before the country. The adroit and
experienced Parliamentarians on the Treasury Bench used all their wits
to obtain the necessary delay. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had given
notice on the 21st that immediately on the conclusion of the debate on
the Address he would move resolutions for the Reform of Procedure and
that these would be pressed to the exclusion of other matters, ‘subject
to the intervention of any specially important or urgent business.’ On
the following day Lord Randolph Churchill suggested that the general
debate on the Address should be brought to a conclusion and that the
reforms in Parliamentary Procedure, the consideration of which Mr.
Gladstone had declared in his election address ought to take precedence
of legislation, might be decided before the amendments to the Address
were considered. The changes which Ministers proposed were in themselves
sufficiently startling to have absorbed the House in calmer times; and
Lord Randolph no doubt calculated upon this. But Mr. Gladstone found no
difficulty in persuading his party that Procedure reform might safely be
a little delayed. Lord Randolph’s proposal was ignored and the debate
continued.
On the 23rd Mr. Smith started for Dublin, which he reached on the
morning of the 24th. The imminent defeat of the Ministry had now become
certain. An amendment relating to Burma was moved on the 25th. Mr.
Gladstone, though recommending that no decision should be taken upon it,
as other more convenient opportunities of discussing Indian matters
would occur, indulged in acid criticism of the Burmese policy. ‘Shall I
answer him now?’ asked Lord Randolph, taking up the red box in which the
India Office papers reposed, ‘or shall I wait for the Indian Budget?’
‘Now or never,’ answered the Leader of the House; and Lord Randolph
thereupon, using the precise information of a great department with the
skill of a practised debater, made a vigorous rejoinder. Upon the spur
of the moment he managed to cite a number of instances from the record
of the late Government where they had themselves been drawn into warlike
operations, with, as Lord Randolph contended, far less justification
than was presented in Burma. Mr. Gladstone was much provoked by such
comparisons. He could not speak again himself, and as the Secretary for
India proceeded he was observed repeatedly turning to those about him
and behind him, explaining how this did not apply; how that was wholly
unfounded: how this, again, was a travesty; and so forth. The
Conservatives were delighted at Lord Randolph’s prowess. The attack was
repelled. On the next amendment the Liberal Front Bench abstained, and
the Government survived by twenty-eight. But this was the end.
Faced by approaching destruction, the Government cared only to rally
their friends, to make one last bid for Whig support, and to declare
plainly the issue on which they were to be dismissed. The Cabinet which
met on the morning of the 26th desired the immediate introduction of a
Coercion Bill. But Mr. Smith was not inclined to be hustled. He could
not realise the rapid developments which had taken place in his absence.
Harassed by telegrams, he appealed to Lord Randolph. The friendship
between them was steadily ripening. Of all the characters with which
this story deals, scarcely one improves so much upon acquaintance as
this valiant and honest man. He was the true type of what Disraeli calls
‘an English worthy.’ Here is his letter:--
_Mr. Smith to Lord Randolph Churchill._
_Private._
Chief Secretary’s Office, Dublin Castle: January 25, 1886, 6 P.M.
My dear Churchill,--I have had a telegram from Salisbury which
affords evidence of pressure for what is termed ‘prompt action,’
and I have replied by letter. Another telegram has just come in
from Beach, which cannot be deciphered before post leaves.
There is only one opinion here--that the League must be suppressed
and large powers obtained to protect life, property and public
order, unless the Government is prepared to treat for terms of
capitulation with the Parnellites. But the Land Question is at the
bottom of the trouble, and gives all the force to the agitation. As
at present advised, I should be unwilling to ask for large
repressive powers unless I had authority to promise a large land
scheme.
But these telegrams indicate restlessness in my colleagues. So big
a question cannot be decided offhand. It is more than peace or war
with a foreign Power. We are at a crisis in the relations of the
Imperial Government with Ireland. I may very possibly fail to do
any good, but I will not be hurried into a positive decision on
such momentous issues by the party or the papers; and if my
colleagues think the three or four days I propose to take too long,
I will return to London with pleasure. Let me hear from you either
by telegraph or post.
Yours sincerely,
W. H. SMITH.
The correspondence was continued by cypher telegrams:--
_Lord R. Churchill to Mr. Smith._
January 26.
Greatly obliged by your letter.
Absolutely necessary for Government to state to-night their
intentions with regard to Ireland--viz. suppression of National
League followed by Land Bill. This is the only method of averting
defeat on Jesse Collings. Notice should be given to-day of
introduction of repressive Bill on Thursday, coupled with revival
of rules of urgency. Telegraph to me your views. I would earnestly
press your return to London.
_Mr. Smith to Lord R. Churchill._
I think proposed action looks precipitate. There is no excessive
urgency here, and great care is required in framing and describing
measure. I should prefer, if possible, to provide against the
intimidation of League than denounce it by name. I cross to-night.
Lord Randolph replied from the House of Commons at six o’clock the same
day:--
Your telegram received half-hour after Cabinet separated. Beach has
just announced introduction of Bill by you on Thursday for
suppression of National League and other dangerous associations,
for the prevention of intimidation and for the protection of life,
property and order in Ireland.[51] Of course, great sensation.
It is not improbable, however, that we shall be defeated to-night,
in which case we shall resign. I showed your wire to Lord
Salisbury. We both agreed you would not wish unanimous decision of
Cabinet modified.
Mr. Smith arrived in London with the daylight, to read upon the early
placards that the Government was out.
The famous Jesse Collings Amendment produced an interesting debate; but
as the members listened to the opposing views of Mr. Chaplin and Mr.
Joseph Arch, of Mr. Goschen and Mr. Bradlaugh, of Mr. Gladstone and Lord
Hartington, they knew that behind the relevant arguments of the
speakers, behind all the talk of peasant-proprietors, allotments,
vegetables, and cows, stood a far greater issue. ‘If the result of this
division,’ said the Chancellor of the Exchequer, ‘should be unfavourable
to Her Majesty’s Government we shall accept that decision without
regret. We assumed office reluctantly, and we shall leave it willingly
as soon as we are assured that we do not possess the support of the
House. But the success of this motion will have another and graver
effect.... It will not only be a defeat of Her Majesty’s Government, but
it will be a defeat of the policy ... which they believe it to be their
duty to pursue with respect to Ireland.’
The Government were beaten on the division by seventy-nine votes,
notwithstanding that sixteen Liberals, including Lord Hartington, Mr.
Goschen and Sir Henry James, voted with them and fifty-six others stayed
away. The next day Lord Salisbury’s Cabinet resigned.
Thus, after a brief but exciting reign, fell the ‘Ministry of
Caretakers.’ They had confronted enormous difficulties with small
resources. They existed at the caprice of their enemies. They had
office, but not power. Yet they faced their task and their opponents
with courage and skill. Their Administration was defended by powerful
oratory; it was sustained--except in its dying moments--by sedate and
efficient Executive action. In a few short months the Conservative party
were freed from the reproach of irresponsibility and their capacity for
government was recognised by the country. The peace of Europe was
preserved amid grave embarrassments and under their guidance the nation
emerged safely and honourably from the Russian crisis. They legislated
with unexpected good fortune. They inaugurated a new policy, never since
abandoned, of Land Purchase in Ireland. They restored and greatly
strengthened the defences of India. They laid the foundations of
Australian Federation, and by a successful, inexpensive and almost
bloodless military expedition added a vast and fertile province to the
dominions of the Crown.
CHAPTER XIII
HOME RULE
‘Vote it as you please. There is a company of poor men that will
spend all their blood before they see it settled so.’--CARLYLE,
_Cromwell_.
On the last day in January Mr. Gladstone undertook to form his
Administration. Its complexion was indicated by the first of the new
appointments: for Mr. Morley became Chief Secretary to the
Lord-Lieutenant. This was followed, without delay, on the one hand by
the statement that Lord Spencer had acquiesced in the new Irish policy
and would be Lord President of the Council; and upon the other by
rumours of Whig refusals. For some days negotiations were protracted
with Lord Hartington, Mr. Goschen and Sir Henry James; but, whatever
signs of hesitation had marked their previous course, their action now
was decided. Sir Henry James was offered successively both the Lord
Chancellorship and the Home Secretaryship, and even more important
Executive offices were pressed upon the others. All were declined. Doubt
and reluctance were also manifested by Mr. Chamberlain and Sir George
Trevelyan and both required and received assurances that they were not
committed, by joining the Government, to the support of any Irish policy
which involved the creation of a separate Parliament. For the rest it
may be noticed that Sir William Harcourt became Chancellor of the
Exchequer; that Lord Rosebery went to the Foreign Office; and that
neither Lord Derby nor Mr. Forster was included in the Government.
The traveller who visits an old battlefield can never fully understand
what its various natural features meant to the combatants. He is shown,
perhaps, a rocky ridge which is called the key of the position. He reads
that it was taken and repurchased on hard terms more than once during
the day. But it is an ordinary object in the landscape. A dozen such
eminences have been seen during the morning’s ride. Was it really so
important? Were the fortunes of kingdoms actually for some hours
involved in the possession of those few acres of rank grass and
scattered stone? As he stands serenely on ground where once the bravest
soldier hardly dared to crawl, he can scarcely believe it. Yet, to the
men who fought, those rocks meant much more than life or death. Duty was
there; honour was there; and in the end victory. And if the smoky
curtain that hangs about the field were lifted and the view enlarged, it
might be seen that great causes of truth, or justice, or freedom, and
long tranquil years in smiling lands depended indeed upon this ragged
ridge, made famous by the blundering collision of two armies, worthless
except for the tactical purpose of the moment and probably ill-adapted
and wrongly selected even for that.
The actual provisions of the Home Rule Bill do not at all convey the
magnitude of the issue or explain the gravity with which it was
regarded. A proposal to establish by statute, subject to guarantees of
Imperial supremacy, a colonial Parliament in Ireland for the transaction
of Irish business may indeed be unwise, but is not, and ought not to be,
outside the limits of calm and patient consideration. Such a proposal is
not necessarily fraught with the immense and terrific consequences which
were so generally associated with it. A generation may arise in England
who will question the policy of creating subordinate legislatures as
little as we question the propriety of Catholic Emancipation and who
will study the records of the fierce disputes of 1886 with the superior
manner of a modern professor examining the controversies of the early
Church. But that will not prove the men of 1886 wrong or foolish in
speech and action.
The controversy of 1886 can never be resolved. Whatever may happen in
the future, neither party can be brought to the bar of history and
proved by actual experience right or wrong. The cases of Catholic
Emancipation, of the Great Reform Bill, of the Repeal of the Corn Laws,
are differently placed. We know that in certain circumstances a great
change was made and that that change was immediately vindicated by
events and afterwards ratified by posterity. The opponents of the change
stand condemned. No such assured conclusion of the Home Rule Question of
1886 can ever be reached, unless by some unthinkable coincidence the
actual circumstances of that time were reconstructed.
Mr. Gladstone ultimately succeeded in convincing not only his personal
friends and half his fellow-countrymen of his entire sincerity, but his
most capable opponents also. Yet at the time his motives were impugned,
and not without much reason. Concessions to Ireland made by any British
Government which depends for its existence on the Irish vote, will
naturally and necessarily be suspect. There must always be a feeling in
English minds that such a government is not a free agent, that it is
trafficking for personal or party advantage with what belongs to the
nation. In 1886 Mr. Gladstone’s Administration lay under deep suspicion.
His own appeals for an independent majority at the election; the sudden
conversion of his principal colleagues; the absolute dependence of his
power upon Mr. Parnell’s followers; the precipitate haste with which he
had taken office; all tended to confirm the distrust and prejudices of
his opponents. Whether his Bill was proposed upon its merits or not, it
was not considered, and could not be considered, upon them. It looked
like surrender--not advance; and surrender made shameful by the party
advantage that was its first-fruits. The violent scenes in the House of
Commons, the declarations of hatred towards England reiterated by Irish
Nationalism, however historically excusable, the long nightmare of
outrage and unrest through which Ireland was struggling, the American
gold, the dynamite explosions, the bloody daggers in the Phœnix
Park, had bitten deep into British minds and memories. The tireless
conflicts of Catholic and Protestant, of landlord and tenant, provoked
and disquieted statesmen of every complexion. Some there were who rose
to Mr. Gladstone’s level of enthusiasm, who shared his consciousness of
unswerving rectitude and dreams of glorious achievement; but by most of
the eminent men in England the Irish proposals of 1886 were regarded as
the surrender of national heirlooms at the compulsion of public enemies,
involving an act of practical secession with potential consequences of
revolution and civil war. And once this conviction was adopted, all
chance that the plan itself would be fairly weighed was inevitably
destroyed. Radicals who, like Mr. Chamberlain, were committed to all
sorts of schemes of devolution, who looked with favour upon National
Councils or Legislatures of the Canadian provincial type, were, by the
stroke of crisis, united with the ultra-Conservatives and
authoritarians. A state of war existed and political leaders selected
their positions upon tactical reasons alone. Here it was good to fight;
there it was bad. At this point a stand might be made; that it would be
well to concede. All question of a reasonable settlement vanished. Every
man chose his ground and fought upon it to win. ‘Never,’ said Lord
Randolph in after years to a friend, ‘have we approached the Irish
Question _avec de bonnes paroles et de bons procédés_.’
Thus it happened that in the tremendous enterprise upon which Mr.
Gladstone had now determined to embark, he found arrayed against him
nearly all the leading men and most of the strongest forces in England
and Scotland. When a party has been for many years supreme in the State,
it draws into itself by its prestige and authority many men who are not
really with it in sympathy and opinion. The Whigs and many moderate
Liberals had long been estranged. They were held by the force of party
associations alone and most of them welcomed a shock which ended the
strain and freed them from obligations they could no longer faithfully
discharge. The wealthy Whig Peers were glad to escape from Radical
associates and to be ranked in the mass of their order. Statesmen of the
old school like Mr. Bright, Lord Hartington and Mr. Goschen, with many
followers whose talents adorned the Liberal party, were quite unprepared
to adapt themselves to the new conditions which a democratic franchise
had imposed. The Home Rule proposals--already in themselves a sufficient
cause for final separation--were, besides, a convenient opportunity. All
this was to have been expected, and no doubt the Irish accession was
estimated to fill the gap. But a Radical defection was utterly
unforeseen.
Of all the men who followed Mr. Gladstone into the Lobby on the night
when the Jesse Collings amendment dismissed the ‘Ministry of Caretakers’
from office, Mr. Chamberlain stood to gain the greatest profit, both in
the furtherance of his political opinions and in his personal
advancement, from the turn events were taking. For five years he had
battled with the Whigs in the Cabinet; for five years they had checked
him. He had declared he would not serve with them again. Now they were
going. Their influence alone had enabled the Prime Minister to moderate
the Radical demands, of which he was the champion. In the place of that
influence was now to be substituted the party of Mr. Parnell. If Mr.
Chamberlain had been powerful before, what would he be in the Liberal
Governments of the future? If Mr. Gladstone had yielded much to his
insistence in the past, what must he concede thereafter? At the very
moment when the Radical movement was growing in strength, after an
election in which the ‘Unauthorised Programme’ had saved the counties
from the Tory triumph in the towns, the whole composition of the Liberal
party was to be changed--and changed wholly in his favour. The Prime
Minister was a very old man. The path was already almost clear. The
future of the party lay at the feet of the leader of thorough, precise
and militant Radicalism.
And if in one direction all prospects looked so bright, the other seemed
entirely barred. He was in acute antagonism with Lord Hartington. Lord
Salisbury had just called him ‘Jack Cade.’ The Whigs regarded him as the
cause of their undoing. To the Tories he was a warning of the wrath to
come. By many acts of his public life, by a hundred speeches, by the
affirmation of important principles and the support of definite
measures, he had cut himself off from Whigs and Tories alike. Many men
will wrestle with their own party or change to another party, but few
will face political extinction. That such a man, careless perhaps of
office, but ambitious for power, should in such circumstances quarrel
with Mr. Gladstone, tear his own Radical following to pieces and go
forth into the night-storm almost alone, was a fact not in human wisdom
to be known or imagined in dreams. Yet his reply to Parnell’s demand had
been prompt and plain. ‘If these, and these alone, are the terms on
which Mr. Parnell’s support is to be obtained,’ he declared as early as
September, ‘I will not enter into the compact.’
That Lord Randolph Churchill was consistent and sincere in his
opposition to Home Rule was at the time much questioned by both sides,
and some shadow of that suspicion has remained. He it was who had
rendered possible the co-operation between the Irish party and the Tory
Opposition, which had placed and maintained the late Government in
office. He was known to hold liberal views on Irish problems. He was
described as being unscrupulous in Parliamentary manœuvre. He had
opposed the renewal of Coercion. He had defended the Maamtrasna inquiry.
If it were true that the Conservative Government had had any Home Rule
dealings as a Government, he was reputed their agent. If any Minister
had trafficked independently, he was that Minister. Many Home Rulers and
Orangemen, agreeing in nothing else, agreed in believing that he at any
rate had been ready upon a Home Rule basis to bargain with Parnell.
These suspicions are injurious. No man was more vigorous in his public
resistance to Home Rule or more vehement in his language than Lord
Randolph Churchill; and if in the midst of his denunciations of Mr.
Gladstone, while he was rousing England and inflaming Ulster, it had
been true that he was fortified by no real conviction, and had been
ready a few months before to sell all that he now declared sacred, an
odious charge would have been brought home.
The documents printed in preceding chapters constitute an unassailable
defence. No Unionist politician has a clearer record. Lord Randolph
Churchill was perfectly willing to work with the Irish members. He
understood how much they had in common with the Conservative party, and
with the best part of the Conservative party. He had no prejudices and
many sympathies in their direction. But his arrangement with them, or
with any of them--for he counted on dividing their forces--would have
been social, religious or economic in its character. It would never have
been of a National character. To give the Irish the educational system
they desired, to court and coax the Bishops, to win the Catholic Church
to the side of the Conservative party--these were objects which all his
life he faithfully pursued. The first political pamphlet he wrote was on
Irish intermediate education. Whether as a Minister in 1885, or out of
office in 1888 and 1889, he will be found deep in schemes of Catholic
conciliation by Irish educational reform--primary, intermediate and
university. One of the last letters this account contains returns to and
reiterates this long-cherished idea. Almost his last speech in the House
of Commons was in defence of Catholic schools. But to the repeal of the
Parliamentary Union he was always unalterably opposed. He did not even
think it worth while to consider seriously the many modified
alternatives in which the times abounded. They might be wise or unwise;
but they were not, he thought, within the functions of the Conservative
party. He knew nothing of the Carnarvon incident, and was incensed to
discover it. His letter to Lord Morris of December 7, 1885, shows how
unyielding he was even to the suggestion of a conference, before the
great attempt was made. His correspondence with Mr. Chamberlain, who
always inclined to alternative proposals, proves him quite unconvinced
in later years by the course of the struggle or by the change in his own
position. ‘It would require circumstances widely different and pressure
of an almost overwhelming kind,’ he wrote in August 1887, ‘to induce any
portion of the Tories to look at any scheme of Home Rule. Gladstone
alone can deal with that measure; and I hope that if he does, and when
he does, he may be kept in check and controlled by a powerful
Opposition.’
The advent of this great crisis therefore threw him for the first time
into complete sympathy with the whole Conservative party. All his
energies and talents were freely expended in a cause for which he cared
intensely. Mr. Gladstone’s vast personal power may perhaps be measured
by the opponents by whom he was confronted, and by whom he was so
narrowly overborne. It would be profitless to compare the relative
services of the various distinguished men who now ranged themselves
against him; to observe that Sir Henry James made the heaviest
sacrifices, that Mr. Chamberlain ran the greatest risks, that Lord
Salisbury showed commanding wisdom or that Lord Hartington struck the
weightiest blows. But when the history of the famous battle for the
Union in 1886 comes to be worthily written, it will be found that no
single man fought with effect in more different quarters of the field
than Lord Randolph Churchill or was in the heart and centre of more
decisive frays.
Outside the walls of Parliament the issue was determined chiefly in the
cities of Birmingham and Belfast. The transference of the whole
political strength of the great Midland centre of Radicalism to the
Unionist cause and the fierce resistance of the Irish North, were the
two most serious obstacles which Mr. Gladstone encountered. In both
cities the conflict was marked by every circumstance of passion and
excitement. In both Lord Randolph intervened as a leader. He possessed
in an eminent degree many of the qualities which may be discovered in a
successful military commander. He could detect with almost unerring
skill the weak points in his enemy’s array. He could make up his mind
with bewildering rapidity and act upon the decision so formed with
absolute confidence. He knew well how to separate what was vital from
what was merely important or desirable. He was quite ruthless in casting
away smaller objects for the sake of a greater. Few men were better
suited to the storms of violent times. Till the explosion of Home Rule
in the early days of December, he was deep in schemes of educational
concession to the Catholic hierarchy--schemes which were in themselves
delicate and complicated and which, on account of the suspicion they
would have excited in Protestant Lancashire, were necessarily secret
while a General Election was pending. But no sooner did Mr. Gladstone’s
intentions become known with certainty than Lord Randolph looked towards
Ulster. All plans of Catholic Universities and nice correspondence with
princes of the Church had to be unceremoniously stowed away till calmer
weather. Christmas found him planning his visit to Belfast. By the New
Year the arrangements were completed. The Ulster Hall was prepared and
the Orange drums were beating. ‘I decided some time ago,’ he wrote
bluntly to FitzGibbon, on February 16, 1886, ‘that if the G.O.M. went
for Home Rule, the Orange card would be the one to play. Please God it
may turn out the ace of trumps and not the two.... I expect,’ he added,
‘your old Commission will go to the devil now.’
Lord Randolph was the first of the out-going Ministers to break silence
and in Paddington, on February 13, he defended the violent oscillations
in the Irish policy of the late Government--the contrast between the
policy of August 1885 and that of January 1886. The reader is already in
possession of the main features of that defence, but it is set forth in
this speech in a complete argumentative shape; and though it is
naturally a partisan account, it will be found to bear a close
comparison with the facts now published. The situation in Ireland in
August had not, he declared, necessitated the renewal of the Crimes Act.
The provisions of the Crimes Act were not suited to deal with the
National League; and by January the growth of that organisation required
the creation of new and different weapons. ‘If the hateful and malignant
domination of the National League had been finally and for ever
suppressed, if the restoration of order had been effective--then Lord
Salisbury’s Government were prepared to propose to Parliament measures
which would to a large extent have met the legitimate aspirations of the
Irish people, whether as regards Local Government or as regards the
further settlement of some portions of the eternal Land Question, or as
regards those wishes of the Catholics of Ireland on higher education
which a large concurrence of the opinion of this country is disposed to
look upon as right and reasonable.’ He concluded by appealing for the
support and encouragement of his constituents in his mission to Ulster
upon which he was about to embark.
Lord Randolph crossed the Channel, and arrived at Larne early on the
morning of February 22. He was welcomed like a king. Thousands of
persons, assembling from the neighbouring townships, greeted him at the
port. At Carrickfergus, where the train was stopped, he imitated--almost
for the only time--a historic example by addressing a ‘great crowd on
the platform.’ In Belfast itself a vast demonstration, remarkable for
its earnestness and quality and amounting, it is computed, to more than
seventy thousand people, marched past him. One who knew Ireland well
declared that he had not believed ‘there were so many Orangemen in the
world.’ That night the Ulster Hall was crowded to its utmost compass. In
order to satisfy the demand for tickets all the seats were removed and
the concourse--which he addressed for nearly an hour and a half--heard
him standing. He was nearly always successful on the platform, but the
effect he produced upon his audience in Belfast was one of the most
memorable triumphs of his life. He held the meeting in the hollow of his
hand. From the very centre of Protestant excitement he appealed to the
loyal Catholics of Ireland to stand firm by the Union and at the same
time, without using language of bigotry or intolerance, he roused the
Orangemen to stern and vehement emotion.
‘Now may be the time,’ he said, ‘to show whether all those ceremonies
and forms which are practised in Orange Lodges, are really living
symbols or only idle and meaningless ceremonies; whether that which you
have so carefully fostered, is really the lamp of liberty and its flame
the undying and unquenchable fire of freedom.... The time may be at
hand when you will have to show that the path of honour and safety is
still illuminated by the light of other days. It may be that this dark
cloud which is now impending over Ireland, will pass away without
breaking. If it does, I believe you and your descendants will be safe
for a long time to come. Her Majesty’s Government hesitates. Like
Macbeth before the murder of Duncan, Mr. Gladstone asks for time. Before
he plunges the knife into the heart of the British Empire he reflects,
he hesitates.... The demonstrations to-day will have a very useful
effect not only upon the public mind in England, but also on the
Ministerial mind, and many more of them must be held. And those
demonstrations ought to be imposing not only from their numbers, but
also for their orderly character. We are essentially a party of law and
order and any violent action resorted to prematurely or without the most
obvious and overwhelming necessity might have the most fatal and
damaging effect upon the cause which we so dearly value and might
alienate forces whose resistance would be beyond all price. The
Loyalists in Ulster should wait and watch--organise and prepare.
Diligence and vigilance ought to be your watchword; so that the blow, if
it does come, may not come upon you as a thief in the night and may not
find you unready and taken by surprise.