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 THE LIBERAL PARTY 
 
 AND 
 
 Mr. chamberlain. 
 
 BY 
 
 W. T. MARRIOTT, Q.C, M.P, 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 CHAPMAN AND HALL, Limited, 
 
 11, HENRIETTA STREET, CO VENT GARDEN, W.C. 
 
 Price Siocpence.
 
 THE LIBERAL PARTY AND 
 MR. CHAMBERLAIN. 
 
 How long the present connection between the Liberal party 
 and certain Radicals is to continue is a question which is 
 rapidly ripening for solution. 
 
 That Whigs are born and not made was recently the 
 assertion — perhaps the unconscious boast — of ona who, ta 
 appearance, was more proud of his E-adical associates than 
 he was, as he had every reason to be, of the great Whig 
 family from which he was descended ; but even he would 
 admit that people w^ho have not the good fortune to be 
 E-ussells, or Cavendishes, or Grosvenors, or Fitzwilliams, may 
 hold Liberal opinions and may also occasionally be allowed to- 
 act upon them. That the Liberals as a party will accept the 
 role assigned to the Whigs by Lord Hartington in his speech 
 at Accrington is not likely. The Liberal party of past 
 days has ever had a higher ambition than to act as the 
 go-between between extremists and those who would stand 
 still, and may claim for itself that in the great move- 
 ments for securing the toleration of all religions, for promot- 
 ing the education and generally the well-being of the people,
 
 for placing taxation on a just basis, and for advancing local 
 self-government, they have acted not as moderators but as 
 leaders. That for some time past they have been followers 
 rather than leaders is true, and it is for this very reason 
 that the time has come for them to take stock of their posi- 
 tion, and to consider whom they are following and whither 
 they are being led. 
 
 As for the Radicals, it may be difficult to define the exact 
 meaning of the word, and since Mr. Bright has declared that 
 he is not one, while Lord Coleridge has stated that he him- 
 self is one, and that yet he agrees in political opinions with 
 Mr. Bright, the difficulty may have increased. But it is 
 well to call people by the name they themselves prefer, 
 and as Mr. Chamberlain and his followers glory in the use 
 of the word Radical, it is certain they will not object to 
 having it applied to them. After all there is not much in the 
 name, and the important part is not what they call them- 
 selves, but what they profess and what they intend to do, 
 and whether in these professions and intentions the Liberal 
 party can consistently go along with them. 
 
 IsTow there is no doubt as to their professions. They are 
 written down so plainly that those that run may read, and 
 Liberals have no excuse for not noticing them, and are bound 
 to consider how far they can act at all with those who make 
 them. This year the country has been literally inundated 
 with Radical political programmes. Passing by many issued 
 by minor lights, it will be sufficient to notice those issued by 
 Mr. Chamberlain, Mr. Labouchere, and an anonymous writer 
 
 o
 
 in tlie Fo)'tni(jhtIy Revieiv, and to comment on their contents. 
 Whether these programmes were drawn up in concert or 
 whether they were made independently, there is a striking 
 similarity in the spirit that permeates them and in the 
 measures that are advocated. 
 
 The Constitution, before any substantial legislative re- 
 forms can be considered at all, is to be revolutionised. Thr 
 Crown is, perhaps, to be tolerated. If her Majesty and her 
 successor will square their conduct to suit Radical ideas, 
 and will not spend too much money, they are to be per- 
 mitted to hold nominal sway over these realms. The anony- 
 mous Radical tells us '* that if the monarchy were proved 
 to be the 'cause of real political mischief, to minimise or 
 endanger the freedom of popular government, no Radical, 
 and probably no large class of Englishmen would exercise 
 themselves to retain it,"* and the wonder is that anybody 
 should deem it worth his while so officiously to give utter- 
 ance to so obvious a truism. As the Crown has up to now 
 been a source of strength and a stronghold of freedom to 
 the country, it would probably be more becoming to defer 
 giving it a lecture till the mischief commences. As for Mr. 
 Labouchere, he poses as the great philosopher, above mun- 
 dane trifles, and boldly declares that " it is a matter of ex- 
 ceedingly small importance whether the ornamental figure- 
 head of the State be a living human being, a piece of painted 
 canvas, or a gilt club,"t and he is prepared to tolerate royalty 
 
 * Fortnightly Review, September, 1883, p. 43.5. 
 t Ibid., March, 1883, p. 379.
 
 6 
 
 if it can be had cheap. Mr. Chamberlain's views on the 
 subject appear to be somewhat mixed. In the year 1877, 
 when Lord Beaconsfield's Government proposed an allowance 
 of £25,000 a year to the Duke of Connaught, and Sir Charles 
 Dilkcj true to the opinions of his youth, proposed a dilatory 
 amendment, Mr. Chamberlain was found amongst the select 
 band of thirty-three rigid economists who supported the 
 I amendment against the overwhelming majority of 320 that 
 j opposed, and when the original question was put he did 
 I not enter an appearance at all ; but in 1881, whom the 
 1 self- same allowance was proposed for the Duke of Albany, 
 he was found with the 387 who supported the vote, and 
 though the band of economists had increased to forty-two he 
 was not with them. The experience, or perhaps the de- 
 lights, of office had altered his views, or at least his vote, and 
 it was probably to conciliate his advanced friends whom on 
 this occasion he deserted that he determined to have a 
 good fling at royalty in general when he addressed his 
 Birmingham audience at the Bright celebration. He then 
 held up royalty and its representatives to the derision — 
 the " loud laughter and cheers,*' and the "renewed laughter 
 and cheering," as the papers put it — of his enhghtened 
 constituents. Mr. Chamberlain has set many precedents in 
 political conduct, but none more singular, and, it is to be 
 hoped, more exceptional, than that of a privy councillor, con- 
 tent at the same time to wear the honoured uniform — or 
 what a Radical might term the menial livery — of royalty, 
 and to hold up that very same royalty to the ridicule of a
 
 mob. However, from this conduct and liis speech it may be 
 concluded that his views upon the monarchy are in accor- 
 dance with those of Mr. Labouchere and the anonj^mous 
 one, and that he with them will tolerate it so long as he 
 is allowed to scold, ridicule, and jibe at it. 
 
 Having thus settled the question of monarchical govern- 
 ment, thej^ next proceed to deal with the Houses of Commons 
 and Lords, and according to them the latter is to be totally 
 abolished or else reduced to absolute impotency, while the 
 former is to be transformed on a truly Radical basis. Uni- 
 versal suffrage, equal electoral districts, and paid member- 
 ship of Parliament, are points to be obtained, and then 
 probably triennial parliaments, and the expenses of elections 
 to be borne by the ratepaj^ers. To most people the advocacy 
 of such changes will appear mere moonshine, but, incredible 
 as it may appear, Mr. Chamberlain told his Birmingham 
 electors that *' it is the first business of Liberals to bring 
 them about," and Mr. Labouchere, with an audacity that 
 would be amusing were not the subject a serious one, declares 
 that " from this moment we demand the equalisation of the 
 franchise ; we regard this as a step on the democratic path 
 from which there is no turning back. The next demand 
 will be electoral districts, cheap elections, payment of 
 members, and abolition of hereditary legislators."* That 
 there is the remotest chance of any of these changes being 
 brought about no one of any knowledge or information 
 believes for a moment, but the danger of suggesting and 
 
 * Fortnightly Review, March, 1883, p. 381.
 
 8 
 
 advocating such changes is that a large portion of ths 
 electorate are, through no fault of their own, without such 
 knowledge or information, and it is upon their ignorance 
 that agitators trade. It may be presumed that the large 
 audiences which Mr. Chamberlain addressed this year at 
 Birmingham and Bristol were of the average intelligence, 
 and yet they seem to have swallowed with avidity and 
 delight the magnificent promises he made to them, and 
 to have actually revelled in the magniloquent phrases he 
 made use of. They did not seem to know that the universal 
 suffrage he talked of would swamp the votes not merely of 
 the middle and upper classes, but also of the respectable 
 artisans, and place the political power of the nation in the 
 hands of those who from ignorance or laziness could not 
 provide a house or lodging for themselves or their families ; 
 or that electoral districts would place the minority, however 
 superior in everything but numbers, at the absolute mercy 
 of the majority, or of the wire-pullers who would utilise 
 them ; or that paid membership would produce a House 
 of Commons the first object of whose members would be 
 to get a salary, the second to keep it, the third to increase 
 it, and the last to think of the good of the country. All 
 this is patent to educated people, but it is not to the masses. 
 They do not know either that these very experiments have 
 been tried in France and other countries, and that the 
 results have been disastrous. France at the present time 
 enjoys all the boons promised to the men of Birmingham 
 and Bristol. She has no crowned head to patronise, or
 
 tolerate, or Jeer at ; and she has universal suffrage, electoral 
 districts, triennial parliaments, paid members, and no here- 
 ditary legislature, and at the present time her condition 
 is more pitiable than that of any country in Europe. Her 
 own statesmen own it. English Radical journals acknow- 
 ledge the fact. It is but the other day that M. Paul Leroy 
 — himself a staunch Eepublican — declared that, "Seldom, 
 in the whole course of history, had the situation of France 
 been, from an international point of view, more precarious," 
 and commenting upon this the Pall Mall Gazette added that 
 *'it8 finances were in an alarming state. The legislature 
 was sterile ; most useful and seriously practical Bills were 
 neglected, trade and manufactures were suffering ; in social 
 and economic progress France was fully behind her neigh- 
 bours and rivals.'' Yet in natural advantaged France is 
 pre-eminent. Her climate is the finest in Europe, and she 
 has a soil so fertile that not only does she produce oil and 
 wine in abundance, but she stands second to America alone 
 as a corn-producing country. At the same time the people 
 are worse paid, harder worked, more taxed, worse clothed, 
 and worse fed than the same classes are in this country. 
 They are watched far more closely by the police, interfered 
 with far more by Government officials, are subject to a 
 grinding law of conscription, and political liberty, as it is 
 understood in this country, is absolutely denied them. It is 
 no wonder that there should exist there a discontent without 
 parallel in this country, and what has raised this discontent 
 to fever heat is the disappointment the people experience at
 
 10 
 
 discovering that promises similar to those made by Mr. 
 Chamberlain to his English audiences have proved vain and 
 illusory. The two most potent causes of French misery 
 and French decay are the want of that stability and con- 
 tinuity in their Government machinery which the monarchy 
 and the recognition of the hereditary principle has given 
 this countrj^ and the unfortunate success of politicians of 
 the type of Mr. Chamberlain and Mr. Labouchere, who 
 have promised the people much to gain their confidence, 
 and with it political power, and when they have gained the 
 power have disappointed them and lost their confidence. 
 
 Our English Radicals of the Birmingham school are in no 
 way original. Their political programmes are just as much 
 translations as are most of the plays that are acted on the 
 stage. Their idol is France, and, notwithstanding the lessons 
 of experience, their one object appears to be to introduce 
 French customs and French practices. French Radicals 
 have ever had on their lips the interests of the working 
 classes, and it has been their constant habit to overwhelm 
 those whom they have styled the " sovereign people '^ with 
 the grossest flattery, and their English copyists have adopted 
 the same tactics ; but the people who have suffered most 
 in France from the success of this Radicalism are the work- 
 ing classes, and the selfsame classes would suffer equally in 
 this countrj'' were these Radical programmes to be carried 
 out. It has ever been a favourite artifice with the political 
 agitator to attack the machinery of Government, and to 
 assure the lower classes that their sufferings would in no
 
 11 
 
 way be alleviated till tlie machinery was radically altered. 
 In France during this century the machinery has been so 
 frequently altered, and so much attention bestowed upon the 
 alterations, that substantial reform for the alleviation of the 
 real sufferings of the people have been neglected, and the 
 quarrels over the alterations of the machinery have caused 
 a bitterness of feeling and class hatred li.ckil}^ up to now, 
 unknown in this country. But were any genuine attempt 
 to be made by a responsible Government in this country to 
 carry out these Radical programmes, feelings as bitter would 
 be aroused, and the prospect of a beneficial practical reform 
 would be postponed for half a century. If the authors of 
 these programmes mean what they say, and intend to prac- 
 tically discard the royal family, and to secure universal 
 suffrage, electoral districts, paid membership, and the aboli- 
 tion of the House of Lords, to act up to Mr. Chamberlain's 
 Birmingham and Bristol declarations before they inaugurate 
 those useful reforms which are to provide a universal happi- 
 ness, then this generation and the next will pass away 
 without seeing even the commencement of this promised 
 happy era. * 
 
 Assuming, however, for the sake of argument, that only 
 fifty years would be consumed in bringing about this so- 
 called rectification of Governmental machinery, the substan- 
 tial reforms promised to be carried by it are of doubtful 
 merit. The first is doubtless substantial enough. It is a 
 formidable piece de resistance to commence the second course 
 with, and reasonable men might well question whether the
 
 12 
 
 time and labour that would be required for its consumption 
 might not be turned to more profitable service. It is nothing 
 less than the disestablishment and disendowment of the 
 Church of England, and the appropriation of such of it& 
 funds as are not required for compensating individuals to 
 secular purposes. Of the abstract merits of this question 
 it is unnecessary to speak now. There can be no doubt that 
 a free Church, or rather many free Churches, in a free State 
 is more consonant with Liberal principles than the establish- 
 ment and endowment of any one Church. In a new colony 
 or State no Liberal or even Churchman would be found to 
 favour a religious establishment as a part of the Constitution. 
 But in England the Church is a part of the Constitution. 
 Starting as an integral portion of the national system more 
 than a thousand years ago, it has grown and thriven with 
 the nation, the Monarchy, and the Constitution. It has 
 traditions of which it may well feel proud, and a history of 
 which it has no reason to' be ashamed. No church or 
 religious body is more tolerant and more comprehensive, 
 and none has interested itself more in the temporal as well 
 as the spiritual welfare of the people at large. Its hold 
 upon the nation is consequently much stronger than Libera- 
 tionists like to think, and sensible men, even if they approve 
 of the principles of disestablishment in the abstract, will 
 count the cost before they engage in the struggle, and 
 consider whether the evils likely to be engendered by it 
 will not far outweigh the good that might be attained by 
 the triumph of the principles. What the public will
 
 13 
 
 have to take into account is this, whether they are willing 
 to postpone all social and other reforms till this great 
 struggle is over. If they possess the common sense upon 
 which as a nation we generally pride ourselves, there can 
 be no doubt as to their views. They will be desirous of 
 seeing other reforms from which they may gain some 
 practical advantage passed first, and then when they are 
 completed they may consider the question of disestablish- 
 ment. 
 
 After the Church has been disestablished and disen- 
 dowed, and its money appropriated, the Radical programme 
 foreshadows a series of domestic reforms which, for the 
 purpose of classification, would come under the four F's 
 which Mr. Chamberlain fabricated in 1873 — Free Church, 
 Free Land, Free Schools, and Free Labour. Up to the 
 present no one has attempted to define the exact meaning 
 of these four portentous F*s ; but, judging from the detailed 
 reform advocated by the anonymous Radical, any attempt to 
 put them into practice would imply an onslaught on the 
 rights of property, a large interference with the liberty 
 of the individual, and a great addition to the power of 
 the central Government. How far the people would stand 
 the amount of interference with individual action which 
 the Radical proposals would necessitate is very doubtful. 
 Government interference in the family matters of the 
 working classes can hardly at present be said to have been 
 attended with unalloyed success, and yet the present inter- 
 ference is as nothing to what is proposed. Compulsory
 
 14 
 
 education lias been accepted with greater complacency than 
 many anticipated, but there are not wanting signs that 
 if it were pressed further than at present it would be the 
 cause of serious discontent. The firmest believers in the 
 beneficial effects of vaccination are also beginning to ask 
 themselves whether the legal compulsion has not been 
 pressed too far. Recognising to the full its advantages, 
 they cannot but admire the sterling and British instinct 
 which induces many parents to resist State interference in 
 the matter, however misguided in views they may consider 
 these parents to be. It is sincerely to be hoped by all well- 
 wishers to their country that the advance of education 
 caused by Mr. Forster's Act of 1870 will in the course of 
 time render the interference of the State both in educa- 
 tional and sanitary matters less than it is now, notwith- 
 standing that the Birmingham Radicals wish to increase it. 
 One of the soundest Liberal principles has always been to 
 limit Government interference to a minimum, to curb the 
 power of the central Government, and to elude as far as 
 possible the multiplicity of those official posts the creation 
 of which seems to form one part of Mr. Chamberlain's 
 creed. 
 
 The more these Radical programmes are scrutinised the 
 more will it be found that the principles advocated in them 
 are counter to the principles of Liberalism as understood up 
 to the year 1880. But some cynical Whig may say. What 
 matters the profession of dangerous principles if those who 
 profess them do not intend to carr}^ them out; and the
 
 1 ) 
 
 15 
 
 important question, he will say, is not what these Radicals 
 profess, but what are their intentions, and about these 
 intentions cynics seem to have little doubt. 
 
 As to Mr. Labouchere, they cannot be brought to con- 
 sider him seriously as a politician. His political actions 
 they look upon as so much excellent fooling, and his article 
 on Democracy they read rather as an amusing burlesque 
 than as a serious political essay. The anonymous Radical 
 they pay no heed to, because they do not know for certain 
 who he is. Some say he is Mr. Chamberlain, others that 
 the articles he writes are written by the inspiration and 
 under the guidance of Mr. Chamberlain. Be this as it 
 may, it is certain that Mr. Labouchere, with whatever 
 nonchalance people may treat him, is, in the House of 
 Commons, next, perhaps, to Mr. Jesse CoUings, Mr. Cham- 
 berlain's warmest and most constant supporter, and the 
 anonymous one in all the reforms he advocates adopts Mr. 
 Chamberlain as the Minister who is to carry them out. 
 The question, therefore, at once narrows itself to what are 
 Mr. Chamberlain's intentions, and it must be admitted that 
 its solution is surrounded with numerous difficulties. His 
 professions are plain enough, but his intentions are dark, 
 and his antecedent history throws but a doubtful light 
 upon them. One thing alone is certain, and that is that he 
 has inflicted incalculable harm upon the Liberal party. His 
 first essay on political matters was a bitter attack upon the 
 Liberal Government of Mr. Gladstone in 1873. In that 
 year Mr. Gladstone was Prime Minister, and as members of
 
 16 
 
 his administration were Mr. Bright, Lord Hartington, Mr. 
 Forster, Mr. Bruce, Lord Granville, Mr. Lowe, Mr. Ayrton, 
 Mr. Goschen, Mr. Stansfeld, and other Liberals, moderate 
 and advanced. These names were then, and are now, con- 
 sidered honourable ones in the ranks of the Liberal party. 
 The attack upon them was made in September, 1873, and 
 yet from the time they entered office up to that date no 
 Ministry in this century had anything like such a record of 
 splendid services rendered to the country in the name and 
 by the aid of the Liberal party. By it the Irish Church 
 had been disestablished and disendowed, the Land Act 
 passed, as well as the Elementary Education Act, the 
 Endowed Schools Act, the University Tests Abolition Act, 
 the Ballot Act, the Supreme Court of Judicature Act, and 
 many others of great if of minor importance to those men- 
 tioned. By it, moreover, purchase in the army had been 
 abolished, the appointments to the civil service thrown open 
 to competition, and the foundations of peace and goodwill 
 betwixt this country and their kith and kin in the United 
 States laid upon a firm basis by the Treaty of Washington, 
 which submitted the Alabama claims to arbitration. These 
 achievements of Mr. Gladstone's first administration, whether 
 compared with what was done prior to it or what has been 
 done since, appear gigantic, and if there be such a thing as 
 remorse in political life, any Liberal who helped to check 
 its beneficial career should feel its keenest pangs. Mr. 
 Chamberlain, however, was not content with sneering at 
 such faithful members of the Liberal party as Mr. Samuel
 
 17 
 
 Morley, and Captain — now Sir Arthur — Hayter, and such 
 ministers as Lord Hartington, Mr. Forster, Lord Aberdare, 
 and others ; but he showed his gratitude to the Premier he 
 is now proud to serve under by abusing him in the strongest 
 language, and ascribing his conduct to the meanest and 
 most discreditable motives. The Liberalism of him and the 
 other leaders was " Liberalism only in name, and was defi- 
 cient in all the characteristics of the great policy which 
 in former times has done so much for civil and religious 
 liberty ; " * it was '^ selfishness witliout organization," and 
 Mr. Gladstone and his colleagues were ^^ leaders without a 
 policy and statesmen without principle;*' and as for the 
 Irish Church and Land Acts, Mr. Gladstone deserved do 
 credit for them, " as they were only undertaken as a matter 
 of expediency. It was to regain office, to satisfy the Irish 
 Irreconcilables, to secure the Pope's brass band, and not to 
 preserve the glorious traditions of English Liberalism 
 that Mr. Gladstone struck his two blows at the upas 
 tree." f 
 
 Mr. Gladstone might well be disheartened at such language 
 and such abuse from members of his own party, and might 
 well be disgusted at the ingratitude of such assailants, and 
 his determination not to meet Parliament again can be easily 
 
 * Fortnightly Review, Sept., 1873, pp. 289, 290. 
 
 t Again, speaking of Mr. Gladstone in October, 1874, he accuses him of 
 having ''promulgated through the country the meanest public document 
 that has ever in like circumstances proceeded from a statesman of the first 
 rank" {Fortnightly Review, October, 1874, p. 412). No Tory has ever yet 
 brought a charge of "meanness" against the Prime Minister. Mr. Cham- 
 berlain has the honour of standing alone as the accuser.
 
 18 
 
 understood. A few montlis after tlie appearance of this attack 
 upon him he dissolved Parliament, and appealed afresh to 
 the constituencies. Those who, like Mr. Chamberlain, con- 
 tributed to compass his defeat, have the satisfaction of 
 reflecting that the result of their tactics has been, up to the 
 present, six years of Conservative Government, and nearly 
 four more years of Liberal impotence, and what is coming 
 in the future appears to be rather chaos and confusion than 
 steady political progress. 
 
 Of course Mr. Chamberlain's opinion of the character and 
 achievements of the Premier in 1868 — 1873 is now altogether 
 changed. He who was "mean '* and " selfish " and " without 
 principle or policy," who sacrificed a great Church and all the 
 landlords of Ireland from the lowest motives of " expedi- 
 ency," he now describes to his Bristol audience as " our 
 great chief and leader," and to the people of Wolver- 
 hampton as the " eminent statesman " whom he, Mr. 
 Chamberlain, is " proud to follow." * The achievements 
 of the administration he attacked with such unprecedented 
 virulence he now admits to be superior to those of any since 
 the Reform Act of 1832, and with becoming modesty he 
 allows that it compares favourably even with the one 
 of which he is so distinguished a member, and of which he 
 has no mean opinion. t What his opinion would now have 
 been had he not been admitted into the Cabinet in 1880 it 
 
 * See Times, December 5th, 1883. 
 
 t " If the present Government were to go out of office to-morrow, I think 
 I may say we should leave behind us a record of legislation which, for 
 completeness and importance, will compare favourably with the legislation
 
 19 
 
 is impossible to say. Not that Mr. Chamberlain ever 
 wanted office. However mean and selfish may be the 
 views and motives of most Liberals, his are not. His esti- 
 mate of the morality of the majority of Liberals is a very 
 low one, but then he is different from them. He is not as 
 other men. His very description of himself, as compared 
 with others of his party, brings this clearly out. Speak- 
 ing at Sheffield on the 1st of January, 1874, he says, " I am 
 glad to be an advanced Liberal, if that means that I intend 
 to use every opportunity I can gain or the influence I pos- 
 sess to advance my Liberalism, and not as some politicians 
 do, use my Liberalism to advance myself. I fear there are 
 too many men of that stamp already in the House of Com- 
 mons, and I will not lift my little finger to go in as one of 
 that company. They talk the cant of Liberalism* but they 
 will not do its work. They have the watchwords of the 
 great Liberal party always on their lips, and when they are 
 called upon to justify the professions they have made, they 
 always have some excuse ready to their hand why they 
 should sit still and fold their arms in masterly inac- 
 tivity." * 
 
 of any similar period since the Reform Act of 1832, excepting perhaps the 
 first few years of Mr. Gladstone's former Administration. (Cheers)." — 
 Bbistol Speech, Times, November 27th. 
 
 * Times, January 2nd, 1874. The world evidently does not know who 
 are its really high-principled and virtuous men till they declare themselves. 
 Mr. Labouchere is just as lofty and ingenuous a character as Mr. Chamberlain. 
 He says, " Whilst Whigs, Conservatives, and Moderate Liberals are actuated 
 by the paltry ambition of appending Right Honourable to their names, and 
 are quarrelling for the spoils of oflfice, we (! !) look steadily to the triumph 
 of our principles." — Fortnightly Review, March, 1883, p. 381.
 
 20 
 
 If Mr. Chamberlain's estimate of himself and of others is 
 a correct one, and if in his sayings and writings he is to be 
 taken at his word, he of all men must be most miserable. 
 Everything that he did not want ten years ago has now hap- 
 pened, and nothing that he did want has come to pass. In 
 the same article in which he showered abuse upon Mr. Glad- 
 stone and the Liberal party, he also set forth his own pro- 
 gramme, and the pressing reforms his heart yearned for he 
 classified under the heads of *' Free Church, Free Land, 
 Free Schools, and Free Labour,'' and with prophetic spirit 
 he declared " that no one of ordinary foresight and intelli- 
 gence will doubt that every item of it will be secured be- 
 fore twenty years have passed away." More than ten years 
 have now elapsed, and what has happened ? He did not 
 want to " use his Liberalism to be advanced," but in spite 
 of this heroic spirit of self-denial he has been advanced. 
 He jeered at the *' "Windsor uniform ; " but stern fate has 
 condemned him to wear it, and strange to say he figures in 
 it wherever circumstances offer an opportunity for its dis- 
 play. Notwithstanding his objection to titles, and the con- 
 tempt that his ally, Mr. Labouchere, has for those who wish 
 to append " Right Honourable " to their names, he is com- 
 pelled to accept the title, and his Radical friends never 
 lose an occasion of advertising him and it in large letters. 
 In spite, too, of his almost superhuman unselfishness, and 
 of his intense sympathy with the poverty of the poor, he has 
 been forced to draw ever since 1880 £2,000 a year out of 
 the coffers of an impoverished nation ; and worse still, when
 
 21 
 
 called upon to put his principles into practice, he has been 
 obliged to have an " excuse readily at hand why he should 
 sit still and fold his arms in masterly inactivity." It was 
 only on the 13th of June last that Mr. Chamberlain had on 
 his lips, like the naughty Liberals he held up to the reproba- 
 tion of the men of Sheffield, "the watchwords of the great 
 Radical party '^ — universal suffrage, electoral districts, paid 
 membership ; but when, some few days afterwards, some 
 earnest members of the Battersea Radical Club asked him 
 to embody these noble watchwords in legislation, he is ob- 
 liged to tell them that *' public opinion must ripen consi- 
 derably before it could be possible for any Government to go 
 further '' than what all parties. Conservatives, Liberals, and 
 Radicals, are agreed upon, namely, the " assimilation of the 
 borough and county franchise," and that the " final settle- 
 ment" which the Battersea Radicals pine after, and he, Mr. 
 Chamberlain, has promised, '' must be postponed." He 
 wanted Free Church, Free Schools, Free Land, and Free 
 Labour. Yet each of these questions is nearly what it was 
 when he penned his article ten years ago, and he himself 
 has not raised " his little finger " to alter them ; and the 
 only alteration that has taken place is in respect of the land, 
 and that alteration is entirely due to one whose misfortune 
 it is to be both a Conservative and a Peer, namely, Lord 
 Cairns, the late Lord Chancellor. 
 
 A man must have a heart of stone not to sympathise with 
 him in his disappointments. He himself certainly bears 
 them with great fortitude. He has recently appeared fre-
 
 22 
 
 quently before the public. He never attempts to hide his 
 light under a bushel. He is frank and ingenuous to a fault. 
 Notwithstanding the destruction of all his hopes he appears 
 cheerful, in excellent spirits, even jaunty, and, if a schoolboy 
 phrase may be excused, " cocky." 
 
 The cynical Whig has an easy explanation of it all. He 
 cannot help chuckling over it. He will tell you that his 
 admission to the Cabinet has proved a great success — a 
 standing proof of the statecraft of Mr. Gladstone. " Why," 
 he will say, "if he had not been in the Cabinet he would 
 have abused the Premier and his colleagues in language 
 tenfold stronger than he used in 1873 ; he would have 
 starred the country arm-in-arm with Mr. Bradlaugh, and 
 raised such a hullabaloo on the Duke of Albany's allowance 
 that the Ministry would have shaken in their shoes and 
 would have pushed obstruction to such lengths that not only 
 all legislation but all government would have been stopped ; 
 whereas now that his official appetite has been satisfied he 
 is perfectly content to vote for royal dowries, never attempts 
 to pass any Radical measures, but confines himself to 
 making magnificent professions and wholesale promises for 
 the future. They deceive the masses, but otherwise do no 
 harm." 
 
 However much this explanation may recommend itself to 
 cynical Whigs, it cannot be accepted by the Liberal party. 
 If Mr. Chamberlain's professions are genuine, the carrying 
 of them out means a gigantic revolution. If his intentions 
 are only to parade them, to catch the applause and the votes
 
 23 
 
 of tlie ignorant, it means a gigantic imposition. It is as 
 disgraceful for the Liberal party to have any connection 
 with the latter as it would be wrong for them to attempt to 
 bring about the former. The dilemma is complete, and it 
 is not probable that the country will allow them to 
 escape from it, unless they disavow both the one and the 
 other. 
 
 Admitting for the sake of argument the correctness of the 
 cynic^s contention, it must also be further admitted that 
 Mr. Chamberlain's presence in the Cabinet has done serious 
 harm to the country. It has impeded legislation. It was 
 impossible for the Conservative party to have suffered a 
 worse defeat than they did at the last election, and when 
 the Liberals came into power their prospects were as bright 
 as those of the Opposition were gloomy. The -first check 
 was the admission of Mr. Chamberlain into the Cabinet. 
 It was a shock to all the moderate men of the Liberal 
 party, and they should be a great majority if the party is to 
 do anything, and it at once put heart into the opposition 
 of the Conservatives. Mr. Chamberlain's attitude has always 
 been one of defiance, which, however imposing it may 
 appear to crowded audiences, is not calculated to promote 
 business. Members of the House of Commons, notwith- 
 standing the degradation that the caucus and its paid 
 servants try to impose upon them, have some little self- 
 respect left, and for the transaction of business a policy of 
 conciliation is preferable to a policy of threats and bullying. 
 The latter, however, is in favour with the Birmingham
 
 24 
 
 Eadicals and their organs ; and the Cloture, proposed and 
 carried in this spirit, and the minatory declarations of Mr. 
 Chamberlain on the platform at the time, created an irri- 
 tation and acerbity of feeling which proved sufficient to 
 paralyse the arm of the Government. He is pleased to 
 put down legislative sterility to Conservative obstruction. 
 Whatever obstruction there was was invited. He has an 
 unfortunate faculty of instilling into any question he takes 
 up an amount of bitterness and political venom which neces- 
 sarily makes its calm consideration impossible. No more 
 striking example of this unhappy talent could be mentioned 
 than that of the housing of the poor. Till he touched it it 
 was free from the vicious contamination of party politics. 
 The nature of the question itself is such as to appeal to the 
 tenderest and most sympathetic feelings of mankind. It is 
 not new. For more than forty years her Majesty the Queen, 
 the late Prince Consort, Lords Shaftesbury and Fortescue, 
 and the late Lord Harrowby, with Mr. Peabody and Sir 
 Sydney Waterlow, Miss Octavia Hill, and a number of others, 
 have taken a warm and practical interest in the subject, and 
 the result of such interest is evidenced by the fact that 
 many thousand artisan families are lodged in excellent tene- 
 ments, in which they can live healthy lives, while the 
 example of these model buildings has led to a general 
 improvement. That much remains to be done is true, and 
 hence the advantage of such writings as *' The Bitter Cry 
 of Outcast London,'' and Lord Salisbury's article in the 
 National Review. Whether people agree with or differ from
 
 25 
 
 the proposals in either of these publications, no one can find 
 fault with the spirit in which they are written. The ap- 
 pearance of Mr. Chamberlain on the scene at once changes 
 the aspect of affairs, and a social question of the deepest 
 interest and the highest importance is by him converted 
 into a political catspaw. 
 
 He begins by a gross misstatement of facts. *' JN'ever 
 before was the misery of the very poor more intense, or the 
 condition of their daily life more hopeless and degraded." 
 Discontent is the fulcrum of the Eadical agitator, and if it 
 does not exist he tries to create it, and if it does exist he 
 tries to intensify it. This alone can account for a statement 
 so opposed to fact. Bad as the condition of the poor un- 
 doubtedly is, and much as there may be to improve in that 
 of the working classes generally, the condition of* both the 
 one and the other has improved most steadily during the 
 last fifty years. This is no reason for giving way to that 
 spirit of thankfulness which signifies rest and a folding of 
 the hands. It is, on the contrary, a strong reason for being 
 thankful for the past, with a firm determination to continue 
 with renewed energy in the course that up to now has 
 proved so advantageous. Mr. Chamberlain does not think 
 so. He wants to change the course that has been so 
 successful, that it is likely to destroy the trade of the 
 Birmingham Radicals, and so endeavours to turn the mind 
 of the public away from the miseries of the poor to the 
 iniquities of landlords. They alone are to blame, and they 
 must suffer if the poor are to benefit. " The expense of
 
 '26 
 
 making towns habitable for the toilers who dwell in them 
 must be thrown on the land which their toil makes valu- 
 able.'' 
 
 This proposition sounds very simple, but why is not the 
 wealth which their toil creates to share the expense ? 
 Charity begins at home, and Mr. Chamberlain's connection 
 with Birmingham is sufficient to induce him to consider 
 the condition of his poorer neighbours there. 
 
 An eminent American, Judge Kelley, the father of the 
 House of Eepresentatives at Washington, has recently 
 been travelling in England and taking notes of the con- 
 dition of its people. Speaking of the midland capital he 
 says : " At Birmingham and its environs there are three 
 principal industries in which women are largely employed 
 — that is to sajy chain-making, brick-making, and the 
 galvanizing of iron. The last trade is one which ruins 
 the health of the workwomen more than any trade I know 
 of, and yet it is the one which they for the most part 
 prefer, because they can gain one shilling a week more than 
 they can at brick-making, the wages of the galvanized -iron 
 workers being seven shillings a week." This is a very 
 shocking state of things. Amidst these hard-worked and 
 underpaid poor women, and probably by their very aid, Mr. 
 Chamberlain made the enormous fortune which he now 
 enjoys. No one wishes to say that he is to blame for the 
 condition of these unfortunate women. Causes which 
 neither men nor laws can affect are probably at the bottom 
 of it. But he is quite as much responsible for it as is the
 
 27 
 
 landlord for tlie condition of the labourer or for that of 
 the poor of London. 
 
 Were Mr. Chamberlain himself an anchorite, or a monk 
 living on plain fare and wearing mean apparel and distri- 
 buting his goods to the poor, nobody would condemn the 
 jeremiads he preaches against wealth and the wealthy, how- 
 ever useless they might consider them. But for one who is 
 clothed in purple and fine linen, and who fares sumptuously 
 every day, to denounce purple, fine linen, and sumptuous fare 
 strikes people as somewhat incongruous. Yet as he himself 
 has a princely income, for which '' he toils not, neither does 
 he spin ; '' as he lives in a stately mansion, which he has 
 recently built at a cost that would supply a hundred artisan 
 families with model dwellings ; as that mansion is furnished 
 and appointed with a luxuriousness and sumptuotisness in- 
 finitely greater and more costly than that of the houses of 
 nine-tenths of the landlords of this country ; and as to the 
 cultivation of that one flower, which, to use his own words, 
 he " so wantonly displays " in his button-hole, he devotes 
 annually sums of money sufiicient in amount to clothe, 
 house, and feed comfortably a score of his poorer neigh- 
 bours, he must not be surprised if the working classes, when 
 they realise these facts, as they will do, look upon his de- 
 declarations as nothing more than examples of glaring 
 hypocrisy. 
 
 As for the ''unearned increment" he talks of, if he will 
 explain the diff'erence in the increment of an acre of land 
 bought at £100 and sold at £200, and of a gas-share bought
 
 28 
 
 at the same and gold at tlie same respective prices, lie will 
 render a service to political economy. 
 
 'Not only, however, has Mr. Chamberlain's presence in the 
 Cabinet impeded legislation, but it has had a most baneful 
 effect upon the government of Ireland. Mr. Bright recently 
 called Mr. Parnell and his followers "rebels," and Lord 
 Hartington at Accrington accused them *' of seeking to 
 influence the hatred of the Irish people against their English 
 fellow -subjects, and allying themselves with those who use 
 violence and force to gain their ends," and further declared 
 that " it was impossible for any English party to have any 
 common connection or any political alliance with them." 
 However impossible this may be for an English party, it is 
 not so for a Cabinet Minister. Up to 1880 Mr. Chamberlain 
 was Mr. Parnell's ally. The alliance has never been dis- 
 claimed on either side, and it is an open secret that there 
 is constant communication between them now, and that 
 practically they work together. This secret alliance is far 
 more dangerous as well as far more disgraceful than an 
 open one would be. If Lord Hartington would only say 
 that he would not act with any colleague who was party to 
 such an alliance or compact, and would follow up his words 
 by deeds, he would not only have the Liberal party but 
 the whole country at his back. 
 
 If fear of Mr. Chamberlain's power with the masses is 
 the reason for retaining him in the Cabinet, the sooner that 
 fear is faced and discarded the better for the Liberal party. 
 If his influence with the working classes were as great as
 
 29 
 
 his friends boast and his adversaries fear lie would not 
 so often flatter them. Flattery is a potent weapon for a 
 time, but it is apt to pall. Mr. Chamberlain is never tired 
 of using the phrase, " the people,'' and proclaiming what 
 wondrous marvels " the people can do ; '' but the working 
 classes of this country, like the rest of their countrymen, 
 rich and poor, are not deficient in shrewdness and common 
 sense, and when they hear Mr. Chamberlain say that 
 "government by the people means government for the 
 people,*' they may bethink themselves of the definition of 
 American democracy, " Government of the people by the 
 people for the benefit of senators," and putting " Govern- 
 ment with Mr. Chamberlain in it " in the place of senators, 
 acknowledge its appropriateness in this country. They, 
 like all classes, are liable to be mistaken ; but they know 
 how to rectify mistakes — as witness the case of Dr. Kenealy 
 and the men of Stoke, and the result of the great Magna 
 Charta agitation. All that is wanted is for them to know 
 the facts of the case ; and the more the history of the last 
 fifty, and especially of the last ten, and more especially 
 still of the last four, years is known, the less power will 
 Mr. Chamberlain have with them. 
 
 Ever to have admitted him into the Cabinet was an 
 egregious blunder. Cabinet Ministers are not philosophers 
 with theories to propound, or preachers of righteousness 
 with doctrines to teach, but men with certain views upon 
 political subjects, and the sole object of their being in 
 power is to put their views into practice. If they cannot act
 
 30 
 
 up to their views, they have no right in the Government. 
 Mr. Chamberlain has proclaimed his views on the housetop, 
 and if they are objectionable and impracticable it is the 
 bounden duty of his colleagues to cease to act with him. 
 His theory seems to be that he may remain in the Govern- 
 ment so long as there is a chance of them carrying out a 
 hundredth part of his programme, or perhaps in the hope of 
 tripping his fellow-ministers up and getting more than they 
 bargained for. It is quite certain that had the Liberal 
 party been connected in any with such disloyalty to the 
 Crown as was implied in his Birmingham speech in June, 
 or with the revolutionary programme he has recently been 
 putting forward, they would not, at the last election, have 
 had a majority at the polls; and it is equally certain that, 
 unless the Liberal leaders purge themselves from this dis- 
 loyalty, and disavow publicly and openly the profession he 
 makes, be his intentions what they may, at the next 
 election many of those who voted with the majority will 
 be found giving their vote in favour of the Conservative 
 leaders, in the hope that they may play better the part Lord 
 Hartington assigns to the "Whigs, and so *' direct guide, 
 and moderate" future popular movements that "beneficial 
 changes may be brought about '^ by the calm and '' peaceful 
 process of constitutional acts." 
 
 PRINTED BY J. S. VIRTUE AND CO,, LIMITED, CITY ROAD, LONDON.
 
 
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