On this page
- Departments (2)
-
Text (11)
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
-
- — —-— : - —— -—-^— #ht Ml it <3^i.(! ^ U*i U ^ ^ | j\ rt 11 h ?
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
-
-
Transcript
-
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
No . 471 , Afrnt 3 , 18591 THE LEADER . 433
Untitled Article
THE REFORM DEBATE . The majority of thirty-nine against Ministers has proved to be larger than anyone perhaps expected .. On all hands it is felt to be conclusive of the fate of the ' measure , and of the Cabinet , at least as it has been hitherto constituted . At the end of a seven nights' debate , Mr . Disraeli gravely reiterated his opinion that the town franchise could not , with safety , be lowered . A majority , in the fullest House there has been for many years , has emphatically declared that some change in that direction must be made . False as the promise
may prove to popular hope , it is fatal to Mr . Disraeli as an official leader . He must , for the present , retire from the post he has filled with so much credit and courage during the last twelve months . If that were all , the vacancy might easily , bo filled up , as we have already hinted , were Mr . Gladstone disposed to undertake the task of preparing a new bill General Peol and Lord Salisbury are , as ie well known , anxious to resign ; and their places might without much difficulty be filled by more acceptable and useful men . We doubt ,, however , if any attempt of the sort will be made , Unless in the event of a failure to form a Government , by one
or other of the Whig Oppositions . JJ \) to the present hour the gangway between them lias certainly not been bridged , and we have no reason to think that at present it will be . The difficulty does not consist , as is commonly imagined , in the personal rivalry of Lords Palmerston . and J . Russell , but in the mutual repugnance of their respective adherence to one another , and in the incompatibility of their political views . Assuming that Lord Derby will not , without some further justification , advise tho Queen to dissolve Parliament , he must ,
we think , inform tho House of Lords on Monday night , that he 1 ms tendered his x'osigimtion , and that ho has advised tho Queen to confide tho tunic of . forming a new Administration to Lord John Russell . But how that veteran cabinet maker is to secure a sufficient amount of siippovt in tho present Parliament , wo own ourselves at a loss to oonjeoturo . Sooner or later , the other two sections will infallibly unite to crush him 5 and crush him they onsily will , unless ho makes up his mind promptly and umntetnlconbly to play out for tho support of tho people .
The opinion we have expressed regarding the temper and the character of the present House of Commons , has been painfully verified by the debate which has been prolonged to an extent so unusual . Nobody can regard it as wanting in ability . There have been many clever speeches made on either side ; and some have been preeminently distinguished by logical and rhetorical power . But throughout there has been manifested an utter absence of faith in great principles , loyalty to high traditions , or generous confidence in the people . From first to last it has ; been obviously a
cold and selfish game of parties and individuals , calculating the odds and playing for power . Lord John Russell set a bad example at the outset , and too closely has it been , followed . Sitting below the gangway , and surrounded by the only men in the Liberal party who command , to any extent , the confidence of the many out of doors , he might have taken up a position which would have placed him at the head , for the rest of his life , of the temperate but earnest friends of progress . He ought to have known , that from the moment he made himself inevitable as a Liberal minister , every
intrigiiiii" - and reactionary ' Whig . 01 the Grey and Clarendon school would be at his beck , and ready to . do his bidding . But instead of saying out plainly what he deemed essential to any satisfactory Reform Bill , either as regards the suffrage or redistribution of seats , Lord John contented hunself with making a speech which ,, if the printers had prefixed to it the name of-Sir Charles Wood , or Sir Cornewall Lewis , nobody would have read with " -surprise . There may have been some degree of policy , though we confess we doubt it , in framing his resolution vaguely as to the franchise : but there could , be nothing / - but imprudence and impolicy in bringing it forward without one hearty or thorough-going phrase in favour of expanded . privileges , and rights too long withheld . A chill caught in the morning is
seldom shaken off during the day ; and the benumbing effects of Lord John ' s temporising prologue have been felt throughout the whole of the drama subsequently enacted . Out of doors the consequences have been still more palpable . There has not been a sentence of cordial or genial sympathy in the aim of the amendment , in any public journal of weight or influence . In terms , more or less sarcastic , it has been treated as a well-manufactured drag-net to catch votes , in order that by the weWit of-the cargo the wily steersman might be enabled to run down a lighter boat . But the personal game to be achieved has been far more obvious than any certainty of advantage to the popular cause ; the people have looked on , during the struggle , with indifference , and learnt its result ¦ without emotion .
It was not until after a week ' s experience of the consequences of this mode of proceeding , nor until after it had been turned to damaging account by Lord Palmerston that Lord John ' s co-laborateur in the production of the resolution attempted to repair the mischief . But Sir James Graham , though a marvellously clever administrator and political critic , is not the man to infuse confidence into a party . Every Government would be glad to have the use of his pen and his tongue ; out who , either in or out of oflice , oares a farthing for what Sir James Graham calls his opinion ? Like tho woman of Saiuaria , he has had many
of thorn , ou < l that in such ' quick succession that nobody can toll if the one that ho now professes to have is really liis or not . For want of a better , however , the weathercock member for Carlisle was put up to declare , that by a further extension of suffrage in towns ho and his noble friend meant the present municipal franchise , which comes pretty nearly to the same thing , in most places , as a Gl . rating ; for , under tho Small Tenements A-et the greater proportion of Si . and Al . tenements are rated in the name of the landlord , and their occupants , therefore , could not bo counted , in general ,
as an element of inoroasc . What is worse is the condition of three years' continuous residence , and two years and a half paymont of rates . Wo veiy much dotibt if ; in country towns , this supplementary suiThvgo would add 20 per cont , ^ on an averago , to tho constituencies : in London , and other largo cities , it would ¦ ¦ virtually amount to no addition at all . This , aftov a week ' s cogitation , is tho upshot of the grand move , for sake of whioh the Cabinet , if not tho country , is to be turned upside down . Mr . Walpolo had already intimated that ho would have no objection to go thus far } and
Lord Palmerston and his friends , as well as Mr . Gladstone and those who follow his lead , were all long since committed to a 61 . franchise by the bill of 1854 . Finally , it is apparent , . from the speeches made by Sir Biilwer Lytton , Sir : Stafford Northcote , and Sir John Pakingtoii , that art influential section of the Cabinet would have no insuperable qualm about going thus far , provided only they had been driven into it quietly in Committee , and not kicked into it before the second reading . The
unanimity , in fact , which prevails in the present House in favour of doing as little as possible , is quite edifying ; and so little scope do the ascertainable differences between rival parties , on the score of the suffrage , afford for argument or display , that in the speech of Mr . Horsman , as in those of several other niembersj no allusion whatever was made to the subject . . Unquestionably , the two most remarkable exhibitions of intellectual courage and adroitness , were those of Lord Palmerston and Mr . Gladstone . Both are evidently playing against Lord John Russell for the leadership of the House of Commons . The
former could hardly have found a decent excuse for refusing to follow " his noble friend , the member for the City of London , " in a general demonstration in favour of reform . But having agreed ^ to vote for the motion , in order to save the mark with the Wobum Whigs , and the wavering Radical , the next thing to be done was to damage the proceeding as much as possible , with a view to conciliate the bulk of the Tories . T . hfe arrogant and insolent tone in which Lord Palmerston addressed those Avho happen to sit on the Treasury bench , did not provoke the same resentment from the mass of the country gentlemen- who sit behind them . Nor was
it intended to do so ; on the contrary , the whole drift of his -lordship ' s 1 speech -was more conservative by some degrees than Lord John ' s ; , and as it was a great deal better conceived and delivered , it was far more acceptable to them . They could not fail to remember , that it was he , af ter all , who had broken up the Cabinet of 1852 , on the morrow of its producing something like a good bill ; that he had quitted the Cabinet of 1854 , sooner than consent to a better one ; and that he had himself been the head of a Cabinet subsequently for three years , ¦
which had contrived to exist without . having any bill at ¦ . all . No one except Mr . Gladstone could have a chance for the lead of such a House as the present , after such a speech from Lord Palmerston . The meniber for the University felt that ho must bid something still higher in the way of resistance to change , and he resolved , accordingly , to become the champion of nomination boroughs . It is all very well for people to say , how could so clever a man think of taking tip with such antiquated notions ? For our part , we see nothing strange whatever in it . Mr . Gladstone * sees , that after the
courses of bleeding and purging it lias « vmc through—first under the hands of Sir Robert Peel , and ' more lately under those of Doctor Disraeli , and his assistants—Toryism , if ifc is to live at all , must have some marrow put into its bones , It has gone on conforming and conceding ,. throwing up and giving out , until it has hardly a leg to stand upon . Any amount of unpopularity with the unenfranchised many ., or of antagonism with another sect of the privileged few , would be better than Gladstone well
this . There arc besides * as Mr . knows , great and powerful ' influences in Church and State , in country and town , in camp and Court , which only need a resolute and eloquent champion to rally thorn around the old flag of Toryism . We bclievo this to be Mr . Gladstone ' s purpose , and if ho adheres to it we believe he will succeed . But as for Reform , let the people bo assured that nothing worjth having will bo granted I » y tho present House of ' Commons . If Reform there is to bo , it must be carried out of doors .
Untitled Article
THE RUSSO-FBKNCH ALLIANCE . AVmathvisk . may bo thoug ht of ltuajiiiu strategy , it is impossible to dftputo tho diplomatic sktli During the latter portion of lust year the influcnco of tho Gsar was iwotl successfully _ to stimulate French and Sardinian ambition at the expense of Austria . Genera encouragement was hold out to both with a lavish hand , iuMlvrh . cn some difficulty was made , about the matrimonial alliance between tho House of Buonaparte and that of Savoy , tho Grand Duke Constantino did not diaduUi to become special attorney in the matrimonial suit , which , xindor his auspices , was
Untitled Article
There is nothing" so revolutionary , because there is nothing so unnatural and convulsive , as the strain to keep things fixed when all the world is by the very law of its creation in eternal progress . —Dr . Arkold . . a— —_ . ¦ . ¦ '
- — —-— : - —— -—-^— #Ht Ml It ≪3^I.(! ^ U*I U ^ ^ | J\ Rt 11 H ?
fflubtiq glfairs .
Untitled Article
Untitled Article
OFFICE , NO . , CATHERINE-STREET , STRAND , W . C ., The commodious premises formerly occupied by the Morning Herald .
Untitled Article
NOTICES TO CORRESPONDENTS . No notice can be taken of anonymous correspondence . Whatever is intended for insertion must be authenticated foVthe name and address , of-the writer ; not necessarily for publication , but as a guarantee of his good laith . It is impossible to acknowledge the mass of letters we rereive Their insertion is often delayed , owing to a press of matter ; and when omitted , it is frequently from reasons quite independent of the merits oi the communication . We cannot undertake to return rejected communications .
Untitled Article
No 1 H . MUTUAL LIFE ASSURANCE SOCIETIES WIIX APPEAR IU OUR NEXT . ;
Untitled Article
SUBSCRIPTION TO " THE LEADER . " ONE GUINEA PER YEAR ' , UNSTAMPED , TREPAID . ( Delivered Gratis ) .
Untitled Article
SATURDAY , APRIL 2 , 1859 .
-
-
Citation
-
Leader (1850-1860), April 2, 1859, page 433, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2288/page/17/
-