The Government of England Part 60

[528:4] Rep. of 1896, pp. 71-78.

[529:1] Rep. of 1897, pp. 75-80. One of the arguments in favour of the election of the Executive Committee by the General Committee was that the latter was more fairly representative than the Council, because the delegates to the Council from the part of the country where the meeting was held attended in greater numbers than from more distant places.

[529:2] _Ibid._, 1898, pp. 39, 41.

[530:1] Rep. of 1898, pp. 40-41.

[530:2] _Ibid._, pp. 54-55.

[530:3] "The Ministry of the Ma.s.ses," _Edinburgh Review_, July, 1894.

[531:1] "The Reorganisation of Liberalism," James Annand, _New Review_, November, 1895.

[531:2] "The Future of Liberalism," _Fortnightly Review_, January, 1898.

[531:3] "The National Liberal Federation," _Contemporary Review_, February, 1898.

[532:1] Rep. of 1900, p. 15.

[532:2] _Ibid._, pp. 63-70.

[533:1] Rep. of 1899, pp. 21, 24.

[533:2] The exceptions are rare. In 1903, however, Mr. Bryce moved a resolution on education. Rep. of 1903, p. 20.

CHAPTER x.x.x

THE RISE AND FALL OF THE CAUCUS

_The Conservatives_

[Sidenote: Formation of the National Union of Conservative a.s.sociations.]

Ten years before the National Liberal Federation was founded, a Tory organisation, called the National Union of Conservative and Const.i.tutional a.s.sociations, had been started upon similar lines. After some preliminary meetings it was definitely formed at a conference in November, 1867, where delegates from fifty-four towns and the University of London were present.[535:1] Here a const.i.tution was adopted, which, with the amendments made in the first few years, contained the following provisions. Any Conservative or Const.i.tutional a.s.sociation might be admitted to the Union on payment of one guinea a year, and would then be ent.i.tled to send two delegates to the Conference. This last body was the great representative a.s.sembly of the Union. Like the Council of the National Liberal Federation it was to meet in a different place each year,[535:2] and was composed of the two delegates from each subscribing a.s.sociation, of the officers of the Union, and of such honorary members as were also members of the Council. The Council was the executive body of the Union, and consisted of the president, treasurer, and trustees; of twenty-four members elected by the Conference; of not more than twenty nominated by the princ.i.p.al provincial a.s.sociations; and of such members of the Consultative Committee as were willing to act, the last being a body formed out of vice-presidents and honorary members to which difficult questions could be referred.

In order to attract money, it was provided that any one subscribing a guinea a year should be an honorary member of the Union, that the subscribers of five guineas a year should be vice-presidents with seats _ex officio_ in the Conference, and that any one subscribing twenty guineas should be a vice-president for life. In order to attract t.i.tles provision was made for the election of a patron and ten vice-patrons of the Union. These methods of procuring the countenance of rank and wealth were not tried in vain. In 1869 Lord Derby became the patron of the Union, and on his death he was succeeded by the Duke of Richmond. In the report of the Council in 1872 we read, "the total number of vice-presidents is now 365, among whom are 66 n.o.blemen, and 143 past and present members of the House of Commons." The honorary members at the same time numbered 219.

[Sidenote: Objects of the Union.]

[Sidenote: It did not Try to Guide Party Policy.]

Although the National Union was much older than the National Liberal Federation, it attracted far less notice. During its earlier years, indeed, the Conferences were very small affairs. At the second Conference, for example, in 1868, there were present only three officers and four delegates, and in the two following years respectively only thirty-six and thirty-five persons all told. The chief reason, however, why the Union made so much less stir than the Federation, lies in the nature of the work it undertook to do. The Federation was a weapon of militant radicalism, designed to carry into effect an aggressive public policy, and was considered a serious menace to old inst.i.tutions; but the Union was intended merely as an instrument for helping the Conservative party to win victories at the elections. Its object was to strengthen the hands of local a.s.sociations; while its work consisted chiefly in helping to form such a.s.sociations, and in giving information.[537:1]

For this purpose, it kept a register of all Conservative a.s.sociations, so that it could act as their London agency; it offered suggestions, was ready to give advice, printed and distributed pamphlets, and arranged for speeches and lectures.[537:2] The Union made no claim to direct the policy of the party. At the meeting in 1867, when the Const.i.tution was adopted, one speaker said that "unless the Union was managed by the leaders of the Conservative party it would have no force and no effect whatever," and this was given as a reason for making the honorary members eligible to the Council.[537:3] The matter was put in a nutsh.e.l.l some years later by Mr. Cecil Raikes, one of the founders, when he said that "the Union had been organised rather as what he might call a handmaid to the party, than to usurp the functions of party leaders.h.i.+p."[537:4] In fact, for the first nine years the Conference pa.s.sed no resolutions of a political character at all, and those which it adopted during the decade that followed expressed little more than confidence in the leaders of the party.

[Sidenote: Its Relation to the Party Leaders.]

Mr. (afterwards Sir John) Gorst, who had presided at the first Conference in 1867, was appointed in 1870 princ.i.p.al agent of the party--that is, the head, under the whips, of the Conservative Central Office--and in order to connect the new representative organisation with the old centralised one he was made the next year honorary secretary of the Union.[537:5] The policy was soon carried farther. In their report for 1872 the Council said: "Since the last conference, an arrangement has been made by which the work of the Union has been more closely incorporated with that of the party generally, and its offices have been removed to the headquarters of the party in Parliament Street. This arrangement has been productive of the most satisfactory results, not only by having brought the Union into more direct contact with the leaders of the party, and thereby enhancing the value of its operations, but also by greatly reducing its working expenses." At an early stage of its existence, therefore, the Union took for its honorary secretary an officer responsible through the whips to the leaders of the party in Parliament, and this was openly proclaimed an advantage. No secret was made of the fact that the Union was expected to follow, not to lead; for at the banquet held in connection with the Conference that same year the Earl of Shrewsbury, in proposing a toast to the Army, said, "The duty of a soldier is obedience, and discipline is the great characteristic of the army and navy, and I may also say that in a like manner it is characteristic of the Conservative Union."

[Sidenote: The Conference of 1872.]

The Conference held in 1872 seems to have been the first that attracted much public attention, and it was notable for two things. Mr. Disraeli had insisted that the working cla.s.ses were by nature conservative, and that the extension of the franchise would bring an accession of strength to his party. His opponents, a.s.suming that Liberalism was a corollary of democracy, had laughed at the idea; and although his followers had expended much energy in organising Conservative workingmen's a.s.sociations, the results of the election of 1868 appeared to have disproved his theory. But the meeting in 1872 showed that among the artisans Tories were by no means rare. In connection with the Conference, which was held in London, a great banquet was given at the Crystal Palace, and this caused Mr. Cecil Raikes, the chairman of the Council, to remark: "a few years ago" everybody said "that if a Conservative workingman could be found he ought to be put in a gla.s.s case. We have found for him the largest gla.s.s case in England to-night."

The banquet was also notable for a speech by Mr. Disraeli, which was ridiculed at the time on account of the characteristically grandiloquent phrase, "You have nothing to trust to but your own energy and the sublime instinct of an ancient people."[539:1] Nevertheless it was a remarkable speech, for it laid down the main principles of Tory policy for the next thirty years and more, a feat that is probably without parallel in modern history.[539:2]

[Sidenote: Complaints that the Union was not Representative.]

Although the Conservative party carried the country at the general election of 1874, and Mr. Disraeli, for the first time, came into power with a majority at his back, popular interest in the Union grew slowly.

As late as 1878 not more than two hundred and sixty-six out of the nine hundred and fifty Conservative a.s.sociations were affiliated to the Union, and delegates from only forty-seven of them attended the Conference.[539:3] Yet complaints were already heard that foreshadowed the strife to come in the future. In 1876 Mr. Gorst, the honorary secretary, but no longer the princ.i.p.al agent of the party, proposed to reorganise the Council by making it more representative in character.[539:4] His suggestion was opposed by Mr. Raikes, and was voted down. The next year, however, he returned to the subject, moving first to abolish the Consultative Committee altogether, and then that its members should not sit on the Council. He withdrew these motions on the understanding that the Council would consider the matter; and although other persons also urged that the Council should be strengthened by becoming a more representative body, the only action taken at this meeting was to provide that the Council itself should not propose for reelection more than two thirds of its retiring members.

[Sidenote: Changes in its Rules.]

Mr. Gorst resigned his position as honorary secretary in November, and in spite of continued criticism of the Council on the ground that it was to a great extent self-elected,[540:1] nothing was done to change its composition until after the Liberals had won the general election of 1880. Under the pressure of the defeat the Conference of that year adopted a new set of rules drawn up by the Council itself. They provided that the a.s.sociations should be represented at the Conference in proportion to their size; that the members of the Consultative Committee should no longer sit on the Council; and that instead of the twenty members of the Council nominated by the princ.i.p.al a.s.sociations, who were said to attend little, the Council itself should add twelve persons to its number. This plan of cooptation was destined to open the door for a most audacious attempt to capture the organisation.

[Sidenote: The Fourth Party.]

The chance for a new man to distinguish himself in Parliament comes in Opposition. As Mr. Winston Churchill remarks in the life of his father: "There is small scope for a supporter of a Government. The Whips do not want speeches, but votes. The Ministers regard an oration in their praise or defence as only one degree less tiresome than an attack."[540:2] But in the Opposition free lances are applauded if they a.s.sault the Treasury Bench from any quarter. Moreover, although the game of politics in England is played under a conventional code of rules which are scrupulously observed, a skilful player can achieve a rapid prominence by violating the rules boldly, if he has great ability, high social rank, or wins the ear of the people. These truths were turned to advantage in the Parliament which sat from 1880 to 1885 by Lord Randolph Churchill and his small band of friends, who, in contradistinction to the Liberals, Conservatives, and Irish Home Rulers, came to be known as the Fourth Party. The general election of 1880 had brought Mr. Gladstone back to power, and in the course of this administration he was obliged to face unexpectedly many delicate and difficult questions. The Conservative Opposition was led by Sir Stafford Northcote, a man of decorous rather than combative temperament, who had been Mr. Gladstone's private secretary in early life, and was not inclined to carry parliamentary contests to extremes. The conditions were favourable to a small body of members, something between knights errant and banditti, who fought as guerillas under the Conservative banner, but attacked on occasion their own leaders with magnanimous impartiality.

[Sidenote: Its Origin and Policy.]

The Fourth Party began in one of those accidents that happen in irregular warfare.[541:1] The Bradlaugh case, involving the th.o.r.n.y question whether a professed atheist could qualify in the House of Commons by affirmation or oath, vexed the whole life of the Parliament, and brought together in the opening days Sir Henry Wolff, Mr. John Gorst, Lord Randolph Churchill, and Mr. Arthur Balfour. This case, in which they played successfully upon the feelings of the House, made them at once conspicuous, and taught them the value of concerted action. With a short interruption, caused by a difference of opinion about the Irish Coercion Bill of 1881, the friends acted in harmony for four years. They had no formal programme, and no one of them was recognised as the chief, but it was understood that they should defend one another when attacked, and they were in the habit of dining together to arrange a common plan of action. They took a vigorous part in all debates, criticised the government unsparingly, and under the pretence of a.s.sisting to perfect its measures, spun out the discussions and obstructed progress. They showed great skill in baiting Mr. Gladstone, and when delay was their object, in drawing him by turns into long explanations in response to plausible questions about the clauses of his bills. Their aggressiveness, and their profession of popular principles under the name of Tory democracy, spread their reputation in the country, and gave them an importance out of proportion to their number or their direct influence in the House of Commons.

[Sidenote: Its Attacks on the Tory Leaders.]

Throughout its career the Fourth Party a.s.sumed to be independent of the regular Conservative leaders in the House. At times it went much farther, accusing them of indecision and an inability to lead, which disorganised the party. Lord Beaconsfield's death in 1881 left the Conservatives with no single recognised leader; for Lord Salisbury was chosen by the Tory peers leader of the House of Lords; and Sir Stafford Northcote remained, as he had been in Lord Beaconsfield's last years, the leader in the House of Commons, neither of them being regarded as superior in authority to the other. The members of the Fourth Party a.s.serted that this dual leaders.h.i.+p, by causing uncertainty in the counsels of the party, was disastrous; and they soon settled upon Sir Stafford Northcote as the object of their censure. The attack upon him culminated in April, 1883, when his selection to unveil the statue of Lord Beaconsfield seemed to indicate that he was to be the future premier whenever the Conservatives might come to power. On that occasion Lord Randolph Churchill published a couple of letters in _The Times_ in which he spoke of Sir Stafford in strong terms, and declared that Lord Salisbury was the only man capable of taking the lead. These he followed up by an article in the _Fortnightly Review_ for May, ent.i.tled "Elijah's Mantle," describing the decay of the Conservative party, setting forth his ideas of Tory democracy as a means of regeneration, designating Lord Salisbury as the proper heir to Lord Beaconsfield's mantle, but revealing at the same time his confidence in his own fitness for command. His quarrel with his chief in the House of Commons did not impair his popularity in the country; while his speeches, with their invective against prominent Liberals, and their appeals for the support of the ma.s.ses, caught the fancy of the Tory crowds. Hitherto he had decried Sir Stafford Northcote and praised Lord Salisbury, but he now embarked upon an adventure that brought him into sharp conflict with the latter. Mr. Balfour, being Lord Salisbury's nephew, could not follow in the new path, and before long opposed his former comrade, while the other two members of the Fourth Party continued to support him.

[Sidenote: Lord Randolph Churchill's Plan to Capture the Union.]

In the summer of 1883 Lord Randolph Churchill conceived the bold plan of getting control of the National Union of Conservative a.s.sociations, and making it, under his guidance, a great political force in the party.

Complaints had already been made, as we have seen, that the Council, instead of being truly representative, was in the hands of a small self-elected group of men. In fact the Council had been managed in concert with the leaders of the party in Parliament; while the real direction of electoral matters was vested in the "Central Committee," a body quite distinct from the Union, created at the instance of Lord Beaconsfield after the defeat of 1880 to devise means of improving the party organisation. The Committee had become permanent, and, working under the whips, had exclusive charge of the ample sums subscribed for campaign expenses. In order to achieve any large measure of independent power the National Union must have pecuniary resources, and hence, as a part of his plan, Lord Randolph Churchill determined to obtain for it a share of the funds in the possession of the Central Committee.

[Sidenote: The Conference at Birmingham in 1883.]

The three friends were already members of the Council. Sir Henry Wolff had been there from the beginning. Mr. Gorst, who had taken an active part in its work in the past, had recently been given a seat again as vice-chairman; and Lord Randolph Churchill had been elected a coopted member in 1882 by the casting vote of the chairman, Lord Percy. The first scene in the drama was arranged for the Conference held at Birmingham on Oct. 2, 1883. There, when the usual motion was made to adopt the annual report, a Mr. Hudson moved a rider directing "the Council for the ensuing year to take such steps as may be requisite for securing to the National Union its legitimate influence in the party organisation." He said that the Conservative workingmen should not be led by the nose, and that the Union ought to have the management of its own policy.

[Sidenote: Lord Randolph Churchill's Speech.]

Lord Randolph Churchill supported the rider in a characteristic speech, in which he described how the Central Committee had drawn into their own hands all the powers and available resources of the party. "From that day to this," he went on, "in spite of constant efforts on the part of many members of your Council, in spite of a friction which has been going on ever since, your Council has been kept in a state of tutelage, you have been called upon year by year to elect a Council, which does not advise, and an Executive which does not administer. . . . I should like to see the control of the party organisation taken out of the hands of a self-elected body, and placed in the hands of an elected body."[544:1] He intimated that the Central Committee had used money at the last election for corrupt purposes, and declared that such practices would not cease until the party funds were managed openly. Finally, he said that the Conservative party would never gain power until it gained the confidence of the working cla.s.ses, who must, therefore, be invited to take a share, and a real share, in the party government. Several men spoke on the other side, among them Lord Percy, who repudiated the charge that the Central Committee had spent money corruptly. He said that he and others had been members both of that Committee and of the Council, and that there was a constant interchange of ideas between the two bodies. He was willing, however, to accept the rider upon the understanding that the Conference was not committed to any of the modes of carrying it out that had been suggested. The rider was then adopted unanimously.[545:1]

[Sidenote: He becomes Chairman of the Council.]

Lord Randolph Churchill was elected to the Council, and so were many of his opponents. The parties were, in fact, nearly evenly balanced, but he and his friends had the great advantage of a definite, well-arranged plan. Twelve coopted members were to be chosen, and by presenting the names of prominent men from the large towns, to whom his opponents found it hard to object, Lord Randolph secured a small but decisive majority on the Council. At the first meeting in December he procured the appointment of a committee to consider the best means of carrying into effect the rider pa.s.sed at the Conference. The committee was composed mainly of his friends, and at once elected him its chairman, although according to the custom that had been followed hitherto the chairman of the Council, Lord Percy, should have presided in all the committees.

Early in January, 1884, the committee had an interview with Lord Salisbury, and brought to his notice the uneasiness that prevailed about the party organisation, and the desire of the Union to obtain its legitimate share of influence in the management. Lord Salisbury took the matter under consideration. Meanwhile, on February 1, when the committee reported progress to the Council, Lord Percy protested against his exclusion from the chair, and motions were made to the effect that he ought to preside at meetings of committees; but they were rejected by close votes. Thereupon he resigned his position as chairman of the Council, and as he refused to withdraw his resignation, Lord Randolph Churchill was, on Feb. 15, chosen to succeed him by seventeen votes to fifteen for Mr. Chaplin. Lord Salisbury, however, ignoring the change of chairman, still communicated with the Council through Lord Percy, which exasperated Lord Randolph's partisans.

[Sidenote: Lord Salisbury's Letter of Feb. 29, 1884.]

On Feb. 29, Lord Salisbury, in a letter to Lord Randolph Churchill, replied, on behalf of himself and Sir Stafford Northcote, to the suggestions that had been made to him in January. He began by observing that no proposals had been put forward by the Union, beyond the representation that the Council had not opportunity of concurring largely enough in the practical organisation of the party. "It appears to us," he continued, "that that organisation is, and must remain in all its essential features, local. But there is still much work which a central body, like the Council of the National Union, can perform with great advantage to the party. It is the representative of many a.s.sociations on whom, in their respective const.i.tuencies, the work of the party greatly depends. It can superintend and stimulate their exertions; furnish them with advice, and in some measure, with funds; provide them with lecturers; aid them in the improvement and development of the local press; and help them in perfecting the machinery by which the registration is conducted, and the arrangements for providing volunteer agency at Election times. It will have special opportunity of pressing upon the local a.s.sociations which it represents, the paramount duty of selecting, in time, the candidates who are to come forward at the dissolution. This field of work seems to us large--as large as the nature of the case permits." But he added that any proposal which the Council might desire to submit would receive their attentive consideration.