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Leader (1850-1860), 18th September 1858, Edition 1 of 2, Page 966, :, • .^. : . __ TT ^WQ KJ)X)Cl~* XlVmk / mLJ v . r^wrff fc °& aV 1^ \ ^ ^ - ^% (1 y \ ML? 4 P^ (oS ^ ¦ ?

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      Untitled Article

      NOTICES TO CORRESPONDENTS . ww notice can be taken of anoiiymous correspondence . Whatever ^ ntfncled for insertion must be authenticated Wthe nteieand address of the writer ; not necessarily ft * publication , but as a guarantee of his good faith . rt is impossible to acknowledge the mass of letters we receive Their insertion is often delayed , owinj ? to a press of matter ; and when omitted ,, it is frequently from reasons quite independent of the merits of the coinmuuica-Ve cannot undertake to return rejected communicatiohs .

      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 . —Du . Arnold .

      Untitled Article

      STATE OF PARTIES COMMITTEE . If the present Government were frankly to avow itself only a provisional Government * and were re garded as suck by the public , there would be no great objection to the position which it occupies , or to the men which' compose it ; but it is understood to advance itself as a fair representative of the country ; and while its members remind us that office was thrust upon them rather than sought , they appear to think they have some right to hold office on their own terms so long as they submit to the most distinct political conditions of the day . If

      and employed in our political system , the Manchester party would have been able to take at least a second haif in the action of the Opposition . The wan £ of rank amongst its leading men would have been no ground for their being kept back had it not been that the prejudices of certain leaders on subjects of war , perhaps of class relations , and certainly trading relations , have rendered the party not popular all over the country , and have abridged the number of its supporters out of doors . For these reasons the principal sections of the Liberal party have been drawn more widely asunder from each other , and have been enfeebled in their own action ; and of the several parties into which the House of Commons is cut , of the five parties , the three "Liberal sub-sections and the two Conservative

      subsections , the Ministerial party is that which brings together the greatest number with the most positive desire to co-operate . It is powerful through the backslidings ot its opponents , strong in their divisions ; but still it fails to supply conditions which have , heretofore been considered essential to the permanent occupation of office . We see the same government of minorities in the colonies ; but that is explained by the fact that a responsible Government is comparativel y new in the British settlements ; that society itself in those distant provinces is undergoing constant alteration ,

      with every local circumstance contributing to uusettlement , and that before Ionsp probably a little more schooling in the business of representative institutions will cure this local defect . We show the same anomaly , notwithstanding our long experience and the boasted perfection of our representative institutions ; can we acquiesce in such a state of things as permanent ? Will the middle class be content to see the upper classes exposing their owii ineompetency to govern the country , and yet

      retaining ^ access to office as if it were their privilege ? With such an exhibition of weakness at head-quarters , would the working class be content to stand excluded ; nay , would any parliamentary party , retaining a spark of political conviction or pride , consent to the permanency of such political anarchy ? It is scarcely possible that our political decline has gone so far as that point ; if it had done so we might confess that we have been seized with political phthisis .

      One of the causes of continuance , however , is of a very simple and obvious kind ; it is the difficulty of bringing a constitutional question to any practical issue on the basis of any inquiry that interests the public at the moment . The House of Commons is cut up into sub-sections , which neutralise each other on almost every political or practical question , and the Administration de facto has a great advantage in the opportunity of balancing one Opposition against another in a House where there is a small 'Ministerial party and four smaller Oppositions . The first attempt at a political rescue lay in the design of forming an independent Liberal

      party . There were meetings in one of the committee-rooms ; Right Honourable gentlemen—no man under a Right Honourable could bo thought of—were named as the leaders of the party . Some hoped that Lord John might , consent to resume his post , others even thought that Lord Palmerston might be induced to own his fault , to mend his ways , and to take up his placo again as leader of the Liberal Opposition ; which , restored to its strength as a consolidated majority , would at once turn the Derby Cabinet out of office ,

      arid re-enter Downing-street in easy- triumph ; The divisions between the Liberals , however , have been aided by the willing and complete submission of the Tories to act under Liberal dictation , lay aside their old principles , and prooced upon the modern priiv ciplos heretofore monopolised by the Liberals . This coupling of Liberal failure with Tory succession to the business of Liberalism , has thrown all our Parliamentary calculations at fault ; it threatens , indeed , to undermine the very ground of responsible Government j for it calls upon us to acoept as Ministers men who have been all their lives opposed to

      jLibeml , prinoiplos . and who , if they have any consistonoy , any matuTiT ^^ n ^ gmeiii ^ an ^ sinceri l ^ - aro from the training and the habit of their lives most likely to turn round at a oritioal niomont and resume their allogianco to Tory principles . Wo continuo to maintain a Tory Govornmon < j in oflioo therefore , at our own peril ; with a groat probability that so long as wo do so we shall weaken every kind of Liberal influence , break down every sort of Liberal connexion , and hand ovor the country to be again the sport of some heavon-born Ministor of

      they will execute Liberal measures they hold themselves free to remain in power , although they are not Liberals , but Tories . Some of their leading members ^ indeed , might very justly disclaim that title ; but what of that ? They must sever thems elves from the more earnest and consistent of their older follower ^ ; an . d the Ministry would then be in the peejvfiar condition of having within itself a J Lafrgtal "Ministry with a Tory Opposition , or vice versa . Lord Derby , or Lord Stanley , or Mr . Disraeli might remain as head of a new Liberal Government if that weeding of the old Tory elements had been effected ; but the Government as it is ,

      with its origin stamped upon it , is for all permanent purposes a political impossibility ; and so long as is remains in office uuchstnged , it stamps the situation as an unterminateel crisis . Meanwhile there are two serious objections to any prolongation of the crisis , or to any maintenance of the present Government in power while its party and political relations continue unaltered . First , the majority in Parliament is debarred from its political right of possessing the Government ; secondly , the de facto jExeoutive is exposed to bo obstructed by party combinations , of the actual majority , These objections

      so strike at the root of our constitutional system , that they form in themselves sufficient reason either for removing the Ministry or for compelling it to adapt itself to its future , We freely admit that the causes , of the situation do not lie at the door of the present Ministers ; they have been passive ; their utmost responsibility consists in accepting power thrust upon them . The reasons for their entry into office lie with altogether different sections of the parliamentary class ; we see the causes of the Derby Ministry in the actual condition of the Liberal party . Before the last session was over , Lord Palmorston was unable to muster a majority oven of Liberals . Ho saw the Opposition

      sometimes led by Lord John Russell , somotunos by Mr . MUner Gibson , or by anybody else who took up the question of the day . Ho was obliged to sur-Hfe"KdeTiriOTesistance « of ^ And on the breaking up of Parliament he seemed to retire from political Ule to his estates in Ireland , or to his sympathisers on the Continent—anywhere but the poHtioaJ society of England . Lord John Russell ana his friends had tho moat magnificent opnor « trinities open before thorn for resuming the load of the Liberal party , and their own . backwardness was ' the solo reason why they did not resumo that load . From its connexion with tho middle class , whose rights have never yet been suflioiently recognised

      Untitled Article

      THE PRESS IN BELGIUM AND PIEDMONT . Since the press of France has been deprived of its freedom , that of the two neighbouring kingdoms which retain the privileges of constitutional rule has become of more intrinsic importance , as well as of more sympathetic interest to Western Europe . The influence of English journalism is undoubtedly greater in the Cabinets and salons of foreign states . The bureaucracy of the Continent , and tho coteries that in most of the large cities continue to indulge in political gossip in spite of tho police , continue one way or other to enjoy the luxury of knowing from time to time what public opinion in this country is talking about . Even where the most liberal

      English journals arc most strictly contraband , their contents , especially when they happen to be a good many degrees " above prooi , " are certain to bo found " entered inwards ; " and so conscious is absolutism that the arts of political smuggling nro invincible , that wo continually soo in the . semiofficial prints of Paris , Naples , and Vienna ohiborfttc replies , tp , accusations which , according to the theory of ' paternal governments ; ought novor- {¦<> ¦ have been read within their confines , or , if read , could only have provoked derision . But , after ml , the influence of English iournalism is a mtc ' utHtc \ » w «

      its direct influence abroad is necessarily conllmd , in a great measure to professional or amateur politicians . For tho many , whether in Italy , Germany , w tlio constitutional states of Northern Europe , oho S » out-spoken , well-writtcn popular journal , in , t renew or Italian , is worth half a down London newspapers of the highest merit . Tho sentiments oi the British Parliament and people recorded in \ im

      powodwaHpiMBgja ^ MMi ^ utmost momont on many orlticlo oconsiownwo ' - ' neighbours , but it is incapable of suppl , ym g ino wants of communities whoso antecedents , nicus , and dialects arc so widely dissimilar . I he F <»» of Paris used to boast that a perusal of its con ion » was an indispensable of polUiowl life throug hout tho Continonfi ; and from 1830 to 1850 this i > » oertain sense wns true . But sinoo tho > ' <»» * 1 . "A «« I of BonapavtiBin , that . brilliant , though oltcnUW

      Untitled Article

      absolutist doctrine . At present , the state of things is only like a laborious joke ; but at the next stage it may be no laughing matter , and our solicitude is increased by reflecting that not a man among us is clever enough to guess " what next . " It has heretofore proved impossible to raise an issue which shall lead us out ol this entanglement . The Liberal party scheme has proved a failure ; we have found that we cannot trust in particular persons as habitual leaders . ; if Ministers were beaten on their India bill , they accepted the measures of their opponents as far as they must—they havoundertalien to neutralise even the claim for reform

      by adopting it . There is no motion to be made about the influence of the Crown , " which has increased , is increasing , and ought to be diminished . " No independent Liberal eould obtain much' attention fora motion " on the state of the nation , " sinccthe nation is very tranquil and rather more prosperous than it has been recently . There has not been yet any . wholesale parliamentary corruption-Perhaps the best mode of dealing with the difficulty is , as usual , the direct mode . The substantial fact is ,, that our system of government by Ministers of the Crown , under a check of responsibility to Parliament is , at this moment , a failure , because the

      authority of Parliament is neutralised by the subdivision of parties . If we were to hazard a judgment on the actual condition of the political world , we might say that the materials for our ¦ constitutional system have come to an end , and that the system fails for want of the men or the circumstances . which ; give it effect . What will be the next stage in this national disorganisation ? The question would justify any member of sufficient energy and courage , who should next session move for a select committee to inquire into the state of parties with

      reference to the construction of Government / n nd the relations of the Executive to Parliament :. The report of the committee—if its inquiry were properly conducted , and it summoned the proper witnesses before it—would be one of the most interesting historical commentaries upon our political history ever produced ; but long before that si age , the mere development of the motion , and the . discussions to , which it would give rise , would bring the whole subject of the dead lock under active debate , and possibly to a practical issue .

      Untitled Article

      066 T H . E L E ABE U . [ No . 443 , September 18 , 1858 ,

      Untitled Article

      SATURDAY , SEPTEMBER 18 , 1858 .

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  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 18, 1858, page 966, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2260/page/14/