II.
While the great measure of the Session went steadily through its stages, various other questions were also occupying the Cabinet. The search for a new Speaker in succession to Sir Henry Brand, who had declared at the beginning of 1883 his unwillingness to retain office beyond that Session, was one, and not the least important, of these questions. Sir Henry James was first mentioned, and he refused.
'November, 1883. Some had thought of putting up Dodson, but the Tories had announced that they should run Ridley in opposition to him. There was also a difficulty about filling Dodson's place. Trevelyan was the only man who could be put into the Cabinet without causing the resignation of Courtney and Fawcett, and Mr. Gladstone was still in the humour which he had developed at the time of the offer of the Chief Secretaryship to me, and declared that he would not have the Chief Secretary in the Cabinet, the Viceroy being in it, for this would be to have two Kings of Brentford.'
On November 10th 'Childers seemed the favourite for Speakership,' but on the 12th it was decided that Herschell, Goschen, Arthur Peel, and Campbell-Bannerman, were to be offered the Speakership—in that order. It was known that Herschell would refuse, it was thought that Goschen would refuse on the ground of sight, and Peel on the ground of health, and it was intended that Campbell-Bannerman should have it. Herschell did refuse, but Goschen accepted, and had to be shown by his doctor that he could not see members across the House, that he would be capable of confusing Healy with Parnell…. Peel accepted, and in spite of his bad health took it, and has kept it till this day (1891).'
There was also continuous discussion behind the scenes as to the two important measures of local government reform—for London and for the country.
'By November 8th, 1883, I had succeeded in bringing Harcourt round on the London police matter … to let the City keep their police, and then went to Mr. Gladstone…. After twelve o'clock at night Harcourt joined us, and it was agreed to put both London and local government in the Queen's Speech for 1884.'
Dilke spent much work upon the London Government Bill with Harcourt in
January of that year; but the Bill, having passed its second reading,
was not further proceeded with, owing to House of Commons difficulties.
Sir Charles gives the true reason in a letter to his agent:
'One unfortunate thing about the London Bill is that no one in the House cares about it except Dilke, Firth, and the Prime Minister, and no one outside the House except the Liberal electors of Chelsea. This is the private hidden opinion of Harcourt and of the Metropolitan Liberal members except Firth. I am personally so strong for the Bill that I have not at any time admitted this to Harcourt, and I have only hinted it to Firth….'
When Sir William Harcourt's Bill collapsed, Dilke attempted a minor improvement for the Metropolis by framing a City Guilds Bill, which he described to Mr. Gladstone as following the scheme of the Bills by which the Universities had been reformed. But the Chancellor, Lord Selborne, fought strongly against this proposal: and nothing came of it.
The great scheme for reforming Local Government in England and Wales was meanwhile being considered by the Committee to which it had been referred. Besides Sir Charles Dilke, who naturally acted as Chairman, the Committee consisted of Mr. Chamberlain, Lord Kimberley, Mr. Childers, Lord Carlingford, and Mr. Dodson (who were members of the Cabinet), and Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice. With them were Sir Henry Thring, the celebrated Parliamentary draughtsman, and Mr. Hugh Owen, the Permanent Secretary of the Local Government Board. The task of obtaining agreement, and even sometimes of maintaining order, in a Committee composed of persons representing such a variety of opinion, was no easy one, and it tested to the full the tact and ingenuity of the Chairman. Mr. Dodson, Sir Charles Dilke's immediate predecessor at the Local Government Board, and Lord Carlingford represented the views which had hitherto prevailed in favour of piecemeal and gradual reform. Mr. Chamberlain, Lord Kimberley, and Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice were, on the contrary, supporters of the large Bill which the Chairman had prepared; while Mr. Childers, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, was there mainly to keep a vigilant watch on the local authorities, who were suspected, and not without reason, of desiring to treat the Treasury as a sort of "milch cow," a description which Mr. Gladstone had recently made current in a debate in the House of Commons, Sir Henry Thring was no mere draughtsman. He had had an immense experience of official life, had known every man of public importance over a long period of years, and had very determined views on most subjects, which he never hesitated to express in clear-cut language and without respect of persons. Mr. Lowe, it was asserted, had once observed at a Cabinet just before Thring entered the room: 'I think before he arrives we had better carry a preliminary resolution that we are all d——d fools.' As it also happened, Local Government was a subject on which Sir Henry Thring, and not without reason, prided himself as an expert, and the Committee over which Sir Charles Dilke presided consequently had Sir Henry Thring's views conveyed to them in unmistakable terms. One of his special objects of hostility was the Poor Law Union area, which he hoped ultimately to destroy. On the other hand, Mr. Hugh Owen, like nearly all the Local Government Board officials of that time, regarded the Poor Law and everything connected with it as sacred. The controversies were frequently fierce, and on one occasion a serious crisis almost arose owing to Lord Kimberley asking to be informed if Sir Henry Thring was preparing a Bill of his own or was acting on his instructions.
The Bill of 1884 contained almost everything now to be found within the corners of the two great measures of 1888 and 1894, which, the one passed by a Conservative, the other by a Liberal Government, entirely revolutionized the Local Government of England. It was, however, decided to have no Aldermen, but a few ex-officio seats were created on the County Council. Otherwise direct election was the method chosen for all the new Councils. The administration of the Poor Law was kept within the purview of the Bill, after a long controversy as to the method of electing the representatives of urban parishes on the local Poor Law authority, when such an authority included both a borough and a rural district; and the limit of population that was to entitle a borough to a complete independence from the county authority was raised from the figure originally proposed of 20,000 to 100,000 and upwards.
It had been part of Sir Charles Dilke's plan to include education within the framework of the Bill, making the Borough and District Councils the local education authority, with a limited superior jurisdiction in the County Council. But it was found that almost insurmountable difficulties would arise in adding so immense a proposal to an already large measure, and it had to be abandoned.
Mr. Gladstone expressed a decided view on one portion of the Bill only. He gave his strongest support to the proposal that the price of any increased contributions in the shape of Treasury grants should be the complete reform of the conflict of areas and jurisdictions, which added so much to the difficulties and the cost of local administration. [Footnote: In a speech made at Halifax on October 13th, 1885, which occupies nearly the whole of a page of the Times, Sir Charles Dilke, after the fall of the Government, gave a full account of the proposed measure.]
The question of female councillors inevitably found its way into the discussions, and it was decided in their favour, notwithstanding much divergence of opinion.
'"I am sorry," Childers wrote, "about female councillors, but I suppose I am in a minority, and that we shall soon have women M.P.'s and Cabinet Ministers." This shows that we had decided to clear up the doubt as to the possibility of women serving as councillors, and distinctly to give them the opportunity of so doing. When Ritchie afterwards introduced portions of my Bill, he left this doubtful, and the Lady Sandhurst decision was the result.' [Footnote: See for "Lady Sandhurst decision," infra, p. 17.]
Sir Charles differed from other members of the Committee in the desire to make the county and not the Local Government Board the sole appellate authority from the district. 'I would, indeed,' he says, 'have gone farther, had I been able to convince my colleagues, and have set up an elective Local Government Board for England.'
Owing to the Parliamentary position, progress with any large measures of reform was, however, difficult even in the preliminary stages; and the road seemed to get more encumbered every day, for the period now under review indicates the high-water mark of Parliamentary obstruction in the skilled hands of the Irish Party and Lord Randolph Churchill, who successfully defied the feeble reforms of procedure of 1882. So it came about that early in 1884 Sir Charles was found rather mournfully writing to Mr. Gladstone:
'We produced to-day our last draft of the Local Government Bill, and had our funeral meeting over it, I fear. I wish to tell you with what spirit and skill Edmond Fitzmaurice has gone into the matter. He is the only man I know who is fit to be President of this Board.'
In the autumn of 1883 Sir Charles made what was rare with him, a kind of oratorical progress. He spoke at Glasgow, at Greenock, and lastly at Paisley, where he received the freedom of the burgh for his services connected with the commercial negotiations. His speech at Paisley naturally dealt with commercial policy, and drew an admiring letter from Sir Robert Morier, who was then just bringing to a head the offer of a commercial treaty with Spain. The Cabinet, however, had been much inclined to issue a general declaration on the subject,
'Mr. Gladstone and Lord Granville being against all commercial treaties, I for good ones and against bad ones, and Chamberlain for punishing Italy for her conduct to us.' [Footnote: 'March 5th, 1883.—We turned to Tariff Treaties: Lord Granville and Mr. Gladstone wishing for a general and abstract declaration against them, and I, with support of Childers, urging most strongly the other view. The proposed declaration was a gratuitous piece of folly, for we were not called on to say anything at all.']
When the proposed treaty with Spain, and the changes in duties which it would involve, were before the Cabinet on November 10th,
'I am afraid I played upon Mr. Gladstone's favourite weakness (next to praise of Montenegro)—namely, abuse of the Customs, a department for the routine of which he always had a perfect loathing.'