supplementary estimates for South Africa, bringing it up to £3,340,000. For the coming year, however, he estimated, supposing there were no changes of taxation, a revenue of £81,560,000, and an expenditure of £81,486,472. But it was no longer possible to postpone payment of past deficits. These had accumulated to a sum of £8,000,000. He proposed to pay this off by creating £6,000,000 of annuities terminable in five years, and meeting the yearly charge for them by adding £800,000 a year to the service of the National Debt. As this would relieve the Government from its existing payments for interest on Exchequer Bonds, the fresh revenue needed to meet the payments for the new annuities in reality came to £589,000, and not £800,000. As to the remaining £2,000,000 of deficits, Sir Stafford Northcote seemed to trust to luck for their payment. The additional revenue he proposed to get by a revision of the Probate Duty. As he increased the Succession Duty on personal property, and left that on land untouched, the Budget was extremely unpopular with the landless class. But even his scheme as it stood, with its £6,000,000 added for five years to the National Debt, and its £2,000,000 of postponed deficits, involved the sacrifice of his Sinking Fund for paying off the debt. Virtually the Government told the electors that they had brought Britain to such a pass, that she had to abandon for five years her scheme for paying off her National Debt, in order to clear off £6,000,000 of their deficits.
On the 24th of March Parliament was dissolved, and the new writs were made returnable on the 29th of April. Lord Beaconsfield’s Manifesto, however, had been issued in the shape of a letter to the Duke of Marlborough, Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, on the 8th of March. In this letter he called on the people to support the Ministry in order to give England an ascendency in the councils of Europe, and check the Home Rule movement in Ireland, which was “scarcely less disastrous than pestilence or famine.” This movement had been patronised, he declared, by the Liberal Party, whose “policy of decomposition” was meant to destroy the Imperial character of the realm. On the other side, the leaders traversed all Lord Beaconsfield’s insinuations. They scoffed at his Foreign Policy, asserted that it was pretentious, futile, and costly; they denounced his restless turbulence and his bankrupt finance, and, though they declared against Home Rule, they promised to give Ireland equal laws and equal rights with England. When the struggle began it was predicted in London that Lord Beaconsfield’s majority would be so vastly increased that the Liberals would be ostracised from power for a generation. As the contest proceeded it was noticed that at Liberal meetings no man could mention Mr. Gladstone’s name without being stopped by prolonged outbursts of cheering. That had happened in 1868, and it was a bad omen, whereupon it was said that the Tories would come back with only a slight reduction in their majority. Finally it was admitted, when the first day’s returns came in, that Lord Beaconsfield’s majority had vanished, and that he himself had fallen from power. The incidents of the struggle were curious. Mr. Gladstone’s campaign in the North was a marvellous achievement, and the sustained passion and energy of his attack on the policy of the Government, alike in principle and detail, seemed to paralyse the Tory leaders. Lord Hartington’s political duel with Mr. Cross in Lancashire completed the wreck of that Minister’s reputation, already damaged by his abortive Water Bill. Lord Derby’s letter to Lord Sefton (12th March) intimating his inability to support the Ministry and his adhesion to the Liberal Party, was a cruel blow, struck at the Tory Party in their most formidable stronghold. Sir William Harcourt and Mr. Lowe vied with each other in rendering Ministers ridiculous. Mr. Bright roused the conscience of the nation against their warlike policy. Mr. Chamberlain and Sir Charles Dilke stirred the latent socialistic sympathies of the masses. As for the Irish vote, it was cast solidly against the Tories, in order to avenge the passage describing Home Rule in Lord Beaconsfield’s letter. Looking back on this historic election, it is amazing to find how few Ministerial speeches of importance were made. Lulled into a false sense of security by the support of the London Press and the gossip of Pall Mall clubs, Ministers seem to have permitted their opponents to talk them down. As for the result, why dwell on it? The first day’s Borough elections destroyed Lord Beaconsfield’s majority. The Counties deserted him in the most unaccountable manner. In Scotland the Tory Party was almost obliterated.[161] In Ireland two-thirds of the Members elected were Home Rulers. The net result was, that when the Election was over, there were returned 351 Liberals, 237 Tories, and 65 Home Rulers. The verdict of the country, therefore, was this: the electors were more afraid of Lord Beaconsfield’s Foreign Policy than of Mr. Gladstone’s Irish Nationalist sympathies. The sweeping reforms which he was pledged to demand and support by his Midlothian speeches did not displease the country so much as Lord Beaconsfield’s manifest reluctance to pledge himself to a strong programme of domestic legislation.
While the elections were taking place the Queen was abroad. Little dreaming that the verdict of the people would destroy Lord Beaconsfield’s Ministry, she had arranged to visit Hesse-Darmstadt to be present at the confirmation of the daughters of the late Princess Alice, and after that ceremony to spend a brief holiday at Baden. Her Majesty returned to England on the 17th of April, and on the 28th of April Ministers resigned office. Lord Beaconsfield was not present on the occasion. He had bade farewell to the Queen on the previous day. After the results of the Election were known strenuous efforts were made to prevent Mr. Gladstone from becoming Prime Minister. The general opinion, however, was that, as Lord Beaconsfield’s fall from power was due mainly to Mr. Gladstone’s energetic and persistent criticism of his policy, Mr. Gladstone ought to take the responsibility of forming a Government. His own views on the subject can be gleaned from two letters which he wrote to Mr. Hayward. In one he seems to resent the idea of taking any office lower than that of the Premiership, supposing he took office at all.[162] In another he tries to explain away a statement he was alleged to have made to a reporter of the Gaulois, who asked him in November, 1879, if he would resume office, and to whom he replied, “No; I am now out of the question.” He (the reporter), says Mr. Gladstone, “rejoined, ‘Mais vos compatriotes vont vous forcer.’ I said, ‘C’est à eux à déterminer, mais je n’en vois aucun signe!’ I meant by these words to get out of this branch of the discussion as easily as I could. My duty is clear: it is to hold fast by Granville and Hartington, and try to promote the union and efficiency of the Party led by them.”[163]
In the ordinary course it was the duty of the Queen to send first for the actual Leader of the Opposition, who was Lord Granville. On the contrary, the first Liberal statesman summoned to Windsor was Lord Hartington, who, when he arrived there on the 22nd of April, it was remarked, declined the use of one of the Royal carriages, and strolled in a leisurely manner to the Castle. He informed her Majesty that a Liberal Ministry which was not headed by Mr. Gladstone could not command the confidence of the country. Next day the Queen sent for Lord Granville, who went to Windsor, accompanied by Lord Hartington. His advice was to entrust Mr. Gladstone with the formation of a Cabinet. They returned to London, and, after an interview with them, Mr. Gladstone proceeded to Windsor and received the Queen’s commission to organise a Government. Whenever Mr. Gladstone became Prime Minister the Whigs (who had secretly done their utmost as a Party to prevent his return to office) swarmed round him like a cloud of locusts. The Whigs and moderate Liberals were, as of old, to have all the comfortable places.
As for the Radicals, they would, it was suggested, be amply repaid for their services by a few of the minor offices under the Government, by including Mr. Bright and Mr. Forster in the Cabinet, and by offering a seat to Mr. Stansfeld, whose health prevented him from accepting it. That, however, was not the view of the Radicals. North of the Humber they constituted the bulk of the Liberal Party. Their system of representative Party organisation, invented in Birmingham and popularised by Mr. Chamberlain, had enabled them to consolidate the opposition to the Tories, to prevent double candidatures, and to win seats that, under a looser form of discipline, it would have been hopeless to contest. If Mr. Gladstone was the Napoleon,
MR. CHAMBERLAIN.
(From a Photograph by Russell and Sons.)
Mr. Chamberlain was the Carnot of the campaign. The cry went forth that some uncompromising Radical must have a seat in the Cabinet, and Mr. Chamberlain was suggested as the fittest person to select. But what had Mr. Chamberlain done? His speeches—hard, brilliant, and clever—were permeated with “socialism.” Good Tory matrons were said to frighten their unruly babes with the whisper of his name. In Parliament he had chiefly distinguished himself by his obstructive tactics and his revolt against Lord Hartington’s leadership. He was even a more persistent opponent of the Monarchy than Sir Charles Dilke, who had abandoned the advocacy of Republicanism for the critical study of Foreign Affairs. Mr. Gladstone’s chief objection to Mr. Chamberlain was that he had no official training. Lord Hartington (who knew, to his cost, that his obstructive opposition in the House of Commons could be most embarrassing), on the other hand, was in favour of including Mr. Chamberlain in the Cabinet. So was Lord Granville, who probably thought that there was no surer way of muzzling a dangerous Republican than that of making him a Cabinet Minister. Still, the Whig antagonism to Mr. Chamberlain was too strong to be ignored, and a compromise was arrived at when office was offered to Sir Charles Dilke. He, however, refused to take any place unless one advanced Radical, at least, was included in the Cabinet, and he said that Mr. Chamberlain should be chosen. After much intriguing Mr. Gladstone yielded, and Mr. Chamberlain became President of the Board of Trade. At the end of April the Cabinet was complete. Mr. Gladstone combined the two offices of Premier and Chancellor of the Exchequer; Lord Selborne was Lord Chancellor; Lord Granville, Foreign Secretary; Sir William Harcourt, Home Secretary; Lord Hartington, Indian Secretary; Mr. Childers, War Secretary; Lord Northbrook, First Lord of the Admiralty; Lord Kimberley, Colonial Secretary; Mr. Bright, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster; Mr. Forster, Chief Secretary for Ireland; the Duke of Argyll, Lord Privy Seal; Mr. Dodson, President of the Local Government Board; Lord Spencer, Lord President of the Council. Outside the Cabinet, Mr. Fawcett became Postmaster-General; Sir Charles Dilke, Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs (the office which he specially desired, and for which he was specially qualified); Sir Henry James, Attorney-General; Sir Farrer Herschel, Solicitor-General; Mr. Mundella, Vice-President of the Council; Mr. Adam (the famous Whip), First Commissioner of Works; and Mr. Shaw-Lefevre, Secretary to the Admiralty. Mr. Lowe was sent to the Upper House with a Peerage as Lord Sherbrooke. Mr. Goschen (whose opposition to any extension of Household Franchise to the counties rendered him impossible as a Cabinet Minister) was sent as a Special Ambassador to Constantinople. Sir H. A. Layard was not recalled, but he was granted an indefinite leave of absence. Lord Lytton having resigned the Indian Viceroyalty, Lord Ripon was appointed in his place.