to pass by those who elected it. The Franchise Bill and the Bill which admits women into Parliament are betrayals and nothing else. As far as we know they were not demanded by the country. No election had justified their passage. A House kept in being to fight Germany has used the trust reposed in it to upset our decent Constitution. We believe that a majority in the House was opposed to the Franchise Bill. We know that a majority of the House, had it been left free to record its own opinion, would have voted against the admission of women to Parliament. But it was not left to itself. By a sort of blackmail it was forced to support a Coalition, which was determined to force through such measures as the most of the members of Parliament deplored. And it has come to this, that a majority of the House thought one way and voted another, and thus has forfeited its right to the title of "honourable " carelessly flung across the House, It is gradually dawning upon our politicians that they are not respected. They need not pretend surprise. A man who solemnly records an opinion, which in his heart he does not hold, does not deserve and rarely obtains honour or respect. When opportunism is the prevailing doctrine, you can look for nothing better than an organised cunning. To take one example: the new Franchise Bill, passed by an obedient, unconvinced House, gave the vote to a vast mob of women. When the women were agitating for the vote by means which should have excluded them for ever from meddling with the government of the country, they proclaimed aloud that the vote would satisfy them. They had no desire to sit in Parliament, oh dear, no! The vote was the thing, and they asked no other privilege. Before they had ever oonfronted a ballot-box, they demanded the right to sit in the House, and the tame members, fearing that if they did not acquiesce they might lose some votes at the next election, gave an eager and silent assent. Everything, then, is possible. The Coalition proposes this or that measure independently of the House or of the country, and finds an instant support from the well-drilled mob which is supposed to represent the free and independent electors. The Coalition has transformed our Constitution without any scruple of conscience, without a "mandate," and without asking the poor silly sheep of an elector what he thought about it. The Coalition, moreover, absorbing into itself all members of the House who do not belong to the Labour Party, will henceforth do whatever it likes. Even Mr Asquith, that veteran leader of the lower middle-class, professes now to be the ardent supporter of Mr Lloyd George. Thus he submits to the necessity of the moment, and we need not take his profession very seriously. There is soarcely a single opinion which he has not held and dropped since the place on the roll, you will be hoodwinked, and before you are many years old you will find yourselves involved in the old morass of protective duties with all its disastrous consequences." Poor new electors, who never heard of the Paris resolutions! Whichever side they take in their innocence of heart, they will find themselves hoodwinked by one or other of the many Mr Asquiths, who have endeavoured, with beginning of the war. He took upon himself the credit of the Paris, resolutions, and presently came forward as the outspoken champion of the oldfashioned Free Trade. He sat by the fireside of the Liberal Party and mumbled about his old faiths, as though they meant something to him or to anybody else. "Take next Free Trade," said he, to an accompaniment of cheers. "Here Liberalism, through its authentic representatives, this view or that, to claim speaks with no uncertain their support. sound." No uncertain sound, indeed! This echo of the political gramophone can be interpreted only with irony. You can't speak with "no uncertain sound" both of the Paris resolutions and of Free Trade. The sound of such words as these trembles with uncertainty. The voice is always the voice of Mr Asquith; the sound varies according to the occasion. The begetter of the Paris resolutions now finds it opportune to deplore the economie boycott. One section of his party is itching to get to work again with the Germans. It longs to welcome the Hun, who stole French women and flogged English prisoners of war, back to its counting-house. And here is Mr Asquith, in forgetfulness of brave words spoken a year or two ago, eloquent in support of Germany's friends. "Let us know definitely and clearly," says he, "who is for us and who is against us. Otherwise I warn you quite frankly, and particularly the new electors who for the first time are taking their When Mr Asquith gets among his friends he is frank in his self-satisfaction. He still pretends to believe that the Bill for the Self-Government of Ireland, "for which, as you will remember, we Liberals have fought for more than the lifetime of a generation, and which in principle we have already placed upon the Statute-book," is indispensable for the happiness of Ireland. He dares still to pride himself upon having clipped the wings of the House of Lords, and is olever enough to say not a word to those who are blessed with short memories about the debt of honour which he has made no attempt to pay. What has the great Liberal Party got to do with debts of honour? A far sterner purpose lies ahead of it-to get back into office by hook or by orook; and with Mr Lloyd George's cast-iron, invincible Coalition in front of it, it must know that success in the House of Commons is impossible for it. In the last four years the world has 1918.] Malice and Ignorance of the Labour Party. changed for England, and Mr Asquith knows it not. He believes, with a touching simplicity, that we are still busied with the problems which before the war aroused his welldrilled audiences to enthusiasm, and that he has only to mention Free Trade or the House of Lords to evoke an immediate response. Poor man! We are almost disposed to be sorry for him. If he wastes too much time in the thankless task of flogging dead horses he will be too late for the poll. At last he begins to fear for his own position. Messrs McKenna and Runciman may be staunch in loyalty, or they may not be. In any case, they are not enough to make a party. And Mr Samuel-is he a tower of strength in a British Parliament? Mr Asquith, then, having spoken with the old familiar voice at Glasgow, suddenly made the astounding confession that he was in complete agreement with Mr Lloyd George. Is he, we wonder? Mr Lloyd George, a chameleon, has been able to assume all the colours. Mr Asquith is not so easy a reflector as Mr Lloyd George, and when he tells us that "he could add nothing nor withdraw anything from the Prime Minister's speech," you perceive clearly enough what a juggle is politics, and you are persuaded that it matters very little what Mr Asquith thinks or does not think. Mr Lloyd George's cast-iron Coalition has but one opponent -the Labour Party. The VOL, CCIV.NO. MCCXXXVIII. 841 Mr single merit of the Coalition is "If being that Mr Barnes is a fate of Russia teaches them blackleg. Messrs Webb and B. Shaw are dangerous men. Perhaps they are less dangerous within the Labour Party than they might be without it. They arouse evil suspicions and they darken counsel. When all was said and done, the upshot of the Labour Conference was that their sacred members, who are said to engross the wisdom of all the ages, refuse to have anything to do with the government of the British Empire. Their elegant reply to the Coalition is that there is "nothing doing." On the other hand, they demand to be represented at the Peace Conference. And they are 80 stupid that they cannot see the anomaly. If they refuse to their members the right of belonging to the British Cabinet, how shall they claim for themselves the right of interfering with the terms of peace? Of course the inference which they would have us draw is that they alone are fit to cure the evils of Europe. And the the truth is that they could not be trusted to keep a Board of Guardians in order. And many of them are Bolshevists, pure and simple. The on nothing. They still dream of murder. One orator pleaded for howitzers; another declared that the Bolshevists in Russia had put up a finer fight for Labour than had ever been put up in any country in the world. Mr Ramsay Macdonald bleated after his wont, and Mr Henderson, who is reputed to be less clever than the mountebank Mr Shaw, was good enough to say that "the world must be reconstructed the basis of human brotherhood." How little understanding he has of politics or of history. "Why should we not plead," he asked, "for a defeated enemy? We must think with an international mind." An international mind is no mind at all, and if Mr Henderson pleaded successfully for a defeated Germany, Germany would never know the pains of defeat. The truth is, the Labour Party consists chiefly of fluent, half-baked, foolish persons, who are ready, from mere vanity, to destroy the world. And their ignorance and volubility are the best argument in support of the Coalition, which will certainly be tyrannical, but which may save us from the terrors of Bolshevism. 20 INDEX TO VOL. CCIV. ADMINISTRATIVE CONTROL, not under AIR, CHANGE OF, 178. AMERICAN TROOP CONVOY, WITH THE, AMONG MAHOMMEDANS IN THE PUNJAB, BAGHDAD KERMANSHAH ROAD, THE BENCH AND BAR OF ENGLAND, THE, 598. CHANGE OF AIR, 178. Paying guest on -VII., At the Mansion-house, 47— 461-XIV., The Pocket-book, 464- Collins, Mr Clifton, an old contributor COLT, THE UNKNOWN: A Story of the Education Bill, Mr Herbert Fisher's, 137-the future of the "young per ESCAPED ADVENTURES IN GERMAN EXPERIENCES OF A WAR BABY, 815. I., FORGOTTEN CAPITAL OF THE NEAR EAST, |
