National Union of Conservative & Constitutional Associations

“ Lord Hartington has been good enough to inform us that the object which the Liberal majority in the House of Commons ought to have in view is not general but particular. The aim of the reform of Parliamentary procedure about to be attempted is not the relief of the House of Commons from disorder, from disgrace, and from impotence, but merely the enactment of certain political proposals enumerated by his lordship. ”

“ That the ancient forms devised "by gentlemen for gentlemen" have come to be employed in a very different spirit, and for objects altogether extra-, or, indeed, anti-Parliamentary, is now unhappily notorious. To arrest particular legislation so long as any good purpose could be served by further discussion, or even to secure the postponement to another Session of novel proposals on which public opinion was imperfectly or not at all matured—these have always been recognised among the legitimate objects of a patriotic Opposition. ”

“ One more consideration may deserve a moment's thought. What is called the Irish party is barely, even after two years' experience of the present Government, a majority of the Irish members. It is certainly a very small minority of the House of Commons taken altogether. It will not be difficult, in the event of the clôture being adopted, to legislate for Ireland as a general rule over the heads of this minority after they have been gagged by an obsequious rush of those gentlemen to whom "coercion is only a hateful incident." ”

“ What we want is such a restraint upon the licence of individual members as may make ordinary legislation practicable. What the Cabinet wants, or at least says that it wants, is such a suppression of the right of speech of minorities as may make extraordinary legislation a mere registering of the decrees of an omnipotent Minister. The country which desires to have its business done thoroughly, carefully, and effectually, is disposed to regard the fondness with which ancient Parliamentarians cling to ancient forms as something not very far removed from the pedantry of Dryasdust. ”

“ If we had not greatly at heart, as all loyal subjects of the Crown have greatly at heart, a real simplification of our Parliamentary forms, we might be very grateful to the Secretary of State for India for an avowal which must paralyse the action of his colleagues on the only question which these ardent reformers seem to think of approaching in the coming Session. ”

“ They have seen only too clearly, and too recently, how a conspiracy against Parliamentary government, developed by a handful of resolute and unscrupulous desperadoes, encouraged and stimulated by independent members—i.e., by candidates for office in the next Administration—excused, if not commended, by party leaders equally ungenerous and shortsighted, can be rendered an effectual method of bringing to a standstill the whole Parliamentary business of the Empire. ”

“ Gladstone has not inspired absolute confidence as to the public spirit or prudence with which he may be expected to handle the very delicate structure of our Parliamentary liberties, his first lieutenant has most miserably contrived to make his task tenfold more arduous. Lord Hartington usually passes for a comparatively discreet politician. When a man of this sort makes a blunder it usually is one of almost prodigious magnitude. ”

“ The enfant terrible of a Government is always a source of anxiety to his friends, but if he occupies, as he generally does, some humble post which enables his chief to profit from time to time by his almost irresponsible eccentricities, he may be kept about the premises as a creature not altogether without his advantages. ”

“ Yet it will not be well to be too confident in the fidelity to be expected from the present House of Commons in representing the views of their fellow-countrymen out of doors. "The House of Commons is, and it may be hoped ever will continue to be, above and beyond all things a free assembly. ”

“ Gladstone unhappily, as has been already shown, had not by his recent declarations done much to inspire this confidence. He has shown that while he is ready to suppress the utterances of a large minority of the Irish members upon a question of absolutely vital importance to the Irish people while he is in office, he has been no less willing to palliate offences of the most unabashed faction when they have served to embarrass a Government to which he has been opposed. People out of doors, who, like other lookers-on, see most of the game, cannot but think that Obstruction in Mr. ”