keep Mr. Asquith in or turn him out. We are ruled by those whom Mr. William O'Brien calls the "Molly Maguires." Mr. O'Brien and Mr. Healy, who will take an independent line against Lloyd Georgeism, return with seven or eight followers after waging a desperate fight for their political lives. They lead a minute new Party sworn to resist the Budget to the death. They are chastened and maturer men; they are in many ways more reasonable men; and they are quite fearless men. They have begun the work of making a new 'political Ireland; and they may succeed, or may at least establish the conditions which in that difficult land may help others after them to succeed. But in the meantime Mr. Redmond, who rules Mr. Asquith, is himself ruled by that cruder but eloquent young man who could easily talk Mr. Lloyd George to a standstill, and whose electioneering energy would reduce any member of the late Budget League to a limp rag-Mr. "Joe" Devlin, the leader of the "Molly Maguires." Thus Mr. Asquith will hold office, if at all, as the political agent of the "Molly Maguires." The House of Lords as a real influence must be pulled down by the "Molly Maguires," since Mr. Asquith can have no majority but what they supply him with on terms. Free imports are to be maintained at a price by the "Molly Maguires," who themselves are Protectionist to a man. If Mr. Asquith seeks to compromise the Crown, he can only ask for five hundred new Peers to be created upon the plea that he has the support of the "Molly Maguires." Not only is the Union of the kingdom to be broken up, but Preference is to be suppressed and the closer union of the Empire prevented by the " Molly Maguires." What do the counties think of it? What do the boroughs think of it? What thinks the North? And what the oversea dominions, who were a little inclined to miss the inward meaning of this struggle until the result of the General Election made the situation plain?

But there is a little note to be made upon the margin. By no means free from mutinous stirrings against the political influence of the Church, the "Molly Maguires" go as yet in wholesome awe of the clergy. There is one thing they will not do. They will not, just because they dare not, go wrong on education. Mr. Lloyd George and the Budget League have helped to return a strong majority of the next House of Commons against the

M

educational policy of the present Government and its Nonconformist supporters. Where is Sir Robert Perks? And why did his late constituents of the lost Louth division so prematurely tear his picture from the wall? He was exceedingly far-sighted. The Prime Minister's position on Home Rule is at present ambiguous. His Chief Whip, before being ejected from the Saffron Walden division, bought the Irish vote in the boroughs, and then sought to sell it in the shires, where nobody would bid. Mr. J. A. Pease says there is "no pledge" on Home Rule. Mr. Redmond says there is complete security. He would be ruined in Ireland in a week if he did not say so. But in this business

the country has to do with the Prime Minister, and will demand from him at the very outset of the new Parliament a plain declaration of his intentions. Mr. Redmond, in mortal fear of being repudiated, now offers to make all possible concessions and to endure any extent of delay. Let the preventive power of the House of Lords be got rid of, he says, and the Irish Party will be able to do what it likes with the House of Commons. The Irish leader is at pains to let England know where she stands. Mr. Redmond therefore desires the Government to continue in power. He will agree to say nothing about Home Rule, and will even pretend not to think about it if only he can induce Mr. Asquith to proceed with the "House-breaking," which the Nationalists desire solely for the purposes of promoting Home Rule, and the Socialists desire solely for the purpose of promoting Socialism.

The Prime Minister has declared that if he proceeds at all against the Peers he will proceed by Bill. He must know that such a measure as he is understood to contemplate, establishing the unchecked despotism of temporary majorities in a single Chamber, cannot be a summary transaction. The rights of a powerful Opposition in the House of Commons itself are still intact. There must be full discussion covering the whole field of past constitutional history and present constitutional practice in other countries. Again, the House of Lords themselves would not be justified in submitting without debate or amendment to an ultimatum altering the whole character of the Constitution, and sent up from below by the vote of the "Molly Maguires." If the Prime Minister proposes to produce this spectacle at once to the exclusion of all other attractions, Unionists could desire

nothing better for the instruction of the country. Of the great problem of the two Budgets we have spoken. It is clear that the Irish Members cannot vote for the whisky tax and other delectable provisions without imperilling their whole electioneering position in Ireland, to the infinite advantage of Mr. William O'Brien and Mr. Healy. Nor can they vote against the vindictive and foolish liquor clauses of the Budget without justifying the recent action of the Peers.

The more closely this problem is studied the more clearly does it appear that Mr. Asquith may attempt to escape from the gloomy responsibilities of office. It is certain, as has been said, that there is no constitutional mandate from these elections for a profound constitutional change. There is no written Constitution under which fundamental alterations in the whole political system. of a country can be made by a bare majority of the electorate. The very object of every Constitution deliberately framed is to provide security against the efforts of slight and temporary majorities to effect organic changes in the State. In these circumstances nothing more inadmissible could be imagined than an attempt to coerce the Crown in the immediate interest of a Party, and to attack the Peers by methods humiliating to the Sovereign, deadly to the monarchy, and hateful, when once understood, to the overwhelming majority of the King's subjects. The House of Lords needs to be reformed. Let it be reformed by consent. Let Mr. Asquith abandon once for all the attempt to load the dice in the interest of one Party. Let statesmen of both Parties meet in conference upon the constitutional question. By no other method has a question of that character been satisfactorily settled in any free country.

The future is grave. Unionists at least are not disturbed by any aspect of it. They are for constitutional peace and stability if these can be secured upon honourable terms. Otherwise they are prepared once more to carry the issue to the country. The issue is whether we are to break up the kingdom, "to knock the Lords out of the Constitution," to compromise and discredit the Throne itself, in order to prevent the foreigner from paying his fair share and to suppress the cause of Imperial Union. Unionists will not shrink from carrying that proposition to the polls. In the meantime, and without the loss

of a moment, let them look to their armour. The Tariff and the land policy will be sufficient, if thoroughly advocated, to hold the shires. The cultivator in every county is dead against any policy allied with Socialism. But we must have something corresponding to the land policy to put before the towns. Without a far more definite and bolder policy of Tariff Reform we shall make no sufficient impression on the northern boroughs. In view of the possibility of another General Election even in a few months nothing could be more urgent than this part of the case. Is social reform to be hung up while the barren wrangle upon the Peers' veto proceeds from one General Election to another? Are the Reports of the Poor Law Commission to be shelved, though no documents ever disclosed more crying need for legislation? Is unemployment insurance to be blocked in the same way? Let us take up this argument at once and drive it with power, and we shall soon break a way through the "solid barrier" of Lancashire and Yorkshire. Words almost fail the present writer to express the urgency of putting forward a definite Unionist programme of social reform to correspond in the towns with the new land policy in the shires. Unemployment insurance will have to be faced sooner or later, and had better be taken up now. There must be no repetition on that matter of the bat-eyed blundering on Old Age Pensions which has since given the Unionist Party so much trouble. The removal of the pauper disqualification for Old Age Pensions must be accepted and assisted. Children must be removed from the taint of the workhouse atmosphere, and, relieved from every sense of degradation, must be given a full chance to grow up self-respecting and efficient citizens. Every part of the Poor Law system that tends to breed degeneracy and to make pauperism an institution more hereditary than the House of Lords must be swept away. Upon these lines we shall conquer. Perfect Unionist organisation even in London. Reconstruct it altogether in Manchester. Quicken Unionist journalism in those parts of the provinces where harm has been done by prolonged mugwumpishness. Given these conditions, we shall sweep the boroughs as we have swept the shires, and the next General Election, whether it comes soon or late, will complete the victories of to-day and lead through a greater struggle to a greater triumph. PRO PATRIA. 60

VOL. LIV

POLITICAL MEETINGS

THE rostrum has lately loomed so large in the public eye that one or two considerations with regard to the power of the platform may perhaps be offered. Never has a nation been so deluged with spoken words. It is reported that over four thousand political meetings were addressed on one evening alone. The speaking peers have between them delivered nearly three hundred speeches in the last four weeks. Almost the whole round of the clock has been invaded, for not long ago a prominent journalist addressed a crowded audience at 2.30 A.M.! Whether this time was chosen because the imagination is supposed to be at its brightest in the small hours of the morning we do not know. The instance is only cited to show that in these days one is never safe from the platform speaker.

Now what is the influence of the political meeting, and how can that influence be secured to the fullest extent? It is of two kinds. It either depends upon the immediate effect produced in the room upon the audience, and upon the subsequent transmission of this effect by word of mouth to those who were not present; or it derives its force from newspaper reports; or it depends on both these vehicles. In examining the methods that contribute to success it is not proposed to deal with the epochmaking assembly of stalwarts brought together to listen to the Rose of his Party, or some one very near it, whose appearance will have been for weeks beforehand the subject of the keenest solicitude. It would be impertinent to offer advice to the organisers of these great gatherings. These gentlemen apparently leave nothing to chance. All inconvenient elements are carefully excluded. The janitor is so vigilant that he has even detected and turned away from the doors a slim young lady who tried in the disguise of a postman to penetrate those portals through