TWO LEADERS.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 688, 13 December 1909, Page 7

TWO LEADERS.

-! « SPEECH BY MR. ASQUITH. "THE VETO MUST GO." MR. BALFOUR'S POLICY. "THE SINGLE-CHAMBER PLOT." UNIONIST SPECIFIC: TARIFF REFORM. (By Tt!egraph.-Pre»e Assooiation.-OopyritliU (Roc. December 11, 5.5 p.m.) London, December 11. A demonstrative gathering of 10,000 people, all men, crowded the Albert Hall to hear the speech delivered by the Prime Minister (Mr. Asquith), who was supported by a majority of the members of, the Cabinet,, besides many Liberal Peers and members of the House of Commons. Hγ. Asquith said the Liberals at the last eleotion reckoned. without their host, and woro not going to make that mistake again. The Liberal party had now laid upon them tho 6inglo task of vindicating and establishing ,upon an unshakable foundation the princTple of representative government. All the causes for whioh they had been fighting hung on this,' in* eluding such questions as education, Welsh disI'stabliehmont, licensing, and women's suffrage. The latter question would bo opened ini the Houso of Commons in connection with the next Reform Bill. Despite the deplorable and suicidal excess of a small section of its advocates, tho Government had no disposition to burk the EUffrage question. Home Rule, Ireland was still the one great failure o( British statesmanship. Speaking on behalf oi his colleagues, he would eay that -tho only solution was a system of Eclf-government in purely Irish affairs, with explicit safeguards oi Ihe supreme authority of the Imperial Parliament. . The present Government had been disabled in advance from proposing this solution, but the hands of the Liberals in tho new' Parliament would be perfectly free. Old ago was only one of the hazards to which tho industrial population was exposed; Sickness, invalidity, and unemployment ' wok spectres always hovering on the horizon.. "We believe," s.ud Mr. Asquith, "that the time has come for tho State to lend a helpinghand. This is one of the secrets of tho 1303 Budget. It has been rightly described as a Budget 'which looked beyond tho 316t of next March." Lords and Commons. "Only once in living memory had the Lords attempted to touch a single tai imposed or repealed by the Commons. It had now shattered the whole fabric of tho year's taxation." He quoted Mr. Joseph Chamberlain's letter to Mr. Balfour's Birmingham meeting to prove that tho Lords' manoeuvre was to reject the Budget because it procided an effective substitute—a destructive substitute— to tariff reform. "1 tell you plainly," Mr. As- , qulth, "I tell my countrymen outside ■■' that 'neither I nor any other Liberal Minister is going to submit again to • tho rebuffs and humiliations which have ' been suffered for years. I favour the bicameral system. I can seo muchprac- ■ tical advantage in a body impartially exercising powers of revision - and < amendmentt subject to proper safe-' guards; but the absolute veto must go. Tho Government demand auli.cnty to translate, unwritten usage into a Parliamentary Act, and authority to place upon the Statute-book a recognition, v explicit and complete, of the 'settled .constitutional doctrine thai it is beyond ■ the province of the Lords to meddle in national finance, The will of the people, as deliberately expressed by their . oleoted representatives, must within the ' life of a single Parliament, be' made effective. That, and the reduction of the duration of Parliaments to five years is the Liberal policy, I should' not fear four years." , Mr. Asquitb. concluded in tho followint words :— "How do wo stand? 1 hope and trust wi will bo united, with all sectional division; well fused, and combined in a common cam paign against a common enemy. Wo hav( behind us the examples of the greatest apostle: of-domocrooy of our time—Gladstone anc Bright. Wo havo to support us tho moinoiiCi of the past, tho need of tho present, and th( hope 9of tho future. Quit yourselves like men." ' "Quackery and Snobbery," Mr. Lloyd-George, in a brief speech, said "Tho subtlest and most potent human woak nesses, quackery and snobbery, nro arrayec against us, hut wo Ehall beat both." "To Smash the Veto." - Mr. Churchill said; Wo have to smash the veto up. If we work together nothing car withstand us. UNIONIST MANIFESTO. STATEMENT BY MR. BALFOUR. THE POSITION OF THE LORDS. UNEMPLOYMENT AND TARIFF EEFOKM London) Docomber 11, Mr. Balfour, in a manifesto to Sis constitu ents, states that the Government is daiminj that tho House of Commons, ho matter hov elected, should have uncontrolled powei over every class of the community with out appeal to the community, ' The prescu question is not whether a Second Charabo! could resist the people's declared wishes In tho United States all kinds of propertj are taxed allko, and a two-third majority' i required for a measure like the Budget. More over, tho Senate can reject and the Prcsidcn can veto special taxation. A Long-Drawn Conspiracy. The pretent attack on the House of Lords Is the culmination of a long* • drawn , conspiracy. The Government from the first has sought not to work tho ' Constitution, but to destroy it, making In effect a tingle Chamber, practically like that of the Greeks. The Budget gave the Government a good opportunity for manoeuvring against'tho House of Lords, so that the Lords must abandon the functions of a Second Chamber or take a step which would jive new life to the single Chamber plot; but the people will refuse to consider themselves insulted by being asked their opinion on the Budget, nor will they think that the Lords have gone beyond tholr duty in asking it. Tho House of Commons already posses: great powers, beyond thoso of similar Cham bers in tho republics of Americn and France These powers are iu some rospects unexampled but the Government desires the Houso o Commons to be independent, not only of thi Houso of Lords, but 'also of tho people. The Will of the Eloctor*. There, could bo no security that a ' singh Chamber would act according to tho wil bf tho doctors. The present Hottso of Com raons wot returned on tho Chinese slavery cry (ind it could not bo assumed to represent tin nation's mind on the question of Socialien and a single Chamber. A single Chamber i 1 impossiblo in tho region' of finance. I the need for money is to be used for adopt ing by instalments a Socialist Budget, treat

ing property, not according to its amount, bul l J its origin, and vindictively attacking political 'j opponents, then tho poaplo havo a. right to I/O ■ consultod; but tlio right never could baio boon exorcised if tho Peers tvro not to use ou behalf < of the pcoplo the powers entrusted to them. , Mr. Balfoor gooe on to state that a cliaugo is not required in tho direction of a modification of tho House of Lords, or tho referendum. ! Tho Houso contains men of the first eminence, in all branohea of life. Ho does not think that tho Houso of Lords should be a mat Houso of Commons, or completely elective; but its functions could be improved, Tariff Reform Proposals. Referring to unemployment, he urges the ' roform of ,the poor ltiw. E\orj member of < tho recent commission considered that tlio ''' presont law might bo scrapped, but state i methods of dealing with destitution will do httlo to promote labour. Hβ looks for that to ' tariff reform. It would stimulate Home in- ; dustry, and it alono, It would contain toloniai N'• preference, would modify commercial treaticai ; and secure tho Homo producer against foreigi competition. It is tho first plunk m thi Unionist platform, ~ Mr. Balfour complnina of the : illusory polioy of back to tho land. Theu molhods discourage private ownership, except m Ireland, by insisting that tenants should ' ■ bocome tonante of a public body. There is "' no farmer who would not prefer a tenancy under one of Mr. Lloyd-George's dukes. Mr. Balfour concludes by stating that at V present ho would say nothing about tho Navy, I Tho situation is gra\o, and tho future tmxioua ' ' Hβ does not think tho> public will forget 01 forgive the negligence which hfti cncouragcc < the presont rivalry in ship-building, which all I 1 deplore. ■> NATIONAL DEFENCE. , MR. BLaTCHFOKD'S VIEWS. \ London, December 10. Oj Mr. Robert Dlatchford, proprietor of the i newspaper "Clarion," after roccntly touring '1 Germany, is contributing to the "Daily Mail" 1 a scries of articles on Groat Britain's dangerous 0 \ I unprcparedness. Ho implores tho electors to plnco national defence before tho Houso of < I Lords question, ' A LIBERAL EARL. ' I J disapproves of the budget,. * i London, December 10. * : Tho Earl of Portsmouth, who uas Parlia- ' } menlary Undor-Sccrttary for War in the '' liberal Government from 1005 to 1908, dis- ' npproves of tho Budget, and declines to assist i in tho Liboral campaign. BUDGET PROTEST LEAGUE. \ ' .ITS OBJECT ATTAINED. ', ' London, December 10, Tho Bndgot Protest League has boon die. solved, having attained its object. It ho» ; issued 20,000,000 loaflots and 300,000 posters, has -,'i arranged 3500 laigo meetings, und many thousands of smaller meetings, and various organisations have been amalgamated with the Central Consoivali\o Office in London. ' is v MR. LLOXD-GEORGE IN TEARS. < WILL NEVER FORSAKE CARNAEVON. , ' London, Dqceinber 10. < Mr. Lloyd-George exhibited his Celtic tern- < peramont at Carnarvon, where, after annonno- ' ing that he would novor forsako that town for Cardiff, he'was so much moved by his hearers* enthusiasm that ho burst into tears and ro. i ' sumed his eeat mthout finishing his' specoh, Tv herein, at tho outset, he had declared that neither Ireland, nor Wales can e\cr obtain ; their rights except by inarching over tho runts of the llouso of Lords,; adding: "When tho Liberals win this fight there will bo a now earth." , ,j . RECALLED. "' ' Hobartj Docembor 11. On the arrival here of tits Onion CotnpiuVe steamer MoeraU from tho Bluff, Mr. Will ' Ciooks, Jt P. for' Woolwich, who was a pasBongoi, was handed a cable message recalling him to England immediately. , ' "■