Evening Post. THURSDAY, JANUARY 17, 1924. THE GOVERNMENT'S FATE

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 14, 17 January 1924, Page 6

Ev ening Post. THURSDAY, JANUARY 17, 1924. THE GOVERNMENT'S FATE

Mr. Ramsay Macdonald and Mr. Asquith are said to have "cemented a tacit agreement whereby the Liberals will support the Labour amendment to the Address-in-Reply." Such an agreement might have been inferred from the Liberal leader's declaration a month ago that he would not raise a finger to save the Government from defeat, and 'as evjsn now the, agreement is described as "tacit" it may still be a matter of inference only. However that may be, the position ia perfectly clear. The terms of the Labour amendment which is to bo moved by Mr. Clynes have been'made broad enough to accommodate the Liberals, and if this hospitality may not be ascribed to agreement it certainly indicates design. If- the amendment had affirmed any article of the Labour creed, it must have been followed by an amendment which would set out the specific objections of the Liberals, and the division of the opposing forces would have enabled ,the Government to score a victory on each, The bald declaration "that Your Majesty's Advisers have not the confidence of this House," with no reasons assigned, will enable the Labour Party and Liberals to go into the same lobby -without quarrelling.

But the rule that a negative is a barren thitig applies with full force to this case. The tacit or implied agreement will avail for the purpose of turning out the Government, but this destructive work will be merely mischievous unless the agreement has also a positive side. It is impossible to dissent, -from the lobby opinion "that Labour is wise to frame the amendment in such, a way that the Liberals can freely vote for it," but whether the Liberals are wise to, accept the invitation is a questionwhich it is impossible to answer until we know, what they have in view after the deed is done and what securities they have for its enforcement. "It is noteworthy;" according to one of. to-day's messages, "that Mr: Macdonald and Mr. Lloyd George uttered a sentence of death, but without exultation. There were no flaming phrases or high-pitched warwhoops." There was very good reason for this restraint. Even if he had a working majority behind him, Mr. Ramsay Macdonald, as the head of the first Labour Government in Britain, would have been compelled to disappoint as many of the expectations and chill as much of the enthusiasm of his followers as -he could possibly satisfy. Holding office as he will with about two-thirds of the House opposed to him on all, or nearly all; the capital objects of his party, the Labour leader will have to carry the process of disappointment and refrigeration so far that at the end of his term he may be in greater need of protection from his jriends than from his enemies.

Mr. Lloyd George has still less cause, for exultation. He 'has never shrunk from responsibilities either in peace or in war which most other,men would have found intolerable, never lost his nerve in the tightest of places, never failed to discover a plausible formula for covering his retreat from a position that- proved to be untenable, or for proving either that tho blunder which dictated it was really that of somebody else, or that after all-it was really not a retreat but merely a strategic movement to , the' rear. But the responsibility which, iri common with Mr* Asquith, Ml-. Lloyd George is now taking may well prove to be as momentous as any which either of them ventured to assume during the war, and to defy even more obstinately the healing power of the most ingenious formula. One obvious distinction between the two cases is that in. war the apparent freedom of selection was often really a matter of Hobson's choice, but that here there was an obvious alternative open and a much safer one. What are the prospective advantages that the Liberal leaders have i n . v f ew to j ustify t _ e grave risks of the course they are taking?

The legislative risks, to which Mr. Garvin and other supporters Pi the Liberals' attitude prefer to confine their attention, are a relatively small matter. An antiLabour majority of two to .one would be a sufficient insurance dgainst the capital levy or any other Socialistic scheme that could only operate through an Act of Parliament. The real crux, as we liave • argued from the first, i" in the sphere of administration, and especially in that part of it which is concerned with foreign policy. What check could be exercised upon the .^SftNosJllftjnifiority; &ovjs*S©e.ri_

hi this department during the recess 1 and what reason is there for confidence that some- of these unchecked vagaries would not have irreparable consequences? In a brief debate the Hbuse of Lords appears very properly 'to have devoted the greater part of its attention to this aspect of the matter. The effect of the political situation on foreign affairs, sa id Lord Grey, was lamentable. It could only be bettered it the three-party system remained by arrangement-, whereby the Secretary of Foreign Affairs took the leaders of the other two parties into his confidence so that he could say, on the general lines « his policy, that the country was behind him. , • On foreign affairs Lord Grey's judgment carries greater weight than that of Mr. Asquith or Mr7 Lloyd George or perhaps anybody else, and this suggestion of his is veil worthy of serious attention. Under the two-party system the British people have as a rule been wonderfully successful in keeping the main issues of foreign policy en a plane above party strife. Can their leaders carry this spirit a little further to meet the demands of the new situation and give effect to Lord Grey's suggestion? If so, the disintegration of the old party system might open the door for a non-party control of foreign policy. And if the Dominions and the Imperial Conference can ever be induced to give up "taihoa" and marking time, and to face the full responsibilities of nationhood and, constructive statesmanship, a genuinely Imperial control of the Empire's foreign policy might ultimately be evolved.'