THE MALAYAN POLICY OF THE GOVERNMENT.

Globe, Volume VI, Issue 690, 5 September 1876, Page 4

THE MALAYAN POLICY OF THE GOVERNMENT.

Lord Carnarvon had an opportunity on Monday, in reply to what he termed, not unreasonably, the vote of censure moved by Lord Stanley of Alderley,. of explaining the policy of the Government in dealing with the States of the Malay Peninsula. It was desirable for two reasons that this should be done ; first, because the Colonial Secretary was able to give a fuller exposition of his motives and hopes than was possible in the closing paragraphs of his despatch to Sir William Jervois; and, secondly, because it afforded an occasion to Lord Kimberley for giving a candid and cordial approval to the policy of his successor. When the present and the late heads of the Colonial Department are agreed upon both the past and the future of our relations with countries of which so little is known outside official circles as the Malayan States, we may take it for granted that there are very strong reasons for their resolutions both of action and inaction. At any rate, no cnse has yet been established on the basis of officially accepted facts inconsistent with the conclusions at which Lord Carnarvon and Lord Kimberley have alike arrived. The speech in which Lord Stanley of Alderley invited the House of Lords to express its regret that "the Colonial Department did not bestow more attention upon the affairs of the Malay Peninsula from the time of the Panel?or Treaty in January, 1874, to October, 1875," was criticised by Lord Carnarvon as " discursive," but the brief report of less than twenty lines which is given in the Times mußt omit most of the " many subjects" over which the argument is said to have ranged. We find, at all events, no trace of an intelligible policy to be put in competition with that accepted by the Colonial Office, and we can only look at Lord Stanley of Alderley's speech, therefore, as a peg on which Lord Carnarvon's reply and Lord Kimberley's endorsement of that reply were to be hung. The objections to Lord Stanley of Alderley's resolution are many and obvious. In the first place, it was nothing less than a "vote of censure" —an inopportune and drastic measure which no one, and least of all the mover, had the wish to enforce against the Government. Moreover, it offended grossly against constitutional ruleß by attempting to cast responsibility for political action not upon the Colonial Secretary but upon the permanent officials of the Colonial Office. Against this course Lord Carnarvon promptly protested, and assumed the whole responsibility for himself. But, indeed, it is not easy to see what the precise responsibility in question was, for Lord Stanley's motion leaves out of consideration the two points at which a question might arise as to the wisdom of those pro • ceedinga of ours in dealing with the Malay States in which the Home Government had apparently the initiative authority. Lord Stanley does not go back further than the Pangkor Treaty; he accepts the principle of that arrangement, and takes its stipulations as the starting point of his criticism; but on the other hand he is compelled to stop short of the proclamation issued by Sir William Jervois in October last; for the published correspondence discloses not only the fact that this instrument was issued without the sanction of the Home Government, but aleo the Colonial Secretary's uncompromising disapproval of its scope and manner. The points therefore which the Colonial Office, according to Lord Stanley of Alderley, treated with dangerous neglect during the year and a half that elapsed between Sir Andrew Clarke's treaty and Sir William Jervois's proclamation, are reduced to two of no remarkable significance. In the first place it is asserted that the Colonial Secretary did not exercise a wise discretion in ratifying the appointments to the office of Resident which were recommended by the Governor of the Straits Settlements , and in the second place that he did not exercise a vigilant control over the conduct of those officers. But manifestly these are points upon which no Minister sitting in Downing street can do anything else than be guided by the local authorities in the colony. Sir Andrew Clarke and Sir William Jervois were the persons on whose advice, very properly, the Colonial Office acted in the presidential appointments, and it is difficult to perceive how Lord Carnavon could have obtained advice elsewhere on which he could have more confidently relied. If mistakes were made in the appointments, they originated in errors of judgment on the part of the Straits Governors, aDd no means have yet bean devised for ensuring the infallibility of these officials. The second point made by Lord Stanley of Alderley against the Colonial Office is less eaaily rebutted. He alleges that the Residents, immediately after their appointments began to exceed their power, and to attempt to engross the administration of the States to which they were accredited ; and he complains that these dangerous departures from from the policy of Sir Andrew Clarke were not immediately checked by the Imperial Government. Lord Stanley's allegations are to some extent supported by Sir William Jervoiß's recent despatches in which he maintains that the resident exercised not advisory but administrative authority, and appeals to this fact as justifying his proclamation. But when this change in the relation between British residents and Malay rulers took place it should have been distinctly explained to the Colonial Office. This was not done, and the Home Government was therefore in complete ignorance of any apprehensions of danger from this source when the proclamation of October last revealed what struck Lord Carnarvon, at least, as a startling revolution in our policy. The Secretary of State says that "during the whole time that Sir W. Jervois was in office, only two despatches on the subject of the settlements reached the Colonial office, and these described the condition of the country as being everything that could reasonably be desired." If there was any blameable misapprehension or wrongful act, it cannot be laid to the charge of the Colonial Office. The policy of total withdrawal from the Malay States is repudiated vigorously by Lord Carnarvon as at once " unworthy " and " dangerous." In this sentiment Lord Kimberley agrees. He says that our intervention in Malay affairs had become " absolutely necessary " at the date of the Pangkor Treaty, and he intimates, what may not be generally understood, that, if we had refused to interfere during that crisis, other European Powers would have gained a footing on the mainland of the Peninsula. These are, no doubt, very strong arguments in favor of some such policy as that which Lord Carnarvon is at present experimentally applying. H the noisy folly of the Singapore annexaSionists f odd be duoked, there would he a

much better chance of establishing English influence firmly among the Malay States. But the merchants of the Straits Settlements ami their local " organs of opinion " are ingenious in making mischief. The following exquisite piece of impudence, which was quoted by Lord Carnarvon, is a fair specimen of the spirit which poisons the native mind against the English power :—" The senous nature of the new?," says a Singapore journal, "from Perak and Salangore suggests some reflections. We feel sure that the Governor will have the hearty support of every man of common sense in the three Settlements in taking the severest «nd most peremptory measures in this matter. It is the colony's quarrel ; very well, the colony will settle it. We say this because we apprehend that the Home Government may possibly intervene. Nobody can say nowadays what a British Government may do : but we distinctly think that the colony should, on its own responsibility, do what is right and proper, and above all, do it quickly. Furthermore, if the Home Government show any signs of shrinkirg in this most righteous quarrel, then the colony will rebel, as it once very nearly did before, not against her Majesty the Queen, but her Majesty's ignorant and misguided Government." From this " spirited " language one could never guess that the " little war " into which the merchants of "the three Settlements " had pushed Sir William Jervois was to be carried on at the cost and under the responsibility of the Imperial Government, or that the colonists of the Straits Settlements had no intention of contributing either men or money for the subjugation of Perak.