THE HARDEST LIFE

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 79, 23 September 1911, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE HARDEST LIFE

A BRITISH PREMIER'S DUTIES. The post of Prime Minister is the most exalted to which under the Crown itself, the Briton can attain. At the same time it is the most onerous and the most anomalous. Until a little under six years ago the ollice of Prime Minister had no legal definition. In November of 1!H)5, King Edward, acting upon the advice of the Prime Minister, defined the status of the Prime Minister, and, for the first time in history, gave the office specific interpretation.

Many aide minds have sought to define the duties of Premier. Mr. Gladstone did not by any means overrate the importance of the office, though none more clearly realised its responsibilities. "Departmentally he is no more," he wrote, "than the first ■named of five persons, by whom jointly the powers of the Ijord Treasurership are taken to be exercised; he is not their master, or, other than by mere priority, their head; and he has no special function or prerogative under the formal constitution of the office."

MR. .GLADSTONE'S VIEW. He added a note upon the absence of recognition of the office, which note is now rendered inapplicable, though there is still truth in "the Gladstonian conclusion: "Upon the whole, nowhere in the wade world does so great a substance cast so small a shadow; nowhere is there a man who has so much power with so little to show for it in formal title and prerogative." Lord Roscbery has thus recorded his view of what the Premiership means:

"The Prime Minister is technically and practically the chairman of an executive committee of the Privy Council, or, perhaps, of Privy Councillors, the influential foreman of an executive jury. His power is mainly personal, the power of individual influence." He has only the influence with the Cabinet which is given him by, his personal qualities and his personal weight. Bub upon the prevalence of that influence how much depends! Only once has history recorded an instance where a Prime Minister failed to gain his way and remained in office.

AN UNCROWNED RING. That was in the case of Lord Aberdeen, who was hostile to the Crimean war, yet remained' to preside over the Cabinet, which in defiance of his wishes decided on the war. The Prime Minister is to a large extent the uncrowned' king of the country. The Sovereign does nothing without the advice of his Ministers, which means, of course, the first of them. The Premier frames the policy to which the King gives the weight of his namo and authority. This applies to Britain's foreign policy as well as to the domestic politics. The King's speech with which Parliament is opened is the Prime. Minister's speech, delivered by the King. The whole business of this vast Empire revolves, then, around the Prime Minister.

He must frame our policy, harmonising the proposals of the various Ministers who serve under him. He must preside at the Cabinets; he must be there on duty for the big debates in Parliament; he has the heaviest correspondence in the world, and though an army of clerks and secretaries relieve him as much as subordinates can, he must in the end deal with the final form which replies shall take. The country looks to him for repeated appearances upon the public platform—the duty which of all others Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman most detested.

iFrom year's end to year's end there is an almost unbroken procession of deputations to deal with; there are multitudinous affairs to settle of which Parliament never hears—diplomatic negotiations, whose result may finally appear in an international treaty or a Parliamentary paper, or mav not appear at all.

The strain of the office was almost intolerable in Peel's day. "If my nose had not bled every night of my Premiership I could not have borne it," he declared.

But since then the work has grown enormously. When Lord John Russell went down into Devonshire to address a meeting of burly farmers, they were disappointed to find their champion so tiny a man. A. wit assured them that Lord John had been considerably higher, but that the strain of office had worn him down to his then dimensions. And they fully believed: and sympathised.

HIS EXCESSIVE RESPONSIBILITY. But Russell and Peel did not have the responsibility of presiding over the Defence .Committee of the country. The present Premier does, and though we may bear much of Mr. McKenna and Lord llaldanc, the First Minister of the Crown is finally responsible for the programmes which these two Ministers submit to Parliament, and has had privately to consider every detail. Palmers-ton found his work so excessive that he had a high-built desk built at which to stand at his work. He had it, he explained, because if he fell asleep over his work, the fall would wake him! No galley-slave toils harder at his labor than the King's right-hand man. How constantly alert he must be amid his everlasting burdens another incident In Palmerston's career, recorded by Grant Duff, suffices to show. While the Trent affair was running its dangerour course, his private secretory, the Hon. Evelyn Ashley, read a despatch from America which obviously meant, "If you intend to shoot, I'll climb down." Palmerston was suffering agonies from gout, and did not grasp the significance of the letter. Ashley passed on, read through all the rest of the. letters, then, taking up the American despatch, read it afresh as if it were something new. This time the tough old Whig took its purpose, and a turning-point in the international controversy was reached. PESTERED DAY AND NIGHT. In addition to the thousand and one duties associated with his office, the Prime Minister is pestered d«ry and night by office-seekers of various grades. One who sought a living wrote to Gladstone, "Although a Conservative, I have always voted for your son Herbert." Another: "The father of the young lady to whom I am engaged is a member of the City Liberal Club, where a large bust of yourself was recently unveiled." And that is the sort of letter to which Prime Ministers give time for a courteous reply. Gladstone never confessed how great was his joy at laying down the Premiership, but he showed it. lie leapt, it is related, hcnd-over-hcels down a, grass bank at Lord Leven's for sheer thankfulness at his release. AH of which is illuminating in face of occasional cable dispatches such as the following: "Mr. Asquifh is suffering from laryngitis, and was absent from the House of Commons to-day."