MR LABOUCHERE AND MR GLADSTONE.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXIX, Issue 3175, 29 October 1892, Page 1 (Supplement)

MR LABOUCHERE AND MR GLADSTONE.

_» The following extracts are taken from a leader in the London Times, of a late date, and give at any rate one view of the situation which considering the meagre accounts, as must necessarily reaeh us by cable, will be read with interest :—lt would assist many people te form a just estimate of the correspondence between Mr Gladatone and Mr Lahouchere, which has just been published by the latter, as well as of. the copious comments upon it made by one of its authors, if they would bear in mind that the serious business of Mr Labouchere's life is to manage and that politics are merely his amusement. For politicians of both parties and all degrees of eminence he entertains a contempt which he never attempts to disguise, either in public writing or in ordinary conversation, but for his own weekly periodical he has an equally unfeigned respott. From the revered chief —"the People's Minister"—down to the humblest toady of the Hawarden circle, he regard.- them all in the light of , material for the manufacture of saleable paragraphs and pungent epigrams. Unless this central fact be steadily kept in view, it is quite impossible to do justice to Mr Labouchere, who will be credited on one hand with virtues to which he lays no claim, and on the other hand, condemn its cynical levity, while others will feel some measure of sympathy for a man able and clearsighted enough to see through the humbug which undoubtedly abounds, and bold enough to ridicule the Bolemn pretensions of intellectual mediocrity. It is not our business to sit in judgment upon a question (.f this kind ; we merely wish to point out a fact, recognition of which is indispensable to a right understanding of Mr Labouchere I .* present attitude towards the Queen and toward* Mr Gladstone. Mr Laboucbero caused it to be made public th :t he ascribed his exclusion from the Cabinet to tho direct intervention of the Queen, assuming, without any warrant, and in the teeth of some reasons for thinking the contrary, that Mr Gladstone, if left to himself, would have yearned for his assistance. Mr Gladstone's attention wa>i called to this public announcement, and he wrote to say !tbat ho alone is responsible for recommendations submitted to Her Majesty, adding in characteristic phraseology—" there were incidents in your case which, wbihs they testified to your energy and influence, were in no decree disparaging 1 to your honour, but which appeared to me to render it unfit that I should a<>k your leave to submit your name to Her Majesty for a political office which would involve your becoming" a servant of the Crown." To this Mr Labouchere replied that he admired the chivalry with which Mr Gladstone covered the Royal action, but would retain the conviction that the Prime Minister was not a free agent. He said, further, that he had never directly or indirectly asked for office, and also took exception to the phrase "servant of the Crown," saying that " executive servant of the nation " expresses tho Radical view. Mr Gladstone rose at onee to the fly thus thrown over him, writinar to nay that he had never had from Mr Labouchere any intimation of a desire for office, and that men in political office are servants of the country as well hs of the Crown. He added: '' There are incidents attaohing to them in each respect, and I mentioned the oapaeity which alone touched the case before me." Mr Labouchere's reply to this is, in plain language, a piece of humbug which the most contemptible of politicians would not outdo. We shall not imitate Mr I abouehere by dogmatizing: about the Constitution, but it must be ssid that ho has not adduced an atom of proof either for his contention that Her Majesty interfered to prevent his appointment to office, or for his argument that if •he did so interfere she over-stepped the constitutional limits of hei power. Wo are aware of no obligation on the part of the Sovereign either to abandon every fraction of initiative of the Prime Minister, who is unknown to the Constitution, or to give her confidence to any one not 1 expressly designated by the House of Common". A Prime Minister, no doubt, has very large discretion in the choice of colleagues, but every one of them is the servant of the and the country, not the servant of the Prime Minister. In practice, whatever constitutional theory may bo, the will of the House of Commons and the will of the Sovereign mutually limit one another. As a matter of fact, Mr Labouchere is not a person of such consequence that the House of Commons should wish to insist upon having him in the Cabinet. Northampton Radicals may wish it, but .'they are not yet Co.ordinato Executive functionaries. Mr Labouchere is a shrewd man, who does not take himself too seriously. He knows very well that in practice these things are settled by a give-and-take process, and that he is not strong enough to interfere with it. What is more, he dees not want to be in the Cabinet for various reason*. If he were there he would, no doubt, be a very active tail, but, wriggle as he might, he could not move the particularly heavy and stolid dog in front of him. He would lose the influence be has and would gain nothing in its place. What is much more to the point, Truth would suffer, and upon that subject Mr Labouchere is no doubt in earnest. Had Lord Palmerston or Lord Beaconsfield been in Mr Gladstone's place, he would have offered office to Mr Lahouchere, certain that he would either refuse it or accept and be extinguished, but Mr Gladstone has no adequate sense of humour, and is too much drynursed by his entourage to be dexterous in handling men. The whole eud and aim of all this talk about the Queen is to provide spicy paragraphs for Mr Labouchere's paper.