The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke Volume I Part 14

One of the measures which contributed to a decline of the Government's popularity was the unlucky proposal in Mr. Lowe's Budget of 1871 to levy a tax on matches; and Sir Charles was the first to raise this matter specifically in Committee, condemning the impost as one which would be specially felt by the poor, and would deprive the humblest cla.s.s of workers of much employment. On the day when Lowe was forced to withdraw the obnoxious proposal, Sir Charles had opened the attack by a question challenging Government interference with a procession of the matchmakers organized to protest against the tax. He was, therefore, personally identified with the rebuff administered to the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

The tremendous spectacle of events in France had inevitably bred a panic in England. It was proposed to increase the active army by 70,000 men. Sir Charles was no friend to panics, and he was one of the seven who voted against the motion.

But his was not merely a blank negative directed against any proposal for increasing the standing army. He writes:

"About this time" (March, 1871) "I promoted a movement in favour of a system of universal instruction in arms, and between fifty and sixty members of Parliament attended the meeting which I called, the most prominent among them being Sir M. Hicks Beach, Mr. Mundella, and Henry James. We all lived to know better."

Those who joined him in this momentary propaganda dropped the proposal of universal instruction in arms, and turned their attention elsewhere. He subst.i.tuted for it another ideal of military efficiency, and laboured all his life to give it effect. Speaking to his const.i.tuents at Kensington in the autumn of 1871, he advocated "the separation of the Indian from the home army, and the adoption of the Swiss rather than of the Prussian military system." As a Radical, he faced the question whether Radicals ought to interest themselves at all in army reform, and he answered:

"As a mere matter of insurance, it is worth taking some trouble to defend ourselves. There are, however, higher reasons for such interest, and among them are treaty obligations and the duty which we owe to the rest of the world of not suppressing our influence--on the whole a just and moral one."

'In these words,' Sir Charles notes, 'there lies in a nutsh.e.l.l all that I afterwards wrote at much greater length upon army reform in my book, _The British Army_.'

In this year he made a visit to the autumn manoeuvres, then held for the first time, and 'looked upon by the army reformers as the dawn of a new day.' Sir Charles, however, with his knowledge of war, 'thought them singularly bad.' He was to repeat that experience several times, attending manoeuvres both in France and England. He held that annual manoeuvres were "essential to efficiency," and with other army reformers brought later much pressure to bear on the Government to secure this end.

As early as February, 1871, Mr. Trevelyan (then out of office) had written to propose "a little meeting of Radical army reformers, say ten or twelve or fifteen, to arrange parts for practical work in the House, and to found a nucleus for an Army Reform a.s.sociation in case of dire need (to stump the country)." The stumping of the country Mr. Trevelyan did himself, and his speeches led to the abolition in this year of the purchase system.

What he wanted of Sir Charles is indicated by another sentence: "There never was a time when your turn for organization would be of more immediate value." But even more immediate use was made of Sir Charles's willingness to confront unpopularity. The "practical" part a.s.signed to him in House of Commons' work was to undertake a motion (on going into Committee of Supply) for the suppression of two regiments of Household Cavalry and the subst.i.tution of two regiments of cavalry of the line. The change was justified by Sir Charles not only on the score of economy, but upon the ground that heavy cavalry had proved unserviceable in the Franco- Prussian War. Whatever his arguments, this attack on the maintenance of privileged troops brought social displeasure on the a.s.sailant.

In 1870 the Queen had consented to abandon the tradition which made the appointment of the Commander-in-Chief a matter within the Sovereign's personal control; and the subordination of the military head of the forces to the Secretary for War was formally recognized. But the Duke of Cambridge continued to be Commander-in-Chief, and army reformers were extremely desirous to remove him. On this subject the Press was reticent no less than public speakers, and finally it was left for Sir Charles to advocate in the speech at Kensington already referred to the subst.i.tution of some other officer "more amenable to parliamentary control."

In 1870 the Civil Service had been (with the exception of one preserve, the Foreign Office) thrown open to compet.i.tive examination. In 1871 the inst.i.tution of purchase in the army perished after a fierce conflict.

In the autumn of 1871 Sir Charles arranged to deliver at great centres throughout the country a series of speeches advocating a redistribution of seats which should make representation more real because more equitable.

The first of the series, delivered in Manchester, merely propounded the view that a minority in Parliament very often represented a large majority of voters, because one member might have 13,000 electors and another only 130. But when he came to speak at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, on November 6th, he gave this general principle definite application to a particular instance, in which very small minorities had nevertheless represented very large bodies of the electorate, and, as Sir Charles held, very widespread opinions.

This instance was the vote for an allowance of 15,000 a year to Prince Arthur, proposed on his coming of age. Radical opinion had been already stirred in the earlier part of the Session by the Queen's request for a dowry of 30,000 for the Princess Louise on her marriage with the Marquis of Lorne; and Mr. Peter Taylor, in opposing the dowry, had spoken of the probability that such a grant would strengthen the tendency towards republican views among the artisan cla.s.s. [Footnote: Taylor's opposition had led to a division, in which Fawcett had a lobby to himself, Dilke, with Taylor, being tellers for the "Noes." But on the question of the allowance to Prince Arthur fifty-three voted for a reduction of the allowance, and eleven against any grant at all.]

'I visited Newcastle, and there spoke chiefly upon the Dowry question, which had led to a division in the House of Commons, in which the minority had consisted of but three persons, with two tellers.... But in the course of the recess I had gone into the question of the Civil List expenditure upon the Court, and at Newcastle I made references to this subject which were accurate, though possibly unwise.'

The Queen's long retirement (now of ten years' duration) from all ceremonial functions had occasioned considerable discontent. A pamphlet, under the t.i.tle _What does She do with it?_ written, as Sir Charles believed, by one who had been a member of the Government, had received wide publicity. Sir Charles alluded to this, and, taking up the pamphleteer's argument, drew a picture of royal power as increasing, of quaint survivals of ancient offices kept up at high cost, and of the army's efficiency impaired by the appointment of Royal personages to command. He concluded by a peroration on the model State, inspired, one fancies, not only by his early training, but by Vacation reading of that long series of Utopias and "Commonwealths ideal and actual," the recollection of which fascinated him to the end: [Footnote: Chapter V., p.

55.]

"It is said that some day a commonwealth will be our government. Now, history and experience show that you cannot have a republic unless you possess at the same time the republican virtues. But you answer: Have we not public spirit? Have we not the practice of self-government? Are not we gaining general education? Well, if you can show me a fair chance that a republic here will be free from the political corruption that hangs about the monarchy, I say, for my part--and I believe that the middle cla.s.ses in general will say--let it come."

This was the abstract avowal of a theoretical preference, which Sir Charles expressed with greater clearness and decision than others who professed it--than Fawcett, who preached Republicanism at Cambridge, or than Chamberlain; whose att.i.tude is sufficiently indicated by the letter which he wrote to Dilke on seeing the very violent leader with which the _Times_ greeted the Newcastle speech:

"I am glad to see that you have raised the Philistine indignation of the _Times_ by your speech at Newcastle, which, as well as that at Manchester, I have read with interest and agreement."

'Going on beyond my utterances, or indeed my belief, Chamberlain added:

'"The Republic must come, and at the rate at which we are moving it will come in our generation. The greater is the necessity for discussing its conditions beforehand, and for a clear recognition of what we may lose as well as what we shall gain."'

The essence of Republicanism to Sir Charles was equality of opportunity for all citizens in a well-ordered State.

His theoretical avowal of Republicanism was seized upon by all who were offended by his lack of deference in dealing with a matter so nearly connected with Royalty. Charges of treason were made against the member of Parliament who, in defiance of his oath of allegiance, proposed to overthrow the monarchy.

This general outcry did not begin till the _Times_ leader had circulated for a few days. But within a week the whole Press had broken out in fury.

The London correspondent of the _New York Tribune_ reported that "Sir Charles Dilke's speech competes with the Tichborne trial" as a subject of public comment. There was a second article in the _Times_ The _Spectator_ imputed to Dilke a want both of sense and decency, and declared that he "talked sheer vulgar nonsense and discourteous rubbish in order to mislead his audience." But as the correspondent of the _New York Tribune_ said: "No one proved or attempted to prove that Sir Charles Dilke had misstated facts."

'On one point, and on one point only, had I any reason to think that I was wrong--namely, upon the Queen's Income Tax.' No doc.u.ments existed, and information was promised to Sir Charles by Mr. W. E. Baxter, Secretary to the Treasury, 'but when he applied for it he was told that it could not be given unless Mr. Gladstone agreed, and on this Mr. Gladstone wrote one of his most mysterious letters, and I never really believed that the matter was cleared up.'

In December, when the Prince of Wales was brought to the extremity of danger by grave illness, an outburst of loyalty was aroused which shaped itself into a protest against the "republican" demonstrations. But in the hearts of thousands of working men who had expected some great change from the Reform Act of 1868 and found no real alteration, there was a deep resentment against the power and the att.i.tude of the upper cla.s.ses; and against this power Sir Charles had struck a blow. The Press campaign against him had the result which always follows when popular clamour seeks to brand a strong man for an act of moral courage--it made him notable. He was at a crisis in his political career, and the risks were great.

Opposition to him in Chelsea was threatened from orthodox Liberalism. A letter from Labouchere warned him of this, and of the support which such opposition would a.s.suredly receive from Government organizers. Dilke went straight ahead. It happened that the projected campaign on Representation had pledged him to a series of speeches, and he did not therefore need to seek occasions.

His next appearance on a public platform after the Newcastle meeting was fixed for November 20th at Bristol, and opposition was promptly threatened, somewhat to the surprise of Professor F. W. Newman, who had been asked to take the chair.

"I do not read the papers daily" (the Professor wrote), "and was quite unaware that any animosity against Sir Charles Dilke existed among the Bristol Liberals. But I think it is high time that the Liberal party everywhere be pulled out of the grooves of routine, and that _new men_ take the lead of it. I hope there will not be a mere noisy disturbance, but I will try to do my duty in any case."

There was a noisy disturbance, but at Leeds on November 23rd the chairman of the meeting was Alderman Carter, a Radical member of Parliament, of considerable local influence, and an immense hall was packed by 5,000 supporters who secured the speaker from any interruption. Under these conditions, Sir Charles delivered a speech much better, in his own opinion, than the Newcastle discourse. As he put it many years later, the former was on the cost of the Crown, the second a defence of the right of free speech in the discussion of the cost of the Crown. [Footnote: Private letter to the Editor of _Reynolds's Newspaper_, June 23rd, 1894.]

A main part of his defence was devoted to one point on which throughout all this controversy he showed himself sensitive. "I care nothing," he said at Leeds, "for the ridiculous cry of 'treason,' but I do care a great deal for a charge of having used discourteous words towards the Queen;"

and he went on to explain by citation of his speech that 'the malversation, if there was one,' had been charged, not against the Queen, but against the neglect of her Ministers. He added now that the "breach of the spirit of the Civil List Act," in allowing the savings to acc.u.mulate, was one for which neither the present Government nor the Opposition were responsible so much as their predecessors; and he made it doubly clear that, although he desired to see savings made for the public, his true objection to the office of Hereditary Grand Falconer and other sinecures was 'not on account of the money that they cost, but on account of the miserable political and moral tone which was set by their retention.'

a.s.serting that the Duke of Edinburgh had been appointed to an independent naval command without the training which other officers would have undergone, he reverted to the ideal of the model State:

"To say these things is not to condemn the monarchy, because they are no necessary part of the monarchy, although the opposite idea--that of promotion by merit alone and of the non-recognition of any claims founded upon birth--is commonly accepted as republican. I care not whether you call it republican or whether you do not, but I say that it is the only principle upon which, if we are to keep our place among the nations, we can for the future act."

'Not only was the Leeds meeting a success, but so also was one at Middlesboro' a few days later than that at Leeds. But on November 30th, when I attempted to address a meeting at Bolton under the auspices of the local leaders of the Liberal party, such as Mr. Cross [Footnote: Eventually the chairman named withdrew his support in view of the agitation; and the Liberal a.s.sociation (on the casting vote of their Chairman, Mr. J. K. Cross) decided to refuse sanction to the meeting.] (afterwards Under Secretary of State for India), Mr. Mellor, and Mr. Haslam, there was a fearful riot, at which a man was killed and a great number of persons injured by iron nuts and bars being thrown in through the windows by the Tory roughs outside the hall.'

[Footnote: Eight of the party who broke up the meeting were put on their trial, and Serjeant Ballantine, who defended, made such play with "Citizen" Dilke's unpopular opinions that "most of the jury felt that, as loyal men, they were bound to acquit the prisoners." Mr.

George Harwood, the late member for Bolton, related in a letter of 1911 what he saw as "an indifferent young fellow" who had "strolled down to look on." "The crowd" he writes, "was very thick and very fierce, having declared that Sir Charles should not get away alive; but when the excitement was hottest, Sir Charles came out of the main door and stood quietly in sight of all, then struck a match and lit his cigar, and walked unguarded and unaccompanied through the thickest part of the crowd. His cool courage quite took everyone's breath away, so not a sound was uttered."]

One pa.s.sage in the speech is notable in view of later events: "I think working men should not make themselves too much the slaves of any political party, but should take care of the means of seeking representation in Parliament, and when they have got the means in their hands, they will then be able to use them so as to be favourable to their interests as a whole."

'My speech at Newcastle had been not only as true as Gospel, but a speech which, as Americans would say, "wanted making." But I was nearly subjected to physical martyrdom for it at Bolton, and was actually and really subjected to moral martyrdom for a time. The thing was not, however, wholly painful. It had its ludicrous side. The then Lord Chelsea, for example, afterwards my friend Lord Cadogan, regretted, in a discourse at Bath with regard to my speech, "that the days of duelling were over."'

The Memoir goes on to note that Lord Chelsea and Sir Alfred Slade, the Receiver-General of Inland Revenue--

'who had both accused me of inventing "lies," afterwards asked to be introduced to me and were very civil, and I, for political and local reasons, had to forget their speeches and to be civil to them.

'On December 6th I spoke at Birmingham Town Hall, and Chamberlain, who was Mayor, and who was my host, had the whole borough police force present or in reserve, and had every interrupter (and there were several hundred) carried out singly by two policemen, with a Conservative Chief of Police to direct them, after which I delivered an extremely humdrum speech to a very dull a.s.sembly. [Footnote: He spoke on the House of Lords.] Chamberlain was more lively, and made a speech in ridicule of Second Chambers, in which I still (1895) agree.

On the other hand, in Chelsea we carried the war into the enemy's camp. The "loyal inhabitants" tried to hold a meeting at the Vestry Hall to censure me, on which occasion no article or piece of furniture larger than a match was left in existence in the room, and the meeting concluded with a vote of confidence in me, carried in the dark after the gas had been put out. The second attempt was made outside the borough, at the Duke of Wellington's Riding School at Knightsbridge, but the result was the same. Although the meeting was a ticket meeting, the hall was stormed, and the loyal address to the Queen captured and carried off in triumph by my friends. It is still (May, 1905) at the Eleusis Club--the centre for the Radical working men in Chelsea.'

Hostility concentrated on Sir Charles because the courage and cogency with which he expounded views shared by many men of standing, and men far senior to himself at this time, marked him out for the public as the leader:

'Fawcett had taken a far more active republican line, as had Chamberlain, and both of them had joined republican clubs in towns, while Fawcett had himself founded one in the University of Cambridge, which had but a short existence. I had refused to join these clubs, and to work in any way in connection with republican propaganda, but it was difficult to get people to understand my position, and the perfect legality of holding republican opinions was even denied by many, while the wisdom of expressing them was denied by almost all.

Some thought that I was of opinion that an immense amount of revolutionary feeling existed in the country, and that I wished to lead a storm to my own profit. Some thought that I was sorry I had said what I did.

'It never seemed to occur to anyone that there were many persons who had been trained up in families republican in sentiment, and that it was possible that I should have never been anything but a republican without the trace of a "reason," and thought it honest to say so when I was charged with Republicanism as with some fearful crime. But to think and even to say that monarchy in Western Europe is a somewhat c.u.mbersome fiction is not to declare oneself ready to fight against it on a barricade. It is only to protest against the silence of many being read into agreement with the fulsome nonsense that the majority talk about the personal loyalty of the country to the reigning House.

My Republicanism was, however, with me a matter of education. My grandfather was a conservative republican in old age, a radical republican in youth, but a republican through life, and, as I have said before, my young ideas were my grandfather's ideas. It is a mistake to think that republican opinions in England died with Algernon Sidney, that Tom Paine was about the only English sympathizer with the French Revolution, and Sh.e.l.ley, Landor, and Swinburne only three mad poets. It is forgotten now that Burns subscribed to the funds of the French Republic, that Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Moore all wrote republican odes to it, and that at the beginning of the century Southey and Brougham were republican, not to speak of Bentham and G.o.dwin and other writers on whose books I had been brought up.'

Sir Charles was not only denounced, but boycotted. [Footnote: Shirley Brooks of _Punch_ wrote in his diary, under date December 5th, 1871: "Macmillan asked me to dine, but as Sir C. Dilke, who has been spouting Republicanism, was to be one, I would not go, hating to dine with a man and abuse him in print, as I must do." (_Life, Letters, and Diaries of Shirley Brooks_, by G. S. Layard).] He seems for the moment to have had only two close friends available in London, Mr. Trevelyan and Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice. The former--

'who had been deeply engaged in the anti-dowry agitation, although keeping himself in the background ... used to come every Sunday to go for walks with me; generally the two of us only, though on one of these occasions he brought Wilfrid Lawson, the wit of the public platforms, but a dismal man enough in private, [Footnote: Sir Charles's friendship with the great Temperance Reformer was cemented five years later by his adhesion to the Temperance ranks.

'February 4th, 1877, in Paris on my road I received a letter from Wilfrid Lawson, who had learnt that I had turned teetotaller. I was as a fact teetotaller for some eleven years, from 1874-1885. Lawson's letter was in verse with a chorus:

"Coffee and tea, Coffee and tea, Those are the liquors for Lawson and me."