The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke Volume II Part 7

He agreed to write for publication a letter to one of his Quaker const.i.tuents; but it was judged insufficient.

'On October 28th Mr. Gladstone wrote to me: "I thought you and I were perfectly agreed about the unfortunate expressions in Chamberlain's speech ... and in the expectation that his letter ...

would fully meet the case. I own that in my opinion it did not come up to the mark. All I had really wished was a note conceived in the same spirit as that in which he withdrew the 'jackal' because it gave offence. Can nothing more be done? You saw a recent letter of mine in defence, written when I thought the objections taken not to be just. I am precluded from writing any such letter with the facts as they now stand, but I hope that you may be able to bring them to the standard of our reasonable expectations." I sent this letter to Chamberlain, as was intended, with a note from me to say that it was clear that the Queen had written Mr. Gladstone a second letter about the matter, and asked whether I should say that I thought Chamberlain's letter met the case; and Chamberlain replied: "Yes. I cannot and _will not_ do more." This I communicated to Mr.

Gladstone. Randolph Churchill had taken the matter up. He accused Chamberlain of having advocated violence, and was loudly threatening, even to me, that there should be "somebody killed at Birmingham next time." Chamberlain told me that Randolph had tried to get up a march against Highbury on the part of the Birmingham Tory roughs; but they were still on speaking terms, and often chatting together at the smoking-room at the House. On the same day, the 28th, late in the evening Mr. Gladstone sent for me about the Chamberlain matter, and said of the Queen: "She not only attacks him but me through him, and says I pay a great deal too much attention to him." When Chamberlain and I went home, as we almost always did, together in one cab, he broke out, evidently much worried and excited, against Mr. Gladstone.

'Next day I warned Mr. Gladstone that it would not take much to make a serious row.'

On October 15th Sir Charles wrote to Sir M. Grant Duff that he expected 'they would sit till February, and send the Bill up a third time.' On October 24th Mr. Gladstone was inclined to resign at the second rejection, which was taken for a certainty. But as to the final issue, it was becoming daily clearer that the Commons were going to win against the Lords. Even in the home counties Liberalism had become aggressive.

'October 24th.--Franchise and Redistribution seemed well in view when I discovered on this day that Nathaniel Rothschild, who had lately looked on Buckinghamshire as his own, was now down on his knees to Carrington about it.' Work now began on the details of the draft Bill.

'On October 25th there was a full meeting of my Committee of the Cabinet on Redistribution. I took the chair, and Hartington, Kimberley, Childers, Chamberlain, James, and Lefevre, sat round the table. I got my own way in everything, and succeeded in raising the 10,000 limit of merger to 15,000. Mr. Gladstone, who disliked the change, and who was the strongest Conservative living upon the subject, yielded to it on the same night by letter.'

Sir Charles now threw himself into getting as big a measure as possible by a 'truce of G.o.d' between the parties.

'On October 29th Mr. Gladstone told me that Lord Carnarvon had proposed to him that they should meet in order to come to some conclusion about Redistribution. He had declined, but had tried, through Sir Erskine May, to induce the Tories to appoint a Committee of their own to draw up a scheme. I saw Sir Erskine May and told him to tell Northcote that I would accept, and press the acceptance of, any scheme not obviously unfair, and not containing minority representation, which I should be unable to carry.'

'On October 31st there was a Cabinet which was Trevelyan's first, and very glad he and his wife were to escape from Ireland, [Footnote: The Chief Secretaryship was offered to Mr. Shaw Lefevre, who refused on the same ground as had previously been taken by Sir Charles. Without Cabinet rank he was not prepared to accept it. Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman was then appointed. Mr. Lefevre entered the Cabinet as Postmaster-General after the death of Mr. Fawcett, which occurred on November 6th, 1884.] which had aged him dreadfully....

On the question of Reform Hartington told us that he had had several interviews with Sir Michael Beach, who had expressly stated that he was not authorized by his party to make suggestions, but had proposed total merger up to 25,000, and loss of the second seat up to 80,000. I, to clinch the matter, at once volunteered to draw up a scheme on this basis.'

'James called my attention to some communications in the Conservative newspapers, stating that he had it on very high authority (which with James always meant Randolph Churchill) that the extremely large schemes hinted at were Lord Salisbury's, and would be supported by the whole Conservative party; but these schemes suggested minority-representation in urban districts, with single-member const.i.tuencies in counties; or, as Chamberlain said, "Tory minority represented in towns, and Liberal minority extinguished in county." Lord Salisbury, however, was only keeping his friends in good humour with minority-representation. In the evening Randolph Churchill sent me a message that he wished to have a conference with me about Redistribution, and by an arrangement made through Sir Erskine May, we met in the Office of the Serjeant- at-Arms. He then told me that Beach's scheme was his, and that he was convinced that an agreement might be come to on those lines. I a.s.sured him of my warm support for a large scheme. I think this was the occasion (about this time) when Randolph, who was thinking of going to India, vented his anger as to Salisbury. Winston Churchill told me in March, 1901, that his father had come to terms with Salisbury as to the future Tory Government before he started for India. I told him this could not be, as the possibility of forming one depended on the Irish, and that Lord Salisbury could not at this early date have agreed to buy them by the promises of (1) Enquiry into Spencer's police, (2) no Coercion, (3) a Viceroy personally favourable to Home Rule.

'In the evening I dined with the d.u.c.h.ess of Manchester to meet the Dufferins, on which occasion Dufferin shone, but his health and spirits were now beginning to decline. Hartington was at the dinner, and told me that he had had a fresh interview with Beach, this time at his (Hartington's) request.

'On Sat.u.r.day, November 1st, I had some correspondence with Hartington about these interviews, of which I warmly approved; and on the 3rd Hartington wrote to me that he was going to see Beach again that day, and I placed all my scheme before him for communication to the Conservative front bench.'

Publicly there was war.

'On November 4th was the laying of the foundation-stone of the National Liberal Club, at which Harcourt, after saying that he was a moderate politician, compared the House of Lords to Sodom and Gomorrah.'

But privately

'on this day Hartington again saw Beach, and afterwards Churchill.... Beach said that Lord Salisbury unreservedly accepted the Queen's suggestion for a meeting of the leaders.... Conferences went on, but all through the month Beach declined to take a "representative character, or negotiate in such a way as would commit his party"--to use Hartington's words. Hartington now thought "Mr. Gladstone would be able either to come to terms with Lord Salisbury or to put him completely in the wrong." Hartington added: "Beach very much regrets the Lowther and John Manners speeches,"'

and probably Lord Hartington expressed regret for Sir William Harcourt's references to Sodom and Gomorrah.

'On the 6th there was a meeting of my Committee on Redistribution to consider Beach's proposals, at which I took the chair, but did little else, and left all the talking to the others, and their view came to this--that they were quite willing to agree to the Tory revolutionary scheme, provided the Tories would take the odium with the House of Commons of proposing it.'

'On November 7th the Cabinet decided that I should be joined to Hartington as recognized plenipotentiary.'

On the 10th

'I proposed and Mr. Gladstone agreed to write to Lord Salisbury "distinctly accepting the Queen's offers." On November 11th we confirmed our decisions at the last Cabinet as to completely taking away from Lord Salisbury the power of saying that he had accepted and we declined the Queen's proposals, by unreservedly supporting Mr. Gladstone's letter to the Queen.'

On November 15th Mr. Gladstone informed the Cabinet that the Lords were unyielding.

'Northcote had taken tea with him on the previous evening. The Lords would not part with the Franchise Bill till the Redistribution Bill was in their House. As regarded Lord Salisbury and Sir Stafford Northcote, Mr. Gladstone considered the door absolutely closed, but he was informed that the Duke of Richmond and Lord Cairns did not agree with the leaders. We then drew up a statement to be made on Monday, November 17th, in both Houses of Parliament as to the steps we had taken to produce conciliation, Harcourt saying: "This is the apple-woman spitting on her old apples and shining 'em up!"--the fact being that it was only done to put the Lords in the wrong.'

'On Monday, November 17th, when I returned from Sandringham, I had to see Lord Rowton, who had been sent to me by the Prince of Wales to try and produce a settlement of the Redistribution difficulty, but we only sat and smiled at one another; he saying that he had come because he had been told to come, and I saying that I had nothing new to tell him, for Lord Salisbury knew all we had to say.'

'On November 19th there was a Cabinet. The first matter mentioned was the arrangement with the Conservatives for an interview, and at four o'clock on this day, November 19th, occurred the first meeting of the parties: an interview between Lord Salisbury and Sir Stafford Northcote on the one side, and Mr. Gladstone and Lord Granville on the other. Lord Salisbury had written to me about it already, and had privately seen my papers the previous day at the Commission, and had asked me a great number of questions, and I had given him my division of the Metropolis and of Lancashire at his wish, and received from him the following note: "I do not know whether it will be possible to discuss the application of the one-member principle to the Counties and the Metropolitan Const.i.tuencies and the suburbs of the larger towns." The hesitating way in which he asked shows that we might have avoided the single-members had we fought upon the point. But, as I liked them myself, I fought the other way, against Mr. Gladstone. At the interview between the leaders of the two parties and the two Houses it was merely decided that the real interview should take place on Sat.u.r.day, November 22nd, at noon between the two Conservative chiefs and Mr. Gladstone, Lord Hartington, and me, Lord Granville being left out as knowing nothing of the subject. On November 21st I continued my private conference with Lord Salisbury at the Royal Commission, and we settled who the Boundary Commissioners should be. On Sat.u.r.day, November 22nd, I had a conference with Chamberlain before going to the meeting with Lord Salisbury. Chamberlain was in favour of two-member seats as against single members, especially for boroughs. He was as clear as was Lord Salisbury that the single-member system would damage the Liberal party in the Metropolis.

'In the afternoon the Conference took place, and there never was so friendly and pleasant a meeting. I fully described it in three letters to Chamberlain, in which I said, among other things: "It looks as though Lord Salisbury is really anxious that we should pa.s.s our Bill." No memorandum on this day pa.s.sed in writing, and the written compact was concluded between Lord Salisbury and me only on November 28th. The meeting of the 22nd was known at the time as the Downing Street meeting; and the other as "the Arlington Street compact."

'On Sunday, November 23rd, Lord Salisbury wrote to me a letter which I sent on to Mr. Gladstone and which he kept. Mr. Gladstone replied on the same day undertaking to move the adjournment of the House for a week, and showing that he was not at all sure that Lord Salisbury, having got from us the whole of our scheme and given us nothing in writing which was worth anything, did not mean to sell us.

Chamberlain wrote on the same day in reply to my letters, "I cannot make head or tail of Salisbury. He appears to be swallowing every word that he has ever written or spoken about Redistribution.... I wonder if he will carry his party with him.... On the whole, you seem to be doing very well."'

Discussion now went on by correspondence between Sir Charles and Lord Salisbury, and it touched subjects which might easily have led to friction. Lord Salisbury proposed to create a number of urban const.i.tuencies by grouping; his plan being to get the small towns taken out of rural districts which he looked upon as otherwise Conservative, and to group them with small manufacturing boroughs:

'I was aghast at this suggestion, because it was a very difficult thing, in a Parliamentary sense, to create a few such groups in England; and if the thing was to be carried far and not confined to a few cases only it would entirely have destroyed the whole of the work that we had done, because all the counties would have had their numbers altered. I therefore fought stoutly for my own scheme, which I succeeded in carrying almost untouched. Lord Salisbury's letter crossed one from me to him in which, after Mr. Gladstone's leave (conveyed in the words "I see no objection to sending him this excellent and succinct paper marked Secret"), I had communicated to Lord Salisbury my views and the grounds on which they were based.'

'On the 26th, at four o'clock, we met at Downing Street, all five being present.... Lord Salisbury, yielding to my reasoning, gave up grouping,' on the understanding that the Boundary Commissioners were 'to keep the urban patches as far as possible by themselves....

Ultimately it was settled that single-member districts should be universal in counties, and that we should leave open for the present the question of how far it should be applied to boroughs.'

Lord Salisbury wished to retain the minority clause in places where he thought it had worked well, but he did not ask for it in Birmingham and Glasgow. 'All this showed great indecision,' says Sir Charles, and he observes that 'Lord Salisbury did not seem to me thoroughly to understand his subject.' It is probable, at all events, that he was no match on the details either for Sir Charles or for Mr. Gladstone, who, after the Conference, thus summed up his impressions in a letter dated November 26th:

'My Dear Dilke,

'I send you herewith for your consideration a first sketch which I have made of a possible communication to-morrow after the Cabinet from us to the Legates of the opposite party. I think that if the Cabinet make it an _ultimatum_ we should be safe with it. There was a careful abstention to-day on their side from anything beyond praising this or that, and at the outset they spoke of the one-member system for boroughs "with exceptions" as what they desired.

'Yours sincerely,

'W. E. Gladstone.'

'Mr. Gladstone's memorandum was on my lines. On the next morning, November 27th, Mr. Gladstone, Lord Granville, Hartington, I, and Chamberlain met before the Cabinet at 11 o'clock, and kept the Cabinet waiting, the Cabinet having been called for twelve, and Redistribution alone being considered at it. I announced at the Cabinet that the Tories proposed and we accepted single-member districts universally in counties, boundaries to be drawn by a commission who were to separate urban from rural as far as possible, without grouping and without creating const.i.tuencies of utterly eccentric shape. The names of the commissioners had been settled, and both sides were pledged to accept their proposals, unless the two sides agreed to differ from them. [Footnote: At the meeting of the 26th 'it was agreed that the Boundary Commissioners should consist of those gentlemen who had been advising me.']

'The Tories proposed single-member districts almost everywhere in boroughs, and only positively named one exception--the City of London--but were evidently prepared to make some exceptions. They made our agreement on this point the condition of pa.s.sing the Franchise Bill, of giving up the decrease of the Irish members from 103 to 100 which they urged, of giving up all forms of minority vote, and of giving up grouping. My own opinion and that of the Prime Minister were in favour of agreement. Hartington, who much disliked what he thought would be the extinction of the Whigs by an omnipresent caucus for candidates' selection, was hostile to the single-member system. I pointed out that we already proposed in our amended scheme 120 single-member borough seats out of 284 borough seats. We had thrown out to the Tories a question as to whether they would accept, say, 184 single-borough seats, and give us, say, not more than 100 for double-member seats; or, if they liked, two-thirds and one-third; and they did not positively decline this suggestion.

Mr. Gladstone proposed to "save from compulsory division those urban const.i.tuencies, not Metropolitan, which, now possessing dual representation, are to have their representation neither increased nor diminished." (This was the ultimate agreement.) Also, that "cities and towns which are to receive four members and upwards, ten in number, should have one central or princ.i.p.al area set apart with two members." (This was purely personal on Mr. Gladstone's part and was universally rejected.)

'I argued warmly in favour of supporting Lord Salisbury's scheme (upon which he and I were absolutely agreed), I being delighted at having got seven more members for the Metropolis than were given by my scheme in its last form after the Cabinet had cut it down. In order to secure Chamberlain's support I told him "I might be able to save a seat for you and give the extended Birmingham seven if you liked to make that a condition, but in that case I must get one somewhere for Glasgow also out of the rest of Scotland, which is skinning flints."

'The reception of our proposals by the Cabinet, to which Grosvenor'

(the Chief Whip) 'had been called in, was not altogether favourable.

Childers talked about resigning, and Grosvenor was most hostile. We had the enormous advantage, however, that Chamberlain and I and Mr.

Gladstone were the only three people who understood the subject, so that the others were unable to fight except in the form known as swearing at large. I was sent off from the Cabinet to Lord Salisbury to tell him that we could agree. At three o'clock we had a further conference with the Conservative leaders, and came to an agreement on my base, Chamberlain, who was somewhat hostile, yielding to me, I going in and out to him, for he was at Downing Street in another room.'

Next day memoranda were exchanged between the parties to the Conference, and Mr. Gladstone was pledged to stand by the heads set down in his memoranda, and accept no provision outside of these without Sir Stafford Northcote's agreement. One detail is of interest as ill.u.s.trating Mr.

Gladstone's inherited Conservatism, which comes out all through these negotiations.

'Mr. Gladstone in sending this (memorandum) to me said: "You will see that Salisbury stands upon our printed statement as to Universities." Mr. Gladstone, knowing that I was strongly opposed to University representation, took this matter upon himself. He proposed a more general form of words in place of Lord Salisbury's pledge against new matters, and, as for Universities, wrote: "a.s.sure Salisbury that I personally will _bind_ myself out and out to this proposition."'

'In the afternoon I went to Lord Salisbury to settle the terms of agreement, and had to go four times from him to Mr. Gladstone, and four times back again, before we finished....

'The next day I lunched with Mr. Gladstone to meet Miss Mary Anderson, the actress, and Princess Louise. I received at lunch a letter from Lord Salisbury making a few reservations ... none of them difficult of acceptance.

'On December 2nd I got a note from Harcourt--to ask what I had been doing with the British Const.i.tution in his absence. On December 8th I had a serious grumble from Spencer from Dublin as to my having settled with Salisbury who were to be the Irish Commissioners, and only asked the Irish Government after the thing was done. I had undoubtedly been wrong, and can only say that Spencer let me off cheaply....'

Sir Charles's holiday in the South of France, whither he went on December 17th, was broken by copies of a correspondence between Lord Spencer and Lord Salisbury, the latter writing 'with much sound and fury' on the question of another Conservative Boundary Commissioner for Ireland. 'Lord Salisbury had always been so extremely soft and sweet to me that it was a revelation to find him writing to Spencer in the style of Harcourt or of Chamberlain when in a pa.s.sion.'