The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1880-02-07 00:00:00

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MR. COWEN ON FOREIGN POLICY.

On Saturday night Mr. Joseph Cowan, M.P., addressed a
crowded meeting of his constituents in the Town-hall, New-
castle, on the foreign policy of England.

Mr. J. Cowen, who was received with enthusiastic
cheers, said,—lnternational problems of great intri-
cscy and importance have come up for consideration
and settlement since the last general election. Many
of the issues stated are old ones—some of them cen-
turies old, but they were not then before the electors.
The Liberals, as a body, have assumed towards them
an altered attitude. They have abandoned, no doubt
for reasons which appear to them good, the historic
policy of the country, if not the traditional principles
of the party. There is necessarily difficulty in
fixing with precision the position of a complex
body in a state of change, but no injustice will,
I think, be done to any one by saying that many
Liberals on foreign questions have espoused in epieit,
if not in substance, the doctrines which were held
with tenacity and expounded with earnestness by that
band of capable men who made the world their debtors
by their labours for free bade. I have not been able
to become a convert to this new faith. lam not, and
never was an adherent of what is popularly known
as the Manchester School. On this subject there is
between myself and some of my friends a distinct
divergency, which I have no desire either to minimize
er to ignore. I am in favour of a European, a national,
as against an insular, and—l use the word in no offen-
sive sense—a parochial policy. In a country where,
unfortunately, speech is controlled so much by and so
much based on party interest, little favour Is shown to
the politician who ignores its consideration and ven-
tures upon the dangerous practice of striving to be ins-
partial. If he speaks the unbiased sentiments of his
mind he incurs the opposition of his former supporters,
the slanders of his opponents, and the sneers and sus-
picions of some of his associates. But sincerity of
utterance is the only channel of truth. (Cheers.) Now,
no one can adduce a new argument, either for or
against the policy which this country has recently
pursued. The subject has been written about and
, spoken about so often and at such length that every
I argumentative thread connected with it is worn thin
and bare. The literature on the interminable theme
is a veritable political kaleidoscope, in which every
I form of thought, every shade of opinion is presented
f in all shapes of attraction and repulsion. But if what
, I say is not new it will only be in keeping with the
I speeches of other persons. We are not philosophers
speculating upon what might be, nor philanthropists
dilating upon what ought to be, nor poets chanting the
dirge of a brilliant but buried past. We are matter-
of-fact politicians talking of the prosaic present, and
politics, I fear, are too often controlled more by self-
interest than by sentiment. We are not dealing with
an ideal State. If we were, the fragmentary and com-
posite Empire of Britain would not realize my Utopia.
Greece, whose name has been a watchword upon earth,
whose fame will never fade, from whose history man-
kind has derived inspiration and guidance, and which
still rises upon our intellectual sight like the mountain-
top gilded with sunshine amid the devastations of a
llood—Greeca. I say, vane. en.... lawgiving,
lag, imperial, splendid but savage Rome, would be my
Model. I would have a State in which every man is
free anl where every man is fortified against super-
stition by education and against oppression by arms;
where the arts and graces of Athens, the martial in-
dependence of Sparta, would commingle with the
mercantile and industrial enterprise and the naval
prowess of Britain; where influence and authority
would be won by intellectual strength and moral worth,
and a proud defiance could be bid to despotism's banded
myriads. Bat these are the dreams of the idealist.
We belong to the real and the active and not to the
imaginary world. We are the inheritors of a colonial
empire the most widespread, scattered, and extensive
ever known. It reaches to every region, and has its
feelers in every corner of the globe. Some of these
possessions came to us in a questionable shape and by
means that no one can justify, and which I at least
have no desire either to palliate or excuse. But the
present generation of Englishmen are guiltless of the
crime amending their acquisition. Our colonies cover
an area of 3,000,000 square miles, with a population of
14,000,060 persons following diverse pursuits, but all
having one mind, aim, and tradition. In India we
have a frontier of 12,000 miles, an area of 1,500,000
square miles, and 240,000,000 of people own our sway.
Our insular position frees us from many of the dangers
which surround many Continental States, but our
external empire makes us at the same time one of the
most sensitive and assailable of nations. No serious
motignt can be made in any part of the earth
wi our feeling its influence. No country ever
occupied such a peculiar position as Britain and her
daughter empires now hold. It is not egotism
to say that, notwithstanding all our shortcomings,
power so vast was never wielded with so sincere
a desire to use it beneficially, to [secure the exist-
ence, to rivet the cohesion of this vast dominion,
blessed with one of the highest forma of freedom
that the world has ever seen. To carry to distant
countries and succeeding ages the loftiest form of
civilisation is our mission. To abandon the oppor-
tunity of usefulness thus conferred, to throw aside the
hope of securing equal rights and impartial freedom,
to-destroy the means of establishing a feeling of fra-
ternity and consciousness of common material inte-
rests among so many millions of our fellow beings
would be a narrow, a niggardly, a short-sighted, and a
selfish policy for a great nation to pursue. If we left
South Africa without some protection from the home
Government, the homesteads erected by years of
patient toil, the centres of civilisation and of com-
merca created would be endangered if not destroyed.
If we abandoned India, a like but more disastrous re-
...tee...la enene. The scores of different races and
nations into wilieh the
population of the country is
divided would fly at each other's throats. In the
earliest encounters probably the fierce, conr 94 la a
unteachable, and impracticable Mahomedans,l4.
are forty millions strong, would assert their
supremacy, but after years of internecine war and
social disorder the country would fall a prey to the
foreign invader, poseiblry Russia. This country would
suffer equally with the Indian people ; the £128,000,000
of Indian debt would have to be provided for; civil
servants and officers whose careers would be destroyed
would require their pensions, and compensation would
possibly be demanded by traders who would be ruined
by our change of policy. India, England, and the
world would all be injured. No Englishman could
contemplate such a contingency with approval or
acquiesce in it with satisfaction. Now that we possess
it we are bound to protect and defend India, and to
hold it against any enemy as stoutly as we would hold
Cornwall or Caithness. England is not so many square
roods of land, but a nation whose people are united in
love of soil and race by mutual sympathy and tradi-
tier, by character and institutions, It is not a for-
tuitous concourse of individuals merely bound over to
keep the peace towards each other and for the rest fol-
lowing their own selfish objects and declaring that out-
side their own cottage, coanting-house, or country,
everything should be allowed to take its course. Our
country is something more than the workshop of the
world, a manufactory for flashy clothing, and a market
for cheap goods. We are pledged to each other as
citizens of a great nationality and by solidarity of life.
We owe a duty to ourselves, to our families, and to
our country, and also to our generation and to the
future. We have grown great not merely by the ex-
tent of our possessions and the fertility of our soil, but
by the preservation of our liberties and the energy and
enterprise of our people. The present generation is
the outcome of centuries of effort; the th history of Eng-
land is woven and interwoven, laced and i
thousand years whereveraeratdy
with the history of Europe interlaced,
e world For a
cessfully or wherever it has suffered struggled
our sympathies have gone.
this world that can be foreign to us,
obfrinagva
wriitceh There is nothing
d .in vain, ,
,thaennid
ebei
oywon,
and tdheeddurceastmiosn
heavy territorial Wealth
p almost
os
given
of it is
will be
responsibili-
ties ; power to the very last particle ledostlerCe.
"Unto him to whom much is
required ;" and as we have inherited so much so
have much to transmit, and no one can look lighhesiongwlye
But
on the
if
ever resnal t a
nationw hic h
drunk
k upon
wit h our
ther
fumeso veas
oi if
pAowsiear,
atttsi n
i
o
and ka,
arid wealth makes an apotheosis of gold andirsini
material
pleasure, prefers riches to duty, comfort to Courage
selfish enjoyment to heoric effort and sacrifiee
in the respect of others and loses the
strongest incentive to human effort. Gr feat
demands great effort, and great effort is the lif vlrk
soul, both of individuals and of nations. I cone, theotea
therefore, for these two principles—the integrity doi
the Empire and. the interest, the right, and the (lett
of England to play her part in the great battle of the
world, as did our illustrious ancestors, the forerunnere
of European freedom. Let us apply these principles to
thi rilOtiat controsersiee in the astand the section that

wha 1

has been taken by this country. India is one of
our most distant, as it is one of our moat important,
dependencies. We hold it more as conquerors than as
colonists. There are urgent and obvious reasons why
our communication with it should be rapid, easy, and
expeditions. Nature, mechanical science, and com-
mercial enterprise have all contributed to make the
best route to it through the isthmus which unites the
continents of Asia and Africa. Through the Suez
Canal we not only reach India, but our dependencies
in the China Seas, our Australian colinies, the
Mauritius, and the Settlements on the East Coast of
Africa. The isthmus is the neck which connects the
head with the extremities of our Empire. It has
been suggested that if we lost it we could resume
our old route by
the Cape of Good Hope. It is
quite true that this could be done; it is equally
true that we might return to packhorses and stage
wagons as a means of travelling or a mode of transit.
We have got the Canal, and .in the interests of our-
selves and of the world we will hold it at
all hazards. If Russia were to obtain political supre-
macy on either side of the Bosphorus she could stop
the Canal or intercept our wai to India by the
Euphrates Valley. North of the Danube she is com-
paratively harmless, but with the Black Sea, the Sea
of Marmora, and the Straits in her possession, she
would have at her command a position unequalled in
the world for commerce and for war. She could barri-
cade the Dardanelles, and-behind it she would have
two inland seas, which would be at one and the
same time harbour, arsenal, dockyard, and naval
station. She could there with security and ease
equip and arm her ships, train her sailors, and
mancenvre her fleet. In the numberless islands
and roadsteads of the Archipelago she would have
protection in conducting either offensive or defensive
warfare Stich as is to be found in no other part of
the globe in equal space. This position is the key
to Europe and one of its life arteries. Its occupa-
tion by a conquering, ambitious, and despotic Power
would be a danger to England, to Europe, and to
liberty. The aspirations of the Russian peasant are
southward; he yearns to be clear of the Boreal regions
of snow and solitude ha which he is enveloped for the
greater part of the year; as naturally as the sap rises
in the vine, so naturally does the desire of the Russian
rise to reach more genial regions and to burst the poli-
tical and frozen cerements which rob him of life and
development. Russia is not a nation like France, or
Italy, or Spain; it is not a dynastic aggregation of
States like Austria; but it islet crushing and devouring
political mechanism which has annihilated full fifty
distinct nationalities. It kills every spring of inde-
pendence it intercepts; it has covered whole con-
tinents with the melancholy monuments of national
aspirations. Poland, the Niobe of nations, whose
gallant sons have been the knight•errants of liberty
the world over has been all but entombed by her in
Siberia; Circassia, the cradle of the human race,
whose people are the manliest and the handsomest in
the world, has been converted into a tomb; and she
is now seeking to engulf the .desert steppes, the briny
waters, and the shifting, burning sands that lie be-
tween the Caucasus, the Caspian, and the Afghan
tableland. The mistrust and, to some extent, the
necessity of the Russian people urge them "to seek
fresh fields and pastures new" away from their
biting north winds, their icy forests, their cold,
their bleak, and their limitless plains. The Govern-
ment, which is Asiatic rule bastardized by German
beaureaucracy, with appropriating frenzy has
striven to annex territory in all directions;
while the Emperors, animated by an ambition
akin to that of Macedonia's madman and the Swede,
have been dazzled by a dream of universal empire,
and have sought to find a foothold for their power
In the unrivalled natural resources which Turkey
affords. The defeat of Russia in the Crimea modified
her external and internal policy, Repulsed in the
south and west, Russia sought an outlet for her
stream of conquest in Central Asia. Unnoticed, to
a large extent unknown, she has in that quarter of the
globe during the last few years absorbed a territory
nearly equal in extent to Continental Europe, and
she has now a bristling array of bayonets in
threatening proximity to our Indian Empire.
Immediately our friend and ally, France, was
worsted in the Franco German war the Czar inti-
mated that he intended no longer to comply with
the clauses of the Treaty of Paris that neutralized
the Black Sea; he did not invite the other Powers
of Europe who along with himself were parties
to the treaty to yield to his request for an alteration,
but with autocratic pride and despotic imperiousness
he proclaimed his determination to lo ,k upon that
-portion of the treaty as null and void. He had
observed it as long as France was in a position to
unite with England for its maintenance, but when
-France was temporarily disabled he seized the opper-
tunity to break an engagement which he had solemnly
entered upon. Russia hi her attacks upon neighbour-
ing.States follows a uniform and unvarying plan. She
begins wally by professing an interelt in their
welfare. At one time she is moved by sympathy for
her brethren in bonds, as if there were no persons in
bonds in Russia. At another time she is roused to
fervour for her co-religionists, as if there were no
persons suffering from their religious opinions within
her own borders.

Mr. Cowen then proceeded, in strong terms, to condemn
the aggressive designs of Russia, which had violated every
one of her declarations made when entering upon her
hypocritical war with Turkey; but said that the Berlin
Treaty had been a diplomatic defeat for her, and had given
the Turks, as well as the Bulgarians, a chance of asserting
themselves as nations. He approved of the occupation of
Cyprus, and referred at follows to the Anglo-Turkish Con-
vention :

of 1 4,,

That it is advantageously situated for guarding the
Suez Canal from any danger from the north, and that
it affords a favourable starting point for advancing to
the east through the Euphrates Valley, will scarcely
be denied by any one who has impartially. examined
the subject. Military and naval men maintain that
it can be made not only a watch tower, but a depOt
r, NA. n g a,valAt em
inn. Tt. is ir, *---i•r•
tiocfori L aTim r ort Said, nine from Acre, and six from
Beyrout. It is near enough to watch and close enopgh
to strike, if we required to strike, in defence of our road
to the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf. (Cheers.) By the
Angio-Turkhsh Convention (England has taken upon
herself heavy responsibilities; but if we had not effected
that arrangement, the Sultan, like Shere All, despair-
ing of help from England, would have thrown himself
reluctantly, no doubt, but still he would have thrown
himself—into the arms of Russia. We had either to
accept the position or permit it to pass into the
possession of a rival. Bear in mind that such a lever-
age in the centre of two continents would not only
have imperrilled our empire in India, but our authority
in Europe. We have often entered into treaties with
other nations entailing equally onerous obligations.
We are bound to defend Greece against Turkey,
Portugal against Spain, Belgium against France and
Germany. We were bound to defend Denmark, and
with culpable cowardice we evaded the responsibility.
(Cheers) Under a stringent treaty we are bound
to maintain, the independence of Sweden and Norway.
We are parties to other treaties, many of them
quite as onerous as the one we have recently
entered into with Turkey, and few of them
offer such a prospect of achieving such bene-
ficial results as may spring from the Anglo-Turkish
Convention, In Asia Minor there are nearly
700,000 square miles of some of the finest land in the
world, washed by three seas, watered by large rivers,
and possessing spacious ports and harbours, The
plains are capable of producing grain, fruit, and cotton
in abundance, while the hills and the valleys abound
in copper,.lesd, iron, and silver. (Cheers.) We send
our surplus population across the Atlantic or to the
Antipodes. There is no reason why they should not
find a field for their labours and an outlet for their
skill in a luxuriant land, rich with golden grain and
an infinite variety of plants and fruit, within a few
hours of our own shores. What has hitherto been
wanted is security for life and property. Under the
protection which might be, ought, and I trust will be,
given by this treaty, these obstacles to colonization
will be removed. (Cheers.) English capitalists and
the English Government have always refused seriously
to consider the project of a railway through the
Euphrates Valley, because they declined to risk
such large investments In a country over which
they bad no legal control. This treaty ought to
and I think will, dispense with this difficulty. The
Euphrates Valley railway would be 1,2d0 miles long,
and the coat of its construction is estimated at
£12,000,000—a comparatively small sum when the
amount invested in railways in this country is con-
sidered. (Hear, hear.) I know no more of the future
than s prophet, but I think it would be no great
venture to h&zard the prediction that the railway will
be made, and made, too, through English enterprise.
This work will not only act as a breakwater against
northern aggression and a bulwark for the Indian
Empire, but can be made the fulcrum for raising a
people and making the primal neat of arts and refine-
ment, the theatre of the most momentous events in
early history, bloom and blossom as the rose, (Cheers.)
My contention, in a sentence, is that our ex-
ternal empire should be maintained and defended as
much in the interests of freedom and civilization as in
the interests of England alid its distant dependencies;
that we cannot honourably and without danger
shrink from the responsibility which our history and
our position as the oldest and one of the chief free
States he the world entail upon us; that the security
of our dominions in the East and the equilibrium of
Europe were threatened by the advance of Russia on
Constantinople; that the action this country took,
although it might be open to objection in details, was
necessary, and in the main judicious; that it largely
contributed to thwart the dangerous and aggressive
designs of Russia; had insured our present and had
made provision for obtaining au improved way to
India; would help to secure better government for
Turkey, and had strengthened the influence of Eng-
land in the councils of Europe, (Cheers)
After proceeding to advert to the war in Afghanistan, Mr.
Cowen concluded by saying—
There are in the House of Commons some thirty
or forty members who more or lees have supported
the policy which the Government have pursued on
foreign questions, but these numbers possibly would
have been larger if vote by ballot had been in opera-
tion in the House. (Hear.) There has never been a
Parliament since the Reform Act where there have
not been instances of the kind occurring. The policy
on foreign questions that I and others in the House
of Commons have defended is the old policy of this
country. I do not wish to shelter myself under
great names. But the policy that I have
expounded to-night, and which I have ex-
pounded in Parliament, is the policy that was
advocated by Mackintosh and Brougham Horner and
Lord Durham • it is a policy that received approval
of the philosophic Liberals Molesworth, Mill, Grote,
and Buller; it is the old Radical policy that was
expounded by Major Cartwright, Lord Dandonald, -
William Cobbett, and General C. Thompson • and it
was the common faith of Radicals when I firsebecame
interested in public life. It is not the faith, I know,
of the Manchester school; but it is, I contend, of the
early Radicals. (Cheers.) I am weak enough to own
of the individual to the State, as one of the
I believe in that now derided obligation of patriotism,
agge
-end of D
rdinutcyiples planted in the human brea4. I know my
's defects, but I cannot join with those who ex-
-ste and parade them, The land of Michael Angelo
Dante was not destitute of energy, but when
cosfillifeutthievri:rarsistently proclaimed herself to be miserable and
her word and trod upon her. English-
men d Posed infamous through the mouth of Machiavelli the world
i/I
took her at
to decry their native land may remember
with advantage the experience of Italy, It is ours to
hem down to posterity undimmed Anti undiminished

the priceless heritage of a free State, the imperceptible
aggregation of centuries won by the struggles of a
heroic national life. It was planted, has been reared,
and has been watered by the sweat, the tears, the
blood of some of the noblest of men. If England is
old she is not decrepit, and has still within her daring
and elasticity. (Loud cheers.)
At the close of the meeting a vote of unabated con-
fidence in Mr. Cowen was passed unanimously amid
enthusiastic cheering.

The Times, in a leader discussing Mr. Cowen's
speech at Newcastle, says it is greatly to his credit
that be anticipated the verdict which will sooner or
later be pronounced on the policy of England daring
the eventful European crisis from which Europe has
come out unharmed. The position which has been
gained for England in the general opinion of the world
will be the common inheritance of all parties. Those who
are now for ward in disclaiming the means will be as ready
as the rest to share the credit of the result. On some
points, it is true, Mr. Cowen is a little in advance
either of his old or of his new friends. He would not
willingly allow any great European question to be
decided apart from England's voice. He appeals
to traditions which the country is not likely to
accept as rules for guidance, and which no re-
sponsible statesman of any party would venture
to adopt. But as far as he deals with the
conduct of the Government as to the Eastern Ques-
tion he bestows no praise which has not been de-
served, or which will not by-and-by be endorsed. We
must contrast the present state of Europe with what
it might have been, and not improbably would have
been, if England had held her hand just at the decisive
moment, —The Times concludes its leader as follows :
"Mr. Cowen's speech, eloquent and patriotic as it is in
every word, suggests the thought that appeals to patriotic
feeling are seldom of very long effect, and that the day some-
times comes when they are apt to do as much harm as good
to the cause for which they are made. A few years hence
we shall all be glad that England in her late trial maintained
a proper spirit and made her influence recognized and
respected throughout Europe. Just now the wish of
the country is for repose. An effort has been made
and has been successful; and there is no present wish
In any quarter that the need for making it should recur.
Foreign complications bring with them duties which it is
not possible for such a country as England to decline, but
they are not therefore welcome duties. Least of all do they
seem attractive during the passing lull which follows a
great effort. The country is not in a mood to call the
Government to account for having acted with too little
spirit. lilt inclined to be unjust at all, it is rather in the
opposite direction. Success, when it has been achieved, is
alwaps apt to be forgotten or to be valued for less than its
due."