The Express.
London, England, 1867-01-22 00:00:00

1081) DERBY'S GOVEHNN MT AXD REFORM.

Numerous indications, which taken together
are of some forge, make it probable, the Deily News says,
' the present government will deal with the reform ques-
tion on Lord Melbourne's celebrated principle of leaving it
alone. If they could assume that the forbearance would
be mutual, and that the reform question would, in its
turn, leave them in peace, this course would be a very
satisfactory escape, so far as their personal convenience is
concerned, out of the difficulties in which they have in-
volved themselves and the country. But the most san-
guine conservative can naively hope that the problem will
be solved by declining to attempt its solution. Mr. Disraeli
told his constituents that the conservatives were, above
all others, competent to reform the representation,
and during the recess the conservatives of every degree
of authority have been pathetic in their exhortations
to give a calm and impartial consideration to any measure
the government might bring forward. They came
into office, indeed, under the implied promise to introduce
a measure which would satisfy the country, and on the
plea of deprecated agitation. If the house desires reform,
a ministry which shirks the question cannot retain its '
confidence ; and as Mr. Disraeli would still be in
opposition if he bad last session avowed the course
which it seems probable he will adopt in office,
it is scarcely too much to say that he and his colleagues
have obtained patronage and place by factious intrigues
and false pretences. If in such circumstances he can
carry on the administration what further proof can be
needed that large changes are necessary to make the
House of Commons truly representative of the nation
The Daily News proceeds to point out the unfitness of
the government to deal with certain other controverted
questions in which the country is interested, and observes
that Lord Derby has acted in the sense of his remark on
taking office—that his party could not be expected to
practice for ever an unrewarded loyalty—for in
six months be has distributed more patronage
than Lord Palmerston exercised in six years. The
improved demeanour of the late opposition, more-
over, may perhaps show that the disciplinary end which
Lord Stanley put forward as an apology for the change of
government, has been answered during the past six
months. If so, the principal raison &titre of the tory
administration, as stated by its titular chief and its most
influential member, will have ceased, and there will be
no need for exacting the services which Lord Derby
renders with so many expressions of patriotic self-sacrifice
and personal annoyance.
The Times regards the republication of Mr. Disraeli's
speeches on parliamentary reform as another proof of his
gallantry, but, after all, if he has failed once in attempt.
ing to solve the problem, who has not failed oftener and
more ingloriously ? and in his speeches on the whole he
contrasts not unfavourably with rival reformers. Be-
traying none of the intellectual sterility or timidity which
renders Earl Russell indisposed to adopt new franchise
qualifications, Mr. Disraeli must have the merit of having
again and again asserted the truth that any reform which
will not take note of the difference between the civilisa-
tion of the nineteenth and of the seventeenth centuries,
or which disdains to consider the undesigned uses served
by the anomalies of our constitution, must be a delusion.