The Sun.
London, England, 1866-04-09 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

gPVC,TATOR " ON Ma. GLADSTONE AT
LIVERPOOL.—Mr. Gladstone's speech at the Liver-
pr: ol banquet was a good blow weir struck at Mr.
Lowe, and a very fair answer to those who desiro
to resist Reform altogether, but that is all it was. It
brings neither consolation nor conviction to those
Liberals who, contending for a wide Reform—a
Reform which shall bring the main body of work-
men within the pale—still demur to intrust the en-
tire State to the hands of a single class. Mr. Lowe
loainseeertainly:contrived in his letter to the electors of
to put himself in an untenable position, and
it is clever of Mr. Gladstone, though a little
un-
worthy of the leader of the Commons, to make theinsecurity of his opponent's standing-ground visible
to the world. It is very absurd of Mr. Lowe to say
that the lower electors are venal, violent, and
drunken, and also that non-electors have often great
prudence, self-reliance, and perseverance, as if the
franchise could in any way diminish these qualities,
and Mr. Gladstone made the point with his usual
incisiveness. It is also very fair to tell anti-Re-
formers that the promises now §even times repeated
are of themselves a sufficient reason for the intro-
duction of a Bill, and to taunt moderate Tories with
the fact that their own leaders brought in a Bill at
least as wide. But in all this there is no answer to
the really formidable antagonists of the Government
—to those who, like Earl Grosvenor and Mr. Bou-
verie, say they will vote for no Bill which is not
complete, or those, like ourselves, who say that the
object of Reform is to perfect representation, and
that this Bill not only does not do it, but prevents
its ever being done. It is these people the Cabinet
has to answer, and with these it steadily, and, so to
speak, warmly declines to cope. What is the
use of answering Tories ? The Government
can vote them down, and Mr. Lowe with
them, if necessary, and in any case arguments will
make with them no manner of difference. The
point is to answer the objections raised on all sides
by those who, being Reformers, see neither prin-
ciple nor expediency in this measure, who cannot
alone defeat it, but who, marching before a more
numerous band, will undoubtedly either coerce the
Government into a compromise, or drive it tempo-
rarily from the field. Mr. Gladstone's present ar-
gument does not touch them at all. It simply
amounts to this, that the workman is worthy of the
franchise, which no one among us all ever attempts
to dispute. Indeed we should go further, and say
that if he were clearly unworthy, his unworthiness
ought only to affect the amount of representation
conceded to him, and not his right to any repre-
sentation at all. What we contend is, that, being
worthy, he should be represented in such a way as
to give him as much direct and appreciable power
as he can have without injustice to the claims of
every other class in the nation. To secure that end
we propose the Government scheme plus a provision
securing finality, minus the provision:insuring cor-
ruption. In other words, we want household suf-
frage in all the large boroughs—household suffrage
being simple and final, while a £7 rental is complex
and temporary—and the exclusion of little boroughs
from the measure. What answer does Mr. Glad-
stone make to the principle so embodied, the prin-
ciple, that is, of admitting the workmen wherever
they are independent, and omitting them wherever
they are not ? Simply none at all, merely an asser-
tion that they are excellent people, which is the very
basis of our objection, that Mr. Lowe is self-contra-
dictory—which is a matter of course when a democrat
talks Toryism, and that Government is bound
by its pledges:—which is very true, very moral, very
satisfactory, and nothing to the immediate purpose.
Government has not pledged itself to any jo!
Reform Bill. We do not suppose Mr..
Gladstone
fancies fancies that the mere word " Referm'
without reference to its meaning, that the country
can be saved, like the soul of a Neapolitan
by an endless repetition of the Credo. peasant,
Nobody on
m
our side of the discussion questions that faith is
good, the point is, faith in what ? representative
by noses or
governmentmr. Goschen, in his
ignosvteitruntmioennst obry enmt
eo;i rgaeenyc, e
lyvgeao adroacceptit
os
vpt
ehe
reane:sn,
ee snna
edn,
apartc 'e'
iln dfi
rteosnmmy
et
ah
ialtinwg carmoant
representa-
aexrtirveemaetl
—the ctioorndi'ally, though it goes too far in form,'
uni-
verse not being governed on constitutional principles
—but it remains to define representation. We have ,
done it till we are tired, and prefer this time to
quote the words of one of the truest, heartiest, and,
as we think, ablest democrats who ever lived, a man
whom even the Star would not dare to accuse of
erypto-Toryism, M. Louis Blanc Many persons
fancy that the sovereignty of the people is realised
by the government of the greatest number, no
matter how that government is organised or how it
exercises its authority. For my part, I confess that
I know few errors of a more dangerous character.
Sovereignty cannot be a mere question of addition.
A nation is something more than a cypher. What
really constitutes-a nation, what makes its great-
ness, what creates its power, is what it contains of

lence eulogized, it
certain given con:
be devised for play .nistration of public
affairs in the hands of the most capable and most
worthy. A democracy in which the sway of num-
bers tends to annul the action of men of intellect,
instead of tending to confide to them the direction
of the State, is not a democracy. It is but a many-
headed, blind, and blundering despotism, a despo-
tism irrevocably doomed to perish, sooner or later,
by its own hands." That ideal, the only true ideal,
cannot be reached through universal suffrage, and
is not approached through a bill which reduces the
suffrage without attention either to circumstances
or to principles, to the fact that low suffrage in
Manchester and Calne are radically different things,
and to the principle that " the rightful liberty of
every man ends where the rightful liberty of his
neighbour begins." This is what the Liberals who
agree with us want to secure; this is not secured by
the bill, and if they are firm they will when the
bill comes on do one of:two things, either throw it
out on Earl Grosvenor's motion, by far the bolder
course, or pass in committee an amendment " That
no part of this bill shall ap-fri to any borough re-
turned in the census as of less than 50,000 inhabi- -
tants." On redistribution neither Mr. Gladstone
nor Mr. Goschen said one word, and the objections
to a bill without schedules remain just what they
were, namely, that it compels the house to vote for
a great transfer of the sovereign power before it
knows the extent of the transfer, or to whom it will
be made.

THE " LONDON REVIE W" ON BUDGET ARITH-
METIC.—The publication of the Revenue returns
for the last quarter of the year is the natural cause
of speculation about the coming budget. We have
before us, in great ;-;A, n.i7laterials with which
Mr. Gladstone will datl. liAfould be very hazardous
work to guess what he will propose; but it is be-
lieved the necessary basis of his proposals can be
stated with approximate accuracy. It is apparent
he cannot have so easy and splendid a scheme as he
had last year, with a surplus of about £4,000,000
to give away. The reductions of last year, heavily
as they told, will tell more heavily in the coming
year. So much is admitted on all hands. We are
inclined to go further, and hold the opinion that
Mr. Gladstone can have no surplus at all, and may
even have a small deficit. First of all, in actual
result, last year has turned out well, but not su-
premely well. Instead of an estimated revenue of
.£66,392,000, the return has been £67,813,000 ; or
an excess of £1,421,000, which, added to Mr.
Gladstone's estimated surplus of £253,000, makes a
total apparent surplus of £1,674,000. But, unfor-
tunately, the expenditure, as well as the income,
has exceeded the estimate. Two large supplemen-
tary estimates for last year have lately been put on
the table of the House of Commons. One is for
£372,943 on account of numerous 'charges for the
Civil Service. The other is £764,000 for the New
Zealand war. In regard to the latter sum, we
are told that the colony has remitted, £500,000 of
their debentures. But in Mr. Fox's book, just pub-
lished, it appears that these bonds, as we will not
guarantee them can only be realised at a heavy
discount, and will not yield anything like half a
million. At any rate, the whole sum of £764,000
is not provided for; and, coupled with the Civil
Service items, will make a severe inroad on
the surplus to be credited to last year. In regard to
the coming year, the first figure to start with is
the total expenditure. That amount will be some-
what in excess of last year's estimate, which was as
follows :
Funded and Unfunded Debt £20,350,000
Consolidated Fund charge 1,900,000
Army 14,448,000
Navy .. .
Revenue collection 4,657,000
Packet Service 842,000
Miscellaneous Civil Services 7,650,000

Total £66,139,000
The total is £66,139,000. For the present year we
may assume that the charges for the debt and the
Consolidated Fund will be the same as last ; and we
have before us the estimates for all the other
branches of the services. There will be two very
large additions. The charges for revenue collection
and Post-office Packet Service are to be increased
by £326,000, and on the Civil Service Estimates, as
compared with the vote of last year, there is an in-
crease of £198,964. These two sums make an
addition of £525,000, which cannot be seriously
diminished. The apparent diminution on the Navy
Estimates is only £4,000, and although the Army
Estimates show an apparent reductio, .C,lralf-st,-.,
tbo t;Si'et, is zounternalanced by the estimated dimi-
nution of repayments, which will be visible under
the head of " miscellaneous receipts" in the revenue,
and may as welislx.....utted. bnre.. ' Nddinir therefore
£525,000 to Mr. Gladstone', :penditure for last
year's budget,we ha.;..E66,664,0a0 as the expenditure
for which he has now w provide. It is plain that if the
revenue had not recovered as it has done, Mr. Glad-
stone would now be face to face with a very large deficit.
His estimated revenue for last year was £66,392,000,
and deducting from that sum £1,417,000 —the
additional reductions to take effect this year—he
would now have £64,975,000 to meet an expendi-
ture of £66,664,000. But the year has been pros-
perous, and the revenue has recovered to the extent
year's
a6r1,73:8
9,
e42x2,1301e0,
noood Oiwt,
rowuehl,
di ca hnbdeu fairlyinsufficient
e ecf nuo
p:e
therr
ae vt
ieocoming
on Mr. Gladstone we know will not have that sum.
He is pledged to sacrifice to the wood and timber.
duty, which yields about £270,000, and something
will be lost by the equalisation of the wine duties.
Probably the whole £392,000 will go, and there will
thus be a revenue of £66,000,000 to meet the ex-
penditure of £66,664,000, or a probable deficit of
more than half a million. The reassuring circum-
stance is, that the revenue can be safely trusted to
recover itself. It will be a novelty nevertheless, for
Mr. Gladstone to trust to such a resource. His
friends say of him that he " very prudently ignores
this element when he makes his annual estimate of
income." The prudence of this course may be
doubted, and it is perhaps a weak, because an ad
captandum, point of Mr. Gladstone's finance. It is
easy to show astonishing results at the year's end,
when you knowingly count on receiving less than
you have a right to expect. It would be still more
creditable, however, to forecast almost exactly the
actual result of an average year. The progressive
growth of revenue is a fact to be counted upon as
much as its present yield, as much as the recupera-
tive effect of a specific remission, winch is always
so far discounted. The only difference is that,
taking such fact into account, the surplus should be
larger than the nominal sum with which Mr. Glad-
stone frequently rests content, every one under-
standing sal) rosa what is his real reliance. A mood
deal would be gained by stating explicitly wilt is
already done implicitly. Let us have it all above-
board.

" THE EXAMINER" ON A DRUNKARD'S FAVOUR.
—Patrick Butler, a private in the London Irish
Volunteers, got drunk at Brighton the day before
the Review, and talked of shooting the Prince of
Wales, showing some ball cartridges provided for
the purpose. His language having been reported,
when he went to the ground to join his regiment,
the next day, he was arrested, and the ball car-
tridges were found upon him, though he denied
having them, but his rifle was unloaded. The ma-
gistrates treated the matter very properly as a
drunken folly, and discharged the prisoner. But
what was there
here begins the incomprehensible part of the affair.
Upon quitting the Court, Butler was cheered by
his friends as invnptdrliaiuinrmedwp:iatv:
hundreds waiting outside, who followisetdhehirem
any-
thing
rvien
drunkard.
we fear tththheear et it
indulgenceso,aa
We believe it is the
only case in which
a feeling of envy is mixed with a feeling of kind-
ness. The rabble would fain be as the drunkard
is, and so they put themselves in .
his place, and like
him and help him as they would desire to be liked
and helped in the • •
same disgusting state. They
scrupulously do le \I
vorNefhltolie,wenht o
as they would be done by in thin
instance, 'ifin no other. In the lowest sense of the
word popular, drunkenness is very popular. Ia
there any explanation of the cheers awaiting
Butler at Brighton ? The discharge of an innocent
mau who had brought himself under reason-
able suspicion is not so rare an event as to
collect a mob to hail it with boisterous applause.
But perhaps Mr. Carlyle may help to another solu-
tion of the question, and it may be that, from the
prevailing propensity to "wind and tongue," people
must make a noise upon all occasions; and if they
cannot yell must cheer, and if they cannot cheer
must yell. Personages who can never show their
faces without being obstreperously cheered should
learn the value of cheers from the fact of -1--- •
them with a discharged drunkard. TI 1-'
Wales hardly left Brighton with more honou
applause than Patrick Butler left the Court-house.
As for Mr. Carlyle's charge that " Ihe two fiercest
nations in the world arc going all away into wind
and tongue," if it be so true that even a drunkard
cannot go forth without acclamation, we may have
altogether lost the eloquence of silence, of which a
great French orator finely said, " the silence of the
people is the lesson of kings." If Mr. Carlyle be
right, Princes henceforth have not -to fear their only
impressive lesson, nor drunkards neither. Both
may lose their senses without losing the vociferatio4
of followers,

ung
.urin co o