The Sun.
London, England, 1868-11-16 00:00:00

MR. GLADSTONE IN LANCASHIRE.

Apropos of the allegations that the " screw" was being
applied on his behalf, Mr. Gladstone spoke on Satur-
day on open voting as compared with the ballot.
"The legitimate use of influence," said he, "of
station, by pure persuasion and without penal conse-
quences, is a very natural use ; but when those that are
in high station and those that are possessed of property
combine together and issue circulars in which they call
upon all their men to place themselves in a band for the
purpose of using that influence, then, gentlemen, we
require no scholar or pedant to translate this into
plain English—we know perfectly well what it means
—it means coercion ; and we have seen the conse-
quences of that 'coercion in the municipal election
at Blackburn; and now the mayor of that town is
obliged to provide for its peace during the par-

liarnentary election by calling in the military power.
For my part, gentlemen, I have always desired, and with

it hoped, that we might continue, through the good sense
of the community, and through the respect of the different
classes, if it can be (lone with freedom, to exercise the
practice of open voting. I don't wish to resort to
secret voting; I hope we may still be able to exercise
the franchise in peace openly ; but this I say in the
presence of you all— if we are to have this-combination
of masters and millowners and managers, on the
Conservative side, for the purpose of exercising a syste-
matic and organised influence to prevent freedom of elec-
tion—that if these measures are taken, and are to be fol-
lowed up by such proceedings as those at Blackburn,
where operatives of Liberal sentiments, and even their wives
and daughters, have been turned out of employment and
deprived of the means of livelihood on account of their
Liberal opinions—then I say, at whatever hazard and cost
we shall be compelled to secure freedom of election.
And if the day comes when the question reaches the
point—l trust it may not come—when it reaches the
point that it can only be bysecrecy of voting, it will not
be you who have brought that about, but it will have
have been brought about by our so-called Conservative oppo-
nents, who, wanting the principles that should lead them to
respect the freedom of their neighbour just as much as
they value their own, will have done in this case the very
thing they have done in a hundred of other cases, namely,
by violence and folly precipitated the very result which
it had been their object, their heart's desire, to obviate
and defeat." He had a brush with Mr. Adderley, who had
claimed for the Conservative party that it had
prevented revolution. " Mr. Adderley says that to deter-
mine to which of these parties you owe the most would be
much the same as if a man-were to strike a balance of
obligations between the leg which he put forward in
walking and the one on which the centre of gravity rested.
"Mr. Adderley," said Mr. Gladstone,"is of opinion that each 1
human being—and the human being was once defined by
the logicians as a two-legged animal without feathers--he
is of opinion that each human being is endowed with two
legs, one of which he puts forward in walking and the
other which he always keeps behind, and that these two
legs are the representatives of the two political parties,
after the manner of what is called the goose-step, or after
the manner of another illustration which I well recollect.
I don't know whether any of you are acquainted with
the song—it is not fashionable at the present moment—
which I think is called ' The Cork Leg ;' but for
the benefit of those who are not acquainted with
it I will remind you that the narrative and moral of
the song turn upon this—that a man having but one
natural leg remaining provides himself with a leg of
cork, and when the leg of cork is attached it becomes so
intolerably active it is continually running away with
him, and the natural leg in vain does what it can to get
him down to a moderate pace. That is Mr. Adderley's
view of the relation of the two parties." Mr. Gladstone
spoke very strongly against putting the Queen in the
front of the battle. " There is 'eg," he said,
"by which a Government can more effectually compro-
mise the highest public interests than by ceasing to
maintain Ministerial responsibility, and there is no
greater breach of duty that a Minister can commit than
to forget the allegiance he owes to the Crown, in
reference to maintaining what is in effect one of the
most essential principles of the Constitution, namely,
that the Crown shall be shielded from personal responsi-
bility, so that the Queen may not have to answer for the
measures of a bad Administration. The practice of
tendering to the Queen not one advice, but two, and leaving
it to the Queen to choose between them, and then coming
down to Parliament and informing Parliament that the
Government have submitted these two alterna-
tives to her Majesty, and that her Majesty has
been pleased to choose one of them, is a serious
Conservative innovation. The man who does
that proves himself by doing it to be totally unfit to direct
for an hour the affairs of this country; because, instead of
making himself responsible for what is done, and standing,
as it is his duty to stand, like a wall of adamant between
the people and the sovereign, he places the sovereign in the
front, he shelters himself behind her august personalty,
and if the result is favourable he is to take the
benefit; if the result is odious, he is always able .to say
Yes, it is true, but we tendered also the other advice,
which, if it had been accepted, would have been pros-