New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1881-09-28
ENGLAND'S TARIFF ISSUE.
SIGNIFICANCE OF RECENT EVENTS.

AGAINST FREE TRADE-MR. JAMES LOwTIIER
AND SIR GEORGE ELLIOT OvERwHEIMINGLY
SUCCESSFUL ON "FAIR-TRADE" PLATFORMS
WILL THE TORIES PROFIT by THEIR OPPOR-
TUNITY f-sIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE's INDIE
CIsIQN-THE LOGIC OF EVENTS.
IFRoM THE REGULAR CORRESPONDENT TRIBUNE.1
LONDON, Sept. Mot since the Tories early in
January of 1874 carried Stroud has such a comno-
ton been occasloned by any bye-election by the
Liberal defeats Friday in North Lincolnshire,
and on Saturday in North Durham. Political gossips
said at the time that it the loss of Stroud which
hlled to overfiowing the cup of Mr.. Gladstone's
proud anger at his decaying popularity and brought
on the dissolution which put Lord Beaconsfeld in
power for six disastrous years. The circumstances
of to-day are widely different, and there is no
thought of dssolving now. for not even Mr..
MAIDSTONE Is sensitive enough to interpret these
county verdicts hints that the country at
large is tired of his rule. None the less are they
likely to have momentous consequences more mo-
mentous perhaps to the Conservatives than to the
Liberals They are beyond dispute Liberal defeats.
Whether they be considered Tory victories or
not depends good deal the use the Tory leaders
decide to make of them. But in any case they
Omnous ofpolitcal changes. They involve possibly
redistribution of political parties; very probably
modification of the creed, so far as they have any,
and of the tactics of which they have beyond qucs-
ton a great DEAL of the Conservative party Ever
since Lord BeacOnfeld died his followers have been
in want of cry. Imperialism has had its day.
1t was an effort of the party OF reaction to substi
tute positive for negative policy. Such
success it had due to the genius of the great
Jingo now departed who invented it, In default
of something to replace it, the sole hope of the Con-
servatives lay in the progress of time in the blum
ders of the Liberals; in popular disgust at Radical
excuses; in such miSfortunes and depressions of
business might create another outburst of that
4 ~ ~
day to which they have so often been much in
debted. Bnt politicians are not generally the most
patient of mortals. When they are out of power
they want to regain power, and they likely to
snatch at any decent means OF regaining 1t. The
elections in North Lincolnshire and North Durham
offer them aneans-whethcr decent OF not is matter
of opinion-and that is the exceptional Importance
of these elections The question they raise is
nothing less than this: whether the Conservatives
are ready 10 20 in for protection.
For months past, theirs has been all anti-Free
Trade agitation. 1t really began there a few years
ago. but. as possible party agitation, snutfed
out by Lord Beaconsfield. to whom 1t seemed pre-
mature. The continued depression OF the agricul-
tnral interests, due part TO bad harvests, IN part
to foreign competition. has given it a fresh start
The manufacturers have been suffering also and
they have contributed to il. hut il is the farmer
whose murmurs have been loudest. need not re-
capitulate the progress of the party which has in
sCribed FAIR Trade on its banner. 1t is enough
to say that though the election of Mr.. Ecroyd at
Preston was due in measure to the working
voters dissatisfaction with his opponents indis-
eliminating hostility to every modification of Free
Trade, important contest had been wholly or
mainly fought out that Issue till this week
When Mr. James Lowther appealed to the electors
of North Lincolnshire, he put himself squarely on
Fair Trade platform, and On that platform he has
carried the election. He wins the seat which
Liberal won at the general election last year. made
not long since by his death. He wins il by
a greater majority All, than Mr. Laycock then won
It. He actually polls more votes than
Mr. Laycock who first on the list
then polled, aud his present Liberal opponent has
more than 400 votes less than Mr. LaycoclS had
The whole number of votes now recorded is larger
than 1t was in April Of last year. and the Conserva-
tive majority is now more than double the then Lib
eral majority.
From such figures as these there is no getting
away. The only thing to be done is tD find what
they mean and how it happens that Tory minority
has thus been turned into Tory majority. For
once both the vctors and the vanqushed are agreed
on that point. Mr.. James Lowther is returned bya
constituency of tenant farmers and the tenant
farmers have returned him because he repudiated
the doctrine of Free Trade In returning thanks to
his supporters after the declaration of the poll Mr.
Lowther summed up his own 'You have re-
turned answer to the questions of free trade and
fair trade and you have inauguraed Il return TO
sound commercial principles. North Lin
colnshlre has sounded the death knell of
the Manchester school" What was called
last year the Revolt of tho Counties
was one of the most significant features of the
general election. 1t taken to mean that the
farmers had grown flred of the unfufled promises
of the Tories, who had always posed as the farmers
friends, and had to the Liberals in homes
of something better than empty husks to I'll their
bellies with. Mr. Gladstone hailed their accession
with delight, and made haste TO secure their alegi-
ance by repeating the malt tax, one of their long
standing grievances. But since then matters have
been going from bad to worse with the British
farmer. Time that bad harvests meant high
prices but the repeal of the Corn Lawsput prices down
and kept them down. A succession of bad haryests
coupled with low prices has made HIM desperate,
and he turns in despair to the first pretender who
offers to restore the Corn Laws and put up the
price of wheat whose name happens to be Mr.
James Lowther. In North Durham the same
agencies were at work, coupled with others to
which will refer Tomorrow Sir George Elliot who
like MIR. Lowther avowed himself Fair-Trader is
returned by majority of $50 by the very consitu-
ency which year ago last April left him at the bot
tom of the poll in a minority of over / 100 Both
North Lincolnshire and North Durham are impor-
tant and powerful constituencies, with more than
10000 voters apiece and their joint and simuta-
declaration Is that they ready to vote for
anybody who will undertake TO protect the British
wheatgrower against his foreign rival.
There, then. is the cry the Tories have been IN
search of; ready made to their lips Viii thoy take
it upf is Mr. James Lowther, who has heretofore
passed for the spoiled child of his party TO be their
St John, and will they hearken to his voice, crying
in the wilderness of North Lincoln That is the
question which gives this contest its Importance