New-York tribune., 1900-10-13
BRITISH RESULTS AND PROSPECTS.

The British elections are now so nearly ended
that their final result may be confidently dis
counted. The marked Government gains of
some days ago have been about counterbal-
anced, and the poll of seats now stands and
in all probability will stand at the end, almost
exactly as it did in 1895. Such a result, as
readers of these columns will recall, has been
looked for from the beginning by many of the
best informed and most judicious observers
At first sight it might be deemed not particu-
larly significant, seeing that the Government
has simply held its own. On more careful con-
sideration it will be seen to possess unusual
significance, greater in fact, than that of al
most any other election result of recent times.
For it is to be observed that while the division
of seats remains practically unchanged the
division of the popular vote has been greatly
changed, the Government majority being
mously increased In the next place, in a land
Of so flexible popular sentiments and subject
to marked alterations of popular political
favor, for party thus to repeat its sweep
ing success of five years before is at least in
recent history unique. Again, 1t is to be OBJ
served that the only considerable successes of
the Opposition have been won through an ap-
proximate adoption of the Government policy.
The Opposition has been nominally anti-im-
perialist But if its candidates had not largely
scarcely a cOrporars guard Of them would have
been returned. When these and other circum-
stances are duly considered we must regard
as entirely sound the opinion expressed by Sir
Charles Dixie to our London correspondent, as
reported by Mr.. Ford in yesterdays Tribune,
that there has begun "a very long period Of
exclusion of the Liberal party from power
With British party politics Americans gen
orally have nothing to do, save in a disnteT-
ested and academic way. 1t is interesting to
note, however, that the one salient and para
mount feature of the electoral campaign and
its results this year is demonstration of the
fact that the British people support the policy
of the Government in the South African busi-
ness. and do so by a majority and with an
earnestness that have not been given to any
issue-not even to preservation of the Union
in recent times. Our readers will pardon us
for the reminder that that is exactly what
The Tribune has consistently maintained. not
only during the war in the Transvaal, but from
the beginning of the negotiations which pre-
ceded the war. We said that whether the Brit
ish Governments policy was right or wrong
it was the policy Of the British people, too, and
that If blame and condemnation for it were
to be bestowed they must be not upon Mr.
Chamberlain Lord Salisbury alone, but upon
the whole nation. We were taken bitterly to
task for saying so. One letter of protest re-
ceived at this office declared that Mr. Cham
berlan was the author of all the mischief
against the will of the British people; that he
was the most execrated man in the kingdom
and that his unhappy sovereign would no
longer admit him to her presence; and another
in similar vein, warned US that Great Britain
was on the verge of an inevitable revolution
which would sweep Mr.. Chamberlain and his
t,,+o
the answer in the votes. In a campaign
fought, by the choice of the Opposition almost
exclusively on the issue Of South Africa the
whole Government is sustained by the nation
as no other has been in our time, while as for
Mr.. Chamberlain, his name has everywhere
spelled victory, and he is to-day the most popu-
lar and probably most potent political leader
in the United Kingdom. 1t is an exact verifica-
ton Of the opinions expressed In these columns
more than year ago.
Whether it is for good or evil we must wait
for time to tell remembering however. that
it is not personal nor a partisan bur a na-
tiOnal movement which we are regarding The
question is not whether Lord Sasbury's or
Mr. Chamberain's policy is to succeed. but
whether the path the British nation has chosen
to tread leads upward or downward This
South African episode does not stand alone
Canada and Australian federation and other
developments of the same Imperial principle
The British race has found itself. 1t has awak-
ened to a realization of its power and its on
pOrtuntes. 1t has revived the old fighting
spirit that once made it pre-eminently the fight
ing race of the world. And in the coming
century, with the filling up of the blank spaces
on the map and the crowding together of the
nations of the world it proposes to assert itself
as it has not hitherto done for many a year
1t is a colossal experiment, failure of which
means total and irretrevable ruin and success
of which means such empire as the world has
never yet imagined, 1t is a shifting of position
of Arnolds weary Titan" striving to rise and
to show whether at last she is to be crushed nv
the vast orb of her fate or is to find in II q
source of strength by the side Of which her
Atlantean shoulders of the past will seem but
weak and puny. 1t is as a token Of such mo
mentouS enterprise that the result of tbis
months Parliamentary elections possesses It's
most commanding interest to the world.