The Montgomery advertiser., 1903-10-06
|DEVONS,E
 HAS ASSIGNED
 ?- Unionist Eader in the
 sordS. NEW CABINET MEMBERS Alfred Lyttletont is Successor of Chamberlain. Brodrick Becomes Secretary for India and Austen Chamberlain is the New Chancellor of the Excequer.


 the Excequsr.
 London, Oct 5.-The Duke of Devon shire. leader of the Conservative Party in the House of Lords has resigned the of- fice of Lord President of the Council. and the King has accepted his resigna- ton.
 The Duke wrote Mir. Balfour, giving his reasons for his resignation, which he att tributed. among other things, to the Pre- mier's speech at Shefiield. and his pam phlet on insuiar free trade. The Duke of Devonshire has not yet made his let ter public. but the following letter of acknowledgement from MT. Balfour was published tonight:
 Whittingham, Oct. 8.
 My Dear Duke-I received this after noon two telegrams forwarded by my secretary in London. the first from you asking how soon your resignation might be announced, and the second giving a full summary of the reasons which moved you to resign.
 Balfour Surprised.
 am not sure which of these unexpected communications surprised me most. On the whole, perhaps, 1t was the second The first. however. was sufficiently strange. Do you remember the circum- stances? It was September ls that you informed me of your resolve to remain in the Government. This decisio nwas preceded by much confidential correspond ence, much intimate conversation. There was no phase of policy which was not prepared to discuss and which did not in fact, discuss with perfect frapkness.
 Men and measures alike were surveyed from every point of view bearing on the present course, and future fortunes of the party. The decision arrived at after these preliminaries I had a right to con- slider final, and final I certainly consid- cred. Accordingly. consulted you as far as the circumstances of time and place permitted, on the best mode of filling the vacancies in the Government, of which you are the most distinguished member. You were good enough to express some wetghty judgments on the delicate mat terk submitted to you. You even initiated proposals of your own. which gladly accepted. ;
 Our last communication on these sub jects was Thursday afternoon. Less than forty-eight hours thereafter I received in Edinburgh the telegrams which first announced your intention to resign. The principal occasion for this singular trans formation was. you tell me, my Sheffield speech. This is strange, indeed. In in- tention, at least, there was no doctrine contained in that speech that was not contained in my note on insular freq trade and in published letters to MT. Chamberlain.
 Rebuke to the Duke.
 You were intimately acquainted with my speeches during the whole fortnight, in which you lent your countenance to the Government after the recent resignations. I must suppose. therefore. that 1t is some unintentional discrepancy between the written document and the spoken words you saw which now drives you to desert the administration you so long adorned. Such unintentional discrepancies are without doubt hard to avoid. Not every one, certainly not I. can always be sure of finding, on the spur of the moment, before an eager audience of 5000 people, the precise phrase which shall dexterously express the exact opinion of the speaker on difficult and abstract subjects to foil his opponents, who would wrest it either to the right hand or to the left. But till o'clock this afternoon 1 had to confess, counted you not as an opponent, but as a colleague in spirit as well as in name.
 To such a one 1t would have seemed natural. so I should have thought, to take in cases of apparent disciepancy the written rather than the spoken words as expressing the true meaning of the au- thor. or, if this is asking too much, at least to make an inquiry before arriving at final hostile conclusion. But after all. what and where is this discrepancy which has forced you into so unexpected a fashion to reverse a considered policy
 I do not believe that 1t exists. and if any other man than yourself had expend- ed so much inquisitorial subtIety in de- tecting imaginary heresies. should have surmised that he was more anxious to pick a quarrel than particular as to the sufflciency of the occasion. To you, for tunately, no suh suspicion can attach.
 Yet, am unreasonable in thinking that your resignation gives me some just oc- casion of complaint and perhaps some special occasion Of regret to yourself? Yet am for example, not right in com blaming of your procedure in reference to my Sheffield speech. You fear that 1t will aggravate the party division. If there is anything certain. 1t Is that the declar- ation of policy then made produced and Is destined to produce greater harmony in the party than has prevailed since the firscal question first came to the front six months ago. To resign now, and to resign on the speech, Is to make the course calculated to make harder the hard task of the peace maker.
 Again do you not feel special regret at having, at this particular juncture. to sever your connection with a unionist administration? Doubtless here is no imagina ble occasion on which you could have left one without snfllcting on it serious loss. At the moment of it's most buoyant prosperity your absence from It's councils would have been sensibly felt. but you have in fact left 1t when. in the opinion of our opponents. It's fortunes are at the lowest. and It's perplexities at the greatest Maybe. however. you are spar ed this aggravation of the inevitable pain of separation by holding. as I hold, that our opponents are in this mistaken: firmly believe they are I see no din- culty in carrying out the policy, which for a fortnight you were willing to ac- cept. by the aid of an administration which for a fortnight you helped me to construct.
 On this point feel no disqmet. I can- not pretend to view with light eouanim- ity the loss of a colleague whose services to the Unionist Party no change and chance of political fortune can tempt any Unionist to forget.
 A. J. Balfour.
 The New Cabinet.
 The new Cabinet ia coFupoSad aa fol-