Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-07-22


LONDON July 11.-Herbert Henry
Asquith. prime minister and head OF
the government of Great Britain since
April. 1905 is the first mlddle-ciasS,
non-conformist. democratic premier Eng
land has ever had. His predecessor,
Campbell Bannerman, was democratic,
but his wealth and his landed eS-
tate caused him to be classed with
1.-THE gentry. Balfour and Salisbury
were of Cecil blood. born with the gov
erning instinct Fosebery was and is
an aristocrat to the tips of his f1ners,
and he now appears TO repent in sack
cloth and ashes the fact that once he was
the leader of the democratic hosts Glad
stone, radical democrat by conviction,
was yet an cristocrat in instinct and
feeling. 1t never can be forgotten thatt
he first entered parliament as boy,
the beneficiary of corrupt nomination
and corrupt election. under the patron
age of VIGOROUSLY corrupt duke.
Gladstone was like Jefferson in that the
volcanic fires of his political and phi
loSophical democracy we're hot enough
to set a nation ablaze. but not fierce
enough to destroy his personal arts
tocracy. And. like Jefferson, Gladstone
thereby earned from his enemies the dis
honoring epithet ''demagogue.'
OF all Mr.. Asauiths predecessors per-
haps the one whose origin was closest to
the people was the tory Disraeli The
father of the primrose statesman was
struggling author, and the efore entitled
to rank in the professional class, put
Dizzy had to struggle upward against
the disadvantages imposed by his Jewish
birth and actual poverty. But, whatever
his origin, Disraeli certainly cannot be
remembered as champion of democracy.
Mr.. Asquith came to his present po-
sition of supreme power from youth of
poverty. He sprang
His Early Years from an humble
Spent in Poverty. engaged in the
clothing trade. He had no money, he got
his education by winning scholarships,
and he made his way to prominence by
hard work at the law. British prejudice
against lawyers in high political place is
marked. and Mr. Asauith is the first
lawyer TO be prime minister since the
days of the Inflated Spencer Perceval,
who held office from 1909 to 1872.
Throughout his entire career Mr.. Asquith
has enjoyed no adventurous aids. He has
has none of the arts of the intriguing
politician Disraer. and none of the ora
torical magic of Gladstone; he has not
the wit of a Rosebery, nor the icy logic
of a Balfour; he never can hope to have
the cavalry dash of his supporter
Churchill. nor the fiery tongue of the
tempestuous Lloyd-George.
The ASauith mind is a legal mind. 1t
lie u-jfI onn6ifinnS theories An
Asuuith policy is a case to be won in
court not a cause to be- died for in bat
tie. A democrat always. he rs adamant
to resist the passionate clalmor of the peo-
pie unless they show that they have rea-
son as well as right. conviction well as
prejudice upon their side. He has the
hard common sense of Grover Cleveland
and the clarity of expression of Benja-
min Harrison. without Cleveland's ego
tism and lacking Harrison's eloquence.
While Asauith is the leader and captain
of the organized forces of the liberal
party. it can
Il the Actual not be said
Leader of Liberalism the moving
spirit in the present swift progress of
political thought. 1t is Lloyd-George
who is leading the actual battles of
democracy in Great Britain. Asquith
never could have invented the radically
progressive schemes proposed by his
Welsh chancellor and Winston Churchill.
His is not the offensive generalship of his
party. But he is nowerful and wise in de-
Tense. and therefore he remains the actual
as weu as the titular leader of liberalism
because he is recognized throughout the
kingdom as the chief champion OF the
doctrine of free trade. After all, Tree
trade is the citadel or the iioerai pon,s,
and if that fortress should fall the cause
of social reform would be left hopeless
for many years to come
Although it would have been impossible
even a score of years ago for man OF
Asnuith's humble origin to have attained
to the high position of premier. and al
though he occupies that position by vlr-
tue of the loss of control OF the Landlords
over the liberal party, yet II is Asqultn
who gives to the liberal government to-
dav a measure of Responsibility" which
il would not possess if Lloyd-George or
Winston Churchill sat at the head of the
cabinet council. Lloyd-George is Welsh
man, and actually says things without
nualifying phrases calling spades spades,
and thereby making himself horrible
person. utterly unfit to drink tea of an
afternoon with perfect gentlemen. Winston
Churchill is half American and therefore
more than half barbarian. His mother. as
Lady Randolph Churchill, or as Mrs. George
Cornwallis-West may be perfectly ac-
ceptable. but every fellow knows" that
there is a wild west streak in her son
which makes him SO much of a savage
that he was impudent and rude enough to
intimate to George that George had
bats in his belfry touching on and ap-
pertaining to- certain matter of gov
Cnnd RncinpS