The Press Tuesday, February 8, 1927. Politics and the Cash-Box.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 18920, 8 February 1927, Page 8

The Press Tuesday, February 8, 1927. Politics and the Cash-Box.

Wo printed .in i.uraordinary cable message l'rom I.'i.-i.ivii \\-stordny lorecasting trouble fur ihe .j'ov._'rr.::ient on the ri'; n .. v .-:mi)iy of the Commons. .Reduced ',<> ;i sing!;' sentence —i.f it were possible io r.'t :h-; " Woman" and the ■• 'Wish "Wizard," t!io ,; Unco' "Guid" and •!•..: - V,' ; - i-'-ecs," tin; "Cabinet »i Verl.l.: ..'■•." • r.-'.v million pound.s' worth of political kisses and "Britain's best brr.it: " into to narrow a space-—if probably ::n\int that if the Oppositions were united they would make it very awkward for the Government, mid that if the Conservatives were united they could snap their finger.- at the two Oppositions. If it meant more than this the " political " correspondent " whose views it purported to give knows a great deal more than any of the English newspapers, or than all of them combined; and if it meant less it meant nothing. The Manchester Cnortlian, for example, and the Nation, which most people regard as the brains of the Liberal Press, believe that it is desirable in general that Liberals should rally round Mr Lloyd George, and that if they do this they may, at the next election, gain the balance of power. The alternative both believe to be the indefinite and unchecked rule of the Conservatives. The Guardian thinks it weak and inconsistent of Liberals to be " willing that a " Conservative Government should hold " power indefinitely rather than that " Liberalism and Labour should dis- " cover grounds on Avhieh they can "honourably co-operate," while the Nation says that the difference between Mr Lloyd George and the Asquithians is not lack of principle on his part or superior high-mindedness* on theirs, but Mr Lloyd George's "greater realism " and good sense." Admitting " all Mr "Lloyd George's undoubted faults," it wonders how large a portion of the charges levelled against him —how much of tho "instability which destroys confidence"—is not attributable to this same quality of realism this restless insistence on facing unpleasant factsi which is so disturbing to colleagues, but so badly needed in British statesmanship. ' The italics of course are ours, and arc added because Mr Lloyd George himself could not have thought of a more ingenious defence, or been bold enough to offer it; but he is almost as generously treated in less likely places. The New Statesman, for example, which does not especially love him, which indeed is far nearer to Labour than to orthodox Liberalism, begins by saying that Lord Grey's repudiation of him "made the split in the Liberal " Party quite definite and unhealablc," and then immediately changes "split" to " chip," explaining that the Liberal Party throughout the country will prefer Lloyd George's energy and money to Lord Grey's principle, and that what has happened therefore is that Lord Grey and his intransigents "have "merely chipped themselves off from "the Party." Even when we turn to Conservative journals Lloyd George is still, as against Lord Grey and the Asquithians, Liberalism's only hope. Truth, for example, says not only that it is humbug to complain of Lloyd George's Socialistic taint, but also that it is humbug to pretend that there is an alternative to him as a Party leader. To suggest that Viscount Grey, or Sir John Simon or Mr Runciman could "supply the energy, imagination, and " driving force necessary for a suc- " cessf ul popular appeal" can, it says, " provoke nothing better than a smile."

Obviously—so obviously that to ignoro the fact is mere blind perversity —there is* no one in the running for a fighting leadership except Mr Lloyd George. Even the Observer, though it denounces Mr Lloyd George's deliberate intention of making himself the Warwick of the political struggle, and so perpetuating the three-Party system wbioh "the English.peculiarly hate," admits that he is "master of the "official machine at last, and Paymaster of the Forces as no single " man has ever been before in relation "to a Party." It is such an extraordinary position that the prophets are as hopelessly bewildered as the seekers 'after precedents. Everybody agrees that the Liberal Party as a Party is dying, and that the "quarreling doctors," as Truth says, " are the patient's worst " infliction." But names and platforms mean very little to Mr Lloyd George, and since he does not "in the least " fancy himself as a venerated corpse," the sensation of the next session may easily be, as our cable so obscurely suggested yesterday, his justification of his purchase of the Party's despairing kisses.