Evening Post TUESDAY, APRIL. 14, 1908. THE RECONSTRUCTED CABINET.

Evening Post, Volume LXXV, Issue 89, 14 April 1908, Page 6

Evening Post TUESDAY, APRIL. 14, 1908. THE RECONSTRUCTED CABINET.

Mr. John Morley in the House of Lords ! It seemed almost as likely that we should see him on tho episcopal bench, and most people on this side of the world must have regarded the prophecy attributed a few days ago to tho Daily News that he was about to bo elevated as a very good joke. That Mr. Morley — sternest of Puritans, most unbending of democrats, at ono time dreaded as tho reddest of Republicans, and at all times as little disposed to bow before a "birkio c&'d a lord " as Robert Burns himself — should be setting up in tho aristocratic line might well have appeared a week ago a thing impossible. But the explanation is forthcoming with the announcement of the fact to-day : "Viscount Morley informs his constituents that his state of health compelled Kirn to choose between "resigning office ov withdrawing from the House of Commons. Ho chose the latter nt the instance of his colleagues." Tho startled Radical should check his rising indignation and' re- j joico that the House of Lords can at I least serve somo useful purpose in find- | ing room for such, a man when his heulth can no longer stand the stress of Ministerial Jife in tho 'House of Com-! Vons. Mr. (Morley — oi« Lord Mor- 1 ley, as wo must now try to call him — J could perhaps be less easily spared from a Liberal Cabinet than at any previous time. As Irish Secretary his adminis- j tration was an episode in one of the bitterest controversies of our time; as Secretary for India ho has commanded tho admiration of men of all shades of opinion, displaying a breadth and firmness which. Jiis natural enemies, tho Imperialists, have greeted with admiration, while his known humanitarianism has reconciled tho Radicals to measures of repression which, in other hands, would have been bitterly assailed. 4s "a democrat condemned to sit upstairs" Lord Morloy will miss tho stir of tho ropresentativo chamber, but he will continue to render the Empire splendid service, and from Iho personal point of view nobody will apprcciato' the irony of the change that has cofno over him moro than himself. Apart from the strange transformation of Mr. Morloy, which, however, has no political significance, the most interesting changes are those which promote Mr. Lloyd-George from tho Hoard of Trade to tho Exchequer, and Mr. \Viiistoa Churchill from the Colonial Oflicc to the Board of Trade, with a scat in tho Cabinet for tho first time. Tn )>oth cases tho promotions havo beoii thoroughly wall doner'vad. In )c«» than *W2 Aegrgjind. g l _h*li,Mx i .Usxsli{laDiUK

has developed from the freest of free lances into an administrator of the very first rank and a statesman who has to a very large extent captured tho confidence of the City of London — the most cbdurate of Conservative constituencies ■ — without sacrificing the idolatry of the Welsh Nonconformists upon which hv rose to power. It is very rare indeed for a politician to combine Mr. LloydGeorge's great gift of popular oratory with the legislative and administrative power which put through the Patents Act of last session, averted by personal intervention the national disaster of a great railway strike which was threatened during the recess, and within the last fortnight has tackled the tangled problems of tfye port of London in a Bill which even the Times has been constrained to applaud as "a conspicuously practical, common-sense measure." As Chancellor of the Exchequer Mr. i ,loyd-Georgo will have even a wider scope for his talents, and he is likely to make his mark upon the fiscal question and the problem of taxation in a manner that will bo helpful to the somewhat drooping energies of the Free Traders. The Spectator, by the way, has recently characterised both Mr. Lloyd-George and Mr. Churchill as " protectionists at heart," which appears to mean that in the matter of the " All-Red" route and other questions where the fiscal issue does not intrude they are not above giving preference to Britishers. . But what shocks the Spectator seems to us exactly the kind of breadth and elasticity required to prevent the theory of Cobdenism from becoming a rigid and intolerable tyranny. A good second to Mr. Lloyd-George in the race for popularity, and a more ijnecocious if not moro rapid goer, is Mr. Winston Churchill, who finds himself in the Cabinet at the age of thirty-three. Among his associates Mr. Churchill is the less popular of the two, from the impression that he is fighting more for himself than for his side. Ho is as good an example as Mr. Chamberlain himself ,of the value of "push," and stands in tho very front rank both as debater and platform speaker. In the latter capacity he will need every ounce of power that he possesses in the byelection for North-West Manchester which is necessitated by his promotion. The Conservatives are making great efforts to recapture the seat which they had held for twenty years until • Mr. Churchill's brilliant victory at the genoral election, and the young President of tho Board of Trade has replied in spirited fashion by a manifesto •of which the most remarkable point is the insistence that "all social reform and commercial efficiency wait on the passage of the Licensing Bill in its entirety." Here is courage -which, disposes us to forgive a good many of Mr. Churchill's youthful indiscretions at the Colonial Office — an offico from which it cannot be said that the colonies will miss him very much. Who his successor as Under-Secretary for the Colonies may be has, oddly enough, not been stated, and we are also left in the dark as to what provision has been made for Lord Elgin, who has made way for Lord Crewe as Colonial Secretary. Lord Elgin did some excellent work at the Colonial Office, but without displaying any of that imaginative sympathy in which his predecessor excelled. In this respect Lord Crewe, who is a graceful, cultured, and polished speaker of tho Birrell school, and who made a remarkable reputation as the Minister in charge of tho Education Bill in the House of Lord 3 in 1906, is calculated to effect a great improvement. Wherever the right thing needs to bo neatly set and sympathetically expounded, or tho wrong thing to bo tactfully smoothed over, Lord Crewe, who inherits tlie humour and literary talent of his father, Lord Houghton, may be relied upon to do it well ; and though as yet he is unknown to the colonies, we shall be surprised if ho does not win their sympathy and do their business well. Altogether, the verdict of The Times, that "the Cabinet is distinctly stronger and more compact" than before, seems thoroughly well founded.