THE NEW LIBERAL PREMIER.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 10574, 27 January 1906, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE NEW LIBERAL PREMIER.

SIR H. CAMPBELL BANNERMAN'S RISE TO POLITICAL POWER.

In his seventieth year Sir Henry Campbell Bannerman becomes Prime Minister and the political prophets are once more confounded.

It is sate to say that ten years ago no one imagined that the steady-going Secretary for War of the last Liberal Administration would ever become the First Minister of the Crown. That was a distinction which his fondest admirers never forecast for him. It was an eminence which m those days, at any rate, "C. B." never sought.

For, like the Duke of Devonshire, Sir Henry is, or was, a politician with no eager longing for the uneasy pillow of high office. He became War Minister not because he was anxious for the place, but because Mr Gladstone appreciated his steady-going, business-like qualities, and selected him from among more brilliant candidates for the office. It was his steady-going character thati made him, m 1899, the leader of the Opposition. "1 was a sort of 'rara avis' m these times—a politician without ambition," he said on one occasion m explanation of his selection for the place which so doughty a warrior as Sir William Harcourt had found untenable. "I never had any desire for the position I was called upon to occupy, but I was put there by force of circumstances, and I said : 'Please, God, I will do my best.' " A STOP-GAP. The fortunes of the Liberal party were never at a lower ebb than when "C. B." strolled, as it were, into the leadership The war it split into factions, which howled at each other more bitterly than they did at the Government, and "0. B." was looked upon as a stop-gap, a nominal leader, who would somehow or other muddle through until the time came for him to step unobtrusively down and make room for another. But "C. B." has never stepped down. Ridiculed and denounced by his opponents, and rejected for a time by his Liberal Imperialist friends, he has plodded steadily on ,and now, "by the force of circumstances," he finds himself strolling into Downing street with no man m the Liberal party to say him nay. His triumph— however short it may be — is the triumph of the eminently Scotch characteristic of "stickativeness." No scorn of his friends and no invective of his foes has succeeded m making "C. B." shift his ground. He was a Home Ruler m 1885; m 1905, m spite of Lord Rosebery, he is Home Ruler still. He described the methods of the British Army m South Africa as "methods of barbarism," and if he were heckled to-morrow he would say the same thing. No one of his opponents trounced him more soundly than Mr Chamberlain did for his prq-Boerism, his little Englandism, his attack on the methods of the war, yet no one has been more ready than Mr Chamberlain to recognise the qualities that have made "C. li." Premier.

THE BRUNT OF THE FIGHT. "Who but Sir Henry has done the work?" said Mr Chamberlain, a year or two ago; "who else has borne the brunt of the fighting? I don't like his views, but I respect the man." Inside and outside the Liberal party men now agree with Mr Chamberlain m this respect.

Perhaps the most remarkable feature of Sir Henry's "call" to the post of Prime Minister is that no one has questioned the propriety of it. He is as inevitable to-day as Mr Gladstone was m 1895. The Liberal party would give a solid vote for him. Mr Balfour would suggest no one else.

For a Prime Minister "C. B." has an unillustrious past. His shrewdness foi business made him an excellent Secretary for War — he has the reputation m Pall Mall of being the best, and best informed, holder of the office for many years — but it was his Department that blew Lord ltosebery's Government to pieces. Cordite laid them low. The one thing m his career that distinguished it was his success m inducing the Duke of Cambridge to resign the Commandership-in-Chief, and, as has appeared quite recently, it was a letter from Queen Victoria herself that finally persuaded the Duke. ,

Sir Henry has, m fact, been regarded, until very recent times, as a parliamentarian whose wealth and social influence as much as his respectable talents procured for him the modest prominence he attained.

He is one of the few Liberal politicians with an income of £50,000 a year. At one time his mansion m Grosvenor-place overlooking Buckingham Palace, was one of the most celebrated political salons, and "C. B.s" dinners and wine were unimpeachable. At Belmont Castle, Perthshire, "C. B." entertains large parties.

MERCHANT PRINCES.

The castle he himself built some 20 years ago, out of the fortune bequeathed to him by his father and a maternal uncle. His father began business m Glasgow m a small draper's business m partnership with his brother, and the two built up the firm of J. and VV. Campbell, and became merchant princes of the north. Curiously enough, those brothers were ardent politicians, one a Liberal and the other a Tory.. To-day there is no stauncher Unionist m the House of Commons than Mr J. A. Campbell, Sir Henry's brother. ,

Although he is one of the best-read men m the House of Commons, and perhaps the best classical scholar on either front bench, "O. B." has never shone as a debater. His manner is what the men m the Commons gallery call "old-woman-ish," even when they wish to be nice. He writes out his speeches beforehand, even to the jokes, and reads them out with uplifted forefinger. He is the only front-bench man who cannot make a speech without a classical quotation, and frequently he "drops into poetry.''

He has what they call a "pawky" humor, which is of a distinctly Scottish variety which southerners find it difficult to enjoy. But m private he is said to be a story teller of great merit, and to have a witty retort ever on his lips. In the great act which "C. B." is now called upon to perform he will be helped by the lady who for nearly 60 years has been his wife. For years Lady Campbell Bannerman has been an invalid, and fears have often been entertained by his friends that Sir Henry would retire from politics m order that he might stay quietly at his wife's side.

The world hardly looks yet awhile upon "C. B." as a, septuagenarian, but m three or four years' time he and Lady "C. li." will celebrate their golden wedding.