ASQUITH’S FALL

Taranaki Daily News, 27 October 1932, Page 6

ASQUITH’S FALL

HOW IT CAME ABOUT BEAVERBROOK’S STORY. INTERNAL PROCESSES. The slaughter of the great battles falling upon very large British armies carried grief and stress into almost every heme. The year 1916, which at one moment had seemed about tb witness a triumph of the allies, closed in savage gloom. Deep fierce passions smouldered with ever-growing fury behind the steel visor and broad shield of the British Empire. It was at this moment that the constitutional convulsion, of which this book preserves the most perfect record, Occurred, writes Mr. Winston Churchill in the Daily Express when reviewing the second volume of Lord Beaverbrook’s "Politicians and the War.” Students of British constitutional history—nay, thinkers about war-time Government in . every country —as well as those who are thrilled by watching virtuous men under altogether unusual pressures, should equally read it and ponder. The author is not entirely convincing in the apologia which he proffers with wholesale and painstaking goodwill for all the actors. Not even hia hero, Mr. Bonar Law, the Sir Galahad and Cincinnatus of our politics, emerges entirely unscathed from the formidable tribunal of facts which this narrative unfolds in their true sequence. Still, no one would impugn his patriotism and fundamental good faith, and few will judge unworthily his behaviour or that of his colleagues and opponents. The times were bitter and ferocious, the needs dire, and the stakes supreme. In telling this story the author has probably incomparable authority. He saw and heard and knew more than any other man. More than that, lie, was a potent and at moments a vital factor in the famous episodes which he relates. But for him, his personal force and address, and his resolute tireless machinations, our history would certainly. have been different. Nor can anyone prove that it would have been better. GREAT IN PEACE. Mr. Asquith was probably one of the greatest peace-time Prime Ministers we have ever had. His commanding intellect, his sagacity, his broad outlook and civic courage maintained him at the highest eminence in public life. But in war he had not those qualities of resource and energy, of prevision and assiduous management which Ought to reside in the executive. Mr. Lloyd George had all the qualities which he lacked. The nation, by some instinctive, almost occult process, had found' this out. Mr. Bonar Law was the instrument which put Mr. Asquith aside and set another in his stead. The relations of the author with Mr. Bonar Law are deferentially and modestly described. We see here the statesman of exceptional manly virtues and parliamentary ability, actuated and animated by a faithful friend endowed with dynamic qualities of which he himself was devoid. All the decisions were made by Mr. Bonar Law, but the conditions were woven, the opportunities created, and the impulse given by his devoted adherent. That at least is my view, and I had some means of forming an opinion. The two personalities were inseparable, and together they formed a remarkable combination. Moro especially was this so when we remember that Mr. Bonar Law was the leader of the Conservative Party in the House of Commons, and controlled the strongest political machine in our public life. TOWARDS THE GOAL. One of the surpassing merits of this book is the careful detail in which the complications and successive phases of the Cabinet crises are unfolded. Full, comprehension is shown of all the forces at work, and fair allowance is made, for friend and foe. No part of this story can be abridged or summarised. Every part is interdependent. No justice can be done to it by partial narration. The book will remain a constitutional document of profound and lasting interest. Its style is lucid, terse, and easy, and rises at times to real power. We should be .very grateful if equally careful records existed of the celebrated transactions of other generations. In these pages we see Mr. Lloyd George advancing to his goal, now with smooth and dexterous artifice, now with headlong charge. W© see Mr. Asquith at bay. A new light is thrown upon his conduct at this juncture. < He was. by no means the helpless victim which his enemies have believed and some of his friends have depicted. When he found himself weak he temporised and retreated; when he felt himself strong he struck back with all his might; and at the end, when he resolved to put his rival to the test, of terming a Government or being utterly discredited, he was at once adamant and jocular. He played the tremendous stake with iron composure. He bore defeat with fortitude and patriotism. It was well said at the time: “He nothing common did, or mean, Upon that memorable scene.” Space allows me only a mention of lesser figures. The ineptitude of the four Conservative Ministers who wanted to expel and punish Mr. Lloyd George, and only succeeded in making him Prime Minister and taking office under him; the very sharp changes and splintered pledges of Lord Curzon; the jealous, quarrelsome, pugnacious fidelity of Mr. McKenna; the unswerving loyalty of Mr. Asquith-s Liberal colleagues—all must be studied in the original version. HIS RIGHT COURSE. Nothing is more instructive than to follow the dispassionate, cool, correct, and at the same time ruthless manner in which Lord Balfour threaded the labyrinth without reproach. He passed from one Cabinet to the other, from the Prime Minister who was his champion to the Prime Minister, who had been his most severe critic, like a powerful graceful cat walking delicately and unsoiled across a very muddy street. I shall never cease to wonder why Mr. Asquith, with a large Liberal majority at his back, did not seek the succour of the House of Commons. There, is the final citadel of a Prime Minister in distress. No one can deny him his right in peace or war - to appeal from the intrigues of Cabinets, caucuses, clubs, and newspapers to that great assembly and take his dismissal only at their hands. The Liberal Government which fell In 1915, the Asquith Coalition which fell In 1916, the Lloyd George Coalition 1 which fell in 1922—a1l were over-

thrown by secret, obscure internal processes of which the public only now know a full story. I am of opinion that the result of confident resort to Parliament in every one of these cases would have been the victory of the Prime Minister of the day. The greatest events of the war were still to come. Russia was to collapse, the United States were to come in; the U-boat warfare was to reach its life-and-death climax; the agonies of Paschendaele and Caporetto, the awful battles of 191’8 —all lay before us. But beyond them all lay a victory as absolute as any ever gained in arms.