Constructive Imperialism by Viscount Milner
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Viscount Milner >> Constructive Imperialism
I do not think it is necessary for me to point out how a widespread
tariff, besides those other advantages which I have indicated, would
strengthen our hands in commercial policy. In the first place, it
would at once enable us to meet the advances of the other States of
the Empire, and to make the British Empire in its commercial aspect a
permanent reality. To do this it would not be necessary, nor do I
think it would be right, to exempt goods from the British Dominions
entirely from the duties to which similar goods coming from foreign
lands are subject. Our purpose would be equally well served by doing
what the Colonies do, and having two scales of duty, a lower one for
the products of all British States and Dependencies, a higher one for
those of the outside world. The amount of this preference would be a
matter of bargain to be settled by some future Imperial Conference,
not foredoomed to failure, and preceded by careful preliminary
investigation and negotiations. It might be twenty-five, or
thirty-three, or even fifty per cent. And whatever it was, I think we
should reserve the right also to give a preference, but never of the
same amount, to any foreign country which was willing to give us some
substantial equivalent. It need not be a general preference; it might
be the removal or reduction of some particular duties. I may say I do
not myself like the idea of engaging in tariff wars. I do not believe
in prohibitive or penal tariffs. But I do believe in having something
to give to those who treat us well, something to withhold from those
who treat us badly. At present, as you are well aware, Great Britain
is the one great nation which is treated with absolute disregard by
foreign countries in framing their tariffs. They know that however
badly they treat us they have nothing to lose by it, and so we go to
the wall on every occasion.
And now, though there is a great deal more to be said, I feel I must
not trespass much further on your patience. But there is one objection
to Tariff Reform which is constantly made, and which is at once so
untrue and so damaging, that before sitting down I should like to say
a few words about it. We are told that this is an attempt to transfer
the burden of a part of our taxation from the shoulders of the rich to
those of the poor. If that were true, it would be fatal to Tariff
Reform, and I for one would have nothing to do with it. But it is not
true. There is no proposal to reduce and I believe there is no
possibility of reducing, the burden which at present falls on the
shoulders of the upper and middle classes in the shape of direct
taxation. On the other hand, I do not believe there is much room for
increasing it--though I think it can be increased in one or two
directions--without consequences which the poorer classes would be the
first to feel. Excise duties, which are mainly paid by those classes,
are already about as high as they can be. It follows that for any
increase of revenue, beyond the ordinary growth arising from increase
of wealth and population, you must look, at least to a great extent,
to Customs duties. And the tendency of the time is towards increased
expenditure, all of it, mind you--and I do not complain of the
fact--due to the effort to improve the condition of the mass of the
people. It is thus no question of shifting existing burdens, it is a
question of distributing the burden of new expenditure of which the
mass of the people will derive the benefit. And if that new
expenditure must, as I think I have shown, be met, at least in large
part, by Customs duties, which method of raising these duties is more
in the interest of the poorer classes--our present system, which
enhances enormously the price of a few articles of universal
consumption like tea and sugar and tobacco, or a tariff spread over a
much greater number of articles at a much lower rate? Beyond all doubt
or question the mass of the people would be better off under the
latter system. Even assuming--as I will for the sake of argument,
though I do not admit it--that the British consumer pays the whole of
the duty on imported foreign goods competing with British goods, is it
not evident that the poorer classes of the community would pay a
smaller proportion of Customs duties under a tariff which included a
great number of foreign manufactured articles, at present entirely
free, and largely the luxuries of the rich, than they do, when Customs
duties are restricted to a few articles of universal consumption?
And that is at the same time the answer to the misleading, and often
dishonest, outcry about "taxing the food of the people," about the big
loaf and little loaf, and all the rest of it. The construction of a
sensible all-round tariff presents many difficulties, but there is
one difficulty which it does not present, and that is the difficulty
of so adjusting your duties that the total proportion of them falling
upon the wage-earning classes shall not be increased. I for one regard
such an adjustment as a postulate in any scheme of Tariff Reform. And
just one other argument--and I recommend it especially to those
working-class leaders who are so vehement in their denunciation of
Tariff Reform. Is it of no importance to the people whom they
especially claim to represent that our fiscal policy should lean so
heavily in favour of the foreign and against the British producer? If
they regard that as a matter of indifference, I think they will come
to find in time that the mass of the working classes do not agree with
them. But be that as it may, it is certain that I, for one, do not
advocate Tariff Reform in the interests of the rich, but in the
interests of the whole nation, and therefore necessarily of the
working classes, who are the majority of the nation.
A CONSTRUCTIVE POLICY
Guildford, October 29, 1907
I am very sensible of the honour of being called on to reply for the
Unionist cause, but I approach the task with some diffidence, not to
say trepidation. I feel very conscious that I am not a very good
specimen of a party man. It is not that I do not hold strong opinions
on many public questions--in fact, that is the very trouble. My
opinions are too strong to fit well into any recognised programme. I
suffer from an inveterate habit, which is partly congenital, but which
has been developed by years spent in the service of the Crown, of
looking at public questions from other than party points of view. And
I am too old to unlearn it.
For a man so constituted there is evidently only a limited _role_ in
political life. But he may have his uses all the same, if you take
him for what he is, and not for what he is not, and does not pretend
to be. If he does not speak with the weight and authority of a party
leader, he is at least free from the embarrassments by which a party
leader is beset, and unhampered by the caution which a party leader is
bound to exercise. He commits nobody but himself, and therefore he can
afford to speak with a bluntness which is denied to those whose
utterances commit many thousands of other people. And I am not sure
whether the present moment is not one at which the unconventional
treatment of public questions may not be specially useful, so, whether
it be as an independent Unionist or as a friendly outsider--in
whichever light you like to regard me--I venture to contribute my mite
to the discussion.
Having now made my position clear, I will at once plunge _in medias
res_ with a few artless observations. You hear all this grumbling
which is going on just now against the Unionist leader. Well,
gentlemen, a party which is in low water always does grumble at its
leader. I have known this sort of thing happen over and over again in
my own lifetime. And the consequence is, it is all like water on a
duck's back to me; it makes no impression on me whatsoever. I remember
as long back as the late sixties and early seventies the Conservative
party were ceaselessly grumbling at Lord Beaconsfield, then Mr.
Disraeli, right up to his greatest victory and the commencement of his
longest tenure of power--almost up to the moment when he became the
permanent idol of the Conservative party. I remember how the Liberals
grumbled at Mr. Gladstone from 1873 and 1874 almost up to the opening
of the Midlothian campaign. Again, I remember how the Conservatives
grumbled at Lord Salisbury from the first moment of his accession to
the leadership right up to 1885. I can recall as well as if it were
yesterday a young Tory friend of mine--he has become a distinguished
man since, and I am not going to give him away--telling me, who was at
that time a Liberal, in the year of grace 1883 or 1884, that it was
absolutely hopeless for the Tory party ever to expect to come back
into power with such a leader as Lord Salisbury. He called him a
"Professor." He said, "No doubt he is a very able man and an excellent
speaker, but he is a man of science. He has no popular gifts whatever.
There is not a ghost of a chance of a Conservative victory so long as
he is in command." Yet that was not more than two years before Lord
Salisbury commenced a series of Premierships which kept him, for some
thirteen and a half years out of seventeen, at the helm of the State.
With all these experiences to look back upon it is really impossible
for me to be much affected by the passing wave of dissatisfaction with
Mr. Balfour. Men of first-rate ability and character are rare. Still
rarer are men who, having those qualities, also have the knack of
compelling the attention and respect even of a hostile House of
Commons. When a party possesses a leader with all these gifts, it is
not likely to change him in a hurry.
But if I refuse to take a gloomy view of the Unionist leadership, I
must admit that I am not altogether an optimist about the immediate
prospects of Unionism. There is no doubt a bright side to the picture
as well as a less encouraging one. The bright side, from the party
point of view, is afforded by the hopeless chaos of opinion in the
ranks of our opponents--by the total absence of any clear conviction
or definite line whatever in the counsels of the Government, which
causes Ministers to dash wildly from measure to measure in
endeavouring to satisfy first one section and then another section of
their motley following, and which prevents them from ever giving
really adequate attention to any one of their proposals.
I am not speaking of Ministers individually. Granted that some of them
have done excellent work at the heads of their several departments--I
think it would not be fair to deny that. I am thinking of their
collective policy, and especially of their legislative efforts. For
monuments of clumsy opportunism, commend me to the legislative
failures, and, for the matter of that, to most of the legislative
achievements, of the last two years.
So far so good. Unionists cannot complain of what the Government is
doing for them. And on the negative side of policy--in their duty as
a mere Opposition--their course is clear. It is a fundamental article
of their faith to maintain the authority of the Imperial Parliament in
Ireland. But that authority can be set aside by the toleration of
lawlessness just as much, and in a worse way, than by the repeal of
the Union. And such toleration is the rule to-day. There may be no
violent crime, but there is open and widespread defiance of the law
and interference with the elementary rights of law-abiding people. It
is a demoralising state of affairs, and one to which no good citizen
in any part of the United Kingdom, however little he may be personally
affected by it, can afford to be indifferent. Once let it be granted
that any popular movement, which is not strong enough to obtain an
alteration of the law by regular means, can simply set the law aside
in practice, and you are at the beginning of general anarchy.
Unionists have to fight for a restoration of the respect for law in
Ireland in the interest of the whole kingdom. And they may have to
fight also, it appears, against the abrogation of our existing
constitution in favour of a system of quinquennial dictatorships. For
that and nothing else is involved in the proposal to reduce the House
of Lords to impotence and put nothing in its place. I am not concerned
to represent the present constitution of the House of Lords as
perfect. I have always been of opinion that a more representative and
therefore a stronger second chamber was desirable. But that we can
afford to do without any check on the House of Commons, especially
since the removal of all checks upon the power of those who from time
to time control the House of Commons to rush through any measures they
please without the possibility of an appeal to the people--that is a
proposition which no man with any knowledge of history or any respect
for constitutional government can possibly defend. To resist such a
proposal as that is not fighting for a party; it is not fighting for a
class. It is fighting for the stability of society, for the
fundamental rights of the whole nation.
I say, then, that on the negative side, in the things it is called
upon to resist, the Unionist party is strong and fortunate. But are we
to be content with that? Should we not all like to feel that we
appealed for the confidence of the people on the merits of our own
policy, and not merely on the demerits of our opponents? That, I take
it, is the feeling at the bottom of what men are saying on all hands
just now--that the Unionist party ought to have a constructive policy.
Now, if by a constructive policy is meant a string of promises, a sort
of Newcastle programme, then I can well imagine any wise statesmen,
especially if they happened to be in Opposition, thinking twice before
they committed themselves to it. But if by a constructive policy is
meant a definite set of principles, a clear attitude to the questions
which most agitate the public mind, a sympathetic grasp of popular
needs, and a readiness to indicate the extent to which, and the lines
on which, you think it possible and desirable to satisfy them--then I
agree that the Unionist party ought to have such a policy. And I
venture to say that, if it has such a policy, the fact is not yet
sufficiently apparent to the popular mind, or, perhaps, I should say,
speaking as one of the populace, to my mind.
Many people think that it is sufficient for the purpose--that it is
possible to conduct a victorious campaign with the single watchword
"Down with Socialism." Well, I am not fond of mere negatives. I do not
like fighting an abstract noun. My objection to anti-Socialism as a
platform is that Socialism means so many different things. On this
point I agree with Mr. Asquith. I will wait to denounce Socialism till
I see what form it takes. Sometimes it is synonymous with robbery, and
to robbery, open or veiled, boldly stalking in the face of day or
hiding itself under specious phrases, Unionists are, as a matter of
course, opposed. But mere fidelity to the eighth Commandment is not a
constructive policy, and Socialism is not necessarily synonymous with
robbery. Correctly used, the word only signifies a particular view of
the proper relation of the State to its citizens--a tendency to
substitute public for private ownership, or to restrict the freedom of
individual enterprise in the interests of the public. But there are
some forms of property which we all admit should be public and not
private, and the freedom of individual enterprise is already limited
by a hundred laws. Socialism and Individualism are opposing
principles, which enter in various proportions into the constitution
of every civilised society; it is merely a question of degree. One
community is more Socialistic than another. The same community is more
Socialistic at one time than at another. This country is far more
Socialistic than it was fifty years ago, and for most of the changes
in that direction the Unionist and the Tory party are responsible. The
Factory Acts are one instance; free education is another. The danger,
as it seems to me, of the Unionist party going off on a crusade
against Socialism is that in the heat of that crusade it may neglect,
or appear to neglect, those social evils of which honest Socialism is
striving, often, no doubt, by unwise means, to effect a cure. If the
Unionist party did that, it would be unfaithful to its own best
traditions from the days of "Sybil" and "Coningsby" to the present
time.
The true antidote to revolutionary Socialism is practical social
reform. That is no claptrap phrase--although it may sound so; there is
a great historical truth behind it. The revolutionary Socialist--I
call him revolutionary because he wants to alter the whole basis of
society--would like to get rid of all private property, except,
perhaps, our domestic pots and pans. He is averse from private
enterprise. He is going absurdly too far; but what gave birth to his
doctrine? The abuse of the rights of private property, the cruelty and
the failure of the scramble for gain, which mark the reign of a
one-sided Individualism. If we had not gone much too far in one
direction, we should not have had this extravagant reaction in the
other. But do not let us lose our heads in face of that reaction.
While resisting the revolutionary propaganda, let us be more, and not
less, strenuous in removing the causes of it.
You may think I am now talking pure Radicalism. Well, but it is not to
the objects which many Radicals have at heart that we, as Unionists,
need take exception. Why should we make them a present of those good
objects? Old age pensions; the multiplication of small landholders--and,
let me add, landowners; the resuscitation of agriculture; and, on the
other hand, better housing in our crowded centres; town planning;
sanitary conditions of labour; the extinction of sweating; the physical
training of the people; continuation schools--these and all other
measures necessary to preserve the stamina of the race and develop its
intelligence and productive power--have we not as good a right to
regard these as our objects, aye, and in many cases a better right, than
the supporters of the Government have?
It is not these objects which we deprecate. On the contrary, they have
our ardent sympathy. What we do deprecate is the spirit in which they
are so often preached and pursued. No progress is going to be
made--quite the contrary--by stirring up class hatred or trying to rob
Peter in order to pay Paul. It is not true that you cannot benefit one
class without taking from another class--still less true that by
taking from one you necessarily benefit another. The national income,
the sum total of all our productive activities, is capable of being
enormously increased or diminished by wise or foolish policy. For it
does not only depend on the amount of capital and labour. A number of
far subtler factors enter into the account--science, organisation,
energy, credit, confidence, the spirit in which men set about their
business. The one thing which would be certain to diminish that
income, and to recoil on all of us, would be that war of classes which
many people seem anxious to stir up. Nothing could be more fatal to
prosperity, and to the fairest hopes of social progress, than if the
great body of the upper and middle classes of the community had cause
to regard that progress as indissolubly associated with an attack upon
themselves. And that is why, if reforms such as I have indicated are
costly--as they will be costly--you must find some better way of
providing for them than by merely giving another turn to the
income-tax screw, or just adding so much per cent. to the estate duty.
From my point of view, social reform is a national affair. All classes
benefit by it, not only those directly affected. And therefore all
should contribute according to their means. I do not in any way object
to the rich being made to contribute, even for purposes in which they
are not directly interested. What I do object to is that the great
body of the people should not contribute to them. It is thoroughly
vicious in principle to divide the nation, as many of the Radical and
Labour men want to divide it, into two sections--a majority which only
calls the tune, and a minority which only pays the piper.
I own I am aghast at the mean opinion which many politicians seem to
have of the mass of their working fellow countrymen, when they
approach them with this crude sort of bribery, offering them
everything for nothing, always talking to them of their claims upon
the State, and never of their duties towards it. This is a democratic
country. It is their State and their Empire--theirs to possess, theirs
to control, but theirs also to support and to defend. And I for one
have such faith in the common sense and fair-mindedness of the British
people that I believe you have only to convince them that you have a
really sound national policy, and they will rally to it, without
having to be bought by promises of a penny off this and twopence off
the other--a sort of appeal, I regret to say, which is not only
confined to Radical orators, but in which Unionists also are
sometimes too apt to indulge.
And, now, gentlemen, only one word in conclusion--a brief and
inadequate reference to a vast subject, but one to which I am at all
times and seasons specially bound to refer. After all, my chief
quarrel with the Radical party--not with all of them--I do not say
that for a moment--but with a far too large and influential
section--is their anti-patriotism. I use the word advisedly. It is not
that they are unpatriotic in the sense of having no affection for
their country. It is that they are deliberately and on principle--I do
not asperse their motives; I do not question their sincerity and
conviction--anti-patriotic, opposed to national as distinct from
cosmopolitan ideals. They are not zealous for national defence; they
have no faith in the Empire; they love to show their impartiality by
taking sides against their own country; they object to their children
being taught respect for the flag. But we Unionists are not
cosmopolitans, but Britons. We have no envy or ill-will towards other
nations; a man is not a worse neighbour because he loves his own
family. But we do hold that it is not our business to look after
others. It is our business to look after ourselves and our
dependencies, and the great kindred communities who own allegiance to
the British flag. We want to draw closer to them, to stand together;
and we believe that the strength and the unity of the British Empire
are of vital and practical importance to every citizen. In all our
propaganda, and in all our policy, let us continue to give that great
principle a foremost place.
UNIONISTS AND THE EMPIRE
Edinburgh, November 15, 1907
I am greatly reassured by the very kind reception which you have just
given me. To tell the truth, I had been feeling a little alarmed at
the fate which might await me in Edinburgh. From a faithful perusal of
the Radical Press I had been led to believe that Scotland was seething
with righteous indignation against that branch of the Legislature of
which I am, it is true, only a humble and very recent member, but yet
a member, and therefore involved in the general condemnation of the
ruthless hereditary tyrants and oppressors of the people, the
privileged landowning class, which is alleged to be so out of sympathy
with the mass of their fellow-countrymen, although, oddly enough, it
supplies many of the most popular candidates, not only of one party,
at any General Election. Personally, I feel it rather hard to be
painted in such black colours. There is no taint of hereditary
privilege about me. I am not--I wish I were--the owner of broad acres,
and I am in no way conscious of belonging to a specially favoured
class. There are a great many of my fellow members in the House of
Lords who are in the same position, and who sit there, not by virtue
of any privilege, but by virtue of their services, or, let me say in
my own case, supposed services, to the State. And while we sit
there--and here I venture, with all humility, to speak for all the
members of that body, whether hereditary or created--we feel that we
ought to deal with the questions submitted to us to the best of our
judgment and conscience, without fear of the consequences to ourselves
and without allowing ourselves to be brow-beaten for not being
different from what we are. We believe that we perform a useful and
necessary function. We believe that a Second Chamber is essential to
the good government of this country. We do not contend--certainly I am
myself very far from contending--that the existing Second Chamber is
the best imaginable. Let there be a well-considered reform of the
House of Lords, or even, if need be, an entirely different Second
Chamber. But until you have got this better instrument, do not throw
away the instrument which you have--the only defence, not of the
privileges of a class, but of the rights of the whole nation, against
hasty, ill-considered measures and against the subordination of
permanent national interests to the temporary exigencies of a party.