§ LORD WILLOUGHBY DE BROKEMy Lords, I desire to call the attention of the House to the following words in a resolution passed at the National Liberal Club on March 31, with the Marquess of Lincolnshire in the chair—
That this meeting views with indignation the unpatriotic attempts of the Tory Party to corrupt the Army and use it as an instrument for the defeat of Parliamentary Government";and to move for Papers showing specific instances, if any, of corruption of the Army by the Tory Party.We have had a great deal of controversy inside and outside Parliament with regard to the position of the Army. I expect that we shall have a great deal more, and in these days of uncertainty and evasion and editing of speeches delivered in this House it is impossible to follow the whole labyrinth of the Government. But we should be failing in our duty to the country if we did not call public attention to this resolution passed at the National Liberal Club with the noble Marquess, Lord Lincolnshire, in the chair. We cannot follow from this House everything that is said by the Radical Party in the country, but it is respectful to the noble Marquess to tell him that the meeting at which this resolution was passed was no ordinary meeting. The noble Marquess occupies in the estimation of his Party a considerable position. He has received greater rewards for his services to his Party than either Lord Chatham or his son, or Lord Wolseley, or Lord Roberts, or Lord Kelvin, or Lord Lister received for services to their country. As the man in the street would say, the noble Marquess has "got there." Therefore this was a meeting of considerable importance.
It is very remarkable that about the time this resolution was passed the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack disclaimed any talk in political circles with regard to the Army. He said—
It is wrong to bring the Army into politics in any way.That is quite right, I agree. But the Daily News, the official organ of noble Lords opposite and their friends who organised the meeting at the National Liberal Club, does not agree with the noble and learned Viscount. The Daily 999 News said of the National Liberal Club meeting—A good sprinkling of Liberal Members of Parliament and candidates was present, but the meeting consisted essentially of the rank and file of Liberalism, the men who drive the machinery in the constituencies and who are often in closer touch with what the mass of the voters are thinking than the Members who represent them at Westminster.So that this idea of the Tory Party having corrupted the Army is going to be used, with the full sanction and approval of the noble Marquess opposite, by the Radical Party in the country.I have taken the trouble to look up in Murray's Dictionary the meaning of the word "corrupt." It appears to be used in two senses. To corrupt means either to make unsound something which was previously sound, to destroy or to damage something or another; or else—and this is the sense which was chosen by the Radicals when the Marconi affair came on—to corrupt somebody means to hold out some inducement to him to pervert his integrity in the discharge of his duty. Now I say that what is called the Tory Party—I wish, by the way, it was the Tory Party—the Unionist Party, is not guilty of either having damaged the Army with regard to Home Rule for Ireland in any way or of having held out any inducement to it to deflect officers and men from their duty, and I challenge the noble Marquess and his friends to produce any speech or any document which can be construed in that manner. I am well aware that a letter did appear in the newspapers, a copy of which was sent by the writer to officers and sergeant-majors in the Army. I refer to the letter which Mr. Rowland Hunt wrote to the Globe. I have that letter in my hand. I do not see any great harm in it, though I should not have written it myself because I think it would have been impolitic from my own point of view, but I make the noble Marquess a complete present of everything that Mr. Hunt says in that letter. But I think the noble Marquess who leads the Opposition in your Lordships' House and Mr. Bonar Law would be the last people in the world to admit that Mr. Rowland Hunt was a representative of the Unionist Party. I fancy that he gives the Unionist Party in the House of Commons a considerable amount of trouble, and that it would be impossible for anybody fairly to claim him as a member of the Unionist Party.
1000 What the country will have to consider—and however you may try to keep this question down we are bound to hear a great deal about it in the future in and out of Parliament—is, Which Party has done the greater amount of damage to the Army? I say that as soon as you made a partisan settlement of the Constitution and passed the Parliament Act you immediately began to place the British Army in an equivocal position, because everybody knew perfectly well—it was apparent to the meanest capacity—that in the face of what Ulster was doing you could not carry out what your political supporters wanted without having recourse to the armed Forces of the Crown. Just consider what the history of the Army has been since the Parliament Act was passed. A few days after that Act was placed on the Statute Book a strike broke out and the Army had to be used. Since that time we have not had a moment's peace in this country, and the state of affairs has culminated in the present position. There has been a colossal scandal with regard to the Army, and in this bungling you have lost the War Minister, the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, and another very distinguished officer. The incident which led up to that is to be laid to the charge of noble Lords opposite and their friends, and to no one else. It is they who are responsible, and not what they are pleased to call the Tory Party.
The position in which officers of the Army have been placed by the Radical Government cannot be better described than by a telegram that was read out in the House of Commons yesterday afternoon from Colonel Hogg, who telegraphed to Mr. Churchill—
All officers Cavalry Brigade required to decide whether they are prepared to accept liability active operations in Ulster on pain of dismissal.That is the position in which you have placed officers in the Army. Yet your supporters are prepared to go about the country and say that the Unionist Party have corrupted the Army. I was very glad to hear the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack say the other day that he deprecated bringing the Army into political controversy. He described the issue between the Army and the people as being the issue whether the Army is to be the instrument of the State or whether it is to be the subject of a political battle 1001 such as has been known with disastrous consequences in times gone by. It seems to me that you have chosen the latter alternative, and that you are going deliberately to make the Army the subject of a political battle.The Ministers at present in office are no doubt responsible for the Executive Government of this country, but they are not in a very strong position. A majority in the House of Commons does not constitute the State. It is quite conceivable that King, Lords, and Commons all acting together might take upon themselves to order out the armed Forces of the Crown to subdue any portion of the United Kingdom who refused to obey a certain law; but all the same, even if they did, that would still be making Civil War on a portion of His Majesty's subjects. The Government are placing an intolerable strain upon officers in the Army because your Party in the House of Commons have all these years sat cheek by jowl with the men who cheered Lord Methuen's defeat in South Africa. You will never get over that. Mr. MacNeill, I am astonished to see, has been trying to explain that away. I should have thought that he would be really rather proud of it than otherwise. In a certain sense, to cheer Lord Methuen's defeat was about the only creditable thing the Irish Members have done since they have been in the House of Commons. It was a perfectly spontaneous and genuine expression of their real feeling, and I would rather know their real feeling in that way than read the platitudes about Empire which Mr. Redmond delivers from public platforms. I shall be glad to hear whether the noble Marquess who presided over this meeting at the National Liberal Club can produce specific instances of corruption of the Army by the Tory Party.
§ Moved, That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty for Papers showing specific instances, if any, of corruption of the Army by the Tory Party.—(Lord Willoughby de Broke.)
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREMy Lords, I do not think that I have anything to complain of in the way in which the noble Lord has introduced this subject. He has spoken but a very short time, but he has certainly rambled over a large field and introduced a good many 1002 matters. He spoke of the Marconi incident, talked of the changes in the Government and of the South African War, and mentioned several great Statesmen in past times. I hope, however, that I may be allowed to confine myself strictly to the Question on the Paper. The noble Lord calls attention to the following words in a resolution passed at the National Liberal Club on March 31—
That this meeting views with indignation the unpatriotic attempts of the Tory Party to corrupt the Army and use it as an instrument for the defeat of Parliamentary Government.I may at once say that resolutions of a similar character have been pouring in in support of the Government from all parts of the Kingdom, some of them very much more strongly worded. As for the atrocious crime of being president of the National Liberal Club, that I shall not for one moment attempt to palliate or deny. I am very proud of the position. I have occupied it for a long time now, and the club of which I have the honour to be president is composed of over 5,000 men, all distinguished members of the party of progress; and amongst them we were fortunate at one time to include a member of the other House who has been very much in the limelight lately—Sir Edward Carson.I must remind the House that the meeting in question was called at a time of great excitement. I was asked, according to the rules of the club, to summon a special general meeting, and in twenty-four hours, without sending out any cards or whipping up, between 800 and 1,000 business men assembled at the club in the middle of the day. The whole thing was over in half an hour, the resolution being carried absolutely unanimously. Not one uncomplimentary or uncivil word was said as regards the British Army, and the meeting ended, as all meetings of English-men should end, with three cheers for the King. But I am bound to admit that the feeling against the Opposition was extremely strong, and I do not mince words when I say that some very strong language was used. The noble Lord asks for Papers to corroborate this resolution. I do not exactly know what sort of Papers he wants, but I have here a very large collection of extracts from statements by different important persons on the subject. They have been collected chiefly and purposely from the four great daily news- 1003 papers which are either wholly or partially owned and edited and supervised by members of your Lordships' House. The reason of that, of course, is that we should then be able to accept them as gospel as regards accuracy and reliability.
First I may perhaps be permitted to call the attention of the House to what fell from my noble and learned friend on the Woolsack on March 30 last. Lord Haldane said—
The Curragh incident is a very serious symptom of the consequences of what has been going on as the result of appeals made in the Press and by distinguished individuals.When I first got this collection of extracts I thought that after all it would be hardly worth while to come down to the House of Lords with it. I thought it would only weary and possibly annoy some noble Lords, and I was determined as far as I could not to quote any remarks that had been made by members of your Lordships' House. But there is one noble Lord who occupies so distinguished a position, and who is, and deservedly is, so respected and honoured in the country generally that, much against my inclination, I am afraid I must refer to what he said, but that will be the only allusion I shall make to any speech made by members of your Lord-skips' House. On November 18 last Lord Lansdowne made a reference to the Army, in which was expressed or implied what Mr. Asquith, in a speech on November 27, described as "the whole gospel of anarchy." That was the description which the Prime Minister gave of a speech made by the noble Marquess who leads the Opposition in your Lordships' House. I do not know whether the noble Marquess carried his Party with him. Of that I have not the remotest idea. But he certainly did not carry the whole of the Front Opposition Bench with him, because four days after Mr. Asquith's speech Lord Derby appeared on a public platform and delivered himself of his ideas. He was compelled to say—There is one matter on which to a certain extent I am in agreement with Mr. Asquith, and that is as to what would be the duty of His Majesty's troops if there was armed resistance. I myself have served, as probably many of you in this room have served, for some time in the Army. You may have served in the Auxiliary Forces, but we were both bound by the same law that binds those who are serving at present. That law was, We have no politics in the Army, and, right or wrong, we have got to do what we are told.1004 Those were the remarks of Lord Derby, after the speech of the Prime Minister in which he had described the observations of the noble Marquess opposite as the whole gospel of anarchy.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEI am sorry to interrupt the noble Marquess. He is, I understand, making an attack upon me for something that fell from me in the course of a speech delivered in November last. He has given the House an account of the Prime Minister's appreciation of that speech. He has also given to the House an account of another speech delivered by Lord Derby. But he has omitted altogether to tell the House what my speech was. If he is going to attack any particular passage in that speech I ask him to be good enough to read it to the House.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREI have an enormous quantity of extracts here, and—
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEI do not want them at all. I want the passage that concerns me.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREIf I may, I will send the noble Marquess the speech.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEWe want it now.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREI am afraid I have not got it.
§ THE DUKE OF DEVONSHIREWe will wait half an hour.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREI have not got the extract with me, but I will send to the Library and get it. [The noble Marquess stooped down and asked Lord Southwark, who sat near him, to go to the Library and procure the file of The Times.] Resuming, the noble Marquess said: It was a speech delivered by Lord Lansdowne on November 18 last. Now may I be permitted to quote one or two short passages which are germane to the subject. Mr. Bonar Law, in the course of debate on June 18, made a very remarkable speech. He said, regarding the Government—
They know that if Ulster is in earnest and if Ulster does resist by force, there are stronger influences than Parliament majorities. They know that in that case no Government would dare to use their troops to drive them out.1005 He finished up by saying—They know, as a matter of fact, that the Government which gives the order to employ troops for that purpose would run a great risk of being lynched in London.
§ LORD WILLOUGHBY DE BROKEHear, hear.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREDid the noble Lord cheer that?
§ LORD WILLOUGHBY DE BROKEYes, my Lord.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREI will take two more speeches. Lord Robert Cecil is reported on April 4 to have said at Ashley in Hertfordshire—
A soldier had to make up his mind whether what he was told to do was lawful or otherwise.
§ VISCOUNT MIDLETONWas that speech from which the noble Marquess is quoting delivered before or after his speech at the National Liberal Club?
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREI am one person against fifty. I do not mind interruptions at all. I welcome them. All I ask for is fair play. I have to defend my Club and myself, and all I ask from noble Lords opposite—and I have never asked it yet in vain—is to be allowed to make my defence, and then demolish it if you can afterwards. Mr. Ronald M'Neill, at the "Don't shoot" meeting in Hyde Park this month, said—
Soldiers, to their eternal honour, refused to soil their uniforms by acting as butchers in the streets of Belfast and the villages of Ulster.I have any number of this sort of quotation, but there is only one more with which I need trouble your Lordships. Sir Edward Carson himself, in July, 1913, announced that "the Army is with us." Now that is a very remarkable statement. How did he know that? How could he possibly tell that the British Army was with gentlemen who had openly announced their intention of breaking every one of the laws? I respectfully ask to be informed where on earth Sir Edward Carson got his information from. Who told him? Was a round-robin sent to the Army? How did he get the information that "the Army is with us"? Let me read a further statement by Sir Edward Carson. He has also said—He intended when he went over to Ulster to break every law that was possible. Let the Government take their own course. He was not a bit afraid of them, for a more wretched, miserable, time-serving, opportunist lot never before sat in Parliament.1006 Where, my Lords, do you think this magnificent speech was made? It was made at a meeting of the Women's Amalgamated Unionist and Tariff Reform Association, here assembled in London on June 24. As I say, there are no end of quotations of this sort. I did not wish to bring them forward, but I have been driven to do so. It has been my duty to defend the National Liberal Club, of which I am proud to be president, and I must plead that the necessity for going into this most painful and disagreeable business has been forced upon me by the noble Lord's Question. As far as I am concerned, nothing would have induced me—I do not think it is "playing the game"—to do anything in this House to place difficulties in the way of a rapprochement between the two Parties as regards Home Rule; and, after all, it seemed a fortnight or three weeks ago as if there was not very much between us and that some arrangement might be come to.I do not put my case solely on these extracts, damaging though they may be to the Party opposite. I ask, Is there any single soldier in this House, or indeed out of it, who will be bold enough to say that a man who asserts that attempts have been made to get at the Army is telling an untruth? Is there any officer who will get up in this House and say that? I do not think for one moment you will find anybody to do it. It was only on March 25 last that the noble Viscount the Lord President of the Council said—
The Chief of the Imperial General Staff and the Adjutant-General represented to the Secretary of State early in December that so many efforts, were being made to seduce officers and men from their allegiance that there was real danger of indiscipline in the Army.That was stated publicly in this House on the responsibility of the Lord President of the Council, who was leading the House at the time, and that statement has never been challenged. It remains at this moment, and there has been profound silence on the part of noble Lords and members of the House of Commons regarding it.You must, as I say, remember the state of feeling that existed when this resolution was put to the Progressive Party at the National Liberal Club on March 31. Do please recall what the state of tension was. I can remember the Chartist Riots; but honestly I cannot call to mind any time 1007 in the whole of my long life in which there was such anxiety and so much tension, because most people thought that in consequence of what had been done the end of Constitutional Government had at last come. We were told that a serious misunderstanding had arisen, that questions which never ought to have been asked were put, and that answers which never ought to have been given were returned. Certain officers said that certain orders under certain circumstances they certainly would not obey. But that is all ancient history now. The misunderstanding has been cleared away.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREThe misunderstanding has been cleared away. The Secretary of State for War has resigned, the Chief of the Imperial General Staff has resigned, the Adjutant-General has resigned, and now we are all agreed on one point—namely, that the real discipline and the real honour of the Army never was called in question at all. We have had it from Lord Roberts, who speaks with considerable knowledge of the Army, that there has not been one single incident of indiscipline or disobedience. I do not suppose for a moment that he means that all the troop and company defaulter books have blank pages. Far from it. What he meant was that in this crisis that had happened there was not one single instance of indiscipline or disobedience. Absolute confidence on the part of the nation has now been restored in the Army; everybody believes that the Army is as sound as a bell of brass; and, mercifully, the dreadful "reason why" policy and the "optional obedience" policy have been knocked on the head, for the great "Don't shoot" meeting which was held in Hyde Park in support of these two new-fangled policies, at which so many illustrious people spoke, has left the country stone cold. And now I think that the wisdom of Lord Derby's advice—that you must not tamper with the discipline of the Army—is recognised on all sides, and we can see now that the matter has been brought to an absolute conclusion. The Prime Minister is at the present moment Secretary of State for War, and he put the case in a nutshell when he said—
The Army will hear nothing of politics from me, and in return I shall expect to hear nothing of politics from the Army.1008 It is now universally admitted everywhere that the Army is as sound as a bell of brass. The tactics of the Tory Party are now entirely changed. The Army cannot be got at. We all agree upon that now. Very well, it has got to be rendered ineffective somehow in some other way so as to carry out this terrible "don't shoot" policy. How is it going to be done? Of course, we have got the "hellish plot," about which I am not going to say a word because that is not within the four corners of the resolution. The idea of Lord Willoughby de Broke, who, besides being an eloquent speaker is a very astute man, with a great capacity for stage management, is to render the Army ineffective legally. From his point of view it is not a bad move. He is reported in The Times of February 11 last to have said—The Lords would deal with the Army Annual Act in such a way that it could not possibly be made available for the purposes of the Government.On this side of the House nobody knows what is going to happen, and we understand that noble Lords opposite have not made up their minds as to what is to be done in regard to the Army Annual Bill, the fate of which is still in the lap of the gods.The last move for influencing the Army is the great British Covenant. That has been started for the purpose of indirectly influencing the Army by presenting optional obedience in a new and attractive form. Lord Milner is at the head of this movement. He is also an extremely able, clever, and astute man, and what does he say? He is reported in the Morning Post of April 4 last to have said—
Every man will act up to his Covenant, in accordance with his conscience and with his courage.Now that is a very attractive proposal, and it ropes in everybody. It ropes in the conscientious man who has no courage and it ropes in the courageous man who has no conscience; but I think the noble Viscount and his friends would be much more willing to rely on the unconscientious desperado than on the conscientious funker. In spite of all these efforts, this great British Covenant, to which every honest, upright and proper-minded man is to subscribe, is not a success, as regards the Army at any rate, because we have the evidence of Lord St. Audries and Lord Methuen that the Army cares nothing for politics at all.1009 I think I have covered the ground and given an answer—I hope a complete and respectful answer—to the noble Lord who put this Question. In conclusion I will make an appeal to him. Perhaps it is an impertinence on my part, but I hope he will not consider it so. Before he again attacks these 5,000 of his fellow citizens who are members of the National Liberal Club in this, I am afraid I must say, rather savage manner, I would ask him to get hold of some of these elegant extracts. I invite him in his own interests to read what persons on his own side have been saying openly on public platforms. I ask him to read, mark, learn and inwardly digest the extracts which I have here, and which, if he will be good enough to accept them, are entirely at his disposal. In thanking the House for having permitted me to make these remarks, which it was my absolute duty to do and which I was forced into making, I ask Lord Willoughby de Broke to believe that though we, the members of the National Liberal Club, may not be as extreme politicians as those South African deported gentlemen on whose platform he made a most eloquent and moving speech on Monday last, all of us are at least as honest, as trustworthy, as loyal, and as patriotic as we one and all know and believe the noble Lord himself to be.
§ VISCOUNT MIDLETONMy Lords, I really doubt whether any member of your Lordships' House has ever listened, in the course of the rambling speech which the noble Marquess has addressed to us, to a more deplorable failure to justify language which is quite unjustifiable. His apology that there was a great deal of excitement at the time was very weak. What was the noble Marquess, with all his experience, there for but to see that in moments of excitement resolutions were not passed which he at all events had no words to justify. The point of his explanation was that there was justification, but when challenged on the point he made a number of haphazard references in which he quoted comments of Ministers instead of quoting the speeches on which those comments were based. He began with a statement by the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack, but he did not give us in any single case the speech to which the comments referred. He proceeded with the noble Marquess the Leader of the Opposition, and I rise to ask the noble Marquess opposite what is 1010 the speech and what were the words on which were based the comments which he so elaborately gave to your Lordships. I think we have some reason to complain that the noble Marquess, who came down to the House fortified, with a great number of extracts, had not got at his command the speech of which he complained. May we hope before the debate closes to hear from him what the words were? Then Lord Lincolnshire—it is almost ludicrous—proceeded to quote as a justification, as I understood him, for the resolution of the National Liberal Club, passed on March 31, a speech made by Lord Robert Cecil in the following month.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREI do not think Lord Robert Cecil's speech was made subsequent to the National Liberal Club resolution, but I am not quite certain. It was made in 1913, was it not?
§ VISCOUNT MIDLETONLord Robert Cecil's speech was delivered on April 14, a fortnight after the National Liberal Club resolution was passed.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREThe noble Viscount is quite right. It was delivered after the National Liberal Club resolution
§ VISCOUNT MIDLETONThe noble Marquess, as I said, detained your Lordships by quoting as a justification for his own language and conduct on March 31 a speech which was delivered a fortnight later. I never knew the noble Marquess taken very seriously in this House, though reluctantly he is taken seriously outside; but he has never before reduced the absolute absurdity of the position he has taken up to a more glorious level than he has done on this occasion. He went on to quote what the Chief of the Imperial General Staff and the Adjutant-General were said to have stated about the Army, and he said that those statements had never been challenged. They have been challenged again and again. Mr. Bonar Law only a few days ago distinctly declared in the House of Commons that no communications had passed with the Curragh either from himself or from those with whom he was connected, or, I think he went so far as to say, from the organisation which represents the Tory Party. The noble Marquess's statements are based absolutely on hearsay. He has not produced one single fact; he has not made 1011 one citation which supports him. It is perfectly true that Mr. Bonar Law may have said that the Government would not dare to use the troops in a particular way, but that is not an attempt to corrupt the Army. That is a remark which any one is at liberty to make, just in the same way as I heard hundreds of times members of the Opposition say that the late Government would not dare to use British troops for such and such a purpose.
I really think the noble Marquess opposite owes it to us, first of all, to tell us what were the words of which he complained on the part of the noble Marquess the Leader of the Opposition; secondly, why he produced Lord Robert Cecil's speech of a fortnight later in support of his own action a fortnight before; and, thirdly, what he means by the statement that everybody now agrees that the Army cannot be got at. Does he mean to say that we have tried to get at the Army and have failed? Because, if he makes a grave charge of that kind, let him produce one single instance. My noble friend made him a present of the fact that Mr. Rowland Hunt had issued an extremely regrettable and undesirable circular, but Mr. Rowland Hunt, I believe, does not even take the Conservative whip. At all events, he does not bear allegiance either to Mr. Bonar Law or to Lord Lansdowne. Is the noble Marquess going to base on that fragile foundation an indictment of the whole Tory Party? I am not sorry that my noble friend has brought this question forward. We have had too much of the noble Marquess's indiscretions in these matters. In this House he hangs on to everything which is professedly statesmanlike and aristocratic, but he goes outside and beats the democratic drum and endeavours to obtain popularity by saying things which he cannot possibly justify in this House. And when called to account, he had not sufficiently studied the brief which had evidently been got up for him to prevent falling into the most obvious pitfalls.
I am sorry that the noble Marquess, so old a member of this House, should have laid himself open to the rebuke which my noble friend has so properly addressed to him. Everything connected with the noble Marquess's character—his life, his history—is aristocratic. It may be said of him, as was once said of a greater man, "He is aristocratic by nature, but he is also tribune by calculation." It is regret- 1012 table that he should drag the Army, of a distinguished regiment of which he was once a member, into this vortex. You cannot do a more gross thing if you want to damage any man than by proceeding to defend him against a charge which has never been made against him. No responsible person has made against the Army the charge which the noble Marquess has attempted to disprove. We have been most careful not to make appeals personally, individually, or collectively to officers or men in the Army not to do their duty. I feel that a man in the noble Marquess's position ought to have been much more guarded in his language; and when called to account, instead of introducing other subjects having no bearing on this controversy, he might at least have provided himself with the citations which caused him to make an attack which is wholly unjustifiable.
§ THE FIRST COMMISSIONER OF WORKS (EARL BEAUCHAMP)My Lords, there are present to-day a large number of members of your Lordships' House who do not often favour us with their presence, and who are waiting for a debate which will succeed this one. I will not, therefore, detain your Lordships at any length, more especially as the arrows from the opposite side have passed over the heads of the Front Bench and have been directed against the person of my noble friend behind me, Lord Lincolnshire. We on the Front Bench are only concerned in the most indirect way, and rather with regard to the technical form of the Motion for the presentation of Papers upon this question. It is, of course, well known to the House that Papers when they are asked for on an occasion of this kind may deal either with matters which are fully known to the House or with matters of a more private character. The noble Marquess who has been attacked has not pretended, in the course of the remarks which he has addressed to your Lordships, that any of his information was derived from any source whatsoever except from those which are open to every member of your Lordships' House. It is perfectly evident that the information upon which he relied was information which your Lordships may find in the newspapers every one for himself as he cares to search. There is, therefore, no reason why His Majesty's Government should comply with the demand for the presentation of Papers. The information is before your Lord- 1013 ships' House, and it is open to all of us to draw our own deductions from that information. Indeed, I dare say the noble Lord who made the Motion did not really expect to get any Papers, and it was rather for a technical purpose that he introduced the demand for Papers on this occasion.
Let me turn to something which was said by the noble Viscount who has just sat down. He will perhaps allow me, in the first place, to congratulate him upon the possession of a conscience so clear from his ever having used unguarded language, from his ever having made any mistakes, that he could address such severe strictures to my noble friend behind me. I deplore the tone in which my noble friend was addressed by the noble Viscount opposite. The noble Viscount leant more especially upon one quotation which was used by my noble friend—the quotation from a speech which Lord Robert Cecil made—of which he made severe remarks upon the ground that the speech had been made after the resolution had been passed at the National Liberal Club. I noticed with interest that the noble Viscount was no more anxious to justify that speech than he was to justify the document which was sent by Mr. Rowland Hunt to the non-commissioned officers of the Guards. It is only a skilled controversialist who will take one isolated passage—which was quoted as much I think by my noble friend in order to show that in his opinion this kind of speech had been going on for some time—without reference to the more particular quotations of which Lord Lincolnshire also made use. I think that, after all, in a long series of quotations it is a matter of comparative unimportance, if the object of the noble Marquess behind me was to prove that there had been a number of speeches of this kind made, whether this was said before or after the National Liberal Club meeting. It would, in the opinion of my noble friend behind me, go to prove whether said before or after the meeting of the club, that speeches of that kind had been made. The only other observation which I shall venture to make, and that also, I hope, in a somewhat detached spirit, is to draw attention to the fact that to the second Covenant, the British Covenant, which has been signed, I fancy, by a good many members of your Lordships' House, the noble Viscount who has just spoken made no reference.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, I am not sure that the more cautious speech to which we have just listened has greatly reinforced the singular defence offered to the House by the noble Marquess on the Back Bench opposite. I observe that the noble Marquess laid some stress upon the fact that the resolution to which attention has been called was one of a great number of similar resolutions which were being thrown broadcast over the face of the country. That is exactly why we take so much exception to this resolution. It evidently represents what I would call a machine-made misrepresentation of the attitude of the Party that sits on this side of the House. The charge made against us is that of having, in effect, tampered with the Army for political purposes. You cannot get away from that. The noble Marquess came to this House on March 31 red-hot from this meeting which he had just attended, and I remember he told us that very severe things had been said about us at that meeting. He did not upon that occasion reveal to us the terms of this resolution with which we are concerned this evening. We are now, however, in full possession of it.
Now what is remarkable is that the noble Marquess has been entirely unable to produce a single case in which he is able to bring home to us, or to any of us, the charge of having tampered with the Army for political purposes. He appeared here armed with a colossal array of newspaper extracts which we thought he was going to read at length to the House. But he spared your Lordships, and told us that he was going to rely upon one or two chosen passages. He at once intimated that he was going to produce, so to speak, his trump card in the shape of something that had been said by me; but, to our surprise and bewilderment, he never produced my speech. He produced comments upon it made by other people; but as to the pièce justificative which we required, that was not even in the noble Marquess's pocket, but had to be hurriedly fetched by a messenger, who has lately returned with, no doubt, the missing document. [The bound file of The Times had just been brought into the House and placed on the Bench by the side of the Marquess of Lincolnshire.] As to the other citations which the noble Marquess did quote, I gathered that he referred to a speech made by Mr. Bonar Law, in which my right hon. 1015 friend dwelt very earnestly upon the great risk which would be incurred by any Government which ventured to employ troops for the purpose of coercing the loyalists of Ulster into submission to Home Rule. It is a matter of notoriety that that would be a hazardous task. If these apprehensions, shared by Mr. Bonar Law, by myself, and by others, are imaginary apprehensions, why have we been treated to all the mealy-mouthed utterances to which we have listened from various members of the Government, who have been at immense pains to convince us that there was, at any rate, no immediate danger of these untoward events taking place? Why, if these were imaginary dangers, dangers to which we had no right to refer, dangers against which we had no right to warn the public of this country, was it necessary to put the two peccant paragraphs into the Gough Memorandum—paragraphs which we know represented then, and represent now, the convictions of His Majesty's Government, although they excised them from the Memorandum for fear, forsooth! that General Gough should appear to have carried off a trophy with him? Why, again, has the Chief Secretary for Ireland been at pains to tell us, as he has lately, that it was out of the question to force upon Ulster any system of government which Ulster distrusted and abhorred? Why was it necessary for the Secretary of State to send for the Commander-in-Chief in Ireland and to instruct him, as we now know that he did instruct him, to explain to his officers in Ireland that they might be called upon to undertake military duties which would be extremely repugnant to them, so repugnant to them that some of them were even to be given an opportunity of temporarily withdrawing from the Army sooner than involve themselves in operations against their fellow-countrymen in Ulster?
The noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack has stated many times quite clearly what in the view of, I believe, all of us is the duty of an officer of the Army in cases of this kind. He has to obey the orders of his superiors, and it is at the same time admitted that those orders must be lawful orders and that the officer may find himself in a position where he has to choose between obeying the orders of his military superiors and declining a task which as a citizen and a patriot he is not prepared to undertake. The noble and learned Viscount put that as clearly as 1016 possible before a Committee of the House of Commons, to which I referred the other evening. He said that an officer might find himself placed between two precipices—that was the simile that he used. All that we have ever said comes to this, that we think it will be a great misfortune if you do put officers between these two precipices and compel them to fall over the one precipice or the other.
§ THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT HALDANE)I made it clear that the choice is between obeying two laws. It is no question of discretion on the part of the officer whether he will do his duty because his political opinions stand in the way. The cases which I put are cases in which the officer has to comply with the Civil Law when that is inconsistent with the military law. It is a choice between two laws and not between duty and policy.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEAt any rate, whether it was a choice between two laws or not the dilemma which was present to the noble and learned Viscount's mind and which has been present to our minds throughout all this, is the very dilemma which the Secretary of State for War endeavoured to avoid when he announced that certain officers might claim exemption from military duties for a time because their military duties might be of a kind which it would be impossible for them to undertake. The noble Marquess opposite, it seems to me, during his somewhat lengthy statement failed absolutely and entirely to connect us, or any of us, with attempts to tamper with the discipline of the Army. And may I say again what I think I said the other evening, that had we attempted anything of the kind we should have been acting not only in a most improper and unpatriotic manner, but in a perfectly idiotic manner. It is notorious, and we have been told over and over again by noble Lords connected with the Army in this House that if there is one thing that the Army as such greatly resents it is an attempt on the part of civilians to dictate to them the political line which they ought to adopt. I am glad my noble friend Lord Willoughby brought this question before the House, and I venture to think that the discussion which has taken place has proved what I understood him to desire to prove, that the charge preferred against us by the noble Marquess's friends was an absolutely unwarranted charge and one which he has been wholly unable to substantiate.
§ LORD WILLOUGHBY DE BROKEI desire to associate myself with the final sentence in the speech just made by the noble Marquess the Leader of the Opposition. I shall not put the House to the trouble of a Division, but shall ask your Lordships' permission to withdraw my Motion for Papers. I do not wish, in doing so, to be understood to withdraw the Motion for any other reason than that I am quite convinced that if I did press the Motion there are no Papers which would justify the charges brought forward at the National Liberal Club. At the same time I wish to thank Lord Lincolnshire for the courteous way in which he referred to myself. But it would add very greatly to the interest of the proceedings if the noble Marquess would produce the speech of Lord Lansdowne which was the whole crux and raison d'être of most of his reply. Has the noble Marquess got it yet?
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREIt is here [indicating the file of The Times].
§ LORD WILLOUGHBY DE BROKEThen do you not think we had better have it? Let us hear it.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREI have the speech here. If the House thinks I am wrong I am perfectly willing to acknowledge it. Perhaps I ought to have brought the exact words that were used, but I quoted what I thought was perfectly sufficient, and that was the Prime Minister's opinion. I am very sorry if I have offended in any way. I now see that I ought to have been ready with the ipsissima verba of the quotation; but I thought that the Prime Minister's criticism of the subject would be sufficient. Of course I should be the first person to express regret if I have done anything wrong, but I do not think I have.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEWill not the noble Marquess give us the quotation now that he has got it
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREIt is a tremendously long speech. Does the House really want the whole speech?
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNENot the whole speech.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREIt is in The Times of November 13, 1913—six columns of it.
§ VISCOUNT MIDLETONAre we to take it that the allegations are withdrawn, and that the noble Marquess made the allegations on the words of a speech which he cannot produce?
§ THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIREI can no more withdraw it than the Prime Minister. I cannot withdraw the Prime Minister.
§ Motion, by leave, withdrawn.