A.D. 1870.]

and you cannot give it him without taking it from somebody else."

Sir Roundell Palmer, who, on questions of property as on ecclesiastical questions, was always rather Conservative than Liberal, took the opportunity of criticising the whole bill from the point of view of "caution," and suggested many difficulties in the way of the treatment of prospective tenancies. But Mr. Chichester Fortescue, and Mr. Gladstone after him, maintained both the moderate character of the bill generally, and the fact that "this clause was the central and essential part, without which it would not be worth the while of Parliament to pass the bill." Mr. Gladstone's speech was at once temperate and firm. He dwelt upon the fact which Mr. Disraeli had slighted-the fact that the bill was "wholly and absolutely exceptional." He did not attempt an abstract justification of its principles; on the contrary, he admitted fully that such interference with the laws of political economy was only to be justified by stern necessity. In fact, the Government hoped that this measure might soon work such a cure in the Irish temper as to cut away the ground of necessity from under its own feet, in which case it would naturally fall into abeyance. "Twenty years, and thereafter until Parliament shall otherwise determine "-that was to be the limit of the operation of the bill: a limit clearly showing both the conviction of the Government as to its exceptional character, and their hope that it would one day cease to be necessary. But at present no such alteration could be made in it as that which Mr. Disraeli proposed, armed, as it was, against one of the main pillars of the bill." One of the grand provisions of the bill was the confirmation of Irish customs. Another grand principle was that improvements made by the tenant were the property of the tenant. And a third principle of the bill, which was by far the most prominent in the lengthened statement it was my duty to inflict upon the House, was that damages for eviction were to be paid to the tenant."

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new

The division which followed upon this debate was perhaps the most important of the session, and it was a great triumph for the Government. The Ayes were 220; the Noes, 296; so that by a majority of 76 the new principle, which did most undoubtedly confer a property upon the Irish tenant, was affirmed by the House of Commons. With this great victory the success of the Government bill became assured; and the frequent divisions upon the later clauses, and upon amendments moved from both sides of the House, were one and all Government successes. The next night to that on which Mr. Disraeli's amendment was lost, Mr. Gladstone carried his own amendment, inserting after the word "compensation," the words, "for the loss which the Court shall find to have been sustained by him in quitting his holding," by a majority of 111. The further alteration which the clause underwent, was that all tenants of holdings at £50 a year and upwards were placed in the class of those with whose freedom of contract the bill did not interfere,-a different thing from excluding them altogether from the right to claim damages for eviction

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in the absence of contract. The former amendment was consented to by Mr. Gladstone, although unwillingly; the latter, proposed by Mr. W. Fowler, was lost by a majority of 32. But there is no necessity for us to follow the bill through every little stage of its progress through committee. On the 30th of May it appeared in its amended shape, waiting for the third reading; and it passed without a division, amid murmurs of protest from the Conservative benches, and articulate protest from Mr. Hardy, who confessed that he looked to the Lords to assert themselves in the interest of landed property, and remedy the injustice of “damages for eviction." Mr. Gladstone knew his strength, and said little on that point. He only appealed to the consciences of the Irish landlords. "If," he said, “ we were to put to the Irish landlords, categorically, the question, Will you take the bill as it is, or will you have it lost?' I may be wrong, but my firm conviction is, that the cry of those landlords would be, 'Let the bill pass into law!" And, so far as the House of Commons was concerned, it did pass into law that night.

There remained the House of Lords. The second reading was moved by Lord Granville, who had, of course, a much less difficult task to perform than Mr. Gladstone had had on the first introduction of the bill in the House of Commons. The subject had been so long before the publie, the discussion of it had been so full, that not only did the Lords know the details of the bill already, but their own opinions of it were pretty well known to one another. Lord Granville did not expect much opposition to the main outlines of the bill, nor did he meet with much. The Duke of Richmond, the Conservative leader, fixed mainly upon the duration of the leases specified by the bill, and wanted to shorten the length of those leases which would exempt parties from its operation from thirty-one to twenty-one years. When this was the chief objection made by the leader of the Opposition, it was evident that the bill would not be seriously imperilled, though Lord Salisbury might "condemn with his whole heart" the principle of compensation for eviction; though Lord Leitrim might object to "every part of it, from the title downwards;" and though Lord Clancarty might cry out that "it was a bill of pains and penalties against the Irish landlord." The second reading passed without a division, though the Opposition declared their intention of making serious alterations in committee. Committee, indeed, is the proper battle-ground-the only possible battle-ground-for a bill of this nature. A bill may be rejected on the second reading when it is a bill of one principle, definite and unmistakable; but the Irish Land Bill had three principles at least, according to Mr. Gladstone's enumeration; and according to the Lord Chancellor's, it had six. To reject it on the second reading, therefore, would have been to reject not one principle, but three, or even six, which, as the House of Commons was not composed entirely of Mr. Henleys, nor the House of Lords of Lord Leitrims, was hardly possible.

In committee the Duke of Richmond appeared much more hostile than he had appeared on the second reading. He carried, by 92 to 71-not large numbers, considering

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the importance of the question and the number of the Peers who actually compose the House-a most important amendment, reducing the scale of compensation for eviction. He demanded that the full scale of seven years' rent should only be awarded in the case of holdings under £4 a year—not under £10, as the Government figure stood; and the rest of the compensation clause was altered by him in a similar spirit. Of the other amendments carried by him, the most notable were-one which forbade a tenant to claim compensation if he had assigned," i.e. let, his farm to another, without the landlord's approval; another, which aroused a feeling of indignation in many hearts, forbade a tenant to let gardens to his labourers under penalty of losing the protection of the Act; another was the same as that which he had given notice of at the time of the second reading. Two other amendments of great importance were also carried-one, by Lord Salisbury, fixing £50, instead of £100, as the maximum rental under which a tenant might claim compensation for eviction; and one, by Lord Clanricarde, removing the legal presumption which the bill had declared was to be in favour of the tenant, and providing that all claims for compensation for improvements should be proved by actual evidence. But before the bill was finally sent down to the Commons, the chances of a collision between the two Houses, which seemed threatening, were very much lessened by the spontaneous reversal by the Lords of many of their own amendments. In particular, that of Lord Salisbury-which he had carried in defiance of the nominal chief of his party; and which, if persisted in, would have robbed the measure of half its force-was withdrawn. In the end, the only one of the Lords' amendments which was allowed to remain in the bill was that which assured to the landlord a modified veto on his tenant's right to assign; and with this alteration the bill was read for the third time. It received the royal assent on the 1st of August-a memorable day in the history of emancipation; and thus this measure, so novel in principle, so bold and yet so temperate in design, took its place among the laws of the United Kingdom. То say that it had much immediate effect in quieting the temper of the Irish people would be untrue; but it must be remembered that the bitterness of centuries is not cured in a year.

CHAPTER XXXIII.

The Elementary Education Act of 1870-Introduced by Mr. Forster System--The Union and the League-Mr. Forster's Speech

-The existing state of Education described-Deficiencies in the

Inspection to be no longer Denominational-The Conscience

Clause-Power to compel attendance-Machinery of School Boards

-How to be elected-School Fees and School Rates-The Twentyfifth Clause-Religious Teaching in Board Schools-The Bill is favourably received as a whole-Mr. Dixon moves an Amendment to the Second Reading-Speech of Mr. Winterbotham-He advocates Secular Education-Mr. Dixon's Amendment withdrawn

The Bill in Committee-The Government accepts Mr. Cowper

Temple's Amendment Other Amendments-The Bill read a Third Time and passed-Is carried through the House of Lords,

and becomes law.

Two days after the introduction of the Irish Land Bill, on the 17th of February, Mr. Forster, the Vice-President

of the Council, brought in his Elementary Education Bill, a measure which, fair as were its opening prospects, was destined ultimately to become far more of a bone of contention in England than any Irish question. Mr. Forster had kept his secret admirably. It was, of course, known that the Government had pledged themselves to deal with the Education question during the session, and that the construction of an Education Bill had been long ago entrusted to Mr. Forster. As the Radical member for Bradford, Mr. Forster had many times proved his Liberal principles, and had already gained the respect and attention of the House before taking office. His vigorous Yorkshire character, his capacity for hard work, and his known ability, seemed to point him out as specially fitted to deal with the vexed and intricate problem of National Education. But how was he going to deal with it? What line was the Government, as represented by him, about to take up with regard to the great questions of free education, compulsion, and State aid to denominational schools? The London newspapers guessed in vain. No one out of the Cabinet had any idea of the provisions of the bill before the night of the 17th of February, when Mr. Forster disclosed his scheme to a crowded House. His speech, as a speech, was perhaps a greater success than any he had achieved before. Perfect mastery of his subject gave a freedom and self-possession to his manner in which it had sometimes been wanting, and his whole demeanour was that of a man who had gone to the bottom of a great question, and who felt himself to be the most competent person to lead the opinion of the House and the country to a satisfactory decision with regard to it.

Before describing the means by which the Government hoped to effect a radical change in the educational condition of the country, it may be as well to glance over the system of National Education as it existed at the time of Mr. Forster's speech. "In no other country," said an able contemporary article in the Quarterly Review, “is primary education provided for as it is in England. Whether children in England shall go to school or not is optional. Whether a parish shall have a school or not for them to go to depends here (but in no other country) on whether any benevolent person will come forward and establish one by himself or with the assistance of his neighbours. In either case he may have help from the State.

The subscription of the State (to the school) is not otherwise different from that of any other subscriber than in its being conditional. It has no power over the school as a State, but only as a subscriber. If its annual subscription were withdrawn, its power would cease." And again, "It is only during the last twenty-five or thirty years that voluntary efforts for the education of the people and the action of the State have been brought into presence of one another, and that the State has come to the help of education. Its relations to it are neces sarily difficult, especially as regards its religious objects. The early policy of the Committee of Council experienced frequent discomfitures, and the existence of more than one Administration was perilled by it." The whole system of National Education in England, then, before the Act of 1870, was a matter of voluntary effort. In bygone ages,

A.D. 1870.]

Greek philosophy had held the education of children to be one of the most essential duties of the State as such-a duty which could not be relegated to private hands, and which the State was bound to conduct with reference to the general welfare of the community. In more modern times, Prussia had recognised this political view of education, and had made the training of every Prussian child a State matter. In England alone, with her over-fondness for self-government, and her love for the system of local provision for local needs, voluntaryism remained intact; and the education of the poor was left wholly at the discretion and in the hands of their richer and more intelligent neighbours. Voluntary effort must come first; then, indeed, State help would follow in the shape of Building Grants or Annual Grants, coupled with the condition of Government inspection; but in all cases the help given by the State had to be called forth by the prior voluntary action of some particular individual or some particular neighbourhood. It had long been felt that the results of this system were most unsatisfactory and inadequate; and as the Reform question advanced, and political enfranchisement had to be yielded step by step to the working classes, the gross and widespread ignorance prevailing among the lower orders began to force itself more and more strongly upon the attention of the country. Mr. Lowe only expressed the general feeling in a bitter and cynical way when, after the passing of the Reform Bill of '67, he pointed out the power which it had conferred upon the working-man, and uttered the now famous phrase, "Let us educate our masters!" The amount of educational destitution existing in England in 1870 may be roughly gathered from the following statistics. From the Census of 1851, it appeared that about one-fourth of the population of England were of an age to go to school-that is to say, from the ages of three to thirteen or four to fourteen. In 1870 the population of England was twenty-one millions, so that about five millions and a half of children would be of what is technically called the school age. Of these, 23 per cent. had to be allowed for as absent from school from allowable causes, such as sickness; half a million were at school for the upper or middle classes; and rather less than two millions and a half of the remaining three and a half millions were actually at school. There remained about one million one hundred thousand children who were not at school at all. Nor did this represent by any means the whole extent of the deficiency. Of the two and a half millions represented as actually at school, only a very small proportion indeed could possibly derive real benefit from the education offered them, because, as was abundantly proved by statistics, far the greater number of children were removed from school before their twelfth year-that is to say, before the age when the average child, much more the child of poor and uneducated parents, becomes capable of anything like lasting and profitable learning. This evil of short-lived and irregular attendance had been increasing during the years preceding 1870 rather than diminishing, and it was admitted on all hands to form one of the most serious elements of the educational difficulty. With regard to local deficiencies, especially to the educational needs of

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our large towns, let Mr. Forster speak for himself. "It is calculated," he said, "that in Liverpool the number of children between five and thirteen who ought to receive an elementary education is 80,000; but, as far as we can make out, 20,000 of them attend no school whatever, while at least another 20,000 attend schools where they get an education not worth having. In Manchester—that is, in the borough of Manchester, not including Salford— there are about 65,000 children who might be at school; and of this number, 16,000 go to no school at all. . . . As a Yorkshireman, I am sorry to say that, from what I hear, Leeds appears to be as bad as Liverpool; and so also, I fear, is Birmingham." The educational need, then, could scarcely be denied, though extreme Conservatives, like Lord Robert Montagu, might attempt to palliate it. But the question of "how is this need to be supplied?" admitted of very different answers; and opinion was indeed divided into at least two hostile camps with regard to it, represented by the National Education Union and the famous Birmingham League. The avowed object of both was to bring a good education within the reach of every child in the country." But the Union proposed to accomplish this by means of the existing system, supplemented and reformed; the League, on the contrary, aimed at the destruction of the existing system, and at the gradual erection of something wholly different upon its ruins. The Union desired, above all things, to keep education in England denominational and founded upon religious teaching; while the League asserted strongly that education ought to be wholly undenominational, that State aid should only be given to secular instruction, and that religion should be provided by the voluntary efforts of all religious sects, the Church of England included. The doctrines of the League were supported inside the House of Commons by men like Mr. Mundella, Mr. Dixon, and Mr. Fawcett; and outside it, by the bulk of the Dissenting communities, who saw in the programme of the League a protest against the undisputed supremacy of the Church in education. On the other hand, the sequel showed that the partisans of the more moderate policy advocated by the Union had Mr. Forster himself in the main on their side, a large majority (both Liberals and Conservatives) in the House, and the whole influence and power of the Church of England. The Church talked of her "claims," and pointed triumphantly to the work done by her, and by her alone, in the cause of education; while the Dissenters complained of grievances, accused the clergy of intentional violations of the Conscience Clause then existing, and professed to regard their zeal for education as a mere cloak for widespread projects of priestly aggrandisement. Between these contending factions Mr. Forster had to take his stand, and to frame a bill which should if possible satisfy both. Many sanguine persons, perhaps even Mr. Forster himself, imagined that it was possible to content both, and that the quarrel was in a great measure one of words. Time, alas! has brought out only too plainly the strength and bitterness of the feelings involved in the dispute.

We cannot do better than let Mr. Forster describe his bill mainly in his own words. The first problem, then, to

cost, had built up and supported. That is to say, "in solving this problem, there must be, consistently with the attainment of our object, the least possible expenditure of public money, the utmost endeavour not to injure existing and efficient schools, and the most careful absence of all encouragement to parents to neglect their children." The principles upon which the present bill is founded, he continued, "are two in number-legal enactment that there shall be efficient schools everywhere throughout the kingdom; and compulsory provision of such schools, if and where needed, but not unless proved to be needed. So much for the principles of the bill. Coming now to

or Wales not included in one school district or another. We have taken the boundaries of boroughs as regards towns, and parishes as regards the country, and when I say parish, I mean the civil parish, and not the ecclesiastical district. With regard to the metropolis, we have come to the conclusion, subject to the counsel and advice of the Metropolitan members, that the best districts we can take in the metropolis are, where they exist, the school districts already formed for workhouse schools; and where they do not exist, the boundaries of the vestries. Having thus got our districts, our next duty is to ascertain their educational condition, and for that

parents can reasonably object, we leave that district alone; and we shall continue to leave it alone so long as it fulfils those conditions. And I may as well state, that for the purpose of ascertaining the condition of a district, we count all schools that will receive our inspectors, whether private or public, whether aided or unaided by Government, whether secular or denominational."

Here Mr. Forster, before describing in detail the means by which districts insufficiently supplied with schools were to be sufficiently supplied, proceeded first of all to explain an important change in the character of Government inspection to be introduced by the bill. "Hitherto," he said, "the inspection has been denominational; we propose that it should no longer be so."

from their own, while a Wesleyan or an Independent school could not be subjected to any such examination at all. On the other hand, the Dissenters were justly irritated by a distinction which seemed to imply that their peculiar tenets were not, and could not be, recognised by the State, in the same way as the doctrines of the Church. The denominational character of the inspection also very much complicated the whole system of inspection, introducing many practical difficulties into the division of inspecting districts, and so on.

In consideration of all these objections, and believing

that the existing system was favourable neither to religion in general nor to the Church cause in particular, "we propose," said Mr. Forster, "that, after a limited period