would sooner that the tories remained in office for the next ten years than agree to what he thought would be the ruin of his country. Nevertheless, it was his friend and follower, Jesse Collings [q.v.], who moved the so-called ‘three acres and a cow’ amendment which gave the tory government its quietus; it resigned on 28 January 1886.
Chamberlain believed that he ought to accept, for the time being, a post in the new liberal ministry; though he recorded another protest against Home Rule in a letter to Gladstone. He would have preferred to become secretary for the Colonies. Gladstone’s surprised comment: ‘Oh! a Secretary of State!’ bears out the assertion of Lord Randolph Churchill that Gladstone never really understood Chamberlain’s capacity till he faced him as a foe. There was some question of Chamberlain going to the Admiralty; but he finally became president of the Local Government Board, though ‘not very willingly’.
Starting under such auspices, it was not likely that the ministry would long remain united. Chamberlain intended to resign on the proposal of a Land Purchase Bill, but it was not till after a discussion in the Cabinet on the question of Home Rule that he finally left the government (15 March). On 21 April he justified his action before a meeting of Birmingham electors; after the Redistribution Act he had in 1885 become member for West Birmingham. ‘Fifteen or sixteen years ago’, he said, ‘I was drawn into politics by my interest in social questions…and from that time to this I have done everything that an individual can do. I have made sacrifices of money and time and labour, I have made sacrifices of my opinions to maintain the organization and to preserve the unity of the liberal party.’ Home Rule, he urged, now blocked the way of social reform, and the persistency of Parnell and the pliancy of Gladstone had altered the whole course of British politics. But Chamberlain knew that he must walk warily; and, after a destructive analysis of the two measures, he was careful to explain that as far as the Home Rule Bill was concerned his opposition was conditional. If the representation of Ireland were preserved on its present footing, the imperial parliament thus maintaining its control over imperial taxation in Ireland, and if there were conceded to Ulster a separate assembly, he might be able to support the measure. But these were not matters for committee; and on the answer to them depended his vote.
The speech was a great personal triumph, and although Mr. Francis Schnadhorst, the master of the ‘caucus’, had thrown in his lot with Gladstone and did what he could to thwart Chamberlain, the meeting passed, almost unanimously, a vote of confidence. The news of Dilke’s intention to vote for the second reading was a great blow. ‘The party’, Chamberlain wrote, ‘is going blindly to its ruin; and everywhere there seems a want of courage and decision and principle which almost causes one to despair.’ For him the retention of the Irish representatives at Westminster was the touchstone. With their removal, separation must follow; with their retention, some system of federation might be possible. He would vote against the second reading, unless the ministry gave definite pledges on this point. ‘The present crisis’, he added, ‘is, of course, life and death to me. I shall win if I can; if I cannot, I will cultivate my garden. I do not care for the leadership of a party which shall prove itself so fickle and so careless of national interests as to sacrifice the unity of the Empire to the precipitate impatience of an old man, careless of the future in which he can have no part, and to an uninstructed instinct which will not take the trouble to exercise judgement and criticism.’ In a subsequent letter (6 May) Chamberlain made an illuminating admission: ‘I do not really expect the government to give way, and, indeed, I do not wish it. To satisfy others I have talked about conciliation and have consented to make advances, but on the whole I would rather vote against the Bill than not, and the retention of the Irish members is with me only the flag that covers other objections.’ On 26 May he wrote: ‘I shall fight this matter out to the bitter end, but I am getting more and more doubtful whether, when it is out of the way, I shall continue in politics. I am wounded in the house of my friends, and I have lost my interest in the business.’ Nevertheless, he threw out in parliament on 1 June the suggestion of yet another scheme, under which the position of Ireland with regard to the imperial parliament should be that of a Canadian province to the Dominion; but there was no support for this proposal.
On 7 June came the defeat of the Home Rule Bill by a majority of thirty; Chamberlain, along with Bright, voting against it. Various motives have in the past been ascribed to: him. It has been supposed that he desired to oust Glad-
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