Chapter XXIV: Act 1870: , I have repeatedly for nine years past affirmed in the (4)

As usual, he appealed. Like Ben Bolt in the novel, he was "bad to beat." He appealed for a new trial, on the ground that the verdict was "against the weight of the evidence." But that was not all. Newdegate, having confessed giving a bond of indemnity to Clarke, had laid himself open to a return action, under a form of law, for the offence of "maintenance;" so on 27th July Bradlaugh accompanied Mr (now Sir) George Lewis, the famous solicitor, to Bow Street Police Court, where Mr Lewis moved for a summons against Newdegate, and another against his solicitor as accessory. The magistrate, Mr Flowers, was somewhat taken aback. "Is it not rather----" he began. "Yes," said Mr Lewis promptly; "and so is the action against Mr Bradlaugh. Mr Newdegate asks for strict law against Mr Bradlaugh, who now asks in return that strict law may also be enforced against Mr Newdegate." The summonses were granted.

Next day, 28th July, and on 1st August, Bradlaugh argued before Justices Grove and Lindley his motion for a new trial on the question of time in the Clarke case. Finally (8th August), after a request from the Court for affidavits had been followed by an extremely improper step on the part of Newdegate's solicitor, who actually sent some affidavits privately to Mr Justice Grove's house, the Judges gave a rule _nisi_ for a new trial on the ground urged. This rule could not be argued till November, and if it were then made absolute the new trial could not take place till after Christmas, so that Newdegate was once more intercepted. The criminal summonses, on the other hand, did not come on till 20th September, for reasons which will appear in the next section, and when heard were dismissed by the magistrate, Mr Vaughan.

"He was of opinion that complainant had not shown that the maintenance of which he complained came within the meaning of the statute. Though the statutes of Richard II. and Henry VIII. did undoubtedly refer to crimes and imprisonment for maintenance, still it was most singular that no indictment could be found for violation of these statutes. It seemed to him that the proceeding was an obsolete one, and that the criminal law ought not to have been invoked for a purpose of this description, when it was open to Mr Bradlaugh ... to apply to the common law courts.... Old statutes had been searched out in order that proceedings--which he could not help thinking had been taken to gratify a very unfriendly feeling on Mr Bradlaugh's part--might be instituted in the hope that Mr Newdegate would be committed for trial."

The licence of general criticism taken by our magistrates has seldom been more strikingly exemplified; and no one but a prejudiced magistrate, probably, would have had the assurance to condemn a litigant for "unfriendly feeling" towards a declared enemy who had wantonly and zealously sought to ruin him.[156] The deliberate setting aside of the statutes as obsolete, too, while a civil action was admitted to lie, was an act of lenity to Mr Newdegate, contrasting favourably with the attitude of other judges towards Bradlaugh. But the fact that a civil action remained open was sufficient for Bradlaugh's purposes; and already Newdegate had begun to repent somewhat of his zeal. His costs were accumulating, and still the hoped-for prey was out of his reach. A circular was accordingly issued on his behalf by Captain Bedford Pim, who felt "strongly that Mr Newdegate, M.P., should not be allowed to suffer for his spirited and patriotic action against Atheism, and that some steps should be taken to bear him harmless in the struggle upon which he has so nobly entered."

[Footnote 156: Mr Vaughan had twice previously given decisions against Bradlaugh, and both had been upset on appeal.]

§ 12

In the interval between the issuing and the hearing of the summonses for maintenance, something more serious had occurred. When the Government had in May decided to postpone their Oaths Bill, Bradlaugh, while acquiescing perforce in the delay, had renewed his platform agitation with redoubled energy, preparatory to forcing a fresh contest on the House if need were. The situation grew worse instead of better. Between 20th June and 4th July he had had a formal correspondence with Mr Gladstone on the subject. "You are aware," wrote Mr Gladstone, declining the request for an interview, "to how considerable an extent Liberal and public interests have been brought into prejudice by untrue suppositions as to communication between you and the Government." Bradlaugh answered by a detailed statement of his action, which had been guided by a desire to avoid embarrassing the Ministry; and Gladstone in reply acknowledged this; but later (28th June) intimated that they proposed to try to close the Session early in August, and they could not hope to carry any strongly controversial measure after the Land Bill. This intimation was made definite in a letter of 2nd July, and Bradlaugh was once more left to his own devices. He chose his course at once. First he addressed to the Speaker, under date 4th July, a formal letter, setting forth his contention as to the illegality of the House's action on 10th May. He was advised, among other things, that the excluding order of that date did not authorise the Sergeant-at-Arms to use force, and that the use of force to prevent his re-entry would be illegal.

"I beg therefore, sir," he went on, "most respectfully to give notice that I claim to disregard the order of the House, ... and to treat the same as not requiring obedience from me, on the ground that such order is absolutely illegal.... In the name of the law, sir, and of my constituents, I also most respectfully give notice that I shall, in the manner and at the time provided by the standing orders of the House, again present myself at the table of the House, to complete the fulfilment of the duty imposed on me by law."

On this declaration he set about acting. He had had no encouragement whatever to hope for justice save under pressure. Northcote, who had no moral motive for his action, was open to no moral appeal. To him Bradlaugh addressed a public letter (1st July 1881), which to-day needs neither adding to nor taking from. After a recital of the facts, it ran:--

"At first, though I disagreed with you, I thought you honest, for you had the repute of an honourable man, and you said that it was not from any desire to prevent my taking my seat, but from a desire to prevent the profanation of the oath, that you were prompted to act as you did. You had been present in the House when John Stuart Mill took the oath, and you raised no objection. You have been present in the House when other members, whose heresy is matter of common repute, took the oath, and you have rested silent. Yet I counted you a fair English gentleman, and I believed your word in any case. But now, from your speeches outside the House, I find that you claim to hinder me from sitting in Parliament, whether by complying with the law as it now stands, or by means of any change which may be proposed to meet your objection. At Manchester you justified your action on the ground that there was a general feeling in the country against me personally[157]--a dangerous argument, even if it were well vouched. But how is this feeling to be tested? Nearly all the meetings called against me have been lamentable failures, despite the most ridiculous precautions. Almost every meeting called in my favour, and this whether or not I have been personally present, has been an enthusiastic success.

[Footnote 157: The essential unveracity of Northcote's political character is shown by the fact that after thus using the "numbers" argument against Bradlaugh, he himself solemnly denounced the principle. Speaking at Edinburgh in 1884 (see Mr Lang's "Life," ii. 218) he said: "I am afraid that the Government will take far too much to the numerical principle, and if you take to the principle of mere numbers, depend upon it you will be introducing the most dangerous change into the Constitution." Exactly what Bradlaugh had said to him.]

"And yet the very vilest means have been resorted to to damage me in the public mind. In your presence at Manchester, and without one word of rebuke from you, one distinguished and noble member of your party repeated against me some of the utter falsehoods of the Varley pamphlet, although I had given you in writing my distinct assurance of the untruthfulness of much of that pamphlet.... To make a show against me, petitions have been sent round the country to hundreds of Sunday Schools, and little children by the score have been compelled to affix their signatures. Two petitions presented by yourself from Glasgow and York contain hundreds of signatures of lads and girls under twelve years of age. Orange Lodges, Roman Catholic organisations, and the machinery of the English Church Associations have been utilised to procure signatures."

Northcote replied:--

"I cannot admit that there is any foundation for the charge of illegality which you make against the House of Commons. But I must decline to enter into controversy with you upon the general subject of your case. I can only say that I have acted from a sense of public duty, and from no personal motives; and that I see no reason for doubting the propriety of the course which I have pursued."

But even those Liberal members who had voted on his side were for the most part quietly acquiescent in the injustice done, regarding a wrong to one "unpopular" man as a small matter. The only member who persistently protested was Mr Labouchere, for whose courage and constancy throughout the whole struggle no words of praise could be too high. In the circumstances there was nothing for it but to rouse the country, and this Bradlaugh did as only he could. It is difficult now to realise the enormous amount of energy he had to spend. While his cases were pending in the higher courts, he was doing three men's work outside. Thus in the week 18th to 24th July we find him spending three days fighting his case in the hot and crowded Court; holding three night meetings in London; attending a Freethinker's funeral (where the sight of the grief of the widow and children made him quite break down); speaking at a great demonstration of miners in the north; giving three lectures in South Shields; and holding a huge gathering in the Free Trade Hall in Manchester. He knew he was drawing terribly on a constitution which, though of a giant's strength, had for many years been doing giant's work; but he never flinched in a battle while he had any strength left. His plan was to evoke a clear expression of feeling on behalf of his claim in all the large towns, to hold a mass meeting in Trafalgar Square, and then again to present himself at the House; and if the House had been capable of looking at the issue half as reasonably as the constituencies did, it would have been promptly settled. Wherever Bradlaugh went, he got unanimous votes in his favour. At one stage he reckoned that out of a series of audiences amounting in numbers to 75,000, only two hands had been held up against his claim. It was wonderful to see how he swayed audiences against their own prejudices. He must have been listened to by thousands of men who disliked him and his opinions equally; but they simply could not resist the appeal for a just judgment. I well remember how, when he spoke in Edinburgh in 1881, he extorted a vote from a general audience there. The body of the hall was filled with middle-class citizens, few of whom had any sympathy with his propaganda, and many of whom must have strongly resented his "notoriety;" in the gallery were a number of Tory students, with the manners of their kind; and post-cards had been freely circulated with a view to an organised opposition. At the outset the students did their best, but Bradlaugh's voice rose easily above their din; a quick repartee or two to their interruptions turned the laugh against them, and soon he was quietly listened to.[158] At the close he made the usual call for a show of hands on his claim. As one of the promoters of the meeting, I was interested in watching the manner of the response; and I can still see the respectable church-going shopkeepers slowly and as it were compulsorily raising their right hands at the call of the Atheist and Republican. Only some dozen, as far as I remember, voted "on the contrary." This was in an audience mainly unsympathetic. At Trafalgar Square, of course, he was in a dense army of enthusiastic supporters, including many delegates from provincial towns. The Dublin _Freeman_ then, owned by Mr E. D. Gray, and the organ of Mr Parnell's party, intimated beforehand that "no large assembly can take place within a mile of Westminster Palace and the police will very summarily dispose of Mr Bradlaugh's ragged followers." The police made no such attempt; and it was well they did not, for the followers were neither ragged nor timorous, and their blood was not just then very cool.

[Footnote 158: In this particular speech he used the phrase "that grand old man" of Gladstone. It was probably he who set the fashion.]

This was on 2nd August; it was on the next day that Bradlaugh again presented himself at the House; and then occurred the crowning episode in the struggle--crowning alike in point of the dastardliness of the tactic employed against him and the desperation to which it momentarily moved him.

His unanswerable contention was that the House was bound to do something to settle the case. It ought either to declare his seat vacant or take some course to permit of his sitting. To keep an elected member out of his seat without disputing the validity of his election was a course which only a majority of professed lawbreakers could consistently take; and the resolution excluding him from the House was merely a puerile evasion by the majority of the legislative problem they had raised. When, however, Bradlaugh presented himself afresh, that puerile policy was adhered to, only in a fashion that developed puerility into brutality. The Liberal Government acquiescing in the vote of the majority, the matter was left to the police, who treated it as a police question, some of them behaving with that exuberance of insolence and ruffianism which they so often and so naturally bring to their task. Their way of seizing him angered him in a way in which he had never been angered before. A few extracts from the newspaper accounts of the time will suffice to tell what happened:--

"Mr Bradlaugh, after having waited till the Speaker had taken the chair, claimed admission to the House. He was in the first place opposed by the regular officials. 'I am here,' he said, 'in accordance with the orders of my constituents, the electors of Northampton; and any person who lays hands on me will do so at his peril!'" Attempting to enter the House, he was seized by the messengers, but their resistance being insufficient to overcome the force they roused him to use, the police were called upon. "It was said by Inspector Denning that four ordinary men certainly could not have expelled Mr Bradlaugh, and that the ten constables, all remarkable for strength and activity, who were engaged in forcing him down the lobby stairs, found their task far more arduous than they had expected." They had him by the throat, arms, and collar, and he had some of them in the same hold. "The strong, broad, heavy, powerful frame was hard to move, with its every nerve and muscle strained to resist.... The sight, little of it as was seen from the outside, soon became sickening.... An almost deathlike pallor had spread over Mr Bradlaugh's sternly-set features; he was gasping for breath, his body was bent, and he was in a state of exhaustion painful to see. His black frockcoat was much torn, his collar and shirt disarranged, and he himself in a condition of intense mental excitement and bodily prostration.... The Trafalgar Square phrase that this man might be broken but not bent occurred to minds apprehensive at the present appearance of him.... His face was deathly white, and there was about the mouth an expression of determination, which those who witnessed it cannot readily forget. Overborne by the desperate struggle, he fainted, but soon recovered when water was brought to him."

When Bradlaugh appeared at the door in the grasp of the police there was a cry of wrath from the assembled crowd, which told of a source of "force" that might conceivably be tapped. At another door Mrs Besant stood, at the head of a mass of followers, who, hearing vaguely of what was happening, were urgent in their demand to be let take the law in their own hands. A word from her, a word from him, would have sent the multitude headlong into the House. They were not a chance London mob: they included thousands of staunch working men from all parts of the country, who had attended the demonstration the day before. They were wroth with the callous iniquity that had been and was being worked by the majority inside. And Bradlaugh, standing bruised and shaken and insulted on the steps, hardly able to breathe, but with the fury of physical struggle still upon him, had a supreme temptation. In his first anger, alluding to the brute force used against him, he had said to Inspector Denning, "I shall come again with force enough to overcome it;" but he did not carry out his threat, though he might have done it on the instant. Had he but lifted his hand to beckon, the ten policemen would have been tossed aside like chaff by the host of his infuriated friends; the House could have been stormed, and his enemies could have been kicked wholesale into the river. With a supreme effort, he controlled himself, and forbade all outbreak; proceeding further to go through the form of trying again to enter the House, so that Inspector Denning should have to make a form of resistance, on which he might found an action. It was well. But it is believed that there are still some who, perfectly recognising the superiority of the course actually taken, can never wholly stifle, on retrospect, an obscure and unreasoned but haunting wish that the multitude had taken its own way, sacked the House, and thrown, if not the Speaker and his wig, at least Lord Randolph Churchill, and Sir Stafford Northcote, and Sir Henry Wolff, comrades three, into the Thames, that ancient river and unclean.

The picture as it stands is memorable enough. I have been told that James Thomson the poet, the estranged friend of Bradlaugh's youth, was among those at the gates; that he turned pale at the sight of the struggling group; and that his companions could hardly withhold him by force from rushing to his old comrade's help.

English gentlemen in general, of course, did not feel about the matter in that way. Bradlaugh told:--

"On Wednesday last I saw more than 150 members of the House of Commons gathered to witness, for the first time in English history, the cowardly and shameful use of overwhelming brute force in order to prevent a duly-elected member of that House from complying with the law. Most of these members seemed to enjoy the scene; one, Montague Scott, climbed to the top of a pillar, so that he might have a good (and safe) view; another, Alderman Fowler, actually followed to the very bottom of the stairs, encouraging with voice and gesture those who were using force against law. A few, a very few members, protested against this conduct towards one of their fellow-members."

Fowler had shouted "Kick him out." He afterwards denied doing so. Bradlaugh on this wrote:--

"I see that Alderman Fowler in his place in the House of Commons denies my statement. I can only say that it is quite impossible I can be mistaken, for I saw Alderman Fowler stand, occasionally making jeering gestures, for nearly ten minutes after this, within four or five feet from me while I was recovering from the exhausting effects of the struggle."

Others saw the same. Concerning Fowler it is not necessary to investigate: his denial may stand for what it is worth; but it is quite certain that scores of members had looked on gleefully. Such creatures can our "English gentlemen" become, under the inspiration of their religion and their politics.

Inside the House the matter was at once raised by Mr Labouchere, who moved as a matter of privilege that the resolution of 10th May only excluded Bradlaugh from the outer doors of the Chamber, and not from the lobbies, and that the officers of the House, in excluding him completely, had acted without authority. The Speaker stated that the officers had acted under his directions. Mr Gladstone lengthily argued that there were "three distinct grounds" on which it was to him "quite plain that the motion could not be sustained." Northcote naturally approved altogether of the Speaker's action. Sir Wilfred Lawson contrived, despite interruptions, to make a good fighting speech on the main question, under cover of a proposed amendment, which turned out to be a motion for the rescinding of the resolutions of 26th April and 10th May. Mr Cowen invited the Government to say whether they would reintroduce their Oaths Bill next session, but no response was given; and the discussion drifted on in the usual wasteful way. Mr Biggar observed that on personal grounds he was indisposed to vote on Bradlaugh's side in the matter, because Bradlaugh had voted for the expulsion of Irish members earlier in the year, but he would vote against it as a bad precedent. The level of the debate was raised by a dignified speech from Bright, who irregularly appealed to the Opposition to think of what they were doing; whereupon Lord John Manners' made the pragmatic reply that might have been expected from that feudal personage. On the moving of an amendment approving what had been done, Gladstone diffusely intimated that it would be out of order for him to answer Mr Cowen's appeal. After much talk a vote was taken, when 7 voted for Mr Labouchere's motion and 191 for the amendment, a number of Radicals walking out to avoid voting. To the amendment, put as a substantive resolution, Mr Ashton Dilke moved a fresh amendment asserting the need for legislation, but this was disallowed as irrelevant. Sir Wilfred Lawson tried another, which fared no better. Mr Callan rose to explain that whereas Mr Bright had described Bradlaugh as being reduced to a fainting condition, he had put one of the officers in a far worse condition by his grip of that officer's throat--a statement which, despite its source, was not wholly untrue. Finally the resolution approving the course taken was allowed to pass, whereupon Mr Labouchere gave notice that he would again raise the main question on going into Committee of Supply.

§ 13.

Thus once more was the day of reckoning put off, the more decisively because an early result of the scuffle for Bradlaugh was a dangerous attack of erysipelas in the arm--the same arm which had suffered from the Tory bludgeons in 1878. He was able, indeed, though sorely shaken, to speak at the Hall of Science in the evening, when he appealed to his followers to avoid all violence. He was able to attend the law courts at Westminster on the 5th, when a House of Commons policeman, seeing him, fled indoors to give warning. On the same day Bradlaugh attended at the Westminster Police Court to apply to the magistrate, Mr D'Eyncourt, for a summons against Inspector Denning for the assault of the 3rd--not the ejection by the police, but the later formal resistance to Bradlaugh's entrance. This was a purely formal action, Bradlaugh having testified in his speech at the Hall of Science that Mr Denning personally had managed his unpleasant task with all possible consideration. The magistrate, laying significant stress on the action of the Speaker and of the House, declined even to grant the summons. One of his explanations was that "society has a right to protect itself against intrusion," and his tone throughout showed sufficient animus.

Having thus done what he could, Bradlaugh had to own himself disabled, and go to the seaside under medical treatment. On his arrival at Worthing, when he had wearily taken his place in the fly, a clergyman walked up, stared hard at him, and then said in a loud voice: "There's Bradlaugh; I hope they'll make it warm for him yet." The enemy in general behaved with their accustomed generosity. The _Irish Times_ led the way with an intimation that he was malingering, stating further that the Irish members had opposed him because he "supported the Coercion Bill." The _North Star_ repeated the charge of malingering with exuberant brutality. The _St James's Gazette_ spoke of Bradlaugh as having behaved "like a drunken rough," further repeating the lie that he had "originally refused" to take the oath. Others rated him for his constant appearances in the law courts. The _Standard_, on being courteously asked to insert a letter correcting a misrepresentation, suppressed it. Liberals, professing to deprecate the course taken, yet palliated it; and Professor Thorold Rogers, among others, declared that nothing the House of Commons could do was illegal. The ministerial journals, of course, condemned him, telling him he had "lost friends" by his attempt. He was to sit still and wait till the Ministry should have the courage to make an Affirmation Bill a Cabinet question--a course which they refused from first to last to take, though it would at once have compelled their deserters to return to their allegiance. On this it may here suffice to say, once for all, that the justification given for Gladstone's course in the matter simply serves to show how low are the standards of our "Christian" statesmanship down to the present day. The justification is that Gladstone was bound to refrain from "compromising" his party by making the admission of the Atheist a Cabinet question. The good of the party must override the claims of justice. Mr Gladstone's memory is welcome to all the credit which such an argument will gain him from a posterity probably devoid of his sense of religious enlightenment. It will be a doubtful certificate of the foundations he claims for his morality, that while conscious of "bloodguiltiness" in the matter of the Transvaal, he declined to incur for conscience' sake the trivial and transient odium of having made justice to an Atheist a decisive demand as between him and certain of his followers. I am not here putting the opinion of Bradlaugh--whose chivalrous respect for Gladstone prevented him from passing any such criticism, whatever he may have thought in his heart--but laying down what seems to me the only doctrine worthy of conscientious democrats.

It is satisfactory to be able to record that whilst the worst of the Tory and clerical party exulted in Bradlaugh's physical ejection, many religious men were moved by it to new sympathy with him. One esteemed Churchman wrote as follows:--

"After reading of the violence unjustly perpetrated on you yesterday by the order (or, at least, with the sanction) of a so-called Liberal majority, I desire, though an entire stranger to you, to offer you my sympathy. I never read anything which warmed me more than this account. If the present Cabinet does not secure your admission to the House in some way or other, I can only wish they may be turned out of office. The name of 'Christian' and the religion of 'Christ,' which _I_ venerate, they make odious. As if Christianity could ever be _less_ than common justice! I don't know what more I can do than say, 'Go on!' and 'Go in!' And if others feel as I do, you will be pushed into your place by a whole nation, with a much more irresistible force than has been used by a contemptible clique to keep you out.--I am, very respectfully and heartily, your well-wisher,

"E. D. GIRDLESTONE."

Needless to say, a number of Liberal journals, though less emphatically, protested likewise. All along, indeed, there were more voices for justice in the Liberal press than in the House, despite the common sense of a need to disclaim sympathy with the wronged man's "opinions." On the other hand, a number of pious persons, none giving their names, but all stating that they were Christians, wrote to assure the disabled man that he was going to hell. One promised to help him thither by shooting him if he again tried to take his seat. Two wrote that they prayed he might not recover, and many imbeciles sent tracts and religious books.

Of another order was the enmity of Sir Henry Tyler, who, feeling now safe in Bradlaugh's enforced absence, made an attack in the House of Commons on the Hall of Science science-classes and their teachers--an attack which he might have made while Bradlaugh sat, but did not. The argument was that science classes taught by atheists should be excluded from the South Kensington system. Of the teachers, three were women, viz. Mrs Besant and the Misses Bradlaugh; and as even the pious majority did not care to back up such an outrageous attack, it came to nothing. Mr Mundella, the Minister concerned, even went out of his way to vindicate the classes; and the press mostly supported him. As a matter of course, the classes had been taught on strictly scientific lines.

In a few weeks from the date of his injury Bradlaugh was about again, lecturing, and speaking at demonstrations. His doctor advised him to go abroad, but he had his law cases before him, and felt he must buckle to work. At the beginning of September he published a fresh appeal "to the people," and on the 5th of that month he spoke at a potters' demonstration at Hanley, despite continued suffering in the arms. In his own journal, too, he once more took up the cause of Ireland--which indeed had all along been advocated in its columns--disregarding entirely the treatment he had had at the Irish members' hands. But stiffer work was before him, in the trial of his appeal against the decision of Justices Denman and Watkin Williams, on the legal or technical point, as to the validity of a writ dated on the day of the ground of action. This appeal was argued before Lord Coleridge and Lords Justices Baggallay and Brett, on 12th and 14th November, partly on different lines from those gone upon in the first instance. Bradlaugh was complimented by the judges on his "able and ingenious argument;" and the discussion between him and them is indeed a very pretty piece of high-class legal fencing. Sir Hardinge Giffard, who throughout these cases makes no great show as a pleader, did not attempt to deal with the most difficult point at all, and his junior did still worse; but their lordships dealt with it fully and carefully; and Bradlaugh handsomely acknowledged their rectitude, though they decided against him. His first care was to make sure that the plaintiff should not be allowed to tax his costs until final judgment on the other appeals to the House of Lords; and this was granted. The wolves were thus still kept at bay.

Next came on the pleading on the rule _nisi_ for a new trial on the point of fact as to whether Clarke's writ (which specified no act of voting) had not been issued before the act of voting on which it was afterwards formally founded. This was heard on 2nd and 3rd December by Justices Denman and Hawkins, who went into the details with minute circumspection. Bradlaugh explained that his argument involved a charge of wilful perjury against James Stuart, the clerk employed by Newdegate's solicitor, who had been a principal witness in the previous trial. He further pointed out that Newdegate's secretary, Hobley, had given a hopeless set of contradictions in cross-examination; and after the notes of that evidence had been read, Mr Justice Denman observed: "I am bound to say that after the searching cross-examination, which no counsel could have conducted more ably, it is hardly wonderful that Mr Hobley was very confused." It required no more than the reading of the rest of the evidence to satisfy the judges that the case for a new trial was fully made out; and they stopped Bradlaugh in his argument to say so. In regard to the special point of the time of the division in which he voted, the actual evidence of reporters was against Bradlaugh, making it earlier than he did; but when the judges checked his calculations they could find nothing wrong with them; and the evidence discrediting that of Stuart was too strong to be dismissed. After a good deal of vacillation, Clarke and Newdegate decided to appeal against the decision allowing a new trial, Newdegate in particular having reason to avoid one if possible.

§ 14.

Northcote's excluding resolution of 10th May being only valid for the session in which it was passed, Bradlaugh was free to enter the House as before, on the first day of the new session. He announced his intention to do so; and on the day of reassembling he kept his word. In the interim an incessant discussion on the case had been going on in the press and on the platform. Tory speakers, as a rule, alluded to him with insult, sometimes of the basest description. One, Lord Ebrington, described him as a person who, but for a legal quibble, "would be in jail at this moment for publishing an obscene, indecent book." Another, Mr Orr-Ewing, spoke of Bradlaugh as circulating "filthy books, calculated to ... drag hundreds down as low as the brute beasts that perish." Most of the Tory speakers dwelt either on his having "first refused to take the oath" or "obtruded his views on the House," or "declared the oath would not bind his conscience;" and scarcely one omitted to add untruth to insult. The "profanation of the oath" was never alluded to without a shudder. On the Liberal side some members altruistically urged upon Bradlaugh to stand aside "for a few years" to let opinion ripen; and of the many who spoke in favour of his admission nearly all thought it necessary to disclaim with "pity" or "abhorrence" all sympathy with his opinions. Of all these disclamatory gentlemen, there was not one whose name had then, or has now, the slightest philosophic authority; but though one or two admitted that they did not know the nature of the opinions which they all the same disclaimed, none seems to have been moved to avow that the subject was beyond his capacity.

Throughout the country, as all along, Liberal opinion was in advance of the action of the majority in the House; but the _Times_ carefully suppressed the reports of meetings held in Bradlaugh's favour, and even of friendly allusions in members' speeches, and the _Daily News_ at times exhibited equivalent traces of the ownership of Mr Samuel Morley. On the other hand, the cause of justice had some unexpected adherents. Lord Derby, speaking at the Liverpool Reform Club, frankly avowed that he "utterly disbelieved in the value of political oaths," and expressed a hope that no further attempt would be made to prevent Bradlaugh from taking the oath if he wanted to. Some groups of dissenting clergy, too--in particular the Unitarians--petitioned for the abolition of the oath or the permission of affirmation. But as against the possible gain from such declarations there was to be set the systematic and energetic hostile action of the Church of England. One Diocesan Conference passed a resolution calling on Churchmen in both Houses of Parliament to resist any measure which would admit "professed infidels" into Parliament. There was no objection to the admission of infidels who were not "professed." Another interesting exhibition of Conservative ethics came from Mr Gorst, Q.C., who, at a banquet at Chichester, in presence of the Dean, avowed that "he was not a person who pretended to have any great horror of the offence of bribery." Bradlaugh, who took a different view, had earlier taken occasion to speak of another of his assailants as a political scoundrel, in respect of being a convicted briber.

On the 7th of February 1882, when Bradlaugh as before presented himself at the table of the House, he was as before interrupted by Sir Stafford Northcote, who made his customary motion. This time, however, it was rested on the ground that Bradlaugh had admitted himself to be a person of a class on whom the law declared an oath had "no binding effect." Thus the Opposition stood explicitly on the nefarious application of an ambiguous legal formula, which, as has been above shown, was not at all framed to carry the meaning thus put upon it. On this occasion nothing seems to have been said by the Tory leader in his opening speech about "profanation."

Bradlaugh withdrew to the bar pending the discussion, and Sir William Harcourt, in Gladstone's absence, briefly moved the previous question. Newdegate followed with an imbecile speech, which supplied a useful measure of the minds of those who had supported him throughout the country. He pointed to the history of France, protested against the proposed Channel Tunnel, and argued that to admit Bradlaugh would be "to destroy the distinctions between the basis of government in the two countries." Further,

"let them compare the condition of the two countries. While the wealth and the population of France were stationary, and the prestige of her arms was gone, England's wealth had increased and her kingdom expanded into empire. The fundamental difference between the two countries was this--that in the coronation oath taken by the Sovereign, and in the oath taken by members of both Houses of Parliament, a Deity was recognised, and the people venerated the obligation. There was but one other country in the world besides England that had not been conquered or had not suffered from revolution, and that was Russia.... Both countries based the claim of their Government to the respect of their subjects upon the Word of God. The United States had not adopted that system, and they had seen a civil war and two Presidents murdered there."

Bradlaugh was then allowed to make his Third Speech at the Bar. He struck briefly but sufficiently at the speech of Newdegate; and once more nailed down the eternal misrepresentation as to his having "paraded his opinions." When he reminded the House that his letter of 20th May was outside the House, and that he had objected to the Committee taking cognisance of it, the Opposition laughed. He reminded them that judges give a silent hearing to a man pleading his case. "If you are unfit to be judges, then do not judge." Again he put the plain dilemma: "If what I did entitles the House not to receive me, why has not the House had the courage of its opinions and vacated the seat?" Then came a graver challenge:--

"I have read within the last few days words spoken, not by members of no consequence, but by members occupying high positions in this House, which made me wonder if this is the House of Commons to which I aspired so much. I have read that one right hon. member, the member for Whitehaven[159]--(laughter from the Ministerial side)--was prompted to say to his constituents that I was kicked downstairs last session, and that he hoped I should be again. If it were true that I was kicked downstairs, I would ask the members of the House of Commons on whom the shame, on whom the disgrace, on whom the stigma? I dare not apply this, but history will when I have mouldered, and you too, and our passions are quite gone. But it is not quite true that I was kicked downstairs, and it is a dangerous thing to say that I was, for it means that hon. members who should rely on law rely on force. It is a dangerous provocation to conflict to throw to the people. If I had been as wicked in my thought as some members are reported to have been in their speech, this quarrel, not of my provoking, would assume a future to make us all ashamed."

[Footnote 159: Mr Cavendish Bentinck.]

As the speech went on, he came into more and more sharp conflict with his antagonists.

"Does the House," he asked, "mean that it is a party to each oath taken? ('Hear.') There was a time when most clearly it was not so a party. There was a time when the oath was not even taken in the presence of members at all. But does the House mean it is a party now? Was it a party the session before last? Was it a party when Mr Hall[160] walked up to that table, cheered by members on the other side who knew his seat was won by deliberate bribery?--(loud Opposition cries of 'Order')--bribery sought to be concealed by the most corrupt perjury. Did the House join in it? (Renewed cries of 'Order.') If the House did not join in it, why did you cheer so that the words of the oath were drowned? Was the House a party when John Stuart Mill sat in this House?"

[Footnote 160: Elected for Oxford.]

After repeating his former explicit declaration that the words of adjuration would in no way weaken the binding effect of the promise on his honour and conscience, he was met by jeers, and he began: "Members of the House who are ignorant of what is honour and conscience," meaning to add "in the case of a non-religionist" or words to that effect. He was again interrupted by loud cries of "Order" and "Withdraw" from the men who had just been insulting him _en masse_. He asked to be allowed to finish his sentence, but was still interrupted by the mob of hon. gentlemen on the Opposition benches. "These," he cried, pointing at the rowdies, "these are my judges." There was a silence, and he went on. His blood was up, and he spoke at greater length than before, dwelling among other things on the scene of August, and indignantly rebuking those who had exulted in it. In conclusion, he offered to stand aside for four or five weeks if the House would in that time discuss an Affirmation Bill. Nay, if they feared to make it a Bradlaugh Relief Bill, he would resign his seat and stand for re-election. The Liberals cheered at this, and he ended: "I have no fear. If I am not fit for my constituents, they shall dismiss me, but you never shall. The grave alone shall make me yield."

Mr Labouchere, speaking next, stated that he had had sent him over 750 fresh petitions, signed by about 170,000, in favour of Bradlaugh being allowed to take his seat, and that other Liberal members had received petitions signed by about 100,000 more. He proceeded to challenge Northcote to abide by his own declaration of the previous year, that the question should be legislated on by the Government; and Northcote rose to make a second speech. He too, he averred, had received many petitions, and among others one from Northampton, "signed by 10,300 persons, giving their occupations and addresses"--a manifest prevarication, inasmuch as many of the 10,000 must have been the wives and children of the Tory electors.[161] On the Government amendment he objected to "profanation of the oath;" and as to the obstruction of the Oaths Bill last session, he reminded the Government that though they had certainly been somewhat obstructed, they might at any later time have put the Bill first on a Government night. As before, however, the Tory leader declined to make any "bargain." Gladstone replied, pointing out that it had been quite impossible for the Ministry to push the Oaths Bill as suggested, and declining to promise that the Government would give precedence to an Oaths Bill. They should let Bradlaugh swear, and take his chances in the law courts as before. On this theme he rang the changes, without much energy. After a number of minor speeches the House divided, when there voted for Northcote's resolution 286, and for the previous question only 228. Such a vote served to dispose of the view which had been advanced by some Liberals, that the minority of 26th April 1881 was due to the absence of many of their party who were prolonging their holiday, while all the Tories were in town for Beaconsfield's funeral. Some seventy "Liberals" had now deliberately stayed away (among them being Mr Goschen, Sir John Lubbock, Sir E. Reed, and Sir A. Gordon), while the whole Parnellite members present voted with the Tories. Five Scotch, eight Irish, and fifteen English Liberals did the same, among the latter being Mr Samuel Morley and Sir Edward Watkin.

[Footnote 161: Bradlaugh noted later in his journal that the petition was "alleged to be signed by 10,300 freemen of Northampton." This, he remarked, "cannot possibly be true, as the freemen do not amount to that number." They really numbered about 300! It turned out that thousands of the signatures were those of school-children.]

Immediately on the vote being announced, and the question being put, Bradlaugh presented himself afresh, refusing as formerly to obey the resolution. The usual appeal from the Speaker elicited the usual motion from Northcote, which being carried, Bradlaugh said: "It would be undignified in me to indulge in any other kind of contest on the floor. I respectfully obey the House, and withdraw below the bar." The struggle was now apparently reduced to something like a recognised set of moves, all of which had been made and might be in due course made again; and Bradlaugh for the present was left to attend every meeting of the House, sitting beyond the bar, but without the power of voting or speaking.

Bradlaugh at once appealed to his constituents to choose whether or not he should resign; and they promptly decided that he should not; while some thirty indignation meetings were held throughout the country within a week, all condemning the action of the House of Commons. The law advisers of the Crown further formally declared on challenge that the seat was not vacant; and Bradlaugh wrote Gladstone, formally asking whether he was prepared to do anything. Gladstone on 18th February formally replied that he was not. Bradlaugh then took a new step, forcing the question on the House more determinedly than ever.

On Monday, 20th February, Mr Labouchere formally moved in the House that a new writ be issued for Northampton, seeing that Bradlaugh had been prevented from taking the oath and his seat. Churchill moved to amend the motion by substituting a description of Bradlaugh as "disqualified." The Attorney-General formally opposed, and the perplexed Northcote did likewise, being guided by the sole fact that the motion was proposed by Bradlaugh's friendly colleague. After a debate, in which Northcote was dishonest enough to assert once more that Bradlaugh had "claimed" to be "a person on whose conscience the oath was not binding," the amendment was negatived, as was the proposition that the words proposed to be left out should be left in. The resolution was thus left at a stand at the word "who;" and on the unfinished sentence the House proceeded to divide. When it seemed as if the "Noes" would "have it" without a division, Bradlaugh moved from his seat and stood at the bar; but on Mr Labouchere's challenging a division he returned. On the vote being taken there were 307 "Noes" to 18 "Ayes." The House thus explicitly refused to decide that the seat should be vacated, though they were all the while preventing it from being taken.

Bradlaugh was once more at the bar when the tellers announced the figures. Immediately he walked up the floor to the table, members looking on without excitement, counting on a repetition of the old scene. But this time "the scene was changed." While members waited for the usual action of the Speaker, it suddenly dawned on them that Bradlaugh had a book in his hand--it was the regulation "New Testament"--and was taking the oath of his own accord! He had gone through the whole mummery before the excited House could collect its faculties, and he duly finished by subscribing a written oath on a sheet of paper with a pocket pen. The Speaker was on his feet; the Clerk had come half-way to meet Bradlaugh; and Northcote had risen to speak, and sat down again, speechless. The Speaker mechanically called on Bradlaugh, as usual, to withdraw below the bar. He did so, but in doing it announced that he should return and take his seat, which he did, seating himself on a back bench. The Speaker solemnly charged him with disobedience, to which Bradlaugh blandly responded that he had obeyed them, and had taken his seat in addition, having first taken the oath. On the Speaker insisting, however, he once more withdrew beyond the bar, sitting under the gallery as before. Churchill, collecting himself more promptly than his leader, argued that Bradlaugh, having taken his seat "without taking the oath," "was as dead," and moved that the seat be declared vacant. The Attorney-General professionally pointed out that to vacate the seat under the statute the offending member must vote or sit during a debate. He suggested that the House had better adjourn the discussion, which it did after much further speech-making, in the course of which Churchill declared that Bradlaugh had "deliberately insulted the House," not for the first time; other members of similar dignity speaking to similar effect.

Next day the debate was resumed. Gladstone made a long and scrupulously bland speech, in the course of which he endured much contradiction of those who thought him insufficiently zealous for the honour of Omnipotence, concluding by saying that he left it to the majority to act for themselves. Northcote was laboriously indignant, and lengthily led up to a motion "that the Sergeant-at-Arms be instructed to prevent Bradlaugh from entering the precincts of the House," which motion, on the correction of the Speaker, he converted into an amendment to that of Churchill. A dispute arose on behalf of Dr Lyons, who had on the previous night given notice of a more drastic motion, but had not "caught the Speaker's eye" when he rose before Northcote. Then the debate drifted on; some members drivelling, some ranting, some platitudinising. At length Churchill's motion was negatived, whereupon Dr Lyons proposed his declaring Bradlaugh incapable of sitting, as an amendment to Northcote's. The pious Lyons was of opinion that "behind the particular issue there lay a great moral question," which, however, he did not specify. Again the debate rolled on. At length it was noticed that Bradlaugh had once more taken his seat within the House. The Speaker challenged him, and Bradlaugh began to explain that he proposed to "ask the indulgence of the House," when his voice was drowned in yells of "Order." The Speaker then solemnly charged him afresh with disobedience, and called "the attention of the House to that circumstance." Gladstone rose in response to calls; but the Speaker hastily interposed to call upon Bradlaugh to withdraw beyond the bar, which he did, formally protesting. Gladstone blandly observed that there was now no disobedience to deal with, and that it was not incumbent on him to do anything. Northcote arose in a state of ostensible but flabby indignation, and declared that "he must say there was a limit" to his "very moderate line." He now proposed to withdraw his amendment and substitute a motion of expulsion. Gladstone suavely intimated that he should not object to the withdrawal of the amendment, and Dr Lyons was induced to withdraw his likewise. The motion for expulsion, on the ground that Bradlaugh had, "in contempt of the authority of the House, irregularly and contumaciously pretended to take the oath," was then put, and Gladstone intimated in a period that he would not oppose. Mr Labouchere dropped the very apt remark that "he had always found that when the House was exercising judicial functions it got into an unjudicial frame of mind," and pointed out that Bradlaugh's action had been taken to obtain a case for legal judgment, and could not reasonably be termed "insulting." On a division, 291 voted for the amendment proposing expulsion and 83 against; some Liberals salving their consciences with the formula that "the House must maintain the authority of the chair."