THE CHINA MAIL APRIL 28, 1998.
Foreign Policy Always A Premier's Responsibility
Cabinets Which Suffered From Divided Counsels
HETHER one thinks Mr. Eden
Wright or wrong in, his convic
tions, his resignation at least proves that he has the courage of them When a Minister especially the For- eign Minister finds himself in seri- ous disagreement with the Prime Minister and with the overwhelming majority of his colleagues in the Cabinet, the interest of the country calls for his resignation.
-BY
J.B. FIRTH
WHEN DIFFERENCES PROVE INTRACTABLE
of
In such an event the public verdict had he looked about him, the real is that he ought to have better as reason why he doubled the parts pro- serted his authority in his own Cabi-bably was that he felt confident -net.--
winning a shining success in both and It is within recent recollection how was resolved to shape his own course severely Mr. Baldwin was blamed for in foreign policy a pacificator not repudiating the terms of the luck where so many others had failed. less Abyssinian Agreement reached in Paris between Sir Samuel Hoare and M. Laval the instant that he was made acquainted with them. Some of his more acrimonious critics even said that his resignation rather than Sir Samuel Hoare's would have been
to
ACROSS THE ROAD FROM
10, DOWNING-STREET
WHEN LORD CURZON ONLY MADE PROTESTS
Mr.
too,
over
"It cannot be in the country's in-
If Lord Curzon, instead of Secretaries, Not all Foreign
interest," he wrote in his letter to the
Baldwin, had become Prime Minister deed, in Mr. Eden's position have Prime Minister, "that those who are
in 1923, it is believed that he, would have retained the Foreign followed that course. Some have held called upon to direct its affairs should the more appropriate.
Office in his own hands. This fast to their office and by destroying work in an uneasy partnership fully
knowledge reinforced the powerful the solidarity of the Government have conscions of differences in outlook, set in hoping that they will not recur. This
representations
the that caused sensibly weakened its authority dealing with foreign affairs. Some applies with a special force to the
change of mind in the highest quar- times even they have been
to the strong relationship between the Prime Minis
The Foreign Office, it is true, has ters at the last moment as enough to fetter the hands of a Prime ter and the Foreign Secretary.”
What is no less true is that where a special status of its own compared advisability of his appointment.
with that of most other Government No burden of work was too great Minister who has not felt able, for
departments. It would be very dif- for Lord Curzon's self-confidence to whatever reason, to force their re such differences prove intractable it is
Prime Minister ficult, however, to define, and whe- undertake and he looked-forward to a signations. Where that has happened the policy of the
which should prevail For the fact ther such a definition would be ac- period of undivided control the national interest has invariably
is that the supremne responsibility for suffered.
cepted at the Foreign Office, if it foreign affairs, such as he had sighed foreign policy rests with the Prime emanated from No. 10, or at "No. for invair when he was Foreign Public opinion, therefore, quite dis- Minister, and that he cannot divest 10 if it were drawn up across the Secretary in the Coalition Cabinet of tinct from the partisanship which himself thereof. If the policy IS eagerly fastens upon any circumstance successful the Foreign Secretary may way, is doubtful: For a century and Mr. Lloyd George. In this connec which may impair the prestige of reap most of the glory, but if it fails more the status has varied according tion I would quote a striking passage the respective personalities of from his official biography by Lord the Government, applauds Mr. Eden's the chief odium falls on the Prime Prime Minister and Foreig Secre- Zetland: independence and courage.
tary and the degree of interest taken "Control shared by two men, both in foreign affairs by successive Heads emotional and highly strung but dif- of Governments.
fering profoundly, not in method only. Nor is that: all. Scarcely less im- but in outlook was bound to lead to portant than the personality of the violent collision. On these occasions Foreign Secretary is that of the chief the Foreign Secretary suffered grie- permanent officials of his department vously. Often he protested verbally, who work behind the thick veil which sometimes in writing, against what he is one of the most valuable of our regarded as the il-judged excursions constituational: fixtures,
of the Prime Minister, made Hence the opinion widely held at times without the knowledge of the one time and by no means without Foreign Office, into the domain of supporters to-day that the foreign Foreign Policy: but always he re- policy of England is really worked frained from pressing his protests to out in the inner-rooms of the Foreign their logical conclusion.” Office unless there happens to be an That is to say, Lord Curzon never unusually powerful Foreign Secretary tendered his resignation, knowing or the foreign situation is such that well with what alamity it would have it over zides all other political in been accepted: terests.
Minister.
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INTERVENTION BY QUEEN VICTORIA'
some-
"He was convinced," saya Lord
During the last decade. foreign affairs have engrossed political atten- tion to an almost unprecedented de- gree and they may well have absorbed as much Cabinet time as hom affairs. Zetland, "that it was in the best. in- Such conditions have not been favour- terests of the country that he should able for the development of, say, 2 remain at his post, even when his British counterpart to Baron Holstein, doing so entailed personal suffering who for years was the real controll- and, indeed, ignominy.” - In Lord ing brain of German foreign policy Curzon's own words, he "persuaded before the War
PRIME MINISTERS “DOUBLING THE PART””
himself to go on by the certain know- ledge that if I were to go my place would be taken by the combination, which I regarded as a great national peril.”
such
Mr. Gladstone, when pressed by How much better and more "digni- Lord Rendel after his retirement fied is direct resignation in from public life, to say "whether he painful circumstances. Should the re- had not found the Foreign Office some signation tarry history is even ready what of an enclave and imperium in to condone such brusque dismissal as imperio, avoiding as much as possible Lord John Russell administered in not alone due recognition of party 1851 to Lord Palmerston, or the sio- policy but the reasonable intervention wer and more cautions methods of ex- of Parliament itself, would not give trusion from the Cabinet which Dis- much or willing assent to these views, rack applied to Lord Carnarvon and though he did not altogether con- Lord Derby in 1878 when they dis- dern them.”
agreed with his Near Eastern policy.
Experts are not valued much un- Queen Victoria, indeed, would have less they hold decided views, but it is welcomed more peremptory measures. the fault of their political chiefs if "Let Lord Carnarvon and Lord Derby they lose effective control, and British go,” she wrote to her Prime Minister foreign policy has perhaps most often from Osborne, and be very form. A failed when there has been a dragging divided Cabinet is of no use” conflict of view between Prime Minis- It was a maxim. of Cardinal de Retz ter and Foreign Secretary.
that political situations sometimes de-
any
The late Lord Salisbury was so velop of such complexity that powerfully impressed by his painful step that may be adopted has the ap- recollections of the deyisigns in the pearance of being a false one.
That British Cabinet from 1875 to 1878, is a truth better recognised by his- and by the dangers of what he called torians, than by party politicians. Yet "a composite-policy that when he such situations have been musually became Prime Minister he took the frequent of late, when high ideals and Foreign Office himself That way of stark realities have been engaged in solving the question of divided or violent conflict. shared control was denounced at the time by Liberais, primarily because it removed effective discussion of for- eign affairs from the House of Cam-. mons to the House of Lords
It was not without its solid advan tages, however, and looking back can hardly be said that the for interests of Great Britain and any way because Lord Salisbury donbl- ed the two roles.
RELIANCE ON THE CABINETS SUPPORT
Mr. Eden's resignation is far from being the first of its kind in British Parliamentary history. Nor is it likely to be by any means the last. The fundamental fact of the position is that the Prime Minister must în the British Constitution be the Minis- ter ultimately responsible for foreign Ar Ramsay MacDonald fol- policy pecially as the influence of Conservative leader's ex- the Crown in this direction is not a ample on forming his first Admini
of what it once was and stration the justification he gave was that where there is serious confict be- of his Socialist colleagues between him and the Foreign Secretary experience of it in the butter: who must go, so long as he might have as the Prime Minister has the sup-
found another
or Chelmsford, port and confidence of the Cabinet,