[19] Since the date of this speech the new concessions, doubling the allowance exempted from income tax for the expenses of agricultural estates, have been made public.

THE SPIRIT OF THE BUDGET

LEICESTER, September 5, 1909

(From The Times, by permission.)

I have done my best to study the political history of the last forty or fifty years, and I cannot find any Government which, at the end of its fourth year, enjoyed the same measure of support, prestige, and good fortune that we do.  The only Administration which could compare in the importance and the volume of its legislation with the present Government is Mr. Gladstone’s great Government of 1868.  That was a Government of measures and of men; but no measure of that Government could equal in importance the Old-Age Pensions Act which we have placed on the Statute-book.  The settlement of the Irish Church question by Disestablishment was not a more baffling and intricate business, than the settlement of the Irish University question which Mr. Birrell has achieved.  The labour legislation of the Government of 1868, although very important, shows nothing which equals in importance the Trades Disputes Act, which we have carried through, and Mr. Cardwell’s reforms in army organisation were not more successful, and were certainly much less generally accepted, than those which have been effected by Mr. Haldane.  In the fourth year of its administration the Government of 1868 was genuinely unpopular.  It had quarrelled with the Nonconformists without gaining the support of the Church; it had offended the liquor interest without satisfying the Temperance forces in the country; it had disturbed and offended many vested interests without arousing popular enthusiasm.

Indeed, if you look back, you will find that the fourth year in the history of a Government is always a very critical and has often been a very unfortunate year.  It is quite true that Mr. Disraeli’s Government, which assumed office in 1874, did enjoy in its fourth year a fleeting flush of success, which, however, proved illusory.  With that single exception, every other modern Government that has lasted so long, has occupied an unsatisfactory position in its fourth year.  The Government of 1880 in the year 1884 was brought very low, and was deeply involved in disastrous enterprises beyond the sea which ultimately resulted in sorrow and misfortune.  The Conservative Government which took office in 1886 was by the year 1890, owing to its strange proceedings against Mr. Parnell, brought to the depths of humiliation.  The Government of 1895 was in the year 1899 thoroughly unpopular, and if they had not plunged into the tumult of war in South Africa, they would very shortly have been dismissed from power.  As for the Government of 1900, in the fourth year of Mr. Balfour’s late Administration, I am sure I could not easily do justice to the melancholy position which they occupied.