SIR EDWARD MACLAGAN’S SPEECH

WE have already commented briefly upon that short speech with which Sir Edward Maclagan brought the proceedings of the last meeting of the Punjab Legislative Council to a close. We have said that we are in strong sympathy with the object which His Honour clearly had in view in making the appeal he did. His Honour has during the short time he has been at the head of our affairs so demonstrated his love of peace and desire to conciliate the Punjab that there is no means of mistaking either the one or the other. In the present speech itself, there is abundant evidence of both. Such an observation, for instance, as that the change from wartime restrictions to complete freedom in speech and writing is a change which in itself is to be welcomed as long as the peace of the Punjab is not endangered by it—which, by the way, is the only legitimate limit to the freedom of speech and of writing that we are ourselves prepared to recognise—shows what a marvellous change has taken place in the ideas and outlook of the head of the Government since Sir Maclagan took charge, how brilliantly the present Lieutenant-Governor contrasts his predecessor who could never open his lips on a political subject without carping at even a modicum of freedom which was left to the public in his time. The contrast is even more vivid when we come across such a remark as the following:--“There is among the people generally and among the enlightened classes in particular no desire whatever that order should be disturbed.” Who in this Province does not know how Sir Michael O’Dwyer would have expressed the nearest approach to his thought that it was ever possible for him to entertain? He would have complimented the people generally on their commonsense, but only for the purpose of expressing his distrust of the enlightened classes, and especially the political classes.