§ Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House, at its rising on Monday next, do adjourn till Tuesday the 6th of November."—(Mr. W. H. Smith.)
§ MR. J. O'CONNOR (Tipperary, S.)said, he wished before the Motion was agreed to, to call attention to the sentence which had just been passed on an hon. Member of the House. Yesterday the hon. Member for Roscommon (Mr. O'Kelly) was sentenced by two of the Irish Resident Magistrates sitting in a Coercion Court, under the Crimes Act, to four months' imprisonment. It had been the duty of the Speaker to report to the House from time to time in a formal manner the cases in which Members of the House had been arrested and imprisoned, and on such occasions the attention of the House was drawn to the peculiar circumstances which surrounded each case. In the present instance no formal Notice was before the House, nor were hon. Members supplied with sufficiently full particulars upon which to express a judgment. Nevertheless, certain facts had already come under the notice of some of the Members of the House, and he thought it was desirable to lay them before the House before they separated on Monday next. His hon. Friend the Member for Roscommon proceeded to Ireland a short time ago in order to take part in some election proceedings in a constituency which bordered upon his own. Having fulfilled his obligations in that respect he proceeded to visit his own constituents, and in the course of his visit he became acquainted with the existence of a state of things to which, as a Representative of the people, he felt bound to refer. He found that there had been established under the Criminal Law and Procedure Act one of those Courts which were commonly known in Ireland by the name of a Star Chamber Court. When the Crimes Act was before the House the Irish Mem- 393 bers took every opportunity of pointing out that its provisions would be used for the purpose of punishing political opponents, and inducing witnesses to come forward and commit perjury. The Court held in the County of Roscommon was being conducted on those lines. His hon. Friend considered it his duty to denounce the proceedings of the police, which he (Mr. John O'Connor) had in the shape of Questions brought under the notice of the House both yesterday and to-day. It was abundantly proved that the witnesses had been tampered with, and that they had been specially supplied by the police with money out of the Secret Service Fund in order to provide evidence in circumstances of drunkenness. Now, when those things were brought under the notice of his hon. Friend he only fulfilled his first public duty as a Representative and guardian of the honour of the people in denouncing not only those practices, but the whole Court and the inquiry itself. The hon. Member was a guardian of the interests of those who might perhaps be found guilty on the evidence of those perjured witnesses, and therefore he was quite justified in denouncing the Court. After having performed that duty, and after coming back to London to fulfil his functions in Parliament—a month after the speech was delivered—he was ruthlessly, without warning, and without warrant, seized in the streets of London and taken away to Ireland; and he had now been tried by another Court established under the same iniquitous law, and punished with four months' imprisonment—and imprisonment, too, under the terrible circumstances which had been exposed over and over again in that House. All who had the acquaintance of the hon. Member for Roscommon knew that he was a man whose prudence, foresight, and general demeanour had commended themselves highly to the estimation of hon. Members of that House, and whose other qualities had shown him to be a careful and a thoughtful man. It must, therefore, on the first blush of the matter, occur to hon. Gentlemen that his hon. Friend had been severely and harshly dealt with. He did not think that any case which has been brought before the House of Commons had excited among its Members a greater amount of surprise and indignation than the un- 394 warrantable arrest and the unjust sentence upon his hon. Friend the Member for Roscommon, and it had been already severely commented upon by the Press and on public platforms. He thought that the Irish Members would fail in their duty if they did not bring the imprisonment of his hon. Friend before the attention of the House. He did not know it would have devolved upon him (Mr. J. O'Connor) to make a statement, and he regretted that he had not been able to lay all the facts and circumstances of the case before the House; he regretted that he was not better acquainted with them, and he had no doubt his deficiencies in that respect would be supplied by some of his hon. Friends; but from the very indignation of his mind he felt it his duty to bring the matter before the House. He trusted that all the circumstances of the case would be investigated, and that these unwarranted and unjustifiable proceedings would be investigated, as they were entitled to the severe condemnation of all just-minded men; and he hoped the House would not hesitate to mark its strong disapproval of such proceedings.
§ MR. T. P. O'CONNOR (Liverpool, Scotland)said, he was glad his hon. Friend had brought this matter under the notice of the House, but he felt that he was to a certain extent precluded from entering fully into the details of the case, as an appeal was now pending. He would, therefore, confine his observations to the evidence given by a constable named Clear—rather an inappropriate name for the individual in question—and which evidence was outside the material point in his hon. Friend's own case, and referred to circumstances antecedent to the trial. His hon. Friend (Mr. John O'Connor) had already called attention to the Star Chamber inquisition, and he (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) thought that if they were told 10 years ago that such a Court would be in full working order in any country within the British Dominions, they would have shrunk back with horror and scepticism, because the inquisition had all those elements which up to a short time ago were confined to Continental despotism and most abhorred by the public sentiment of this country. However, unfortunately that was the state of things now existing in Ireland, 395 and he wished to call the attention of the House to the manner in which witnesses were prepared and doctored by such an inquisition. This witness, Constable Clear, was examined as to his proceedings in connection with the Star Chamber inquiry, and was asked in cross-examination by Mr. Bodkin—"Did you give any money to one Keenan?"—Keenan was one of the witnesses who gave evidence and was asked to give evidence before the Star Chamber inquiry—Witness—"For what?" "No matter for what," said the cross-examining counsel. Then said Constable Clear, "I did; I gave him a 1s. I knew that Keenan was a witness." Now, it would be observed that this worthy constable had at first said that he gave no money to anybody, and then he acknowledged that he gave money actually to one of the witnesses who was to be examined before the Star Chamber inquiry. Mr. Bodkin—"And you swore that you gave no money to any witness." Cross-examination continued—
I may have given drink to some of the witnesses in this case. I cannot tell to how many, or how much. I could not say how often I gave Keenan drink.That was the man to whom he had protested he had given nothing.I cannot say when I first gave it to him, and I could not tell when I gave it to him last. I may have given Keenan drink in several houses since the trial began. I could not say how often I gave witnesses drink since this trial began. Mr. Beckett, R.M.—Did you give him drink? Witness—I do not remember. Cross-examination continued—I cannot say how many witnesses I gave drink to.Now, when facts like those were known to the British public, they would, he believed, form their own estimate of a system of inquiry which was carried out by such discreditable methods and means. Poor men were brought before those secret tribunals, with no friend and no representative of the public or of the Press near, and witnesses were also corrupted with money and with drink before they went into those chambers of torture. He thought that Englishmen who were in favour of the Government of Ireland by that House would, at least, like to see their administration elevating the people whom they ruled, instead of degrading them, as in this case, by appealing to the base passions of love of drink and money. And yet, for protesting against this 396 system, the savage sentence of four months' imprisonment was inflicted on Mr. O'Kelly, a sentence that would subsequently have to be investigated very closely. Though he wished the Chief Secretary would pay more frequent visits than he did to Ireland for the purpose of relieving the absolute blankness of his ignorance on all Irish affairs, he thought it would have been more fitting for the right hon. Gentleman to have postponed his present visit till the rising of the House. He certainly regretted the absence of the Chief Secretary that day, because he intended to refer to the case of Mr. Lane, who had declared in the public Press that he had been supplied with chicken and poached eggs. Mr. Lane had gone before the Coroner's Court and repeated on oath the statements he had previously made. The Chief Secretary had adopted a curious method of controversy with his political opponents in the House. The right hon. Gentleman did not dare to call them audacious, but many ways had been discovered of calling a man a liar. The right hon. Gentleman had stated that the hon. Member for East Cork must be labouring under a strange illusion. It was true that at one time Mr. Lane's mind did reel, but he did not think the hon. Member had so far lost his reason as not to know a piece of chicken and poached eggs when he saw them. Mr. Lane in his letter stated, and had since repeated on oath before the coroner, that he did receive from Dr. Ridley a piece of roast chicken and poached eggs. The Chief Secretary suggested that this was untrue, but the hon. Member for East Cork had explained the circumstances in which the doctor was able to exercise this charity. He next complained that the Chief Secretary or his subordinates had not supplied the materials for discussing the case of Mr. Mandeville. The Chief Secretary had promised the shorthand notes of the evidence at the inquiry. He understood that the notes of one day's evidence were written out and supplied the next day, and why there should be this delay he could not understand. It was desirable that the facts of this tragic case should be inquired into while they were still fresh in the public memory, but owing to the unaccountable delay of the Chief Secretary this could not be done. The case, however, would be discussed 397 by-and-bye. It was a question on which the public mind was very much stirred, and he believed the Government, which was responsible for the brutalities and tortures under which Mr. Mandeville succumbed, would be brought to a bitter account one of these days. On a former occasion he (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) had made some reference to some passages in the earlier history of the Home Secretary, to which the right hon. Gentleman had given a flat contradiction. The principal charge he had made against the right hon. Gentleman was that he was formerly in association with the members of the Fenian organization in Ireland. In order to show what the facts of the case were, he would refer to a speech delivered by the right hon. Gentleman at Dungarvan, when the candidature of the right hon. Gentleman was opposed by the present Lord Justice Barry, who, at the time of the election, was Attorney or Solicitor General for Ireland.
§ THE SOLICITOR GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. MADDEN) (Dublin University)No; he was then Mr. Serjeant Barry only.
§ MR. T. P. O'CONNORsaid, the point was immaterial; but he believed that Lord Justice Barry commenced to fight the election as Serjeant Sir F. Barry, but became Solicitor General for Ireland while the contest was in progress. The Home Secretary, speaking of his opponent, strongly denounced the attitude he had taken in the prosecution of persons charged with Fenianism, and used language which abundantly proved that at that time, at any rate, the right hon. Gentleman was in close sympathy and alliance with the Fenian Party. The right hon. Gentleman, among other things, said that in those troublous times there had been men who had come into collision with the law, who had been visited with punishment which he would not say was unjust, but who, if they had sinned against the law, had at least deserved well of their country. He could not forget the accomplished Luby, and the gentle, child-like simplicity of the high-souled O'Leary, and others—men who had been sentenced to penal servitude for their share in the Fenian movement. The right hon. Gentleman added that the justification of Mr. Serjeant Barry that he was guided by his professional duties was characterized 398 by the Home Secretary as no excuse at all, who said that it would form no excuse whatever in the minds and hearts of true Irishmen. Under these circumstances, he (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) asked the House and the public to pause before they finally accepted the statement of the Home Secretary that he, although now a prominent Member of Her Majesty's Government, had not at one time been an ally, an associate, and a protégé of the Fenians. At a subsequent date he (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) would give the House a fuller opportunity of judging between the statements of himself and of the Home Secretary.
§ MR. CLANCY (Dublin Co., N.)said, that owing to the block of business in the Land Court, the Government had, according to the statement of the Chief Secretary, decided to increase the number of Sub-Commissioners; but the steps which the Government now proposed to take were precisely the steps which the Irish Home Rule Representatives urged them, without avail, to take four or five months ago. That was a sample of the treatment always accorded to the advice given by his Party. They knew the business of their country better than anybody else could know it, and yet their suggestions were always at first treated by the Government with ridicule. Then months, or perhaps years, afterwards, the Government were at last forced to adopt their suggestions and act upon them. With reference to the conspiracy prosecutions, as he had showed, so it had been proved that there was no justification for the action of the Resident Magistrates. There was not one of these prosecutions which was not on all fours with the Killeagh case. In all the cases the evidence amounted to this only—that certain persons individually and separately refused to supply goods to certain other persons. Upon this totally insufficient evidence prisoners had been found guilty of conspiracy to induce and compel other people not to deal. He challenged the Solicitor General for Ireland to point to a single piece of evidence in the depositions beyond the proof of a mere refusal to sell. At Miltown Malbay two smiths were tried before the removable magistrates for refusing to shoe the horse of a Mrs. Moroney, and they were convicted for conspiring to induce and compel other smiths not to shoe Mrs. Moroney's horse. Would the House 399 believe that there were no other smiths in the place? Was it not preposterous and ridiculous that men should be convicted for conspiring to influence others of the same trade when there were no such people for them to influence? Although the Boycotting Returns presented to the House by the Chief Secretary, prepared by his agents in Ireland and inspired by the landlords, formed the greater part of the cases for which the Coercion Act had been applied, it was nevertheless a remarkable fact that for four months after the passing of the Coercion Act not a single prosecution for Boycotting took place in Ireland; and that proved one of two things, either that the Boycotting Returns were fraudulent, and the House of Commons was deceived, or else that the Chief Secretary neglected his duty, and allowed four months to pass before he put into operation those powers for the prevention of the very outrages of which he most complained to the House of Commons. As to the conviction of Mr. O'Kelly, his hon. Friend had only performed a public duty in advising his people to keep far away from the dark and treacherous Star Chamber inquiries, which had been abolished in England for 200 years, and which, in spite of anything that the Lord Advocate might say, did not now exist in Scotland, and had never existed there for an equal period of time. Those Courts were used as instruments of oppression in the hands of a class, and were not used for the purpose of discovering the perpetrators of serious murders. It had been stated that a case of murder in Kerry, for which two men had been hanged, would never have been unravelled without the interposition of the Secret Inquisition Court. That statement was not worthy of credence, for no evidence was obtained at the inquiry which would not have been disclosed in the ordinary course of events. In certain other serious cases, such as an outrage on a church in Fermanagh and another outrage on a church in Donaghmore, County Cork, in both of which cases members of the Orange Party were suspected of having committed the outrage, the clause in question was not put in force; but in a case of larceny of hay at Loughrea the Star Chamber inquiry was set on foot to discover the guilty parties in regard to this offence, which was four years old. The 400 Catholic Bishop of Raphoe had recently written a letter, in which he stated that he was as deeply interested as anyone could be in the peace and order of the country, but protested against the administration of the Coercion Act as being a "menace to peace and an incitement to disorder." For saying very much the same thing in somewhat different words, the hon. Member for Roscommon had recently been sentenced by the Irish Government to the atrocious term of four months' imprisonment. He asked the House whether that was a justifiable sentence in view of the legislation which that House had passed? The offence of the hon. Member, if any offence at all, amounted to sedition, and in regard to sedition there were by Act of Parliament special provisions that persons so convicted should be treated as first-class misdemeanants. By proceeding against the hon. Member under the Coercion Act, the Government, however, secured that he should be treated like common thieves, housebreakers, and wife beaters. This was one of innumerable instances of the way in which the law was being administered. Was it to be expected that, under these circumstances the law would be respected, and its administration esteemed and reverenced, and that the Union would be maintained and grow in the affections of the Irish people. Why, the Irish people would not be fit for freedom, the Irish people would not be fit to live, if they did not hate and detest the law administered in such a fashion as that. In June last Judge Johnston, in opening the Commission in Dublin, stated that he found the County Dublin was in a satisfactory state. Yet soon after this that county was proclaimed under the Act, and when questioned as to the reason for this, the Chief Secretary made an answer which, even coming from him, was astonishing; he admitted that the amount of crime in the county was by no means abnormal, and that, in fact, it was almost non-existent; but he added that, under certain circumstances, some of the powers under the Act might be required by the Government, and that therefore the county was proclaimed so that those powers might be available beforehand. It was monstrous that a county should be proclaimed, in order to enable the Government to meet circumstances which were not specified, and which might never 401 arise. The excuse made by the Chief Secretary for his action in the matter reminded him of the excuse of the English woman who was beating her husband without a cause—that if he did not want the beating now, he should have it in case he might want it. With regard to the hon. Member for Roscommon, all that was practically alleged against him was that he had broken the law by giving certain advice to the people. But those who opposed James II. and supported William of Orange broke the law, and so did Washington in opposing the British Government, and the Neapolitans who opposed King Bomba. Yet history had vindicated those men, and history would also vindicate the hon. Member for Roscommon. It was clear now, a year after the Coercion Act had been in operation, that the Government had not used the principal clauses of the measure—namely, the summary jurisdiction clauses, for the purposes for which they said they wanted those clauses when they introduced them into Parliament. The horrible deeds which had formed the stock argument against Home Rule at Primrose League meetings had been left almost entirely untouched by the working of the Coercion Act, and the principal cases in which it had been employed were those of assaults on officers of the law arising out of unjust evictions, and those unjust evictions the Government were responsible for, for they declined to prevent them though they had the power. No one could say that those were premeditated. They were wanton crimes arising out of circumstances over which the people of Ireland had no control. Most of the cases tried under the Coercion Act were cases of the most trivial, and, at the same time, the most irritating character—cases which, if they occurred in England, Scotland, or Wales, would not be seriously treated as offences at all, but would be treated as reasons rather for altering certain unjust and oppressive laws rather than of instituting wholesale prosecutions and inflicting upon political opponents those punishments which were reserved for common criminals. There would be no advantage gained by referring to these cases at the present time more in detail; but he could tell the Government that during the Recess the people of every city and town in England would not be allowed to be without knowledge of the true state of 402 things in Ireland and of the way in which the country was governed under this oppressive Act.
§ DR. FITZGERALD (Longford, S.)said, as the circumstances of the punishment of his hon. Friend the Member for Roscommon had been referred to, it would be scarcely right for him to sit by in silence. He found it impossible to discover in his own mind for what offence his hon. Friend had been tried, and for which the atrocious sentence of four months' imprisonment had been inflicted. It would be recollected that in the month of June last he (Dr. Fitzgerald) was a candidate for the constituency of South Longford, and that immediately before that time the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham (Mr. J. Chamberlain) had written a letter to the electors of Ayr—of which, by the way, they took no notice—in which he stated that the Representatives which were from time to time elected by the Irish people were not really the Representatives of the Irish people at all. The right hon. Gentleman and his supporters had a fair chance of sending over a candidate to try conclusions with him (Dr. Fitzgerald) in South Longford, and at one time he thought that the Attorney General for Ireland might have appeared to oppose him there. Indeed, it had been said that an hon. Baronet and friend of the right hon. Member for West Birmingham did go as far as Dublin with the intention of contesting Longford with him (Dr. Fitzgerald), but that gentleman never appeared amongst the constituency, and he (Dr. Fitzgerald) was allowed to walk over. As an English citizen for the last 15 or 20 years, and being used to political contests in this country, he was astonished to find that he was followed about by the police through the counties of Longford and Roscommon as if he was a murderer, and he wished it to become known to the country that the policeman Clear had followed them through the County Roscommon for 14 miles. He wished to know who was going to pay for the horse which the policeman killed in following them that night? He noticed that the hon. Member for the constituency in which he resided went down to Balham and consulted his political supporters under his (Dr. Fitzgerald's) very nose, and yet he made no objection, while, because Mr. 403 O'Kelly went through the county to introduce him (Dr. Fitzgerald) to his future constituents, they were suspected of being engaged in a conspiracy. He had a glass of port with Mr. Fitzgibbon's wife, and that was what was termed conspiracy. But what had his hon. Friend the Member for Roscommon done? He went to Boyle to address a meeting, and, being anxious to see the country, he drove, as he had said, with his hon. Friend to two or three of the principal towns in Roscommon. The Chief Inspector asked his hon. Friend the night before the meeting whether there would be any objection to a Government reporter being on the platform, and his hon. Friend said there certainly would not be any objection. If this was an illegal meeting, why did not the Head Constable say so? He would like to know, for the future guidance and protection of Irish Members, whether their meeting with their constituents was contrary to the provisions of the Crimes Act or was a conspiracy? It was only fair that that question should be answered. His hon. Friend certainly made a speech to his constituents in which he told them that if in England the Administration attempted to obtain evidence by the aid of informers in secret inquisitorial Courts, the people would kill them; and he (Dr. Fitzgerald) now repeated, from the floor of that House, as an English citizen, on the very first occasion that he had had the honour of addressing that Assembly—and he dared them to deny it—that if in England they were to establish a Court such as the Star Chamber Courts that they had in Ireland, the English people would kill them.
§ MR. ADDISON (Ashton-under-Lyne)said, he must congratulate the Irish Members on the acquisition of debating power which they had acquired in the hon. Member who had just spoken. He (Mr. Addison) thought as the hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Clancy) had thrown out the threat that the English people would be well enlightened during the Recess as to the opinions of the Roman Catholic hierarchy and others on the subject of the improvement of Ireland, that they should also know the opinions of the Prelates whose words he had quoted. He found in a Manchester paper a report of a sermon by the Bishop of Waterford, in which he declared that 404 the police of Waterford were honestly doing their duty there, and complained of the way in which, under the veil of patriotism, the police had been treated and attacked in the city of Waterford.
§ MR. J. O'CONNORwished to know whether the circumstances in reference to that discourse had anything to do with politics?
§ MR. ADDISONsaid, the police ought not to be attacked when doing their duty honestly.
§ MR. CLANCYNot honestly.
§ MR. SPEAKEROrder, order!
§ MR. ADDISONsaid, the police must be protected when honestly doing their duty.
§ MR. HARRIS (Galway, E.)said, it was the fault of the system of Irish administration that the police were unpopular, and not the fault of the people. While sitting in Court during the trial of the recent action against The Times, he had seen a number of policemen and other agents of Dublin Castle brought over for the purpose of swearing against himself and other men like him, and he must say that all ideas of justice and fair play left his mind as he concentrated his attention on those men, who have been trained in blood and perjury. If those men were to be brought up and examined on the Commission that was soon to sit, and if the slightest regard was paid to their oaths, and if some means were not taken to ascertain from Lord Spencer or some other competent authority who had found out how regardless of truth or honest, upright dealing those people were, they would be going into an inquisition in which English people and the Judges would have no idea of their characters or modes of action. He charged Mr. Beckett, the Resident Magistrate, and County Inspector Smith with having been engaged in a foul conspiracy to bring home the writing of certain threatening letters to an innocent man, a course for which County Inspector Smith, who then was a Sub-Inspector, was reprimanded by Lord Justice Christian; and he might also point out that notwithstanding this reprimand, Dublin Castle, in accordance with its usual method, granted that police officer promotion to the high rank he at present holds in the Constabulary. As to Mr. O'Kelly's case, he considered Mr. O'Kelly perfectly justified in giving the advice 405 that he did, having regard to the character of these Star Chamber inquiries. Further, he maintained that the action of the Government in sending paid Guardians to the Ballinasloe Union merely because strong language had been used at the Board, was a distinct violation of the elective principle, and it had entailed enormous expense on a poverty-stricken district and caused the greatest exasperation. It seemed as if the Government were determined, not only in political matters and on the agrarian question, but in every department of affairs to show their contempt for the wishes of the people.
§ MR. MAHONY (Meath, N.)said, he desired to call attention to a matter which only came to his knowledge yesterday, and he considered it a question of great importance that the facts of the case should be known in Ireland. Before he alluded to it he desired to say how much he approved of the action of the hon. Member for Roscommon. He had always held a strong opinion on the subject of the Star Chamber inquiry, and he could not understand how any man holding Irish Nationalist opinions and who had within him the spirit of manhood and of independence, could, by any possibility, give evidence before any one of these Secret Commissions of Inquiry. At the time the Crimes Act was passing through Committee in the House the Irish Members made a very fair offer to the Government, which was that they would not oppose the institution of these secret inquiries, provided they were confined to the more serious crimes. The Government had refused to accept that fair offer, and they were now using these secret inquiries for the purpose of finding out combinations of tenants not to pay unjust rents. In his opinion Irishmen were bound in honour to refuse to give any evidence whatever before these secret commissions, and he trusted that not one of his constituents would give a particle of evidence before them. As for himself, if he were called before them, he should absolutely refuse to utter a single word before them. He, therefore, thought his hon. Friend was perfectly right in recommending his constituents not to give evidence before those Courts. He now came to the matter as to which he only obtained information yesterday, and which he communicated as quickly as he could to the hon. and learned Gen- 406 tleman the Solicitor General for Ireland. In The Belfast Weekly News, about 10 days or a fortnight ago, the following paragraph appeared:—
Sale of the Verner Estate.—All the tenants of the late Sir W. E. Verner have received a circular from Mr. S. A. O'Sullivan, of the Land Purchase and Investment Society, stating that he had been authorised by Mr. Jackson, the trustee of the estate, to sell to the tenants their holdings. The following is an extract from the Circular:—'Land Purchase, Mortgage, and Investment Offices, 15½, Parliament Street, Westminster. Sale of the Verner Estate, in the counties of Armagh, Tyrone, and Monaghan.—Dear Sir,—I have been instructed by the trustees of this estate to sell the lands in the occupation of the tenants, and I have now to inform you that I have made arrangements accordingly. Negotiations have been proceeding for some months past with the Irish Land Commissioners, who were empowered to purchase estates provided that a certain proportion of the tenants are willing to buy the holdings. All the maps, &c., called for are now ready.'That appeared to be the first intimation that the tenants had received.The negotiations with the Land Commissioners require that the tenants' undertakings should be lodged without delay, and I therefore send you a proposal (form A.), which please fill up and return to me not later than Friday next.That did not give much time for consideration.I have arranged that holdings not purchased by tenants will be sold to a Company here—the United Kingdom Ground Rent and Mortgage Investment Society, Limited. I may remark that when the proposal for sale was first mentioned to the Land Commission, we required about two years' purchase more than the rate now decided upon.The inference being that the Land Commission and these gentlemen had decided upon a certain rate of purchase—And as the altered terms are final no modification need be proposed by the tenants.This was one of the free bargains that they heard so much about. Then he went on to illustrate how the thing worked, but in his illustrations omitted to call the tenants' attention to the fact that they would in future have to pay all the rates and taxes. This S. A. O'Sullivan—about whom he (Mr. Mahony) knew nothing—had, he understood, been negotiating sales between landlords and tenants in different parts of the country—the Verner estate—and he was also told the estate of Mr. Greville Nugent, in the County of Limerick. Now, 407 if that circular was correct, it implied that negotiations had been carried on for some considerable period between Mr. O'Sullivan and the Land Commission without any notice whatever having been given to the tenants. But he wished it to be distinctly understood that he did not say that the Land Commissioners had carried on any such negotiations; but Mr. O'Sullivan distinctly implied that they did, and he thought that the House was entitled to an answer from the hon. Gentleman as to whether the Land Commissioners had carried on any such negotiations behind the backs of the tenants, and whether it was a custom of theirs, and whether on any occasion they had fixed upon terms of purchase without previously consulting with the tenants? He would also ask whether negotiations for the sale and purchase of land in Ireland were still conducted by the Irish Land Commissioners, although as a fact they had no money with which to conclude the purchase? If it was found that the Commissioners were carrying on those negotiations, although the money had run out, the House, no doubt, would be informed in the Autumn Session, when the Government came to ask for more money, that there were a number of cases in which all the terms were arranged on which they were virtually obliged to advance the money for the purchase of the land, and, surely, the House would not refuse to grant it. He thought they were entitled to an assurance in that House that no further negotiations would be conducted by the Land Commissioners until Parliament had decided to give a further advance of money, which he hoped it would not do, at any rate, on the present basis. He maintained that there was a direct proof in those cases that the unfortunate tenants were, in the first instance, compelled to agree to exorbitant prices, and, in the second place, that the Land Commission sanctioned terms which were very unfair, considering that the tenants had an interest in the holdings as well as the landlords. Now, to come to another statement in the letter—I have arranged that holdings not purchased by the tenants will be sold to a company here—the United Kingdom Ground Rent and Mortgage Investment society, Limited.How was the unfortunate tenant in the 408 counties of Armagh and Tyrone to know anything about this Mortgage Investment Company in London? He might not have a very favourable experience of his landlord in Ireland; but he (Mr. Mahony) would think that in most cases he would prefer him to this speculating Company in London. He proposed to enlighten the tenants in this case as regarded this Company in London. A friend of his had taken some trouble to inquire into the status of the Company. He called at Somerset House to see the memorandum of association. He found that the Company had been registered on the 14th of May, 1888, with a nominal capital of £1,000,000, in 100,000 shares of £10 each. Five per cent of the shares was to go in the formation of 10 founders' shares. Mr. S. A. O'Sullivan, the writer of that letter, owned seven out of the 10 founders' shares, and Mr. Thomas Cross, of Piccadilly, an estate agent, of whom he (Mr. Mahony) knew nothing, held the other three founders' shares. It appeared that, in addition to the 10 founders' shares, it was necessary that there should be five other shareholders in order to constitute the property to register the Company. Well, five other shareholders held one share each. His friend then went to the office of the Company, and he found that the Company had its offices in Mr. O'Sullivan's chambers. He tendered a shilling, and demanded his right to see the list of shareholders of the Company, and, after a good deal of hesitation on the part of Mr. O'Sullivan, he acknowledged that there were no shareholders except those that were registered at Somerset House; and that was the Company with which the unfortnnate tenants in Tyrone and Armagh were threatened. Now, he wanted an assurance from the hon. Gentlemen opposite that the Land Commissioners would exercise great caution in dealing with those public Companies, that they would take steps to inquire very carefully whether they were negotiating sales between landlords and tenants; whether any form of pressure had been brought to bear on tenants to make those purchases; and that they would specially inquire whether they were threatened by being told that public Companies or other people were ready to purchase their holdings.
§ THE LORD MAYOR OF DUBLIN (Mr. SEXTON) (Belfast, W.)said, he wished to point out that the intention of the Land Purchase Act was to enable tenants in Ireland to become the owners of their holdings, and if any transaction was entered into with the fugleman of a swindling company by the tenants in the purchase of their interests, the effect very plainly would be, not only to fail to carry out the intentions of the Land Purchase Act, but to defeat the intentions of that Act by preventing the tenants from becoming owners of their holdings, and by placing the exchequer of the estate in the hands of a person who could hardly be adequately described except at the bar of the Old Bailey. With reference to the case of the hon. Member for Roscommon he wished to point out the incongruity that had been shown in the action of the Government in causing his hon. Friend to be arrested and taken from his Parliamentary duties in London, while their Bench of Removables admitted him to bail as a matter of course, thereby testifying the fact that they had no apprehension as to his hon. Friend not appearing when called upon to answer the charge. The incongruity of such a course of action was indefensible, and he asked the hon. and learned Solicitor General for Ireland to give them an undertaking that if in the future—but he need scarcely employ the word "if"—rather would he say "when"—in future an attack was made by the Irish Government upon a Member of Parliament in the discharge of his duty, the Government would act upon what was their belief, as shown by the conduct of their agents in Ireland, that he was a Gentleman who would attend if called upon at any time, and that they would have sufficient regard to the political sanctity of his constitutional duties to give him some intimation otherwise than by arrest. He would now call attention to the evidence given by Constable Clear in reference to his treatment of witnesses examined at the Star Chamber in the County Roscommon. That constable was engaged as a trainer of witnesses before the Star Chamber Court, to which his hon. Friend in his speech objected, and he (Mr. Sexton) would ask if any such proceeding took place in England—if they found a constable in the witness-box admitting on his oath that he had 410 been debauching witnesses, suborning perjury, and bringing them up to the adequate swearing point, would not an hon. Member feel it to be his duty when next he saw the persons who elected him, and amidst whom such proceedings were being enacted, to call attention to that crime and outrage? Constable Clear admitted that he could not state to how many witnesses he had given drink or how much, and he also declared that he gave that drink "in the ordinary course of business." He would ask what was the "business" there alluded to, and what was its "ordinary course?" Was it the procuring of convictions, right or wrong, and did the case of Members of Parliament come within the "ordinary course" of that business? Those questions ought to receive an answer. The magistrate who held the secret inquiry did not appear to have reported that constable or to have rejected or questioned the evidence of any of the witnesses produced by such a disgraceful system. The analogy of the practice of Scotland or of France in regard to private inquiries did not apply in this instance, because in Scotland and in France the examining functionary examined into real crime, whereas in the case of the Star Chamber inquiries in Ireland the examination was held into acts which they had fabricated into crime for political purposes by an Act passed by a political party in defiance of the ancient rights of the Legislature. His hon. Friend having advised his constituents in the discharge of his duty was found guilty by two servants of the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite, who sentenced him to four months' imprisonment as a common criminal. He would tell him, and he would respectfully tell the House, that the effect of the prosecution, conviction, and imprisonment of his hon. Friend would be to defeat the purpose of the Government. Their purpose was to uphold the Star Chamber Courts—their purpose was to induce people to come forward and give evidence. Would that purpose be furthered by the imprisonment of his hon. Friend? Why every person in Ireland would feel that his hon. Friend had simply acted according to the dictates of his conscience, and his imprisonment would shed a lurid light on the action of the constabulary and upon the system by which in the Star Chamber Courts in Ireland igno- 411 rant men, by these degrading practices, were trained to give evidence that would take away the liberty of their fellow subjects. If the Government had been willing to confine their Star Chamber Courts to real crime, he ventured to think that his hon. Friend or any other Member of the Irish Party would have paused before they made any attack upon these tribunals. These Courts were not used to discover crime, but to prevent political action and to defeat social combination. The Government directed the Star Chamber Courts against trades unions and against combination of the Irish tenants. They directed them in Ireland against the exercise of that right which in England they dare not touch, and where it was exercised by the humblest labourer in the factory, workshop, or mine. In punishing the man who had denounced that system, the Government had given a death blow to those Star Chamber Courts by making them, if possible, more odious and hateful than ever to the people. The conduct of the removable magistrates in condemning his hon. Friend to be treated as a common felon for acting on the impulsion of his conscience was nothing less than an indecency. Turning next to the case of Father M'Fadden, the hon. Member said that that priest, who had stood between his parishioners and their tyrant, as he had a right to do, was convicted, but the Court directed that he should be treated as a first-class misdemeanant. The Chief Secretary for Ireland had sought to attach to Father M'Fadden the taint of immoral conduct in regard to the advice he gave to the tenants, and the rev. gentleman wrote to the Press in vindication of his character. A Star Chamber inquiry was held, and as the conduct of Father M'Fadden was to be the subject of investigation, the rev. gentleman wished to be admitted to give evidence; but that request was refused, the inquiry was held behind his back, and he was condemned. Then followed more harsh and rigorous ill-treatment. The window of his cell, where there was no chimney, was blocked up, and all ventilation or fresh air was excluded. There was nothing for him to look at for weeks and months together but four whitewashed walls—a thing calculated to destroy a man's sight. In addition to this he had not been allowed to send out any letters, and he had been deprived of the 412 right of having food supplied to him as a first-class misdemeanant. He had received two telegrams—one stating that Father M'Fadden had been deprived of this right, and the other stating that on being visited by the hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar), he had been also denied the right of speaking about his prison treatment. When a question was put by the hon. Member on the subject to Father M'Fadden, the visit was immediately cut short, and the rev. gentleman hustled away by the warders to his cell. Because he had fulfilled his duty as a pastor in standing up for a defenceless people, he had been thrown into prison and subjected to such treatment there that his hair had turned grey, and he was now visibly failing and drooping and sinking into the grave. He was now deprived of his rights in prison because he had endeavoured to prove that a charge made against him by the Chief Secretary was false. Was it then come to this that an English gentleman took this means to protect his honour and vindicate his veracity? He had referred to the case of Mr. Latchford, of Tralee, and his veracity had been called in question in that case. The Solicitor General had stated four times in answer to him that the order of the Court of Exchequer was not based on the facts of the case, and that the facts of the case had not been before the Court of Exchequer. In regard to this case the Solicitor General had departed once from the truth, and the Chief Secretary twice, for in addition to stating that the Court never had the evidence before them, the Chief Secretary also stated that Mr. Latchford had resorted to violence while the matter in dispute was still sub judice, and had infringed an order of the Court, while at the time of the occurrence Mr. Latchford had received no such legal document. As to the statement that the facts of the case had not been before the Court, he was informed by the solicitor to Mr. Latchford that the order of the Court of Exchequer of the 4th August recited the evidence on which the habeas corpus was granted, "including the depositions of all the witnesses examined before Messrs. Roche and Massey." The solicitor further, in the communication which he now held in his hand, said, "It is not true that the facts of the alleged riot were not before the Court." Referring to the audacious pretence of 413 the Government that there was no personal matter between Mr. Latchford and Mr. Roche, which disqualified the latter from acting as a judge in the case, he might quote Mr. Latchford's speech at the indignation meeting in Tralee, condemning the action of Mr. Roche in batoning men, women, and children in the streets of the town in such a manner that but for the good temper of the people there might have resulted fearful loss of life. Mr. Latchford also signed a petition praying for the removal of Mr. Roche from Tralee. Then when he went to exercise his legal rights and was obstructed and attacked by a body of men who went there for the purpose, Mr. Latchford was sent to be tried under the Coercion Act by the very Cecil Roche whom, in a public speech, he had condemned. Let the Solicitor General justify this if he could, and though he seemed ingenious enough to justify anything, if ever there was a case in which he would find difficulty in doing so, this was the one. The 23 other prisoners charged with riot on the same occasion were let off, and Colonel Turner—who had had the people batoned and bayoneted at Ennis—stated that this was done on the ground of leniency after the ringleader was convicted. He thought, however, that the real reason was not leniency, but the fact that after the police had been incubating the evidence for three weeks and found there was no case, the men were of necessity let off. Mr. Latchford was convicted of an impossible offence; and though the Court of Exchequer may have released him simply on a technical ground, the order of the 4th August showed that they had the evidence before them, and Mr. Baron Dowse showed himself fully cognizant of the character of that evidence. He (Mr. Sexton) denounced the conviction of Mr. Latchford as illegal, indecent, grotesque, and unworthy of even a Turkish pashalik. The Solicitor General was one of the administrators of the law in Ireland. Was it too much to ask him and his friends to act within the law themselves, not to prohibit constitutional meetings, and not treat with violence the people who held those meetings. The Government, too, had no right to use violence to political prisoners, nor, indeed, to any prisoners, unless it was necessary to make the prisoners refrain from using violence 414 themselves. They knew the way in which the unfortunate Mr. Mandeville had been treated, although the highest authority had declared that there was no right to enforce by violence the wearing of prison clothes, which were only intended to meet the case where the prisoner had no other suit. Another statutory right of prisoners—namely, that which entitled them to two hours' walking exercise daily, had been infringed by the Irish Government, and the Prisons Board had actually deprived men of this right by way of punishing them. He would not now go into the case of Mr. Mandeville, which would yet form the subject of a great indictment against the Government; but he claimed the observance by the Irish Government of those two rights of prisoners which he had mentioned—protection from personal violence and two hours' daily exercise. The Government had no right to break down the health of a prisoner. In England, no matter what his crime might be, a prisoner must be released when it appeared that imprisonment was undermining his health and placing his life in danger. The reverse seemed the principle in Ireland, for when the Government there got a political prisoner into their hands—a man who had been simply discharging his duty to his people—they tortured him, deprived him of his walking exercise, and did everything to undermine his health and put his life in danger. If they had constitutional power corresponding to the justice of their case, they could impeach Ministers under the law of this country of having taken every occasion possible to deliberately destroy the rights of the people in Ireland, and to provoke the people into violence and insurrection. The Irish Government was now going to be free for some time from Parliamentary supervision, but let him warn them how they used their powers during that time. They were bound, while enforcing the law, to keep within the law themselves. And he warned them that during the Recess the scrutiny of their actions, not merely by the Irish people and the Irish Members, but by the Liberal Members and the people of England, would be close and constant. He warned them that if in endeavouring to defeat the political rights of Ireland they went beyond the law, and they had before gone beyond it, they would be 415 called to a speedy and a certain account of their misdoings.
§ SIR WILFRID LAWSON (Cumberland, Cockermouth)said, he thought that the views of the Liberal Members of Great Britain ought to be given expression to, although there were but few of them present that day. He regretted to see on the benches near him only two Liberal Members from England, three from Scotland, and one from Wales. It bad been very pleasant on Friday night to hear the compliments that passed across the floor of the House with reference to the Local Government Bill; but while those congratulatory speeches were being made did it ever enter the minds of hon. Gentlemen that Ireland had had no share of that beneficial legislation? Parliament had improved the system of Local Government in England, and had given the English people more power to manage their own affairs, and yet they persistently refused to their Irish fellow subjects the same rights in that direction. In our sorrow and in our joy "up came Ireland." There must be some reason for that, and the only one he could think of was that we treated that country with injustice, and all injustice rose up against those who perpetrated it. What had men done for Ireland this Session? Law and order had been enforced in a certain way. That was all. Years ago they used to hear "Order reigns in Warsaw," where the people's rights had been entirely extinguished and overborne, and that rather tragical joke was now applicable to the state of things in Ireland. The Government might say what they liked about establishing law and order in Ireland; but any order which was brought about in a country by neglecting the wants and wishes of the people, and setting aside the demands they made—such order was a mockery, delusion, and a snare. The manner in which Irish Members had been treated that Session caused him deep pain. Outside the House detectives had being lying in wait ready to pounce upon and arrest the Representatives of the Irish people. Many of the Members of that House had seen the hon. Member for West Cork arrested just beyond the precincts, and hurried off to the police station by the myrmidons of the law on a cold winter's night. It was a most distressing scene, and one which he should never forget. It was 416 a humiliating thought that a Member of this House, who was one of the most popular men in Ireland, should now be in gaol enduring a sentence of six months' imprisonment for advocating the rights of his countrymen. These things could not go on very much longer, and he would appeal to his hon. Friends from Ireland to continue to show that patience which they now displayed, taking care not to commit any rash or unlawful deed which would give a handle to those who supported the unfortunate policy of Her Majesty's Government. On behalf of his Radical Friends, he could assure their hon. Friends from Ireland that they would not be forgotten during the next three months, and that every effort would be made to explain to the English people the true state of their case. He was not without hope that when they met together again their position would be brighter and more hopeful than it was now, and that they would be able to point with increased confidence to the day when Irishmen would have the same rights, liberties, and privileges as were enjoyed by those who resided in other parts of the United Kingdom.
§ MR. CUNNINGHAME GRAHAM (Lanark, N.W.)said, that he was sorry that the end of the Session had arrived without a word having been uttered by the Government, not only in reference to Ireland, but as to the condition of the people in the neighbourhood of London. He was aware that a man who always spoke upon one subject was considered a bore; but, even at the risk of being as "tedious as a king," he felt it necessary to bestow his tediousness upon the House on this, the last day of the Session, and without the slightest hope of raising any interest in anyone's heart or of doing any good to people whose cause he wished to advocate. He thought there was no one but would agree with him in thinking that it was an unpleasant duty for a Member to stand in the face of hostile Colleagues on both sides of the House to speak for an unpopular cause. It was unpleasant for him to take up the attitude he was now adopting, but he felt compelled to do violence to his own feelings in this matter, and also to do violence to the feelings of many hon. Members in the House. He did not apologize to his Irish Friends in standing between them 417 and the answer of the Solicitor General for Ireland. He did not apologize, because he knew that the first day Home Rule was granted to Ireland Members would find themselves face to face with similar questions in Dublin to those existing in London to which he wished to draw attention. It had always seemed to him an indisputable fact that every day they put off the discussion of this question of the unemployed made it more acute, more dangerous, and more difficult of solution when they at last came to deal with it. He would ground his case upon a few particular and general aspects of the question. He did not think there was a single Member who would deny that in London, Liverpool, Birmingham, Manchester, Glasgow, Dundee, and the large centres of the United Kingdom, wherever they had the two extremes existing, they there had the greatest wealth and the most abject misery. Assuming that they would never see a trade go back to the proportions it had done during the past 20 years, it was only a question of mathematical progression to assume that the day will come when the 50,000 unemployed now existing in London would reach 300,000 or 400,000—and when he said unemployed he did not mean the dockyard men, the street corner men, the roughs of Whitechapel and the East End of London, but the unemployed in the ranks of the genuine working men. And when the number of unemployed assumed such proportions, it was fair to believe that the idea would cross these men's brains—he did not wish it to, but he was afraid it would—that they might as well die fighting as starving. In this direction he could not help looking back to what happened some years ago, when riots and disturbances were initiated in London. An immense amount of injury was done to the tradespeople, and large numbers of strangers from America and elsewhere were deterred from visiting the Metropolis. The breaking out of a tumult such as would result from the presence of such a number of unemployed and disaffected people as he referred to would be almost destructive of London trade, and, he ventured to think, would be the beginning of a downward career in this country which he, for one, wished to see avoided. He would ask any Member of the House whether he 418 did not admit what he (Mr. Cunninghame Graham) and those who thought with him declared to be true—namely, that here in London they were living upon a volcano, and that they could not endure that for another three or four years unless something was done to improve the condition of the working classes? He did not wish to open a socialistic discussion; but he felt bound to point out that very little would satisfy these people and render their lives more tolerable to them. To show the condition in which large numbers of the people in London lived, it was only necessary to say that he had visited some of the most miserable districts in London, and that he had seen amongst the chainmakers, for instance, women stripped to the waist and working in the midst of men, who were also naked to the waist. He would ask anyone whether that was work for a woman, especially when it was remembered that the remuneration was only 4s. a-week? He would ask whether they would not, perhaps, be doing well by directing attention to the condition of such people, and endeavouring by legislation to make their lives happier—as they unquestionably had shown they could do by the passing of the Factory Acts? Were men and women who were removed from starvation by the narrowest margin interested in political changes? Did they care, for one moment, whether the Conservative or Liberal Party were in power? Neither Party had or ever would do anything for them, notwithstanding that all that these people cared for was that they might get enough to eat, and that after 50 years of toil there should be something better for them than the skilly of the Christian workhouse. These, and these only, were the questions which interested the residuum of the working classes of this country, and these were the questions that no section of the Parties in the House had ever directed its attention to during the time he had sat in the House. There was yet time to do something. The winter was still three or four months distant from us. If the Government would only—as he feared they would not—take this matter into their consideration, and endeavour to deal with the great and deep danger which was undoubtedly impending, they would have the concurrence of every honest 419 man outside the House, as he believed they would have the concurrence of every honest-minded Member on both sides of the House. They should do something to render the lives of these peoples less intolerable to them, and to alter the state of things which was daily converting England more and more into a hell for the poor and a paradise for the rich.
§ THE SOLICITOR GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. MADDEN) (Dublin University)said, that the speeches which had been addressed to the House by hon. Members opposite had travelled over a very wide field indeed, and he mentioned this, not by way of complaint, but by way of explanation, so that the House might understand that it was not possible for him at this period to deal in a thorough and exhaustive way with the topics which had been presented to them by the speakers who had addressed the House. He would, however, endeavour to deal with the chief matters that had been brought forward. The hon. Gentleman the Member for the Scotland Division of Liverpool (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) had referred to the evidence given by a constable in the case of the prosecution of the hon. Member for Roscommon. The hon. Member (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) very fairly declared that he would not discuss the circumstances of the case, as an appeal was pending; but the hon. Member seemed to forget that his remarks on the constable's evidence really bore upon the pending litigation. It was in the course of a cross-examination which was intended to shake his credit as a witness that the evidence was elicited. At the appeal before the County Court Judge this man could be again examined and cross-examined, and therefore to discuss the matter now would be an exceedingly improper proceeding. What would hon. Members think if the reverse were the case, and if he were to comment upon evidence given by a witness for the accused, for the purpose of discrediting the witness? It would be justly said that he was attempting to prejudice the case. Therefore he could do no more at present than to read to the House, without comment, and merely by way of information, a statement which he had just received as to the constable's evidence. It had been charged in the debate that this man admitted having suborned perjury— 420 that he said he ordered drink "in the ordinary way of business," and that meant the suborning of perjury, or the procuring of evidence at any rate. The statement which he had received was to the effect that that Clear said he was on friendly terms with the Castlerea people; that about 80 persons were examined at the preliminary inquiry before Mr. Townsend, RM., that he often had a drink with some of them, but that he did not give drink for the purpose of inducing them to give evidence. Furthermore, he treated them out of his own pocket, and the cost did not come out of the funds provided by anyone else. It was suggested by an hon. and learned Member that Mr. O'Kelly's offence amounted to sedition, and reference was made to the Prisons Act of 1877. On the appeal, if that was a good point, Mr. O'Kelly would have the full benefit of it; but it was not for the House to discuss the matter pending the appeal. Various observations were addressed to the House with regard to what were called "Star Chamber" proceedings, and it was asked what would be thought of such a secret inquiry in any other part of the Kingdom? But then the remark was rather suddenly narrowed to England, because the hon. Member who made it saw the Lord Advocate in his place, and he was quite aware that a proceeding which was similar in all substantial principles had long existed in Scotland. ["No, no."] He repeated that a preliminary proceeding which was in all substantial particulars similar, though not identical, with those proceedings in Ireland had been from time immemorial, or, at all events, for a long period, with the approbation of all sections of the community, existing in Scotland; and it was considered a most valuable part of legal procedure in that part of the Kingdom.
§ MR. SEXTONOnly for crime.
§ MR. MADDENagreed that it was for crime. But the hon. Member must be aware that under the Act of last year a secret inquiry could not be held until information had been sworn that a crime had been committed. The hon. Member took up the position that conspiracies such as the Plan of Campaign were not crime. He was not going, at this period of the day, to argue that question. Hon. Members would probably retain their 421 own opinions as to whether these conspiracies were criminal or not, and he would retain his; but what he wanted to point out was that this procedure could not be called into operation except under the condition he had stated. Hon. Members were aware that, under the Act of 1882, a similar procedure, but without some of the safeguards which were introduced into the present Act, was in operation all over Ireland. Nevertheless, hon. Members opposite took upon themselves to advise that this process of law which was deliberately adopted by Parliament for the purpose of detecting crime should be prevented, as far as possible, from being carried into effect. That was a most significant fact, and he hoped it would be duly noted. The hon. Member (Mr. Clancy) had again referred to the question of conspiracy in connection with the Boycotting prosecutions. He admitted that the hon. Member appeared to have studied the subject; but he could not agree with him in his conclusions. He had entered into detail upon this subject a few days ago; but he would again call the attention of the House to the fact that the depositions in the case referred to only contained a portion of the evidence upon which the prisoners were sentenced. The depositions were the ground of conviction before the magistrates, but the prisoners appealed, and it was with reference to the appeal that his observations were made, when he stated that further vivâ voce evidence was taken and various important matters were proved, which supported the charge of conspiracy to induce others not to deal. With regard to the Land Commission, he would remind hon. Members that the Chief Secretary stated that the Government had appointed a number of additional lay Sub-Commissioners for the purpose of attaching them to existing Sub-Commissions presided over by legal Sub-Commissioners, thus very much increasing the working power of each Sub-Commission. It was said—"Oh, this proposition was made to the Government some months ago, and why did they not then adopt it?" The reason was plain. A Bill was introduced by the Government which would have dealt, as they believed, with the block of business in the Land Courts in a way which would have rapidly got it under and disposed of it. That Bill 422 was objected to and opposed, but the Government were in hopes of passing it up to a recent period. From pressure of Business it had been found impossible to do so at present, and the Government were left face to face with the block. They were unable to make provision for the existing state of affairs by this Bill, and then they did the next best thing possible by appointing extra Sub-Commissioners. The hon. Member (Mr. Mahony) had called attention to a Circular which appeared to have been addressed to the tenants of a considerable property in the North of Ireland. That Circular, he hoped, and had not the smallest doubt, would be fully considered by the Land Commission when the facts were brought before them, and he felt certain that the various matters to which attention had been called would receive due consideration at their hands. The hon. Member asked for an assurance that nothing would be done by the Land Commission which would pledge the House to a further advance of public money for land purchase. It was perfectly obvious that nothing of the kind could be done by the Land Commission. Hon. Members might disabuse their minds of the idea that any contract or arrangement would be entered into by the Land Commissioners which would in any way prejudge the question upon which the House would be asked to decide during the Autumn Session—namely, whether or not there should be an additional sum of money voted for the purposes of Lord Ashbourne's Act. In further answer to the hon. Member (Mr. Mahony), he had to say that the powers of purchasing a whole estate, if exercised by the Land Commission, would be used for the benefit of the tenantry of Ireland—for the purpose of facilitating occupying tenants in becoming the owners of their holdings. He did not believe that the hon. Member need be under any apprehension that steps such as he contemplated would be taken over the heads of the tenants, or without due consultation with them. The hon. Member had called attention to a Company of which he (Mr. Madden) knew nothing. All he could say was that if that Company were suggested to the Land Commission as a proposed purchaser, or as taking part in transactions to which the Land Commission was asked to be a party, he had not the least doubt that all the circumstances 423 to which the hon. Member had called attention would be carefully examined by the Commission before they entered into any such arrangement. As to the idea of pressure having been put upon the tenants, he was convinced that if any such thing existed, the Land Commissioners would absolutely decline to have anything to do with the matter. He thought the hon. Gentleman might make his mind easy on that subject. With reference to the remarks of the hon. Member for West Belfast (Mr. Sexton) respecting the case of Father M'Fadden, he was not able to make any statement to the House regarding the telegram which had been read, but hon. Members might be certain that the rights of the rev. gentleman as a first-class misdemeanant would be strictly observed. The investigation which had been made as to several matters mentioned was purely a departmental examination with which the prisoner had nothing to do. He was not, therefore, present.
§ MR. SEXTONIs it not a legal right of first-class misdemeanants to have their food supplied from outside the prison?
§ MR. MADDENsaid, he thought it very probable it was, but he had not the prison rules before him. He had not the slightest reason to suppose that any of the rights of this first-class misdemeanant had been taken away; any complaint which might be brought forward of the deprival of any such rights would, no doubt, be fairly and thoroughly considered. Then the case of Mr. Latchford had been referred to. He was convicted under the Crimes Act, and the Chief Secretary had said that the conviction was quashed, not upon the evidence, but upon a technical point. That statement was absolutely correct. At the first application, as reported in The Freeman's Journal of August 6, 1888, the depositions in the Court below appeared to have been read, not to the Court of Exchequer, but to the Chief Baron, who made the conditional order on a technical point, on the ground of the order absolutely excluding from the Court any question on the evidence.
§ MR. SEXTONExcluding evidence from the knowledge of the Court.
§ MR. MADDEN, continuing, said, the counsel for the accused, in opening the case, took the objection that there was 424 no sufficient legal description of the offence in the commitment. That was the only ground on which the conditional order was granted, that was the only matter argued before the Court of Exchequer, and on that point the conviction was quashed, and, having regard to the form in which the conditional order was granted, the Court of Exchequer had no power to go into the evidence. The Judges, in fact, only held that the statement of the offence in the conviction should be more specific, and should have shown that the person convicted had taken part with others in a riot. It would be seen from statements in The Cork Examiner and The Kerry Sentinel that a riot actually occurred, and he submitted that the authorities were fully justified in prosecuting only the man in whose interest the riot occurred, and in withdrawing the charges against the people who were merely his dupes and instruments. The fact was that Mr. Latchford took the law into his own hands while legal proceedings were pending as to the matter in dispute.
§ MR. SEXTONNo. The alleged riot took place on June 25, and the civil proceedings were not instituted till July 5.
§ MR. MADDENsaid, he had read the accounts of what had actually occurred from newspapers not unfavourable to hon. Members opposite; and those reports showed that the riot was a serious one.
§ MR. SEXTONWas anyone hurt?
§ MR. MADDENreplied that that was not the point. The dispute between Mr. Latchford and his neighbours was really irrelevant. What he wished to make plain was that the Court of Exchequer did not go into the circumstances of the case, but quashed the conviction on a technical point. It was said that the other persons who took part in the riot were not convicted. It was, however, quite fair to take legal proceedings only against the person in the assertion of whose alleged rights the riot was perpetrated. Moreover, as a matter of law, beyond all question the withdrawal of the prosecution against the other persons did not affect the validity of the conviction of the principal offender.
§ COLONEL NOLAN (Galway, N.)remarked that the hon. and learned Gentleman treated the government of Ire- 425 land as a game, and wanted to point out that the rules of the game had been strictly followed. The hon. and learned Gentleman had not attempted, however, to defend the game itself. The whole case by which Mr. Latchford was convicted was illegal; but what hope was there that Mr. Latchford would receive that compensation to which he undoubtedly had a claim? The Solicitor General for Ireland tried to argue that the ultimate acquittal of the gentleman in question was due to a technical irregularity. If that were so, and he did not admit that it was, could there be a more glaring instance of neglect in appointing magistrates who were versed in the law? But, putting aside particular questions, could there, taking a general view, be a more melancholy record for a Session—so far as Ireland was concerned. What a wretched game the Government were playing in Ireland. What had the Government done for Ireland this Session? A system existed under which the Members from Ireland were supposed to have a share in the government of their country. But Her Majesty's Government had been chiefly occupied in imprisoning Irish Members. A Member of Parliament, by the very nature of his duties, came into contact with the official classes in Ireland, and yet he was sent before those very officials to be tried. The sending of a large number of persons to prison was a mockery and a parody of the free institutions of other countries. Prisoners, including Members of Parliament, priests, and commercial men, were treated with extraordinary harshness, and it was surprising there had been no death among the Government victims other than that of Mr. Mandeville. He (Colonel Nolan) had been several times in Galway prison, and, in his view, the greatest torture imposed on the prisoners was the total deprivation of mental exercise. If the Government put political opponents in gaol, they ought at least to supply them with books, and make their condition as easy as possible. Her Majesty's Government derived £7,500,000 a-year from Ireland. When the Government came into power two years ago great promises were made by the noble Lord the Member for South Paddington (Lord Randolph Churchill), then Leader of that House, that the material prosperity of Ireland should be developed; but the Government had 426 done absolutely nothing to redeem those promises. True there were Drainage Bills introduced; but that was a mere pretence, because dealing, though those Bills did, with novel conditions of taxation and costly engineering plans, no opportunity was given for discussion. All this while the Government had been drawing from Ireland more than £15,000,000 in taxation. So matters would go on until the next General Election approached, and then all the fine promises would be renewed. It was the saddest, most disgraceful Session—so far as Ireland was concerned—that for many years had been recorded; but happily there was nothing in it with which Irish Members could reproach themselves.
§ MR. PICKERSGILL (Bethnal Green, S.W.)said, he wished to call attention to a matter of urgency, regretting that the Home Secretary was absent. That right hon. Gentleman was charged with the duty of advising the Queen in the exercise of clemency in capital cases, but lately a practice had been growing up of delaying the decision in such cases to almost the last moment. Only the other day, in a notorious case, the decision of the Home Secretary was not communicated to the condemned criminal until the evening preceding the day appointed for execution. This was practically returning to the barbarous custom of old days, when a criminal was condemned on one day and executed the next. There was a growing feeling that this unnecessary delay was an aggravating cruelty and a public scandal. His reason for mentioning it was that there was a young man now lying in Newgate under sentence of death, and, without in the slightest degree wishing to encroach on the heavy responsibility that rested upon the Home Secretary, he urged this public request that the decision should be communicated to this unhappy man a reasonable time before the day fixed for execution, so that he might be able to prepare for his end.
§ MR. J. NOLAN (Louth, N.)said, the hon. and learned Solicitor General for Ireland, in his speech on the case of Mr. Latchford, had carefully avoided two things in that case of which all lovers of justice had to complain—that a special crimes court was set up when the ordinary law ought to have been employed, and that one of the magis- 427 trates sent to try the case was a personal enemy of the gentleman to be tried, and not only a personal enemy, but a man notorious for his extreme and reckless views on things in general—a gentleman who, as had already been stated, had said on a public platform in England that he would fight against the Home Rulers until hell was frozen over, and continue the struggle on the ice. It was surprising that no Member from the other side, political opponents though they were, had risen to protest against the manner in which Mr. O'Kelly had been arrested at midnight and conveyed to Ireland like a felon. It was like the incidents in the worst days of Russian rule when offenders were carried away to Siberia. He felt bound to denounce the system by which police witnesses were drugged with drink; it was a common practice. Outside Dublin there was a regular nursery for Crown witnesses, where they were fed and schooled in the nefarious work of swearing away the liberties of innocent men and luring ignorant peasants to deeds of violence. It had been said that the people of Ireland had no friendly feelings toward the police. Unfortunately that was true, but the police authorities were altogether to blame. The police, hounded on by their superiors, had acted most brutally towards the people of Dundalk on the occasion of Mr. Dillon's imprisonment in June last. Many of the people of the town had been permanently injured by the police, and yet the Chief Secretary had declared that the police had done nothing. Whoever had supplied the right hon. Gentleman with such information had put a lie in his mouth, and that would be very soon proved by a Return of the injured which was now being prepared. He would read for hon. Members opposite a passage from a letter he received only yesterday from a friend in Dundalk. It stated that a gentleman who had seen Mr. Dillon in gaol says that—
Poor Dillon looks very bad. He will find it hard to pull through the six months. He (the visitor) thinks he will not live. The confinement is killing him.He (Mr. Nolan) believed that hon. Members would not regard that statement with equanimity. He hoped that during the Recess they would do what they could to prevent the murder of one of the noblest and most upright men in 428 Ireland or England. The Irish people could not do much for Mr. Dillon under the circumstances; but if they bad the privilege of a free nation, and if Mr. Dillon was done to death, there would be many fixed bayonets at his funeral. As things stood, they must content themselves by appealing to hon. Gentlemen opposite not to allow a political opponent to be murdered in so cruel a way.
§ MR. A. SUTHERLAND (Sutherland)said, he regretted that neither the Lord Advocate nor the Solicitor General for Scotland was present, because he wanted some information on points of administrative detail in the Highlands of Scotland. He had had on the paper a few days ago a question regarding the release of a person who was imprisoned for riot, and who had been kept in gaol for several months, although primâ facie evidence of the strongest nature had been given of his innocence. He could understand why the Executive for Scotland had stood in the way of a full investigation, because he believed that a formal investigation into all the circumstances would reveal a state of matters with regard to the administration of justice, even in the higher courts of Scotland, that would not be very creditable. There was another question which he had postponed at the request of the Lord Advocate. It was whether the Secretary for Scotland was now in a position to release the man forthwith; and also whether bail had been refused in the case of a man who has surrendered himself to justice. He also wished to ask why a man who was arrested and committed for trial seven or eight months ago, but who was bailed out, and against whom the charge was departed from, his bail bond had not yet been returned to him, and why proceedings had been kept hanging over his head for seven months. He regretted that the Lord Advocate was not in his place to answer these questions; but there was this to be said for his Lordship, that he (Mr. Angus Sutherland) had given no notice of bringing on this matter.
§ THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. W. H. SMITH) (Strand, Westminster)said, that if the hon. Gentleman would furnish him with the particulars of the cases to which he had referred, he would take care that they should be inquired into, and a communi- 429 cation would be made to the hon. Gentleman at once.
§ MR. A. SUTHERLANDsaid, he would do so.
§ MR. W. H. SMITHsaid, he hoped now (5.10) that discussion would be allowed to come to a conclusion as there were several small matters which had to be disposed of after this Motion.
§ MR. SEXTONsaid, he hoped the Government would give attention to the facts laid before them by the Irish Members. There would, under the circumstances, be no objection to the Adjournment.
§ DR. TANNER (Cork Co., Mid)said, he wished to draw attention to the conduct of the police in -West Muskerry, and especially to the case of Mr. Credon, of Clonakilty, who was assaulted by the police. He himself had to complain of ill-treatment at the hands of the constabulary. He had got his head broken, was knocked down and kicked insensibly by the police, but that was, of course, in the ordinary routine of the life of a Nationalist Member of Parliament in Ireland, and he supposed they would have to submit to it while the Chief Secretary was in power. He wished, also, to bring under the notice of the House the action of the Government in appointing Mr. Hegarty, of Ballyvourney, to the Commission of the Peace, simply because he was an agent of the Emergency Association. That was the class of man the Government appointed to harass the enemy; and while it continued it would be subversive of all law and order in Ireland.
§ Question put, and agreed to.