Commons Sitting of 2 June 1882

MINUTES.
PRIVATE BILLS (by Order)—Considered as amended—Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Railway and Cheshire Lines*; Melton and Hollesly Bay Railway*.
PUBLIC BILLS—Ordered—First Reading—Government Annuities and Assurance* [190].
First Reading—Married Women's Property* [191].
Committee—Prevention of Crime (Ireland) [157]—R.P. [Third Night].
Considered as amended—Artillery Ranges* [183].
Third Reading—Poor Rates* [171], and passed.

QUESTIONS.

  VACCINATION ACT, 1867—PROSECUTIONS (JOHN SAVAGE).
  MR. HOPWOODasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether his attention has been called to the case of John Savage, of Kinsale, county Cork, who, for refusing to have his child vaccinated because, as he alleged, a child of his previously had suffered from its effects, and he had besides seen two children of neighbours dead, as he believed, through its operation, has been twenty-six times prosecuted and fined for his refusal, his effects distrained upon and sold, and is now under the order of the justices for a similar fine; whether he has petitioned the Lord Lieutenant upon the subject, and with what result; and, whether the Government of Ireland will consider the propriety of such repeated prosecutions with a view to their restraint? He wished also to ask whether the Chief Secretary would consider the propriety of sending to the Boards of Guardians recommendations after the manner of the English Local Government Board with regard to the number of prosecutions to be made?
  MR. TREVELYAN,in reply, said, he found that John Savage, of Kinsale, had petitioned his Predecessor on the subject referred to in this Question. He represented himself as having been summoned 27 times, and having been fined 11 times for one child and twice for another. The late Chief Secretary appeared to have given very careful attention to the case; and, after consideration with the Vice President of the Local Government Board, he informed Mr. Savage that the Board did not consider it their province to interfere with the discretion vested in the Boards of Guardians in reference to prosecutions under the Compulsory Vaccination Act. He would, however, make further inquiries.

  ARMY (AUXILIARY FORCES)—VOLUNTEER CORPS—TRAVELLING ALLOWANCES.
  MR. RANKINasked the Secretary of State for War, Whether he has any intention of proposing any alteration in the present system of travelling allowances to the head quarter companies of Volunteer Corps, whereby they only receive two shillings and sixpence per man when the regimental camp is held more than five miles distant from the head quarters, whereas the outlying companies receive five shillings per man, although the camp may be within five miles of their locality?
  SIR ARTHUR HAYTER: Yes, Sir; it is in contemplation to give the travelling allowance of 5s. per man to the head-quarter batteries of Artillery Volunteers, since they have to proceed to considerable distances to camp for heavy gun practice. It is not, however, intended to increase the travelling allowance for the head-quarter companies of the Infantry Volunteers. It must be remembered that the sum granted is intended to form a fund to defray, or help to defray, travelling expenses for the whole corps, and not to be allotted to particular companies.

  ARREARS OF RENT (IRELAND) BILL, CLAUSE 1—EVIDENCE.
  MR. VILLIERS STUARTasked Mr. Attorney General for Ireland, Whether, under Clause 1, of the Arrears of Rent (Ireland) Bill, the Commissioners may accept joint affidavits from landlord and tenant, countersigned by the Land Court Valuer, or other competent authority
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  (after examination of the office books), as sufficient evidence that the amount of antecedent arrears claimed is due, and that the tenant is unable to pay the same?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON)said, the 1st section of the Arrears Bill provided that it must be proved to the satisfaction of the Commission that the tenant was unable to discharge the antecedent arrears; and under the 7th section they had the power to make rules for applications under the Act, and the conduct of proceedings before any tribunal for hearing these applications. The Land Commissioners had practically, under the Land Act, all the jurisdiction of the Judges of the High Court; and it was part of their jurisdiction to take evidence, both orally and by affidavit, or either way as they thought fit. It might, therefore, be left to the Land Commissioners to decide in what way evidence might be taken in these cases.
  MR. VILLIERS STUARTasked, was he to understand that there was nothing in the Act to prevent the taking of evidence in the manner specified in his Question?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON)said, there was nothing in the Act about the evidence of a valuer. The Commissioners had power to take evidence, either orally or by affidavit; but it must be proved to their satisfaction that the tenant was unable to pay.

  AFRICA (EAST COAST)—ZANZIBAR—THE SLAVE TRADE.
  MR. DONALDSON-HUDSONasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether it is true, as stated in the "Times" of May 30th, that a large slave trade is carried on between the Islands under the dominion of the Sultan of Zanzibar and the interior of Africa; and, if so, whether Her Majesty's Government will take steps towards the suppression of the traffic?
  SIR CHARLES W. DILKE: Sir, all the information on the subject in the possession of Her Majesty's Government is contained in the Blue Book on slave-trade matters presented to Parliament this year, from which it will be seen that Her Majesty's Government are taking all the steps in their power to suppress the traffic.

  SOUTH AFRICA—CETYWAYO, EX-KING OF ZULULAND—ABANDONMENT OF VISIT TO ENGLAND.
  SIR WILFRID LAWSONasked the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether he has any objection to lay upon the Table the Correspondence which has passed between the Colonial Office and the Cape Government, touching the abandonment of Cetewayo's visit to England, and also touching his continued captivity?
  SIR CHARLES W. DILKE: Sir, in the absence of my hon. Friend the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, I have to say that the Correspondence on the subject is being prepared for publication, and will be laid before Parliament.

  LAW AND JUSTICE—HAMMERSMITH AND WANDSWORTH POLICE DISTRICT.
  MR. FIRTHasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether the Commission which recently investigated the matter reported in favour of the division of the Hammersmith and Wandsworth Police District; and, if so, whether it is proposed to carry such recommendation into effect, in order that Hammersmith may be constituted into a separate Court, competent to deal with the increasing business now devolving upon it?
  SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: Yes, Sir; I am very anxious to have the arrangement which has been recommended carried out.

  SOUTH AFRICA (THE TRANSVAAL)— THE BOERS AND NATIVE TRIBES.
  MR. ASHMEAD-BARTLETTasked the First Lord of the Treasury, Whether his attention has been called to a letter in the "Standard" of May 31st, from Pretoria, in the Transvaal, which gives many details with regard to the cruel persecution by the Boers of natives in and on the borders of the Transvaal, in revenge for their support of the British cause during the late war, and particularly to the cases of three loyal native chiefs named Montsion, Monkoroane, and Kalafri; whether the chief, Montsion, who received and protected during the war numbers of refugees from Boer rapacity, was first attacked by a Boer Commando, assisted by other chiefs whom
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  the Boers instigated to attack him, and has since been constantly harassed by these chiefs, aided by large numbers of Boer volunteers, while the British authorities in South Africa have orders to prevent volunteers or ammunition from reaching Montsion for his defence; whether the chief, Kalafri, and his tribe, because "they had English sympathies," have been utterly ruined by a fine of 10,000 head of cattle imposed by the Boers; and to quote the words of the correspondent—
  "This tribe is small and weak, which the Boers well knew. The women, with children in their arms, pleaded in vain to the Boers to leave them something or they would starve, but the latter only jeered at them;"
  and, whether Her Majesty's Government will take prompt measures to protect these loyal natives, and if England will not step in and insist on the Boers putting a stop to this murderous war, if she will not prevent these poor natives from obtaining ammunition and assistance to enable them to defend their country?
  MR. GLADSTONE: Sir, the attention of the Government has been called to the matters contained in the letter referred to. I am not able to enter at large into the details; but I can state this—that hostilities have been going on for some time between the Chief called Montsion and other Chiefs and a certain number of Boers who have taken part in these hostilities. Under these circumstances, representations have been made to the Transvaal Government on the subject, and we have urged that Government to prevent any violation of its neutrality. It has also been the duty of the British authorities to warn British subjects against any violation of neutrality.

  PARLIAMENT—BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE—MORNING SITTINGS.
  SIR R. ASSHETON CROSSasked whether Morning Sittings would be abandoned while precedence was given to the Prevention of Crime (Ireland) Bill?
  MR. GLADSTONE,in reply, said, it was not intended, for the present, to propose any other arrangement than a Morning Sitting on Tuesdays. The House would, therefore, meet at 4 o'clock on Fridays.

  EGYPT (POLITICAL AFFAIRS).
  SIR GEORGE CAMPBELL: I beg to ask the Prime Minister whether any confirmation has been received of the telegram alluded to by him as showing that Arabi Bey "has thrown off the mask and declared his intention of openly proceeding to depose the Khedive;" or whether, on the contrary, Arabi professed himself a true servant of the Khedive?
  SIR CHARLES W. DILKE: If the hon. Member will refer to the Papers, he will see how far Arabi has expressed himself a servant of the Khedive. With regard to the proposed deposition, no further steps have been taken.
  MR. JOSEPH COWEN: I wish to know whether my hon. Friend the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs has received any information as to the acceptance or refusal of the proposed Conference by the other Powers?
  SIR CHARLES W. DILKE: We have every reason to suppose that the Conference will be accepted by them, because all the Ambassadors in London have held friendly language with regard to it, and all the Foreign Ministers in foreign capitals have held language equally friendly to it. There has been no formal acceptance up to the present time.
  SIR H. DRUMMOND WOLFF: Is it true that the French Government proposed to the other Powers the expediency of appointing Prince Halim as Khedive?
  SIR CHARLES W. DILKE: That is a question which is not at all within the range of practical polities at the present moment; but some reference to the matter in the past will be found in the Papers.
  SIR WILFRID LAWSON: I wish to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he has received confirmation of a telegram which appears in The Daily News of to-day. The telegram states distinctly that the English and French Consuls have—
  "Advised the Khedive to summon Ragheb Pasha to the Palace and intrust him with the formation of a Ministry. The French Consul is said to be the author of this scheme to settle the difficulty, which has been accepted by the British Consul General. Besides being a cripple and suffering from paralysis, Ragheb Pasha is one of the old school, with a very bad reputation, and was the author of the once famous
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  national financial project, a man of anti-European sentiments, and pledged to destroy Anglo-French influence in Egypt?"
  SIR CHARLES W. DILKE: No, Sir; we have received no confirmation of that report, and have heard nothing whatever on the subject.
  MR. BOURKE: I should like to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs two Questions—First, whether he can give the House any more information than he was able to afford yesterday with reference to the earthworks which are said to be erected in the harbour of Alexandria; and, also, whether the French Government have yet consented to the publication of the Papers up to the latest period? I understood yesterday from the hon. Baronet that he could only lay the Papers up to January upon the Table; but I trust we shall have them up to a much later date.
  SIR CHARLES W. DILKE: With regard to the Papers, we have not yet received any answer from the French Government. My impression is their consent was asked, not yesterday, but to-day. With regard to the earthworks at Alexandria, there are, undoubtedly, some earthworks that have been thrown up; but they are not armed in any way. Sir Beauchamp Seymour has been in communication with the Government on the subject.
  MR. BOURKE: Has any communication been made to the Egyptian Government on the subject of the earthworks?
  SIR CHARLES W. DILKE: No, Sir; not at present. It is desirable that I should state in advance that I do not think it would be proper for me to answer any Questions that might be addressed to me next week on the subject of these earthworks, because there might be matters passing in respect of them on which it would be undesirable to speak. I can only say that the matter has not escaped the attention of Her Majesty's Government.
  MR. MACFARLANE: I wish to ask, whether the Representatives of the Western Powers in Egypt have conveyed to Arabi Pasha that they hold him responsible for the safety of the Khedive; and, if not, whether they will consider the propriety of doing so?
  SIR CHARLES W. DILKE: Some considerable time ago the Representatives of the Western Powers conveyed

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  to Arabi Pasha, in pretty general terms, the intention of the Government to hold him responsible for the maintenance of order in Egypt.
  MR. BOURKE: I beg to give Notice that on Monday I will ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs another Question with respect to further Papers on Egyptian Affairs. I will ask him whether the Government of England has not agreed with the Government of France for the production of Papers up to a later date?

  PREVENTION OF CRIME (IRELAND) BILL, CLAUSE 1—ALLEGED RESIGNATION OF JUDGES.
  MR. HEALYasked Mr. Attorney General for Ireland, Whether there was any truth in the report of the intended resignation of many of the Irish Judges; and whether, before the passing of the 1st clause of the Bill, the Government would inform the House of the new appointments? Further, he wished to know whether it was a fact that Mr. Murphy, a son-in-law of Judge Keogh, was likely to be appointed? Also what reply, if any, had been given to the unanimous Memorial sent by the Irish Judges to the Government, declaring that the Bill in its present form was calculated to seriously impair the confidence of the Irish people in the maintenance of the integrity of the judicial system?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON): I can only say that I am unable to answer that series of Questions without further information.
  MR. HEALYsaid, he begged to repeat the Question to the Prime Minister. He wished to know what answer had been given to the declaration of the Irish Judges; whether any resignations, or notices of intended resignations, among the Irish Bench had been received; and, whether it was intended to appoint Mr. Justice Keogh's son-in-law, or any other creature of the Government? [Cries of "Order!"]
  MR. GLADSTONE: Sir, with regard to the first Question of the hon. Gentleman, I shall be much obliged to him if he will put it upon the Paper, because my memory does not serve me as to the channel through which the Memorial has reached the Government, or the formal steps that have been taken with respect to it. Of course, the hon. Member will
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  have a proper answer if the Question be put on the Paper. With respect to the resignation of the Irish Judges, I am very much in the same position as my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney General for Ireland, for I have no information on the subject, and I am, I must say, in a somewhat incredulous frame of mind, up to the present time, with regard to it; because I think it is probable—indeed, it is highly probable—that a rumour of that kind has arisen from the fact that Her Majesty has been pleased to approve of the appointment of an Irish Judge to the position of a Law Lordship in the House of Lords, thereby creating a vacancy on the Irish Bench. As to filling up that vacancy, no communications have taken place with the Lord Lieutenant; but I am quite sure that when any decision is taken on the matter, it will be taken with a due sense of its importance, and with a careful regard to all the considerations involved.
  MR. HEALYasked, whether the Government would inform the House, before Clause 1 of the Bill was passed, what person had been appointed to fill the vacancy?
  MR. GLADSTONE: That is a matter primarily for the consideration of the Irish Government, and especially of the Viceroy; and we have had no communications with them on the subject.

  COMPANIES' ACTS, 1862 & 1867— DIRECTORS OF COMPANIES.
  MR. P. MARTINasked Mr. Attorney General, Whether his attention has been called to a decision made by Mr. Justice Fry on the settlement of the list of contributories in the winding up of the Electric and Magnetic Company, Limited, and reported in the "Morning Post" of the 22nd May, whereby it appeared that a gentleman who had permitted his name to be advertised as chairman of a company, and applied for shares to qualify him as a director, and who had attended and presided at several meetings of the board, was struck off the list of contributories by reason of his having withdrawn his application for shares a short time previously to the company going into liquidation; whether for the protection of the public he will consider the desirability of so amending the law as to secure that gentlemen who permit their names to be published as directors

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  and attend board meetings shall not be allowed on any technical grounds to escape liability from the just demands of the creditors of the company over which they have so acted as directors; and, whether there is any probability of early legislation on this matter?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir HENRY JAMES): Sir, my attention was not called to this Question until I saw it on the Paper; but I have made inquiries, mainly of the learned counsel engaged in the case, and he informs me that the decision of Mr. Justice Fry only followed a precedent laid down by the Court of Appeal, and that there was really no contract at all which could be enforced.

ORDER OF THE DAY.
  PREVENTION OF CRIME (IRELAND) BILL.— [BILL 157.]
  (Secretary Sir William Harcourt, Mr. Gladstone, Mr. Attorney General, Mr. Solicitor General, Mr. Attorney General for Ireland, Mr. Solicitor General for Ireland.)
  PREVENTION OF CRIME (IRELAND) BILL.— [BILL 157.]

    COMMITTEE. [Progress 1st Jnne.]
    [THIRD NIGHT.]
    Bill considered in Committee.
    (In the Committee.)

  PART I.

    SPECIAL COMMISSION.
    Clause 1 (Special Commission Court).
    Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 17, to leave out the words "treason or treason felony."—(Mr. Horace Davey.)
    Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause."
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, it might be for the convenience of the Committee if he were to state at once the views of the Government with respect to the question raised upon this clause. A discussion took place yesterday as to the period which was to apply to the operation of the Court, so far as the questions of treason and treason-felony were affected; and he admitted, on behalf of the Government, that those offences ought not to be placed upon the same footing as the other offences specified in the clause. So far as regarded the period when the Bill came
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    into operation, the Government had carefully considered the matter, and they were prepared to amend the clause so as to provide, in respect of treason and treason-felony, that the Bill should not have a retrospective action, but that it should apply only to offences committed after the Act had come into operation. As regarded other offences the Act would remain unaltered.
    MR. PARNELLsaid, that the decision of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Home Secretary was satisfactory as far as it went; but he regretted very much that the right hon. and learned Gentleman did not feel it his duty to go further, and to state to the Committee that he was prepared to give up the sub-section altogether. He did not imagine that the Government wished to proceed in any vindictive spirit in regard to past offences; but it must be borne in mind that various Members of that House might have spoken in Ireland in the course of the agitation which had been carried on during the last few years; and he certainly thought the concession went a very little way in removing the objections which were entertained to the sub-section as it stood in the Bill. The offences of treason and treason-felony were highly constructive, and, unless a person carried a legal guide in his pocket, it would be almost impossible to be perfectly sure that on every occasion he was avoiding the meshes of the Statute relating to these offences. He wished to point out to the Committee that there had been an entire absence of any attempt on the part of the Government, or on the part of any speaker, in support of this sub-section to justify it in any way whatever. He had asked the right hon. and learned Attorney General for Ireland yesterday whether he could mention any instance in which a jury had not been able to decide according to the weight of evidence in any trial for murder in Ireland during the last two years, and the right hon. and learned Gentleman had not taken up the challenge. He would now again ask the right hon. and learned Gentleman if he could recollect any instance in the whole criminal jurisprudence of Ireland, during the last century, in which a jury had failed to decide in accordance with the weight of evidence in a trial for treason or treason-felony? He was willing to allow the right hon. and learned Gentle-

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    man to go back for 100 years, and he would challenge him to produce a single instance in which an Irish jury had ever failed to decide against the weight of evidence in the case of a person accused of treason or treason-felony. A good many instances might be cited in which men had been convicted of these offences. If they took the Rebellion of 1798, if they took the abortive Rebellion of 1848, or Robert Emmett's ill-starred attempt in 1803, or the attempts that were made in 1865 and 1867, it would be found that in all those rebellious movements scores and scores of persons were convicted by Irish juries on charges of treason and treason-felony. They were, therefore, entitled to have some sort of ground and foundation for the claim of the Government that these offences should be placed outside the ordinary Constitution. It had, unfortunately, been the habit of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Home Secretary, in the discussions upon this clause, to endeavour to impute to everybody who wished to except a certain offence from the provisions of the section sympathy with the offence sought to be excepted; but he (Mr. Parnell) wished to point out that up to the present time it had always been considered that accused persons were innocent until they were proved to be guilty; and when hon. Members desired to observe the ordinary Constitutional safeguards and the ordinary forms of law provided for accused persons in Ireland, even in the case of persons accused of treason and treason-felony, it was very hard they should be charged with sympathy with those crimes, and accused of acting in the interests of murderers and treasonable persons. He would himself answer the question he had addressed to the right hon. and learned Attorney General for Ireland. There had been one exception during the whole course of the last 100 years in which an Irish jury failed to decide according to the weight of evidence. He referred to the trial of Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, in 1848, on the charge of high treason. Sir Charles Gavan Duffy was tried twice for his life, and he was saved on each occasion—he (Mr. Parnell) would not say from death, but certainly from penal servitude—by one or two of the jury having held out against the majority. But what would have been the fate of Sir Charles Gavan Duffy under this Bill?
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    It must be borne in mind that Sir Charles had since been knighted by the Queen; that he had become Premier of Victoria and Speaker of the Legislative Assembly there. What would have been his fate if tried by a Special Commission under this clause? Beyond doubt he would have been sentenced to death; and although that death sentence would probably have been commuted to penal servitude for life, Sir Charles would, at all events, have been degraded, and a gentleman who had since proved himself a most brilliant statesman and a distinguished ornament to the literature of this country and of the Colonies would have been disgraced. It was a remarkable fact that political prisoners in this country were treated like ordinary criminals. There was no special treatment for persons convicted of political offences; but they were treated as degraded felons, and as if they had been guilty of crimes of the most atrocious and abominable character. The Committee had been reminded, over and over again, of what took place at Portland and Dartmouth, and they appeared to be forgetful of all those feelings of humanity which animated the Prime Minister when he interfered on behalf of the Neapolitan prisoners. He (Mr. Parnell), and those who thought with him, claimed, on this ground also, that the safeguards of the Constitution should not be removed, and that political prisoners in Ireland, with such a dreadful fate before them as that involved in penal servitude, should not be deprived of the Constitutional guarantees promised to them when the Act regarding treason and treason-felony was passed. When that Act was placed before Parliament—it was introduced by Sir John Romilly, and its object was to alter the character of treason to a considerable extent, and to do away with the death punishment. It was expressly defended by Sir John Romilly, on the ground that the accused person would always have the Constitutional safeguard of trial by jury. That declaration was made in the year 1848, when the times were tenfold more troublesome in Ireland than they were now, and when outrages and murders of every description were threefold as numerous. Sir John Romilly, in bringing in the Crown and Government Security Bill, said—
    "The mode in which persons are to express their intention of committing these crimes is

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    either by printing, writing, or by open and advised speaking. No speaking can fall within the penalty of these statutes unless it be such as is used for the purpose of levying war, by force to compel the Queen or this House to take certain measures without which force they would not be disposed to adopt them. You must also have a jury of twelve men, who shall be of opinion that the speaking has been of such a nature as is calculated for the purpose of levying such war. The Act limits the nature of the evidence to be given, and requires the evidence of certain overt acts to be given, such as printing, writing, and open and advised speaking. It has been frequently observed that speaking is liable to much misrepresentation, and that you have frequently words reported not supposed to have been spoken. In those cases the difficulty of proof will form a safeguard for the accused; and the party, as I said before, must be tried by a common jury. He will have the benefit of that jury; and I have always heard it said that it was part of our Constitution to have confidence in the verdict of a jury; and I do not think you will get juries to convict unless they are convinced that the open and advised speaking was of such a nature as that pointed out by the statute."—[3 Hansard, xcviii. 97–8.]
    In that passage there was evidently an admission on the part of the Solicitor General for England, which position Sir John Romilly then occupied, that he would not he justified in asking the assent of the House of Commons to the Bill in reference to treason-felony, unless it was provided that the person accused should have the benefit of a jury. Sir John Romilly did not foresee that the time would arrive when, in a much more tranquil state of society, all the Constitutional guarantees for the life and liberty of the subject would be suspended in Ireland, and advantage would be taken of such Acts as this to put men in danger of their liberty for offences of this character. It had been said that it was very difficult to prove high treason as regarded public speaking. The question was, what constituted high treason? Mr. Justice Stephen laid down that almost every political riot was high treason; so that if at a meeting in Ireland a riot took place between the police and the people—as happened in Dublin just before the arrests last October—the Judges would be entitled to hold that it was an act of high treason, and that all persons accused of participating in it could be tried under this provision. The Government would be further entitled to hold that words spoken at a public meeting on such an occasion, however innocently they were spoken, were intended to be an incitement to riot and levying war against the Crown.
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    It had been said by the Home Secretary that what he wanted to reach was treasonable societies that were worked by means of murder and outrage. If the right hon. and learned Gentleman wished to reach treasonable societies that were worked by means of murder and outrage, he had a way open to him in the subsequent sections of this Bill which applied to murder. If there were treasonable societies in existence in Ireland which were worked by means of murder and outrage, those societies were not only treasonable societies, but they were murderous societies; and under the Law of Murder, which, according to the statement of the Home Secretary yesterday, was a Judge made law, and not a mere constructive law, they could be dealt with. The law regarding treason and treason-felony rested upon Statute Law. The Government had perfect liberty to indict persons belonging to such societies, if it could be shown that they had knowledge of such murderous intentions on the part of any member of such societies, and the Judges would hang them upon conviction. They did not require—he might almost say, to sanctify murder by identifying it. They had a remedy straight and direct. That remedy was by proceeding against the offence itself, which they said they desired to reach. They had every opportunity of punishing murder and outrage, under a subsequent subsection of the Bill, without mixing political offences up with the matter at all. He hoped it was not yet too late to influence, if possible, the mind of the Government in regard to this matter. He believed, as he had said last night, that they had a favourable opportunity in Ireland, at the present moment, for restoring law and order if they did not proceed in a vindictive fashion. If they sought to proceed in a vindictive fashion, and to take away all the rights of the Irish people, he feared that their measure of conciliation, which was to follow, would prove a failure. They made a great mistake last Session in carrying a Coercion Bill before proceeding with their remedial measure. He was convinced that if they had proceeded at the commencement of last Session to carry their Land Act, it would have met with a different reception, and would have had a very much better trial at the hands of the Irish people. In the same way he believed now that very much of the good

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    effect of the Arrears Bill would be lost if the Government insisted on proceeding with this vindictive Coercion Bill. The Irish people were a very susceptible people; they were very quick to recognize any reliance on their honour and their good feeling; and if the English Government relied more on the honour and good feeling of the Irish people than they were in the habit of doing, they would find their task of governing Ireland very much easier than it had been. They had, unfortunately, relied too much on their brute strength; they had used that brute strength from year to year, and from century to century; and where had it left them? It had left them in a state, which, according to the Prime Minister, had never been equalled in intensity in Ireland. Was it not time, then, to turn over a new leaf and reverse the evil traditions of the past; to trust more to the power of affection, to the feeling that justice was being administered, and that generosity was being extended to Ireland? If the Government had the strength to try this course, they would find that they would not be disappointed. They were now, in including in the Bill such provisions as this—provisions directed against political offences arising out of open and advised speaking—depriving the Constitutional politician in Ireland of every kind of locus standi. Between the secret societies on the one side, and the Government on the other, it would be impossible for any Constitutional politician to exist; and he thought that the feeling of the Irish Members, knowing as they did the state of affairs in that country, and desirous as they were of truthfully representing it to the House of Commons in this very grave and important crisis—he thought their feeling should have some regard paid to it; and when a point had been urged so strongly, as they felt it their duty to urge this point, the Government should consider whether they could not give way to the overwhelming sentiment which had been expressed.
    MR. MORGAN LLOYDsaid, it was very satisfactory to observe the tone in which the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell) had addressed the Committee. The tone of the hon. Member's speech had been moderate throughout, and what he had said was, no doubt, well worthy of consideration. At the same time, it did seem to him (Mr.
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    Morgan Lloyd) that the arguments of the hon. Member were divisible into two sections. The first class of arguments were directed against the operation of the Bill altogether—against the doing away with trial by jury and the other main provisions of the Bill; and the other class of arguments were based upon a misunderstanding of the existing law. A great deal had been said by the hon. Member in regard to the danger of trying a person for treason or treason-felony upon statements made in open and advised speeches. But he would tell the hon. Member that by the law now in force no man could be found guilty of treason or treason-felony for words spoken, however extravagant the sentiments uttered might be. No doubt, for two years after the passing of the Treason-Felony Act, treasonable words were a sufficient ground for an indictment for treason or treason-felony; but that ceased at the end of two years after the passing of the Act. And even then, in order to prove a case of high treason or treason-felony against anyone charged, it was necessary, in order to constitute the offence, that the speech should be reduced to writing or printing, and have been published by or with the authority of the person charged. Nothing less than that would do, except some overt act of high treason. A great deal had been said about the uncertainty of the Law of High Treason; and his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr. H. Davey) had made some remarks which were calculated to mislead the Committee, owing to the weight that any statement of the law made by his hon. and learned Friend deservedly had. Instead, however, of being, as his hon. and learned Friend stated, Judge-made law, no portion of the law of England or of Ireland was more thoroughly defined by Statute than the Law of Treason. The Law of Treason rested on Statutes, and on nothing else. Before the 36th year of Edward III., treason was Judge-made law; but by 36 Edward III. all Judge-made law was entirely done away with, and the provisions of that Statute remained in force down to the present day. That Statute contained a clear definition of treason, and prohibited the Judges from entertaining any charge of treason which was not within the words of the Statute without

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    the authority of Parliament. The offences declared to be high treason by that Statute were the following:—
    "(1.) When a man doth compass the death of our lord the king, of our lady the queen, or of their eldest son and heir.
    (2.) If a man do violate the king's companion or eldest daughter if unmarried, or the wife of the king's eldest son and heir.
    (3.) If a man do levy war against our lord the king in his realms.
    (4.) If a man he adherent to the king's enemies in the realm.
    (5.) If a man slays the king's chancellor or king's justices.
    No other offence to be declared treason except by Parliament."
    These offences were all declared to be treason by that Statute. Acts were passed in the Reigns of Henry VIII., Mary, and Elizabeth, extending the Law of High Treason; but they had since all been repealed. There were also two Acts still in force which were directed against the Pretender; but those were not applicable now. The next was the 57 Geo. III., which made it treason to "compass or intend death or bodily harm to the person of the king." The last Statute was the 11 Geo. IV. and 1 Will. IV., which provided that forging the Great Seal should be a treasonable offence. Those were all the Acts defining treason which now remained in force, and they comprised the whole of the Statute Law as it existed in England and Ireland at this moment, and formed a complete Code of the Law of High Treason. Anything beyond that was without authority. The hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell) had spoken of constructive treason. No doubt, these Statutes, like other Statutes, had been construed by the Judges, whose duty it was to construe them, and apply their provisions to any given state of facts. But no Judge could extend the Statutes, and the law at present was based on the statutory declarations contained in these Acts. He came now to treason-felony. Treason-felony was an offence unknown to the Common Law. It was an offence constituted by the 11 Vict. c. 12, s. 3; and he would read the words of the section, as they were very short. Section 3 enacted that—
    "If any person whatsoever, after the passing of this Act, shall within the United Kingdom, or without, compass, imagine, or invent, devise, or intend to deprive or depose our most gracious lady the Queen, her heirs or successors from the
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    style, honour, or royal name of the imperial crown of the United Kingdom, or of any other of her Majesty's dominions and countries, or to levy war against her Majesty, her heirs or successors, within any part of the United Kingdom, in order by force or constraint to compel her or them to change her or their measures or counsels, or in order to put force or constraint upon or in order to intimidate or overawe both or either House of Parliament, or to move or stir any foreigner or stranger with force to invade the United Kingdom or any other her Majesty's dominions or countries under the obeisance of her Majesty, her heirs or successors, and such compassing imaginations, inventions, devices, and intentions, or any of them, shall express, utter, or declare, by publishing any printing or writing, or by any overt act or deed, such person shall be guilty of felony."
    But no prosecution for merely publishing treasonable documents could be instituted except within two years after the passing of the Act. His hon. Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Labouchere) had said that the holding of a meeting to overawe Parliament in Trafalgar Square would amount to treason-felony; but in that he was entirely mistaken. The first portion of the section governed the whole. The essence of the offence was a compassing, imagining, inventing, or in tending to depose the Queen, or a levying war within the Realm. If a man had such intention in his mind, and committed some overt act in order to carry out his intention, he would be guilty of treason-felony; but no overawing of Parliament, or holding seditious meetings, came within the Act, unless it was done in pursuance of such intention. He would therefore ask, why should not treason and treason-felony be cognizable under the new Act? Why were not three Judges, subject to an appeal to six Judges, all six of whom must be unanimous in their decision, be a proper tribunal to try any person who was guilty of either of those offences? The hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell) stated last night that if the Bill passed in its present shape it would not be safe for him or his friends to hold meetings in Ireland; but that they might be arrested if they did so for treason or treason-felony. Now, the fact was that they might go through Ireland from one end to the other and use any expressions they pleased without being liable to be arrested for the crime of treason or treason-felony under the new jurisdiction, unless it could be proved that they had committed some overt act with the intention either of levying war against the Queen or of doing some in-

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    jury to the reigning Sovereign. Unless that could be proved, the hon. Member might go all over Ireland, as far as this particular clause was concerned, without incurring the risk of being charged with the commission of these offences. Under these circumstances, he thought it could not be shown that they were not offences that ought to be included in the new jurisdiction. But there was another question—namely, that if this Amendment were carried, it would diminish the power of the Judges over the other offences enumerated in the clause. There was not one of the offences enumerated in the 1st clause which might not be an overt act of treason or treason-felony. A murder, for example, might be an overt act of treason or treason-felony; and when a man was charged with murder an attempt might be made on that ground to withdraw the offence from the jurisdiction of three Judges acting without a jury. Every one of the offences specified in the clause and sought to be brought within the jurisdiction of the new Court might be made, in particular cases, an overt act of treason or treason-felony. If the Amendment were agreed to an attempt to try one of these cases might be objected to by the counsel who appeared for the prisoners on the ground of want of jurisdiction. The charge might be for murder, but, nevertheless, not a simple murder, but one involving an overt act of high treason; and what would be the result? The jurisdiction under the new Act would be taken away, and the accused person would have to be tried by the ordinary tribunal. He should certainly vote against the Amendment, and he trusted that the Government would maintain the Bill as it stood, and not allow the measure to be weakened by inserting the Amendment.
    MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell), and hon. Gentlemen sitting behind him, appeared to entertain great alarm lest the Government, by means of the new powers they claimed under the Bill, should show themselves to be unduly severe against the crimes of treason and treason-felony. He, however, should have thought that the personal experience of the hon. Member for Cork would have convinced him of the opposite result. The hon. Gentleman might recollect that he himself was put in prison on a charge of treason-felony only some
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    seven months ago, and the Committee were aware that the Government pledged themselves that they would not commit any man to prison on any charge which would not in their belief, in ordinary times, have subjected him to conviction by a jury. Therefore, it was plain that, so far as the Government were concerned, they believed the hon. Member, in quiet times, was likely to have been found by a jury guilty of treason-felony seven months ago; and yet the hon. Gentleman now found himself in the agreeable position of dictating to the Government what they were to do with treason-felony in Ireland. The debate last night was remarkable for this peculiarity, that the Amendment was supported by speakers belonging to almost every section of the Liberal Party. He did not know exactly what amount of support that fact indicated; but he would warn hon. Gentlemen who sat behind him—hon. Gentlemen from Ireland—not to count too much on Liberal support in this matter. It was an easy thing to speak in favour of the Common Law of the land, and against a Coercion Bill; and it had the additional merit, in the eyes of many Liberal Members, of conciliating that important part of the constituency known as the Irish vote. He warned hon. Members behind him, however, that if there was the least chance of the Government being defeated, on that or on any other important Amendment, the Liberal Party would come forward, as they always had come forward, to support the Government. They knew very well that the Government were sure of Conservative support; and, therefore, although he did not in the least doubt their sincerity and their affection for liberty and law, it was not uncharitable to say that their own affection for the enforcement of the preliminary conditions of civilization would very likely remain entirely Platonic. It appeared that all the odium was to be cast upon the Conservative Party, who were prepared to see the Government over their difficulty. He believed that the Conservative Party, in the present instance, would do all they conceived to be their duty, although it was by no means a pleasant task to support the Government in a measure of coercion. He, for his own part, in the vote he meant to give in favour of the Government, did not mean in the least degree to express a general confidence in their policy, or

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    any admiration for this particular measure of coercion. He had supported the Government last Session in the coercion policy then brought forward, although he thought at the time, and still believed, that the Government themselves had come to think now that their Bill was an extremely bad one. What was the position of the matter? The Government had the confidence of the majority of that House, and it was possible, although not very probable, that they had also the confidence of the country at large. At all events, they were the Government; there was no chance of their being displaced, and it was the bounden duty of the House to assist them in doing that which every Government must do—namely, preserve law and order. When the Government came down to the House and said, after mature consideration, they were fully convinced that certain clauses were absolutely necessary in order to secure the proper working of this Bill; having made that declaration, they ought to receive the general support of the House; but if they showed any intention of going back from that declaration, not because they might have changed their convictions, but because pressure of some kind had been put upon them, either by hon. Members from Ireland behind him or by some of their more immediate supporters, it would be necessary to take a different action, because the only possible inference the House could draw was that the Government were acting under pressure of some kind or another. But, under existing circumstances, it appeared to him to be the plain duty of the Committee, without at all pledging themselves to any particular admiration for their policy, to help them to do that which was their first duty. Her Majesty's Government told the House, upon their responsibility as Ministers of the Crown, that the present machinery for preserving law and order in Ireland was imperfect, and must be amended. As the Government of the day, they alone had the power of controlling the machinery, and the Conservative Party had no power of taking the control into their own hands. It must be left entirely in the hands of the Government; and, therefore, the first duty of the House was not to prevent them from doing that which they declared to be absolutely necessary in
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    order to enable them to make proper use of the power which must be given to any Government. For these reasons he should support the Government, and should oppose the Amendment. He believed that the House were called upon to assist the Government in remedying any defects in the existing machinery of the law which they considered to be defective.
    MR. SERJEANT SIMONsaid, that, although he differed from the Home Secretary in regard to this particular question, be did not think it could be said of him that in his attitude towards the clause under discussion he had displayed any apprehension of the Irish vote in his constituency. In the borough he had the honour to represent (Dewsbury) there was considerable voting power in the hands of Irishmen. He had, nevertheless, supported the Coercion Bill of last Session, and he had voted for the second reading of the present Bill; but, notwithstanding the arguments he had listened to last night from the Home Secretary, he was not convinced of the necessity for this sub-section. As he understood the Bill, it was introduced for the purpose of meeting a state of things which was beyond the reach of the ordinary law. It was a Bill for the purpose of bringing punishment home to those who were charged with the offences of treason and treason-felony, and other offences. Now, what were the offences which the ordinary law, and the ordinary mode of trial, had failed to reach? As he understood, from the statement made by the Home Secretary, on the introduction of the Bill, it was that class of outrage commonly known as "agrarian," ranging from murder down to assault on the person, and including attacks on property and injury to cattle belonging to tenant farmers. He had not yet heard that, in any case of treason or treason-felony, the ordinary mode of trial had failed. He had not heard it said that the crime of treason or treason-felony had been committed during the last two years in Ireland at all. His right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary, last night, in reply to his hon. and learned Friend (Mr. H. Davey), who introduced the Amendment, said that there was a precedent for the introduction of the offences of treason and treason-felony into the Bill. The right hon. and learned Gentleman referred to the suspension of

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    the Habeas Corpus Act and the Coercion Act of last Session; but he (Mr. Serjeant Simon) thought there was no analogy between the Coercion Act of last Session and the Bill now before the Committee. The Coercion Act of last Session was a preventive measure. The then Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant, the right hon. Member for Bradford (Mr. W. E. Forster), had over and over again stated, in that House and elsewhere, that the object of that Act was not to punish, but to prevent the commission of crime. The object of the present Bill was not to prevent the commission of crime, but to search it out and follow it up by punishment. Instead of being a preventive measure, the present Bill was a punitive one. Therefore, the analogy did not hold good, seeing that the Bill before the Committee was intended to punish certain offences, in regard to which it was asserted that the ordinary modes of trial were abortive. If it could be shown that treason and treason-felony existed in Ireland, and that it was not possible to bring the offenders to justice, because the law failed to reach them, then, he would say, include those offences in the Bill; but, in the absence of such evidence, he could not see why such offences should be included in the Bill. Such offences had occurred in Ireland; but the ordinary law had hitherto been sufficient to deal with them. His right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary said the present state of Ireland was manifested by the abominable outrage which took place in Phœnix Park; and he further asserted that that outrage proved the existence of a disloyal and treasonable spirit throughout the country. Now, he (Mr. Serjeant Simon) contended that the murders in Phœnix Park were murders simply. They were not treasonable murders; they were neither treason nor treason-felony; and there was not a clause in the present Bill which would reach them. It was said that the distinction which had been drawn by some of his hon. Friends on that side of the House between criminal offences and ordinary political offences was a sentimental one. If it was, he was bound to admit that he fully shared in that sentimental objection. There was no doubt that the crime of treason was of the very gravest character. Political offences, however, did not spring from the sordid motives
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    which gave birth to ordinary crimes; and the two ought not to be classed together. In the case of political offences, acts were done in furtherance of what the unfortunate people who committed them believed to be the good of the general public; and that was a very different motive from avarice or gain, or personal vindictiveness, which inspired other offences. At all events, offenders were entitled to a fair and impartial trial. He did not join in the animadversions which had fallen from some Members on the other side of the House respecting the Irish Bench. He had the pleasure of knowing several of the Irish Judges; and he believed that, in learning, integrity, ability, and high-mindedness, they did not fall short of our own Judges; and he had no doubt about their doing justice in every case that was properly brought within their jurisdiction. But he had a decided objection to intrust to any Judge the trial of a political offence; because, however high-minded he might be, however honourable, and however anxious to do what was right, there must be, more or less, a bias in the mind of a man who had to try an offence against which all his sympathies were directed. He had had some personal experience in a matter of this kind. He was one of the counsel in the last political State Trial in this country. He He referred to the case of Dr. Bernard, who was tried for complicity in the Orsini conspiracy. Political feeling ran high at the time, and the counsel engaged in the case not only scanned most anxiously the panel of the jurors, but the political views of the Judges appointed to try the case. He recollected how very anxiously they looked at the political leanings of the Judges selected to try Dr. Bernard. But, notwithstanding the fact that the trial took place in England, and that every confidence existed in the impartiality of English Judges, there was a good deal of fear lest the smallest amount of political bias should be brought to bear upon the case. How much stronger, then, would this be in Ireland, where the Judges would have, under this Bill, to determine issues of fact? There was another consideration that ought to weigh in a matter of this kind, and it had been referred to last night by an hon. Friend near him. It was this—that without a jury there was no check upon a Judge.

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    It might not be possible to know what part of the judicial decision was law-made, or what was Judge-made, because they might have no opportunity of hearing the reasons or the authority. There would not, or there need not, be any statement of the law, as in the case of charging a jury upon a legal point. They would have, under the new tribunal, no opportunity of knowing the views taken by the Judges, and no means of correcting them if they were wrong. In the State Trial to which he had just referred a great number of questions of law were raised; and if the Judges had ruled wrongly, they had another Court to go to with an appeal against the ruling. They were now proposing to refer political trials to a tribunal of Judges only. They all knew that political questions were of a most elastic nature, and by submitting a case to the idiosyncrasies of Judges there would be great risk of colouring legal decisions with moral prepossessions. A Judge would lay down the law for himself, and the reasons for his decision, and even the decision itself might never be known, and could not be reviewed. Everything was in the hands of the Judge; he summed up the case for himself; he heard the evidence; he laid down the law for himself; the views he took were within his own mind and within his own breast, and no one was able to know whether he had been in conflict with the law or not. Upon these grounds he (Mr. Serjeant Simon) ventured to think that the Committee ought not to intrust too much power to Judges in the trial of political cases. Treason and treason-felony were political offences. It might be said, in the state of things which existed in Ireland, that where there was strong political feeling one way or the other—that where, as stated last night by the right hon. and learned Member for the University of Dublin (Mr. Gibson), there was so great an amount of disloyalty, they could not trust to a jury, because they might have a man on the jury who was, for instance, a Fenian. No doubt that might be said; but it could be equally said at all times when treasonable offences were tried. Charges of treason and treason-felony were never made except at times of great political excitement. Treason and treason-felony were the offspring of political excitement; but it did not fol-
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    low that juries were not to be trusted to deal with such offences. He remembered the trial referred to by the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell). He remembered the State Trials which occurred nearly 35 years ago in Dublin; but he also recollected that, although political feeling ran high in Ireland at the time, with one or two exceptions, the men who were put upon their trial—and among them were some of the most popular men in the country—were convicted. Therefore, he thought there was nothing in the argument based on the fact that political bias and excitement would prevent jurors from doing their duty. For his own part, he valued trial by jury so highly that he would rather see a man improperly acquitted than he would trust the liberty of the subject to the Judges without the assistance of a jury. It must be borne in mind that the Judges were servants of the Crown, that they held their appointments direct from the Crown, and that they would be at once prosecutors and Judges. No doubt, they would go into Court with well-balanced minds, and with highly-trained intelligence; but he failed to see anything in this particular case which would justify the Legislature in abolishing trial by jury for such offences as treason and treason-felony. The Home Secretary said it was not home Irishmen that he was afraid of, but American-Irishmen, emissaries from abroad who came over here for the purpose of exciting animosity between England and Ireland. It was against these that the clause was said to be directed. But this Act provided the means of dealing with these persons in another and more effectual manner, inasmuch as it contained clauses for the re-enaction of the Alien Act. The Bill would, therefore, when it passed into law, contain power for their expulsion from the country; and this he regarded as a much better remedy than that of bringing them to trial for treason or treason-felony. The interests of the country demanded that these evil-doers should be rooted out, and that they should be got rid of by sending them out of the Kingdom. He repeated that this would be a more effective mode of dealing with them than bringing them before the tribunal which the Bill proposed. He need not point out to hon. Members that one of the most peculiar

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    characteristics of a Court of Justice was the confidence which the public had in the impartiality of the Judges; but that confidence, he believed, would not exist when it was found that political prisoners were brought before a tribunal composed of persons who were servants of the Crown. He would support the Bill in all those parts of it which provided remedies which did not now exist, and dealt with crimes which the ordinary law did not reach. He said this after hearing the arguments of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Home Secretary, in answer to his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr. H. Davey). Those arguments had failed to convince him that the sub-section in question was necessary; and he regarded it as most inexpedient that it should form part of the measure.
    MR. BULWERsaid, he had listened with great attention to the remarks of the hon. and learned Gentleman who had just sat down, which remarks, however, had failed to convince him that there was any reason for omitting the sub-section relating to treason and treason-felony. The hon. and learned Gentleman admitted the high character of the Irish Judges; and yet, in cases of treason and treason-felony, he thought it better to have a trial by a jury composed of 12 men such as might be expected to be got together in Ireland. Had the question before the Committee related to the relative capacities of the two tribunals, he should have thought his hon. and learned Friend would have conceded that a tribunal of three Judges would be infinitely superior to one composed of 12, probably ignorant, men, especially if the crime before them was treason-felony, which they were so often told involved very intricate considerations. It would seem that his hon. and learned Friend wished the Committee to draw the inference that the Judges of the Special Commission Court would sit mute while the evidence in the case before them was being given, and that, when it was concluded, they would simply say—"We find the prisoner 'Guilty' or 'Not Guilty,'" as the case might be. But did his hon. and learned Friend suppose that this tribunal, composed of three Judges, would not state in Court the facts on which their judgments were founded, in order to give satisfaction to the public, and also to liberate their own
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    consciences? The Judges would, of course, state their reasons, as was the practice in every Court in this country and in Ireland. According to the inference suggested by the hon. and learned Member for Dewsbury (Mr. Serjeant Simon), one might as well expect that a Judge of Appeal, or one who sat alone at any trial, would deliver judgment for the plaintiff or the defendant without giving the reasons on which his judgment was based. Why, it was certain that a Judge would not hold his seat very long under such circumstances; but this had never been the practice, and he ventured to say that it never would be. He confessed that incalculable mischief had been done by Lord O'Hagan's Act, which lowered the class of men from whom Irish juries were drawn; and he had heard the effect of that Act criticized in Ireland by laymen and gentlemen of the Legal Profession also in their arguments before the Judges. Moreover, not long ago, he asked one of the Judges how the Act was working, and the answer was "fairly well." By way of illustration, he said that at the last Assizes a man had been brought before him for a violent and brutal assault; the offence having been proved up to the hilt, he summed up to the jury for a conviction; but the jury acquitted. In the course of the same Assizes, the same man appeared before him as the complainant in another case of brutal assault. Again, the summing up was for a conviction; but an acquittal followed. Next day the Judge asked the Clerk of Arraigns if a man sitting in front of the jury box was not the man who had been defendant in one case of assault and complainant in another, to which the Clerk of Arraigns replied, "Bedad, my Lord, and heis." "So," said the Judge, "Lord O'Hagan's Act works fairly well in this respect—that a man at the Assizes is tried by his peers." He hoped the Government would stand firm in their refusal to accept the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Christchurch (Mr. H. Davey), and he was prepared to give them his loyal support in passing a measure which, in their judgment, it was absolutely necessary to introduce owing to the present condition of Ireland. But he ventured to think that if Her Majesty's Government were prepared to listen to appeals, the object of which was to whittle down

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    the Act, such a policy was not well calculated to give satisfaction to those on that side of the House, who were prepared to support them loyally. In opposing the Amendment he was not actuated by any of those brutal or bloodthirsty feelings which hon. Members from Ireland were accustomed to attribute to everyone who advocated the repression of crime in that country. Now, his hon. and learned Friend gave it as one reason for striking out from the Bill the sub-section relating to treason and treason-felony, that there had been no case of trial for treason within the last two years. [An hon. MEMBER: Ten years.] An hon. Gentleman said 10 years, and, no doubt, that was correct. There had, then, been no trial for treason or treason-felony during the last 10 years; but he would like to know how many gentlemen had been in prison for treason during the last two years? Why were those men imprisoned, whom the right hon. and learned Attorney General for Ireland referred to in that speech of his as being "steeped to their lips in treason?" Was it not that because there could be no doubt that if they had been brought before such a jury as he had described there would have been no chance of their being convicted? He was not one of the persons referred to, and was, therefore, unable to judge, except from the public utterances which responsible Ministers in that House addressed to the country, what were the actual reasons for keeping them in prison. His hon. and learned Friend opposite said, with great authoritativeness, that the murders in the Phœnix Park were not connected with treason. But how was it possible for him to know that? The inference which he (Mr. Bulwer) drew was that it was an overt act of treason; and, therefore, he regarded the suggestion as unfounded, or resting, certainly, on no good authority. He protested against the doctrine that the services of the Judges of Ireland were to be brought into requisition for the purpose of trying the minor offences specified, and that the more serious charge of treason should be left to trial by jury. For these reasons he should support Her Majesty's Government, if the Committee went to a division on the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Christchurch, in their resolution to maintain the clause as it stood.
    MR. O'SHAUGHNESSYsaid, as he believed no Member from Ireland sitting on that side of the House had taken part in this discussion, he ventured to offer a few observations upon the subject of the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Christchurch (Mr. H. Davey). It seemed to him that some legislation of the kind proposed was absolutely necessary in the present state of Ireland, the Coercion Act of last year having undoubtedly failed. At the same time, he was bound to express his opinion that if there was any Amendment to this Bill on the Paper which deserved the attention of, and ought to enlist Irish Members in its support, it was the Amendment now before the Committee. One of the reasons which induced hon. Members to extend their support to the present measure was the undoubted necessity which existed for strengthening the arm of the law in Ireland. What was the principle on which coercive legislation ought to be framed? It appeared to him that it ought to proceed with a strict regard to the necessities of the time being; and no coercive legislation ought, in his opinion, to be applied by Government, except in those places where it was shown that crime demanding coercive measures existed. Moreover, he thought Her Majesty's Government would do well to keep over all the crimes named for the time being until the actual necessity arose for their being dealt with otherwise than under the ordinary law. It seemed to him that the entire body of crime which the House was asked to deal with under this Bill was crime of agrarian origin—that was to say, crime having for its object the carrying out of certain views with regard to land in Ireland, and also the avenging of certain wrongs, fancied or real, in connection with it. It was perfectly true that the murders committed in the Phœnix Park, Dublin, were not agrarian crimes; nor were they by any reasoning to be connected with the agrarian objects for which the late agitation had been carried on. That crime was probably committed for the purpose of preventing the carrying out of the policy of conciliation which had been laid down by Her Majesty's Government. But then the Phœnix Park murders were not acts of treason, although probably they were murders proceeding from treasonable motives. They

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    were overt acts of a kind which had never been dealt with as treason; which could be dealt with, as he trusted they would be when the perpetrators of them were brought to justice, as murders. Consequently, there was nothing in these murders to justify the contention that treason or treason-felony should be retained in the Bill. He did not for one moment say that a tendency to treason did not exist in Ireland; on the contrary, they knew there were many disloyal men in Ireland, and that it was nothing but treason which induced such as these to commit the Phœnix Park murders. Those murders were not to avenge any fancied or real wrong on the part of a landlord or a policeman. No such object existed in that case; the murders were decided upon with a treasonable object, and one utterly at variance with the ends of the men who were promoting the interests of the Irish tenantry. But he repeated that, as the crime took the form of murder, it could be dealt with as such under the ordinary law. As he had before pointed out, the Government should, in his opinion, confine this repressive and coercive legislation to the proved necessities of the case—to the crimes actually committed in Ireland, which could be equally well dealt with and put down if the sub-section relating to treason and treason-felony were omitted. In supporting the Amendment he did not rely on the fact that the ordinary tribunals of the land had not broken down as against treason or treason-felony; he relied on the fact that treason and treason-felony were distinct offences from the crimes of an agrarian character specified in the Bill. He admitted it was probable that if a treasonable movement should arise in Ireland, juries would breakdown and verdicts of "Guilty" would not be returned. But his point was that there was no treasonable movement going on in Ireland at the present time, except so far as it had shown itself by acts such as those committed in the Phœnix Park, and which were capable of being dealt with under the ordinary law. He did not agree with those who sought to extenuate the crime of treason; and although he knew it was different from other offences, he should not say that it differed from them in the sense that it did not create as strong an impression when it arose. He thought it did, but
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    he contended that treason in the ordinary sense of conspiracy against the Throne, and conspiracy to rebel, did not at that moment exist in Ireland. If that were so, he thought they should avoid the danger of handing over this jurisdiction to the Judges. He did not wish to pass again over the ground which had already been covered in the course of this discussion; but he would say only this—that Judges, as the result of their judicial training, had certain tendencies with regard to treason, even when there was a jury standing between them and the accused. What, then, would be the effect of taking away that institution which had hitherto stood in the case of trials for treason between the prisoner and the Crown? On the whole, it seemed to him that the fair and wise policy for the Government to pursue, that most calculated to carry out their intentions, and, at the same time, to convince the Irish people that there was no desire unduly to curtail their liberties, was to confine the operation of this Act to crimes which undoubtedly existed in Ireland, and which all must admit that the law as it stood at present was insufficient to meet. For the reasons given he should vote for the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Christchurch.
    SIR EARDLEY WILMOTsaid, he felt himself under the necessity of supporting the Bill as it stood, although he wished to express the opinion that under a different administration of Irish affairs the necessity for the subsection relating to treason and treason-felony would not have arisen. The condition of Ireland at the present moment was unfortunately such, that a Bill which proposed to do away with the Constitutional Law of the country could not, he thought, be avoided. But he would ask the occupants of the Treasury Bench, and Gentlemen sitting on the other side of the House, whether they were aware that in this Bill, and in the particular sub-section of it now under consideration, they were abrogating a clause of Magna Charta? Hon. Members would know that it was there laid down that no person should lose his life, his liberty, or his property, except by the judgment of his peers; and he said that the Liberal Party now, for the first time in the history of their country, were bound to come forward and abrogate that glorious Statute which Blackstone

    1965
    described as the national bulwark of the liberties of Englishmen. Then, again, the memorable Statute of Treason had been adverted to, and some of its sections enumerated, by his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaumaris (Mr. Morgan Lloyd). But the hon. and learned Gentleman had not enumerated every section of that statute; but, above all, he had omitted what, after all, was its pith and marrow—namely, that portion of the Act which said that persons attainted of treason must be convicted of an overt act by people of their own condition. The right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government had brought them to a pass in which it was necessary, without delay, to do away with a large portion of the Constitutional Law of the country. A great necessity had arisen, and they must face it by passing this measure for the protection of life and property in Ireland. With regard to the distinction drawn yesterday by the hon. and learned Member for Christchurch (Mr. H. Davey) between political and ordinary offences, he appealed to the right hon. Gentleman the Prime Minister, and to other right hon. Gentlemen on the Government Benches, as to whether it was not true that treason and treason-felony were much graver offences than any murder or attack upon an individual could be? Treason and treason-felony attacked the very foundation of civil society, as well as the peace, happiness, and comfort of the whole community, whereas other offences were only aimed against individuals. The Government were, therefore, doubly and trebly called upon to provide safeguards for our peace as a nation; and it was impossible, at the present time, to avoid placing treason and treason-felony in the list of those offences which were to be tried by the Special Commission Court. He implored Her Majesty's Government not to be influenced by the arguments of those who were, perhaps, ordinarily their supporters, in attempting to strike out this sub-section, but to consider alone the happiness and well-being of the community in general. As regarded the Judges, he agreed generally with what had fallen respecting them from the hon. and learned Member for Cambridgeshire (Mr. Bulwer); but he confessed to an almost enthusiastic reverence for juries, and as long as these existed in this country he believed
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    there was no fear that our liberties would be assailed. The case with regard to Ireland was exceptional, and juries in that country were not found to do always what was right and just. Cases had occurred of crimes passing unpunished by reason of juries not doing their duty; and although he looked forward to the time when they would again have their proper influence, he was bound, on the present occasion, to give his firm and cordial support to the clause before the Committee.
    MR. BRANDsaid, that the hon. and learned Member for Limerick (Mr. O'Shaughnessy), whenever he addressed the House, was received with attention, because of his reasonableness and moderation. On the present occasion the hon. and learned Member had justified his opposition to the particular part of the clause under discussion on the ground that the Government ought to restrict their proposals to the necessities of the case, and to the crimes which at present existed in Ireland. Moreover, he added distinctly that there were no treasonable crimes in Ireland. Now, he (Mr. Brand) joined issue with the hon. and learned Member for Limerick on that point. The hon. and learned Member said that the crimes in Ireland were agrarian; but it was well known that these agrarian crimes were mixed up with political objects. Had they been so deaf or blind for many months past that they could forget the speeches of the Leaders of the Land League? There was, in particular, in his recollection, a speech of the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell), who said he would never have taken his coat off merely for the purpose of carrying out land reform in Ireland. From the speeches which he had read of that hon. Member, delivered not only in this country, but in America, he had come to the conclusion that his ultimate object was, and had always been, the severance of the connection between England and Ireland; and, therefore, he said that his action as Leader of the Land League had mixed up with its agrarian objects treasonable designs.
    MR. O'DONNELLasked if it were in Order for one hon. Member to say of another that he was pursuing treasonable designs—that he was mixed up with treasonable designs? He might observe that this point of Order had been raised in the House in connection

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    with a statement made by the right hon. Member for Ripon (Mr. Goschen) to the same effect, which the right hon. Member was obliged to withdraw.
    THE CHAIRMANsaid, as he understood the hon. Member for Stroud, he referred to certain speeches made outside the House, and stated that the conclusion in his mind drawn from those speeches was that the hon. Member for the City of Cork desired a severance of Ireland from this country, and that that, in his opinion, was a treasonable object. The hon. Member was within his right in drawing his conclusion.
    MR. O'DONNELLsaid, he could assure the Chairman that was not the statement of the hon. Member for Stroud. He was speaking to the point of Order. The speech of the hon. Member was a specimen of the manner in which treason would be imputed under the Bill. The hon. Member for Stroud stated that, in his opinion, the hon. Member for the City of Cork was mixed up in treasonable designs. He believed those were the exact words.
    THE CHAIRMANsaid, he must point out to the hon. Member for Dungarvan that if there was any mistake on his part he should at once have moved that the words be taken down. The impression upon his mind was as he had stated.
    MR. BRANDsaid, the Chairman had correctly interpreted his meaning. The next point of the hon. and learned Member for Limerick (Mr. O'Shaughnessy) was that the murder in the Phœnix Park was an overt act, which could be dealt with by the ordinary law. It was, no doubt, an act instigated by members of a secret society in Ireland; and his contention was that it was extremely probable that the members of the Executive in Ireland had a knowledge of the leaders of certain secret societies, and that if there was any chance of conviction they would be able to bring them to trial for treasonable practices. The question he put to himself was as to whether there was treason at the present moment in Ireland. If there was treason in Ireland, would any reasonable man say that in the present circumstances of the country there was a fair chance of obtaining conviction by jury? He answered the question in the negative, and upon that ground he was prepared to support Her Majesty's Government in their refusal to strike out the
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    sub-section relating to treason and treason-felony. He trusted they would remain firm in this matter. The position was a very difficult and painful one, both for Her Majesty's Government and their supporters; and, moreover, they were exposed to a cross-fire from hon. Members opposite, as well as from some of their own supporters. That fire was, in his opinion, rather badly directed, for there were many of their supporters who now endeavoured to make them yield on this point whose idea of liberty was unbounded freedom and unbounded licence. He would qualify that remark by saying that those hon. Members were willing to allow men to proceed to plot against the State, so long as they did not commit murders, and the other crimes mentioned in the clause, and until they had perfected their machinery. That, he contended, was not a safe thing to do; on the contrary, action should be taken now, in order to prevent these crimes. It was said there had been no break-down of trial by jury in the case of treason or treason-felony. But it was perfectly easy to see why there had been no break-down with regard to treasonable practices. The reason was not far to seek, and it was that within the last two years the Government had not been willing to bring persons to trial, because they knew they would not get a conviction. Her Majesty's Government had also been opposed on this question by the noble Lord the Member for Calne (Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice), who had manifested the most laudable love of independence. He admitted that his noble Friend was a powerful opponent of the Government; but he trusted that, on the present occasion, he spoke only for himself and the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Heneage), when, like the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell), he interpreted the speech of his follower. In conclusion, he would again express the hope that Her Majesty's Government would remain firm. They had, in the struggle now going on in Irelaad, to deal with men who were ready to commit any act in order to obtain their end; and he, for one, would not refuse Her Majesty's Government the weapons necessary for their purpose.
    MR. JUSTIN M'CARTHYsaid, he was glad that the hon. Member who had just sat down had so fully expressed his

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    opinions upon the question before the Committee, because the speech of the ton. Member afforded an admirable illustration of the spirit in which this Bill, when it passed into law, might be worked in Ireland. They had just listened to the doctrine of constructive treason in all its perfection. His hon. Friend the Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell), in some of his speeches, had advocated the legislative independence of Ireland, and from that the hon. Member for Stroud deduced treason.
    MR. BRANDbegged to say that he had expressed the opinion, after reading the speeches of the hon. Member for the City of Cork, that his object was the severance of the connection between the two countries.
    MR. JUSTIN M'CARTHY: Exactly. The hon. Member for Stroud construed those speeches to mean that the hon. Member for the City of Cork was in favour of overthrowing the British Government in Ireland. Upon certain words spoken by his hon. Friend the hon. Member for Stroud constructed a charge of treason. His hon. Friend, like himself, was a member of an Association having for its object domestic rule in Ireland; and it would be perfectly easy, by applying the doctrine of constructive treason, to bring the hon. Member for Cork City, and any Member of that House who acted with him, before the Special Commission Court, and charge them with treason, because they were members of the Association he had referred to. Why, it was only yesterday that the Mayor of Liverpool gave it as his opinion, in a letter written to The Times, that the mere fact of being a member of the Home Rule Association made a man a traitor, and liable to a charge of treason. Let the Committee remember that some of the Irish Judges had already expressed their opinions upon the Land League, in language not unlike that of the hon. Member opposite. Mr. Justice Fitzgerald had declared that the Land League was an unlawful Association, and that at a time when Her Majesty's Government held it to be neither treasonable nor illegal. Now, supposing his hon. Friend were brought before three Judges, who had already given their opinions in this sense, what chance would there be of his getting a fair trial before such a tribunal, and what chance would there be of the Irish people at-
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    taching the least confidence or weight to their verdict? He was fully convinced that when this Bill once passed into law it would be in the power of partizan Judges to make the most justifiable expressions coming from members of political associations an excuse for bringing such men before the tribunal, and holding them guilty of treasonable practices.
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, he should not have risen again to address the Committee except for two reasons. In the first place, he would ask hon. Members whether they did not think that this subject had been adequately discussed? The Government last night had yielded, he would not say reluctantly, to the adjournment of the discussion on the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Christchurch, upon the appeal of the hon. Member for the City of Cork, who desired to have further time to make a statement to the Committee. The hon. Member for the City of Cork had made his statement, and, therefore, the object for which the adjournment was granted had been fulfilled. The second reason for his rising was to dispel the apprehensions of the hon. Member who had just spoken. Certainly, he could not at all agree that the things he had suggested would or ought to come within the category of treason. But he must ask hon. Members on this point, and upon all points in this Bill, having regard to the circumstances in which it was brought forward, to apply this test. No doubt, it was possible to put extreme cases which might possibly arise, and in connection with them to arouse a strong feeling of prejudice against the Bill. That, he thought, was not a fair test of what was likely to happen. But there was another test, and a far more important one, which should be applied to the Bill, and that was to ascertain what were the crimes which would go unpunished unless the provisions of the clause were retained. By all means, let hon. Members look at the possibilities of the case if they thought fit; but let them also look at the certainties of impunity which would exist if they did not adopt the measures proposed. The one mode of criticism was safe, the other was entirely misleading and one-sided. He asked the Committee to consider what were the things which would go unpunished without this provision, and

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    he used the word unpunished because, after all, he did not pretend to give statistics on the subject. There were many things which we believed and acted upon in life without statistics—things which were known to the common sense of mankind. Now, he was speaking to the common sense of the House of Commons, and those who agreed with him would support the provisions of the Bill, while those who did not would vote in the opposite direction. He made two propositions. One was that there existed in Ireland secret societies whose main objects were treasonable; and his second proposition was that for such offences as those there was, at the present time, no probability of conviction by jury. He must leave the Committee to judge whether or not these propositions were true. If they were, he would endeavour to point out what was the character of the offences which would go unpunished, supposing the sub-section in question were not in the Bill. "Meeting or consulting together for the purpose of killing or deposing the Queen." Would any man of common sense say it was impossible that there should be meetings in and out of Ireland with that object? But, if there were such meetings, he said they were without the means of punishing those who took part in them. The hon. Member for Longford (Mr. Justin M'Carthy) did not agree with that statement, and would, he knew, vote against the Government on this question; but to those who thought there was a possibility of these meetings and consultations of secret societies with regard to the Queen, either here or elsewhere, he repeated that they could only be punished as treason on conviction by a jury. But he would take another case—that of "comforting the Queen's enemies and inciting foreigners to invade the Realm." Would anyone say that such a thing as that was impossible? Why, there was not a day on which he did not read columns of incitement to that very thing, and longing for the time when England would be engaged in a war, in order that the Queen's enemies might be comforted, and foreigners induced to invade the Realm. That was treason. Was it inconceivable that such things should exist, and was it desirable that there should be no certainty of punishing them? But it was
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    said that people might be entrapped under this clause for having used words not intended to be treasonable. With the utmost confidence he said this was not so. No upright Judge would hold such a thing to be treason. Writings, no doubt, which compassed the Queen's death, comforted her enemies, or recommended the invasion of the Realm, were treasonable; but it was quite clear that loose words with no reference to any act were not treason. That was the law in England relating to treason, and he ventured to tell the hon. Member for Longford that the law of Ireland was the same. Blackstone laid it down as clear, according to the Common Law and the Statute of Edward III., that words spoken, however atrocious, could not amount to more than a high misdemeanour, for they might be spoken in heat without any intention, or by mistake perverted or misremembered by their hearers; their meaning also always depended on their connection with other words and things, and might signify differently even according to the tone of voice in which they were uttered. These were the reasons why words were not treason; and, therefore, continued Blackstone—
    "There can be nothing more equivocal and ambiguous than words, and it would, indeed, he unreasonable to make them amount to treason."
    Now, he ventured to say that this was the Law of Treason which the Judges of Ireland, as also the Judges of England, would be bound to administer and would administer; and, therefore, he entreated hon. Members not to vote on this Amendment under any notion like that which had been suggested by the hon. Member for Longford, that words would be treated as treason. The hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell) referred to a passage from a work of Mr. Justice Stephen to show that riot would constitute treason. But that would not be so. Some act of attack on the State was necessary to constitute treason. In the well-known case called Forth's case, it was laid down that if an armed body of men entered a town, not to attack it, but to make a demonstration of strength to the magistracy, in order to procure the liberation or the mitigation of punishment of prisoners convicted for political offences; this, though an aggravated misdemeanour, was not high trea-

    1973
    son. He wished, as he had before pointed out, to remove some of the effect of some of the erroneous surmises which had been imported into this discussion. The Law of Treason was a law applicable only to those offences which overthrew, or attempted to overthrow, the securities of the State, in which the interests of all the subjects of the Queen were deeply involved. The other offences which had been suggested did not come under the category of treason; they were offences punishable otherwise. In coming to a decision on this Amendment, he asked the Committee not to be led astray by the suggestion that this sub-section would in any manner interfere with the free expression of political opinion. It was meant to apply only to acts intended to overthrow the Government of the country and destroy the basis of law and order on which it rested; and, for his own part, he could not see that any good whatever could be done in the present state of Ireland if precautions were not taken in this Bill against offences of that character, because he believed that in conspiracies of the kind indicted lay the root of the violently disorganized condition of society in that country.
    MR. O'CONNOR POWERsaid, he did not know how the Committee would be disposed to receive the invitation of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Home Secretary to bring this discussion to a close. He could imagine, however, that hon. Members who had risen, and risen repeatedly, as the hon. Member for Manchester (Mr. Jacob Bright) had done, without catching the Chairman's eye, would be indisposed to assent to the proposal to terminate the discussion, especially after the unbending manner in which the right hon. and learned Gentleman had met the protests on the subject before the Committee, which had reached the Government Benches from every quarter of the House. The right hon. and learned Gentleman commenced his speech with an assumption which ran through the whole case of the Government, in asking the Committee to assent to this sub-section. And then he read out a list of the offences which would go unpunished if this sub-section were not retained in the clause. He (Mr. O'Connor Power) repeated the question he had already put to Her Majesty's Government. What evidence had they
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    to show that persons indicted for treason or treason-felony in Ireland would not be convicted on sufficient evidence? A satisfactory answer to that question, he ventured to say, would terminate the present discussion at once; but until that was forthcoming, he said the Government stood without an atom of justification, save what existed in their own apprehensions with regard to the state of Ireland; and the right hon. and learned Gentleman could not deny this in the face of his admission that he had no statistics to lay before the House. The right hon. and learned Gentleman, in making that admission, said that men were accustomed, in the ordinary affairs of life, to put their belief in things in the absence of positive evidence; but he ventured to point out that the House of Commons was not accustomed to sacrifice great political principles on such a plea as that. And the argument of the right hon. and learned Gentleman showed the extremity to which he was driven, when he was obliged to come to that House and say on behalf of the Government—"We believe that such a thing is necessary, and therefore we ask you to accept this sub-section of the Bill." He said that the speech of the right hon. and learned Gentleman rested on very imperfect information, so far as he could make out; and he thought the Government ought to have taken the Committee more into their confidence, and shown some grounds for including treason and treason-felony in the clause. He was afraid that the inefficient police system of the Government did not lend itself to the detection of crime in Ireland. But they were now discussing the best means of bringing speedy punishment on criminals whom they could detect. The evidence of the weakness of the Government position in this matter was added to by the quotation of the right hon. and learned Gentleman from Blackstone, that certain words, spoken under suspicious and violent circumstances, would not constitute the crime of treason. The right hon. and learned Gentleman could not apply those words to the crime of treason-felony; though he (Mr. O'Connor Power) admitted he could quote Blackstone to show that the crime of treason was one which could not be readily brought home to persons indicted for words only. He (Mr. O'Connor Power) was not in the habit

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    of offering subtle definitions of law, for he was but a student in that department, and listened with respect to the right hon. and learned Gentleman when he made any statement with regard to the law. But when he found eminent lawyers on the other side of the House contradicting each other on this very question, he hoped he might be excused, although a humble member of the Bar, for doubting the dictum laid down by the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Home Secretary. Let the Committee have before them the words of the Act of 1848, and he believed they would come to the conclusion that the legal mind of Black-stone would have been horrified if anyone had proposed to invent the crime of treason-felony in his time. That Act, which he regretted to say was introduced by a Whig statesman, defined the offence in such a manner as to make it difficult for anyone to say what did not constitute treason-felony. Hon. Members who had spoken against this sub-section had based their opposition on the very strong ground that no necessity had arisen for superseding the ordinary law; and he reminded the Committee of the statement of the noble Lord the Member for Calne (Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice) that he would not budge one inch beyond the necessities of the case, and he (Mr. O'Connor Power) asked if it were the part of a Liberal Ministry to go beyond the necessities proved to exist? The noble Lord added, however, that if after 12 months' trial of the other powers included in this Bill, the Government were able to say that in such and such instances persons had been accused of treason or treason-felony, and juries had persistently returned verdicts against the weight of evidence, he should be willing to agree to an extension of the Act. They had no ground to go upon. He and his hon. Friends had again and again challenged the Government—and he hoped the challenge would ring in the ears of the Government until the very last stage of the Bill had been reached—they had challenged the Government to show that the ordinary law had failed before they called upon Parliament to supersede that law by the extraordinary power which no Government had, at any former period of English history, come down to the House and asked to
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    have intrusted to them. He was astonished that hon. Gentlemen representing Liberal constituencies did not spring to their feet to resent the bare suggestion that they could be guilty of such a betrayal of Liberal principles as to vote for a proposal of this kind.
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir HENRY JAMES)said, he had listened carefully to the discussion on this subsection of the clause; and, as far as he could gather, there had been three objections urged against the sub-section. The first was that the powers now asked for were exceptional; the second was that the offences of treason or treason-felony should not be tried by the special tribunal proposed by the Bill; and the third objection was that there had been no proof that there had been any failure of justice under the ordinary law in cases of treason or treason-felony. With regard to the first objection, he fully admitted that the powers asked for by the Government were exceptional; but it must be remembered that they were called upon to deal with exceptional circumstances. What was the object of the Bill at all, if it were not to deal with an exceptional state of things, that could not be properly dealt with by that which was not exceptional? The objection was, of course, a strong one to raise to the second reading of the Bill. If hon. Members maintained that there was no reason why an exceptional tribunal should be established, that objection could be urged to any legislation on the subject. When once they admitted there was an exceptional state of things, with which the ordinary tribunals of the country could not deal, and with which they could not combat, their objection ceased to be valid, for the necessity of the Bill was to be found in what was exceptional. As to the second objection, he felt, from what had been said by many hon. Members, that considerable misapprehension prevailed on the subject. He understood the second objection to be founded on the apprehension that the powers of the new tribunal might be applied to that which was merely political action. Of course, that apprehension was founded on the belief that a mere expression of words, unaccompanied by acts of violence—that was to say mere political agitation—would be construed to amount to high treason. If

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    that view were rightly founded, much weight must be given to the apprehension; but in fact, as well as in substance, it was not so. He knew of no crime to which the statement that it was undefined could be with so little justice applied as that of treason or treason-felony. Hon. Members, strangely enough, and especially the hon. Member for Bedford (Mr. Magniac), who made a speech last night, said that treason and treason-felony was a Judge-made law. The hon. Member for Bedford showed the difference between the definition of murder and manslaughter and treason; and he said that in the one case there was a bonâ fide definition, but in the other case they had simply the words and opinions of the Judges to guide them. Treason was clearly defined in the Act of Edward III., and his right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary had mentioned what was, indeed, well established in practice. Of course, in one sense words might amount to high treason; for instance, it would be treasonable for a man to incite people to rise and take up arms against the Sovereign, for that would be incitement to war. An invitation a Foreign Power might be conveyed by words, and that would be high treason; because it amounted to what was in substance an act which came within the Statute of Edward III. When, however, they came to deal with words alone, he said that substantially there was no such thing in these days known to constitute high treason or treason-felony which could be proved by words, and words alone. His right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary had dealt with the statement in the text of Blackstone with respect to high treason; and his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Mayo (Mr. O'Connor Power) had challenged him (the Attorney General) personally to say whether that doctrine would apply in the case of treason-felony. The challenge was one which deserved to be answered; and he, in answering it, wished to express his gratification that the hon. and learned Gentleman, who had but recently joined the Bar in this country, had already given proof that he was likely to make a distinguished Member of the Profession. He was astonished, however, that the hon. and learned Gentleman had not exercised a little more caution, in giving the challenge, by reading the Sta-
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    tute to which he referred. The 11 & 12 Vict., which created the offence, expressly declared that mere words alone should not constitute treason-felony, and that there must be an attempt by "force or constraint" to compel the Queen or the Ministry to change their measures before the offence could be committed. That was a necessity which ran through the whole of the section. The Legislature, however, were not satisfied to rest there; and they proceeded, in the 4th section, to say that no person should be prosecuted for any felony, by virtue of the Act, in respect of such act so far as concerned mere words, unless the warrant should be applied for within 10 days of the uttering of the word, and unless the warrant should be issued within two years next after the passing of the Act. It contained, as the Committee would see, the express declaration that no words spoken alone should, after the year 1850, constitute the crime of treason-felony. It was argued that it might be held that mere political agitation, that mere attempts by argument or assertion of views to procure legislative independence for Ireland, constituted the crime of high treason. They provided only for the right administration of the law, and not for the wrong. There was no reason to suppose that for the first time the Judges would commence to read the law wrongly; it could not be supposed that the Judges would take upon themselves the grave responsibility of misreading the law in order to accomplish some end; against such a thing there was a safeguard in the character of the Judges, there was a safeguard in political opinion. The hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell) said they had no public opinion in Ireland to protect them; and he (the Attorney General) admitted that the hon. Gentleman and those with whom he acted, and on whose behalf he spoke, had not made much of English public opinion. They had said in the House of Commons they did not care for English public opinion, and that they did not wish to appeal to it. He was sorry they had taken that view, for they could have made much of it if they had appealed to the just public opinion at this time. If they were willing to throw it on one side, he was sure the English public would not withhold its opinion from them. If in this

    1979
    country any Judge refused to perform his duty in order to accomplish an end which was not right, he could assure the hon. Member for the City of Cork there would be such an opinion expressed throughout the country that would form a great safeguard to the person accused, and would form a condemnation of the Judge who had betrayed his trust. Now, let him ask the Committee to consider what would be the effect if they refused to put treason or treason-felony in the clause. The effect would be that they would be able to get at the minor offenders, but not at the instigators or prime movers in crimes of treason or treason-felony. It would be in the recollection of the Committee that in the case of the Cato Street conspiracy the men met in secret conclave and agreed upon murder; they were tried for high treason, for high treason was their offence. It was now clear that persons committed murder at the bidding of secret societies—at the bidding of persons who had planned the crime; but if the Amendment were accepted, the very persons who had selected emissaries to commit murder, with the object of striking a blow at the Government, would, if they made their platform of crime broad enough, escape, for they could not be brought to trial before the new tribunal, while the persons who had committed the crime could be. He had now dealt with the first and second objections to the clause. In the next place, it was said there ought to be no such enactment as that which was suggested by the sub-section, unless it could be proved that juries had in the past refused to convict in cases of treason or treason-felony. He would not take issue upon the statement made. He demurred altogether to the objection, because it was not a proper objection to take. The first thing they had to determine was whether crime existed in Ireland. If there was no crime in the country, no widespread unpunished crime, the Bill was not wanted, and it was the duty of the House to have thrown it out on the second reading. He asked hon. Members who voted for the second reading, and who thereby admitted the necessity of the Bill, to consider whether, if they were satisfied that the crime of treason, which created murder, did exist, something ought not to be done to meet the present state of things, and to deal with
    1980
    the crimes when once they were detected. When it was admitted that crime was there, it was useless to say that in times past there had been convictions. They were dealing with a new state of things; they were dealing with a state of things under which it had been proved that men sympathized with crime; they were dealing with a state of things in which it had been proved that men sympathized with murder. Was it, therefore, a proper argument when they said—"We admit that juries would not convict the murderer, yet we ask you not to be prepared to try the source from which these murders have sprung by this new tribunal?" They had to look to the future, and they had to look to the punishment of the guilty persons, if detected; they had to do something to instil terror into the men who committed these crimes. They had to let the men know that if once they committed a crime, and evidence could be found against them, there would be to try them an impartial tribunal, which would show no sympathy with the criminal. Let that be shown to them, and the Committee might fairly hope that their action, if not entirely paralyzed, would be seriously crippled. He hoped the Committee would seriously consider the position of affairs, and refuse the Amendment now before them.
    MR. HEALYsaid, the hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General had used a phrase which corresponded with a phrase used last year when the Coercion Bill was passing through the House. The hon. and learned Gentleman was cheered, just as the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bradford (Mr. W. E. Forster) was cheered last year. The late Chief Secretary for Ireland said, last year—"We must strike terror into these criminals;" and the Attorney General now used the same expression. Unfortunately, as the criminals of last year were not paralyzed by the Coercion Bill, so the criminals of this year were not likely to be troubled by the present Bill. The hon. and learned Gentleman had given a friendly warning to the hon. and learned Member for Mayo (Mr. O'Connor Power). He (Mr. Healy) wished the Attorney General for Ireland had been in the House when the Attorney General and the Home Secretary were speaking, in order that he could have received from those right hon. and

    1981
    learned Gentlemen a friendly lesson in law. The hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General, in his capacity of a lawyer, stated—"There is no such thing as treason or treason-felony which can be proved by words alone;" and the hon. and learned Gentleman now maintained that expression. Now, let them contrast that with the words of the Attorney General for Ireland, and he thought they would find a conflict of opinion between the English and Irish Law Officers. This was a friendly lesson in law, which he (Mr. Healy) was attempting to give to the English or Irish Attorney General, because he did not yet know which of them was in the wrong; and until the Committee was able to decide the matter he was afraid he would have to act as temporary schoolmaster for both those hon. and learned Gentlemen. The Attorney General said words alone did not constitute treason; but, some time ago, the Attorney General for Ireland quoted from a speech of the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell). The words quoted were—
    "A spirit that is shown in every quarter and corner of Ireland. That spirit, fellow-countrymen, will never die till it carries the alien rule which has kept our countrymen impoverished and in chains,.… clean over the Channel."
    And the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General for Ireland asked—"What is that but rank treason?" Was that the opinion of the English Attorney General? He paused for a reply.
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir HENRY JAMES)said, he stated distinctly that words which excited to war or rebellion, or which invited an alien to attack us, would amount to treason; and he proceeded to say that mere words did not, under the Act 11 & 12 Vict., constitute treason-felony.
    MR. HEALTsaid, he took down in shorthand the words of the hon. and learned Gentleman, and they were as follows:—
    "When you deal with words alone there is no such thing as treason or treason-felony which can be proved by words alone."
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir HENRY JAMES)asked the hon. Member if he took down in shorthand his words in reference to inciting to war?
    MR. HEALYsaid, he did not take down the entire speech, and he did not
    1982
    think the hon. and learned Gentleman could expect that he should. The hon. and learned Gentleman made an extraordinary admission, and that extraordinary admission was quite sufficient for his (Mr. Healy's) purposes. He had quoted it against the Attorney General; and he would now proceed. He would, however, like to know whether the Attorney General agreed with his learned Brother from Ireland that the words of the hon. Member for the City of Cork constituted "rank treason?" The hon. Member for Tipperary (Mr. Dillon) made a speech at one of the Land League meetings in Dublin, and he gave it as his opinion that the tenants should not go into the Land Court until certain test cases had been tried. The Attorney General for Ireland, referring to that speech, said—
    "That was to say, a man was not to have liberty even to apply to the Queen's Courts, without the permission of this Land League. They need not tell him that all this was not treason. Mr. Parnell himself was at this time steeped in treason to the lips."—[3 Hansard, cclxvi. 809–10.]
    He (Mr. Healy) really thought it was time they should have a clear understanding on this matter. The hon. and learned Member for Cambridgeshire (Mr. Bulwer) had very properly asked, if the hon. Member for the City of Cork was not "steeped in treason to the lips," why was he imprisoned at all? He (Mr. Healy) would ask why, if his hon. Friend was "steeped in treason," was he in the House of Commons to-day? The Government had made a charge against the hon. Gentleman, and they had neither withdrawn it nor substantiated it. The Attorney General for Ireland told them that the words of the hon. Gentleman constituted "rank treason," and that the hon. Gentleman was "steeped in treason to the lips;" the English Attorney General said that no words alone could constitute treason. ["No!"] He very much regretted that there was a difference as to the jurisdiction of the hon. and learned Gentleman; and he also regretted that there was a dispute as to what had been said. The Home Secretary made an extraordinary admission, which showed very clearly to them the reason for this Bill. They had always regarded the right hon. and learned Gentleman as a man whose brain was filled with all kinds of dynamite plots and vain imaginings, and the

    1983
    right hon. and learned Gentleman had told them that that was the case. He (Mr. Healy), however, never believed the right hon. and learned Gentleman would confess the mental pabulum he had been battening on of late. Referring to certain vile newspapers which incited to murder, and to the invasion of this Realm, the right hon. and learned Gentleman said—"There is not a day in which I do not read columns of this stuff." He regretted to think the right hon. and learned Gentleman should read columns of this "stuff" every day, because it was very unfit stuff for a man who had to bring forward a Bill of this kind to read, and who should keep his head cool and clear. The right hon. and learned Gentleman should read something upon the other side. If the Home Secretary turned to the columns of The Daily Express, or The Dublin Evening Mail, or The Northern Whig, or any other of these very loyal journals, he would find a very excellent tonic to the ferocity of Mr. O'Donovan Rossa. The Solicitor General for Ireland, in defending this Bill the other day, said the Bill was necessary because in the columns of United Ireland there had been a quotation from the writings of Mr. O'Donovan Rossa. The editor of United Ireland, however, had written to him (Mr. Healy) to say that he had taken the extraordinary quotation in question from The Daily Express—the chief Orange organ. Nothing, however, was charged against The Daily Express for making the quotation originally. The charge came against the paper which copied it at second-hand. The editor of United Ireland said he never saw O'Donovan Rossa's paper in his life; the Home Secretary, however, received it every morning by mail. Such things as these were made the ground for bringing in a measure of this character. They had had another remarkable admission by the Home Secretary—it was an admission of which he hoped the most would be made. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said the "freest expression of political opinion would be allowed under the Bill," and that the Bill was not designed in any way to prevent the expression of opinion. If that were so, he should invite the right hon. and learned Gentleman, at a later period, to support the proposal that no person who had been committed for trial for treason
    1984
    or treason-felony should be tried by three Judges, when the treason or treason-felony alleged had been committed by publication in a newspaper, or by speech at a public meeting. They would be able to test the sincerity of the right hon. and learned Gentleman on that point. They knew that the Attorney General for Ireland would soon find himself on the Bench. They knew what he considered "rank treason," and they would like to know what the Home Secretary considered "free expression of opinion?" They had heard that Judge O'Hagan's Act was the cause of all the mischief. That was not so, because Judge O'Hagan's Act was amended by the Act of the right hon. Member for East Gloucestershire (Sir Michael Hicks-Beach). Judge O'Hagan's Act proposed a certain qualification for jurymen; and the late Conservative Government did not attempt to interfere with trial by jury, but increased the qualifications of jurors. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Gloucestershire was the man upon whose Act the present jury system was founded. It was with the Act of the Tory Government, which was generally supposed to be more illiberal than a Liberal Government, and not with the Act of Judge O'Hagan, that the Government were now interfering. Now that they had learned that words spoken might, in certain cases, constitute treason, he thought the Judges should be 12 men, peers of the accused. It was his misfortune to have made many speeches in Ireland. He did not know that he would very much care to be tried by so nice a gentleman as the Attorney General for Ireland. Instead of being tried by one who had so keen a sense of what was treason or treason-felony, he should prefer to be dealt with by 12 of his countrymen; and for that reason he should give his strong opposition to the clause.
    MR. A. GREYsaid, that the hon. Member for Hertford (Mr. A. J. Balfour) made, in an incautious moment, some general accusations of no pleasant character against all the hon. Members who had spoken in favour of the Amendment on the Liberal side of the House. [Mr. A. J. BALFOUR: Not all.] He did not understand that the hon. Gentleman made any reservation; but he understood him to insinuate that all the hon. Gentlemen who had spoken in favour of

    1985
    the Amendment on the Liberal side of the House were influenced, in the speeches they made and in the votes they were about to give, by the Irish vote in their constituencies. If the hon. Member had remembered, as he now evidently remembered, that the noble Lord the Member for Calne (Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice) spoke in favour of the Amendment, and that he represented a borough very closely resembling in character the borough of Hertford—if he had also remembered that the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Heneage), who had not 20 Irish electors in his constituency, also supported the Amendment, he would not have made a statement so damaging to himself. Hon. Members on the Ministerial side of the House were no more biassed by the Irish vote than hon. Gentlemen opposite were biassed by the English vote in their constituencies. The hon. Member for Hertford inferred that the Government might possibly make a concession in the direction of the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Christchurch (Mr. H. Davey). He (Mr. A. Grey) was afraid, from what they had heard from the Ministerial Bench, that there was little chance of any such concession. The hon. Member for Hertford had said that, although it might be a political blunder to propose this sub-section, the fact of the Government introducing it made its passing a political necessity. Although he (Mr. A. Grey) acknowledged the force, he also recognized the immorality of such an argnment. [Mr. A. J. BALFOUR: That was not my argument.] He (Mr A. Grey) said he understood that the argument of the hon. Gentleman was something very like that. He ventured to contend that the political effect of making concession in the direction of the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Christchurch entirely depended upon the quarter of the House from which the appeal for concession came. If Her Majesty's Government were to make a concession in obedience to the demands of the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell), and in opposition to the united opinion of hon. Gentlemen behind the Treasury Bench, it would, he admitted, have a very damaging effect, for it would inflict a serious blow upon the authority of the Government in Ireland. But the effect would be very different if Her
    1986
    Majesty's Government were to make a concession in obedience to the demands of hon. Gentlemen behind them. It must be well known to the right hon. and learned Gentleman who was in charge of the Bill that there existed not only among the extreme, but among the more moderate section of the Party which supported the Government, an extreme dislike to Sub-Section A. The right hon. and learned Gentleman the Home Secretary had pointed out the nature of the crimes which would, in his opinion, go unpunished, unless the Sub-Section A was included in the Bill; but the right hon. and learned Gentleman must have failed to notice the Amendment standing on the Paper in the name of the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Heneage). If that Amendment was accepted the Government would attain the very object it had in view, only by means less distasteful to a large number of hon. Members. His hon. Friend the Member for Great Grimsby proposed to omit the words "treason or treason-felony," and insert at the end of the clause "conspiracy to commit any of the aforesaid offences." All attempts upon the life of the Queen, or all conspiracies like the Cato Street conspiracy, would come under the operation of the clause if the suggestion of the hon. Member were adopted—every case, in fact, brought forward by the right hon. Gentleman on the Front Ministerial Bench would be covered by the Amendment to which he referred. If the Government were to introduce such an Amendment he was confident it would meet with considerable favour. He could not sit down without saying that he viewed with satisfaction the resolution with which the Government were endeavouring to pass the measure, which he believed to be absolutely necessary for the maintenance of law and order.
    MR. MAGNIACrose to address the Committee, but was received with repeated cries of "Divide!"
    MR. HEALYrose to Order. He wished to ask if it was in Order for hon. Gentlemen, who could be named, if necessary, standing at the Bar, to interrupt the hon. Gentleman by shouting "Divide! Divide!"
    THE CHAIRMANsaid he had not noticed any peculiar interruption, and he was sure the Committee would be glad to hear the hon. Gentleman.
    MR. MAGNIACsaid, he did not often trouble the Committee, and he did not propose to trouble them very long now. He thought, however, that if an hon. Member rose to make an explanation in consequence of some reference to himself, he was entitled to be heard. His hon. and learned Friend the Attorney General had done him the honour to refer to an argument he used very briefly last night, when he was alluding to the difficulty of defining treason, and the facilities for defining murder, arson, and the other offences mentioned in the clause. The hon. and learned Gentleman had put the case for him much stronger than he could have put it himself; but he seemed to misapprehend what he intended to say. What he had said was that there was no difficulty whatever in defining the crime of murder, arson, attempts to kill, and such offences, but that there was difficulty in defining treason. His hon. and learned Friend said the reverse was the case; he said that the crimes to which he (Mr. Magniac) had referred did not depend upon Statute—they were not included in the Statute, but that the crime of high treason was the only crime that was included in the Statute. That was precisely the whole of his (Mr. Magniac's) argument. He contended that the crime of treason depended upon the fallible words of fallible men, and it had to be interpreted in connection with matters which were placed in the Statute by men who had failed hitherto to define what the offence was. Everyone knew what murder was; but treason depended upon the mere judgment of men.
    MR. LEAMYsaid, he would have been quite content to go to a division had it not been for the conduct of certain hon. Members sitting below the Gangway on the other side of the House, and of certain other hon. Members standing at the Bar, who had endeavoured, by shouting, to prevent the utterance of opinions in favour of the views of the Irish Members. He did not intend to occupy the time of the Committee very long; but he wished to invite the attention of hon. Members to what had fallen from the hon. Member for Bedford (Mr. Magniac). The crime of treason depended upon Statute, which did not attempt to define it; and under the new tribunal the definition of treason
    1988
    would lie entirely with men who, certainly in political cases, did not possess the confidence of the people; and, therefore, they asked that the crime should not be included in the list of those to be sent before the new tribunal. A well-known authority on the Law of Evidence, referring to the difficulty of defining treason, had said—
    "The line between treasonable conduct and justifiable resistance to the encroachments of power, or even the abuse of Constitutional liberty, is often so indistinct—the position of the accused is so perilous, struggling against the whole power and formidable Prerogatives of the Crown—that it is the imperative duty of every free State to guard with the most scrupulous jealousy against the possibility of such prosecutions being made the means of ruining political opponents."
    He was afraid that if a prosecution had been instituted against the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell), a week after the Guildhall speech, there would have been very little chance of his escape from any tribunal of Judges. There was one thing which showed the cue of the course the Government were now taking. It was the threat of the Irish Judges to resign. There was a Judge here the other day, who, it was reported, said he would not be made a hangman by the English Government. They were told last night that there was sympathy for the traitor in Ireland, and that that sympathy came from the time when almost every patriotic Irishman was bound to be a conspirator. He would tell the Government that anyone who was sent before the tribunal of three Judges, and who was found guilty of treason or treason-felony, would receive the heartfelt devotion of the Irish people; the English Government would call the man "traitor," the Irish people would call him "patriot." Murder was murder all the world over; but a traitor in one country might be looked upon as a patriot in another country. When a man was brought before Judges in Ireland on a charge of treason or treason-felony, the Irish people would say that that man's life and liberty had been tampered with by men with loaded dice in their hands. He knew that, notwithstanding the opposition of some of the Government supporters, the Amendment would not be carried, and the Committee would be told it was absolutely necessary if they wanted to put down treason

    1989
    in Ireland. They had got no evidence of the existence of political secret societies. They had asked for such evidence from the Home Secretary. They had asked the Home Secretary for evidence as to the failure of juries to convict. There came to the Home Secretary's assistance the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for the University of Dublin (Mr. Gibson), and he said that the argument that juries had not failed to convict in criminal cases was only a technical one against the clause. But suppose they were able to produce evidence in the case of every one of the offences mentioned in the clause; suppose they were able to show that trial by jury had not failed in cases of murder, or arson, and the like, would anyone pretend to say that the Government would come down to the House and ask for a Bill to suspend trial by jury? The English people might feel tolerably secure in the possession of their liberties; there were, however, many political rights which the English enjoyed at this moment, but which the Irish did not enjoy. For those rights they had to struggle yet, and they intended to struggle; and it was, therefore, all the more desirable that the Irish people should not be deprived of a single Constitutional safeguard. They knew very well that this Bill, aimed as it was at political agitation, would fail to put down political agitation. He and many of his countrymen looked upon the Bill as a means of testing their fidelity to the National cause. The people would come out of the struggle with triumph. The English Government would fail, as they had always failed; and he believed that before the three years during which the Bill was to operate were over, they would recognize there was only one way of putting an end to secret political societies, and that was by granting to the Irish people the right to make their own laws.
    Question put.
    The Committee divided:—Ayes 227; Noes 70: Majority 157.—(Div. List, No. 104.)
    Amendment proposed,
    In page 1, line 17, after "treason felony," insert "committed after the passing of this Act."—(Mr. Lea.)
    Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, this Amendment would carry out the intention he had expressed earlier in the evening.
    Question put, and agreed to.
    MR. HEALYmoved, as an Amendment, in page 1, line 17, after "felony," to insert the words—
    "Provided always, That this section shall not apply in the case of any person committed for trial in consequence of any words appearing in a newspaper published in Ireland, or for any words spoken at a public meeting in Ireland."
    The effect of this Amendment would be that if any person was on trial in consequence of words written in a paper or spoken at a meeting should not be tried by Judges, but by a jury, and that was a proposition which he thought the Government might accept. The Home Secretary had said this Bill would permit the freest expression of opinion, provided that a writer or speaker did not aim at the overthrow of the Constitution. He was sure the right hon. and learned Gentleman did not intend to suggest, as against the jurors in Ireland, that if any charge was made of attempting to overthrow the Constitution they would not properly deal with it. There was necessarily some wearisome iteration in the arguments upon this matter; but as they were true, he was afraid that, like the "starling," Irish Members must go on crying "Mortimer" to the Government, if they refused to make any concessions upon these points. The Government of England had instituted, a series of prosecutions against newspapers in Ireland, and in every single instance they had been successful. They had prosecuted Mr. Sullivan, not for treason, but for the lighter offence of sedition, and he was convicted. Mr. John Mitchel was prosecuted and convicted for treason-felony; and several newspapers had been convicted. The Government sometimes took a very short method with newspapers, and seized them, although they did not seize organs of immoral principles in England, such as The National Reformer, which inculcated blasphemy and Atheism. Those papers were not prosecuted, and The Freiheit was permitted to remain in circnlation. But in Ireland the Government seized the news-

    1991
    papers—though where they got the power to do so the Lord only knew—and tried them with a certainty of conviction when there was nothing like a fair show of evidence. Then, with regard to public meetings, he should be surprised to learn that the Government thought that a man who had designs for overthrowing the Constitution would proclaim those designs in public meetings. It was with conspirators that the Government had to deal—with secret and hidden conspiracies. The man who was seeking to overthrow Queen Victoria and the British Realm would not go on to a platform and state his designs, but would conceal them; and the man who was about to murder someone else would not proclaim his intention in the newspapers unless he was a fool, and if he was a fool there was not much reason to be afraid of him. In no newspaper had there been anything like incitement to murder or outrage. One passage had been quoted; but it was taken from the Tory Express of Dublin. No complaint was made against that paper, but against the paper which quoted the passage, while the editor had stated that he had never seen a copy of O'Donovan Rossa's paper. He sincerely hoped the Government would make some concession in regard to public meetings and newspapers. The Government, it was said, desired to give the fullest liberty of expression wherever that liberty was compatible with the institutions of the country; and, to make out their case, they ought to produce some evidence that in any newspaper in Ireland, from the chief organs in Dublin to the meanest country newspaper, there had been any words constituting treason. Irish Members demanded such evidence, and would continue to demand it. If the Government could show that there were newspapers which incited to treason, let them produce their evidence. If they said they wished to cope with speeches on public platforms, he would remind them that heinous expressions had been used on public platforms in England as well as in Ireland. For instance, one man in England had said it would have been lucky if Joe Chamberlain had been in Phoenix Park, and had been stabbed instead of the other men. Then, during the regretted illness of the Prime Minister, there had been shouts at a Tory meeting of—"Very glad; put him in his coffin!" Those words were uttered at
    1992
    a meeting in 1880 without the slightest reproval from anyone. What the Government had to deal with was language showing designs of a treasonable character. Let them deal with that; but was it likely that men who had treasonable designs would go on to public platforms and say so? Was it the view of the Government that the Irish were such poor conspirators that whenever they wanted to overthrow the Queen they would form a committee, appoint a chairman, and pass a resolution "that the Queen shall be overturned; and we are the men to do it?" It was necessary to be precise upon this point, because the present Attorney General for Ireland would soon be made a Judge. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said certain words were rank treason, and the utterers of them were steeped in treason. There was not a word used by the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell) which the Attorney General for Ireland said was rank treason, which he (Mr. Healy) did not endorse, and should be prepared to repeat in that House; but he did not want to be tried by the Attorney General for Ireland. They must draw the line somewhere, and he hoped the Government would make some distinct statement upon this matter.
    Amendment proposed,
    In page 1, line 17, after the word "Act," to insert the words "Provided always, That this section shall not apply in the case of any person committed for trial in consequence of any words appearing in a newspaper published in Ireland, or for any words spoken at a public meeting in Ireland."—(Mr. Healy.)
    Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, he agreed with a good deal of what the hon. Member had said; but he could not accept the Amendment, because it was founded on a supposition which the hon. Member (Mr. Healy) entertained, and which he seemed to think some lawyers entertained, that under no circumstances could words spoken or published be treason. But that was not the law, and the hon. Member had entirely misapprehended what the Law Officers had said. The argument put forward was, that if people encouraged, on platforms or in newspapers, the use of loose words capable of various interpretations, the law would come down upon them for

    1993
    treason by the words they had used; but that was not the law, and anyone who administered the law upon that footing would be perverting the well-known principles of the law. But in this Amendment the hon. Member went further, and proposed that nothing said on a platform or written in a newspaper should be treated as treason under this Bill. With that he could not agree. It was agreed that treason was to be treated under this section; and, if that was so, how could words spoken or written be excluded under all circumstances? Suppose a man on a platform distinctly recommended the people to make war on the Queen, or to assassinate the Queen, how could those words be excluded, simply because they were uttered on a platform? Or, suppose a man speaking on a platform said he had made arrangements to aid the landing of an enemy in Ireland? The hon. Member must see that it would be utterly impossible to exclude such cases. In the same way, newspapers might do the same thing; and though when they advocated reasonable opinions newspapers were a great blessing, if they advocated detestable principles they were a curse. The hon. Member for Newcastle (Mr. J. Cowen), he believed, considered everything that appeared in the newspapers good necessarily; but that was not his view. Suppose a newspaper recommended what might have appeared in a speech—recommendations to make war on the Queen, for instance, which was unquestionably treason—and it was circulated by thousands all over the country, could it be held that before this advice appeared in a newspaper, therefore it should not be dealt with as treason? The Committee would be entirely inconsequential if, having decided that treason should be in the Bill, it then said nothing on a platform or in a newspaper should be treated under this section as treason. Words spoken or written would be treason if they advised or persuaded to an act which of itself, if committed, would be treason. The legal definition of treason said—
    "Loose words, with no reference to any act or design, or which are not words of persuasion or advice, cannot he deemed to be overt acts of treason."
    That was a clear distinction. The words must not be loose words capable of various interpretations, but distinct words
    1994
    of persuasion and advice to the doing of an act which, if it were done, would itself be a treasonable act. That seemed to him to be the clear state of the law; and, therefore, he could not accept the Amendment.
    MR. JOSEPH COWENsaid, he thought this Amendment really covered the greater portion of the objections to the Bill. Hon. Members opposing and seeking to amend the Bill, as far as it admitted of alteration, did not object to it so far as it attempted to prevent crime. They had little objection to it as a machine for detecting and punishing crime; what they did object to was its interference with the liberty of public opinion. They felt that the powers of the Bill would be used to prevent the legitimate expression of public opinion in Ireland. So far as he was concerned, he had no doubt the Bill would be leniently and temperately exercised by the present Viceroy. He would trust the Viceroy with these, or even greater, powers, without fearing their wise and equitable exercise; but this Bill might not always be administered by the same Viceroy. It would be in operation for three years, and during that time it might pass into hands which would not exercise the powers in the same way. The explanations of the Home Secretary were satisfactory, and the right hon. and learned Gentleman was, no doubt, sincere in his intentions; but, according to universal experience, measures of this kind, passed for a special object, had been used for other objects. It was stated that the last Coercion Bill would not be used except to arrest midnight marauders and villains; and the late Chief Secretary for Ireland said he could lay his hands upon those men, and that, in a few months, all the Irish criminals would be under lock and key, and the country would be peaceful. On the strength of that assurance, a large number of hon. Members on the Liberal Benches voted for the Bill; but political opponents were arrested, and not the criminals, who were still at large. The fact of those men being at large rendered some Bill necessary; and the Government must, therefore, excuse the suspicions that the power now asked for might be applied under a feeling of excitement or political exasperation. It was with a view to prevent that that this Amendment was proposed. The Bill ought

    1995
    to be made simply to apply to crime, and not to opinion. The explanation of treason given by the Home Secretary was a reasonable one—that a speech made, or an article delivered, might he as dangerous to the State and the institutions of the country as any act; but the circumstances had to be taken into account—the way in which a speech might be made, or an article written. The men who would decide whether a speech or an article was injurious to the country would be three Judges; but while hon. Members did not object to articles and speeches being dealt with by the ordinary tribunals of the country, they did object to their being tried by a tribunal in which the Judges were also the witnesses. A large number of the Judges in Ireland had won their way to their position by political services; and it was contrary to human nature to suppose that they would not be influenced politically when they were called upon to act as Judge and jury in cases respecting which they had expressed strong opinions, and entertained strong feelings. It was possible for treasonable practices to be committed by newspaper articles or by speeches; but such acts should be tried by the ordinary tribunals of the country, and not by this exceptional tribunal.
    COLONEL NOLANsaid, that the Home Secretary had put the case of a person inciting to murder or to open war, and said he had no doubt the hon. Member for Wexford (Mr. Healy) would be perfectly willing to make assassination an exception. In an Amendment which he himself had put down, for exempting treason or treason-felony from the Bill, he had carefully eliminated the case of any attempt to injure a Royal person. He did that not only because such an attempt would be a very serious offence, and more than usually wicked, but also because he knew that serious and regretable offences had created such an effect on the public mind that it was only necessary to raise the cry of an attack on the Queen to arouse very strong feelings. He did not think that question ought to be raised, but thought the hon. Member might consent to the suggestion he had made. That would be a reasonable compromise. As to the other case which the Home Secretary had presented, of an enemy landing in this
    1996
    country or in Ireland, or aiding of an invasion, such a case would be impossible; and, at all events, it was rather premature to legislate at present for any such contingency. If this country lost two naval battles, legislation might be necessary; but until that happened it was absurd to discuss a question of open warfare. If something of that kind occurred, he had no doubt the House would pass a Bill in 48 hours proclaiming martial law. These cases, however, were not the cases present to his (Colonel Nolan's) mind. The case present to his mind was the case of someone advocating Home Rule on a platform in Ireland. That had been interpreted by an hon. Member as meaning severance, and it might be interpreted by this new tribunal as treason. It would be easy to guard against treason if the Government and hon. Members opposite would accept a compromise. Since the previous day there had been a serious change in this Bill, and it now presented itself in a new aspect. It now appeared that three or four new Judges would probably be appointed in Ireland. Four Judges were intending to retire; most of them because of this Bill, and one ostensibly on account of ill-health. He did not wonder at their retirement, and at their not caring to be placed in the position of Judge and jury. What would happen under this tribunal? The new Judges would be appointed under this Act, and anyone taking a Judgeship would know what he would have to encounter. The new Judges took their appointments under the shadow of this Act, and would be prepared to act up to it; and, therefore, there would be a tribunal totally different from that which was expected a few days ago. The new Judges would be appointed to undertake a very serious and formidable responsibility, such as Judges had never before had; and there would be nothing to prevent the Government from selecting their Commission of three exclusively from the new Judges. They would have the power of trying and settling what was, or what was not, treason; and they might decide that Home Rule was treason. He had been told that words he himself had used amounted very nearly to treason, and it would be a very serious thing for him to be brought before such a tribunal. Therefore, he hoped his hon. Friend would go to a

    1997
    division upon this point, for the question involved the freedom of politicians in Ireland and the freedom of the whole country.
    MR. BULWERsaid, it appeared to him impossible to draw distinctions by way of definition between one class of treason and another; distinctions might as well be drawn between one class of murder and another. With regard to the argument of the hon. Member for Newcastle (Mr. J. Cowen), that this Bill would interfere with legitimate freedom of speech, he thought the hon. Member might set his mind entirely at rest upon that point; but if the Bill did produce some little moderation in the language used at public meetings in Ireland it would be very valuable.
    MR. O'DONNELLsaid, it so happened that he himself had been very nearly a victim to the construction which a Government official could put upon words spoken at public meetings. In England there had been no observation more common at public meetings with the Party to which the hon. and learned Member for Cambridgeshire (Mr. Bulwer) belonged than that throughout Ireland the law was in such a condition that nobody minded the Government of the Premier, while everybody minded the government of the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell). That language passed unchallenged in England, and was, doubtless, considered calm and moderate by the Conservatives; but in the course of a speech at Dungarvan, on the occasion of a visit to that town by the hon. Member for the City of Cork in October last, he (Mr. O'Donnell) contrasted the general unpopularity of Her Majesty's Government and the general unpopularity of the Liberal policy with the general popularity in Ireland of the policy of the Land League, and he stated that nobody in Ireland cared for the Government of Mr. Gladstone, while everybody cared for the government of Mr. Parnell. He used those words in the same sense as Lord Salisbury, and a large number of other Conservative speakers had used them, and he found that he had narrowly escaped the attentions of the Chief Secretary for Ireland, for the right hon. Gentleman openly quoted those most innocent and moderate words as distinctly proving that he entertained treasonable
    1998
    intentions in regard to the Government in general. He was merely criticizing the policy of the particular Party then in power; and the Attorney General for Ireland, sticking to the ship, as he said he was bound to do, endorsed the opinion of the Chief Secretary for Ireland that he (Mr. O'Donnell) had used treasonable language in speaking with undue levity of the Government of the Prime Minister. He was quite sure that the mind of the late Chief Secretary for Ireland was as judicial a mind as that of a great number of Government nominees on the Irish Bench, and was quite as judicial as the minds of any of the Government nominees who would be specially appointed to fill the vacancies on the Irish Bench with a view to the operation of this Bill. This Amendment was, of course, an attempt to limit the scope of the sub-section which was designed to deal with treason and treason-felony. There was no reason why, if the Bill could not be amended, it should not be exposed. Unquestionably, the tendency of the Bill would be to compel men belonging to the National Party to be silent, and that would render public agitation in Ireland on Constitutional platforms absolutely impossible. It would not long be safe to speak ill of the Government of the day, except in secret conclave, and under the greatest possible precautions. In this respect this particular clause exemplified the policy of the late Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, when he stated at Belfast that the policy of the Government at the time was to drive disaffection under the surface. If, for language spoken at public meetings in carrying out Constitutional agitation, men were to be held liable to conviction as traitors by three Judges in whom nobody placed any confidence, the result would be to prevent public meetings and public discussions, and absolutely necessitate secret associations. He maintained distinctly that where the Government of any country made public agitation impossible, then it was not only the right, but the duty, of the people to engage in secret association. Public liberty and national rights were sacred; they were the first things to be consulted, and where the Government prevented national rights and liberties being discussed and defended, the duty remained on the nation to defend its rights, and to maintain them secretly or by any other

    1999
    means, only with the limitation of prudence. He had observed all through this discussion that the Government tried to assume that trial by jury was proved to have broken down. If trial fry jury had broken down, what was the legitimate conclusion? Not that an irresponsible tribunal of Government nominees should be set up. If it were proved that trial by jury had broken down, the only legitimate conclusion to be drawn would be that if the offences which jurors refused to convict upon were moral offences, the duty of the Government would be to reform the law and carry it out by statutory tribunals. But, although the Government asserted that trial by jury had broken down, they had not proved anything of the kind. The Home Secretary and the Attorney General for Ireland scoffed at the idea that there was any necessity to prove that, saying that it was incontestable that treason and treason-felony existed in Ireland, and that, whether by acts, or words, or publications, treason and treason-felony were promoted, and, therefore, this tribunal of Government nominees must be established. The Attorney General had said that he altogether demurred to the contention that proof of the breakdown of trial by jury was necessary; but the position which the Government assumed for the purpose of creating an exceptional tribunal in Ireland was one which they would be equally entitled to hold in regard to England, because, undoubtedly, treasonable sentiments and treason did flourish in England. Within the last few days a foolish organization, called the Democratic Confederation, held a meeting at Westminster within a stone's-throw of the House, at which resistance to the law, if necessary, by shooting people was openly advocated. That was treasonable conduct; but the Government did not propose to abolish trial by jury in England in consequence of such sentiments in England. The existence of treasonable sentiments in Ireland did not absolve the Government from the necessity of proving that trial by jury had broken down; but instead of doing that they called upon the House to give them power to construe, not merely acts, but words, as treason. The Government, in bringing forward this monstrous proposition, relied only upon the ignorance and ready prejudice
    2000
    of England against Irishmen and Irish nationality. No matter how great public disaffection might be in England, no Minister would dare to introduce such a proposition for this country. The Government were simply treating Ireland in this way because they thought it safe. The Home Secretary had presented the case of open incitement to war and rebellion being apprehended in Ireland actually during the course of a foreign invasion of that country. There had been repeated attempts to extract from the country some idea of their foreign policy; but after the statement of the right hon. and learned Gentleman that during the operation of this Bill—during the three years for which it was to run—they expected a foreign invasion of Ireland, against which they must take precautions, he thought a more alarming statement of the foreign policy of the Government had been obtained, quite incidentally, than could have been expected under other circumstances. If that expectation of a foreign invasion was a mere vain imagining created by the Government to impress an erroneous impression on the House, then the Government were singularly wanting in respect for the House, and were descending to stratagems unworthy of any Government. The hon. Member who had contested his statement that the new tribunal was singularly unreliable for offences of this description was evidently not aware that all the Irish Judges had protested against duties of this kind being imposed upon them, and were resigning one by one, rather than do this dirty work. In connection with this clause, which was a clause to suppress Constitutional agitation in Ireland, he would ask the Committee to weigh well the sentiments signified by the resignation of Baron Fitzgerald. Among all the Irish Judges, Baron Fitzgerald, without the slightest doubt, stood highest in the respect of the Irish people. That respect was founded on no community of religion, for he belonged to the religion of the minority; but he had such a name for stainless probity and impartiality that, if the principle of trial by jury could be laid aside at all, the Irish people would prefer that that single Judge, without assistance and without appeal, should try the grievous offences, and himself, if necessary, be witness, Judge, and jury in one. Baron Fitz-

    2001
    gerald would retire from office on the day when this Bill received the Royal sanction. Baron Fitzgerald was a prop and pillar of law and order in Ireland, and yet he would resign on the day this Bill received the Royal sanction rather than play the part of a judicial "Jack Ketch," which he would have to do if he accepted that which would be imposed upon him by the Bill. He (Mr. O'Donnell) warned the Government—and he ventured to warn the House—to profit by the example, and learn a lesson from the resignation of Baron Fitzgerald. The clause would simply prevent Constitutional agitation, or, what was equally detrimental, it would render the exercise of every Constitutional right dependent on the arbitrary will of the Government nominees. Even if those Government officials did not exercise the arbitrary power at their disposal under this clause, every man in Ireland would be under a menace of the possible exercise of that arbitrary power. Such a position could not be endured by any defender of national liberty; and he entirely sympathized with those Irish Representatives who considered that during the duration of this Bill, and especially during the duration of the operation of this clause, all Constitutional agitation in Ireland ought to be suspended, together with all representation of the Irish people in that House, and all co-operation in the work of, by Constitutional means, reforming Ireland. By this Bill, and by this clause, the English Government in Ireland declared that nothing but secret organization was safe; therefore, out of regard to their people, and to the interests committed to them, they ought not to continue the most dangerous and detrimental course of public agitation; but the whole people ought to take refuge in as secret as possible a system, guarded round by every precaution that could protect them from the machinations of government by sbirri and Cossacks.
    COLONEL NOLANsaid, it was very easy for a person to misrepresent a speech he had heard delivered by someone else. They had had an instance of it this evening, and that, too, on the part of a skilled witness—an hon. and learned Member who was in the habit of dealing with evidence and cross-examining witnesses. The hon. and learned Member for Cambridgeshire (Mr. Bulwer) had so misrepresented his (Colonel Nolan's)
    2002
    words that, although entirely innocent of the meaning attributed to him, if he were to be tried by a Judge he would be very likely to be brought in guilty of that meaning. When the hon. and learned Gentleman could so misrepresent him, how might not an ordinary listener, at the edge of a crowd, at an open-air meeting do so? Such ordinary person might be ready to come forward and swear most emphatically to that which might be really an utter misrepresentation of what had been said.
    MR. T. D. SULLIVANsaid, that, in pleading for this clause of the Bill, the Home Secretary was at his usual work of exaggerating the dangers to the State which were alleged to exist, and of minimizing the dangers to public liberty which were involved in the passage of this measure. But why should they speak in that House at all of Irish liberty? There appeared to be no regard whatsoever for it. It seemed to him that there was no measure of repression for Irish political life, for Irish freedom of the Press, for Irish freedom of the platform, too extravagant for that House to pass. The Home Secretary tried, as usual, in his very skilful way, to assure the House that there was very little harm indeed in this measure. The right hon. and learned Gentleman spoke of it smoothly and softly; and he showed, or attempted to show, that without it law and order in Ireland would be in great peril, and that with it no well-intentioned man would be in any danger whatever. But the Irish Members asked the Committee now, as they had asked it before on other occasions, not to rely too much on those representations of the Home Secretary. However smoothly he might talk of it in the House, they knew the aspect it would assume when it was passed into law, and was transferred to the care of the Irish Judges and magistrates to administer amongst the Irish people. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said that loose and strong words written and spoken in connection with Parliamentary agitation would not come within the purview of this clause, and the Committee seemed somewhat disposed to accept those rather re-assuring words. But the Irish Members, who knew something of Ireland, and of the Irish magistrates, and of the Irish Judges, denied altogether the truth of this representation. He thoroughly and sincerely

    2003
    believed that there was no time of political excitement in Ireland in which it would be safe for Irish public men to speak on a platform, or for Irish pressmen to write in their newspapers the ordinary language of Irish political agitation, if this measure were law. He had been himself connected with political affairs in Ireland for a period of about 25 years; and he had a most profound conviction that upon many occasions within that period, if he had been tried for his speeches or his writings, before such a tribunal as that which would be established by the Bill, he would have been sent to penal servitude. He believed the same danger would confront them in the future. It was of no use telling the Committee that strong language that was not manifestly of a treasonable character would not be challenged by the Judges and the Law Officers in Ireland, or that, if so challenged, no conviction could possibly be obtained. What were the facts? As had already been stated in the House, the Irish Judges seized every opportunity that was open to them of delivering strong political harangues. They knew that the Irish Judges were intensely and violently opposed to political agitation in Ireland, even though that agitation were what was called legal and Constitutional. It was detested by them. They condemned it in every way they possibly could; and if they could get it within their grasp—as they would be able to do when this Bill became law—the writers and speakers of the language of political agitation would surely suffer. Quite recently they had had a specimen of the temper of the Irish Judges. On the very eve, he might say, of the recent State Trials in Ireland, the Lord Chief Justice of Ireland so delivered himself in a public Court that the matter became absolutely a public scandal. He prejudged the cases of the men yet to be tried, and spoke so strongly and intemperately that he found it desirable to retire from the trial of the case in consequence of the storm of public opinion which he had created. There were other Judges in Ireland who would be a little more careful in the delivery of their sentiments than was Lord Chief Justice May; men who were more judicious and prudent, but who were just as bitter at heart as was Lord Chief Justice May, and who would have given agitators brought before them just as
    2004
    short a shrift as he would have given if they had been tried by a tribunal of this kind. Therefore, the Irish Members contended, and he thought with good reason, that there would be no security for political speech or writing if this Bill became law. They might exist at the mercy of the Judges of Ireland; but, as Grattan had once said, to depend on the goodwill of another man was the very definition of slavery, and that was the condition to which public life would be reduced in Ireland under the provisions of this Bill. They were told that there was some safeguard in English public opinion against abuses of the measure; but English public opinion was no safeguard—the very contrary was the case. An Irish magistrate, an Irish Judge, or anyone else, might denounce patriotic action and political speaking and writing in Ireland; and the more severe the temper in which he regarded these things the more did he charm English public opinion, and produce in the Press of England applause and approval of every sort. They had had a specimen of the public opinion of England in the House of Commons when the arrest of Michael Davitt was announced. The shout that arose from those Benches, and almost shook the glass over head, told them what was public opinion in England. The roar of approval that arose in the Mansion House when the Prime Minister announced the arrest of the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell) was another evidence to them of how much they might rely on English public opinion for the safeguarding of Irish liberty. If, instead of announcing the arrest of the hon. Member for the City of Cork, the Prime Minister could have announced that his head had been cut off, the shout of approval would have been even more intense than it was. They knew very well what would happen when freedom of political utterance was suppressed in Ireland—the House had been warned of it over and over again. What would happen would be this—people would convey their opinions to one another in private; they would frame resolutions and form plans and projects that would not bear to be discussed in the light of day—that no speaker from any platform would venture to advise, and that no writer in the Press of Ireland would sanction and approve of. Freedom of the Press and freedom of

    2005
    speech had been in Ireland, as elsewhere, not a peril to public liberty, but a safeguard of it. Abolish that, and they would be face to face with dangers more serious and perilous to the peace of both Ireland and England than any they could have to contend with in consequence of allowing freedom of speech and freedom of the Press to prevail.
    MR. T. C. THOMPSONsaid, that, unless they took great care, they were going to deprive the subject of the protection to which he was entitled by the law. The law of England had been that the question whether the words, written or spoken, were a libel was a question for the Judge; but under the influence of that great statesman, Charles James Fox, an alteration was made in the law, and the jury was made judge of the libel, and not the Judge. Under that law the subject had a double protection. He had, in the first instance, the protection of the Judge explaining to the jury what the law was, and he had the additional protection of the jury, notwithstanding the expression of opinion from the Judge, deciding for themselves what the law was. In the present case, if they did not accept the Amendment, the fact of the Judge sitting in place of the jury would deprive the prisoner at the Bar of the double assistance or double protection which he would have in an ordinary case of libel from the Judge and jury. The consequence might be that the prisoner would be in a very much worse position than he was in now, when he had the benefit of the jury as well as of the Judge. He (Mr. Thompson) wished to put this as clearly as he could. If the Judge laid it down that such and such a thing was a libel, the jury might take his opinion, or they might refuse to be guided by it. It was for them to decide, as well as it was for the Judge to express an opinion; but under the Bill they would have the Judge acting for himself, expressing his opinion, as it were, to himself, and the consequence was that the prisoner was deprived of his second protection. He did not know what the Government intended to substitute for that second protection. Unquestionably, they were going to give an appeal; but it would be an appeal only to a Judge again, and the prisoner would never get that expression of public opinion which was outside the Judicial Bench, They all knew very
    2006
    well—at all events, most of those connected with the Bar knew very well—the immense difference that separated the Bench from the Bar. Well, there was a similar distinction between the Bench and the public. No doubt the Judges were independent. He was inclined to believe, notwithstanding what had been said to the contrary, that the Irish Judges endeavoured to do their duty to the best of their ability. They could only be removed by Addresses from both Houses of Parliament; and he had no doubt there was the protection that they, as far as they could, would do their duty. But here the Committee was imposing on the Judges a double duty. In ordinary cases, with Judges sitting as a jury, a prisoner would be in a worse position than he would have been under the existing law; he would lose the influence with which counsel touched the minds of juries by their appeals; but where the offence charged was in connection with political writing or speaking the prisoner would be in a very much worse position still, as besides the power which counsel brought to bear in common cases he would lose the influence of public opinion, which always affected the jury in such cases, but never affected the Judge. He did not wish to waste the time of the Committee; but he had desired to put these points as clearly as he could, as he thought they should do nothing inadvisably, nothing unwisely, to touch the liberty of the subject.
    MR. BIGGARsaid, the Amendment proposed by the hon. Member for Wexford (Mr. Healy) seemed to him to be one that the Government could not have reasonable grounds for objecting to. If their object was to get a certain number of criminals punished, whether guilty or not, it was, no doubt, a good thing that the trials should be before a selected tribunal. By this Bill a jury would be selected by the Lord Lieutenant. They knew the system of packing juries had been largely followed in Ireland; but under this new legislation, not only would new juries be packed, but a new sort of Judges would be appointed to try a particular description of case, these gentlemen only having temporary employment. They would be altogether different to the ordinary Judges, who were practically independent, so far as Irish Judges could be independent, of the Government of the

    2007
    day. The Government of the day, as had been pointed out, could not suspend the present Judges, who could only be interfered with by an Address from both Houses of Parliament. But it was proposed by the Bill to select from the Bar, if it was so desired by the Executive, a certain number of lawyers—Queen's Counsel—who could be trusted to carry out the behest or the will of the Government. That was a state of things which he did not think any so-called Liberal Government could openly and honestly defend. The proposition of the Bill had been objected to by all the Judges in Ireland, he believed. It was reported—and he believed the report was well-founded—that two of the Judges had offered their resignation rather than submit to the terms of this new law. One of these Judges, Mr. Baron Dowse, was a gentleman of great ability, who had risen to be leader of his Circuit, and had not had much fault found with him as a political partizan. The other was Mr. Baron Fitzgerald, a gentleman who had never held either of the two Irish Law appointments—namely, the appointment of Attorney General or Solicitor General for Ireland. He was a gentleman who would not be under the suspicion of being a political Judge, and in whom the public would have very great confidence. Both of these Judges refused to undertake the duties proposed to be conferred on them—refused to be parties to a scheme which they believed to be so unfair and detrimental to the due and honest administration of justice. With regard to the particular Amendment of his hon. Friend as to words spoken, it was always very difficult to repeat the exact words spoken by a person, particularly at a public meeting. The reporter had not always an opportunity of hearing everything that took place; and if he made a slip of one word in a sentence, or one word in a speech, it might alter entirely the whole meaning of that sentence or that speech. The custom in Ireland had been to send to take reports of proceedings at public meetings men who were not competent to write shorthand at all. In the State Trials in 1881, a number of persons were examined, from time to time, with regard to alleged words uttered by the speakers, and they had been obliged to confess that they were perfectly incompetent to
    2008
    take down a whole speech as spoken by a speaker. Now, in that state of things, it seemed to him that very great care should be taken, if justice was to be done, in framing such an Act as this. If the object of the Government was merely to find a number of persons guilty, of course it was a different matter; and he must confess that it seemed to him that unless they accepted the proposition now before the Committee their sole object was to obtain convictions, and not to do justice. With regard to speeches, nothing was more easy than for the prosecution to select individual sentences from whole speeches which, taken by themselves, probably conveyed a different meaning from that which was intended by the speakers, and from that which the whole speeches would convey if carefully reported. In the case of 1881, the two Judges—Fitzgerald and Barry—allowed witnesses to give evidence after they had acknowledged themselves in competent to take down all that had been spoken by the speakers. Under those circumstances, he thought the Government should agree to the proposition of his hon. Friend. Then, as to the freedom of the Press, there was not the slightest difficulty in prosecuting a newspaper if it infringed the law. It was not as though it was a difficult thing to get a conviction in a case of that sort; the words were printed down and the case was clear. They had seen what the Government had done during the past six months. They had not only seized newspapers week by week, but they had driven a newspaper from Dublin altogether for a good many weeks; and, ultimately, prosecutions being brought against them, they had found their position untenable, and had been mulcted in damages for the value of the newspapers they had seized. It was probable that the Attorney General for Ireland—the advising Counsel of the Government at the time these newspapers were seized—was consulted on the subject, and offered it as his opinion that the Government would be justified in making the seizures. Now, if the Attorney General for Ireland got upon the Bench, and if he should be one of the Judges selected to try these cases, they might fairly assume, when questions of this kind came before him, as they did in December last, that he would act in the

    2009
    same spirit as when he recommended the Government to suppress the paper called United Irishman. Under these circumstances, he thought, in the interests of political speech, and in the interests of a free Press, the Government should not object to the Amendment before the Committee. There was always plenty of freedom of speech and freedom of the Press in a time when there was no political excitement; but as soon as political excitement took place the Government was sure to declare that things spoken and written that had been held to be perfectly innocent in ordinary times were highly improper and seditious. No prosecution would take place under the Act unless some great excitement occurred. When that excitement occurred, and these selected Judges—who had been selected, first of all, on the tacit understanding that they were to find verdicts of "Guilty," whether rightly or wrongly—gave their decisions, they would suffer in the opinion of the English public; but instructions would be sent to the different local Whig newspapers, and circulars would be sent round to the so-called Liberal Associations in the country, denouncing the action of the Irish speakers and of the Irish Press, and a spurious public opinion would thus be excited, with the result of making it appear that the public opinion of England was entirely in favour of the decisions of these selected Judges. He trusted that a Liberal Parliament would declare in favour of freedom of speech and freedom of the Press. If speakers or the Press infringed the law, the law as it at present existed was perfectly competent to punish them, and was sufficiently stringent for all the objects required. It seemed to him that it was unreasonable to say that the proposed alteration in the law was necessary.
    MR. LEAMYsaid, he thought that, seeing they had the Attorney General for Ireland there, they should get some information from him as to the manner in which trials would be conducted under this Act. They were about to have a new and exceptional tribunal established, and it appeared to him only right that they should have some statement as to the mode of procedure which would be adopted in that tribunal. They knew how trials for treason were conducted now. They knew that before the jury
    2010
    were called on to give their verdict the Judge usually summed up the evidence, and, on a question of law, gave his direction. Now they were to have three Judges on the Bench; and he was curious to know whether it would fall to the lot of one of them to explain the law to the other two; whether the three, after hearing a case, were to retire to a consulting room and make up their mind as to what verdict they should give; or whether, immediately after the closing address of the counsel for the prosecution, each Judge would proceed, without any consultation with his fellows, to give his opinion? This might seem a very trivial sort of thing; but, after all, if they were to have an exceptional tribunal, he thought they ought to be told how it was to work. They knew that at present it was the custom for the jury to retire into a private room to consider their verdict. He wished to know whether the Judges would follow that example; and, if so, whether, when they came out of the retiring room, they would give their reasons?
    THE CHAIRMAN: I must point out to the hon. Gentleman that the questions he is raising are not within the limits of the Amendment, which is with regard to words spoken, or words in newspapers.
    MR. LEAMYsaid, he did not wish to travel beyond the Amendment, and the subject to which he had been devoting his attention he would come to by-and-bye. The Amendment before the Committee provided that no words spoken at a public meeting, and no matter printed in a newspaper in Ireland, should be held to be evidence in any trial for treason or treason-felony within the meaning of this sub-section. The hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar) had pointed out that recently at the State Trials witnesses were put forward by the Crown to prove words spoken at certain meetings, which witnesses had had to admit that they did not write shorthand, and that, as a matter of fact, they had only taken down a word here and there. He himself had been concerned in a case that occurred in the county of Londonderry a short time ago. A man was prosecuted for preaching the "no rent" doctrine. A witness, a police constable, appeared, and was sworn; and when he (Mr. Leamy) proceeded to cross-examine him, he found that the

    2011
    man had not taken down, at the time they were uttered, the words which were relied on by the Crown to secure a conviction, but that he had gone home, and, a considerable time after, proceeded to write down the words. But that was not all. The witness admitted that he had only put down from memory such phrases as he thought would be likely to be sufficient to enable the Crown to secure a conviction. Were they to have the same thing carried out under this Act? Were they to have speakers prosecuted for what they had said on the evidence of men who were not acquainted with shorthand, and who did not take down the words relied on when they were delivered, but put them down from memory some time afterwards? That was important, when they bore in mind the incident which had occurred that evening, when the hon. Member for Wexford (Mr. Healy) was replying to the hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General (Sir Henry James). The Attorney General had said—"Oh, you took down one sentence, but you did not take down the whole of my speech. If you had done so, you would have found the particular sentence you quote would not bear the meaning you attach to it." But they had found that in trials in Ireland particular portions of speeches, that it was believed would serve the purposes of the Crown, only had been taken down. He knew it was the boast of their Poet Laureate that England was a land
    "Where, girt by friends and foes,
    A man may speak the thing he will;"
    but he knew that an Irish Member could not address his constituents without finding himself in the presence of a couple of men sent down by Government, to try and torture every word he said into something seditious. He should like to see the Amendment accepted; but, at the same time, he had not much hope of it. When a Liberal Government proceeded to measures of this kind there was not much hope; but, whether this Bill was passed or not, so long as he was a Representative of the people, he should always speak the thing he thought. He knew there would be attempts made to check free speech in Ireland, and he knew what effect those attempts would have. He and his Friends had been trying to guide popular sentiment in Ireland,
    2012
    trying to keep the people out of illegal courses and from secret societies, and to hold out to them the hope that there was a chance that by Constitutional agitation they would win back their national right. The Irish Members knew very well that the English Government found it inconvenient to have them here. They had been rather troublesome to the Liberal Ministry, having prevented that Ministry, who had come in with such splendid promises of reforms for England, from carrying out their pledges. They had compelled the Ministry to pay attention to Irish questions, and had made them cut a sorry figure in regard to their promise of reforms for England. The English Government were, therefore, anxious to get rid of them. They would find, in the long run, that it would be better to deal with extreme partizans in that House than with extreme partizans outside, who now cared very little for English Ministers or the British Government.
    Question put.
    The Committee divided:—Ayes 26; Noes 61: Majority 35.—(Div. List, No. 105.)
    MR. PARNELLsaid, that, in the absence of his hon. Friend the Member for Tipperary (Mr. Dillon), he wished to move a portion of the Amendment which stood in the name of his hon. Friend. His hon. Friend proposed to leave out the Sub-Sections B, C, D, and E, which specified among the offences to be tried—B, murder or manslaughter; C, attempts to kill; D, aggravated crimes of violence against the person; E, arson, whether by Common Law or by Statute. He (Mr. Parnell) would not move the whole of this Amendment, but would propose simply to leave out from Sub-Section B the words "murder or." He did this on the ground which had been frequently stated in the course of the discussion in Committee, that there had been no failure on the part of juries to convict, during the last two years, where the weight of evidence required them to convict. He again respectfully asked the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General for Ireland to state whether, in his opinion, as one of the Law Officers of the Crown, there had been any failure of justice, with regard to juries, in the cases of murder tried during the year 1881, in each of

    2013
    which it was, no doubt, true that the persons accused were acquitted. Personally, he was not aware that any charge had been brought against the juries upon these occasions of having acted contrary to the evidence; and if the Government could not make out a satisfactory case, or a more satisfactory case than had been made out, in regard to Sub-Section A, he should certainly feel himself compelled to put the Committee to the trouble of a division.
    Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 18, to leave out the words "murder or."—(Mr. Parnell.)
    Question proposed, "That the words 'murder or' stand part of the Clause."
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON)said, he was sorry that he had been unable to be in the House that night in the earlier part of the discussion; but he did not think that the hon. Member was quite justified in stating that he had endeavoured to avoid expressing an opinion. It was hardly to be expected that if juries broke down in cases of less importance, as far as the penalties awarded to them were concerned, than murder, they would have succeeded in doing justice in cases of murder. If any hon. Member would look into the Report of the Lords' Committee of 1881, and examine the evidence given by Mr. Bolton in July, he would see there a continuous series of cases, coming down to the year 1880, in which the juries had made default, not from any misapprehension, not from any mistake, and not from any inability to weigh the evidence properly, but from a determination not to convict.
    MR. PARNELLasked if the cases referred to were murder cases?
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON)said, he was speaking of murder cases, and the Committee would find them all mentioned in the Report of the Lords' Committee. He would give one instance. It was a case of a murder committed with firearms. A portion of the wadding was found either in the neighbourhood of the scene of the murder, or on the person of the murdered man. A corresponding piece of wadding, with the identical word through which the paper had been torn, was found in the pocket of the man charged with the
    2014
    offence. The accused was also brought in immediate contact with the scene of the murder, and yet the jury acquitted him. It would be found, on referring to the case, that one of the Judges—he thought it was Mr. Baron Dowse—expressed his astonishment at the conclusion arrived at by the jury, and asked them if there had not been some mistake on their part. It would also be found in another case that Judge Lawson expressed similar astonishment, and also Mr. Justice Fitzgerald.
    MR. O'DONNELLasked if the right hon. and learned Gentleman did not mean Baron Fitzgerald?
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON)said, no; he had referred to Mr. Justice Fitzgerald, who was a different person. It seemed to be an extraordinary thing that there should be two persons who did not possess the same identity. There had also been a lamentable miscarriage of justice since he had been in Office; but he would not refer to it more in detail. Probably hon. Members would understand why he exercised a reserve in the matter. It was a most lamentable case.
    MR. PARNELLasked what the case was?
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON)said, he would tell the hon. Member if he would put the question to him out of the House; but he could assure him that the results in the case he had in his mind had been most lamentable. He would, however, give the Committee one instance, and one only, of a case which had occurred since he had been in Office, and from that case he would ask the Committee to draw an inference whether it was possible to get juries to deliver a verdict in accordance with the weight of evidence or not. It was a case of public interest, tried at the Kerry Spring Assizes. The Judge who presided was Mr. Justice Barry. It was a case of posting a threatening notice. Two constables, who were watching behind a ditch, saw a man approach a Roman Catholic church, and put a threatening notice on one of the piers.
    MR. PARNELLsaid, that a threatening notice was not murder.
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON)said, the hon. Member for the City of Cork

    2015
    was too hasty. Murder followed upon this transaction. One of the constables jumped across the ditch, and the instant the man charged with the offence heard a rustle behind him he pulled the notice down and ran away. Both constables followed him. The man apparently thought that if he tore the notice and threw it down the constables would probably stop to pick it up. He therefore threw it down; but, instead of stopping to pick it up, the first constable who was in pursuit of him followed him up, and caught him. The second constable, who was following behind, picked up the torn notice, which was put together and produced in Court. The indictment was read. The jury were properly empannelled; the Judge was fully competent to try the case; the evidence was clear; the man was taken red-handed, and yet the foreman of the jury, after the case had been heard, and the jury had retired, came back and informed the Judge that one of the jurors had stated that if they sat for six weeks he would never consent to a conviction in the case. The Judge discharged the jury. The foreman who made the statement was Mr. Herbert, and a few days afterwards Mr. Herbert was murdered. He might mention another case. A friend of his, when at the last Spring Assizes, had a son, an only child, who was summoned to serve on the jury. The father got a friendly warning that if he allowed his son to serve on the jury, and a certain particular case came before him, and there was a conviction, he would inevitably be put out of the way. His friend thought it his duty to compel his son, even if apprehensive of danger, to discharge his duty as a citizen; but he was strongly advised, against his own judgment, not to risk his son's life. He (the Attorney General for Ireland) thought he had quoted enough to show that jurors were acting from terror, and that they could not be relied upon. He might put in a statement contained in a confidential report made to him, in reference to the present year 1882, by one of his own officials. The official said—"In my judgment——"
    MR. BIGGAR: Who is the official?
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON)said, he was not going to state. He had already said that this was a confidential report made to him by an official, and he
    2016
    gave it on his responsibility as Attorney General for Ireland. The official said—
    "In my judgment, trial by jury in its present condition, instead of being a protection to innocence, operates as a protection to the guilty."
    MR. HEALY: What do the Judges say?
    MR. BIGGAR: Is the official Mr. Clifford Lloyd?
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON)said, he had already informed the Committee that he could not give the name of the person who made this statement, and the Committee would well understand the reasons for the refusal. He thought he had adduced sufficient to show that it was impossible, in the present circumstances and condition of Ireland, to obtain a fair and impartial trial by jury in agrarian cases. It would be impossible for him to accept the Amendment moved by the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell).
    MR. O'DONNELLsaid, the Committee had now received a sample of the kind of cases which the Government had trumped up against Irish juries. Hon. Members who heard the statement were perfectly well able to judge of the accuracy of the description given by the right hon. and learned Gentleman. The right hon. and learned Gentleman had read an anonymous scrap of paper from some subordinate person, probably Mr. Clifford Lloyd or Major Bond.
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON): I said it came from an official who is responsible to me, which no magistrate is.
    MR. O'DONNELLsaid, he did not know that the fact of the man being responsible to the Attorney General for Ireland made the responsibility one whit more important than if it was a responsibility to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. Of course, he was well aware that the Attorney General for Ireland had a sufficiently high idea of the importance of his functions; but he begged to assure the right hon. and learned Gentleman that that anonymous scrap of paper from the official who was responsible to him possessed very little value at all. The man who wrote it knew very well that the right hon. and learned Gentleman could dismiss or promote him, according to the sort of evi-

    2017
    dence he was able to produce. The kind of responsibility which this subordinate official enjoyed appeared to be indescribable, and there he (Mr. O'Donnell) would leave it. Then they had another story that was almost anonymous—the story of some person who, having found a scrap of paper in the pocket of a man accused of an offence, which corresponded with another scrap of paper that was brought into immediate connection with the instrument of death, and because the jury did not put these two pieces of paper together, and jump at once to the conclusion that the man who possessed one piece must have fired the fatal shot, the right hon. and learned Attorney General for Ireland was excessively indignant with the jury for not having hanged the accused man. The right hon. and learned Gentleman made an attempt to connect the torn scrap of paper found in the possession of the accused with the other scrap of paper which had been used as wadding; and, therefore, according to the opinion of the right hon. and learned Gentleman, any man who intended to become an assassin in future had only to contrive to get in his possession a scrap of paper torn from a letter, or from a book belonging to another person, in order to make it necessary for an intelligent jury to declare that the person who possessed the corresponding scrap must have been the actual assassin. He really thought that the right hon. and learned Gentleman had afforded a useful illustration of the methods by which the Law Officers of the Grown in Ireland arrived at conclusions. But this was not all. The right hon. and learned Gentleman told another anonymous story, and a very delicate story, judging from the reluctance of the right hon. and learned Gentleman to enter into any details in regard to it; and these were the only cases given by the Government to justify the abolition of trial by jury in the case of persons charged with murder. He (Mr. O'Donnell) ventured to think that every man accused of murder had a right to have a fair trial for his life; and if he had not a fair trial, and was sentenced to death without a fair trial, then the men who condemned him to death were murderers, and he would make no exception, whether they were official persons or not. He contended that the Committee had received no evidence whatever from the
    2018
    Government, and they were not going to receive evidence of a single case in which a jury had been discharged, or in which a jury had acquitted a man charged with murder, where they ought to have agreed upon a conviction. ["Oh, oh!"] Hon. Members who said "Oh!" were quite as ignorant in the matter as the Attorney General for Ireland. There was simply a dead set being made against the jury system in Ireland for English Party purposes. That was the real explanation of the proposals contained in this Bill. They were asked to abolish trial by jury in Ireland, because it had occasionally happened in that country that a jury returned a verdict of acquittal. But did not the same thing constantly happen in England, and constables accuse the wrong person in default of finding out the right one? It was of fundamental importance in the Constabulary mind that somebody ought to be accused. Somebody, therefore, was accused, and because 12 men were unable to consider that the evidence which had satisfied the mind of Policeman X, who was ambitious for promotion, was not sufficient to convince them of the guilt of the man, the right hon. and learned Attorney General for Ireland at once proposed that trial by jury in all accusations for murder should be abolished in Ireland. There had not been an attempt made in the discussion which had taken place that evening, on any part of the clause or of the sub-sections, to prove in any case in which the jury had disagreed that the evidence was conclusive, and that the jury did not disagree for good reasons. Not a single attempt of this kind had been made. On the contrary, they were told that the fact that murders took place in Ireland, or that treason was committed, formed a sufficient reason for abolishing trial by jury. Murders took place in England. [Mr. HEALY: No.] Yes—dastardly murders. [Mr. HEALY: No, no.] He could assure his hon. Friend the Member for Wexford that murders did take place in England; and it was, further, a fact that dastardly murders took place in England, and that a large number of those murders went unpunished. [Mr. HEALY: Oh dear no.] A very large number went unpunished; but he did not think there was the slightest likelihood of Her Majesty's Government introducing

    2019
    a Bill for the abolition of trial by jury in England. If they did, he was afraid that Her Majesty's Government would be in a sad minority at the next General Election. ["Hear, hear!"] A staunch Ministerialist who sat behind the Liberator of Bulgaria applauded that statement. Judging from the applause of that Ministerialist, perhaps one of the grounds on which Her Majesty's Government would go to the electors at the next General Election was that they had abolished trial by jury in Ireland. Did not the Government see the lesson they were teaching in insisting upon this monstrous proposal, by declaring that juries in Ireland declined to give their verdicts according to the evidence placed before them, by justifying upon that ground the abolition of trial by jury, and by endeavouring to make out that the abolition of trial by jury was necessary for the detection of crime in Ireland? Not a single word had been uttered by the Government, or by a supporter of the Government policy, to show that this Bill would promote the detection of crime; and by asserting that trial by jury, one of the fundamental Constitutional principles of civilized society, ought to be abolished in Ireland, they were teaching the horrible lesson that, unless future Governments were encouraged to bring in similar Bills, there would be a failure in the detection and punishment of crime. That was the lesson which the English Government were seeking to teach the Irish people; and, by so doing, they were driving the Irish people into a course which would render the detection and punishment of crime extremely difficult. The Ministerialists applauded the policy of the Government. They considered that it was likely to obtain for the Liberal Party a majority at the next General Election; and there had been an attempt to defend it on the part of the right hon. and learned Gentleman, who, however, was not present during the previous discussion, because his views, in giving an exposition of the law, would have inconveniently clashed with the views laid down by his English Brother. The right hon. and learned Gentleman was now, fortunately, present in order to afford to the House a complete and satisfactory exposition of the unreason on which Her Majesty's Government was conducted in Ireland.
    MR. JUSTIN M'CARTHYsaid, he had no desire to find fault with the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General for Ireland for the manner in which he performed, with as much courtesy as possible, his somewhat difficult duties in that House; but he thought that the last speech of the right hon. and learned Gentleman was singularly unfortunate. The speech was made to prove that there were sufficient grounds for exempting trials for murder from the ordinary law which prevailed in England and Ireland. They were bound to suppose that the Attorney General for Ireland was in possession of sufficient reasons for taking up that position, and they had expected that he would have brought them forward in order to justify the course the Government had taken. But what was the argument of the right hon. and learned Gentleman? In order to induce the Committee to agree to this extraordinary and exceptional course, in the first place, he read to the Committee three or four words from some anonymous correspondent, whose name he declined to give, and who had informed him that, in his judgment, trial by jury in its present condition, instead of being a protection to the innocent, operated as a protection to the guilty. The Committee had no means of judging what amount of weight or authority was to be attached to this declaration of opinion, and they had no means of testing the accuracy of the statement made. What other means had the right hon. and learned Gentleman taken in order to induce the Legislature to adopt the extraordinary course proposed to them by Her Majesty's Government? He gave the Committee another example—the example which had been referred to by his hon. Friend the Member for Dungarvan (Mr. O'Donnell)—the case of a man who was not convicted of murder by the jury after they had heard the whole of the evidence. Now, in that case the only evidence against the man who was charged with murder was that he had in his possession a portion of the piece of paper which was subsequently discovered to be part of another piece that was found wrapped round the bullet that killed the murdered man. That evidence amounted to this. If one were out in the country walking along the road-side, and were to tear a piece of paper in two, throw one part away

    2021
    and put the other piece in his pocket, and the corresponding piece was subsequently used as wadding, and was found in a murdered body, then the jury ought to find him guilty of the murder. He would appeal to any hon. Member of the House whether, if he had been upon the jury, he would for one moment have listened to the idea of convicting a man of murder on trumpery evidence like this? It was no evidence at all; and if there were other evidence of a stronger character, why was it not brought forward, or why were the Committee not informed of it? Yet this case was given to the Committee as an excuse for the kind of legislation the Government were now introducing. Hon. Members who opposed this Bill were placed at a great disadvantage. The assumption against them appeared to be that by their opposing the Government they were endeavouring to screen outrage. They were doing nothing of the kind. They were only insisting that the law, as it at present stood—the law both in England and Ireland—was sufficient for the conviction of crime, if proper evidence were only produced. What they said was this. If the Government did not give sufficient evidence, but simply wanted to strengthen their own hands by establishing a tribunal which would convict, without regard to the evidence, any person accused of murder, they had no right to ask the House to assist them until they had established an overwhelming case. He said, therefore, that if the Government had any stronger reasons to give in support of their position than those which had been already brought forward, they ought to be produced at once. As far as the speech of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General for Ireland was concerned, it contained no reason and no evidence whatever to justify the proposals contained in the clause.
    MR. PARNELLsaid, he had put a question to the right hon. and learned Attorney General for Ireland in the hope that he might have been saved the necessity of putting the Committee to the trouble of a division. He had asked the right hon. and learned Gentleman if he could give the Committee any instance, during the two years of the agitation of the Land League coincident with the right hon. and learned Gentle-
    2022
    man's tenure of Office, in which, in his opinion, a jury had given a verdict against the weight of evidence in a case of murder. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said there was one occasion on which this had occurred; but the right hon. and learned Gentleman did not think it proper to inform the House what that case was. He (Mr. Parnell) was, therefore, not able to identify it, or examine the basis of the right hon. and learned Gentleman's conclusions. At the same time, he had no doubt that the right hon. and learned Gentleman had acted with proper regard to his duty in not stating the evidence to the House. Now, he (Mr. Parnell) had followed the list of cases sent to trial for murder, and had read the evidence attentively; and his impression was that in no case in which persons were made amenable to the law since the land movement came into operation had there been a failure on the part of the jury to convict where proper and suitable evidence had been given. The right hon. and learned Gentleman attempted to controvert his (Mr. Parnell's) views by referring him to what he called a long list of failures on the part of juries to convict, which was contained in the evidence given by Mr. Bolton, the Crown Solicitor for the County of Tipperary, before the Lords' Committee of last year. When he (Mr. Parnell) asked the right hon. and learned Gentleman if these were cases of murder, the right hon. and learned Gentleman said "yes," with a great deal of emphasis. Now, he (Mr. Parnell) had had an opportunity of going over all these cases since the right hon. and learned Gentleman had alluded to them; and he found, in Mr. Bolton's long list of cases, that there were only three of murder extending over the period from 1854 to 1880.
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON)said, he had not referred to those dates. All he had referred to was the number of cases which had occurred between 1875 and the present date.
    MR. PARNELLsaid, he had misunderstood the right hon. and learned Gentleman, and it was possible he might have made a mistake, as he had not had an opportunity of examining the evidence of Mr. Bolton as carefully as the right hon. and learned Gentleman had. He, therefore, accepted the right hon.

    2023
    and learned Gentleman's correction of the dates. But, at all events, the figures he had referred to included the period of the years from 1875 to 1880, with the result he had already mentioned. These dates would not include the period which he was dealing with, of the Land League agitation. He must remind the right hon. and learned Gentleman that the late Government were in Office during most of that period; but they never thought it necessary to base upon that failure of juries to convict a demand for the abolition of trial by jury in murder cases. The right hon. and learned Gentleman had only given one instance of failure to convict in a case of murder to justify the Government in the proposals they now made. He wished to show the sort of evidence that was given before the Committee of the House of Lords in substantiation of the charge made against juries in the county of Tipperary of refusing to convict. That was one of the cases of murder to which he thought the right hon. and learned Gentleman referred. It would be found mentioned in Question 3,848 of the Evidence before the Lords' Committee. The charge preferred was that of firing at a man with intent to kill. The firearm used was a pistol. The pistol was loaded when found on the person of the man who was accused of the offence. It was loaded with what were called slugs cut from a piece of sheet-lead, and in the house of the accused person a piece of lead of the same description was discovered. But anyone who knew anything of sheet-lead knew that it was always the same. In the particular case mentioned by the right hon. and learned Gentleman, on the charge being drawn from the pistol, the wadding was found to consist of a piece of The Dublin Evening Mail, a newspaper which persons were in the habit of borrowing from a magistrate who lived in the neighbourhood; and in the pocket of the person charged with the offence a piece of the same newspaper was found. The contention raised by the right hon. and learned Gentleman was, that because a person had in his possession a piece of The Dublin Mail newspaper, and because a certain firearm was found to have been loaded with a piece of the same newspaper, therefore a jury of the county of Tipperary failed to do their duty in
    2024
    acquitting the accused upon this extremely doubtful circumstantial evidence. He must say that the right hon. and learned Gentleman had not made out a case. He had only been able to give the Committee one instance of the failure of a jury to convict in a case of murder. The same remark would apply to the three other instances which were given on the testimony of Mr. Bolton. Under these circumstances, with very great reluctance, he should feel obliged to take the sense of the Committee upon the Amendment.
    MR. LABOUCHEREsaid, he quite understood the object of hon. Gentlemen opposite, and their objection to allow sentence of death to be passed against their countrymen without the verdict of a jury; but it seemed to him that, in insisting on this Amendment, they were somewhat weakening their case in regard to treason and treason-felony, which remained in the category of offences to be dealt with by the Special Commission Court; but which, he hoped, would be reconsidered when the Bill came up upon the Report. The great argument in favour of treason and treason-felony being excluded was that they were political crimes, while all the others were personal crimes; and it seemed to him that his hon. Friend the Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell) would gain his object better if he were to introduce the Amendment on Section 22, Sub-Section 2, which gave the Court its powers and jurisdiction. If he introduced there an Amendment not allowing the Court to pass sentence of death, his hon. Friend would gain all he desired to obtain by the Amendment which he now submitted. He threw out this suggestion because he thought that a good many hon. Members, who would not vote with his hon. Friend on this Amendment, would vote with him on a similar Amendment on Clause 22, because they were altogether opposed to the infliction of sentences of death; and, in order to be consistent, they would feel bound to support the hon. Member.
    MR. TREVELYANsaid, that he had attempted to make a careful analysis of the case referred to by his right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney General for Ireland. It was the case of a man who was brought to trial for firing with intent to murder, and it was one in which a portion of the newspaper was found

    2025
    on the person of the accused from which another piece used for wadding had been cut. Now, this was pretty strong evidence; but it was only a portion of the confirmatory evidence. There had been a large body of evidence, in addition to this fact, given against the man who was upon his trial.
    MR. HEALYasked what the number of the question was in the Evidence before the Lords' Committee to which the right hon. Gentleman referred?
    MR. TREVELYANsaid, he was unable to say off-hand. But he felt that this was not a case which was to be argued on special grounds. He had a general list of crimes committed against the person, crimes which, if successful, would have been punished with death, and crimes which, when unsuccessful, were of the same guilt. In the case of murder, there were, in the year 1881, 17 murders reported. Of these, in four cases the persons suspected were brought to trial; but they were all acquitted. He would take next the case of firing at the person. There were 66 of these cases reported.
    MR. PARNELLremarked, that the arguments had been confined to cases of murder.
    MR. TREVELYANsaid, that these were cases of attempted murder; and he wished to take murder and attempted murder together. There were 66 cases of firing at the person reported. In 20 of these cases the persons accused were brought to trial; 16 were acquitted and 4 were convicted. Of firing into dwellings there were 144 cases; 14 accused persons were brought to trial, and of these 11 were acquitted and 3 were convicted. That was to say, that of cases in which murder was either attempted or committed 38 were brought to trial, 31 were acquitted, and 7 were convicted; but in none of the cases of murder—the 17 murders committed in 1881—was a single person punished. Ten agrarian murders had been committed in the first five months of the present year; so that, in a year and a-half, there had been 27 agrarian murders in regard to which no person, as yet, had received the slightest punishment.
    MR. HEALYsaid, the right hon. Gentleman had omitted a very vital portion of his statement. He had told the Committee that in the year 1881 there
    2026
    were 17 murders, and that this year there had been 10 more, making 27 in all, who had gone unpunished. He wished to ask the right hon. Gentleman in how many of these cases the murderers were caught?
    MR. TREVELYAN: Forty of them were tried.
    MR. HEALYsaid, that in four out of 27 there were trials. He would ask if these facts were sufficient to justify the House of Commons in consenting to the abolition of trial by jury? The right hon. and learned Attorney General for Ireland said that there was one case which he could not mention to the House. He would ask the right hon. and learned Gentleman if it was a case in which a lady was tried?
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON): No.
    MR. HEALYwished to know whether it was an agrarian case at all? The whole claim of the Government was that these were agrarian cases, and that in regard to them sympathy existed between the people and the persons by whom they were committed. If it were not a case of an agrarian crime, it would not be a case in point at all; but, as the Bill now stood, cases which were not of an agrarian character would come within its provisions. A man accused of horse-stealing would not be tried under the Act; and were they going to tell Irish jurors that they were fit to try horse-stealing cases, but not murders? He should certainly move to insert horse-stealing and pocket-picking. Why should not the duty of trying these cases be thrown upon the Judges as well as that of trying those which were specified in the clause? He should certainly move to insert these offences, believing that, in that case, he would get the Government on the hip. The Government told them that it was not altogether agrarian sympathy that was concerned in the matter. They were told yesterday, when his hon. Friend behind him (Mr. Parnell) moved to insert that the offences dealt with should be agrarian offences, that it was not agrarian offences simply the clause was intended to deal with. If that were so, what was the class of offences they proposed to deal with? Was it horse-stealing? If not, they had better abolish trial by jury in Ireland altogether. Why should a man be put to the trouble of attending the Assizes,

    2027
    and leaving his work, under penalty of a fine, for the purpose of trying persons for horse-stealing, robbery, and plundering, when the same man was not to be trusted with any higher class of offences? He wished to get at the exact meaning of the Government. It was said that they could not distinguish between agrarian crime and ordinary crime. That was the statement of the Home Secretary yesterday; and it showed that the Home Secretary did not understand his own Bill; because, in examining the clauses of the Bill, he found there was a provision that the Lord Lieutenant was to give compensation in cases where the offences committed were supposed to be of an agrarian character. The Lord Lieutenant was to be the judge in that case; and yet the Home Secretary said—"How are you to judge whether the offence is of an agrarian character or not?" If the Home Secretary was correct, how was the Lord Lieutenant to judge? From first to last, the statements they had had with regard to the Bill were of a most flimsy character, and he should move to leave out every one of these sub-sections. So far the Government had given them no facts, and he insisted upon having facts, or, at any rate, upon exposing the intentions of the Government. The Committee were told by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary that there had been 27 murders in the course of the last 18 months, and there had not been one punished. His (Mr. Healy's) answer to that was in the words of the old proverb—"First catch your hare." Let the Government first catch their murderers and put somebody before the jury before they asked them to dispense with trial by jury altogether. He wanted to know what percentage of men had been put upon their trial, and what percentage had been acquitted? If there had been 27 murders committed in Ireland, and all of them had gone unpunished, all he had to say was that it was a great disgrace to Her Majesty's Government. How could they expect to maintain law and order when their police were so bad? Did they expect that the Judges would be able to do better for them? He ventured to say that they would not; and, for his part, he objected to a jury of three Judges. The right hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General for Ireland had made a most extraordinary
    2028
    statement. He had stated that Mr. Herbert was shot because he was foreman of a jury in the county of Kerry, which acquitted or was discharged because a member of the jury refused to consent to a verdict of conviction. He wished to know if there were no other persons on the jury who stood out? The right hon. and learned Attorney General, if he had been a Judge on that occasion, would, no doubt, have said that no person had a right to expose the secrets of the jury-box; and yet the right hon. and learned Gentleman was not ashamed to come before the House of Commons and expose those secrets. But if that fate befell Mr. Herbert because he would not consent to an acquittal in a case of posting a threatening notice, what would be the fate of three Judges who convicted a man of murder? The argument of the right hon. and learned Gentleman was that the people of Ireland were so bloody-minded that in a case of posting a threatening notice they shot the foreman of the jury because he refused to acquit the accused person. Now, supposing it was a case of conviction and murder before three Judges, what inference could they draw? He told the right hon. and learned Gentleman that he was pursuing a very dangerous path. He was telling the people of Ireland that they were so bloodthirsty that they shot Mr. Herbert because he refused to acquit for sending a threatening notice; and on that particular subhead they were dealing with crimes which would require the hanging of a man, not on the verdict of 12 men who would be the peers of the accused, but of three men who, in all probability, would be partizans of the Government. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said that Mr. Herbert was shot because he refused to acquit in the case of posting a threatening notice. He (Mr. Healy) invited the House to consider, by a parity of reasoning, what would probably be the fate of the Judges who refused to acquit in a case of murder tried under the provisions of this Bill? What would be the inference that would be drawn in Ireland he left the right hon. and learned Gentleman to explain. Personally, he thought it was a disgraceful charge to make against the people of Ireland, that they were ready to shoot a man because he refused to acquit a prisoner on a charge of posting a threatening notice,

    2029
    especially where, seeing there was a disagreement, no one was punished, and no vindictive feelings could have been aroused. Such an accusation ought not to be made, and he regretted that the right hon. and learned Gentleman had made it. Nobody knew better than the right hon. and learned Gentleman that Mr. Herbert had various other reputations besides the reputation he had acquired as a juryman. They would remember a calm-minded English journal making the remark that Mr. Herbert ought to be dismissed from the Bench for advising that the people should be "skivered," and that buckshot ought to be distributed amongst the people. The verdict of The Spectator was that the man who could make a recommendation like that was not fit to be a magistrate intrusted with the administration of justice. He (Mr. Healy) thought that he had now dealt with all the statements of the right hon. and learned Gentleman. He came next to the document the right hon. and learned Gentleman had read—a confidential document from some subordinate official. It was a wonderful thing that they never got these confidential documents published unless to suit the convenience of the Government. Whenever the Irish Members applied for the publication of a confidential document they were told that the document was confidential, and therefore it could not be given. By an extraordinarily fortuitous concurrence of events, the right hon. and learned Gentleman happened to have the faithful subordinate in Ireland; and just at the proper moment he was able to produce this remarkable document and flourish it before the Committee with an air of mystery and triumph. Now, let him tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman that that argument would not wash; it was a great deal too thin. They all knew that these confidential officials were in receipt of certain salaries from the Government; that the Government were about to abolish trial by jury in Ireland; and that these subordinates were only too anxious to earn their salaries. He thought that the feeling of the people of Ireland had just as much right to be considered as the statement of any confidential subordinate of the right hon. and learned Gentleman, or of the right hon. and learned Gentleman himself; and, therefore, unless distinct facts were placed before the
    2030
    Committee as to the number of persons who had been brought to trial, and the percentages of those acquitted, he should certainly challenge a division on every one of these sub-heads.
    MR. P. MARTINsaid, he desired to correct a misapprehension which he considered had been conveyed by the words used by the right hon. and learned Attorney General for Ireland. He understood the right hon. and learned Gentleman to state that the entire principle which this clause proposed to enact had been sanctioned by the Report of the Committee of the House of Lords on the Jury Act. Now, if that was the impression sought to be conveyed, he challenged the accuracy of that statement. No such conclusions had been adopted by that Committee, or, indeed, by any of their Lordships who sat on that Committee. It was true that a majority on that Committee did recommend the abolition of trial by jury to a limited extent. But that recommendation was opposed by Lords Spencer and Carlingford. The result of the evidence was not as had been stated. It was fairly summarized in the Report of the Committee—namely, that, as far as murder generally was concerned, there had been no failure of justice in Ireland. In regard to murders arising out of agrarian cases, he admitted that the Committee of the House of Lords came to a very different conclusion. What were they asked to do under the present Bill? Under this Bill, in every case of murder, whether agrarian or otherwise, they were asked to transfer the jurisdiction hitherto vested in a jury to three Judges alone. That proposal was not merely not in accordance with the Report of the Committee of the House of Lords on the Jury Act, but, as it appeared to him, it was entirely contrary to that Report. Their Lordships had, in their summary of the evidence to which he desired to call the attention of the Members of the Committee, carefully and pointedly called attention to the fact that the alleged misconduct on the part of the juries was, in the opinion of most of the witnesses, limited to cases in which the evidence came under a certain well-defined category, such as disputes as to the occupation of the land, crimes arising out of political or religious antagonism, and aggravated assaults. Then, as to the recommendations of the Lords' Committee, what were those recommenda-

    2031
    tions? Were they to suspend trial by jury altogether in the case of murder? Far from it. They made no such recommendation at all. Their recommendation was utterly different. They stated—
    "Under these circumstances, it will be for Her Majesty's Government to determine whether trial by jury should not, for a limited time, within a limited area, and in regard to crimes of a well-defined character, be replaced by some form of trial less liable to abuse."
    The crimes of a well-defined character, of which their Lordships spoke, were limited to that class of crime which bore relation to the three categories he had pointed out. In the general and sweeping character of the provisions proposed to be enacted under the Bill, the Government were proceeding, not in accordance with, but, as he respectfully submitted to the Committee, entirely contrary to, the distinct suggestion made by the Lords' Committee. But, in addition to that, he was not going to weary the Committee by going through all the evidence, or contesting the accuracy of the summary to which he had already referred; but he must, in fairness, observe that anyone reading the evidence would see that many witnesses of great experience and knowledge considered any interference with the jury system uncalled for, and not required. As, for instance, Mr. Corcoran, the Clerk of the Crown for Queen's County, whose evidence would be found in the Report, stated that there had been no failure of justice in cases of murder in that county since the passing of Lord O'Hagan's Act. Then, again, Mr. Constantine Molloy, a barrister of considerable position and practice, both in the defence of criminals and prosecutions on behalf of the Crown, when asked a question by their Lordships as to whether there had been any very general failure of justice in respect to these murder cases, stated that he did not think there had been. He pointed out several cases in which there appeared to him to have not been complete justice done; but he added that, as they all knew, cases of this character occurred not only in Ireland, but in England. He (Mr. Martin) admitted that the evidence of Mr. Bolton, the Crown Solicitor for the County of Tipperary, alluded to by the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney General for Ireland, was very strong; but on reading the instances he gave, not much weight was, he
    2032
    conceived, to be attached to his testimony, especially when confronted with that of the two gentlemen he had mentioned. It was also met by the evidence of Mr. Cecil Moore, who had been for a long time a practising solicitor, and who, to his knowledge, was a gentleman of ability and sound opinion. Mr. Moore did not think there had been any such failure. The proposal now made to the Committee was not to confine the clause to the category of offences specified by the Lords' Committee, but in every case of murder to take away from juries the jurisdiction they had heretofore possessed of pronouncing a verdict of "Guilty" or "Not Guilty," and of averting the power in a tribunal composed of three Judges. He thought that, in the course they were taking, the Government were proceeding, not merely with haste and precipitation, but even with injustice towards the great body of the people of Ireland. If there had been a failure such as that which had been described, it would be more appropriately met by the mode suggested by the Lords' Committee—namely, to establish another tribunal for dealing with the specified classes of cases in which it was ascertained that justice could not be obtained. He thought it would be much more reasonable and much more just, on the part of the Committee, if the jury system of Ireland were defective, to apply at once a remedy for the defects which existed in the system, instead of proposing the unconstitutional and exceptional modes proposed in the present Bill. He thought the Government were adopting what was really a wrong mode of arriving at that which every right-thinking man in Ireland was anxious to arrive at—namely, perfect security that crime should not go unpunished. The principle contained in the clause would aggravate and intensify the very mischief they wanted to remove. The mischief, unfortunately, in Ireland was that evidence was not forthcoming. And what were the Government doing? They were establishing an unpopular tribunal—one which had been condemned by the members who were to act. The tribunal would be discredited by, and held in odium by, the people. It would not command popular sympathy, and would wholly fail in the object the framers of the measure had in view. So far from inducing witnesses to come forward, they would

    2033
    prevent them coming forward to give evidence.
    SIR GEORGE CAMPBELLsaid, he could understand the objection of the Irish Members to abolish trial by jury, although he did not agree with them. He could understand their desire to limit the new tribunal to the trial of agrarian offences; but that proposal had already been discussed and decided. He could also understand the views of hon. Members opposite in regard to the exemption of the crime of treason and treason-felony from the Bill, and he had voted against the proposal to exempt those crimes with some reluctance; but he could not understand the proposal to exempt murder from the clause, when it was well known that murder was the typical instance of the offences which had been committed with absolute impunity in Ireland. It was patent to everyone who had studied the history of Ireland during the last few years that murder was a crime which was now-a-days committed with absolute and positive impunity. There might be a few cases in which a murder which was not of a political or an agrarian character had been detected, and the murderers had been brought to justice; but when an agrarian or a political murder was committed in Ireland, for several years past it had gone unpunished. He was quite free to confess that the first and primary difficulty in regard to the punishment of these crimes was that the murderers had not been apprehended, and that evidence had not been brought against them; but, at the same time, it must be borne in mind that if at any time persons charged with murder were brought to trial, they must have a tribunal free to deal with them without fear and without prejudice. If there was any case in which the new tribunal should be allowed, it was that of murder in the present circumstances of Ireland. Hon. Members opposite had conducted the discussion upon this Bill, so far, with great fairness and moderation. Nothing could be more moderate or more reasonable than many of the arguments put forward by hon. Members opposite; but he must appeal to the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell) whether, having, so far, acted fairly on this subject, and, at the same time, having spoken resolutely in defence of the rights of the Irish people, it was worth his while to continue the discussion with respect to
    2034
    this particular Amendment—an Amendment which had objectionable features beyond all others? The hon. Member would certainly not be supported on a division except by very few Members, and was not likely to receive any support at all from the Liberal side of the House.
    MR. PARNELLsaid, he had not desired to continue the discussion, and if it had not been for the appearance of the hon. Member for Kirkcaldy (Sir George Campbell) in the arena, the Committee would probably have been going through the division at that moment. The speech of the hon. Member exemplified the waste of time he deprecated, and which so frequently arose in that House in consequence of certain hon. Members, who were in the habit of remaining out of the House when an Amendment was under discussion, coming in at the very close of the discussion, and giving their opinions upon the matter without having heard the reasons why the Amendment had been brought forward. He did not propose to state all the reasons which had induced him to make this proposition; and, in refusing to do so, he hoped the hon. Member would acquit him of any desire to be discourteous. He thought, however, that before the hon. Gentleman came into the House, he (Mr. Parnell) had made out a very strong case—a very convincing case, and a case which had not been answered in the slightest degree by any Member of the Government—against this portion of this particular sub-section. He thought they had made out an equally strong case with regard to convictions for murder as they had with regard to convictions for treason.
    Question put.
    The Committee divided:—Ayes 133; Noes 22: Majority 111.—(Div. List, No. 106.)
    MR. HEALYsaid, before the hon. Member for Kilkenny (Mr. Marum) moved the Amendment standing in his name, he wished to propose the omission of the words "attempt to kill" in Sub-Section (C). The Government must be aware that Irish Members required some figures and particulars to show the necessity for including in this clause, which was do away with the right of trial by jury, the various offences specified in the Sub-Sections C, D, E, and F.

    2035
    Irish Members were certainly not inclined to allow the Government to pass the Bill without challenge; and if the particulars asked for were not forthcoming the only conclusion at which they could arrive was that the Government had come before the House of Commons to ask for this Act without any reasons to justify it. In the first place, he wished to know how many attempts to kill there had been in the last two years; the number of convictions, the number of disagreements, the number of persons caught, and the number brought to trial? None of these particulars had been given, notwithstanding that the Bill stated with regard to all the offences named that trial by jury in Ireland had failed. Irish Members denied the truth of the proposition that trial by jury had failed; and, moreover, they did not admit that the tribunal to be erected was an impartial tribunal. In short, they traversed every one of the Government statements. They were now upon a most important portion of the measure, and he appealed to Her Majesty's Government to supply the information to which they were justly entitled before further progress was made. If the answer to that appeal were satisfactory, he should not feel it his duty to press the Committee to a division; but, in the meantime, he begged to move the omission of Sub-Section (C).
    Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 19, leave out the words "attempt to kill."—(Mr. Healy.)
    Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause."
    Sir WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell) had argued with great force against the inclusion of treason and treason-felony in this Bill. The Amendment of the hon. Member for the omission of the sub-section relating to those offences had been discussed at great length, and decided by the Committee in a sense contrary to the view which he entertained. He had not, however, understood the hon. Member for the City of Cork to object generally to the suspension of trial by jury in Ireland; and he thought, from a Parliamentary point of view, it must be considered that that question had already been decided by the House. If that were so, he asked whether it was consistent with
    2036
    the view taken by the hon. Member for the City of Cork that each of the things contained in the following sub-sections should be fought on the same footing and in the same manner as the inclusion of treason and treason-felony in the Bill? He might be mistaken; but the impression on his mind was that the hon. Member for the City of Cork regarded these other offences as standing on a totally different footing from treason or treason-felony. The remaining offences were, generally speaking, offences against the person, with the exception of the last, which was incidentally against the person, and a very grave offence it was. This last was intended to be met by the subsection relating to the firing into dwelling-houses. Now, he put it to the hon. Member for the City of Cork and his Friends whether it would not be a fair course to allow progress to be made with this clause of the Bill, inasmuch as the decision of the House had been taken on the necessity of suspending the action of trial by jury? He trusted the Amendment of the hon. Member for Wexford would not be pressed.
    MR. WARTONrose to Order. It appeared to him that the Amendment of the hon. Member for Kilkenny (Mr. Marum) had been passed over.
    THE CHAIRMANsaid, he had called upon that hon. Member in the order in which the Amendments stood on the Paper; but the hon. Member was absent, and no response reached his ear. After that the hon. Member for Wexford rose and moved the Amendment now before the Committee.
    MR. WARTONsuggested that the word "murder," which was a term known to the law, should be substituted for the word "kill."
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, he was willing to adopt the suggestion of the hon. and learned Member for Bridport.
    MR. HEALTbegged to remind the right hon. and learned Gentleman that the proposal he made was that before proceeding with the next four or five lines of the Bill, the Government should furnish some particulars of the crimes therein specified, so far as arrests, convictions, and acquittals were concerned.
    SIR GEORGE CAMPBELLsaid, he had understood the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Home Secretary

    2037
    to accept the proposal of the hon. and learned Member for Bridport, to substitute the word "murder" for the word "kill."
    THE CHAIRMANpointed out that in that case the Amendment of the hon. Member for Wexford would require alteration.
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, the Government had accepted the word "murder" in substitution of "kill." If, therefore, the hon. Member for Wexford intended to proceed with his Amendment, the wording should be altered so as to be consistent with the change in the sub-section.
    MR. HEALYsaid, he had pressed the Government to consider whether they would lay on the Table of the House some figures as to the offences included in the various sub-sections of this clause. Irish Members declined, without further information, to assent to the decision of the House of Lords' Committee, which was held with closed doors, and whose Report was based upon evidence of an extraordinary character. The information he desired to have was this—how many cases had there been of aggravated offences against the person; how many convictions; how many acquittals, and how many men had been caught? The same in the case of arson. He had no wish to divide against the sub-section, if he could get at these facts; but he felt it his duty to press for them before the clause was further proceeded with. He also wished to know if the Government would include cases of horse-stealing in the Bill; because he could see no reason why juries should be excluded from the trial of minor offences any more than from the trial of those named in the clause? If the Government were in possession of the desired particulars, he trusted that the Return would be laid on the Table of the House.
    MR. TREVELYANsaid, as far as he was able, he was prepared to satisfy the hon. Member with regard to the particulars asked for. He held in his hand Returns for the last two years, which, however, were not extremely strong in details. But it must be remembered that what lay behind them was of great importance. It appeared that many cases had not been brought forward for trial, because the authorities had absolutely despaired of convictions being obtained. Accordingly, the crimes which appeared
    2038
    in the Return were those for which it was thought likely the juries would convict. Therefore, although the figures before him told a sad story, that story did not appear so bad as the reality. The crime which stood next to attempt to murder was that of firing at the person. In 1881, 20 crimes of that character were brought up for trial before juries; in 16 of these cases there were acquittals and in four convictions. In 1880, seven crimes of this nature were tried, the result being five acquittals and two convictions. The number of these crimes committed in 1881 was 66. In the case of aggravated assaults against persons, there was, undoubtedly, a considerable number of convictions; but it would be improper to found a conclusion upon the one case in which the convictions were proportionate to the offences committed. Of assaults endangering life, 17 were brought to trial in 1881, out of which there were 15 convictions and two acquittals. But he believed that most of those convictions were obtained at the Winter Assizes, of which so much had been heard in that House. In 1880 there were eight cases of such assaults brought to trial, the result being three convictions and five acquittals. The next offence in the Return was that of arson. For incendiary fires in 1881, 10 suspected criminals were brought to trial, of whom eight were acquitted and two convicted. In all, 356 crimes of this kind were committed. In 1880, 13 cases of incendiary fires were brought to trial, and there was an acquittal in each case. He now came to cases of attacks upon dwelling-houses, which, he supposed, were coincident with those of firing into dwelling-houses. Of these, in 1881 there were 14 trials, resulting in 11 acquittals and three convictions. In 1880, eight of these cases were brought to trial, and no convictions were obtained.
    MR. HEALYsaid, he trusted there would be no objection to lay the Return asked for on the Table of the House, so that Irish Members might have the facts before them on Report. The statement of the right hon. Gentleman had caused him some amusement. The right hon. Gentleman had omitted to state the total number of agrarian crimes committed. But he said this information was necessary in order that the public might know what was the reason for the passing of this Coercion

    2039
    Act. The right hon. Gentleman had said, in one case, that of arson, 356 crimes had been committed; but he added that only 10 people had been caught. Who, he asked, was to blame for that? Was it the juries or the police? Again, the right hon. Gentleman said there would be no evidence forthcoming until there was some assurance of conviction, to which he replied that there would be no evidence unless the police arrested the people who committed the crimes. There had never been a more flimsy attempt on the part of any Government to deprive the Irish people of their liberties. It could not be expected that juries could convict criminals until they had criminals to convict. They had arrived at the time for considering whether this Bill would be of any use at all; and he asked Her Majesty's Government if they really intended to proceed with it after the statement of the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant? The progress of the Bill, in his opinion, should be delayed until the production of the Return asked for; because it was idle to expect the House of Commons to proceed in the absence of information, notwithstanding the reason alleged by the right hon. Gentleman that the preparation of the Return would impose a little extra duty upon those busy gentlemen, the Crown Prosecutors. If the Government would not furnish the Return, it was only right that the English public should know why it was asked for. They had at last obtained the admission that in the case of 356 crimes of arson only 10 people had been caught; and that fact was in itself sufficient to show the flimsy nature of the Government allegations.
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, the hon. Member for Wexford (Mr. Healy) complained that the Returns had not been presented to Parliament before this. Why, they had been before the House for months past. There was not a figure which the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland had referred to which had not been in the hands of the hon. Member who made the charge for months. He confessed he took a somewhat different view from the hon. Gentleman as to the reason why, out of the great number of offences committed, so few were brought to trial. If, for instance, they had 13 men brought to trial for arson, and the
    2040
    13 men were all acquitted, what was the use of bringing the others who had committed that crime to trial? As the Chief Secretary had already stated, in some districts it was no use to bring people to trial at all; and that was the reason why, when such a large number of offences had been committed, so few had been brought to trial. Few had been brought to trial, and still fewer had been convicted.
    MR. HEALYsaid, the right hon. and learned Gentleman had said he asked for information which had long been on the Table. If that was the case, he would like to know how it was that in answer to a question he put on the subject, he was misled by one of the right hon. and learned Gentleman's own officials? He had asked the Attorney General for Ireland for specific information, and the right hon. and learned Gentleman replied that it would take months for the Crown Prosecutor to make it out. If the information was in possession of the Government, why could not the Attorney General for Ireland have given it when asked to do so?
    THE CHAIRMAN: Before any other hon. Members speak on this subject, I must draw attention to the irregularity of the discussion. The particular Amendment before the Committee is as to whether the words "attempt to kill" are to form part of the clause. I must ask hon. Gentlemen to confine themselves to the Question.
    MR. NEWDEGATEsaid, it had been suggested by an hon. and learned Friend of his (Mr. Warton) that the word "kill" should be omitted, and the word "murder" inserted. He wished to point out that there was great difficulty in procuring evidence in case of murder, and that the evidence to prove murder was far more extensive than the evidence to prove manslaughter. The word "kill" would include manslaughter. He suggested to Her Majesty's Government that if they inserted the word "murder" instead of "kill," they would entail the necessity of producing a much larger amount of evidence than would be necessary under the words as they now stood.
    MR. O'DONNELLsaid, he thought the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate) need not be too apprehensive on the subject, because, under the new Bill, there would be

    2041
    always plenty of evidence forthcoming. A very important admission was made by the Chief Secretary a short time ago when he referred to the number of cases where the authorities, not having previously obtained as many convictions as they desired, took it upon themselves not to bring any more cases to trial; but to credit all the untried cases to the account of the failure of the jury system in Ireland. The Committee would be very much in the dark with regard to what had been going on in Ireland during the last two years, if it did not bear in mind that during that time all the officials, including a certain number of the Judges and most of the executive officials with all their dependents, had been carefully getting up a case for the abolition of trial by jury. The explanation why the police had been so slack, and why there had been so few arrests in proportion to the large number of offences committed, was to be found in the deliberative policy of the Executive in Ireland, who, desiring to discredit the whole of the existing system and to induce that state of mind in England, the results of which they saw at present, did not arrest, or, if they did arrest, did not bring to trial, being always able to state that they so acted knowing that no justice would be done. That was an important point, which they could not expect a Government prosecuting a Bill like the present to bring forward; very probably Her Majesty's Government did not know anything about this process in Ireland. During the reign of the late Chief Secretary for Ireland, it was admitted the Government knew nothing about what was going on in Ireland; and he (Mr. O'Donnell) was sure, when the new Chief Secretary had become acquainted with Ireland, he would recognize the justness of the claim made by the Irish Party. He would not detain the Committee more than a few minutes, while he pointed out that even in England there was a most extraordinary discrepancy between the number of crimes committed and the number of persons even returned for trial. In the Midland district the very respectable total of 7,523 indictable offences were committed in a given period. For these offences only 4,244 persons were arrested, leaving upwards of 3,000 crimes for which no arrests whatever were made. But only 3,227 persons were returned
    2042
    for trial. In one district alone of law-abiding England, there were thus 4,000 indictable offences for which no one was returned for trial. He would now take the Southern district, which included a large number of rural communities like Devonshire, true to Conservative traditions, and Kent and other primitive localities, and he found that there was a total of 6,039 indictable offences committed, and this in the heart of Conservatism. There were only 3,751 persons arrested, and for the 6,039 offences, only 2,708 persons were even returned for trial, leaving, again, thousands of indictable offences without a single person being even returned for trial on their account. If Ireland were the governor of England, and if the Irish Government found it suitable to its policy to bring in a Bill for the abolition of trial by jury in England, there would be an abundance of evidence, in the statistics he had just read, to make out as good a case as the Government were now making out for the abolition of trial by jury in Ireland.
    THE CHAIRMAN: I must point out that trial by jury is not the Question before the Committee. The Question is whether "attempts to kill" shall stand part of the clause; and I must beg the hon. Member to keep closely to that subject.
    MR. O'DONNELLsaid, the exact point, as the Chairman would perceive, was whether attempts to kill, which were indictable offences, ought to be tried by Judges or by juries, and that was the very thing he was referring to. If he was not allowed to refer either to indictable offences or to trial by jury, on a clause which provided for the abolition of trial by jury, with regard to indictable offences, he was entirely at a loss to understand in what manner the question could be discussed from an Irish or a National point of view.
    THE CHAIRMAN: The Committee has already decided to give the Lord Lieutenant the power to appoint a Special Commission Court for the trial of certain offences, and the question of trial by jury is not at present before us. The Question is, whether "attempts to kill" shall be offences which are to be tried by the Commission of Judges.
    MR. HEALYasked if they were not to discuss attempts to kill, in reference to trial by jury, could they discuss them

    2043
    abstractly with reference to the particular weapons used?
    MR. O'DONNELLsaid, he was arguing in favour of the omission of the indictable offences of attempts to kill from the sphere of jurisdiction of the Government nominees who were to be appointed instead of juries; he was arguing in favour of keeping these particular indictable offences within the sphere of trial by jury. That was distinctly legitimate, because the Amendment was that the words "or attempt to kill" be omitted. Omitted from what? Omitted from the scope and from the jurisdiction of these Government nominees, and retained within the sphere of trial by jury. He had every respect for the ruling of the Chairman; but he submitted he was perfectly in Order in arguing that the indictable offences of attempts to kill ought to be reserved for trial by jury. Surely they were in Order in moving the exemption of this or that particular kind of offence from the jurisdiction of the Government nominees. In support of his statement that there was no sufficient case made out by the Government for the abolition of trial by jury, with regard to the offences of attempts to kill, he quoted the enormous number of indictable offences in England for which persons were not even returned for trial; and he argued that the Government could just as easily make out a case for the abolition of trial by jury for attempts to kill in England as in Ireland. An unjust, untenable, and tyrannical distinction was being drawn between England and Ireland; but, unfortunately, Ireland was subjected to the uncontrolled and despotic mastery of the English nation.
    MR. WARTONsaid, the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate) had completely misapprehended the point. A man could not attempt to commit manslaughter; but he could attempt to commit murder.
    THE CHAIRMAN: I must explain to the Committee that it is not in my power to withdraw an Amendment in the possession of the Committee. Until the hon. Member for Wexford (Mr. Healy) asked leave to withdraw the Amendment, in order afterwards to propose that "murder" be substituted for "kill," I cannot put the Question in the form now desired until the Amendment be withdrawn.
    MR. T. D. SULLIVANsaid, the statistics which had just been read to the Committee by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary convicted no one but the Irish police. The right hon. Gentleman had read statistics to show that a large number of crimes had been committed, or had been alleged to have been committed; that a small number of persons had been brought to trial for those offences; and that of that small number a still smaller number were convicted. What did all that prove? Take, for instance, the crime of arson. There were 356 crimes of this nature; only 10 persons were committed for trial, and two were convicted. Of the 356 crimes committed, there were 346 which the police were not able to touch at all. That 10 persons were brought to trial and only two convicted—what did that prove to him? That the police brought eight men to trial who never should have been brought to trial. The whole failure of justice rested with the police, and he did not wonder at it. The Irish police were warriors; they were trained as soldiers; their thoughts naturally ran on battles, sieges, sorties, cigars, and cognac. They were the sort of men who composed the Irish Police Force; and what wonder that crimes were undetected. No case had been made out by the figures of the Chief Secretary for Ireland against trial by jury; but a very strong case had been made out against the military organization of the Irish police.
    MR. H. SAMUELSONsaid, that, even in cases in which juries had convicted, hon. Gentlemen from Ireland had thrown every possible aspersion upon the fairness of the verdict. The hon. Gentleman who had just sat down told them that the statistics which had been placed before them by the Chief Secretary convicted no one but the Irish police. The hon. Member said that if a small number of offenders had been caught out of a very large number of criminals, and if a still smaller number of those brought to trial had been convicted, it showed that the Irish police system had broken down. He (Mr. H. Samuelson) thought a very different deduction was to be drawn from the figures. He had always been willing to vote with hon. Gentlemen from Ireland when he could do so consistently with his conscience; he voted with them in the first division, and he would vote with them now if

    2045
    they could prove that the Government was not right in asking Parliament to give them further power, because the jury system had broken down. Why was it that the criminals could not be caught? Why was it that the criminal in Ireland almost invariably managed to elude the police? Because he possessed the sympathy of his neighbors; because he was more popular with the persons amongst whom he resided than the officer of justice was. And these neighbors were the very persons who were now called to serve on the juries. Was it not reasonable to understand that the same reason which had caused the people not to give information as to the crime—information which they must be possessed of—would lead them not to convict a criminal when he was brought before them? It was the sympathy of the population with the criminal, rather than any inefficiency on the part of the police, which prevented the evidence necessary for the conviction of crime from being forthcoming. Hon. Gentlemen opposite only asked for further statistics; and if they had no stronger argument to advance than that the police system in Ireland had broken down, they might now allow progress to be made with the clause. They had been shown that the statistics had been in their possession for a long time past, and their only answer to that was that the Irish Law Officers had made a mistake in regard to them. Granted that that was so; they had got their statistics and why argue the point longer? It was quite clear that so long as the criminal had the sympathies of the people, so long would it be difficult to secure fair and impartial trial.
    THE CHAIRMAN: I may point to the speech we have just listened to illustrate that the Committee have forgotten the point under discussion. The Question has no reference to the police or trial by jury, but is simply whether the words "attempt to kill" shall be omitted from the clause.
    MR. H. SAMUELSONsaid he had only followed the line of argument which the Chairman had permitted at the beginning. The Chief Secretary for Ireland presented certain statistics, upon which comments were made. Those statistics were applicable to the Question before the Committee. The Question was whether the offences of
    2046
    "attempts to kill" should be left in the jurisdiction of the juries, or taken out of the hands of juries and put into the hands of the Special Commission? Why were such offences to be taken out of the hands of juries and put into the hands of the Commission? Because of the failure of juries to convict, and of the police to obtain evidence.
    MR. BRODRICKrose to Order. He wished to know whether the hon. Gentleman was in Order in making two speeches consecutively.
    MR. MACFARLANEsaid, in reference to the statistics, he wished to ask one question. It was said that 356 crimes of a certain class had been committed, that 10 persons had been brought to trial, and that only two had been convicted; and that the Government, in despair at such a result, had not brought forward any other cases. He wanted to ask the right hon. and taught Gentleman the Home Secretary, if he meant to convey to the Committee that the police were in possession of the evidence in the remaining 346 cases, but that, despairing of convictions, they did not bring the cases to trial? If that was the case, the Government would have been justified in demanding a Bill of this kind at the time they made that discovery. They would have been not only justified in such a demand, but they would have been bound to make it. Perhaps the right hon. and learned Gentleman would say whether he had correctly interpreted the speech he made a few moments ago?
    THE CHAIRMAN: The question of the hon. Member has no relation to the Amendment before us, but to another portion of the Bill. I must ask hon. Members to keep strictly to the point under consideration.
    MR. MACFARLANEsaid he referred to the statistics quoted by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland.
    MR. H. SAMUELSONsaid he hoped the Chairman would give his ruling upon the point raised by the hon. Gentleman the Member for West Surrey (Mr. Brodrick), who had stopped him (Mr. H. Samuelson) in the remarks he was addressing to the Committee. The Chairman would, perhaps, kindly enlighten the hon. Member, who was new to the House, as to whether there was any restriction upon the number of

    2047
    speeches an hon. Member might make in Committee upon any given point?
    THE CHAIRMAN: It is a well-known Rule that a hon. Member may speak more than once in Committee.
    MR. HEALYsaid, the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary had said there had been 66 cases of firing into dwellings; that 20 persons had been brought to trial and 16 had been acquitted. Did the Government mean to say that there were 46 cases of this nature which the Government did not think it desirable to bring to trial? The right hon. Gentleman had given a very different account of the statistics to that given by the Attorney General for Ireland. The right hon. Gentleman had said that the statistics had been before the House for months; but, surely, that could not be correct with regard to the year 1882. Would the Government give a Return in each of the nature he had asked for—namely, the number of crimes committed, the number of persons made amenable, the number of convictions, the number of acquittals, and the number of disagreements? He denied that the Returns were before the House in the shape he desired. It was the duty of the Government to put the figures before the House in a proper shape. The right hon. Gentleman could not expect that hon. Gentlemen, who had plenty of other things to do, could have all such facts at their fingers' ends. The Chief Secretary for Ireland had clerks whom he could direct to prepare the Returns now asked for. They were told by the Attorney General for Ireland that it would take months to make such a Return; but the Home Secretary told the Committee they were in possession of the facts already. He (Mr. Healy) did not blush to find himself as ignorant as the right hon. and taught Gentleman the Attorney General for Ireland.
    MR. TREVELYANsaid, he would admit the advantage of the Government in having experienced officials to assist them in their work; but the Returns from which he had quoted were extremely plain in their character. The number of convictions in respect of indictable offences was, in 1880, 13, and in 1881, 72. If the hon. Member would examine the statistics he would find that clearly shown.
    MR. HEALYsaid, he would withdraw his Amendment, on the understanding
    2048
    that the Returns quoted by the Home Secretary would be produced; but if he did not find that the Returns bore out what the right hon. and learned Gentleman had stated in the sense in which they were asked for, he should put down a Motion for a further Return, which, no doubt, the Government would get one of their officials to block.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 19, leave out "kill," and insert "murder."—(Mr. Warton.)
    Question proposed, "That the word 'kill' stand part of the Clause."
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid he would accept the Amendment.
    Question put, and negatived.
    MR. MARUMsaid the Amendment he proposed did not involve any complication. It was merely a proposal that certain cases which would be tried under the direction of a stipendiary magistrate should be transferred to the jurisdiction of a Judge on the ground that the nature of the offence was such that it was desirable not to have it tried by an inferior tribunal, and especially a tribunal from which there would be no appeal, as was the case before he put this Amendment on the Paper. Since he did so, however, an indication had been given that the Government had under consideration whether they would give an appeal from the Courts of stipendiary magistrates. If the Government gave a satisfactory appeal that would make a great change in the views that prompted his Amendment. The offences which he wished to have transferred were those which related to unlawful associations. If unlawful associations merely meant secret societies he would not so very much mind; but unlawful associations might be taken to mean all political organizations, and that would be rather too large a matter to leave to the jurisdiction of an inferior tribunal. He, therefore, unless the Government were prepared to show that their Appeal Court would be one of weight, and would be capable of entering into the legal niceties that might be involved, should be disposed to persevere with his Amendment. He would not now enter into the question of the nature of an unlawful assembly, because that was a

    2049
    matter upon which there might be a great deal of discussion, and the hon. and learned Member for Dundalk (Mr. C. Russell) had an Amendment with relation to that subject which would involve considerable discussion. It was sufficient for his argument to say that the question of unlawful associations, and particularly political associations, was one of great importance and large character—too important to be placed before a minor tribunal such as that of a stipendiary magistrate, especially if there was no appeal. He hoped the Government would give some explanation of the Appeal Court they contemplated.
    THE SOLICITOR GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. PORTER)said, it was intended by the Government to take steps with regard to providing an appeal but, of course, that could not be discussed at this part of the Bill; and he would suggest to the hon. Member that it would be better to postpone this Amendment until Clause 6 was reached. But under no circumstances could the Government accept the proposal for submitting cases of this kind to the tribunal now under consideration.
    MR. MARUMsaid, he would accept the suggestion of the hon. and learned Gentleman, and postpone his Amendment.
    MR. FIRTH,in moving, on behalf of the hon. Member for Herefordshire (Mr. Reid), to leave out the words "the Lord Lieutenant," and insert—
    "Any three Judges of the Supreme Court, on motion made by or on behalf of the Attorney General for Ireland,"
    Said it would be within the recollection of the Committee that the hon. Member (Mr. Reid) had indicated the danger, as it appeared to him, of having the Lord Lieutenant both an Executive and judicial officer, and this Amendment went to the root of that question. If the Committee should think fit to accept the Amendment in this form that would practically amount to a declaration that it was undesirable for the Lord Lieutenant to be a judicial officer. So long as he issued Commissions he was the Executive officer; but when he had to decide whether a particular case should be referred to this Commission or not he assumed the judicial authority. There was no provision as to how the Lord Lieutenant was to act; but he supposed
    2050
    the Lord Lieutenant would be informed by the ordinary sources of information in Ireland. But the Viceroy would not have the opportunity of testing the value of this source of information as a judicial functionary would have, and he would probably have to act on the information conveyed by the police, and to receive such information; and, without suggesting that that information was unreliable, he thought there was this to be said about it—that so far as would appear from the section as it now stood, those against whom the section would be worked would not have an opportunity of presenting their side of the case. In English jurisdiction there was a practice which furnished a close analogy to the course proposed by this Amendment. The 3rd section of Palmer's Act provided for the transfer to the Central Criminal Court of cases of felony or misdemeanor outside the jurisdiction of that Court, when any Judge or the Court of Queen's Bench considered it expedient that the persons accused should be tried in that Court. That Act provided for the decision of the judicial tribunal being brought to bear on the question; and the effect of this Amendment would be that the judgment of the judicial tribunal would be brought to bear on specific cases. If that were done, the three Judges would have to be persuaded that the particular case was one in which a fair trial could not be had. Affidavits would be presented giving the reasons for that conclusion, and upon the affidavits or other evidence from one side or the other the decision of the Judges would be given. He believed that would be an advantage in the present case, and it would have the essential advantage that it would separate the judicial and Executive functions, which it appeared dangerous to place in the hands of the same person. He should be sorry to delay by a single hour the introduction of remedial Irish measures; but it seemed to him that so far as that could modify this Act in the direction of making it in accordance with satisfactory precedents, and of persuading the Irish people that it was introduced to support law in that country, it was desirable to do so.
    Amendment proposed,
    In page 1, line 23, leave out "the Lord Lieutenant," and insert "any three judges of the Supreme Court, on motion made by or on behalf

    2051
    of the Attorney General for Ireland."—(Mr. Firth.)
    Question proposed, "That the words 'the Lord Lieutenant' stand part of the Clause."
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid that if he could agree with the hon. and taught Member that this Amendment would relieve the Lord Lieutenant of judicial functions, he would be prepared to assent to it; but he did not think the acts of the Lord Lieutenant would be judicial. A judicial act was the investigation of evidence, and the Lord Lieutenant was not called upon to do so. He considered that in deciding whether this special tribunal should be brought into action, the Lord Lieutenant would be exercising a function simply of constituting a tribunal, and the argument of the hon. Gentleman was, therefore, not well-founded that that would be an Executive and judicial function. After all, what was the determining circumstance which was to apply this tribunal to a particular case? It was the knowledge of the country where the offence had been committed, and that knowledge could only lie in the Executive Government. The Executive Government possessed the knowledge upon which the step that ought to be taken would depend, and it seemed to him that the action upon that knowledge should rest on the responsibility of the Executive, who would be called to account for their decision. If that knowledge was to be filtered through affidavits before a judicial tribunal, a great part of the responsibility, which ought to be kept in the Executive, would be lost. So far from increasing the responsibility of the Executive, the Amendment would diminish the responsibility; and if hon. Members would consider the circumstances which ought to determine the bringing of this tribunal into operation, they would see how exceedingly unfit these circumstances were for affidavits, and how impossible it would be to try these circumstances before a judicial tribunal. He hoped the hon. Member would not press the Amendment.
    SIR GEORGE CAMPBELLsaid, that the Home Secretary had said the action of the Lord Lieutenant would be founded, not on the knowledge of a particular case, but on the knowledge of the particular district in which it ap-
    2052
    peared that a fair trial could not be had. He would venture to suggest that it would be much easier for the Government to say that the condition of a district was such that a fair trial could not be had, and that it would be difficult to throw on the Lord Lieutenant and other officers the task of picking and choosing the particular cases in a district. If the state of a district was such that a fair trial could not be had, that would apply to all cases; and it seemed to him that the argument used to throw on the Lord Lieutenant the duty of picking and choosing particular cases would be very invidious and very undesirable.
    MR. LEAMYsaid, with reference to the statement of the Home Secretary, that the knowledge required could only be with the Executive Government, and, therefore, the question of constituting this tribunal ought to be left to them to decide—that, as a matter of fact, motions were frequently made by the Attorney General for changing the venue in criminal cases, and those motions were made on affidavits that, owing to the state of the country, a fair trial could not be had. That being so under the present law, he did not see what difficulty there was in requiring that affidavits should be presented under this Bill. If the Bill was passed as it stood, it would be enough for the Lord Lieutenant to have a reasonable suspicion that a fair trial could not be had before a jury; the least that the House could do was to provide that a person to be deprived of the ordinary trial should have an opportunity of showing that there was no ground for his being so deprived. He should support the Amendment, because he thought the Bill gave too much power to the Lord Lieutenant in allowing him, without any sworn testimony or information, but simply on the suggestion of some person who might be personally hostile to the accused, to call this tribunal into existence.
    LORD EDMOND FITZMAURICEsaid, what struck him with regard to this Amendment was, that it was totally inconsistent with the argument which had been used at the earlier stage of this clause, when line 11 was under consideration, and Amendments were moved, which were based on the great necessity of full publicity and the control of this House of the Irish Executive. He

    2053
    would ask any person who looked at the framework and object of this Bill, whether, if the Judges of the Supreme Court were substituted for the Lord Lieutenant, that would not be putting a judicial body in the place of the Executive, and thereby practically removing from the control of this House those very Acts which every Member of the House most clearly desired to keep well within the control of the House? He was astonished that an hon. Member of such great legal knowledge as the hon. Member for Herefordshire (Mr. Reid) should propose this Amendment; and as that hon. Member was absent, he regretted that another hon. Member should not have allowed this Amendment to remain covered by that discreet silence which others would have obtained by the absence of those hon. Members.
    MR. BIGGARsaid, he thought the noble Lord had entirely, though not intentionally, misrepresented the real purport of the Amendment. The noble Lord had referred to the desirability of having publicity with regard to cases tried before this tribunal; and that seemed to him to be the very object of an Amendment which proposed that three Judges in open Court should decide whether or not a particular case should be heard before a particular tribunal. An hon. Member had argued that the decision of the Court should be based on affidavits for and against the proposal; and that was the proposition of the Amendment—namely, to have cases decided upon evidence in open Court. The Bill proposed that the Lord Lieutenant should decide the question without evidence, or on the recommendation of some obscure person, and without giving any reasons for his decision; but it seemed to him that this Amendment was very much preferable, for if the decisions were to be come to in open Court, and the reasons were given, then the House could reasonably and fairly discuss the cases. As the Bill at present stood, some Member of the Government, representing the Lord Lieutenant, would say if any questions were asked, that the Lord Lieutenant had come to his decision upon his own responsibility, and it was undesirable to state his information.
    Question put, and agreed to.
    Amendment proposed,
    In page 1, line 23, after "Lieutenant," insert "upon sworn information which shall within ten days be communicated to Parliament, if Parliament be sitting, and, if Parliament be not sitting, which shall be published in the 'Dublin Gazette.'—(Mr. Healy.)
    Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
    MR. TREVELYANsaid the Government had serious reasons for objecting to this Amendment. They believed that it would weaken the authority of the Lord Lieutenant, and at the same time produce a false impression on the public mind. The Lord Lieutenant would have to decide these very important questions upon a great mass of information which poured in upon him from all quarters. Nothing could be added to the effect of his decision after having received this information, by the mere fact that sworn information was put forward by some official or unofficial person. Before deciding to try a case by this special tribunal, the Lord Lieutenant would have to consult the Judges, who were his most authoritative and trusted advisers. He would have to receive and consider an immense quantity of facts and circumstances sent to Dublin from various quarters of the country; and it would be no further guarantee of the justice of his decision that he was obliged likewise to lay before Parliament the sworn information of some special Resident Magistrate or police-constable. He would form his judgment on the collected facts and circumstances, and if the sworn information was laid before Parliament, it would be but superficial. It must be remembered that the principle of the Lord Lieutenant making his decision was the same principle upon which he acted in proclaiming or not proclaiming a district. That power was largely used in this Bill, and upon that the Government laid very great stress, for they were very anxious to except from the provisions of this Bill those districts which, by the absence of outrage, were worthy of exception. The power of accepting districts rested with the Lord Lieutenant, and on the same principle he would exercise his judgment as to this special tribunal.
    MR. T. D. SULLIVANsaid, he wished to know what necessity there was for the Lord Lieutenant to have a great mass of evidence? What gua-

    2055
    rantee was there that he would not act upon the information of a single person? Matters were put before the Committee in this way: a view of the case was put forward which he and his Friends maintained would not represent the actual facts of the case when the law came to be administered. What obligation was there on the Lord Lieutenant to wait for any mass of information? What guarantee was there that a whisper from a magistrate or a police-constable would not suffice? There would be no such guarantee or obligation, and it was not fair to the Committee to deal with the matter in that way.
    MR. T. P. O'CONNORsaid that, speaking on behalf of the hon. Member for Wexford (Mr. Healy), he admitted the reasonableness of some of the objections advanced by the Chief Secretary for Ireland; but he would ask the right hon. Gentleman to consider the position of the clause as it at present stood. The great argument on the other side of the House in opposition to the Amendment immediately preceding this Amendment was, that it was desirable to have the Lord Lieutenant responsible to Parliament, and that it would weaken the responsibility if the decision was taken out of the hands of the Lord Lieutenant and given to the Judges. He accepted that argument; but how could the Lord Lieutenant be responsible to Parliament if he was not bound to lay some information before Parliament upon which his conduct could be discussed? That was no imaginary difficulty whatever. The Chief Secretary for Ireland next Session might have to defend some portion of the action of the Lord Lieutenant in reference to the trial of a particular person. Some hon. Members on that Bench might get up and ask the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary why such and such a person had been put on his trial before a Judge without a jury? What would be the response? Why, that the Lord Lieutenant had acted upon information which it would be inconvenient and to the prejudice of Public Business to reveal to the House; so that under the Bill, as it at present stood, there would be nothing to prevent the right hon. Gentleman from taking refuge in silence under the plea of the interests of Public Business. He (Mr.
    2056
    T. P. O'Connor) was not responsible for the drawing up of the Amendment; and he quite agreed with the right hon. Gentleman as to the fairness of his objection, that it would be wrong to lay before Parliament, or to publish in the columns of The Dublin Gazette, the names of the persons giving information, as it would be exposing those persons to risks that they had every reason to ask the Government to protect them from. But suppose the Amendment were amended, the words "sworn information" could be retained, because it did not follow that the fact of giving the sworn information necessitated the publication of the names of the person or persons tendering it. If the right hon. Gentleman would take the Amendment in any other form, he should be glad to agree to its being re-framed. What he and his hon. Friend (Mr. Healy) wished to secure was, that when the Lord Lieutenant did a particular thing, there should be some res justi given for it, and that he should not, or his mouthpiece in this House should not, be able to take refuge in silence on the plea of Public Business.
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid the exercise of the powers contained in the Bill might be confined to a particular district. The House was quite familiar, and had been for many years, with the practice of proclaiming particular districts; and when the Lord Lieutenant proclaimed a part of the country, he did it upon both the general and particular knowledge he had of that part. It had never yet been proposed that the sworn information he received should be laid before Parliament, and the grounds on which it was founded. It could not be done. His right hon. Friend had pointed out that the information the hon. Gentleman asked would necessarily be incomplete; and the hon. Gentleman himself had admitted that they could not give the names of the persons tendering information. But what would be the object of giving sworn information if they did not give the names of the persons who took the oath? To keep back the names—which could not be given—would deprive the information of all value; and, after all, they came round to this, that the whole matter must rest upon the responsibility of the Lord Lieutenant. The hon. Gentleman said—"But how are you to call the Lord

    2057
    Lieutenant to account? Well, if his memory served him, there had been many cases of late, in connection with the Protection of Life and Property Act, in which hon. Members on the Opposition Benches had challenged the grounds on which action had been taken by the Lord Lieutenant. They could always demand information, and to see any document of a general character to which the hon. Gentleman referred—they could always demand from the Government, who were responsible for the action of the Lord Lieutenant, the grounds, generally speaking, upon which he had availed himself of the powers of the Bill.
    MR. JOSEPH COWENsaid the object of the Amendment was to elicit the grounds upon which a county was proclaimed. It would be remembered that when the county of Waterford was proclaimed last year, the hon. Member for Waterford (Mr. Leamy) had asked upon what grounds that course had been taken; and it had been pointed out that the Mayor of the city of Waterford and other magistrates in the district had declared themselves at a loss to know why the county had been proclaimed. There was no information given on that occasion; and the object of this Amendment was to secure that, upon similar occasions in the future, the required information should be forthcoming. Anyone who was familiar with the discussion that took place in this House years ago on a Coercion Bill—the Bill, he thought, of 1833 or 1834—would remember that Mr. O'Connell raised the same objection, and made the same proposal. In support of his demand that hon. Gentlemen had said that counties in Ireland had been proclaimed at the instance of a single individual to serve particular personal objects. Mr. O'Connell had attempted to insert in that Coercion Bill an Amendment of a like kind to the present; and, he believed, the hon. Member's wish was, to some extent, met by the Government of the day. There was no clause or Amendment inserted in the measure to carry out the suggestion; yet the Government undertook that, when a county was proclaimed, official information should be given as to the grounds upon which that course was adopted.
    Question put, and negatived.
    MR. T. P. O'CONNORsaid, he now had to move another Amendment, standing in the name of his hon. Friend the Member for Wexford (Mr. Healy)—namely to leave out the words "committed for trial," and insert "tried." The Committee would at once see what was the object of the Amendment, and that the Amendment to line 25, which was next on the Paper, was purely consequential—which latter Amendment he should not, of course, move until he knew the result of the discussion on the one he was now submitting. As the Committee would see, the whole case of the Government rested on the refusal of the juries to convict; but how could they say that a jury refused to convict until they had tried a case? He did not intend to re-hash the rather prolonged debate they had already had—a debate in which, so far as he could see, the Government had been compelled to take refuge in misleading statistics, or in silence, when meeting the arguments of his hon. Friend—but he wished to insist upon this, that if they were going to put a prisoner on his trial before Judges without a jury, they should not do so without full, ample, and complete reason; and they could not have that until they had first tried the ordinary law and found it to fail. The statements which had been made with reference to the last Amendment were the strongest arguments in favor of this proposal. The Lord Lieutenant, of his own motion or caprice, was to have the right of placing any man on his trial without a jury; and he (Mr. O'Connor) contended that it was a necessary limitation of responsibility on the part of the Lord Lieutenant that they should prove, in each particular case, before sending a prisoner for trial before the Judges, that trial by jury had broken down.
    Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 24, leave out "committed for trial," and insert "tried."—(Mr. T. P. O'Connor.)
    Question proposed, "That the words 'committed for trial' stand part of the Clause."
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON)said, it would be impossible for the Government to accept the Amendment proposed. The suggestion was that each case should be submitted to a jury, and that when the jury had disagreed, then, for the

    2059
    first time, three Judges should be asked to decide the point upon which the jury had failed to come to a decision. This was founded on a statement of fact put forward by hon. Members, which, he presumed, it was now proposed to admit—namely, that, very largely at all events, the institution of trial by jury had broken down. It was quite impossible for the Government to accept the Amendment.
    MR. T. P. O'CONNORsaid, he emphatically denied the statement that the right hon. and learned Gentleman had put into his mouth and into the mouths of his hon. Friends.
    THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. W. M. JOHNSON)said, he had not referred to every hon. Member, but to the majority of hon. Members.
    MR. T. P. O'CONNORsaid, he did not think the majority of hon. Members agreed with the statement that trial by jury had broken down. If they had voted with the Government, it did not follow that they were convinced by the arguments of the Government. The right hon. and learned Member had said that the jury system had broken down. That was the whole question to be tested; and why should not the Government allow a prisoner a chance before a jury of his peers before they sent him before this special tribunal? He would tell the Committee the reason the right hon. and learned Gentleman did not do it; it was because he was afraid. The right hon. and learned Gentleman did not believe in the soundness of his own arguments, otherwise he would give a prisoner the chance of being tried by his countrymen.
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, the hon. Gentleman had evidently not observed what would be the effect of this Amendment. It would entirely defeat one of the objects of the Bill, which was to provide for proper trial where juries acquitted against the weight of evidence. Where cases went before juries and acquittals were given, there would be no new trial; and the Bill only provided that there should be trial without a jury in cases where it appeared that a just and impartial trial could not be had according to the ordinary course of law. There had been cases of arson tried lately, in which there had been no convictions. Supposing such acquittals
    2060
    had been against the weight of evidence, in the future, in similar cases, the juries might, if they were so disposed, say—"In order to defeat the Bill, we will acquit."
    MR. PARNELLsaid, that hitherto the Government had rested their case on the ground that the juries disagreed, not that they acquitted against the weight of evidence. The statement that juries acquitted against the weight of evidence was now made for the first time in the discussions on the Bill in regard to the Irish Jury question. The right hon. and learned Gentleman, in order to prove the statement which he now made for the first time, assumed, for the sake of argument, that in certain cases of arson in Ireland juries had acquitted prisoners against the weight of evidence. This was the sort of case that Ministers of the Crown brought before the Committee for the purpose of inducing them to grant this extraordinary and unconstitutional enactment; this was the kind of argument upon which they were asked to give up all their rights and liberties, upon which they were asked to place their very lives in the hands of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. He must say he had expected that they would have had some facts, some figures, some statistics, brought before them to bear out the claim of the Government, not that they would have had such an extraordinary statement as this from the right hon. and taught Gentleman the Home Secretary.
    MR. HEALYsaid he wished to point out that the Government shifted, from time to time, according to the necessities of the case. Last night, when discussing trial by jury, the argument of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Home Secretary was—
    "Are you going to retain trial by jury in the Bill, when you know that one man, a fellow-assassin, or fellow-conspirator of the prisoner in the dock, it may he, is sufficient to cause the jury to disagree and to defeat the ends of justice?"
    They, however, came to to-day; the kaleidoscope was twisted, and they got another view altogether. The Government now said, "Out of 12 men there is not one to be found who will convict." Was that so? If it were, then the whole fabric of British government in Ireland had broken down and was done for. Notwithstanding that the juries were packed by themselves, the Government

    2061
    could not depend upon one man out of 12 giving an opinion in favour of conviction—upon getting one man to uphold the view of the Crown. This was a startling admission on the part of the Home Secretary, that 700 years after his country had been trying to rule Ireland—although he brought it forward altogether in the teeth of his statement last night, which was, that the juries disagreed, some of them being of one opinion and some of another—the right hon. and learned Gentleman and his Friends, who yesterday were prepared to vote white black, and were now prepared to vote black white, were of opinion that not one man out of 12 could be trusted to give an honest verdict in support of the English Government. He had expected that the Government would accept the Amendment, and for this reason, that it did not make the matter one whit better for the prisoner. Every acquittal in Ireland was a fair one; and he did not think they could get 12 men to act more honestly between the prosecution and the prisoner in any country than in Ireland, not even in England, where there was so little regard for the oath—["Oh, oh!"]—he meant to say as compared with the regard for it in Ireland. Let them take, for instance, the case of Mr. Bradlaugh, that well-known Gentleman who was not, he believed, born in Ireland. Jury panels consisted of 300, 400, or 500 persons, and the Crown had an unlimited right of challenge, and yet, the Home Secretary said, out of 12 men selected from a panel, the Government could not get one to give them a verdict. Would the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Home Secretary get up and repeat that assertion? No, he ventured to think that the right hon. and learned Gentleman would not have the hardihood to do that. The reason, as he said, why he had expected the Government to accept this Amendment was this, because, in the event of a disagreement on the part of the jury—which was certainly a most reasonable case to assume; and the right hon. Gentleman had warned them not to select extreme cases, although, when it suited his own purpose, he did not shrink from doing it—the prisoner would be put in no better position, as he would then have to be tried by the Judges. But, whilst it would not put the prisoner into a better position, it would be a spur and an incitement to the Irish juries to
    2062
    do their duty. Of course, he was always supposing there was one man, at least, in the panel, in connection with which the Crown had an unlimited right of challenge. The Crown had not been so modest as to say, that with all their challenge power, they could not find one honest man in the country. No; because they had hitherto been able to put 12 "Lion and Unicorn" men on the jury. The Attorney General for Ireland was not so green in, he would not say, jury-packing, but jury composing—he did not mean to say that the right hon. and learned Gentleman had directly had a hand in this kind of thing—and he would ask him to get up and say whether, with an unlimited right of challenge on the part of the Crown, and with such a dexterous manipulator as a Crown Prosecutor, or Clerk of Arraigns, he could not depend on getting one man, at least, on a jury in the interest of what was called law and order? He (Mr. Healy) would venture to say that the right hon. and learned Gentleman would not be worthy of his place if he could not, at any rate, guarantee one man. Right hon. Gentlemen were willing to take up extreme cases when they told in their favor and against their opponents, and they were ready enough now to say that they could not accept an Amendment of this kind, because, if they did, prisoners would be certain to be acquitted. The truth was that from first to last, the Government had had nothing else to rely upon but pretexts. It required Gentlemen of the extremist hardihood to defend the Bill. The Prime Minister, so far, had been silent, and he was to be congratulated upon the fact. The right hon. Gentleman was open to argument, as they had seen last year during the discussion of the Land Bill; and if he had been in his place, a dozen times, at least, during the discussions on the present Bill, he would have been convinced that the weight of argument was against the Government. The right hon. Gentleman's Colleagues, however, unlike himself, would have the Bill, the whole Bill, and nothing but the Bill.
    MR. BULWERsaid he congratulated the hon. Member for Wexford (Mr. Healy) on being in a position to say that the Prime Minister was open to conviction, and that the right hon. Gentleman was ready to do the bidding of the Irish Party. He also congratulated right hon. and learned Gentlemen op-

    2063
    posite upon the dexterity with which they had dealt with the eel-like arguments of hon. Gentlemen from Ireland. One would imagine, listening to the observations of Irish Members, that they had all been asleep for the last two years, and that Ireland, instead of being what it was, was really a happy, contented, well-conducted country, and that the Government, in a fit of hallucination, had brought in a Bill to do away with their liberties, to deprive them of trial by jury, and all the rights they possessed. Everyone—save, perhaps, the Irish Members—admitted it was the condition of Ireland that justified the introduction of this exceptional measure. Let them see how the condition of Ireland had been dealt with. First of all, new powers were put into the hands of the Lord Lieutenant. There was a great outcry against that. Then trial by jury was to be done away with in certain cases at the pleasure of the Lord Lieutenant, trial by Judges—Government officials, as they had been called to-night—being substituted for it. In place of juries, they would have three Judges appointed to try whether——
    MR. T. P. O'CONNORsaid, he rose to Order. The hon. and learned Member seemed to have been himself asleep for some time——
    THE CHAIRMAN: I must say I think the hon. and learned Member is not discussing the Amendment before the House.
    MR. BULWERsaid, he bowed at once to the right hon. Gentleman's ruling. He was not, strictly speaking, discussing the Amendment, but the arguments which had been offered in support of it. He had understood hon. Gentlemen from Ireland to say that they desired these three Government officials——
    THE CHAIRMAN: The Amendment is not about the three Judges, but that the word "tried" be substituted for the words "committed for trial."
    MR. HENEAGEsaid it appeared to him that this Amendment was opposed to every provision and every principle of the Bill. It was opposed to every ground on which the measure had been brought forward, particularly to the main ground, which was that trial by jury had been a failure, and that it was absolutely necessary that some other kind of trial should be adopted in its
    2064
    place. The argument had been used that the Government now contended that not a single juryman could be found who would convict a prisoner. But what was the inducement that this Amendment, if adopted, would hold forth? They knew that, notwithstanding a sense of responsibility, the juries of Ireland, under the influence of terrorism, had refused to do their duty. ["No, no!"] Oh yes, they had. Now, all sense of responsibility would be taken away, whilst the fear of terrorism would remain. Would it not be quite possible for juries to agree to disagree? A jury would quite naturally say—"If the prisoner is innocent, by all means let us acquit him;" or, "If there is any doubt in his favor, by all means let us give him the benefit of it." Or they might say—"If the prisoner is really guilty, and the evidence is strong against him, let us agree to disagree, because then he will be brought up again before three Judges; he will be tried, and will probably be convicted, but the blame will not attach to us." What would be the moral, or rather the immoral, result of that? Why, the prisoner, in that way, would receive a sort of certificate of innocence before he came to be tried by the Judges. And what would be the result of the Judges convicting in the face of that certificate of innocence? The result would be that here, in this House, they would have hon. Gentlemen getting up and saying—"Is it not scandalous that such and such Judges have ventured to convict a man who has been found to be perfectly innocent by a jury of his fellow-countrymen?" This, he thought, would be most unfair on the Judges, who had quite enough ones thrown on them by the Bill as it at present stood. Do not let the Committee throw any more ones on them. He believed the Amendment to be utterly and entirely antagonistic to the whole scope of the Bill; therefore, he trusted the Government would not give way upon it.
    MR. BIGGARsaid, that the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down said, in effect, that everyone put on his trial in Ireland should be convicted whether there was evidence against him or not. ["No, no!"] That was, practically, what the hon. Member's observations came to. They in Ireland contended that a very large proportion of the people put on

    2065
    their trial in that country were, in point of fact, not guilty at all; and they did not agree that trial by jury had broken down. They said that, in spite of the system of jury-packing which had hitherto prevailed in Ireland, there were very often some jurors who would listen to the evidence, and would exercise a sound judgment as to whether or not a certain class of witnesses who were brought forward on behalf of the Crown were entitled to be believed on their oaths or not. That was the real state of the case. The Government of Ireland had been carried on heretofore by the subornation of perjury. Witnesses had been prepared to give evidence against unfortunate prisoners; and, in point of fact, when a person was put on his trial in Ireland for a political offence, the general opinion was that he was probably not guilty of the charge brought against him. On the other hand, the advocates of British rule in Ireland always assumed that every person charged with an offence ought to be convicted, whether the evidence was trustworthy or not. He submitted that the Irish people had the soundest part of the argument, because it was notorious that in their country many innocent persons had not only been condemned, but executed, on charges which had been afterwards proved to be untenable. They knew that even in this country, where the evidence against prisoners was much stronger than it was in Ireland, persons who had afterwards been found to be innocent had been brought in guilty even of the charge of murder; and it was unfair that the assumption of guilt should be pressed as it was against persons in Ireland by the Government. He had heard it said that the High Sheriff of Cork, during the last Winter Assizes, had sat up all night in order to make arrangements for packing a jury to try cases on the following day. If the Government could not succeed in getting verdicts of "Guilty" when they had juries packed in this way by a High Sheriff who knew the district well, it might be said that the evidence given by their witnesses was altogether unworthy of credit.
    MR. O'DONNELLsaid, it seemed to him that this Amendment really tested in the most vital way the contention of Her Majesty's Government as to the alleged failure of trial by jury in Ire-
    2066
    land. If the Government were really serious and straightforward in their expressed wish only to make use of this abolition of trial by jury in extreme cases as a supplement to the ordinary law, then he could see no reason why they should not accept this Amendment. If a prisoner was brought up, and if the evidence adduced at his trial was clear and conclusive of his guilt, and if he was found guilty accordingly by a jury, then Her Majesty's Government were relieved from the odium of a very disagreeable piece of business—they were relieved from the odium of doing without a jury. On the other hand, if a man was brought before a jury on clear and conclusive evidence, and the jury openly and evidently refused to do its duty, then Her Majesty's Government would have the strongest possible excuse and the greatest exculpation which could be imagined for their recourse to three Government nominees instead of a jury. But Her Majesty's Government refused this test. They refused to give proof that recourse to three Government nominees must be had in consequence of the failure of the ordinary jury to do its duty. What must be the conclusion derived from that refusal on the part of the Government? Why, that they were more than doubtful of the strength of the case which they themselves brought forward. He should like also to call the attention of the Committee to the bearing of this Amendment on the text of the clause. The Clause said—
    "Whenever it appears to the Lord Lieutenant that in the case of any person committed for trial for any of the said offences a just and impartial trial cannot be had according to the ordinary course of law, the Lord Lieutenant might by warrant assign to any such court," &c.
    He should like the Committee to consider the extraordinary capacity, the perfectly marvellous perspicuity—he might say power of prophecy—which the clause as it stood attributed to the Lord Lieutenant. He believed that the Lord Lieutenant, who was a Member of the Liberal Government, was in many respects an ordinary mortal, and that he was no more likely to be endowed with any considerable knowledge of the future than other persons. And there was another fact to bear in mind. By the time this Bill passed, the Lord Lieutenant would not have had more than a few weeks'

    2067
    knowledge of Ireland. Of course, the noble Earl had some experience of the country during his former tenure of Office; but the circumstances of the country were totally different in those days, so that, practically, all the experience the noble Earl would have had of Ireland, in order to enable him to make use of this Bill, would have been obtained in a few weeks. Was, then, the Committee to be asked seriously to declare that an English Nobleman, sent over to Ireland and resident there only a few weeks, was to be able at the expiration of those few weeks to say, with infallible certainty, that such and such a district—a district he had probably never even visited during his short period of Office, and the people of which, together with their manners and customs, he was entirely unacquainted—that such and such a district was a place where an impartial trial could not be had? The Amendment proposed by the hon. Member for Wexford would supply the necessary deficiency of even so infallible a person as a Liberal Lord Lieutenant. The Lord Lieutenant would be placed in the same position as every other person in the country. He would be able to see if the evidence was clear and conclusive; he would be able to judge whether or not the jury were going against the weight of evidence, and whether they had openly broken their oaths and failed to do their duty. Suppose, for instance, a gross murder case was tried, or a gross case of manslaughter, and there was an unjust acquittal, the Lord Lieutenant, if this Amendment were accepted, instead of being regarded as the hated instrument of a most arbitrary despotism, would be considered in Ireland as acting as a lover of justice in bringing before another tribunal the prisoner who had escaped through the malfeasance of the jury. But, instead of this, the Lord Lieutenant was to foretell that the jury would not return a true verdict, and on the strength of that baseless prophecy he was to provide that the prisoner should be tried before a Bench of Government nominees—or as the wits of Dublin, not being possessed of an adequate fear of Her Majesty's Government, had profanely described it, "a Hanging Committee of Judges." He could only regard the refusal of the Government to accept the Amendment as a simple admission of their intention to carry out this Bill as a
    2068
    Party measure. There could be no love of justice in a refusal to have a man tried by an ordinary jury before sending him to trial by a special tribunal. The whole theory of the Government was that the Bill was only required in consequence of the non-performance of duty by the regular tribunal; but his (Mr. O'Donnell's) contention was, that each case was a complete whole in itself. They were bound to bring each particular case before the ordinary tribunal, and only in case of notorious failure were they entitled to bring a prisoner before their tribunal of most extraordinary law. He did not think the attempts which had been made to advance the clause by volunteer supporters of the Government policy had been of much material assistance to Her Majesty's Ministers; and he looked upon the refusal of the Government to accept the Amendment as an absolutely incontrovertible proof that their real objects were different from their asserted objects. The conduct of the Government would only add another spur and stimulus to the resolution of the Irish nation to do all in their power to make this wretched Bill a failure.
    LORD EDMOND FITZMAURICEsaid, it was a mystery to him what pleasure the hon. Member for Dungarvan (Mr. O'Donnell) and the hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar) could find in mixing up what they were pleased to call "British rule" and "English government" in Ireland in the consideration of such a question as that involved in this Amendment. Anyone, in listening to the hon. Members, would be justified in drawing this conclusion from their speeches—a conclusion he, for one, did not draw, but which a person might be justified in drawing—that, in their opinion, the people of Ireland, whom they claimed to represent, had a vested interest in the continuation of certain kinds of crime and of certain kinds of evils in Ireland. If a person were to draw this no doubt most unjust conclusion, no one would be to blame for it except hon. Members themselves. He believed that in this matter the hon. Gentlemen to whom he referred did not represent the people of Ireland; and he called the attention of the Committee to the conspicuous absence from the House of at least one half of those who claimed to be the Parliamentary and National Party of Ireland. Hon, Members oppo-

    2069
    site said they were "the people of Ireland." Well, he could only say to them, in the words of the long-suffering patriarch, Job—"No doubt ye are the people, and wisdom will perish with you." He did not deny that upon the face of them there appeared to be a certain amount of plausibility in the arguments for the Amendment. It sounded really like a demand for a new trial. But just let them consider what was the practice with regard to new trials. They were all familiar—["Question!"]—this was the question. He thought he was arguing most closely to it. What was done in new trials in civil cases—for, to all intents and purposes, new trials in criminal cases were not known to English law? The case of a new trial, where the jury disagreed, was a totally different thing from that proposed by the Amendment. It was a so-called new trial in a case where there had really been no trial at all. In criminal cases—in a case of felony, for instance—they all knew that when once there had been an acquittal there could not be a fresh trial. There was an attempt made not long ago to obtain a new trial in a case from one of our Colonies where there had been a conviction. The case came on for hearing on appeal; but it was decided that there should be no new trial. For all practical purposes in criminal cases new trials did not exist; but whenever a new trial had been proposed, it was where there had been a conviction. But what he understood hon. Members here to desire was that there should be new trials in cases where prisoners had been acquitted. The hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Heneage) had shown most unanswerably that the only result of accepting the Amendment would be to deprive juries of all responsibility, and place the Judges who subsequently would have to try the cases in a most unfair position. The jury would be able to gain all the popularity to be obtained by an acquittal, and the the whole of the odium of a conviction would fall on the unfortunate Judges. Considering these facts, and the unfair position in which all parties would be placed, he hoped the Amendment, which was altogether alien to the spirit of our law, would not be pressed. He very much regretted that hon. Members opposite seemed inclined to insist on it.
    MR. LEAMYsaid, the noble Lord who had just sat down had said he could not understand how the hon. Member for Dungarvan (Mr. O'Donnell) and the hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar) could take pleasure in mixing up "British rule" with the Amendments proposed to be made in the Bill. He (Mr. Leamy) did not think his hon. Friends took pleasure in references to British rule; but, considering that it was a British rule backed by rifles and bayonets which was forcing this Bill down the throats of the people, it was not always easy to avoid referring to that rule when discussing the Amendments to the Bill. The noble Lord said, also, that the Irish Members talked as though the Irish people had a vested interest in crime. He (Mr. Leamy) rather thought it should appear that they believed, rightly or wrongly, that the people of Ireland had, or ought to have, a vested interest in trial by jury. The hon. Member for Great Grimsby had said that if the Amendment were accepted, they would find that men who were innocent would be acquitted. There would not be very much to complain of in that. And the hon. Member went on to say that juries would say, if there was a doubt in the question, the prisoner should have the benefit of it. Here, again, the juries would not be going against the law. But then the hon. Member went on to assume that the juries would agree to disagree. Probably the hon. Member thought assumption was quite sufficient for the House of Commons. He (Mr. Leamy) was not sure the hon. Member was not right in that; and that all it was necessary for the Government to do when they wanted to get a Coercion Bill for Ireland was to say that they "believed it to be necessary." The Committee had, over and over again, heard hon. Gentlemen sitting on the Conservative side of the House and sitting behind the Ministry say that they could not take it upon themselves to refuse a loyal support to the Government—the Government having stated, on their responsibility, that the policy they had adopted was necessary for the preservation of peace and order in Ireland. But the Government had said the same thing with regard to the Arrears Bill. Were English Members, Conservative as well as Liberal, inclined to accept that statement, and to give a "loyal support" to Her

    2071
    Majesty's Ministers in the carriage of that measure? He thought not. He did not think the Irish Members would succeed in amending this Coercion Bill at all; nevertheless, he held it to be their imperative duty to make as good a stand as they could for the maintenance of trial by jury in Ireland. The measure, it was said, was to be in operation for three years; but they knew, from past experience, that when the Judges and the Executive became accustomed to their extraordinary powers they would be very slow to give them up. One Coercion Act had followed another until they had had something like 50 in Ireland in 80 years, some of these having become almost incorporated with the ordinary law. He knew the Irish Members were looked on as Obstructionists; but still they were obliged to fight the measure which even The Times had said contained "startling provisions," and which The Daily Telegraph said contained "detestable" provisions.
    THE CHAIRMANsaid, the hon. Member was not entitled to discuss the principle of the Bill.
    MR. LEAMYsaid, the Amendment he was endeavouring to support was one which would give the Lord Lieutenant power, in case of an acquittal, to order a trial by Judges. That was as much as the Government should ask. If there had been any failure of justice owing to a want of independence of the jurors since the passing of Lord O'Hagan's Act, it was because men like the magistrates had not come into the jury-box. They considered it too great a bore, and would not mix with the class of farmers who were sent into the box. They it was who were calling out for the abolition of trial by jury. If the Amendment were adopted, he believed no criminal would escape under the Bill, and that in cases where the Lord Lieutenant found there was a dishonest refusal to convict, and he appointed Judges to try the prisoners, the public opinion of the locality would assuredly recognize that he had acted wisely, and according to instructions contained in the Act.
    MR. HEALYsaid, a statement had been made by the noble Lord opposite which deserved some attention. The hon. Member had said that it would appear that the Irish people had a vested interest in the continuance of crime. It appeared to him (Mr. Healy), however,
    2072
    that it was the Government, and not the Irish people, who had a vested interest in crime in Ireland. The Government said that jurors were in such sympathy with assassins that they would not convict; but the Irish Members contended the reverse was the case, and that the Government were in such strong sympathy with the witnesses and prosecution that the evidence was tainted. Irish juries would convict prisoners, if proper evidence was brought before them. The noble Lord would see, on reflection, that his argument applied more to the Government than to the Irish people.
    Question put.
    The Committee divided:—Ayes 124; Noes 22: Majority 102.—(Div. List, No. 107.)
    MR. T. P. O'CONNORsaid, in the absence of his hon. Friend (Mr. R. Power), he proposed to move the Amendment next upon the Paper. It would be in the recollection of the Committee that in the course of the discussions on the Coercion Bill of last year, he had moved an Amendment of a similar character, to the effect that the Lord Lieutenant should publish the sworn information upon which he directed the trial without jury of certain prisoners, and that the right hon. Gentleman the then Chief Secretary, and the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary to the Home Department, had brought forward arguments of sufficient cogency against that Amendment. It would also be in the recollection of those right hon. Gentlemen that he had raised the objection that, although the Lord Lieutenant was responsible to Parliament, yet Parliament would have before it no means of obtaining the information necessary to discuss the action of the Lord Lieutenant. Now, he thought that in the Bill of last year there was a precedent for supplying the information asked for in this Amendment, because one of the provisions of that Bill was publication of warrants with a list of names of prisoners, together with the grounds on which they were detained in prison. That being so, he would not detain the Committee further than by expressing a hope that the Amendment he was about to move would receive the favourable consideration of the Government.
    Amendment proposed,
    In page 1, line 26, after "warrant," insert "and public proclamation, specifying the names

    2073
    of the prisoners and the offences for which they are to be tried."—(Mr. T. P. O'Connor.)
    Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, Her Majesty's Government were, of course, willing, with regard to the trial of persons under this Bill, that proper measures should be taken for bringing the matter into such a form as would enable it to be taken notice of in that House. They were, therefore, prepared substantially to accept the Amendment before the Committee—that was to say, they proposed that the warrant should be published in the official Gazette, instead of its being made known by public proclamation. To prevent confusion in drafting, he suggested that the hon. Member should withdraw his Amendment if he were satisfied with the assurance that it would be adopted in the form indicated.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    MR. MARUMsaid, he wished to point out that the clause did not provide that the warrant should state the time at which the Special Commission Court should sit. Although the specification of the time was not so material a point as that raised by the Amendment next standing in his name, he regarded it as of importance to the person accused, and should feel it his duty to move, after the word "sitting," to insert the words "at the time specified and." Perhaps he might be permitted to refer, in connection with this subject, to the subsequent Amendment of his which sought to provide for the trial of prisoners in the county, or county of a city, as the case might be, in which the offence was committed. The object of that was to insure that prisoners should not be brought from one end of the country to the other for the purpose of trial, and that the Lord Lieutenant should be bound not merely to mention the trial in the warrant, but to specify the place where the trial should be had. The objection which had been so often urged in the case of jurors, that they were liable to intimidation, could not by any means apply here, because there were to be no jurors, and, consequently, there could be no fear of intimidation. As to the intimidation of Judges, the idea was not to be entertained for a moment, for although
    2074
    Judges might become unpopular in Ireland, they were not subjects of intimidation; and there was a well-known instance of a certain Judge who became unpopular in Ireland, but who, nevertheless, was accustomed to walk about without the smallest escort, never meeting with the least offensive behaviour on the part of the people. For these reasons he was quite unable to understand why the Government should not allow the Special Commission Court to sit at the place where the offence for which the prisoner was to be tried had been committed. The specification of the time of the sitting of the Special Commission Court was, of course, an important element, although, as he had before pointed out, it was not so material as having the trial at the place where the offence was committed. It had, however, more importance in connection with another Amendment with reference to time and place standing in his name at the foot of the page, and which he gathered from the statement of the right hon. Gentleman, in his reply to the hon. Member for Galway, was likely substantially to be accepted by Her Majesty's Government. If it were possible, he should wish to move the two former Amendments together; but as that would, perhaps, be inconvenient, he would for the present only propose the insertion of the words relating to the time at which the Special Commission Court should sit.
    Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 28, after "sitting," insert "at the time specified and."—(Mr. Marum.)
    Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, although it would be the more regular course for him to deal only with the Amendment before the Committee, he might be allowed to say that in substance Her Majesty's Government were prepared to accept the Amendment of the hon. Member which stood at the foot of the page with reference to the notice to be given as to trial. Now, as regarded the present Amendment, the only object there could be in fixing the time, was to give persons interested proper notice before the trial came on, and that object they hoped to meet when they came to deal with the hon. Member's Amendment lower down. But he reminded the Committee that the practice both in England

    2075
    and Ireland with reference to Special Commission Courts was to issue a Commission; the Judges then fixed the exact time at which the Court should sit, due care being taken that all parties should have proper notice. Her Majesty's Government undertook that this should be done in the present case, and, that being so, he trusted the hon. Member for Kilkenny would not insist upon the actual words of the Amendment before the Committee.
    MR. MARUMsaid, he should be disposed to withdraw this Amendment if he could have an assurance also with regard to the place at which the trial would be had. He must press the question of venue very strongly upon the Committee.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    MR. MARUMsaid, his next Amendment had reference to the place at which the trial was to be had. Under the clause as it stood there would be very great inconvenience and hardship caused to witnesses who had to travel long distances to the place of trial. It was only right that the expenses of these persons should be considered, and that principle was, to a certain extent, admitted in the 5th sub-section of the clause. But the expense of travelling 150 or 200 miles was too great to be paid for, in the first instance, by persons of the class likely to be affected by the provision for holding the trial at a different place from that at which the offence was committed. It would be a very bad thing indeed that a man's wife or a woman's husband should not be able to be present at the trial for want of means to travel to the place where the Special Commission Court was sitting. Again, when a man was on trial a great distance from his place of abode, without friends and without means, it was impossible that he should have the confidence which was necessary at such a time; and he felt sure that no man sitting in that House would wish to see any accused person so dispossessed. Therefore, he said, the trial should be had in the place where the offence was committed, according to the old principle of law. As he had already pointed out, no inconvenience could arise on the ground of intimidation, as alleged in the case of jurors. That argument could not be made to apply to the Judges, and, therefore, he could see no reason why the Government should refuse to have
    2076
    the trial in the place where the offence was committed.
    Amendment proposed,
    In page 1, line 29, after "warrant," insert "and which shall be situate in the county, or county of a city, as the case may be, in which the offence was committed."—(Mr. Marum.)
    Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, he agreed with the hon. Member opposite that, as a general rule, the argument was in favour of trying prisoners where their offences were committed. But that was not so in the present case; and although it was true that the intimidation which had taken place in the case of juries was not likely to operate in the case of the Judges, yet cases might arise in which a fair trial at the place where the offence was committed would not be possible on account of the intimidation of witnesses. He was sensible of the hardship in the case of witnesses of the kind pointed out by the hon. Member; and the Government were perfectly willing to meet that matter in a liberal spirit, and in a way that would do justice to prisoners in cases were the trial took place at a distance from their homes. There would be provisions to meet the inconveniences pointed out by the hon. Member; but the Government could not accept as an absolute rule that the trial should be had in the place where the offence was committed.
    MR. PARNELLsaid, he regretted that the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Home Secretary had not seen his way to accept the very reasonable Amendment of his hon. Friend. The change of venue inflicted enormous hardship both on prisoners and witnesses. He had himself seen a great deal of this at the Assizes last winter. Crowds of witnesses were brought to the various towns in which the Assizes were held; they were kept from their homes for weeks, and a very scanty allowance was made for their expenses, in some cases no allowance at all. It was, under any circumstances, a great hardship to take persons away from their own districts, and ought to be avoided, if possible. As to the proposed arrangement providing against the intimidation of witnesses, the argument was absurd, because, if they were to be inti-

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    midated, they could be intimidated just as well when they reached home again from the place where their evidence was given, as they could be when they gave their evidence on the spot. This was a very important Amendment, and Irish Members would have to insist upon it very strongly; and as that could not be done satisfactorily at that hour of the night, he begged to move that Progress be reported.
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again."—(Mr. Parnell.)
    MR. CALLANsaid, he should feel it his duty to support the Amendment. He reminded the Committee of a case in which the lives of two innocent men were saved by the appearance of wit-
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    nesses from the neighbourhood, who under the operation of this Bill could not have given their evidence in time. The case was one which showed the absolute necessity of having the trial at a place easily approached from that where the offence was committed.
    Motion agreed to.
    Committee report Progress; to sit again upon Monday next.

  GOVERNMENT ANNUITIES AND ASSURANCE BILL.
  On Motion of Mr. FAWCETT, Bill to extend the Acts relating to the purchase of small Government Annuities, and to assuring payments of money on death, ordered to be brought in by Mr. FAWCETT and Mr. COURTNEY.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 190.]
  House adjourned at half after One o'clock till Monday next.