HC Deb 04 April 1889 vol 334 cc1589-91
MR. W. A. MACDONALD (Queen's County, Ossory)

I beg to ask Mr. Solicitor General for Ireland whether he has read a report of the actual proceedings in trial of Mr. P. J. Conlan, proprietor of the Carlow Nationalist, as the result of which he is now undergoing a sentence of two months' imprisonment; whether he is aware that the sole ground upon which the Crown asked the Magistrates to order Mr. Conlan to give bail for his good behaviour, or to be imprisoned, was that he published in his paper of the 12th of January a report of the ordinary fortnightly meeting of the Ballyadarus and Wolfhill Branch of the Irish National League in the Queen's County on the previous Sunday; whether the attempt to show that boycotting resulted from the publication of the report was disproved by the evidence of the only Crown witness, Sergeant Downes of the Constabulary, who swore that the boycotting had commenced some days before the paper containing the report was published; whether he is aware that the report was published as an ordinary item of news, without note or comment; and whether there is any other instance of the Statute of Edward III. being employed to prevent the Press from publishing the reports of meetings?

*MR. MADDEN

I have examined into the actual proceedings in this case, as the result of which Mr. Conlan is now undergoing imprisonment by reason of his refusal to give bail. The complaint, as stated in the summons, was, in substance, that the defendant, on the 12th of January, unlawfully published in a newspaper called the Nationalist and Leinster Times certain notices whereby he unlawfully incited certain persons to violate the laws of the land, and to obstruct and impede the administration thereof, and to set certain of Her Majesty's subjects against certain others of them, and whereby he incited certain of Her Majesty's subjects to combine to impede, obstruct, frustrate, and defeat the execution of lawful writs of possession issued forth of the High Court of Justice in Ireland, and County Court ejectment decrees. The acts complained of, and for which the defendant was ordered to give sureties to be of good behoviour, did not consist in publishing the report of a meeting as an ordinary item of news, but in publishing notices of the character and under the circumstances stated in the summons; and the magistrates, being of opinion that the defendant had been guilty of such conduct, ordered him to give sureties to be of good behaviour. As regards the third paragraph, the information before me does not enable me to state whether the boycotting of Mrs. Brennan had or had not commenced before the 12th of January. I cannot, however, see that this would be material if the magistrates were of opinion that the continuance of the boycotting resulted from the publication of the notices.

MR. W. A. MACDONALD

Does the hon. Gentleman persist in his statement made last Tuesday, that this sentence was under a Statute of Edward III., in view of a telegram which I have to-day received from Mr. Conlan's solicitor, to the effect that it was under the ordinary law?

*MR. MADDEN

I said that the magistrates exercised jurisdiction under an Act of Edward III., but they also possessed sufficient jurisdiction under the ordinary law?

MR. CLANCY

Were these notices simply part of proceedings which were reported?

*MR. MADDEN

The documents in question were in the nature of notices which appeared in this newspaper.

MR. CLANCY

Were they merely an account of a public meeting?

*MR. MADDEN

In part they were. But if the magistrates, having the evidence before them, were of opinion that they were published for the purposes alleged in the summons, the mere fact that they were embodied in the report of a public meeting would not give them immunity.