LORD DUNSANYrose to call the attention of Her Majesty's Ministers to the last four county elections in Ireland, and to the probable causes of the growing disaffection to the Imperial Government manifested at those elections and elsewhere in Ireland. The noble Lord said that the subject was one of importance, not only to Ireland, but to the whole of the United Kingdom. The state of Ireland, as far as disaffection was concerned, was very serious, and was daily growing worse, and if things went on in the same manner very soon we should have to choose between the disruption of the Empire, or the forcible suppression of what was going on. The few facts upon which he should found his remarks admitted of no controversy—they were generally known and had become historical. Their Lordships were aware that shortly before the end of last Session there was a somewhat discreditable election for the county of Tipperary, when the electors of that county thought fit to elect as their Representative in the House of Commons one of the worst of the Fenian offenders—a man who had been three times convicted. Since then, four county elections had been held, the result being the return to Parliament in unbroken succession of men belonging to the Nationalist, the Fenian, or the Home Rule Party—or whatever they pleased to call themselves, but whom he might safely venture to describe as the Party of Disaffection. One of those counties was situated in the East of Ireland, another in the far South-West, a third in the South, and the fourth in the North-West, and therefore they might well be regarded as a fair sample of the state of feeling which existed in the rest of the country. Endeavouring as far as 92 possible to avoid using language that might be offensive to Roman Catholics, he might say that a recent election had been influenced by what Macaulay had termed the strongest known organization in the world—the Roman Catholic clergy, who had so often acted as the electioneering agents of Her Majesty's Government. No doubt it might be said that even if the worst came to the worst, insurrection in Ireland would be at once put down by the strong arm of England. But was that a satisfactory state of things to have arrived at after we had adopted a course of sentimental legislation, and had instituted a series of experiments which, in the opinion of many people, nothing but success could justify? If in five English counties Members were returned who advocated the dissolution of the Empire, it would have meant that revolution was proximate: but in Ireland it meant the spirit of revolution restrained by the power of England. Now, in what position would Her Majesty's Government be placed in the event of their having to repress insurrection in Ireland with a strong hand? In the first place, the course they had taken with regard to the Fenian prisoners would entirely preclude the possibility of their obtaining the conviction of any Irish traitors in future. When a jury composed of respectable men at the risk of their lives found those charged with Fenian crimes guilty, they found that they were made fools of, and that the traitors they had pronounced guilty were released after a short confinement;—under these circumstances it would be too much to expect that Irish juries could be brought to convict in similar cases in future. The crime of high treason was the highest known to the law, yet the Government in dealing with traitors invariably treated them as political offenders, who were entitled to special favours. The course pursued really amounted to setting aside and repealing some of the most important statutes of the Realm. All the Fenian prisoners had been set at liberty except a few who had dyed their disaffection with the further mark of military treason. These poor soldiers had been seduced from their military allegiance, and were still in prison; but the traitors who seduced them were set at liberty. This was not dealing out even-handed justice between man and 93 man. The well-affected were discountenanced, the seduced were relentlessly punished, the seducers were let off. Notwithstanding all this, the Government could not retain its popularity in Ireland. How did it happen that after two such measures as the Church and the Land Acts, which—for the sake of argument, he accepted as beneficial and just—the Government was still unpopular? Evidently because the people of Ireland did not feel they owed the Government anything, although they accepted these Acts as boons. It was true they despoiled the few for the good of the many; but nothing less than the confiscation of the whole of the land of Ireland would satisfy the hopes raised by the speeches of Mr. Gladstone before he took office, and the people of Ireland felt the Government had been well repaid by securing and holding office by virtue of declaring for these measures. One great evil in Ireland was the absence of a Liberal party. The Roman Catholic priests could not possibly be Liberals—their vows forbade it. He might be told there was a brighter side to the picture, as evidenced in the courageous and manly judgment delivered by Mr. Justice Keogh. It was due to Mr. Justice Keogh, who had had a great amount of injustice done him, to point out that his judgment, which contained apparently some very objectionable expressions, took nine hours to deliver; and what appeared in the public journals was only an abridgment, in which, no doubt, any spicy expressions it contained were extracted; and which, in their published connection, might have had their complexion considerably changed. Nevertheless some of these expressions were justified by the evidence, and as they stood in connection with their context, they were not subject to any such strictures. There were painful rumours of the retirement of that learned Judge. He hoped they were unfounded—he hoped there would be not only a Justice Keogh on the Bench in Ireland, but a long succession of such able and upright Judges. The noble Earl, in conclusion, adverted to Trinity College, attributing Mr. Justice Keogh's independence to his training at that institution, and expressing a fear that, as the "third branch of the upas tree," it was doomed by the Government, with the view of giving the priests the control of education.
THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYsaid, that had the noble Lord impugned the conduct of the Irish Executive his noble Friend (Earl Spencer) was present, and would have given him a complete answer. He had, however, admitted that the conduct of the Executive was creditable, considering the circumstances in which they were placed, and his speech had been rather a general indictment against the Government and the Liberal party. The noble Lord's variety of topics, and his anticipations that no answer could be given to his inquiries, placed him under some difficulty in replying, and therefore he would not attempt to follow him over the whole ground through which he had travelled. As to the recent elections, the most remarkable of them was Galway—the most remarkable, perhaps, in modern days. Their Lordships were, no doubt, aware that the judgment of Mr. Justice Keogh was about to be laid on the Table of the House, and it was undesirable to discuss the matter until an authentic record of the judgment delivered by that able and upright Judge was before them. As to the Land Act, he denied that it took away the property of the few to give it to the many. He (the Earl of Kimberley), on the contrary, would rather describe it as an Act which secured to the many what they were fairly entitled to, and did not infringe the limits of equity and justice. He believed it had given considerable satisfaction to the tenantry, who, the landlords complained, had been too well treated. He did not believe the release of the Fenian prisoners had been followed by any evil effects. So far from its having stimulated disaffection, at no period since the Fenian outbreak had Fenianism been more quiescent, and at its head-quarters across the Atlantic it had never been at a lower ebb. The noble Lord had spoken of general disaffection in Ireland. He (the Earl of Kimberley) feared that at no time could it have been truly said that no disaffection existed in any part of Ireland; but he saw no signs of growing disaffection; and as to Home Rule, it was an evident improvement on Fenianism, since it showed that agitators had reverted to constitutional and legal measures, and that an armed insurrection against the Queen's Rule had been abandoned for the present. With respect to the gene- 95 ral condition of the country, he had never known a time when it was not represented as worse than ever on the one hand, and as strikingly improved on the other. He thought the truth lay between the two views. He believed there was great material prosperity, and the disestablishment of the Church had, to the credit of all parties, caused less agitation and bitterness than might have been expected. Disaffection, he feared, had always existed, and would probably continue to exist for many years, whatever course Parliament or the Government might take; but he believed it was more quiescent than for a considerable time past, and he could not concur in the noble Lord's view of the situation.
LORD ORANMORE AND BROWNEcontended that the Land Act, which had hardly begun to operate, had produced, and would produce, separation between landlord and tenant and between the tenants themselves, disputes formerly settled by the intervention of the landlord being now decided by litigation. Referring to the murder of the Policeman at Dublin, he felt no surprise at the acquittal of the accused, for the jury were evidently afraid to subject themselves to danger, or returning a verdict against the murderer, especially since, after the release of the Fenian convicts, they could feel little confidence in the sentence being carried out in case they convicted him. The fact of the acquittal of this man—who had been taken red-handed—could carry but one conviction to the people of Ireland—that the Executive of Fenianism was stronger than the Executive of Her Majesty's Government. The murder of Mrs. Neil in open day at her own door, after having given notice to quit to a tenant who had refused right of way to a fellow-tenant, was another lamentable symptom, and there appeared no prospect of the murderer being detected. The language of several Members of the Government at the time of the passing of the Land Act excited illusory hopes, and he especially regretted the statement of the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack, that an evicted tenant had no choice but between the pauper churchyard and an American swamp. ["Hear!"] He was surprised that noble Lords on the Ministerial Bench should cheer that statement, for at the time it was uttered evicted tenants 96 had almost universally the means coming to England or emigrating.
LORD ORANMORE AND BROWNEsaid, he was surprised to hear the representative of the Government say that the only alternative before the tenant was the workhouse.
THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYwould thank the noble Lord not to exaggerate his meaning. His noble and learned Friend had never meant to say that in no case had an evicted tenant no choice except between the graveyard and an American swamp; but that there were cases in which eviction practically left him no alternative but beggary or expatriation.
LORD ORANMORE AND BROWNEHe remembered the passage perfectly well, and that was the interpretation he put upon it. The Premier, also, in the other House, had said that under some circumstances emigration implied banishment. Statements like these, which were scattered the next day throughout every village in Ireland, might lead the ignorant to suppose that even the Lord Chancellor of England and the first Minister of the Crown thought a good deal was to be said in favour of the crimes which they committed. But he complained that the noble and learned Lord, though ready to express his sympathy with one class, did not extend it to another. He thought a strong case for sympathy might be found in the poor orphans left by the unfortunate lady who was murdered without cause. In the recent elections the operation of the Land Act was manifest. Before the passing of the Land Act, the respectable and reasonable landlords regulated every difference between themselves and their tenants on the principle of giving every advantage and consideration to the latter; but that had all been changed now, for the law stepped in in their place. There was an estrangement as between class and class. Look at the two recent elections for Kerry and Tipperary. The Roman Catholic clergy went with the popular cry of Home Rule, and carried everything before them. In Kerry the landlords were unable to make any stand at all, and the tenants returned a young candidate who was comparatively unknown to the country. The fact was that Her Majesty's Government had tried the experiment of governing 97 Ireland in a great measure through the influence of the Roman Catholic priests, their creed being Catholicism, nationality, and what he called Socialism—in other words, division of land. As for the two former, they amounted, according to Cardinal Cullen, to the same thing. When the Conventions Act was under discussion in the other House, Mr. Butt said that unless the Government granted what Ireland asked, the people there would take such measures as could not be resisted by the Government; whereupon the Prime Minister acknowledged the temperate and moderate tone in which the hon. and learned Gentleman had spoken, and went on to say, in effect, that the separation of the Empire, in some shape or other, was a matter of fair discussion—an expression coincident with that which had been used by the noble Earl that night.
THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYI never said anything that implied that the separation of the Empire was a matter of fair discussion.
LORD ORANMORE AND BROWNEhad yet to learn that there was much difference between Home Rule and separation. Whether Fenianism, Home Rule, or repeal of the Union was the term used, separation was implied of the two countries. He thought the noble Earl gave their Lordships reason to believe he meant that.
THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYI must again interrupt the noble Lord. I beg him not to put into my mouth words which I never have spoken. What I said was, that a difference existed between Home Rule and Fenianism; that, whereas the former meant the adoption of Parliamentary methods, the latter implied violent methods.
LORD ORANMORE AND BROWNEconfessed that he could not see any exact difference between the explanation of the noble Earl and his previous remarks. Mr. Butt said in the House of Commons the other night—
§ EARL GRANVILLErose to Order. The noble Lord was not in Order when he referred to what Mr. Butt had said in the other House.
LORD ORANMORE AND BROWNEpresumed he should be in Order when he said "in another place." What he maintained was that it remained an open question, from what the Prime Minister had said "in another place," as to the 98 course the right hon. Gentleman intended to pursue in the future with regard to Home Rule.