11 OCTOBER 1919, Page 3

Something must be done in regard to the Home Rule

Act. It would be absurd to let that measure, for which no one now has a good word to say, come into operation by the mere lapse of time. Still, the case is not so urgent as the Deily Mail would have us believe. The Suspensory Act of 1914 provided that no steps should be taken to put the Home Rule Act into opera- tion until a date, " not being later than the end of the present war," fixed by Order in Council. But the present war does not end, under the Termination of the War Act, until the Peace Treaties have been ratified by all the belligerents. The German Peace Treaty is not complete in that sense even yet. The Bulgarian Treaty has not been concluded. The Turkish Peace Treaty, for all we know, is not even drafted. Nevertheless until we have made peace with Turkey, as well as with Balgaria, Austria, Hungary, and Germany, the Home Rule Act may remain in a state of suspended animation. It Is rather odd to find the Sublime Porte, as we used to call it, becoming an unconscious factor in Irish politics.