[TO THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATO:12]
SIR,—The argument of President Lincoln as to the Virginias, quoted in your admirable article of last week, is unanswerable. By constant repetition of the phrase " on the statute-book, &e.," the case of Ulster may go by default. Is the Amending Bill which is not on the statute-book, as a matter of honourable obligation to loyal Ulster, one whit less a part of the agreed settlement than the Home Rule Bill which is on the statute-book? Everything is where it was except that by both sides the existing Home Rule Bill seems to be admitted to be unworkable. Then the question is still wide open. In view of the supreme import- ance of the subject, is there any difficulty in the Government's introducing at once a short Bill—with or without the approval of the Nationalists, and notwithstanding the presence on the statute- book of the present Home Rule Bill—empowering Nationalist Ireland to demand and to receive a Constitution analogous to or identical, 7nutatis mutandis, with the Constitution enjoyed by any one of the States of the North American Union? Such a Bill, which would be permissive and not mandatory, might now be accepted by the Irish themselves, and it could not fail to bo acceptable to Irish-Americans, who presumably take the line that they are taking because they approve their prevent position. It would incidentally in any case prove to all Americans beyond the possibility of dispute that there is no ground in this Irish question for their withholding hearty co-operation from the Entente. They would see, as they have not yet seen, that Great Britain, in order to secure a settlement, is, and for some time has been, willing that those Irishmen who desire to do so should govern themselves with precisely the same liberty of action as the American peoples of the several States govern themselves.—
I am, Sir, &c., RICHARD H. Herres. 2 South Square, Gray's Inn, W.C. 1.
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