Lord Hartington spoke at Carlisle on Wednesday, and has been
accused by the organs both of his opponents and of his supporters, of having taken quite a new departure on the subject of local government in Ireland, in consequence of the intro- duction of Mr. Ritchie's Local Government Bill. What he said was, that Mr. Ritchie's Bill seemed to him to promise Home-rule in the only form in which Home-rule is beneficial and legitimate, to the inhabitants of the separate localities of all the various portions of the United Kingdom. Of course, he knew that Ire- land is not to be included in it, neither, indeed, at present is Scotland ; but still, on the same principles, local liberties might be given to Scotland and Ireland, if it could be shown that the people of those localities were not likely to abuse their local liberties for the purpose of setting the Central Government at defiance :—" My position as to extension of local government in Ireland is simply this. I have not the smallest objection to a wide extension of local self-government in Ireland on principle. I take no objection to it such as I do to the principle of the establishment of a Parliament in Dublin. That is a proposal to which, so long as I am able, I will always refuse my assent. That is a proposal to which, under no circumstances that I can conceive, I would be a party. As to the extension of local self-governing institutions on some system similar to that proposed for England, it appears to be simply a question of ex- pediency, to be considered by Parliament on the grounds of expediency of time and circumstance ; to be discussed just in the same way as any other subject has to be discussed by Parliament on the ground of expediency, convenience, and appropriateness
to time The county of Cumberland, in which we are assembled, is going to have a species of Home-rule. But if the Members for Cumberland had given notice to Parliament that they denied the right of Parliament to make laws for Cumberland ; if they had given practical proof of the sincerity of the denial by resisting, in every way they could, the laws of the British Parliament in Cumberland, and had excited their constituents by every inducement to resist those laws ; if they had shown themselves absolutely regardless of the rights of certain classes, then I think that Parliament might very pro- bably hesitate in granting to Cumberland the Home-rule which is now going to be granted to it. And so for Ireland. We have a right, in my opinion, to inquire, before we commit ourselves to grant extension of local self-governing institutions in Ireland, to examine rather closely in what spirit they are asked for, in what temper they would be received, and what would be the probable result." Lord Hartington added that what be should condition for, before thinking of extending such local govern- ment to Ireland, is that the Executive Government should retain in its hands "all the powers that are necessary for the enforce- ment of order and for the enforcement of justice between class and class, and between man and man." Is there any concession of premature Home-rule to Ireland there P
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