"HOME-RULE IS DEAD."
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."] SIR,—I have read with considerable interest " Forewarned's " letter in the Spectator of October 17th, and your comments thereon. May I also offer my opinion, which is that Home- rule has been finally killed by the fiscal question? A Liberal Administration will hardly bring forward a measure calculated once more to divide a party so recently reunited through Mr. Chamberlain's propositions, and the present Government will find it impossible to do so successfully. Although his Majesty's present advisers might agree to bring in a measure of Home-rule disguised perhaps under another name, in return for the support of the Nationalist party in the House of Commons, we must remember that since the split in the Unionist party on the fiscal question they cannot command the same support in the House of Lords as before. The Free- traders amongst the Lords will scarcely support a Home-rule measure so obviously the price of a bargain for the advance- ment of Protection ; and these Free-traders, together with the Irish Peers, who seem of late to be infused with fresh blood and energy, will be numerically sufficient to defeat any Bill that approaches to Home-rule.—I am, Sir, &c., IRISH LANDLORD.
[Our correspondent is, we believe, perfectly right when he suggests that there is far more danger of Home-rule from the Protectionists than from a Free-trade Government led by such men as Mr. Asquith, Sir Edward Grey, and Mr. Haldane. —En. Spectator.]
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