TOPICS OF THE DAY.
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MR. PARNELL'S NEW POLICY.
MR. PARNELL has been described by the best judge of speakers among the statesmen of the day as the man who always succeeds best among our Parliamentary orators in saying precisely what he means, neither more nor less. If that be admitted, his three last speeches—one at Arklow and two in Dublin—are very formidable signs of the times, which have come just in time to be discussed at length before every cot- stituency in Great Britain by the candidates for the new Par- liament. They deserve no less. And if they do not receive what they deserve, the next Parliament will not know its own mind on by far the biggest question that is certain to be brought before it. An Irish correspondent, who appears to repudiate Mr. Parnell's Irish policy—or at least the policy to which Mr. Parnell for the present thinks it prudent to confine his demands, the policy of restoring Grattan's Parliament, plus the new household suffrage and minus the Irish House of Lords,—speaks of our last week's article as " a violent anti-Irish article." That is his own view of it. Many a Conservative might call it a violent pro-Irish article ; and not entirely without reason, for though it drew the line sharply between what ought to be given and what ought not to be given to Ireland, it advocated the extension to Ireland of every political right and claim desired for herself by Great Britain, in spite of the flagrantly and increasingly anti-British tone of the popular Irish Party. It is, indeed, quite a mistake to suppose that we entertain the slightest anti-Irish feeling. But we do entertain a very strong feeling indeed on behalf of the Union ; and we anticipate for Ireland, as well as for England, nothing but a long history of calamity as certain to result from the repeal of the Union. Now, as we hold that anticipation to be in the highest degree reasonable, we cannot express too strongly our conviction that no candidate should address himself to any constituency in the United Kingdom with- out laying down in the clearest manner his convictions on this subject, and that no candidate should be accepted by any such constituency without that constituency having deliberately considered and formally sanctioned his view on that all-important subject. Let us look at Mr. Parnell's avowals in his last three speeches, and the conse- quences to which, judging by the history of the last twenty years, the concession of his demands would probably lead.
What Mr. Parnell apparently proposes is the restoration, as we have said, of the old Irish Parliament, with the new popular suffrage, and without the House of Lords. He further proposes that the Parliament so regained should at once begin to legislate for the benefit of Ireland, by establish- ing a strict system of Protection, and rooting out landlordism by an extension of the celebrated Healy Clause in the Land Act. So far the Irish King is perfectly explicit. But no statesman, however deep might be his sympathy with Irish nationalism, could reasonably accept such a programme, as if even it were final,—as if that being once granted, all strife would be over, and England might, on the one hand, leave Ireland to starve herself into reason by her mad Pro- tectionism, and, on the other hand, to eradicate landlordism of one type till she was face to face with landlordism of another and perhaps more formidable type still, with- out fear of any further demands. We are bound to read the Irish history of the future by the light of the Irish history of the past. Now, what has that history been ? During the last twenty years we have been amongst those who have fervently pleaded for, and who have obtained, the concession to Ireland of laws accommodated to her national history and suitable to her national faith. Has that rendered the Irish Party more reasonable I Has it rendered an approximation between Irish policy and English policy pro- bable On the contrary, it has developed the anti-English feeling in Ireland from an attitude of remonstrant protest, into an attitude of raging fury. The more the Irish Party have gained, the more violent has become their invective against England ; and now there are no words black enough to describe, not merely English policy, but especially the Liberal Party who have brought about all these concessions. Well, that is their affair and not ours. If the Irish Party would but let us alone, and not obstruct our Imperial business, they are at liberty to inveigh against the black-heartedness of England in any terms they please. But that is just the question,—would they, under any circumstances that can be conceived, let us alone Mr. Parnell asks now for an Irish
Parliament, with liberty to establish a strict Protective system and to root out landlordism. Well,—without in- sisting even on the very ominous fact that half the population of Ulster, and the most prosperous part of that population, would probably be ready to resist many of the proposals
of such a Parliament, even at the sword's point,—is it
under any circumstances conceivable that the Irish wrath with England would end there I Why should we be
blind to the lesson of the past twenty years, which has shown us the Irish Party's hatred rising from a feeling of generous indignation against real wrongs, to a feeling of unintelligible and almost ungovernable anger that England should have shown herself willing to redress those wrongs. If the Land Act, instead of softening, has exacerbated the temper of the Irish Party, why should the repeal of the Union not exacerbate it further? Can any one be blind to the fact that the Irish Party appears to find its meat and drink in violent denunciation of Great Britain I We do not complain of it, we only insist upon it as a most important and most instructive fact in relation to the future. Now suppose a repeal of the Union passed, does any one maintain seriously for a moment that there would not be still food—and much more than food, plenty of stimulus—for that feeling which has been so long growing I In the first place, as the letter of our Irish correspondent of this week must itself suggest to us, would not a party form itself from the very first in the new Irish Parliament to protest against the gross injustice that Irishmen should have no influence in determining the policy of the Empire ; that Ireland should not be formally represented in the Parliament which directs the policy of the United Kingdom ? Why, the wrongs they have had to complain of so long, and which have swelled in their imagination to a magnitude large exactly in proportion as some of them have been redressed, would be as nothing to the wrong which would be inflicted if the Parlia- ment of Westminster, containing no formal Irish representa- tives, should legislate for the United Kingdom without having the opportunity of hearing from Mr. Healy, or Mr. Callan, or Mr. O'Brien what the foreign policy of Great Britain ought to be. Then there would be the new Protective policy. Ireland would, of course, expect that while she was allowed to shut out English merchandise to any extent she pleased, Great Britain would continue to take Irish butter and pork and linen as freely as ever. We hope she would. We hope no party would be insane enough to propose that we should refuse Irish products,' because Ireland had been so insane as to refuse our products. But how can we tell that Lord Salisbury and his friends would hold that view I They have shown a strong desire to try retaliatory tariffs, and there is no knowing that they might not retaliate by shutting out Irish products. Well, if they did, there would be another fearful grievance for Irish patriots to descant upon and avenge. Then all this time, of course, a powerful Irish militia would be growing up, which would give Ireland,—for no one can doubt the genius of Irish soldiers,—a very fair chance indeed of preparing for a civil war far more formidable than any we have had yet. We are arguing, remember, by the light of recent events. The more just England has become, the more furiously anti-English the popular party in Ireland has become. We have already pointed out that assuredly, if that temper is to grow in the future as it has grown in the past, there would be plenty of stimulus for it. We could not ourselves defend on principle the exclusion of Ireland from all influence over the Imperial policy of the United Kingdom ; but certainly if, in practice, we had to admit an Irish delegation to a Federal Parliament, as our correspondent of this week proposes, to worry and embarrass us at every step as the so-called Irish Party has worried and embarrassed us for the last eleven years, the repeal of the Union would lose the only conceivable attraction which it might other- wise have for Great Britain. And it is impossible to ignore the fact that a repeal of the Union would mean an immense stimulus not only to the disposition to quarrel with England and to the incentives to such a quarrel, but to the power of quarrelling with us to some purpose.
Now, without indulging in the smallest anti-Irish feel- ing,—and we are at least just enough to admit that there is quite sufficient and more than sufficient ground in history to excuse the explosion of anti-English feeling, though it seems to us, like many other explosions, to come off at a very in- appropriate time,—should not these things be gravely con- sidered by the constituencies of Great Britain before they take
any step which either directly sanctions a repeal of the Union or virtually involves the kind of calamities which we have suggested as almost certain to result from it ? Now is the time to lay down the line for future action. If the repeal of the Union is to be firmly and steadily resisted, the candidates for the various constituencies should clearly know what they are about, and shciuld be instructed that any needful combination even between Liberals and Tories to resist so great a calamity should be preferred to doing in haste what we might have to repent at leisure. We cannot refuse to Ireland, and we ought not to refuse to Ireland, what Ireland cannot refuse to Ulster, and does not refuse to Ulster. But we may refuse to Ireland, and in our opinion we ought to refuse to Ireland, what Ireland would certainly refuse to Ulster, let Ulster demand it as loudly as it would. As for the plan of Federation, that involves a violent reconstruction of our history without the smallest promise of good result. A Federation entered upon in the present temper of the Irish people would be simply a Constitution to quarrel under and to waste power under. Nor is it reasonable that a great State, which has no desire or excuse for Federation in any other quarter, should break with history in order to please a party who, so far as we can judge, are not in the temper to be pleased, and who will use every concession they get to sharpen the edge of their hostile weapons. Our own deep belief,—a belief in no respect founded on anti-Irish feeling, for we have none,—is that if we do anything to facilitate the repeal of the Union, we shall do what is big with calamity for Ireland first, and for the United Kingdom next. It would be calamity that might, and probably would, end in war ; and not only in war, but in such war as would render a solid Union more distant than ever. If the new Democracy takes its stand firmly where alone it can take its stand firmly, on the right of the whole to refuse disintegration at the will of the parts, we shall soon have the popular Irish Party in a better humour. It is firm resistance on a ground of clear principle,—not weak concession,—which will alone bring them to reason.
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