Mr. Asquith then came to the main provisions of his
Bill, which we summarize as follows : The Irish Parliament is to consist of a Senate of forty members and a House of Commons of 164 members. The Senate, nominated in the first place by the Imperial Executive, will hold office for eight years. They will retire by rotation, and the vacancies will be filled by the Irish Executive. In cases of disagreement the two Houses will decide the point at issue by a joint session. The Imperial Parliament will in theory retain its complete supremacy over Ireland just as it does in theory in the case of the Colonies ; but we may feel pretty sure that if once the Bill is passed the Imperial Parliament will be as impotent to legislate for Ireland as for New Zealand. The Irish Parliament will have power to legislate for the peace, order, and good government of Ireland, but the Crown, peace and war, the Army and Navy, treaties, dignities, Sm., will be excluded from its purview. Again, it will not have power to make any law so as either directly or indirectly to establish or endow any religion, to give preference or impose disability on account of religious beliefs, or to make any religious belief or religious ceremony a, condition of the validity of any marriage.
