THE RESULT OF THE " NO-CONFIDENCE " DEBATE. T HE No-confidence
debate, which yielded the Opposi- tion on Thursday the majority of 40,—being only one less (with a Liberal Unionist in the Chair) than its maximum strength, has certainly not been without instructiveness for the country at large. It settles finally the real drift of the Irish demand, though it represents the Anti-Panaellites as willing to press it for the moment with less force and less resolution than the small troop of Parnellites. It renders Mr. Gladstone's meaning decidedly less "nebulous," to use his own phrase, than the prospects of his Government. It shows us the irresolution and procrastinating attitude of Mr. Gladstone's English followers, who cannot make up their minds to say that, on a question which clearly involves the political fate and power of these islands, 'Thus far we will go and no farther.' And it leaves the position of the Unionists as distinct, as confident, and as formidable, as that of a homogeneous minority, considerably more powerful than any one section of the composite and very much divided majority, could possibly be. Mr. John Redmond formulated what we may call the extreme Irish demand, but it is clear enough that the extreme Irish demand will more or less determine the ideal of all the Irish Nationalists. The priests and Anti-Parnellites will take less at first, as Mr. Parnell was willing to take less at first, but they will never really be satisfied till they have used what they obtain as a handle by which to extort more. Mr. Redmond puts the Nationalist ideal forcibly enough. It is, in short, a separate Ireland, protected but not controlled by Great Britain,—not even exposed to the influence of English opinion. Nothing, says Mr. Redmond, short of the total abolition of the new Irish constitution by the Imperial Parliament (which of course would mean re-conquest), should be tolerated in the way of interference with its action when it has once started on its career. An appeal from its decisions to the decisions of the Imperial Parliament is not to be thought of for a moment. Anything that, under the statute which creates it, it can legally do,—and only an Irish Constitutional Court, to be appointed under the statute which creates the new Constitution itself, can be allowed to define what that is,—it must be at liberty to do without any let or hindrance from the Imperial Parliament and Administration. No veto by the Imperial Parliament and Administration is to be tolerated at all. The only veto must be the veto of the Crown, exerted on the advice of the Irish Ministry, in other words,of the Ministry which has the confidence of the Irish Parliament for the time being, a veto which could hardly by any possibility be used at all, since no Ministry which had the confidence of the Irish Parliament would desire to veto its own measures. That is, the minority in Ireland, and the majority in Ulster, are to be put abso- lutely under the heel of the Dublin Ministry and Parlia- ment without any possibility of redress, unless, indeed, the moral feeling of the Imperial Parliament is so outraged that it is willing to overturn altogether its own work, and trust to force for the restoration of order and tranquillity. Further, Mr. Redmond demands peremptorily the restora- tion of all the evicted tenants who have been evicted for defiance of the law, and the turning out of all the legal tenants who have been formally installed under the law as it is now understood and administered in Ireland. He also asks for the release of the political prisoners,—dynamiters who have been guilty of the base and cowardly outrage of risking innocent lives to create political alarm. Mr. Justin McCarthy is not so thoroughgoing. He supports the two latter demands in feebler accents, but is vague about the meaning of the supremacy of the Imperial Parliament. He will at present apparently take what he can get, so long, at all events, as what he can get gives him the virtual independence of a Colonial Parliament. Anything short of that he would probably be obliged by Irish jealousy to refuse. But whatever be gets, his party will certainly use to press for more. It is hardly open to doubt that anything like steady control by the Imperial Parliament, control of the police, appointment of the Judiciary, or a practical veto to be exercised, whenever desirable, by British Ministers, would not be endured for a moment. Mr. Justin McCarthy's language is vague, but none of his party ventured to protest against the unreasonableness of Mr. Redmond's demands, and declare that they thought them dangerous to the Union. The Irish majority will be as restless as ever if anything substantially less than Mr. Redmond's demands is conceded. The Irish minority will be much more restless than ever if anything at all like it is conceded.
And now, what shall we say of Mr. Gladstone's inten- tions? As usual, Mr. Gladstone is reticent to the last degree ; but it is easy to see what he really contemplates. He contemplates giving Ireland, so far as the statutory limitations on the self-governing power are not in excess of those of a self-governing colony, as much liberty as a self-governing colony,—in effect, that is, perfect liberty,— but he will not yet define what the statutory limitations are to be. "I cannot enter into the question," he said, "of the particulars of that Bill [the Irish Home-rule Bill]. The principles are perfectly well known. They are limited, on the one hand, by the full and effectual maintenance of the Imperial supremacy which pervades the whole of the Empire, and on the other hand by an equally full and effectual transfer to Ireland of the management of her own local concerns." The words we have italicised sufficiently show that Mr. Glad- stone does not mean to allow the revision of Irish legisla- tion and administration in the Imperial Parliament except so far as Colonial legislation and administration are there revised. And as the right to enforce any such revision is practically a dead letter in relation to any self-governing colony, no doubt he intends it to be a dead letter in relation to Ireland. The full and effectual maintenance of Imperial supremacy will mean nothing in the world but the formal reservation of perfectly dormant rights. The "equally full and effectual transfer to Ireland of the management of her own local concerns" means, of course, the " much fuller and more effectual transfer," as it also means in the Colonies. Ulster, unless the statutory provisions of the Irish Constitution make special exception in her case, of which Mr. Gladstone gives no hint, will have no appeal to Westminster at all. The net result of the debate is certainly to make it more than probable that Mr. Gladstone means to go far beyond the Bill of 1886 in concession to the Irish Party, and that both sections of the Irish Party will unite their forces to keep him up to the fulfilment of the sanguine hopes that his present attitude inspires.
As regards the intentions of the Disestablishment party and the Labour party, the debate has left us entirely in the dark. It is probable that Mr. Gladstone does not intend to hold out any hope of grappling with the difficult question of Welsh Disestablishment while he retains the position of Premier. He emphatically avows that his own labours must be almost absorbed by the Irish Qua- tion, at least so far as any legislative change is concerned, and yet he could hardly permit so great a step as a Bill for the Disestablishment of the Welsh Church to be officially introduced without giving some of his own attention to an ecclesiastical change so important. We fully expect that he will not give Welsh Disestablishment the second place in his programme, but will reserve that place for some constitutional tinkering at the Registration and the Suffrage, together with some extension of Local Government to parish and district Councils. How far this may embarrass his Government by disappointing and mortifying the rather powerful Welsh contingent of his supporters we do not venture to predict. But that if he does give Welsh Disestablishment the go-by it will disappoint the Welsh members greviously, and cool their zeal for Home-rule, we feel no doubt. Possibly he may avoid the difficulty by adopting Mr. Asquith's proposal of Home-rule all round, and an Imperial Parliament to settle federal questions and federal questions only, in which case the Welsh will, no doubt, expect to receive power to deal in their own Welsh diet with the revenues of the Church in Wales. But that course, though it might turn one difficulty, would vastly exaggerate others, and probably alienate a great many of Mr. Gladstone's English supporters. Such a solution would create universal alarm, if not some- thing like a panic. It would involve not only the disinte- gration of the nation but a simultaneous scramble for the assets of each division of the nation. Mr. Sydney Webb would rejoice, but Mr. Gladstone's homelier admirers and supporters would be plunged into the deepest dismay. However, the debate of the week sheds no light on this part of the subject. Questions affecting disestablishment, as Mr. Chamberlain pointed out with so much effect, are not touched at all in it. It is their absence, not their presence, that points to rocks ahead. One of the most curious characteristics in Mr. Glad- stone's speech was his obvious irritation at the necessity of making a speech at all. It was plain that he thought it a cruel necessity, that he would have liked to defer any hint of his policy as long as possible, and that what has been called the "conspiracy of silence" was his deliberate choice. Throughout the debate not a single member of the incoming Administration, except Mr. Gladstone, so much as opened his mouth. The mot d'ordre- evidently had been : 'Don't let us commit ourselves, and don't let us anticipate our difficulties.' Mr. Gladstone did not wish to take stock of those difficulties. He did not wish to know how many sunken rocks there might be in the course he would have to steer. He ignored Mr. John Redmond, though he could not ignore Mr. Justin McCarthy ; and the hint given to all followers of the Government evidently was to defer the evil day when difficulties would have to be fully faced and grappled with, as long as possible. This is not a good omen for his Government. Mr. Gladstone is quite right not to hamper himself by premature pledges ; but he seems to us grossly mistaken in not encouraging the various sections of his composite party to ,unbosom themselves as freely as possible of their purposes and hopes. It is all very well to reserve his decision. It is by no means well to follow the ostrich-like policy of keeping the main difficulties as long out of sight and out of mind as a policy of procrastination can manage to keep them.
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