THE ULSTER PROBLEM.
[To THE EDITOR 07 THE " SPECTATOE.1 Sin,—As a constant reader and admirer of the Spectator may I protest against the tone of your articles on the Ulster ques- tion ? The theory that underlies these articles would lead in practice to the disruption of all Parliamentary government, for it assumes that a majority has the right to resist the decrees of Parliament, and if it feels itself in any way injured may, and indeed ought to, set up a government of its own. This spirit of lawlessness is undoubtedly abroad, but it is strange to find the Spectator among its advocates. When it finds expression among the working classes in the breaking of agreements and strikes without cause, you, Sir, are the first to condemn it. You disapprove of the resistance to the law of the land in the case of the servant tax-resisters, as they are called, and yet you apparently approve of the threat of rebellion in Ulster, if she does not get her way. If Ulster is right to revolt why should Surrey, Sussex, and Kent, which return an almost unbroken Conserva- tive majority to the House of Commons, obey a Liberal Government ? And why should Wales, and, indeed, the majority of the people of Ireland, obey a Conservative Govern- ment if, and when, it returns to power ? The theory is surely capable of many applications, and, according to the Spectator, all such demonstrations against the sovereign law of Parlia- ment may be justified if one half of the people of Ulster are right to resist Home Rule.
The Home Counties would, indeed, have a stronger case for resistance, for they return very few Liberal members, whereas Ulster returns sixteen Nationalist members to seventeen Unionists. Is this majority of one seat to give Ulster the right to determine its own form of government in direct defiance of the Imperial Parliament and the rest of Ireland ? Are the Protestants of Ulster to be allowed to force on the minority of Ulster, which is almost a half of the whole province, a form of government that is detestable to them? This form of government is detestable to the minority in Ulster, and the rest of Ireland at present, and are the views of three quarters of the people of Ireland not to be taken into account because they are Roman Catholics ? There are Protestant Home Rulers in Ulster. If Home Rule- were defeated do you not think that, according to your own argument, the majority of the people of Ireland would be absolutely right in setting up their own form of government ? It seems to me that in your zeal for Ulster you are preaching a political doctrine that would reduce any country to anarchy.
I would like to ask another question. If Ulster refuses to obey the new Irish Parliament who will be the loser but Ulster P There is no law that compels any member once elected to sit in the House of Commons. Either he or his constituency can, if they like, disenfranchise themselves. Do you really suppose that the King's troops would be called out to force Ulster members to sit in the Dublin Parliament ? But the malcontents will set up a provisional
government, you say, with the approval and assistance of the Spectator i gather. What then? Do you suppose that the Government is so simple that they have not foreseen this possibility ? If Ulster does so the acts of their provisional Parliament will have no effect. Its laws will be still-born and the King's writ will still run in Ireland. If the Pro- testants of Ulster refuse to pay taxes they can only refuse as far as 25 per cent, of the taxation goes. They cannot refuse to pay on whisky and tea and coffee, and it would be quite open to the Irish Parliament to abolish direct taxation altogether so as to defeat the non-payment of direct taxation. But to whom will the Ulstermen refuse to pay taxes ? To the Imperial authorities and not to the Dublin Parliament. Why should the Ulster Protestants refuse to pay taxes in this case ? If Ulster goes in for passive resistance no one but Ulster will be one bit the worse. If she goes in for armed resistance the case will be different. You would surely admit that no Government could. allow the beads of the minority in any province in the British Empire to be split by their neighbours. The Catholics will not lift a hand against the Protestants in Ulster. Do you really then defend an uprising on the part of the majority of Ulster, who, I gather, are well armed, to force the minority to obey a pro- visional government which is in open rebellion against King and Parliament ? Surely it would be more in consonance with the dignity of the Spectator if, instead of supporting the threat of mob rule in Ulster, it advised the Ulster Protestants to do their part as good citizens and obey the law of the land if Home Rule be placed on the Statute Book.—I am, Sir, &c.,
A LIBERAL READER.
P.S.—Since this letter was written the threat of mob law in Ulster has taken effect in cowardly assaults on Catholic workmen in the shipyards of Belfast. Is this the civil war with which the Conservative Press threatens the Government in Ulster ? The Opposition cheered these exploits in the House ; but does the Spectator think that the bludgeoning of Home Rule workmen is a good argument against a change in the present system of government in Ireland? Would it not be the first to demand the use of troops to protect the right of free labour if such outrages occurred in London or in any other city? If I am not mistaken this is just what the Spectator has been demanding for the protection of labour at the London docks.
[If our correspondent had taken the trouble to read the Spectator during the past six months he would have found every one of his points dealt with, and most of them several times over. We have always been careful to confine our argu- ment to those portions of Ulster in which there is a local majority in favour of the Union. His Surrey and Kent analogies are worthless. The proposal is, not to let Ulster set up a separate government, but to refrain from forcing her out of the Legislative Union against her will. That is an act of tyranny which she has a right to resist. North-East Ulster does not propose to prevent by force of arms the assembly of a Dublin Parliament, but to resist being forced under that Parliament. With the difference between domestic legislation and legislation changing the status of the citizen and his
rights in the Union we have already dealt at length. We strongly object to attacks on Roman Catholic workmen by Unionists and also to attacks by Hibernians on defenceless schoolchildren whose only crime was carrying the Union Jack. Since such faction fights would be enormously increased by the abrogation of the Union we are opposed to Home
ED. Spectator.]
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