THE CONDITION OF IRELAND.
I N the preceding article we have confined ourselves to the principles upon which alone Home Rule can reason- ably be granted to Ireland. But the terrifying prevalence of crime in Ireland to-day is really a more important subject, because the restoration of order is a condition precedent to the grant of any conceivable form of Home Rule. There save been changes of men and changes of plan in the government of Ireland, but things have gone from very bad to even worse, and the Sinn Fein scheme for exte-rmin- sting the Irish Constabulary has now reached such a point that six policemen have been murdered within two days. Mr. Bonar Law has stated in the House of Commons that Sir Nevil Macre-ady has made fresh plans for checking murder, arson, and terrorism, and that the Cabinet have approved of these plans without reserve. There seems to be a dual policy of more conciliation where conciliation may fairly, or at least plausibly; be expected to do no harm, and more firmness in matters where firmness is essential. Thus Su Hamar Greenwood is evidently relaxing the practices of military visits to the houses of suspected persons and the impnsonment of suspected persons without trial ; but for the outcome of Sir -Nevil Macready's plan of campaign we have still to wait.
As we have been saying for months, the essential thing is that the police and the troops should be co-ordinated. We are glad to see that the word "co-ordination " is now very much in the air and in the mouths of Ministers. It is frequently a vague and stupefying word, but nevertheless it represents the only right line of action, and we sincerely hope that it will be practically applied in Ireland at once. There is no good in beating about the bush. There is war in Ireland. And if the troops are n.ot used to protect innocent lives and legally held property, neither lives nor property will ever be safe. It is no answer to say that it is not the duty of soldiers "to do the work of policemen," and that they must not help to put down. murder and to stop the burning of police barracks unless they are "called in" by the police. When they are "called in" by the police it is always too late. The Government will have the support of every rational and law-abiding person if they absolutely refuse to stand on a punctilio, and if they declare that unprecedented crimes must be met by exceptional means. They will even have thousands of so-called Sinn Feiners behind them because, though the Terror prevents Irishmen from saying what they think and feel, prosperous Irish farmers, as !I matter of fact, de not want to be ruined, and all the Irish towns and the Irish countryside are longing to be relieved from the burden ot disorder, misery, and intimidation which is at present crushing the life out of the whole population..
Elsewhere in connexion with a remarkable Jewish pam- phlet we have written a good deal about conspiracy, and the rumours and suspicions of conspiracy which make men mad. The only conspiracy which we know to be in actual and active existence at the present rqoment is the con- spiracy in Ireland. There is unfortunately no doubt about . that. The Irish Republican Brotherhood is a secret society which hopes to reach its ends by wading through blood. It would- be a good thing if some of the leaders of Labour could distinguish between real and alleged con- spiracies. If we lived in a rational world, we might have hoped for the support of a Labour newspaper like the Daily Herald against a. system of assassination in Ireland which is comparable with the Jacobin Terror of the French Revo- lution. But as readers of that organ of British Labour know, we look in vain for help. The victims of masked and false-nosed bands of roaming criminals in Ireland also look in vain for any word of sympathy or any promise of succour. What the Daily Herald prefers to do is to write a great deal about an alleged conspiracy on the part of the Government to exterminate Russian Bolshevism by using the Poles. In the opinion of the Daily Herald, it apparently does not matter very much that women and children should lie awake night after night in Ireland listening for the fatal knock on the front-door of a gang of assassins, but it does matter very much that any impediment should be placed in the way of the cold-blooded theorists who have come to the conclusion that working men must be placed in a poei- tion of compulsory servitude to the State. It is significant that such writers in such times as these should have con- spiracy on the brain, and refuse to open their eyes to the only real conspiracy. According to these people, it is right and natural that firearms should be freely at the dis- posal of Russian Bolsheviks and Germans and Sinn Fein.ers, but wholly wrong and unnatural that they should be at the disposal of Poles or the law-abiding inhabitants of Belfast.
Ireland is the only country in the world in which open sedition against the State is treated very leniently. In Russia the sedition-mongers are shot; in the United States they get long terms of penal servitude or are locked up without trial ; in France their organizations are prose- cuted and may be abolished. An Irish correspondent informs us that it is commonly believed that certain Sinn Feiners who were found mysteriously murdered near Thurles were murdered by the police. He adds that whether this belief be true or not, there is some evidence that a counter-offensive against the Sinn Feiners is taking shape in the Thurles district. He suggests that if the latest murder of a policeman near Thurles should be fol- lowed by the removal of another Shin Feiner, the evidence of a counter-offensive would become distinctly credible. Another Irish correspondent informs us of a rumour that Dr ,Mannbr, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Melbourne, Australia, who recently resigned, is to be made a Cardinal and appointed to Ireland. Archbishop Mannix has un- measingly provoked anti-British and pro-Sinn Fein senti- ments in Australia.
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