PARNELLISM AND CRIME.
THERE have been few more passionate episodes in Parlia- ment than the two last nights' debate on the second reading of the Criminal Law (Ireland) Amendment Bill. On the first night, Colonel Saunderson had to face the wildest excitement when he stated,—in one or two instances without sufficient accuracy,—the case for his belief that the National League has inherited the connection of the Land League with Irish and American-Irish violence and crime. Yet after the suspension of Ur. Healy, who was not one of the persons whom Colonel Saunderson had attacked, and an equally violent scene with Mr. Sexton, who was, Colonel Saunderson Bo concluded his amended indictment of the National League as to leave on the minds of a great number of the Members of the House of Commons a very deep conviction that, both inside Ireland and outside, the National League has availed itself freely of un- lawful alliances, and has recruited its funds from resources which would not have been available except to men who tampered with ruffianism, and who dared not disavow it. To our minds, however, nothing in Colonel Saunderson's speech seemed more impressive than the permission he had received to reveal the names of two men whose cruel treatment had been confided to the Land Commission, but confided to that Commission without authority for the publication of their names. Colonel Saunder- son declared,—and this represents, we believe, what is equally true fora great many different parts of Ireland,—that the mere proof of resolution which the Government had given by intro- ducing this Criminal Law Amendment Bill, had so revived the failing courage of the friends of law and order in Ireland, that they are able to face the prospect of fighting out their battle with the intimidators, though only a few months ago, while they feared that they should be abandoned to their fate, they did not venture to identify themselves with a law which they believed to be incapable of protecting them. To our minds, that revival of hope in the breasts of those who are on the side of order, is an even better augury of hope, than the fury of the little band who see in this amendment of the Criminal Law the death-warrant of their own agitation. Both symptoms are encouraging; but the return of courage to the breasts of those who wish the law to prevail, has a greater promise in it than the access of anger in the hearts of those who are deter- mined, as Mr. Redmond so candidly avowed on Thursday week, to make the British government " impossible " in Ireland, and who see that their chance of doing so is on the wane.
After the wild scene of Saturday morning, there came the publication in Monday's Times of the alleged letter from Mr. Parnell to some correspondent unnamed, in which the writer apologised for his manifesto against the assassins of 1882, as an evidently necessary act of policy, and while regretting the incident of Lord Frederick Cavendish's murder, declared that Mr. Burke had got his deserts. When the debate was resumed on Monday night, this letter was denounced as a barefaced forgery by Mr. Sexton and Mr. Parnell, Mr. Sexton making the greatest possible effort to show that the Irish leaders had had no sort of connection with the advocates of assassination, though he did not and could not prove that in receiving the liberel assistance they did receive from Patrick Ford, of the World, and in consorting, as some of them undoubtedly did consort, with Mr. P. Egan, Mr. Finerty, and others of the same stamp, they had hesitated to iecur obligations to the advocates of dynamite ani the peignard. Of course, it has not been proved that any of the leaders of the National League themselves sanctioned expedien's of this ctuel and cowardly character. Era slip of course, ,t is se certain as it well can be that they h sve aceepted help freely from those
who do, and have expressed no kind of indignation at the doctrines of their allies. Lord Hartington forced this home upon them with irresistible force, and made the House of Commons see that the predominance in Ireland of chiefs of the National League who interfere with the free sale of tenant.. right sanctioned by the Irish Land Act, as much as they inter- fere with the payment of judicial rents sanctioned by the same Act, is intended to be inconsistent, and is, in fact, radically inconsistent with the peaceable government of Ireland under the present system. Indeed, Mr. Plunket in his effective speech of Friday week quoted the triumphant and ostentatious boast of the Nationalist leaders that the decrees of the present Government "are literally danced upon by the Irish people ; their proclamations from Dublin Castle are treated as waste- paper." Mr. William O'Brien's declaration that the flag of Campaign "floats over all the land ;" "it is our enemies who are broken and beaten ; from shore to shore of this island, the law of the League is the law of the land," was also pro- duced by Ur. Pluuket, but without making more impression on Mr. Gladstone and his followers than so much idle wind. Yet what evidence could be more to the purpose than the triumphant boast of the leaders of the League, that whenever the law of the League comes into collision with the law of the land, it is the law of the League which triumphs, the law of the land which succumbs? Mr. Parnell himself did not venture to deny that boast. It suits him at present to pose as deserving the certificate of character which Mr. Gladstone, in his strange speech, awarded to him,—in the Times' report, not only Mr. Parnell, but "his friends" are apparently more or less included in the certificate,—as having never since 1881 shown in his words or acts a disposition unfavourable to law and order. But none the less Mr. Parnell certainly did not venture, and has never ventured, to utter any stern reproof of those acts unfavour- able to law and order of which his lieutenants, both in the House and out of it, openly assume the responsibility. Does Mr. Gladstone really mean to say that Mr. Redmond, in describing his belief that his party are bound to make the present government of Ireland "impossible," and Mr. Dillon in devising and pushing through the "Plan of Campaign," and in inciting the Irish people to rebel against the provisions of this new Crimes Bill, if they should become law, have shown no disposition unfavourable to law and order ? Or does he only mean that Mr. Parnell does not openly countersign these violent counsels Is he not aware that Mr. Dillon told his audience at Enniscorthy on January 15th that while it was politic for Mr. Parnell to abstain from taking any active part in the operations of the autumn, Mr. Parnell was working as hard as ever for Ireland, and was as much entitled as ever to their hearty loyalty ?—front which, of course, they inferred, and were meant to infer, that Mr. Parnell heartily approved Mr.Dillon's "Plan of Campaign." And is it not patent to all the world that for Mr. Parnell to sit mute, while Mr. Redmond and Mr. Dillon tell the world frankly what they are about, is to give them that tacit sanction which it does not need the quickness of an Irish population to interpret into the warmest approval ? The House of Commons evidently per- fectly understands this constructive approval by Mr. Parnell of the party of violence, and does not understand the singularly ambiguous testimony to his loyalty by Mr. Gladstone. The result is the strong majority of 101 by which the House passed a Bill intended to strike at the illegal action of the National League, and to restore order in Ireland. We have never read anything with deeper regret than Mr. Oladstone's certificate to the law-abiding character of Mr. Parnell, in the face of all the testimony which the debate had given,—testimony absolutely final,—that the newspaper in which Mr. Parnell has so large a share, has, in conjunction with many of his chief lieutenants, been actively engaged not only during many years, but during this, the latest and most bitter of the Irish campaigns, in threatening j tries, plundering landlords, and terrorising tenants.
Mr. Parnell's own speech, which closed the debate, was not one of much moment, and unless it be followed by the prosecu- tion of the Times for a criminal libel of the very gravest character, will carry no weight at all with the country. It commenced with a burst of wrath, which does not read very genuine, against Mr. B dieter for not giving way to him,—a deficiency In good feeling which Mr. Parnell declared worse than any action of Renck Ford's, that open advocate of dyna- mite and assassination. The world will certainly infer from this that Mr. Parnell regard- Patrick Ford's criminal under- takin;s as, at the worst, a breach of good manners. We ven- ture to cdl Mr. Parnell's wrath simalated, because we do not believe that he could have regarded Mr. Balfour's course in
replying to Mr. Gladstone as in any way intentionally unfair to himself; nor is there even a rumour that the report of his speech suffered from the hour at which it was delivered. His heat in describing the letter attributed to him by the Times, was, of course, to be expected, though why he spent so much of his eloquence in showing how grievously the Phcenix Park murders had injured his cause,—which everybody will admit,— and spent none of it in showing that his denunciation of the crime could not hare been resented by the violent men from whom he had derived so much pecuniary aid for his cause, we cannot imagine. The letter, which he declares to be a barefaced forgery, did not, even if it were a forgery, indicate any wish to suggest Mr. Parnell's complicity in the crime, but only to sug- gest a consciousness that his severe denunciation of the crime wouldendanger his influence, if not his person. The forger of such a letter, if it were forged, must have been well aware that Mr. Parnell's position was greatly injured and shaken by the shocking crime which had been committed, and he must have aimed at conveying by his forgery only that Mr. Parnell trembled for the consequences of his denunciatory words. It was for Mr. Parnell to show that he had no reason to tremble, and he was not wise in labouring so hard to prove that the murders themselves were a terrible blow to his influence. That was known to all the world. What the House of Commons wished to know was that Mr. Parnell had no need to apologise to some of his supporters for the indignant language in which he denounced the assassins to the world at large. He owes it to his cause to raise the issue formally before a Court of Law ; for nothing is more certain than that his success would greatly advance his cause, and that the Times could only secure an acquittal by making out a very strong case for the authenticity of the letter in dispute. The onus probundi would lie on the Times. Mr. Parnell would only have to criticise and break dawn the leading journal's defence of itself. We hold that the great majority which the Government obtained for the second reading of their Bill,—a majority greater by 12 than the majority which they gained for "urgency." though a greater number of Conservatives and Liberal Unionists were absent than of Gladstenians and Parnellites put together,—was due to the growth of conviction in the House of Commons during the debate, first, that the National League and its leaders are moving earth and heaven to render the British government " impassible " in Ireland ; and next, that the Criminal Law Amendment Bill is a mild Bill, not intended to create new offences, but only to amend the law so as to render it possible to punish actual crimes, such as the agents of the National League habitually protect, if they do not instigate. The failure of this Bill would be the failure of the Unionist Government, and would bring with it, of course, the triumph of the party which is committed to the impossible task of devising a practicable plan for giving Ireland Home-rule without giving her independence, and with- out handing over Ireland bound hand and foot to the mercy of the National League.
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