Lord Hartington made a very masterly speech at Hudders- field
on Monday, in which he pressed home the argument that when household suffrage was given to Ireland in a shape which greatly over-represented the numerical majority of Irishmen, and greatly under-represented the very large minority, English statesmen bad declared that the danger, if it took any practical form, would be averted by the ample pro- tection which the representatives of England and Scotland would afford to the representatives of the Irish minority. That promise involved, said Lord Hartington, a very grave respon- sibility, and it is now the absolute duty of Englishmen and Scotchmen to see that that promise is kept. If Home-rule were to have been given to Ireland at all, it ought to have been given twenty years ago, before the Parliament at Westminster began its work of disestablishing the Church, reforming the Land Laws, and in various ways reducing the political power of the minority and enhancing that of the majority. But now that the work of removing Irish grievances had been under- taken by the Imperial Parliament, it should complete its work, and not band over to a local Parliament a duty of which it had formally undertaken the responsibility, more especially as it could not trust such a local Parliament to do equal justice between the different sections of the people.
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