The Sun.
London, England, 1869-05-10 00:00:00

SPIBIT OF T:

JOURNALS.

The Times remarks that numerous anti arrodous as-the
•ecent outrages have been, it has yet to be convinced that
,ife and property in Ireland are by any means as insecuro
as in 1844-8. At the same time, it should freely be
acknowledged that a deplorable reaction has set in within
the last two or three years, and that Lord Russell's in-
ferences from statistics which end with 1866 must be taken
with considerable modification. Nor should it be disguised
that, with or without adequate justification in fact, an
,xtraordinary alarm has possessed Irish landowners and
enants of the better class. This, in itself, is a very grave
.vil. It is possible that Ireland, like patients under treat-
ment for diseases of long standing, must be worse before she
s better ; it is possible that, before the land question is
ettled, revolutionary solutions may be propounded with
hreats and violence. All this proves nothing, except
hat beneficent legislation must be tempered with index.
ale firmness in administration. We have always regretted
le release of the Fenian prisoners, not only because they
re capable of much practical mischief, but because such
I act done at such a time inevitably brought upon the
overnment a suspicion of weakness. A few months ago
enianism appeared to be at least dormant, but it already
ehibits renewed activity, and may need to be crushed
gain. What is now wanted, especially as the Habeas
'orpus Act is no longer suspended, is a resolute
ssertion of the supremacy of law. We cannot
ut down Ribandism as Russia would put down
ach an association in Poland, or, perhaps, as we
ut down the Thugs in India, but we can make its
missaries feel that no lapse of time will ever screen them
rom detection, and that no mercy will ever be extended
o them. It was long ago pointed out by Sir Robert Peel
hat, for detective purposes, the Irish police force is ill-
rganised. Let this be remedied without delay, and let
to shortsighted forbearance be exhibited towards any one
zho may abuse his influence, as a priest or otherwise, to
helter assassins from punishment. We have undertaken
Ireland the arduous, though not hopeless, task of over-
oming evil with good, but order is the first condition of
ational well-being, and it is the paramount duty of every
overnment to enforce it, cost what it may.
The Herald cannot think that the Radicals have very
I,rong reasons to be proud of their handiwork. We shall
et the Irish Church Bill, if ever we get it at all, at the
ost of two wasted sessions, and what value will it repre-
?nt either to Ireland or the empire? Are we one inch
tearer the pacification of Ireland now that " the act of
justice " has passed its crucial stage ? Would it not be
ruer to say that we are farther off than ever, and that as
he bill has progressed disaffection has increased? Of
.ourse we do not charge it upon the bill that Fenianism
;as become more violent, and agrarian crime more
requent and atrocious, but we have a right to remind
hose who have pressed forward and supported this
neasure as the panacea for all the ills which afflict Ireland
.hat the present state of things is infinitely worse than

.vhen they began their attempt at a cure. They are fully

aware that they have succeeded in alienating the affec-
tions of the Irish Protestants, but can they affirm that
they are a single step nearer winning the goodwill and
confidence of the people ? Is not Ireland less peaceable
and less contented now than it was before they began
their work of pacification? Is not the progress of the
Irish Church Bill associated, even from the mere chrono-
logical point of view, with the growth of discontent and
disorder? This is hardly the kind of result which should
justify the exuberant felicitations of last Friday.
The Standard thinks that the Irish Church Bill has
been very little altered in its passage through committee.
go material amendment has been accepted by the Govern-
ment or adopted by the House, and such differences as
may be found between the original and the present edition
of the measure are, for the most part, verbal and trivial
ones. The bill as amended in committee is the same
measure of sweeping spoliation and cruel injustice which
Mr. Gladstone introduced on the Ist of March with such
vehement protestations of his desire to accept any modifi-
cations consistent with the principle of disestablishment
which might be suggested on behalf of the Church.
There can be, therefore, no division of opinion, and no
hesitation as to the course which Conservatives
and Churchmen must take with regard to this
bill. Had the fair and equitable proposals of Mr.
Disraeli for facilitating the transition of the Irish Church
from an establishment to a voluntary body, and for sup-
plying it with the means of providing for the teaching of
the Protestant faith in those parts of the country in which
the Protestant inhabitants are unable to provide teachers
for themselves, been accepted, the House of Lords might
possibly have been induced, regarding the adoptian of
these amendments as evidence of the sincerity of the pro-
fessions made by the Government of its desire to settle
the question justly and generously, to assent to the prin-
ciple of the bill ; but the bill, as it will reach their lordships,
is one of unqualified spoliation and unmitigated injustice.
The moment is critical no doubt, and the question is grave,
but we have yet to learn that the Peers have no higher
functions than to register the decisions of a House of
Commons in which Mr. Gladstone and his colleagues
obtained a majority by the solemn pledges to treat the
Irish Church with justice and generosity, which, under
some " deleterious influence," they have flagrantly
violated.

The Telegraph says that instead of waiting until he
should be abolished by Act of Parliament, the Mayor of
Cork has abolished himself. He has, we hear, placed his
resignation in the hands of Mr. Maguire and The
O'Donoghue, and when the Bill of Pains and Penalties
shall come before the House of Commons on Tuesday, those
gentlemen will doubtless suggest that the act of official
suicide has removed all need for the second reading of the
measure. But for the moment, at least, that inference
would be premature. No one would wish to
proceed with a Bill of Pains and Penalties if the
measure could be safely set aside. If, with all the
facts before it, the Government saw that Mr.
O'Sullivan had really and definitively ceased to be Mayor
of Cork, with no view to relection, the idea of legislation
might stand over for a time. But, even if the bill should
be withdrawn, the matter cannot be allowed to end there.
The Mayor of Cork has broken the law ; he has been
guilty of sedition ; and for that offence he should still be
called to account before the courts of justice. Should
the resignation turn out to be real, it will remain for the
Crown to consider how best Mr. O'Sullivan can be called
to account for his words. We do not want to make
a martyr of him ; but his fate ought to teach
a lesson to loose-tongued men. If he has resigned,
he has ceased to be a public scandal ; but the
mere loss of his mayoralty may seem in Ireland a
penalty so light as to encourage other wild geese to babble
as freely and as offensively. We have therefore to con-
sider, not how any feeling of wrath may be directed against
a poor creature unworthy of Imperial notice in himself,
but how far misplaced lenity may mislead other Irishmen
into similar offences. Should Mr. O'Sullivan have made
the unqualified resignation which we have been led to
expect, the act might afford time for reconsidering the
whole subject with more deliberation. But at the outset,
before the Government can think of lenity, the House of
Commons must have directly before it Mr. O'Sullivan's
unconditional submission.

The Daily News declares that the question involved
in the O'Sullivan Disability Bill is essentially a parlia-
mentary one. The Government does not propose to act
of itself and by its own authority ; it calls upon the par.
liament to use its legislative power. It will, therefore, be
for the House of Commons on Tuesday, putting aside con-
siderations of party character, forgetting that there is in
it any such thing as a Liberal majority or a Conservative
minority, and keeping in mind only its historic character,
and its relation to the other institutions which make np
the complex machinery of British government, to deter-
mine on the course which it shall pursue. Every
individual in the United Kingdom who holds, or
may hold, the office of Mayor in any Corporation
in the United Kingdom, and every such Corporation,
is as much, though not as directly, interested in the
O'Sullivan Disability Bill as the Mayor and Corporation
of Cork. The omnipotence of Parliament, and the claims
of a paramount and overwhelmingnecessity, may be urged
against the objectors to the bill. But the allegation of
necessity, and the assertion of power, are both tyrant's
pleas. The Government itself must be anxious that they
should not be lightly admitted ; and the House of Com.
mons is bound to consider carefully the attitude in which
the measure it is asked to pass will place it towards the
people and the local institutions of the kingdom. In a
free country, where local self-government exists, the most
embarrassing questions which can arise often spring from
the relations of central to municipal authority. On this
head we have warning from Switzerland and the United
States.

The Post says that it had occasion a short time since to
allude to the evident bent of American policy of late
years towards identifying the union with the entire of the
continent of North America. No one can doubt that the
people of the United States are desirous of giving prat
tical effect to the Monroe doctrine, of America for the
Americans—that is to say, for the citizens of the Union; and
the only question is, whether, either now or at some not
distant period, those who wield the Executive power in
the United States will attempt to realise the scheme.
Grant is a soldier, and, it is said, is ambitious cf gaining
additional laurels. We can, however, only judge him ar
we findlihe, and it must be admitted that he he'4 yet
done anythieg to lead us to con el ode that he int,:
Bo bold a step. As we cannot believe that the niericar
President contemplates—more especially in tie present
condition of affairs in America— such a war as au ulti
matum of that kind would involve, we are sanguine in the
hope that, however unusual may be the language used it
the American Senate, or however equivocal the conduct
of the Executive in connection with the rescission of the
Alabama Convention, no intention exists of provoking
England to war. It must be observed that the mon
respectable section of the New York press spoke in con
lemnation of Senators Sumner and Chandler, and did ut
the justice of believing that we would be incapable ce
resigning,, without a bitter struggle., any portion of Ow
vosseesions at the dictation of a forentnTower.