The Sun.
London, England, 1866-11-01 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TIMES.—The want of statesmanship and construc-
tive ability has often been imputed to Mr. Bright.
He has himself, at least on one memorable occasion,
disclaimed the name of " statesman," and expressed
a doubt whether a pure ambition would aspire to it.
Perhaps he is conscious that a power of denouncing
political evils effectively is seldom combined with
the gift of anticipating or removing them by wise
counsels, and deliberately prefers assured success as
an agitator to the uncertain prospect of a more
enduring fame. In accepting an invitation from
Ireland, however, he has taken upon himself for the
first time the part which he professes to decline. If
his visit has any meaning at all, it is a pledge that
he and those who follow him will act together with
the Irish Liberals in devising such measures " as to
bring about in Ireland contentment and tranquillity,
and a solid union between Ireland and Great Bri-
tain." His speech illustrates, possibly even more
than Mr. Bright himself would desire, the wide dif-
ference between a flagrant case and one which has
to be made out, between actual grievances deep in
history and in the heart of millions, and grievances
of an almost purely speculative character. We have
often had to remark that the great difficulty of the
Reform question is the want of practical reasons for
Reform. We ask, and get no answer to the ques-
tion, what there is a Reformed Parliament would do
which this leaves undone, and what are the particu-
lar evils so great that they can only be remedied by
running the risk of revolution ? We admit the in-
strument of legislation to be full of defects and
roughly made, but so long as it does its work—which
is hardly disputed—we doubt the wisdom of throw-
ing it aside for a more showy and ingenious machine.
It is this very deficiency in the argument which
Mr. Bright finds exchanged for superabundance
when he touches Irish soil. There he finds, and
describes as he can describe, land the property
of a few, the people without an interest in the
soil, the Church of a fractional minority, an an-
cient faith converted into a badge of subjection,
famines, and emigrations far beyond the example
of modern times—evils all culminating, and threat-
ening long to endure, in a fierce national resent-
ment transplanted to American soil, and full of
danger to our colonies and even ourselves. The
question which Mr. Bright proposes to himself is
that raised by the so-called Parliament of Kilkenny
in the reign of Edward IV. " How comes it to pass
that the King is never the richer for Ireland?" The
statute passed by this very assembly is quite enough
to show how incompent they were to entertain it.
The policy which divided Ireland into two nations,
and ultimately governed the one through—that is,
by the " ascendancy" of the other," may be said to
date from that period. The " English' were for-
bidden to intermarry with the " Irish," to use Irish
names, Irish costume, or Irish fashions, or even to
let Irish cattle graze cm their lauds ; ani although
Mr. Bright's humorous construction of this last
clause is scarcely justified by history, which tells
us that a principal object of the whole statute was
to prevent the English settlers from degenerating
into Irish barbarism, it still typifies an inveterate
antagonism of race, which, combined with religious
animosity, has been the curse of Ireland. Moreover,
in Ireland, as Mr. Bright observes, " the landowner
is the creature of conquest—not of conquest 800
years ago, but of conquest completed only 200 years
ago," the memory of which is still treasured up in
tradition. Add to this the imposition of a Protes-
tant Church Establishment upon a Catholic popu-
lation, the penal statutes, and all the other sins of
English rule in Ireland committed by our forefathers,
but visited upon us, and we have quite enough to
account for " a general sense of wrong," outlasting
its cause by many generations. At the same time, we
cannot flatter our Irish fellow-subjects by dismiss-
ing the idea of " some radical defect in the Irish
character" quite so easily as their guest. All races
do not possess the same virtues, and no disrespect
is shown towards Irish character in maintaining that
its genius is not political. The Government of Ire-
land by its own chiefs before the English conquest
was nothing but an organised anarchy, and modern
experience, of which Fenianism in America affords
the latest example, makes it impossible for us to
share Mr. Bright's conviction that the misery and
discontent of the Irish people " come, not from their
race, but from their history and the conditions to
which they have been subjected." It may be quite
true that, on the whole, " there is a remarkable
absence of crime in Ireland," but, as Mr. Bright
admits, there have been too often perpetrated, at
the bidding of secret societies, " offences of appal-
ling guilt in the eyes of the whole world," though
not, it is to be feared, in those of the Irish peasantry.
The agrarian murders, countenanced and concealed
as they are by a large crass of the people, are proofs
of a lawless spirit, which may have been aggravated
by pure oppression, but of which the root lies far
deeper. It would be most unjust on the one hand,
to assert that Ireland is ungovernable, because,
having been misgoverned for many ages, it is almost
impossible to govern now. It would be foolish, on
the other, to shut our eyes to the difficulties, partly
indeed resulting from soil and climate, but partly
also from the national temperament, which a most
enlightened Government might have failed to over-
come. In considering " what is the matter with a
country," Mr. Bright specifies two main grievances
—the Church and the land, Without seeking to
exaggerate the magnitude of the former, he observes
that "it is often the galling of the collar that is
more tormenting than the weight of it." Into his
comments upon this subject we need not follow him,
since few Conservatives would venture with Sir
Hugh Cairns to defend the Irish Church upon
principle, and all Liberals would agree with Mr.
Bright that whatever be done, vested interests
must be duly respected. " The land" opens out
far more intractable problems. There is some
truth in the statement that in Ireland we
have had " the country gentleman in all his
power," and that an almost exclusive regard to
the prejudices of the Protestant landed interest long
prevailed in Parliament. To allege, however, that
emigration is chiefly due to the tyranny of this class,
or that evictions have driven many thousands of
families across the Atlantic, is grossly to misrepre-
sent the case. The simple reason why so many
Irishmen emigrate is that wages in Ireland are too
low to support them in decency, while their relatives
in America are living in comfort and even luxury.
Wages are low because Ireland, a purely agricul-
tural country, is over-stocked with labourers, and
they never will or can be raised except by a reduc-
tion of population, or an influx of capital for the im-
provement of the land and the development of manu-
factures. It is no fault of "the class that rules" that
the supply of Irish labour is in excess of the demand
for it. Even an Irish Republic could not reverse the
economical laws of nature, and had such a Govern-
ment been established 50 years ago the hopes of the
Irish peasant, desirous of bettering himself, would
still have turned " towards the setting sun." Mr.
Bright, however, believes that, desperate as the
condition of Ireland is, " there is a certain remedy
for it." The two measures he suggests are the ex-
tinction of the Irish Church endowment, saving, of
course, the existing recipients ; and the purchase by
the Government of Irish estates possessed by Eng-
lish landowners, in order to their division and re-
distribution by sale. We will not at present discuss
either the justice or the policy of these measures ' •
we will suggest only a few practical difficulties. As
to the Church, would Mr. Bright abolish all endow-
ment in money as well as land ? How would he deal
with the numerous endowments of other religious
bodies, and the endowments for education on reli-
gious principles ? To whom should the land, or the
tithe rent charge, or the Consols revert ? What is
to be done with the property or the money ? It is
almost needless to ask whether he would allow
any endowments for the future. His proposition
for dealing with the large Irish estates in the
hands of English landowners is even more sug-
gestive of problems. 'What constitutes au " ab-
sentee," and beyond what amount is the posses-
sion of Irish land to be forbidden to English land-
owners ? What is to be done with the purchase
money ? It will, we presume, be handed over to
the trustees under settlement. In the interest of
the numerous class of Englishmen and Scotchmen
who are not landowners, and who do not wish to
see land enhanced to an impossible price, we protest
against the purchase money being reinvested on the
soil of this island. Then under what regulations is
the land of the " absentee" to be divided, sold, held,
and occupied ? For example, may an Englishman
purchase a lot, lay it down in grass, build a house
upon it, and come and go as he does in this country ?
May the purchaser of a lot sell it again, and may
the land sold under this measure be capable of ac-
cumulation, like other land? May a man buy all
the property of an absentee, turn out all human
beings upon it, and substitute deer? If a man elects
to reside in Ireland, what quantity of English or
Scotch land may he possess ? Some of these ques-
tions must present themselves on the very threshold
of the discussion of the proposed measure ; AMC of
them can be avoided altogether, and until something
like an answer can be given to them we shall doubt
whether Mr. Bright has advanced his reputation by
his first essay in constructive statesmanship. Vague
denunciation is much more easy.