The Sun.
London, England, 1866-11-03 00:00:00

" To JOHN BRIGHT, ESQ-, M.P.

" Sir,—We, the representatives of the working-classes of
Dublin, recognising in you, by your untiring advocacy of
Irish interests and Irish rights in the British House of Com-
mons, the faithful friend of oppressed humanity without
distinction of class or creed, avail ourselves of this pleasing
opportunity of publicly tendering to you before your depar-
ture from amongst us the characteristic gratitude of Irish-
men. We offer it at a peculiar time in our history, when
barely in the enjoyment of sufficient personal freedom to
enable us to place on record our friendly and affectionate
sentiment towards you, who throughout your distin-
guished career have been the foremost champion. of civil
and religious liberty, ever pleading with unrivalled genius
and power as a statesman for the enfranchisement of the
toiling millions. Actuated by motives pure as they are
patriotic, and not influenced by selfish or party ambition,
or even the hope of being benefited by privileges such
as you are now seeking for the working classes of your
own country, we are firmly assured that our feelings, how-
ever plainly expressed, will be regarded by you as the reflex
of honest hearts. Our warmly cherished recollection of your
able exertions and surpassing exposition of the wrongs of
our oppressed land, especially in the continued suspension
of the Habeas Corpus Act, when under discussion in the
Imperial Parliament, invites memories of other times, sug-
gesting those noble names that stand out as brilliant ex-
ceptions amongst Englishmen, some of whom became
" more Irish than the Irish themselves." In the upheav-
ings of the mighty multitudes pressing onward in England
.to the goal of their emancipation, we cannot fail to discern
kindred impulses which demand our sympathy ; though,
from the unhappy relations between the owners of the soil
and the people of this country, our aspirations inevitably
tend to a different destiny, and aim at the obtainment of a
native Legislature ; being hopeless of any substantial
remedy from the London Parliament for the numerous evils
springing from the misrule under which the land and the
artisan alike labour, and which, even by the illustrious
O'Connel, were never more truly depicted than they have
been by yourself. You have ever, in the philanthropy of
your noble and generous mind, duly appreciated the use-
fulness, intelligence, and worth in the social scale of the
downtrodden class we are proud to represent, from whose
ranks are daily recruited the strength and ability of hand
and brain by which society is upheld and dignified. And well
you deserve the enthusiastic greetings which you have met
with in your great journey through life wherever you have
lifted your potent voice amongst the sovereign people. In
conclusion, we are anxious to express a hope that you will
ere long, under more auspicious circumstances, revisit our
suffering but ever hospitable Ireland, when we may revive
the feelings of the present hour, and you can, as now, carry
back to the land of your birth and to our brother-workmen
the assurance that among the people who have clung with
uuparalleled tenacity to the faith, customs, and nationality
of their sires you have met with that hearty welcome and
warm friendship which Irishmen are over ready to accord
to a public benefactor, and which is expressed in their own
comprehensive phrase, ' Ccad mille failthe.'"

Mr. BRIGHT, who was loudly cheered, then ad-
dressed the meeting. lie said--Mr. Chairman and
Gentlemen,--When I came to your city I was asked
if I could attend a public meeting on the question
of Parliamentary R.Jorni. I answered that I was
not in good order for much speaking, for I have
suffered—as I am afraid you may find before I come ,
to the end of my observations--much from cold and
hoarseness ; but it was urged upon me that there
were at least some, and not an inconsiderable num-
ber, of the working men of this city who would be
glad if I would meet them, and it was proposed to
offer to me some address of friendship and of con-
fidence such as this which has been read. I have no
complaint to make of it but this—that whilst I Jo
not say it indicates too much kindness, yet that it
colours too highly the services, the small services,
which I have been able to render to any portion of
my countrymen. (Cries of "No.") Your country-
men are recognised generally as being a people of
great gratitude and of much enthusiasm, and there-:
fore I accept the address with all the kindness and
feeling of friendship with which it has been offered,
and I hope it will be, at least in some degree, a sti-
mulus
to me, in whatever position in life lam p laced,
to remember—as I have ever in past times remem-
bered—the claims of the people of this island to
complete and equal justice with all portions of the
United Kingdom. (Loud cheers.) Now, there may
be persons in this room—l should be surprised if
there were not—who doubt whether it is worth their
while even to hope for substantial justice, as this
address says, from a Parliamentary sitting in Lon-
don. (Loud cheers.) If there be such a man in this
meeting, let him understand that I am not the man
to condemn him—(e:ieers)—or to express surprise
at the opinion at which he has arrived; but I will
ask him, in return for this, that he will give me at
least for a few minutes a patient hearing, and he
will find that, whether justice may come from the
North or the South, from the East or from the
West—(several voices, •‘ From the West," and
cheers) —at any rate I stand as a friend to the
most complete justice to the population of this
island. (Cheers.) When discussing the question
of Parliamentary Reform I have often heard it
asserted that the people of Ireland—and I am not
speaking of those who arc hopeless of good from a
Parliament in London—that the people of Ireland
generally imagine that the question of Parliamen-
tary Reform has very little importance for them.
Now, I will undertake to say—and I think I can
make it clear to this meeting—that whatever be the
importance of, this question to any man in England
or Scotland, if the two islandsare to continue under
one Parliamentary Government, it is of more im-
portance to every Irishman. You know that the
Parliament of which I am a member contains 658
members, and of those 105 cross the Channel from
Ireland. When the 105 Irish members get across
the Channel, they meet—assuming that they all
assemble together-553 members who are returned
from Great Britain. Now, suppose that your 105
members were absolutely good and honourable re-
presentatives of the people of Ireland—l will not
say
whether Whigs or Tories, Radicals or Repealers,
but anythinn,
c,you like. Let any man suppose, for
instance, that all those members were exactly the
sort of members he would wish to go from Ireland.
When they arrive in London they meet with the
553 members who are
that Parliamentary
from Great Britain.
But suppose
rtnentary representative
is ta
system of Great Britain
vineryhbad ; that it repre-
few persons
sents but very
that those who appear to
be
represented
at great island, and
dis-
tributed in small boroughs are so and different
country, and in counties under - the parts of the
thumb and
finger of their landlords, it is quite clear that the
whole Parliament—less your 105
inen' who might
be very good men—the whole Parliament to legis-
late for the United Kingdom might stilla very
bad Parliament. (Cheers.) Therefore, if any man
imagines, and I should think that no man can itria-
ginethat they representation of thepeople of Ireland
is in a very good state ; still, unless the representa-
tion of Great Britain were equally good, you might
have 100 excellent members in Parliament at
Westminster, but the whole 658 might be a very
bad Parliament for the United Kingdom. (Cheers.)
•A member for a borough or county in Ireland, when
he gets to London votes for measures for the whole
kingdom ; and a member for Lancashire or War-
wickshire, or any other county or borough in Eng-
land, votes not.only for English measures, but also

for measures for Ireland, and therefore every part of
the United Kingdom. Every county, every borough,
every parish, every family, everybody, has a clear
and distinct and unalterable interest in aParliament
that should fairly and justly represent the whole
nation. (Loud cheers.) Now look for a moment at
two or three facts with regard to Ireland alone. I
have stated many facts with regard to England and
Scotland at recent meetings held across the Channel,
and now for two or three with regard to Ireland. In
Ireland you have five boroughs returning each one
member, the average number of electors in each
borough being only 172; then you have 13 boroughs
the average number of electors in each being 316;
Iyou have 9 other boroughs with an average number
of electors in each of 497. YOll have therefore 27
boroughs whose whole number of electors, if they
were all put together, is only 9,453, which gives an
average of 350 electors for each member. I might
tell you also that you have a single county with
nearly twice as many voters as the whole of those 27
boroughs. You have only 9,353 electors, and your
county of Cork has 16,177 electors, and that county
of Cork returns two members. But that is not the
worst of the case which happens in Great Britain and
in Ireland, wherever the borough constituencies are
so small. But it is almost impossible that they should
be independent. A very acute lawyer, for example,
in one of the boroughs, or a very active and influen-
tial clergyman, whether of your Church or of ours
—and when I say ours I do not mean mine, but I
mean the Church of England—or half a dozen men
combining together, or a little corruption occasioned
by a candidate going down with a well-filled purse,
may carry the representation of a small borough
either in England or in Ireland, and a free and real
representation of the people is hardly ever possible
in a borough of this very small size. (Hear.) But if
I were to compare your boroughs with your coun-
ties, just see how the matter stands. You have 39
borough members with 30,000 electors, and you have
64 county members with 172,000 electors, and there-
fore you see the representatives are so distributed
that the great population have not a quarter proba-
bly of the influence in Parliament that the small
boroughs have in their members. And here we come
to another question of great consequence. Not only
are these small boroughs altogether too small for
independence, but if we come to your large county
constituency we find, from the peculiar circum-
stances and relations existing between the voters
and the owners of land, that. there is scarcely any-
thing of freedom of election even
ifinthyeore wurcaos nuno-
ties. (Cheers.) I should suppose
compulsion of landowner or agent that in at least
three-quarters of this island the votes of the county
electors would be by a vast majority in favour of
Liberal candidates. (Cheers.) And when I speak
of Liberal candidates, I am not now speaking merely
of men who profess the sort of liberality which just
.enables them to go with their party, but I speak of
men who would be thoroughly in earnest in carry-
ing out, so far as they were able in Parliament, the
opinions which they were thought to represent by
the large constituencies which had elected them.
(Hear.) The question of the ballot in my opinion
is of the greatest importance in Great Britain and
in Ireland, but it is of more importance in the
counties than it is in the large boroughs. For example,
in Great Britain—take such boroughs as Edinburgh
and Glasgow, and Manchester and Birmingham, and
the metropolitan boroughs—there the number of
electors runs up from 10,000 to 25,000, and bribery
is of no avail where the numbers are so large, be-
cause you can't bribe thousands of men, and to bribe
only a hundred or two would not secure a return at
an election with so large a constituency. What you
want with the ballot is this. In cases where the
tenant farmers vote, and where there they live upon
their land without the security of a lease, or with-
out the security of any law to give them
the benefit of the improvements they have made upon
the land, they feel themselves always liable to injury,
and sometimes liable to ruin, if they get themselves
into a dispute with the agents or the landowners
with regard to the manner in which they have exer-
cised their franchise. (Cheers.) And what would
be very important also, if you had the ballot your
elections would be tranquil, without disorder, and
without riot. Last week or the week before there
was an election in one of your counties. (Several
voices "Tipperary.") Yes, in Tipperary. Well,
making every allowance that can be made for the
supposed exaggerations of the writers of the two
parties, it is quite clear to everybody • that the cir-
cumstances of that election—alas ! not absolutely
uncommon in Ireland—were still such as not to be
utterly discreditable to the representative system.
(Hear.) And you must bear in mind that there is
no people in the world that considers that it has a
fair representative system unless it has the ballot.
The ballot is universal almost in the United States
—(cheers)—it is almost universal in our colonies,
at any rate in the Australian colonies ; it is almost
universal ou the Continent of Europe ; and in that
new Parliament of North Germany which is about
to be assembled every male person of 25 years of age
is to be allowed to vote, and to vote by ballot.
(Loud and continued cheers.) Now, I hold, with-
out any fear of contradiction, that the intelligence
and the virtues of the people of Great Britain and
the people of Ireland are not represented in the Im-
perial Parliament. (Cheers.) You have your
wrongs to complain of, wrongs of centuries old, and
wrongs that long ago the people of Ireland, and I
venture to say further that the people of Great Bri-
tain united with Ireland— (cries of " Never," and
interruption)—l say that the people of Great Bri-
tain, acting with the people of Ireland in the fair
representation of the whole nation, would long, long
ago have remedied every just grievance of which
you complain. Now, I will take two questions
which 'treated upon the other evening at the dinner.
One of them is the question of the supremacy of the
Church in Ireland. Why, half the people of Eng-
land are Nonconformists. They are not in favour of
au Established Church anywhere, and it is certainly
impossible that they can be in favour of an Estab-
lished Church in an island like this—an Established
Church formed of a mere handful of the popula-
tion in opposition to the wishes of the whole
ntgaikaentdhbeyprincipality
people. (Loud cheers.)
Ilolyhead
of Wales. When you go to
lyeoaustrfuonurrioguhtt
otfhraovueghofthtbee populationprincipality of Wales are
• I suppose at
Dissenters, and they are not in favour of maintain-
ing the Protestant Establishment in Ireland. Take
the people of Scotland. They have seceded in such
large numbers from their Established Church--
although their Church
from hisof
favmt in sucheryidemocrat largecha-
racter—they.ic
numbers,
leave secededat I suppose those who have seceded are
t
a considerable majority of the whole population.
'Rey are not in favour of maintaining a Church
Establishment in Ireland in opposition to the views
of the great majority of your people. Take the other
question to which I referred—the question of the
Greatat
middle
en
aosfs,thoer
great town population,
land. There is nobody in
ulationso
of the great
of the still more numerous working class—none of
them have any sympathy with that condition of the
law and the administration of the law which have
worked such great mischiefs in your country but
that upper class, whether in England, Wales, or
Scotland. And that great middle class, and that
still greater working class,
why they are in the
position that you are in. Only 16 out of every 100
men have a vote, and those 16 are so arranged that,
in point of fact, when their representatives get to
Parliament they turn out for the most part to be
no real representatives at all. (Cheers, and a voice,
" That's Bob Lowe," and laughter.) Now, I will
tell you fairly that the people of Ireland have by far
the strongest interest in a thorough reform of the
Imperial Parliament, and I believe that you could
not do yourselves more complete justice than by
fairly acting with the generous millions of my coun-
trymen, in whose name I speak to you. (Cheers.)
You have on this platform to-night, I believe, two
members of the Reform League from London. I re-
ceived, I think yesterday, or
the day before, a tele-
gram from the Scottish Reform League Glasgow.
I am not sure whether there has been any account of
ci,trdinerthtbeaptalpelrnsig; presumehbturteladitif I
it was sent to me in
a men and un-
d the opportunity
-
of meeting any of the working
enfranchised men in this city. It is
president, James Smith, treasurer,
an.doGn:d by John girt,
rotary, of the Scottish Reform League, and
itJsaacheon,, sec-
The
Scottish Reform League requests you to convey
to the Re-

formers in Ireland their deep sympathies. They sincerely
hope that soon in Ireland, as in Scotland and England, Re-
form Leagues may be formed in every town to secure to the
people their political rights. Urge upon friends in Ireland
their duty to promote this great movement, and so secure at
home those benefits which thousands of their fellow-country
men aro forced to seek in other lauds, wherolaud and State
Church grievances are unknown. We also seek co-operation
since our freedom, though secured to-morrow, would not be
safe so long as one portion of the United Kingdom was less
free than the others." Now, there is the outspoken voice of
the representatives of that great multitude which only a
fortnight since I saw pass through the streets of Glasgow.
For three hours the procession passed with all the emblems
and symbols of their various trades, and the streets for two
or three miles were enlivened with banners, while the air
was filled with the sound of music from their bands. Why,
these men speak but the same voice that was heard iu the
West Riding—that was heard in Manchester —that was
heard iu Birmingham —that was heard in London—and
you, men of Dublin, never committed a mistake more
grievous in your lives if you come to the conclusion that
there are not millions of men in Great Britain willing to do
you f ull justfee. (Loud cheers, and some interruption, which
the chairman endeavoured to suppress.) The fact is, Mr.
Houghton has not been so much at political meetings as I
have, or he would only welcome an explanation now and
then which shows the vivacity and diffidence of the
audience. (Cheers.) I am sorry that my voice is not
now what it once was ; and when I think what the
work is which is to be done I think it is sometimes
a pity that we grow old so fast. Years ago, many years
ago, when I have thought of the condition of Ireland, of
its sorrows and wrongs—of the discredit its condition
brought upon the English and Irish and Scottish name—l
have thought that if I could be in all other things the same
but by birth an Irishman, there is not a town in the island
that I would not visit for the purpose of discussing the
great Irish question, and of rousing my countrymen to some
grand and united action. (Great cheering and waving of
hats.) I do not believe in the necessity of wide-spread and
horrible misery. Ido not believe that we were placed in
this island and on this earth that one man might be great
and wealthy, and glorying in every profuse indulgence,
and five or six or nine or ten men suffering the abject
misery which we see too common in this world. Why, with
your soil, and with your climate, and with your active and
spirited race, I know not what this island might not do ;
but there have been reasons, to my mind, why the soil,
and the climate, and the labour of your population have
not produced general comfort and competence for all. This
address speaks of friendly feeling and sympathy which I
have had for Ireland during my political career. Why,
when I first wont into the House of Commons the most pro-
minent figure in it was Daniel O'Connell. (Loud cheers.)
I have sat by his side for hours during the discussions in
that house, and have listened to observations both amusing
and instructive on what was passing in discussion. I have
seen him too, more than once, on our platform on the anti-
corn law, and I recollect that he sent to Ireland expressly
fora newspaper which contained a report of a speech which
he made against the corn law when the corn law waspassing
through Parliament in 1815, and we owe much to his exer-
tions in connexion with that question, for almost, indeed,
I suppose the whole Liberal party of Irish representatives
in Parliament supported the measures of free trade of which
we were the prominent advocates. (Cheers.) I know of
nothing that was favourable to freedom, whether in con-
nexion with Ireland, or with England, that O'Connell
did not support with all his great powers. (Cheers,
and a Voice, " That's personal.") I know nothing plea-
santer, and hardly anything more useful, than personal
recollections of this nature. Why is it now that there
should be, if there be, any kind of schism between the
Liberal people of Ireland and the Liberal people of Great
Britain ? Ido not ask you to join hands with supremacy
or oppression, whether in your island or in ours. What I
ask you is to open your heart of hearts, and to join hands
for a great cordial thorough-working union for freedom
with the great people of Great Britain. (Cheers.) Perhaps
before I sit down I may be allowed to advert to a point
which has been much commented on—a paragraph in the
speech I made the other night, with regard to the laud. I
need not tell you that there are newspapers in Dublin which
I need not name, because I am quite sure you can find them
out. (Laughter.) lam sorry to say that there are news-
papers which do not feel any strong desire or any consci-
entious compulsion to judge fairly anything which I may
say. Amongst the various measures which I proposed
for what I should call the pacification and the re-
demption of the people of Ireland, I said that it is of the
first importance that the people of Ireland, by some process
orother, should be made and have the opportunity of being
made the possessors of their own soil. (Great cheering.)
You know perfectly well that I am not about to propose to
copy the villanous crimes of 200 years ago, and to confis-
cate the lands of the proprietors here or elsewhere. I pro-
pose to introduce a system which would gradually, but
rapidly and easily, without injuring anybody, make many
thousands who are now tenant farmers without leases
and security the owners of their own farms in this
island. Now, this is my plan ; and I want to restate
it here with a little further explanation, in order that the
gentlemen to whom I have referred may not again repeat
the very untrue and what I call the dishonourable com-
ments which they have made upon it. There are, as you
know, many large estates is Ireland which belong to rich
families in England—families in England, not only of the
highest rank, but of the highest character ; because I will
venture to say that there are to be found among the English
nobility families of as much perfect honourableness and
worth as some of those to whom my plan would be offered.
Therefore I am not speaking against the aristocracy or
against the families, or against property, or against any-
body or anything that is good; but I say this, that if Par-
liament were to appYnt a commission, and give it, say at
first, up to the amount of five millions sterling, and power
to negotiate or treat with the greatlamilies in England who
have large estates in Ireland, it is probable that some of
those great estates might bo bought at a not very unreason-
able price. (Cheers, and a Voice, " Could we not got them
for nothing ?") Hear me to the end of my statement. I
ma opinion that it would be the cheapest money that the
Imperial Parliament almost ever expended, oven though it
became possessed of those great estates at a price consi-
derably above that which they would fetch if put up in
your market to-morrow. I propose that it should be worked
in this way. I will take a case. I assume that this com-
mission got a largo estate in its possession bought from
Lord A, B, C, or D. Wo will take one farm upon it which
I assume to be worth £l,OOO, and for which the present tenant
pays a rout of £5O a year. lie has no lease—he has no secu-
rity ; he makes almost no permanent improvements of any
kind, and he is not quite sure whether, when he has saved
a little money, he will not take his family off to the United
States. (Loud cheers, and a Voice, "He will come back
again.") We will assume, if you like, that we are the commis-
sion, and that we have got before us the farmer who is the
tenant on that particular farm for which he pa) s £5O a year,
without having a lease or security, and which I take to be
worth £l,OOO. Now the Government, I believe, lends money
to Irish landowners forgreat drainage purposes at about 31
per cent. per annum. Suppose the commission wont to this
farmer, and said, "Surely you would have no objection to be-
come possessed of this farm." " No, not the slightest," ho
would.say. (Laughterand cheers.) But how is that to be done ?
In this way —you tell the farmer, " You now pay £5O a
year; that is 5 per cent. on £l,OOO. The Government can
afford to do these transactions for 3} per cent., and if you
will pay £6O a year for a given number of years, which
any of the actuaries at the insurance offices or any good
arithmetician can calculate—if you pay £6O a year for rent
instead of £5O for a given number of years—it may be
10, 15, or 20 —at the end of that time the farm will be
yours, without any further payment." 1 want you to un-
derstand how this is. You see, if the farmer had paid £5O,
and you asked him to pay £lO a year more towards buy-
ing his farm, ho might do it ; but the fact is, that the
£l,OOO the Government pay for the farm would not cost
them more than £35 a year, and therefore the difference
between £35 and £6O being £25, would ,be the sum
-which the farmer annually in his rent would be paying the
Government for the redemption of his farm"; and this at the
end of a very few years, the farmer having perfect security
that no one could turn him out if he paid his rent and no-
body could touch him for the improvement he makes on his
lands. What would he do the next morning after having
made that agreement? He would speak to his wife and his
big boy who had been idling about during a great deal of his
time, ho would explain all this, and there is not a stone on
the land that would not be removed, there is not a weed
that would not be pulled up, not a particle of manure that
would not be saved, there is not a single thing they would
not do, with a zeal and enthusiasm, a labour of delight
they had never known before, to cultivate that farm; and
by the time the few years had run out when the farm had
become his without any further purchase, he would have
turned a dilapidated and miserable farm into a garden
for
himself and family. (Great cheering.) This story and
this statement may be commented on again by these
newspapers. (Laughter.) You will understand that I
propose no forced purchase—no confiscation. I would
undertake to give, if I were the Government, to any one
of those landlords 10 per cent. more for his estate than it
would fetch in any market in Dublin or London ; and I say
that to do this would produce the most marvellous change
in the sentiments of the people and in the condition of agri-
culture in Ireland. But then I see in one of these papers—l
wish we could only get these fellows before the public and
see them, for I don't know what these men can be who
write these things--I see in one of the papers they say, How
would I like a commission to come down to Lancashire to
insist on buying my factories ?" I can only say, that if they
would give me 15 or 20 per cent. more than they are worth
they should have them to-morrow. (Laughter.) But I did
not propose that the commission should come down and in-
sist on buying these estates. They say farther, "Why should
an Irishman keep his estate, and not a man in England who
has an estate in Ireland ?" There is this difference—a
man in Ireland has an estate and has a house upon it. It is
his ancestral home, and there aro ties that attach him to it
which it would be monstrous to think of severing. But a
man who lives in England, who is a rich man, and never
comes here except to receive his rents, and generally gets
them through his banker—has no particular tie to the
country, and only comes over here because ho feels that
he is a great proprietor of land in Ireland, and is scrupu-
lous never .to show his face to his.tonants. In such a