The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1886-04-23
HOME RULE.
GladstOne..s Great Effort on
the Presentation
Of His Home Rle Scheme

"AiueSt eutuuSIaSLn prevailed, ana 1t Is sal,
to say that no such scenes We're ever wit
messed before Ill the Commons. As soon a.
| the cheering had ceased Gladstone rose anC
moved for permission to introduce . u bill
to amend previous legislation and to max,
provision for the future government o.
| Ireland
After reviewing the condition of affair.
and the crime existing in Ireland since 1888
Mr.. Gladstone described the coerciYe legis
latiOn enforced during the same period az
not exceptional, but habitual. He com
pared Ireland during all this period to &
man trying to find sustenance in medicine
only meant for cure. Serious disaffection
said he, continued to prevail in Ireland
and If England and Scotland had suffered
similar hardships, he believed the people
of those countries would resort to means
similar to those the Irish had used to ven
tilate their grievances. ParneIlite cheers.
| Coercion was admitted to have been 8
failure for the past fifty-three years, only
| two of which have been wholly free from
repressive legislation.
The claim of Ireland to make laws fol
| herself was never denied continued Mr.
Gladstone, until the reign of George II
The Parliament of Grattan was as indie.
pendent in point of authority as it could be
They (the Government were not about to
propose the repeal of the Union. 1t was
| impossible to propose the repeal of the
Union until they had settled what was the
essence of the Union He defined the
| essence of the Union to be the fact that
whereas before the Union there were two
| separate and independent Parhaments.
| What then is the problem before us It is
this: How to reconcile imperial unity with
a diversity of Legislatures. Grattan held
| that these purposes were reconcilable. More
than that, he demanded a severance of
Parliaments, with view to the continuity
and everlasting unity of the empire. Was
that an aUdacious paradox? Other coun-
tries had solved the problem, and under
much more difficult circumstances. We,
ourselves, may be said to have solved it
with respect to Ireland, during the time
that Ireland had a separate Parliament.
Did it destroy the unity of the British
Empire ?" [Cheers.
Gladstone stated what he had to say on
the subject of the new Irish Constitution
The proportion of the imperial burdens
which he had to propose that Ireland should
bear was one to fourteen. He thought that
the new Irish Parliament ought to stand
with a balance to its credit; but the only
fund that it would have if left alone would
be the solitary 100000 from the Irish
Church fund. He knew no way of pro-
ing it out of this years budget, and he
proposed that in future Ireland should pay
One-ifteenth toward the imperial expendi-
ture. He then entered into an elaborate
calculation of the total income and expend-
iture of Ireland, in the course of which he
stated that the total charge to Ireland as an
imperial contribution he put at e3, PAP 900
per annum. He estimated the total ex-
penditure of Ireland, including the payment
as sinking fund for the Irish portion of
the national debt, at 81, 94S 900 per annum.
Against this there was a total income of
e6, $50, 900, or a surplus to the Government
of e404, ZOO.
Referring to the great settlement of 1882,
Mr.. Gladstone said " 1t was not a real set
Element, and why? Was it claimed that it
prevented real settlement being made
{ Irish cheers. No; it was the mistaken
policy of England listening to the per-
nicious voice and claims of ascendancy.
The Irish Parliament labored under great
disadvantages, yet it had in it the spark of
the spirit of freedom, and it emancipated
the Roman Catholics of Ireland when the
Roman Catholics of London were still un-
emancipated. 1t received Lord Fitz Will
liam with open arms, and when, after a
brief career, he was recalled to England, the
irish Parliament registered their confidence
in him by passing a resolution desiring that
he should administer the Government.
Lord Fitz William had promoted the adj
mission of Roman Catholics into the Irish
Parliament and there was a spirit in that
Parliament which, if it had had free scope,
would have done no noble work, and prob
ably would have solved all the Irish problem
and have saved this Government infinite
trouble.
The speaker said he would pass to the
plan of how to give Ireland legislature to
deal with Irish, as distinguished from i'm
perial affairs. He was confronted at the
outset with what he felt to be formidable
dilemma. AS Ireland was to have a domes-
tic Legislature for Irish affairs, that was his
postulate, from which he set out. Were the
Irish members and Irish representative
peers in either house to combine to form a
part of these representative assemblies
The speaker thought it would be perfectly
clear that if Ireland was to have domestic
legislature, the Irish peers and Irish repre-
could not come to Parliament
TO control English and Scotch affairs
Cheers. Then with regard to the ques-
ton whether Irish representatives should
come to the House of Commons for the set
.Iement of imperial affairs, he thought that
t could not be done. He had therefore
arrived at the conclusion that the Irish
members and Irish peers ought not to sit in
he palace of Westminster. [Oh, oh, and
cheers. If Irish members were not to sit
II the House of Commons, Irish peers ought
not to sit in either house of Parliament.
Hear, hear, and Oh!1 How were the Irish
people to be taxed if they had legislators in
both countries He believed that Great
Britain would never impose upon Ireland
axatiOn without representation. Then
here would come another question which |
would raise a practical difficulty, and that
s: Are we to give up the fiscal unity OF the |
empire He did not think that by giving |
Up the fiscal unity of the empire they were |
giving up the unity of the empire. He, |
however, stood upon the substantial ground |
hat to give up the fiscal unity of the en-
Dire would be a public inconvenience and /
misfortune. 1t would be great misfortune |
or Great Britain and greater misfortune |
or Ireland. He conceived that one escape |
rom that dilemma would be such an
as would give the Imperial
government authority to levy customs du-
les and such excise duties as were imme-
hately connected with the customs. The
of such an arrangement We're:
glrst-That the general power of taxation
'ver and above those particular duties