The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1886-06-30
GLADSTONE'S MANIFESTO.
He Asks His Constituents to Return
Him to Parliament.

III
Him to Parliament.
Mr.. Gladstone has issued a manifesto to
the electors of Midlothian. Scotland. He
solicts for the fifth time the vote Of his con-
stituents, and says of the Irish Home Rule
question:
will you govern Ireland by coercion or
will You let Ireland manage her own affairs!
To debate in this address this and that detail
of the lately defeated bill would only be to
disguise this issue, and woald be as futile rs
to discuss the halting. stumbling, ever-shift-
ing and ever-raniShing projects OF an inter-
mediate class which have proceeded from
positive and Ineligible plans before the
world; there is the plan Of the government
and there is the plan of Lord Salisbury. Our
plan is that Ireland should, under well-con-
Sidere1 conditions, transa It her own affairs.
His plan is to ask Parliament to renew re-
pressve laws and enforce them reSolutely
for twenty years, by the end of which time,
he assures us, Ireland will be fit to accept any
government in the way of local govern
ment, on the repeal of the coercion laws, you
may wish to give her.
II leave this Tory project to speak for
itself in its unadorned simplicity, aud turn
to the proposed poli"y of the Government.
Our opponents, gentlemen whether Tories or
seccders, have assumed the name OF Union:StS.
l deny them the title to it. In Intention, in
deed, we are all Unionists alike, but the
union they refuse to modify is in its present
shape a paper union, obtained by force
and fraud and never sanctioned or accepted
by the Irish nation. They are not Up:onists,
but paper Unionists. True union Is to be
tested by the sentiments of the human beings
united Tried by this criterion, we have less
union between Great Britain and Ireland
now than we had under the settlement of
J7S2.
"Enfranchised Irel,nd, gentlemen, asks
through her lawful representatives for the
revival of her domestic Legislature-not on
the face of it an innovating, but restora-
tive, proposal. She urges with truth that the
GENERALIZATION Of Parliament has been the
division of peoples, but she recognizes
the fact that the Union, lawleSSly as it was
obtained, cannot and ought not to be re-
pealed. She is content to receive her legis-
which might have impaired her imperial
interests and better adapted than the
settlement of 1852 to secure to her
regular control of her own affairs. She
has not repealed but has welcomed the
stipulations for the protection Of the
minority. To such provisions we have given
and shall give careful heed, but I trust Scot
lduu VIII lut 81
made to import into the controversy ven
omous element of religious bigotry. Let her
take warning by the deplorable riots in Bel
fast and other places in the North.
Among the benefits. gentlemen, l antici-
pate from your acceptance of our policy are
these:
The consolidation of the united Empire
and great addition to its strength.
THE stoppage of the heavy, constant and
4 nv Of 1io traa
1.-THE abatement and gradual extinction of
ignoble feuds in Ireland, and that develop
ment of her resources which experience shows
to be natural consequence of free and Or
derly government
The redemption of the honor OF Great
Britain from the stigma fastened upon her,
almost from time immortal in respect to Ire
land, by the Judgment of the whole civilized
world and lastly, the restoration Of Parlia-
ment to its dignity and efficiency and the
regular progress of the business of the coun-
try"