Waterbury evening Democrat., 1889-03-26
HOME RULE PROGRESS.

That the Pigott and London Times fiasco has had beneficial effect in devel oping public sentiment favorably to Irish home rule has been proven by the bye elections held recently, and it is ex- pected and hoped it will be made still more evident by those that are yet to come The home rulers are looking with hopeful expectancy to the election soon to take place in Rochester, whose sitting tory member-Colonel Hughes-Hallett- Was forced to resign his seat recently owing to the fact that the revelation of his vicious, unsavory and dishonest life in his own country has compelled him to live, as fugitive, among the disrepu- table English haunters of the continen | tai resorts. Should the liberals gain this seat as they did that of Remington, it would strike another serious blow at tory domination in the English govern ment.
 How the loss of such tory strongholds is regarded in England may be inferred | by the following quotation from the London Standard published few days before the Remington election: ''If Mir Beresford-Hope keeps the seat, even though it be with a smaller ma jority, the unionist party will have every reason to
 be satisfied. Even if a 'neck-and-neck
 race should end in MT BeresfordHope's
 defeat-a result we do not care to anti
 cipate-we should be justified in draw
 ing the conclusion that the metropolitan
 constituencies had been little affected by
 circumstances upon which great expec- tations have been built by the advocates
 of home rule. But a majority in favor
 of Mir Beaufoy large enough to show that
 some impression had been made in the
 more solid and coherent mass of the
 unionist connection would be a much
 more serious affair. A radical majority
 of thousand, for instance, would cer-
 tainly imply that recent incidents had
 largely influenced the constituency, and would be of very bad augury for future metropolitan contests. An emphatic conservative defeat at this moment would undoubtedly be a calamity, as ii
 could be hardly attributed to shy cause but one, and would show that the work. ing classes had been the dupes of 8
 plausible imposture to a greater extent
 than at this moment we are prepared to
 think possible" When one of the ablest and most influential conservative journals I in England talks in such a vein it may be easily inferred, in the light of MI g Beaufoys great majority, what a power ful effect the Times villainy has had or
 the minds of the English people. The s result in the Remington case is an in , dication of a change in public sentiment 3 which bids fair to create almost politi D cal revolution in England. If dissolu
 tion of parliament could be forced a
 this time there is little doubt as to what f the outcome of the election would be F It is hardly possible, however, in view of the express determination of LorC
 Sa aisbury to hold on in spite of the most
 glaring evidences of the withdrawal o1
 pubic confidence, to force the tory gov p ernment out. As MT Gladstone tersely
 remarked in the first year of the presen 8 tory regime, they are running the stat e ute of limitations against his life," hop n ing that the grand old man will hav' } passed away before the end of their par @ liamentary term of office in 1893.
 ] We believe, however, that home rul, E; for Ireland is nearer than many peopl, |, think. John Boyle O'Reilly was no l. dreaming, nor was he weaving an, !, threads of poetic fancy when he declar = ed that home rule would come within - the year. He may perhaps have placed the dawn at too early an hour, but if thu signs of the times mean anything the, 7 are gilded with the faint rays of tn, 3 coming morn when Ireland shall enio q her God-given right of governing her D self within herself.