The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-07-17
SEATTLE. SUNDAY. JULY ~.
THE MORAL GRANDEUR OF GLAD
STONES sTATESMANSHIP.


ton of that year. there was not daily
newspaper or public body of any influence
in Great Britain that was not opposed to
home rule. and the election was not fought
on the Irish question. Gladstone won the
election by large majority, and had he
not declared for home rule for Ireland he
could have held Office until this day. 1t
was upon his home rule bill that Gladstone
was defeated in the house Of commons IN
the first session of the parliament elected
in 1885. He was defeated by the desertion
of seventy or eighty members of his party,
who have since been known as Liberal
Unionsts, the leaders of whom are the
Duke of Devonshire (then Marquis OF Har-
tington) and Mr.. Joseph Chamberlain.
Gladstone appealed to the country. and at
the general election of 1886, at which home
rule for the first time became an issue at
the polls in Great Britain, Mr.. Gladstone
was beaten.
Not disappointed or discouraged by de-
feat Gladstone at ~ years of age bent him
self to the task of educating his country
men and converting them to the cause Of
home rule for Ireland. He has from the
beginning taken the high ground that
England should grant Ireland home rule
"because it is the just thing to do; because
morality and equity demand it, and be-
cause 1t is crime against Gods justice to
withhold it."
Mr. Gladstone in advocating home rule
las always argued that under the present
ystem Ireland is governed at cost, civil
md military, which If applied to the rest
ould not sustain; he has held that
English government of Ireland has been q
wretched failure; that it obstructs all
progress Of pressing needful domestic legis-
lation on the one side and is an unfailing
source of discomfort and hostility on the
other.
These are questions Of fact, not debatable
matters of opinion and the only worthy
solution of the evil situation is home rule.
In confirmation of Gladstones view that
England's government of ireland has been
inexcusable and outrageous misgovern-
ment, at times sinking to shameful and
barbarous oppression might be quoted the
testimony of Fox, Burke, Earl Fitz-
william, Lord CORVALLIS and other states
men of the last decade of the eighteenth
century. and that of the great Englishmen
OF the last half century, Bright, Golden,
Macaulay, Froude, Lord John Russell,
Disraeli. Sydney Smith, Professor John
Stuart Blackie, Matthew Arnold and
John Stuart Mill Indeed, all the
ablest Tories have always agreed
with the Liberals that Ireland
rs been a horribly oppressed and mis-
governed country. The only difference
hiss been as 10 the wisest means to be
siopted to reach the end of better govern
ment. The remedy for the situation
offered by Salisbury was the same old
ugly resort 10 coercion bills and crimes
acts. q further application of the political
tbumbscrews % people already mad
dened by the memory of a century Of
similar pains and penalties. for the story
of Ireland from the act of union in 1901 to
the present day is eloquent testimony to
the truth of Gladstone's declaration that
Ireland has always been extravagantly
and unjustly governed by England TO the
damage OF England and to state of dis
content. despair and disaster in Ireland.
From 1880 10 date no less than fifty
coercion acts have been passed. During
this period Ireland has lost three millions
Of people She is subject TO periodical
iamines; land is steadily dropping in
value and passing out of cultivation. Two
millions of people in Ireland today live in
cne-roomed. mnd-walled cabins; manu-
featuring industry is dead in Leinstcr
Munster and Connaught, and leads but a
languishing life in the large cities and
towns of Ulster. Ireland is full Of squa,id
poverty, industrial stsCnation and social
anarchy. Salisbury. 10 cure this situation,
followed the liag of the traditional policy
of coercion, a policy cursed and con-
demned by its historical record, while
Gladstone proposes policy approved by
historical experience. policy that thus
far has proved constructive Of happiness
and harmony in Canada, Australia and
the United States, not destrul tive Of peace,
order, law and popular content
Suppose after our civil war we had ar
piled persistently the policy of coercion
and contiscstion TO the maloontent popu-
lation Of the South. The result would have
been. unless there had been a wholesale
expatriation Of the planter class. that we
would have msde social and political he'll
identical with the worst days of ireland.
maintained by . standing army o: federal
hayonets. The bloody cspers Q! the ku.
Klux Khan wouldn't have been patch e
the turbulence and crime that would have
ragged over the whole South. southern in
dustryw ouid have been paralyxed and pesc,
put 10 flight: We didn't try coercion, be
cause the common sense of the American
people was equal to understanding th'
great truth uttered by Burke when h.
warned England that while YOU can in
diet and punish the individual. you can
rot ind.ct, try, convie: and execute /:
whole people" which is exactly what the
Salisbury coercion policy aimed - DO.
No English statesman has been 50 otter
victorious in The Iual struggle as Glad