New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1893-08-03
HOME PTLE md SECESSION.

"Thc Quarterly Review is bitterly opposed
to Home Rule. but it has the candor required
for exposing favortc analogy Of the Union
lists who compare Mr.. Gladstones IRISH policy
TO the secession cause in America. IL remarks
that the difference between the two cases lies
in this, that the American Congress had never
passed a vote sanctionlng secession IL con
tends that if Congress- and not the seeding
States. had authoritatvely asserted the right
Of withdrawing from the Union. it would have
been difficult for the Northern States to de-
monstrate the inadmissiblity of secession
Comparisons between the United Kingdom ana
a Federal Union in which every state has al
ways enjoyed as large "A measure Of Home Kulc
As Ireland will have under Mr. Gladstone :
measure. are obviously defective. There was
a United Kingdom after the conquest when
Ireland had Parliament of its own and there
will be "A United Kingdom If that Parliament
be re-cstablshed. One has only 10 90 back a
hundred years in English history in order to
prove that the Home Rule movement does not
involve the breaking up of the lnlted King
dom or any revolutionary process analogous
to the secession Of the southern states. ever,
one Of which had legislative autonomy.
In order to have a true parallel Ireland must
be represented a. seeding from the United
Kingdom by her own authority and then
firing upon the British flag in Dublin llarbor.
Then the analogy with the Confederate
states. which established a Government Of
their own in hostility II the Federal mon,
will be complete The Irish Nationalist have
neither passed a secession ordinance nor taken
up arms against the Imperial Government
They have perScvcrcd in a constitutional agl-
tation for a rcver>ion to the conditions which
preceded the act of legislative union. They
desire the restoration of the Dublin Parlia
mcnt in order To have the privilege of legs
laing for themselves in Irish affairs The
Home Rule bill does not resemble in any sense
the ordinance Of secession passed by the south
Carolina Legislature. II has received the sane
ton not Of an Irish assembly planning a mil
itary campaign against the United Kingdom
but Of the House of Commons recently elected
by the people Of Great Britain and ireland.
II provides for the representation al Ireland III
the Imperial Parliament for financial conribu-
tons t. the General Government and for the
suprcmac, of the United Kingdom. 1t aims.
not al di>union and d>mcmbcrmcnt. bat at Il
renewal of thc conditions of Union which pre-
vailed for Il long period after the conquest when
ireland had Parliament of lis own
The parallel may be rcadlu>tcd in another
way. Let lis suppose that the southern STATES
instead Of having complete legislative aatono-
my had been governed ~ Territories for several
decades before the Civil War; and further
| more that instead of Withdrawing from The
I 'nion and firing upon the Nag they had united
i'm a constitutional agitation for the restoration
of their legislative privileges. II House Of
Representatives had been elected under those
circumstances with majority IN favor of re-
admitting them II their former status ~ self
governing states under the constitutional re
strants of the Federal Mon. the Home Rule
| movement in is present phase in the United
Kingdom would have been laiallcIcd Between
secession a> il was in 1851 and constitutional
agitation for legislative autonomy such aS We
have outlined. there are sharp lines of diver
gencc Between the secession movement i'm
the United states and the Home Rule cause in
the United Kingdom there is practically no
! analogy whatever