The Irish standard., 1893-05-13

Of judicious policy to invite the Irish
people to accept it.
You should not give Home Rule to Ire
land, forsooth, because Irishmen honor
the sentiment Of Ireland nation. Why
should they not? Ireland is nation
Ireland whatever you would do with il
will never be anything but nation.
8he has every mark and token Of ana
Eon, the taken of race, the token OF
creed, the token Of special interest, the
token il you will Of mental distinction.
You are IN the habit here of talking
about Irish bills and saying that some
thing is very Irish. / think, though /
may not concur IN the sentiments Of those
observations, that they show the deeply
buried opinion in your minds that the
Irish people are distinctive race, as
distinctive as any race in Europe This
talk about Ireland as q nation argues q
strange confusion of thought. A people
may be nation without being sover-
eign State, and people may be sover-
eign State although they may not be a
nation. Is Roumania nation? Is
Montenegro a nation? They are not
sovereign States, and Ireland, although
not sovereign state is unquestionably q
nation.
OF course we have had denunciations
of the Land League and the Plan of
Campaign. I do not fear to say that
the Land League and the Plan of Cam
paign are the two events of contem-
porary Irish history which exclusively
proye the incapacity Of this Parliament
to legislate for Ireland. What made the
Land League formidable? The House
of Lords. Famine was the parent OF the
Land League, the House of Lords was
it's foster parent. The Land League
had barely nominal existence until the
Lords in 1880 rejected the Compensation
for Disturbance Bill, bill which was
only trivial compared to the bill they
were compelled to pass in q succeeding
year. The Land League was necessary
to produce a Land Act.
Mr.. Gladstone-Hear,h hear.
Mr.. Sexton-I am glad of that cheer
from the Prime Minister. It is cheer
justified by history and experience. Why
dld you wait thirty years to act on the
report of the Devon Commission? These
were the thirty years that saw 100000
of the people OF Ireland driven out of
their country. I say the Land League
produced the Land Act. The member
for West Birmingham mr. Chamberlain
has confessed that but for the Land
League the Land Act would not have
been passed. conclade that, so far
from there being any success in your ef-
fort to make the Land League or the
Plan of Campaign an argument against
Home Rule, it is fatal argument against
your competence to legislate for Ireland,
because the Irish people suffered from
extortion, from distress, in the earlier
years from famine, and they appealed to
you in vain; but by the agitation of the
Land League and the agitation of the
Plan of Campaign they procured the Act
of 1881 and the Land Act of 1887. And
lay it down without fear as constitu-
tional axiom that when a Legislature is
charged with the care of people in an
other country, and when the Legislature
shows by long experience that it cannot
be driven to pass necessary laws until
the people of that country resort to agi-
tation, and by the violence of passion
are driven into crime, that Legislature
stands sself-condemned.
We are told that Ulster will fight. I
think Ulster will be quiet This is really
not an Ulster question, it is question
of Belfast. I have shown how fit Belfast
is to be the cradle of the cry of civil and
religious liberty. Task every member of
this house to read the evidence taken on
oath before committee of the House
upon the Belfast bill last year. The
evidence was sworn, it was not contra
dicted. In that evidence you will find
that Catholics are excluded as an in
ferior race from all the public bodies of
Belfast, that they are excluded from
public employment out of the rates to
which they contribute, that it is made q
matter Of boast If a Catholis is allowed
to be scavenger, tnat Catholic boys are
taken in childhood into the mills and
factories, and when the age Of appren-
ticeship arrives are taken out again be-
cause they will not be admitted to the
trades, and that in this city of civil and
religious liberty the poor Catholic fam:i-
lies because of that system are obliged
to quit the city of Belfast, and to emf
CRATE from Ireland. 1t was proved in
evidence that Catholic paupers in the
workhouses and Catholic patients in the
other public institutions there have been
allowed to die without the ministrations
of their Church. because the spirit gov
erning the bodies would not allow the
or presence of a Catholic
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