The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1896-01-26

sTRANGLING INDUSTRY.
But the wrongs of ireland we've not wholly
religious wrongs. While the leaders OF the
Protestant ascendency were tyrannizing over
their Catholic fellow-citizens England was
tyrannizing over the Protestant ascendency
Indeed, the exceeding savageness of the Irish
penal laws arises from the fact that they were
made by slaves to torture slaves.
During the reign of Charles II Ireland was
excluded from the benefits of the navigation
act and her shipping interests were ruined
In 1866 the importation of Irish cattle into
England was forbidden. Even dead meat but
ter and cheese were excluded from the British
market. Driven by these measures into sheep
raising the Irish graziers produced the best
wool in Europe. Considerable progress was
made in the manufacture of wooden cloths,
and in many cases the Irish article was sold
cheaper than the English.
This was intolerable. The two houses of the
British Parliament addressed King William
and urged him to find some remedy for the
grievance inflicted on the industrious people
OF England by the mere Irish. Listen to their
prayer: Wherefore we most humbly beseech
your most sacred Majesty that your Majesty
would be pleased, in the most public and
eHectual way that may be, to declare to all
your subjects OF Ireland that the growth and
i Increase OF 1ne Woollen manufacture hath
long been and will be ever looked upon with
great Jealousy by all your subjects of this
kingdom, and if not timely remeded may
occasion very strict laws totally 10 prohibit
ana suppress the same"
The result might be expected. The exporta-
tlon OF Irish woolens was forbidden and in
rev years the manufactures OF the South of
Ireland were entirely destroyed.
The linen trade for which the soil of Ulster is
suited did not in terfere with any English in
terest and therefore was tolerated. If Ulster
to-day is in possession of this trade she owes it
not to British benevoience or TO her native in
dustry, but solely to the fortunate accident that
she did not come into competition with Eng
land.
These manufactures once killed never re.
vived. The population was thrown entirely
on the resources of the soil. The worst system
OF land laws in the world extracted in the
shape OF rent the product OF the peoples labor.
UP TO nifty years ago what the landlords left
was eaten up by the Protestant parsons in the
shape of tithes. 1t is no wonder therefore,
that when in the forties the potato disease de-
stroyed the chief dependence of the people
famine ensued. Let it be remembered that
this was no natural famine, but one created by
law During the worst years more grain and
meat were exported from the Irish ports than
would feed the population ten times over.
But the rent had to be paid. The landlords
IN England and elsewhere exacted their pound
OF flesh. The food which should go TO the
starving people was torn from them by police
ana soldiers and sent in the shape of rent to
minister to the pleasures of rakes and de-
bauches in London and Paris.
According to conservative estimates a mil.
hon people died of starvation and fever n Ire
land during the famine years A million and
hall fed from their native land. But death
followed them. In one year alone, from 1916
10 1S47, twenty thousand of them died OF the
pestilential ship fever and saved England the