The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1900-01-20

fair and temperate communication
Editor the New York Times:
The advocate in chief for the British
government in this country seems to be
your correspondent, Thomas G. Shear
man. whose statements on the Boer Re
publ1cS have occupied space in the Times
ana other pro-BritiSh organs for some
time past SO numerous, so glarinS and
so ridiculous have been the misreDre
sensations and eXaggerations of the
writer that his communications nave
been apty designated a Comedy of En-
rorS. In one of his recent effuSiOnS he
makes the following declaration: AS
for Irish Catholics, President Kruger
hates them so much that he has never
allowed them TO have the right of gain
ing vote or ever holding an Office under
any circumstances This is a malicious
and deliberate misstatement. DR.. LeydS.
plenlpotentiary of the Beers in Europe. is
himself a Catholic, and among others
holding office under the present Kruger
administration are DIR. Fare!ly, govern
ment advisor on international law. Irish
Catholic; Mr.. Hogan, secretary to the
commandant general, Irish Catholic;
CheValIer y Donohue vice chairman Of
the Johannesburg corporation. Irish
Catholic. One-fourth of the Transvaal
civil service are Catholics. The Catholic
church and convent in Pretoria are built
on ground presented by the Transvaal
government to the church.
crate to the nuns and priests. OF this we
have ample testimony in letters which
have appeared in the leading Catholic
journals in the United States from various
German and Irish priests. who have been
on the mission in the TransVaal The
Oblate missionaries now in America, and
having had practical experience of life III
the IranSVaal, have declared that there
is no need of the removal of any Catholic
disabilities, as the constitution of the
republic guarantees religious equality.
In the convention of 81, the sixteenth
clause guarantees religious equality TO
the various sects and this is confirmed
in clause nine of the convention of 81.
Great Britain should be the last power
in the world to protest against religious
disabilities in another country. If l We're
TO refer to Ireland, 1 find that in that
country no Catholic is allowed to hll the
office of lord lieutenant. Notwithstand-
ing the fact that Queen Victoria has mil
liors of Catholic subjects, under the con
stitution of Great Britain her majesty
was obliged to take an oath that the
fundamental tenets of the Catholic faith
are false and idOlatrous.
President Kruger was never compelled
to take cowardly and bigoted oath Of
that kind.
In Ireland which is three-fourths Cath
Ollie, the vast proportion of offices are
in the hands of the Protestant minority
and the bishops and archblShops are per-
mitted to exercise their sacred functions
merely by sufferance of the government
Within the last few years the vast
Catholic majority in Ireland has been re-
fused university, while the small
Protestant minority has entire control of
the university and the higher education
of the country. Only sixteen out of fifty
six of the queens counsel are Catholics,
and only three Of the eighteen judges of
the higher courts of procedure.
As an evidence of the conditions pre-
vailing in Ireland at the present time, I
cite the case of young Irishman, a ward
of court who recently expressed a wish
to enter the Jesuit order as a novice. The
lord chancellor was about to make a
minute confirming his wish, when his