The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1907-03-30
HOME RULE ASSURED.

For 700 years the English government has car
ried a campaign of more or less virulence to
crush the Irish nation and force upon the people
a system of government extremely distasteful to a
large majority. Bloody wars have been fought and
just about every economic system to tax to poverty
the people has been tried in an endeavor to force
dociliy and obedience to the crown but the tenaci
being conquered or the nation vanquished than it
was at the beginning of the unjust domination.
1t is a fact well known and recognized not only
by Americans but by all fair-minded Englishmcn
that Great Britain lost her colonies in America
through misgovernment and an intolerant attitude
toward the colonists The only reason she has re-
tanned possession of Ireland is the physical nabil
ity of her people to throw off the yoke by force.
In the past century, the futility of the halter
and pitch-cap, the prison ship, to
crush the life and spirit of the Irish people, hav
ing been proven, movement to enforce certain
economic and educational laws, whose workings
are more insidious than the crude methods of for
mer times grew up in England with results hardly
less deplorabe than those which gave the world the
martyrs to the Irish cause. The system seemed to
be to make the Irish people dependent the Brit
ISL government by rendering them ineffective in
their work and non-productive by running the in
dustries and the educational systems which have
been the leaven of the Irish national life
The recent transfer of James Bryce from the
position of chief secretary for Ireland to be the
British ambassador at Washington and the APP
pointment of Augustine Birrell to succeed him
marks an epoch in the contest for home rule Mr.
Birrell came into prominence in British politics
twenty years ago when Gadsone's first bill grant
ing home rule was up. His ardent advocacy of the
measure his logical and forceful presentation of
the issues involved and his stirring eloquence
aroused much enthusiasm for the young man for
he was then only 36 years old. But the defeat of
the Gladstone Irish proposals and the defections
from the Liberal ranks together with the Boer war,
throughout which the Tories held the rens of gov
kept Mr.. Birrel and nearly every other
of his class effectuay in the background. With
the overwhelming triumph of the Liberals at the.
last general election, Mr.. Birrell became minister
of education in the cabinet formed by Sir Henry
Campbell-Bannerman, devoting his energies to a
readjustment of the English educational system.
His proposals we're passed by the house of COM
MONS but the lords rejected them.
Succeeding James Bryce as secretary for Ire
land, with the failure of such eminent and able
as Balfour, Wyndham, Trevelvan and
Forster, who had tried to rule Ireland through the
agency of Dublin castle, it is not surprising that
his efforts should be directed to accomplishing what
in earlier years he had earnestly advocated-home
rule. He recognized at the start the Nationalist
of Ireland as no small portion in the life of the
island and, not vindctivey with malice. but So
berly and justly, in recent speech fayed the land
lord element numerically for their attitude to-
ward the tenants on their estates.
That self government for Ireland is seriously
considered by the British is evidenced by the speech
of King Edward which he read at the recent open
ing of the new session of parliament as well as by
the attitude of the prime minister and the secre-
tary for Ireland.
With home rule agitating the British govern
settle the fundamental principles underlying the
political institutions of the kingdom. The house
Of lords is up for modification of its legislative
Mr. Birrels education bill was so emas-
culated by the lords that its principal features were
nulliied and this has so aroused the government
that the modification is urged in order to prevent
that body from defeating the Irish home rule bill
and other legislation which would tend toward
giving the people voice in governmental affairs.
The house of lords has been an incubus on the
English government for good many years, entire