The Northern Guardian. — 1892-07-04 (Hartlepool, Cleveland, England)

LETTERS. GLADSTONIS-M-CONDEMNED.  To the Editor of The Northern Guardian.  write a few last words to your readers on the great issue to be decided to-day. I support Mr Richardson and the Unionist Government not because I am an ardent party man, but because, before everything else, I am an Englishman and am anxious that this magnificent Empire which is an heritage from our fathers, and held in trust by us for our children, shall be handed down to them undivided and intact. I believe that the interests of England, of Ireland, and the whole Empire are infinitely safer in the hands of the patriotic Unionist Party than they would be in the hands of the motley crew of which Mr Gladstone is either the head or the tail.  The Unionist Party has in it nearly all the best elements of the old Liberal Party which Mr Gladstone wrecked, and the larger wing of that party has shown the greatest chivalry and patriotism in sinking all minor differences and side issues, and working heartily, honestly, earnestly, and loyally with their former opponents in order to save our country from what we regard as a grave constitutional danger and an irreparable disaster. Again, the Unionist Government has been, financially, a brilliant success, and in other respects the late Government has deserved well of the country. It has given you immense acquisition of territory in Asia and Africa, new outlets for your trade, and a navy adequate to its protection. They, at least, have lost you no Transvaal. There you had a territory larger than France, fertile and rich in all the resources which make a country great. That was acquired by the Conservative Government, and given up by Mr Gladstone, and, worse than all, was given up after the disgraceful defeat at Majuba Hill. The Unionist Party have given you no Majuba Hill and no disasters in Zululand. They have given no abject apologies to Austria, or no craven surrender to Russia. They have sacrificed no Forster, and deserted no Gordon. Mr Gladstone scuttled out of the Transvaal. He has given pledges to France to scuttle out of Egypt, and thus to undo the grand work we have done there, and give up our highway to the East. He is pledged to scuttle out of Ireland ; he is pledged to sacrifice Ulster to Connaught, Ireland to boycotters, , and Imperial interests to a treasonable conspiracy. The late Government found Ireland in a state of anarchy, ruin, and chaos, and yet to-day, but for the faction fights amongst the Nationalists themselves, Ireland is enjoying all the conditions of civilised existence; and I do urge that if it were only for this that Government has earned the everlasting gratitude not merely of England but of every right-thinking Irishman, whatever his religion or his politics may be. Again, Great Britain rules something like 350 million people—people of almost every race and creed and clime and tongue. On the whole, it does this successfully, and yet Gla.dstonians tell us that this same people, this same Parliament, cannot govern 4 million Irishmen, not even with the assistance of 100 Irish representatives to help them. They go further, and , confess not only that they cannot govern Ireland (which is true enough) but that they cannot govern England properly because "Ireland blocks the way." ; They therefore propose to give these 100 Irish members a sort of "No. 15 Committee-room," from which they are to do what they and their allies could not do, viz., govern the different races and creeds in Ireland in accordance with what they call Irish ideas. Why, during Mr Gladstone's last term of office Ireland practically had Home Rule. What I mean is this, that the same men who would govern Ireland if Mr Gladstone's measure should pass had almost absolute power in Ireland then. Ireland was governed, as they boasted, by the unwritten law of the League, and what was the result? Why, you had anarchy and treason, outrage and murder, oppression and tyranny, moonlighting and cattle maiming, and boycotting of the living, ti e dying, and the dead. All this has passed away like a hideous dream, and why? Simply because you have had a party in power which knows its own mind and which has not lent itself to the un-English and cowardly method of bribing its enemies to allow it to live; because the power of these men has been broken and Ireland has been governed from Great Britain and not from America. .  ..„... ----The great issue before you to-day is this: Will you hand over the destinies of Ireland to these men, who have shown themselves tiu be ~310 only the bitterest foea of England.