THE HOME RULE CASE
Those who, like myself, visited Ireland last summer as delegates of the
Eighty Club included some who had not thoroughly explored that country
since the early nineties. They were all agreed that a great change had
taken place in the internal condition of Ireland. They noticed a great
increase of self-confidence, of prosperity, of hope. Many who entered
upon that tour with doubts as to the power of the Irish people to take
up the burden of self-government came back convinced that her increase
in material prosperity would form a firm and secure basis on which to
build the new fabric.
What does this new prosperity amount to? The new Census figures leave
us in no doubt as to its existence. For the first time there is a real
check in that deplorable wastage of population that has been going on
for more than half a century. The diminution of population in Ireland
revealed by the 1901 Census amounted to 245,000 persons. The diminution
revealed by the 1911 Census amounts to 76,000. In other words, the
decrease of 1901-11 is 1.5 per cent., as against 5.2 per cent, for
1891-1901, or only one against five in the previous decade[12]. This is
far and away the smallest decrease that has taken place in any of the
decennial periods since 1841; and this decrease is, of course,
accompanied by a corresponding decline in the emigration figures.[13]
What is even more refreshing is the evidence which goes to show that
the population left behind in Ireland has become more prosperous. For
the first time since 1841, the Census now shows an increase--small,
indeed, but real--of inhabited houses in Ireland, and a corresponding
increase in the number of families[14].
It is the first slight rally of a country sick almost unto death. We
must not exaggerate its significance. Ireland has fallen very low, and
she is not yet out of danger. There is no real sign of rise in the
extraordinarily small yield of the Irish income tax. That yield shows
us a country, with a tenth of the population, which has only a
thirtieth of the wealth of Great Britain--a country, in a word, at
least three times as poor[15]. The diminution in the Irish pauper
returns is entirely due to Old-age Pensions.[16] The much-advertised
increase in savings and bank deposits, always in Ireland greatly out of
proportion to her well-being, is chiefly eloquent of the extraordinary
lack of good Irish investments.
The birth-rate in Ireland, although the Irish are the most prolific
race in the world, is still--owing to the emigration of the
child-bearers--the lowest in Europe. The record in lunacy is still the
worst, and the dark cloud of consumption, though slightly lifted by the
heroic efforts of Lady Aberdeen, still hangs low over Ireland.[17]
Finally, while we rejoice that the rate of decline in the population is
checked, we must never forget that the Irish population is still
declining, while that of England, Wales and Scotland is still going
up.[18]
But still the sky is brightening, and ushering in a day suitable for
fair weather enterprises. Perhaps the surest and most satisfactory sign
of revival in Irish life is to be found in the steady upward movement
of the Irish Trade Returns.[19] That movement has been going on
steadily since the beginning of the twentieth century.[20] It is
displayed quite as much in Irish agricultural produce as in Irish
manufactured goods; and in view of certain boasts it may be worth while
to place on record the fact that the agricultural export trade of
Ireland is greater by more than a third than the export of linen and
ships.[21] Denmark preceded Ireland in her agricultural development,
but it must be put to the credit of Irish industry and energy that
Ireland is now steadily overhauling her rivals.[22]
The mere recital of these facts, indeed, gives but a faint impression
of the actual dawn of social hope across the St. George's Channel. In
order to make them realise this fully, it would be necessary to take my
readers over the ground covered by the Eighty Club last summer, in
light railways or motor-cars, through the north, west, east and south
of Ireland. Everywhere there is the same revival. New labourers'
cottages dot the landscape, and the old mud cabins are crumbling
back--"dust to dust"--into nothingness. Cultivation is improving. The
new peasant proprietors are putting real work into the land which they
now own, and there is an advance even in dress and manners. Drinking is
said to be on the decline, and the natural gaiety of the Irish people,
so sadly overshadowed during the last half-century, is beginning to
return.
It is like the clearing of the sky after long rain and storm. The
clouds have, for the moment, rolled away towards the horizon, and the
blue is appearing. Will the clouds return, or is this improvement to be
sure and lasting? That will depend on the events of the next few years.
* * * * *
What has produced this great change in the situation since 1893? To
answer that question we must look at the Statute Book. We shall then
realise that defeat in the division lobbies was not the end of Mr.
Gladstone's policy in 1886 and 1893. That policy has since borne rich
fruit. It has been largely carried into effect by the very men who
opposed and denounced it. Not even they could make the sun stand still
in the heavens.
The Tories and Liberal dissentients who defeated Mr. Gladstone gave us
no promise of these concessions. The only policy of the Tory Party at
that time was expressed by Lord Salisbury in the famous phrase, "Twenty
years of resolute government." Although the Liberal Unionists were
inclined to some concession on local government, Lord Salisbury himself
held the opinion that the grant of local government to Ireland would be
even more dangerous to the United Kingdom than the grant of Home
Rule.[23]
If we turn back, indeed, to the early Parliamentary debates and the
speeches in the country, we find that Mr. Chamberlain in 1886
concentrated his attack rather on Mr. Gladstone's Land Bill[24] than on
his Home Rule scheme. In his speech on the second reading of the 1886
Bill, indeed, Mr. Chamberlain proclaimed himself a Home Ruler on a
larger scale than Mr. Gladstone--a federal Home Ruler. But in the
country, he brought every resource of his intellect to oppose the
scheme of land purchase.
Similarly with John Bright. Lord Morley, in his "Life of Gladstone,"
describes Bright's speech on July 1st, 1886, as the "death warrant" of
the first Home Rule Bill. But if we turn to that speech we find that
Bright, too, based his opposition to Home Rule almost entirely on his
hatred of the great land purchase scheme of that year. He called it a
"most monstrous proposal." "If it were not for a Bill like this," he
said, "to alter the Government of Ireland, to revolutionise it, no one
would dream of this extravagant and monstrous proposition in regard to
Irish land; and if the political proposition makes the economic
necessary, then the economic or land purchase proposition, in my
opinion, absolutely condemns the political proposition." In other
words, John Bright held to the view that it was the necessity for the
Irish Land Bill of 1886 which condemned the Home Rule Bill of that
year.
So powerfully did that argument work on the feelings of the British
public that in the Home Rule Bill of 1893, not only was the land
purchase proposition dropped, but in its place a clause was actually
inserted forbidding the new Irish Parliament to pass any legislation
"respecting the relations of landlord and tenant for the sale, purchase
or re-letting of land" for a period of three years after the passing of
the Act.[25]
So anxious was Mr. Gladstone to show to the English people that Home
Rule could be given to Ireland without the necessity of expenditure on
land purchase, and with comparative safety to the continuance of the
landlord system in Ireland!
Such was the record on these questions up to the year 1895, when the
Unionists brought the short Liberal Parliament to a close, and entered
upon a period of ten years' power, sustained in two elections with a
Parliamentary majority of 150 in 1895 and of 130 in 1900.
But the biggest Parliamentary majorities have limits to their powers.
Crises arise. Accidents happen. There is always a shadow of coming doom
hanging over the most powerful Parliamentary Governments. With it comes
an anxiety to settle matters in their own way, before they can be
settled in a way which they dislike. Thus it is that we find that
between 1895 and 1905, during that ten years of Unionist power, two
great steps were taken towards a peaceful settlement of the Irish
question.
One was the Irish Local Government Act of 1898, which extended to
Ireland the system of local government already granted in 1889 to the
country districts of England. The other was the great Land Purchase Act
of 1903, which carried out Mr. Gladstone's policy of 1886, and set on
foot a gigantic scheme of land-transference from Irish landlord to
Irish tenant. That scheme is still to-day in process of completion.
It is these two Acts which have largely changed the face of Ireland.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Take first the Act of 1898. Up to that year the county government of
Ireland was carried on entirely by a system of grand jurors, consisting
chiefly of magistrates, and selected almost entirely from the
Protestant minority. These gentlemen assembled at stated times, and
settled all the local concerns of Ireland, fixing the rates, deciding
on the expenditure, and carrying out all the local Acts. They formed,
with Dublin Castle, part of the great machinery of Protestant
Ascendancy. Very few Catholics penetrated within that sacred circle.
These gentlemen, even now for the most part Protestants, still hold the
power of justice. But the power of local government has passed from
their hands. Every county of Ireland now has its County Council.
Beneath the County Councils there are also District Councils exercising
in Ireland, as in England, the powers of Boards of Guardians. Neither
the Irish counties nor the corporations of Ireland's great cities have
power over their police. There are no Irish Parish Councils. Otherwise
Ireland now possesses powers of local government almost as complete as
those of England and Scotland.
How has this system worked? In the discussions that preceded the
establishment of local government in Ireland we heard many prophecies
of doom. So great was the fear of trusting Ireland with any powers of
self-government that the Unionists actually proposed, in 1892, a Local
Government Bill, which would have established local bodies subject to
special powers of punishment and coercion.[26]
It was with much fear and trembling, then, that the Protestant Party in
Ireland entered upon the new period of local government. As a matter of
fact, all these fears have been falsified. Instead of proving
inefficient and corrupt, the Irish County Councils have gained the
praises of all parties. They have received testimonials in nearly every
report of the Irish Local Government Board. If, indeed, they possess
any fault, it is that they are too thrifty and economical.[27]
In one respect, indeed, these County and District Councils of Ireland
have conspicuously surpassed the corresponding bodies that exist in
England.
One of the most important measures passed by the British Parliament
during this period of Irish revival has been the Irish Labourers' Act.
It was one of the first measures passed by the new Liberal Parliament
of 1906, and it has been since often amended and supplemented. But its
main provisions still stand. In this Act the Imperial Government grants
to the local authorities in Ireland loans at cheap rates for the
purpose of re-housing the Irish agricultural labourers. It places the
whole administration of these loans in the hands of the Irish District
Councils--a very delicate and difficult task.
So efficiently have the District Councils done their work that more
than half the Irish labourers have already been re-housed. It is fully
expected that within a few years the whole Irish agricultural labouring
population will have received under this Act good houses, accompanied
always with a plot of land at a small rent.
Compare with this the administration of the Small Holdings Act by the
English local authorities. That Act, passed in 1908, placed the actual
allocation of small holdings in the hands of the English County
Councils. It is not necessary to dwell here upon the notorious failure
of most of the high hopes with which that measure was passed through
the British Parliament. The cause of that failure is obvious. The
promise of the Small Holdings Act has been practically destroyed by the
refusal of the County Councils to throw either goodwill or efficiency
into its administration.
LAND PURCHASE
But the second of the two great renovating measures--the Irish Land
Purchase Act of 1903--has contributed even more powerfully than the
first to the recovery of Ireland during the last ten years. There again
we have a great instance of the supremacy of the spirit of Parliament
over the prejudices of Party. The whole tendency of democratic
government is so rootedly opposed to coercion that it is difficult for
any party to continue on purely coercive lines for any long period. And
yet, as Mr. Gladstone always pointed out with such prescience, the only
alternatives in Ireland were either coercion or government according to
Irish ideas.
Now, the most noted Irish idea was the desire for personal ownership of
the soil by the cultivator himself. In the years 1901 and 1902, just
when the Unionists were embarrassed with all the complications of the
South African trouble, the Tory Government were faced again with this
imperious desire. They found arising in Ireland a new revolt against
the power of the landlords. The Land Courts of Ireland, set up under
the Act of 1881, had given to the Irish tenant two revisions of
rent--the first in 1882, and the second in 1896--amounting in all to
nearly 40 per cent. But these sweeping reductions had produced a new
trouble. They had brought about a state of acute hostility between
landlord and tenant without any real control of the land by either. The
landlords, deprived of their powers of eviction and rent-raising, were
in a state of sullen fury. The tenants had made the fatal discovery
that their best interest lay in bad cultivation. Both parties were
opposed to the existing land administration, and the Irish people were
on the eve of another great effort to attain their ideals.
The Tory Government of 1902-3, then, either had to change the whole
system, or they had to enter upon a new period of coercion with a view
of suppressing the increased passion of the tenants for the full
possession of the land. Looking down such a vista, the Irish landlords
themselves could see nothing but ruin at the end. The Irish tenants
might suffer, indeed, but they would be able to drag down their
landlords in the common ruin along with them. The prospect facing the
Irish landlord was nothing less than the entire, gradual disappearance
of all rent.
With such a black prospect ahead, the time was ripe for a remarkable
new movement, started by two distinguished Irishmen--Mr. William
O'Brien on the side of the tenants, and Lord Dunraven on the side of
the landlords. The omens were auspicious. Lord Cadogan, one of the old
guard, had retired from the Viceroyalty, and had been succeeded in 1902
by a younger and more open-minded man, Lord Dudley. A still more
remarkable man, Sir Anthony MacDonnell (now Lord MacDonnell) had been
appointed to the Under-Secretaryship of Dublin Castle under
circumstances which have not even yet been clearly explained. Sir
Anthony MacDonnell was known to be a Nationalist, although his
Nationalist tendencies had been strongly modified by a prolonged and
distinguished career in India. Mr. Wyndham, then Chief Secretary, made
the remarkable statement that Sir Anthony MacDonnell was "invited by me
rather as a colleague than as a mere Under-Secretary to register my
will." There is, indeed, no doubt that if the full facts were known, it
would be found that the new Under-Secretary was appointed on terms
which practically implied the adoption of a new Irish policy by the
Tory Government. In other words, the party which is at the present
moment (1912) entering upon an uncompromising fight against Home Rule
was, in 1903, contemplating a policy not far removed from that very
idea.
In the mind of Sir Anthony MacDonnell himself--and probably of several
members of the Government--the policy took two forms. One was to settle
the problem of Irish land, and the other was to settle the problem of
Irish Government.
The first of these great enterprises went through with remarkable
smoothness. Both landlords and tenants were weary of the strife, and
ready for peace on terms. The leaden, merciless pressure of the great
Land Courts set up by Mr. Gladstone's Act of 1881 had gradually worn
down the dour and obstinate wills of the Irish landlords. The very men
who had denounced land purchase as the worst element in the scheme of
1886 were now enthusiastic on its behalf. The only opposition that
could have come to such a scheme was from the House of Lords, and the
opposition of the House of Lords, as we all know, did not exist in
those blessed years. Mr. Wyndham was sanguine and enthusiastic, and
both Irish tenants and Irish landlords found a common term of agreement
in mutual generosity at the expense of the taxpayer. With the help of
that taxpayer--commonly called "British," but including, be it
remembered, the Irish taxpayer also--the landlords were able to go off
with a generous bonus, and the tenants were able to obtain prospective
possession of their farms, while paying for a period of years an annual
instalment considerably less than their old rent.
The terms to both landlords and tenants were so favourable that the Act
of 1903 was, after a short period of pause, followed in Ireland by
results which transcended the expectations of Parliament. There was a
rush on one side to sell, and on the other to buy. From 1904 to 1909
the applications kept streaming in, and the Land Commissioners were
kept at high pressure arranging the sale of estates. The pace, indeed,
was so rapid that it laid too heavy a strain on the too sanguine
finance of Mr. Wyndham's Act. The double burden of the war and Irish
land proved too great. The British Treasury found that they could not
pour out money at the rate demanded by the working of the Act. In 1909
it was found necessary to pass an amending Act, which has given rise to
fierce controversy in Ireland. That Act slightly modified the generous
terms of the Act of 1903, but not before under those terms a revolution
had already been effected. Practically half the land of Ireland had
passed before 1909 from the hands of the landlords into those of the
tenants.
Even on the new terms the process will go on. By voluntary means if
possible, but if not, by compulsion, the land of Ireland will pass back
within twenty years into the hands of the people.
* * * * *
Here, then--in land purchase and the new machinery of local
government--are the two leading facts in the great change which had
come over Ireland since 1893. What do they signify?
Why, this. In 1886 and 1893 the Unionists pointed out, not without some
heat and passion, two main difficulties in the path to Home Rule. One
was the incompetence of the Irish people for local government. "They
are by character incapable of self-rule," was the cry; and we all
remember how Mr. Gladstone humorously described this incapacity as a
"double dose of original sin."
That incapacity has been disproved. The Irish have been shown to be
fully as capable of self-government as the English, Scotch, and Welsh.
The other great difficulty was the unsolved land question. "We cannot
desert the English garrison--the Irish landlords," was the cry. "We
cannot trust the Irish people to treat them justly." But the Irish land
question is now settled. The Irish landlords are either gone or going.
The Irish tenants are becoming peasant-proprietors. All that is
required now is a national authority to stand as trustee and guardian
of the Irish peasantry in paying their debt to the British people--or,
perhaps, even if the material condition of Ireland under Home Rule
should justify that course, to take over the debt. That is the new
"felt want," and the only way to supply it is to create a responsible
Irish self-governing Parliament.
Thus the two principal changes in Ireland since 1893 have not weakened,
but immensely strengthened, the case for Home Rule.
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES:
[12] See Appendix B.
[13] Appendix B (4), 31,000 in 1911, the lowest figure since the
Famine. There is a similar decline in the number of the Migratory
Labourers, from 15,000 in 1907 to 10,000 in 1910 (Cd. 6019).
[14] Appendix B (2) and (3). 2,000 families and nearly 3,000 inhabited
houses.
[15] The yield of Irish income tax is practically stationary at
£1,000,000, as against £30,000,000 yielded by Great Britain. (Inland
Revenue Report, 1910-11, page 100.) The assessment to income tax is
£40,000,000 for Ireland, as against £93,000,000 for Scotland (with
about the same population), and £878,000,000 for England.
[16] See Appendix F. The diminution is from 99,000 to 80,000.
[17] The deaths from consumption in Ireland declined from 10,594 in
1909 to 10,016 in 1910. (Irish Registrar-General's Report, 1911, p.
xxvi.)
[18] See Appendix B.
[19] The most trustworthy thermometer of Irish trade is to be found in
the volume now yearly issued by the Irish Government--the Report on the
Trade in Imports and Exports at Irish Ports. In the absence of Irish
Customs there must be some uncertainty in the tests, but the Government
figures are collected from the "manifests" of exporters and importers.
(The latest report comes up to the 31st December, 1910. Cd. 5965.)
[20] The growth of Irish trade since 1900 can be seen at a glance in
the following table (including exports and imports):--
£
1904 103,790,799
1905 106,973,043
1906 113,208,940
1907 120,572,755
1908 116,120,618
1909 124,725,895
1910 130,888,732
[21] The export of manufactured goods increased from £20,000,000 in
1906 to £26,000,000 in 1910. Those goods consisted mostly of linen and
ships from Belfast. The export of farm stuffs increased from
£31,000,000 in 1905 to £35,000,000 in 1910.
[22] Ireland now exports into England three times as much live stock as
any other country. She imports more potatoes and poultry than any
other. She also stands in butter only second to Denmark, in eggs only
second to Russia, and in bacon and hams only third to the United States
and Denmark (Cd. 5966).
[23] "Local authorities are more exposed to the temptation of enabling
the majority to be unjust to the minority when they obtain jurisdiction
over a small area, than is the case when the authority derives its
sanction and extends its jurisdiction over a wider area. In a large
central authority the wisdom of several parts of the country will
correct the folly and mistakes of one. In a local authority that
correction is to a much greater extent wanting, and it would be
impossible to leave that out of sight in any extension of any such
local authority in Ireland."--Lord Salisbury (1885).
[24] Proposing to buy out the Irish landlords at an estimated cost of
£100,000,000.
[25] See Appendix D for a summary of the 1893 Home Rule Bill.
[26] It was named by Mr. Sexton the "Put 'em in the dock Bill," and
that phrase practically killed it.
[27] See the Local Government Board Reports _passim_:--
"Before concluding our reference to the Local Government Act we may be
permitted to observe that the predictions of those who affirmed that
the new local bodies entrusted with the administration of a complex
system of County Government would inevitably break down have certainly
not been verified. On the contrary, the County and District Councils
have, with few exceptions, properly discharged the statutory duties
devolving upon them. Instances have, no doubt, occurred in which these
bodies have, owing to inexperience and to an inadequate staff, found
themselves in difficulties and have had to receive some special
assistance from us in regulating their affairs; but this has been of
rare occurrence." (Annual Report of the Irish Local Government Board
for year ending March, 1900.)
"In no other matter have the Councils been more successful than in
their financial administration. After the heavy preliminary expenses
necessarily attending the introduction of a new system of local
government had been provided for, and the Councils and their officers
had succeeded in obtaining a satisfactory basis on which to make their
estimates of future expenditure, they found it possible to effect
considerable reductions in their rates, and there seems to be every
reason to anticipate that, with extended experience, there will be a
still further general reduction of county rates." (Annual Report of the
Irish Local Government Board for year ending March, 1902.)
Our impression as travellers was that the Irish County Councils do not
yet spend enough money on their roads.
THE HOME RULE CASE
THE CASE THAT HAS CHANGED--(CONTINUED)
i.--THE CONGESTED DISTRICTS
ii.--THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE
iii.--OLD-AGE PENSIONS
iv.--THE UNIVERSITIES
"Although while I live I shall oppose separation, yet it is my
opinion that continuing the Legislative Union must endanger the
connection."
O'CONNELL
(1834).