PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT AND PROPAGANDA
By the death of the Duke of Abercorn on the 3rd of January, 1913, the
Ulster Loyalists lost a leader who had for many years occupied a very
special place in their affection and confidence. Owing to failing health
he had been unable to take an active part in the exciting events of the
past two years, but the messages of encouragement and support which were
read from him at Craigavon, Balmoral, and other meetings for organising
resistance, were always received with an enthusiasm which showed, and
was intended to show, that the great part he had played in former years,
and especially his inspiring leadership as Chairman of the Ulster
Convention in 1893, had never been forgotten.
His death inflicted also, indirectly, another blow which at this
particular moment was galling to loyalists out of all proportion to its
intrinsic importance. The removal to the House of Lords of the Marquis
of Hamilton, the member for Derry city, created a vacancy which was
filled at the ensuing by-election by a Liberal Home Ruler. To lose a
seat anywhere in the north-eastern counties at such a critical time in
the movement was bad enough, but the unfading halo of the historic siege
rested on Derry as on a sanctuary of Protestantism and loyalty, so that
the capture of the "Maiden City" by the enemy wounded loyalist sentiment
far more deeply than the loss of any other constituency. The two parties
had been for some time very nearly evenly balanced there, and every
electioneering art and device, including that of bringing to the poll
voters who had long rested in the cemetery, was practised in Derry with
unfailing zeal and zest by party managers. For some time past trade,
especially ship-building, had been in a state of depression in Derry,
with the result that a good many of the better class of artisans, who
were uniformly Unionist, had gone to Belfast and elsewhere to find work,
leaving the political fortunes of the city at the mercy of the casual
labourer who drifted in from the wilds of Donegal, and who at this
election managed to place the Home Rule candidate in a majority of
fifty-seven.
It was a matter of course that the late Duke's place as President of the
Ulster Unionist Council should be taken by Lord Londonderry, and it
happened that the annual meeting at which he was formally elected was
held on the same day that witnessed the rejection of the Home Rule Bill
by the House of Lords.
It was also at this annual meeting (31st January, 1913) that the special
Commission who had been charged to prepare a scheme for the Provisional
Government, presented their draft Report. The work had been done with
great thoroughness and was adopted without substantial alteration by the
Council, but was not made public for several months. The Council itself
was, in the event of the Provisional Government being set up, to
constitute a "Central Authority," and provision was made, with complete
elaboration of detail, for carrying on all the necessary departments of
administration by different Committees and Boards, whose respective
functions were clearly defined. Among those who consented to serve in
these departmental Committees, in addition to the recognised local
leaders in the Ulster Movement, were Dr. Crozier, Archbishop of Armagh,
the Moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in
Ireland, Lord Charles Beresford, Major-General Montgomery, Colonel
Thomas Hickman, M.P., Lord Claud Hamilton, M.P., Sir Robert Kennedy,
K.C.M.G., and Sir Charles Macnaghten, K.C., son of Lord Macnaghten, the
distinguished Lord of Appeal. Ulster at this time gave a lead on the
question of admitting women to political power, at a time when their
claim to enfranchisement was being strenuously resisted in England, by
including several women in the Provisional Government.
A most carefully drawn scheme for a separate judiciary in Ulster had
been prepared with the assistance of some of the ablest lawyers in
Ireland. It was in three parts, dealing respectively with (a) the
Supreme Court, (b) the Land Commission, and (c) County Courts; it was
drawn up as an Ordinance, in the usual form of a Parliamentary Bill, and
it is an indication of the spirit in which Ulster was preparing to
resist an Act of Parliament that the Ordinance bore the introductory
heading: "_It is Hereby Enacted by the Central Authority in the name of
the King's Most Excellent Majesty that_------" Similarly, the form of
"Oath or Declaration of Adherence" to be taken by Judges, Magistrates,
Coroners, and other officers of the Courts, set out in a Schedule to the
Ordinance, was: "I ... of ... being about to serve in the Courts of the
Provisional Government as the Central Authority for His Majesty the
King, etc."
It will be remembered that the original resolution by which the Council
decided to set up a Provisional Government limited its duration until
Ulster should "again resume unimpaired her citizenship in the United
Kingdom,"[48] and at a later date it was explicitly stated that it was
to act as trustee for the Imperial Parliament. All the forms prepared
for use while it remained in being purported to be issued in the name of
the King. And the Resolution adopted by the Unionist Council immediately
after constituting itself the Central Authority of the Provisional
Government, in which the reasons for that policy were recorded,
concluded with the statement that "we, for our part, in the course we
have determined to pursue, are inspired not alone by regard to the true
welfare of our own country, but by devotion to the interests of our
world-wide Empire and loyalty to our beloved King." If this was the
language of rebels, it struck a note that can never before have been
heard in a chorus of disaffection.
The demonstrations against the Government's policy which had been held
during the last eighteen months, of which some account has been given,
were so impressive that those which followed were inevitably less
remarkable by comparison. They were, too, necessarily to a large
extent, repetitions of what had gone before. There might be, and there
were, plenty of variations on the old theme, but there was no new theme
to introduce. Propaganda to the extent possible with the resources at
the disposal of the Ulster Unionist Council was carried on in the
British constituencies in 1913, the cost being defrayed chiefly through
generous subscriptions collected by the energy and influence of Mr.
Walter Long; but many were beginning to share the opinion of Mr. Charles
Craig, M.P., who scandalised the Radicals by saying at Antrim in March
that, while it was incumbent on Ulstermen to do their best to educate
the electorate, "he believed that, as an argument, ten thousand pounds
spent on rifles would be a thousand times stronger than the same amount
spent on meetings, speeches, and pamphlets."
On the 27th of March a letter appeared in the London newspapers
announcing the formation of a "British League for the support of Ulster
and the Union," with an office in London. It was signed by a hundred
Peers and 120 Unionist Members of the House of Commons. The manifesto
emphasised the Imperial aspect of the great struggle that was going on,
asserting that it was "quite clear that the men of Ulster are not
fighting only for their own liberties. Ulster will be the field on which
the privileges of the whole nation will be lost or won." A small
executive Committee was appointed, with the Duke of Bedford as Chairman,
and within a few weeks large numbers of people in all parts of the
country joined the new organisation. A conference attended by upwards of
150 honorary agents from all parts of the country was held at
Londonderry House on the 4th of June, where the work of the League was
discussed, and its future policy arranged. Its operations were not
ostentatious, but they were far from being negligible, especially in
connection with later developments of the movement in the following
year. This proof of British support was most encouraging to the people
of Ulster, and the Dublin correspondent of _The Times_ reported that it
gave no less satisfaction to loyalists in other parts of Ireland, among
whom, as the position became more desperate every day, there was "not
the least sign of giving way, of accepting the inevitable."
Every month that passed in uncertainty as to what fate was reserved for
Ulster, and especially every visit of the leader to Belfast, endeared
him more intensely to his followers, who had long since learnt to give
him their unquestioning trust; and his bereavement by the death of his
wife in April 1913 brought him the profound and affectionate sympathy of
a warm-hearted people, which manifested itself in most moving fashion at
a great meeting a month later on the 16th of May, when, at the opening
of a new drill hall in the most industrial district of Belfast, Sir
Edward exclaimed, in response to a tumultuous reception, "Heaven knows,
my one affection left me is my love of Ireland."
He took occasion at the same meeting to impress upon his followers the
spirit by which all their actions should be guided, and which always
guided his own. With a significant reference to the purposes for which
the new drill hall might be used, he added, "Always remember--this is
essential--always remember you have no quarrel with individuals. We
welcome and we love every individual Irishman, even though he may be
opposed to us. Our quarrel is with the Government." When the feelings of
masses of men are deeply stirred in political conflict such exhortations
are never superfluous; and there never was a leader who could give them
with better grace than Sir Edward Carson, who himself combined to an
extraordinary degree strength of conviction with entire freedom from
bitterness towards individual opponents.[49]
In this same speech he showed that there was no slackening of
determination to pursue to the end the policy of the Covenant. There had
been rumours that the Government were making secret inquiries with a
view to taking legal proceedings, and in allusion to them Carson moved
his audience to one of the most wonderful demonstrations of personal
devotion that even he ever evoked, by saying: "If they want to test the
legality of anything we are doing, let them not attack humble men--I am
responsible for everything, and they know where to find me."
The Bill was running its course for the second time through Parliament,
a course that was now farcically perfunctory, and Carson returned to
London to repeat in the House of Commons on the 10th of June his defiant
acceptance of responsibility for the Ulster preparations. He was back in
Belfast for the 12th of July celebrations, when 150,000 Orangemen
assembled at Craigavon to hear another speech from their leader full of
confident challenge, and to receive another message of encouragement
from Mr. Bonar Law, who assured them that "whatever steps they might
feel compelled to take, whether they were constitutional, or whether in
the long run they were unconstitutional, they had the whole of the
Unionist Party under his leadership behind them."
The leader of the Unionist Party had good reason to know that his
message to Ulster was endorsed by his followers. That had been
demonstrated beyond all possibility of doubt during the preceding month.
The Ulster Unionist Members of the House of Commons, with Carson at
their head, had during June made a tour of some of the principal towns
of Scotland and the North of England, receiving a resounding welcome
wherever they went. The usual custom of political meetings, where one or
two prominent speakers have the platform to themselves, was departed
from; the whole parliamentary contingent kept together throughout the
tour as a deputation from Ulster to the constituencies visited, taking
in turn the duty of supporting Carson, who was everywhere the principal
speaker.
There were wonderful demonstrations at Glasgow and Edinburgh, both in
the streets and the principal halls, proving, as was aptly said by _The
Yorkshire Post_, that "the cry of the new Covenanters is not unheeded by
the descendants of the old"; and thence they went south, drawing great
cheering crowds to welcome them and to present encouraging addresses at
the railway stations at Berwick, Newcastle, Darlington, and York, to
Leeds, where the two largest buildings in the city were packed to
overflowing with Yorkshiremen eager to see and hear the Ulster leader,
and to show their sympathy with the loyalist cause. Similar scenes were
witnessed at Norwich and Bristol, and the tour left no doubt in the
minds of those who followed it, and who studied the comments of the
Press upon it, that not only was the whole Unionist Party in Great
Britain solidly behind the Ulstermen in their resolve to resist being
subjected to a Parliament in Dublin, but that the general drift of
opinion detached from party was increasingly on the same side.
FOOTNOTES:
[48] See _ante_, p. 53.
[49] But he could be moved to stern indignation by the treachery of
former friends, as he showed in December 1921.