Speeches on Questions of Public Policy Part 17

I will tell you fairly that you, as the less populous and less powerful part of this great nation--you of all the men in the United Kingdom, have by far the strongest interest in a thorough reform of the Imperial Parliament, and I believe that you yourselves could not do yourselves such complete justice by yourselves as you can do, by fairly acting with the generous millions of my countrymen in whose name I stand here. You have on this platform two members of the Reform League from London. I received yesterday, or the day before, a telegram from the Scottish Reform League, from Glasgow. I am not sure whether there is a copy of it in any of the newspapers, but it was sent to me, and I presume it was sent to me that I might read it, if I had the opportunity of meeting any of the unenfranchised men of this city. It says:--'The Scottish Reform League request you to convey to the Reformers in Ireland their deep sympathy. They sincerely hope that soon in Ireland, as in Scotland and England, Reform Leagues may be formed in every town to secure to the people their political rights. Urge upon our friends in Ireland their duty to promote this great movement, and to secure at home those benefits which thousands of their fellow-countrymen are forced to seek in other lands--where land and State Church grievances are unknown. We also seek cooperation, knowing that our freedom, though secure tomorrow, would not be safe so long as one portion of the United Kingdom were less free than the other portions.' There is the outspoken voice of the representatives of that great mult.i.tude that only a fortnight since I saw pa.s.sing through the streets of Glasgow. For three hours the procession pa.s.sed, with all the emblems and symbols of their various trades, and the streets for two or three miles were enlivened by banners, and the air was filled with the sounds of music from their bands. Those men but spoke the same language that was heard in the West Riding, in Manchester, in Birmingham, and in London; and you men of Dublin, and of Ireland, you never made a mistake more grievous in your lives than when you come to the conclusion that there are not millions of men in Great Britain willing to do you full justice.

I am very sorry that my voice is not what it was, and when I think of the work that is to be done sometimes I feel it is a pity we grow old so fast. But years ago, when I have thought of the condition of Ireland, of its sorrows and wrongs, of the discredit that its condition has brought upon the English, the Irish, and the British name, I have thought, if I could be in all other things the same, but by birth an Irishman, there is not a town in this island I would not visit for the purpose of discussing the great Irish question, and of rousing my countrymen to some great and united action.

I do not believe in the necessity of wide-spread and perpetual misery. I do not believe that we are placed on this island, and on this earth, that one man may be great and wealthy, and revel in every profuse indulgence, and five, six, nine, or ten men shall suffer the abject misery which we see so commonly in the world. With your soil, your climate, and your active and spirited race, I know not what you might not do. There have been reasons to my mind why soil and climate, and the labour of your population, have not produced general comfort and competence for all.

The Address speaks of the friendly feeling and the sympathy which I have had for Ireland during my political career. When I first went into the House of Commons the most prominent figure in it was Daniel O'Connell. I have sat by his side for hours in that House, and listened to observations both amusing and instructive on what was pa.s.sing under discussion. I have seen him, too, more than once upon the platforms of the Anti-Corn-law League. I recollect that on one occasion he sent to Ireland expressly for a newspaper for me, which contained a report of a speech which he made against the Corn-law when the Corn-law was pa.s.sing through Parliament in 1815, and we owe much to his exertions in connection with that question, for almost the whole Liberal--I suppose the whole Liberal--party of the Irish representatives in Parliament supported the measure of free trade of which we were the prominent advocates; and I know of nothing that was favourable to freedom, whether in connection with Ireland or England, that O'Connell did not support with all his great powers. Why is it, now, that there should be any kind of schism between the Liberal people of Ireland and the Liberal people of Great Britain? I do not ask you to join hands with supremacy and oppression, whether in your island or ours. What I ask you is, to open your heart of hearts, and join hands for a real and thorough working union for freedom with the people of Great Britain.

Before I sit down, I must be allowed to advert to a point which has been much commented upon--a sentence in my speech made the other night with regard to the land. There are newspapers in Dublin which I need not name, because I am quite sure you can find them out--which do not feel any strong desire to judge fairly anything I may propose for the pacification and redemption of the people of Ireland. It was this I said: 'It is of the first importance that the people of Ireland, by some process or other, should have the opportunity of being made the possessors of their own soil.' You will know perfectly well that I am not about to propose a copy of the villainous crimes of two hundred years ago, to confiscate the lands of the proprietors, here or elsewhere. I propose to introduce a system which would gradually, no doubt rapidly and easily, without injuring anybody, make many thousands who are now tenant-farmers, without lease and security, the owners of their farms in this island. This is my plan, and I want to restate it with a little further explanation, in order that these gentlemen to whom I have referred may not repeat the very untrue, and I may say dishonourable comments which they have made upon me.

There are many large estates in Ireland which belong to rich families in England,--families not only of the highest rank, but of the highest character,--because I will venture to say there are not to be found amongst the English n.o.bility families of more perfect honourableness and worth than some of those to whom my plan would be offered; and, therefore, I am not speaking against the aristocracy, against those families, or against property, or against anybody, or against anything that is good. I say, that if Parliament were to appoint a Commission, and give it, say, at first up to the amount of five millions sterling, the power to negotiate or treat with those great families in England who have estates in Ireland, it is probable that some of those great estates might be bought at a not very unreasonable price. I am of opinion that this would be the cheapest money that the Imperial Parliament ever expended, even though it became possessed of those estates at a price considerably above the market price. But I propose it should be worked in this way. I will take a case. I will a.s.sume that this Commission is in possession of a considerable estate bought from some present owner of it. I will take one farm, which I will a.s.sume to be worth 1,000_l_., for which the present tenant is paying a rent of 50_l_. a-year. He has no lease. He has no security. He makes almost no improvement of any kind; and he is not quite sure whether, when he has saved a little more money, he will not take his family off to the United States. Now we will a.s.sume ourselves, if you like, to be that Commission, and that we have before us the farmer who is the tenant on that particular farm, for which he pays 50_l_. a year, without lease or security, and which I a.s.sume to be worth 1,000_l_. The Government, I believe, lends money to Irish landowners for drainage purposes at about 3-1/2 per cent. per annum. Suppose the Government were to say to this farmer, 'You would not have any objection to become possessed of this farm?' 'No, not the slightest,' he might answer, 'but how is that to be done?' In this way;--You may pay 50_l_. a-year, that is, 5 per cent. on one thousand pounds; the Government can afford to do these transactions for 3-1/2 per cent.; if you will pay 60_l_. a-year for a given number of years, which any of the actuaries of the insurance offices or any good arithmetician may soon calculate,--if you will pay 60_l_. for your rent, instead of 50_l_., it may be for perhaps twenty years,--at the end of that time the farm will be yours, without any further payment.

I want you to understand how this is. If the farmer paid ten pounds a- year more than he now pays, towards buying his farm, and if the 1,000_l_. the Government would pay for the farm would not cost the Government more than 35_l_., the difference between 35_l_. and 60_l_. being 25_l_., would be the sum which that farmer, in his rent, would be paying to the Commission, that is, to the Government, for the redemption of his farm. Thus, at the end of a very few years, the farmer would possess his own farm, having a perfect security in the meantime. n.o.body could turn him out if he paid his rent, and n.o.body could rob him for any improvement he made on his land. The next morning after he made that agreement, he would explain it to his wife and to his big boy, who had perhaps been idling about for a long time, and there would not be a stone on the land that would not be removed, not a weed that he would not pull up, not a particle of manure that he would not save; everything would be done with a zeal and an enthusiasm which he had never known before; and by the time the few years had run on when the farm should become his without any further purchase, he would have turned a dilapidated, miserable little farm into a garden for himself and family. Now, this statement may be commented on by some of the newspapers. You will understand that I do not propose a forced purchase, or any confiscation. I would undertake even to give--if I were the Government--to every one of these landlords twenty per cent more for his estate than it will fetch in the market in London or in Dublin, and I say that to do this would produce a marvellous change in the sentiments of the people, and in the condition of agriculture in Ireland.

But I saw in one of the papers a question to which I may give a reply.

It was said, How would you like to have a Commission come down into Lancas.h.i.+re and insist on buying your factories? I can only say that if they will give me 20 per cent, or 10 per cent, more than they are worth, they shall have them to-morrow. But I do not propose that the Commission should come here and insist on buying these estates. They say, further, Why should a man in Ireland keep his estate, and not a man in England who has an estate in Ireland? There is this difference. A man in Ireland, if he has an estate of 10,000 acres, has in it probably his ancestral home. He has ties to this which it would be monstrous to think of severing in such a manner. But a man living in England, who is not an Irishman, and who never comes over here except to receive his rents (which, in fact, he generally receives through his bankers in London), who has no particular tie to this country, and who comes over here occasionally merely because he feels that, as a great proprietor in Ireland, it would be scandalous never to show his face on his property and amongst his tenants--to such a man there would be no hards.h.i.+p if he should part with his land at a fair price.

I have been charged with saying severe things of the English aristocracy. Now, this is not true in the sense in which it is imputed to me. I have always said that there are many men in the English aristocracy who would be n.o.blemen in the sight of their fellow-men although they had no t.i.tles and no coronets. There are men amongst them of as undoubted patriotism as any man in this building, or in this island, and there are men amongst them, who when they saw that a great public object was to be gained for the benefit of their fellow-men, would make as great sacrifices as any one of us would be willing to do.

I am of opinion therefore--I may be wrong, but I will not believe it until it is proved--I am of opinion that if this question were discussed in Parliament when next the Irish land question is discussed, and if there was a general sentiment in the House of Commons that some measure like this would be advantageous for Ireland,--and if it were so expressed, it may be a.s.sumed that it would be accepted to a large extent by the people of the United Kingdom,--then I think that a Commission so appointed would find no difficulty whatever in discovering n.o.blemen and rich men in England, who are the possessors of great estates in Ireland, who would be willing to negotiate for their transfer, and that Commission, by the process I have indicated, might transfer them gradually but speedily to the tenant-farmers of this country.

I am told that I have not been much in Ireland, and do not know much of it. I recollect a man in England during the American war asking me a question about America. When I gave him an answer which did not agree with his opinion, he said, 'I think you have never been in America, have you?' I said I had not; and he replied, 'Well, I have been there three times, and I know something of them.' He was asking me whether I thought the Yankees would pay when they borrowed money to carry on the war; and I thought they would. But, as he had been there, he thought his opinion was worth more than mine. I told him I knew several people who had lived in England all their lives and yet knew very little about England. I am told that if I were to live in Ireland, amongst the people I should have a different opinion; that I should think the State Church of a small minority was honest, in the face of the great Church of the majority; that I should think it was not the fault of the landowners or of the law in any degree, but the fault of the tenants, that everything went wrong with regard to the land; and that I should find that it was the Government that was mostly right, and the legislation right, and that it was the people that were mostly wrong. There are certain questions with regard to any country that you may settle in your own house, never having seen that country even upon a map. This you may settle, that what is just is just everywhere, and that men, from those of the highest culture even to those of the most moderate capacity, whatever may be their race, whatever their colour, have implanted in their hearts by their Creator, wiser much than my critics, the knowledge and the love of justice. I will tell you that, since the day when I sat beside O'Connell--and at an earlier day--I have considered this question of Ireland. In 1849, for several weeks in the autumn, and for several weeks in the autumn of 1852, I came to Ireland expressly to examine this question by consulting with all cla.s.ses of the people in every part of the island. I will undertake to say that I believe there is no man in England who has more fully studied the evidence given before the celebrated Devon Commission in regard to Ireland than I have. Therefore I dare stand up before any Irishman or Englishman to discuss the Irish question. I say that the plans, the theories, the policy, the legislation of my opponents in this matter all have failed signally, deplorably, disastrously, ignominiously, and, therefore, I say that I have a right to come in and offer the people of Ireland, as I would offer to the people of Great Britain and the Imperial Parliament, a wise and just policy upon this question.

You know that I have attended great meetings in England within the last two months, and in Scotland also. I think I am at liberty to tender to you from those hundreds of thousands of men the hand of fellows.h.i.+p and goodwill. I wish I might be permitted when I go back, as in fact I think by this Address that I am permitted to say to them, that amidst the factions by which Ireland has been torn, amidst the many errors that have been committed, amidst the pa.s.sions that have been excited, amidst the hopes that have been blasted, and amidst the misery that has been endured, there is still in this island, and amongst its people, a heart that can sympathise with those who turn to them with a fixed resolution to judge them fairly, and to do them justice.

I have made my speech. I have said my say. I have fulfilled my small mission to you. I thank you from my heart for the kindness with which you have received me, which I shall never forget. And if I have in past times felt an unquenchable sympathy with the sufferings of your people, you may rely upon it that if there be an Irish Member to speak for Ireland, he will find me heartily by his side.

IRELAND.

VIII.

HOUSE OF COMMONS, MARCH 14, 1868.

_From Hansard_.

[This speech was spoken on the occasion of a proposition by Mr.

Maguire, M.P. for Cork, for 'a Committee of the whole House to consider the state of Ireland.']

When this debate began it was not my intention to take any part in it; for I had very lately, in another place and to a larger audience, added my contribution to the great national deliberation upon Irish affairs which is now in progress. But the speech of the n.o.ble Lord the Chief Secretary for Ireland, and some misunderstanding that has arisen of what I said elsewhere, have changed my intention, and therefore I have to ask for the indulgence of the House, in the hope that I may make on this question a more practical speech than that to which we have just listened.

It is said by eminent censors of the press that this debate will yield about thirty hours of talk, and will end in no result. I have observed that all great questions in this country require thirty hours of talk many times repeated before they are settled. There is much shower and much suns.h.i.+ne between the sowing of the seed and the reaping of the harvest, but the harvest is generally reaped after all.

I was very much struck with what happened on the first night of the debate. My hon. Friend the Member for Cork, in the opening portion of his address, described the state of Ireland from his point of view, and the facts he stated are not and cannot be disputed. He said that the Habeas Corpus Act had been suspended for three years in his country-- that within the island there was a large military force, amounting, as we have heard to-night--besides 12,000 or more of armed police--to an army of 20,000 men--that in the harbours of Ireland there were s.h.i.+ps of war, and in her rivers there were gunboats; and that throughout that country--as throughout this--there has been and is yet considerable alarm with regard to the discontent prevalent in Ireland.

All that is quite true; but when the n.o.ble Lord the Chief Secretary opened his speech, the first portion of it was of a very different complexion. I am willing to admit that to a large extent it was equally true. He told us that the condition of the people of Ireland was considerably better now than it was at the time of the Devon Commission.

At the time of the Devon Commission the condition of that country had no parallel in any civilised and Christian nation. By the force of famine, pestilence, and emigration, the population was greatly diminished, and it would be a very extraordinary thing indeed if with such a diminution of the population there was no improvement in the condition of those who remained behind. He showed that wages are higher, and he pointed to the fact that in the trade in and out of the Irish ports they had a considerable increase, and though I will not say that some of those comparisons were quite accurate or fair, I am on the whole ready to admit the truth of the statement the n.o.ble Lord made. But now it seems to me that, admitting the truth of what my hon. Friend the Member for Cork said, and admitting equally the truth of what the n.o.ble Lord said, there remains before us a question even more grave than any we have had to discuss in past years with regard to the condition of Ireland.

If--and this has been already referred to by more than one speaker--if it be true that with a considerable improvement in the physical condition of the people--if it be true that with a universality of education much beyond that which exists in this island--if it be true that after the measures that have been pa.s.sed, and have been useful, there still remains in Ireland, first of all, what is called Fenianism, which is a reckless and daring exhibition of feeling--beyond that a very wide discontent and disloyalty--and beyond that, amongst the whole of the Roman Catholic population, universal dissatisfaction--and if that be so, surely my hon. Friend the Member for Cork--one of the most useful and eminent of the representatives of Ireland--is right in bringing this question before the House. And there is no question at this moment that we could possibly discuss connected with the interest or honour of the people that approaches in gravity and magnitude to that now before us.

And if this state of things be true--and remember I have said nothing but what the hon. Member for Cork has said, and I have given my approval to nothing he has said that was not confirmed by the speech of the n.o.ble Lord--if this be true, surely all this great effect must have some cause.

We are unworthy of our position as Members of this House, and representatives of our countrymen, if we do not endeavour at least to discover the cause, and if we can discover it, speedily to apply a remedy. The cause is perfectly well known to both sides of the House.

The n.o.ble Lord, it is clear, knows it even from the tenor of his own speech--he spoke of the question of the land, and of the Church. The n.o.ble Lord the Member for King's Lynn--whose observations in this debate, if he had offered them, we should have been glad to listen to-- understands it, for he referred to the two questions in his speech at the Bristol banquet. The right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government understands it not only as well as I do, but he understands it precisely in the same sense--and more than twenty years ago, when I stated in this House the things, or nearly the things, I stated recently and shall state to-night, he, from your own benches, was making speeches exactly of the same import. And though there is many a thing he seems at times not to recollect, yet I am bound to say he recollects these words, and the impressions, of which these words were the expressions to the House. He referred to an absentee aristocracy and an alien Church. I would not say a syllable about the aristocracy in this matter; if I had to choose a phrase, I would rather say an absentee proprietary and an alien Church.

What is the obvious remedy which for this state of things has been found to be sufficient in every other country? If I could do so by any means that did not violate the rights of property, I should be happy to give to a considerable portion of the farmers of Ireland some proprietary rights, and to remove from that country the sense of injustice, and the sense--the strongest of all--of the injustice caused by the existence of an alien Church. Just for a moment look at the proposition the n.o.ble Lord is about to submit to the House. It is very like the Bill of last year. I will not enter into the details, except to say that he proposes, as he proposed then, that the Government should lend the tenant-farmers of Ireland sums of money, by which they would make improvements, which sums of money were to be repaid by some gradual process to the Government authorities. He proposes that the repayment should be spread over a considerable number of years--I do not know the exact number, and it is not of importance for my argument. These tenant-farmers are very numerous--perhaps too numerous, it may be, for the good of the country-- but there they are, and we must deal with them as we find them. The number of them holding under 15 acres is 250,000; holding between 15 acres and 30 acres, 136,000; holding over 30 acres, 158,000--altogether there are more than 540,000 holders of land. It is to these 540,000 land-holders or occupiers that the n.o.ble Lord proposes to lend money, on the condition that they make certain improvements, and repay after a certain number of years the sums advanced to them. I think I am right in saying that there is no limitation in the Bill as to the smallness of the holding to which the advance of money will be refused; and therefore the whole 540,000 tenants will be in a position to come to the Government, or to some Commission, or to the Board of Works, or to some authority in Ireland, and ask for money to enable them to improve their farms.

The House will see that if this plan is to produce any considerable result, it will be the source of a number of transactions such as the Government have not had to deal with in any other matter; and I expect that the difficulties will be very great, and that the working out of the plan with any beneficial results will be altogether impossible. What I ask the House is this--if it be right of the n.o.ble Lord, to enable him to carry out his plan, to ask the House to pa.s.s a measure like this--to lend all these tenants the money for improvements to be repaid after a series of years, would it not be possible for us by a somewhat similar process, and by some step farther in the same direction, to establish to some extent--I am not speaking of extending it all through Ireland--a farmer proprietary throughout the country? If it be right and proper to lend money to improve, it surely may be proper, if it be on other grounds judicious, to lend money to buy. I do not know if the right hon.

Member for Calne is here; but very likely he would spare me from the severe criticisms he expended upon my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster.

Now, I am as careful as any man can be, I believe, of doing anything by law that shall infringe what you think and what I think are the rights of property. I do not pretend to believe, if you examine the terms strictly, in what is called the absolute property in land. You may toss a sixpence into the sea if you like, but there are things with respect to land which you cannot, and ought not, and dare not do. But I do not want to argue the question of legislation upon that ground I am myself of opinion that there is no cla.s.s in the community more interested in a strict adherence to the principles of political economy, worked out in a benevolent and just manner, than the humblest and poorest cla.s.s in the country. I think they have as much interest in it as the rich, and the House has never known me, and so long as I stand here will never know me, I believe, to propose or advocate anything which shall interfere with what I believe to be, and what if a landowner I would maintain to be, the just right of property in the land.

But, then, I do not think, as some persons seem to think, that the land is really only intended to be in the hands of the rich. I think that is a great mistake. I am not speaking of the poor--for the poor man, in the ordinary meaning of the term, cannot be the possessor of land; but what I wish is, that farmers and men of moderate means should become possessors of land and of their farms. About two centuries ago, two very celebrated men endeavoured to form a const.i.tution for Carolina, which was then one of the colonies of this country in America. Lord Shaftesbury, the statesman, and Mr. Locke, the philosopher, framed a const.i.tution with the notion of having great proprietors all over the country, and men under them to cultivate it. I recollect that Mr.

Bancroft, the historian of the United States, describing the issue of that attempt and its utter failure, says: 'The instinct of aristocracy dreads the moral power of a proprietary yeomanry, and therefore the perpetual degradation of the cultivators of the soil was enacted.' There is no country in the world, in which there are only great landowners and tenants, with no large manufacturing interest to absorb the population, in which the degradation of the cultivating tenant is not completely a.s.sured.

I hope that hon. Members opposite, and hon. Gentlemen on this side who may be disposed in some degree to sympathise with them, will not for a moment imagine that I am discussing this question in any spirit of hostility to the landowners of Ireland. I have always argued that the landowners of Ireland, in their treatment of this question, have grievously mistaken not only the interests of the population, but their own. I was told the other day by a Member of this House, who comes from Ireland, and is eminently capable of giving a sound opinion upon the point, that he believed the whole of Ireland might be bought at about twenty years' purchase; but you know that the land of England is worth thirty years' purchase, and I believe a great deal of it much more,--and it is owing to circ.u.mstances which legislation may in a great degree remove that the land of Ireland is worth at this moment so much less than the land of England. Coming back to the question of buying farms, I put it to the House whether, if it be right to lend to landlords for improvements, and to tenants for improving the farms of their landlords, to those who propose to carry on public works, and to repair the ravages of the cattle plague, I ask whether it is not also right for them to lend money in cases where it may be advantageous to landlords, and where they may be very willing to consent to it, to establish a portion of the tenant-farmers of Ireland as proprietors of their farms.

Now, bear in mind that I have never spoken about peasant proprietors. I do not care what name you give them; I am in favour of more proprietors, and some, of course, will be small and some will be large; but it would be quite possible for Parliament, if it thought fit to attempt anything of this kind, to fix a limit below which it would not allow the owner to sell or the purchaser to buy. I believe that you can establish a cla.s.s of moderate proprietors, who will form a body intermediate between the great owners of land and those who are absolutely landless, which will be of immense service in giving steadiness, loyalty, and peace to the whole population of the island. The n.o.ble Lord, the Chief Secretary, knows perfectly well at what price he could lend that money, and I will just state to the House one fact which will show how the plan would work. If you were to lend money at 3-1/2 per cent., in thirty-five years the tenant, paying 5 per cent., would have paid the whole money back and all the interest due on it, and would become the owner of his farm; and if you were to take the rate at which you have lent to the Harbour Commissioners, and to repair the ravages of the cattle plague, which is 3-1/2 per cent., of course the whole sum would be paid back in a shorter period. Therefore, in a term which in former times was not unusual in the length of leases in Ireland, namely, thirty-one years, the tenant purchasing his farm, without his present rent being raised, would repay to the Government the princ.i.p.al and interest of the sum borrowed for that purpose, would become the owner of his farm, and during the whole of that time would have absolute fixity of tenure, because every year he would be saving more and more, adding field to field, and at the end of the time he would be the proprietor of the soil.

Let not the House imagine that I am proposing to buy up the whole of the land. I am proposing only to buy it in cases where men are willing to sell, and to transfer it only in cases where men are able and willing to buy, and you must know as well as I that there will be many thousands of such cases in a few years. Every Irish proprietor opposite--the n.o.ble Lord the Member for Tyrone (Lord C. Hamilton) himself, who made so animated a speech, and appeared so angry with me a short time ago--must know perfectly well that amongst the tenantry of Ireland there is a considerable sum of saved money not invested in farms. Well, that saved money would all come out to carry into effect transactions of this nature; and you would find the most extraordinary efforts made by thousands of tenants to become possessors of their farms by investing their savings in them, by obtaining it may be the a.s.sistance of their friends, and by such an industrious and energetic cultivation of the soil as has scarcely ever been seen in Ireland. I said there were landlords willing to sell, and there are cases in which, probably, Parliament might insist upon a sale--for instance, the lands of the London Companies. I never heard of much good that was done by all the money of the London Companies. I was once invited to a dinner by one of these Companies, and certainly it was of a very sumptuous and substantial character, but I believe that, if the tenants of these Companies were proprietors of the lands they cultivate, it would be a great advantage to the counties in which they are situated. I come then to this: I would negotiate with landowners who were willing to sell and tenants who were willing to buy, and I would make the land the great savings-bank for the future tenantry of Ireland. If you like, I would limit the point to which we might go down in the transference of farms, but I would do nothing in the whole transaction which was not perfectly acquiesced in by both landlord and tenant, and I would pay the landlord every s.h.i.+lling he could fairly demand in the market for the estate he proposed to sell.

Well, I hope every Gentleman present will acquit me of intending confiscation, and that we shall have no further misunderstanding upon that point. I venture to say to the n.o.ble Lord that this is a plan which would be within compa.s.s and management, as compared with that laid down in his Bill, if it worked at all, and I believe that it would do a hundred times as much good, in putting the farmer upon the footing of a holder of land in Ireland. What do hon. Gentlemen think would become of an American Fenian if he came over to Ireland and happened to spend an evening with a number of men who had got possession of their farms? I remember my old friend Mr. Stafford, in the county of Wexford, whom I called upon in 1849, who had bought his farm and had built upon it the best farm-house which I saw in the whole South of Ireland, and who told me that if all the tenantry of Ireland had security for their holdings-- he was an old man, and could not easily rise from his chair, though he made an effort to do so--'If they had the security that I have,' said he, 'we'd _bate_ the hunger out of Ireland.' If the Fenian spent his evening with such men as these, and proposed his reckless schemes to them, not a single farmer would listen to him for a moment. Their first impression would be that he was mad; their second, perhaps, that the whisky had been too strong for him; and it would end, no doubt, if he persisted in his efforts to seduce them from their allegiance to the Imperial Government, by their turning him off the premises, though perhaps, knowing that he could do no harm, they might not hand him over to the police.

The other day I pa.s.sed through the county of Somerset, and through villages that must be well known to many Gentlemen here--Rodney-Stoke and Drayford, I think they were called--and I noticed a great appearance of life and activity about the neighbourhood. I asked the driver of the carriage which had brought me from Wells what was the cause of it.

'Why,' he said, 'don't you know that is the place where the great sale took place?' 'What sale?' I asked. 'Oh! the sale of the Duke's property.' 'What Duke?' 'The Duke of Buckingham. Did you never hear of it? About fifteen years ago his property was sold in lots, and the people bought all the farms. You never saw such a stir in the world.' He pointed out the houses on the hill-side which had been built to replace old tumble-down tenements, the red soil appearing under the plough, and cultivation going on with such general activity as had not been witnessed till within these last few years. The appearance of these villages was such as must strike every traveller from another part of the country, and it was produced by simple means. The great estate of an embarra.s.sed Duke had been divided and sold off; he had not been robbed; the old miserable hovels of the former tenants had been pulled down, and new life and activity had been given to the whole district. If you could have such a change as this in Ireland, you would see such a progress and prosperity that gentlemen would hardly know the district from which they came.

I think it only fair to my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster to say, that I do not believe the time is come in Ireland, and I do not believe it ever will come, when it will be necessary to have recourse to so vast and extraordinary a scheme as that which he has proposed to the House. It appears to me that it is not necessary for Ireland. There is the land--there is the owner--there is the tenant. If the landowners had been a little wiser we might not have had before us to-night the difficulty that now perplexes us. Suppose, for example, they had not been tempted to coerce or to make use of the votes of their tenants; suppose they had not been tempted to withhold leases--undoubtedly the condition of Ireland would have been far superior to what it now is. My hon. Friend the Member for Westminster has some scruples, I believe, on the question of the ballot, but I believe even he would not object to see that admirable machinery of election tried in that country. Do hon.

Gentlemen think it not necessary? I was talking, only two days ago, to a Member of this House who sat on one of the Irish election committees-- the Waterford committee, I think--and he said: 'We could not unseat the Members, though the evidence went to show a frightful state of things; it was one of the most orderly elections they have in that country--only three men killed and twenty-eight seriously wounded.' After all, we may smile, and some of you may laugh at this, but it is not a thing to be laughed at. It is a very serious matter, but it exists in no country in the world where the ballot is in operation.

If you were to try that mode of election in Ireland it would have two results: it would make your elections perfectly tranquil, and at the same time it would withdraw from the landowner--and a most blessed thing for the landowner himself this would be--it would withdraw from him the great temptation to make use of his tenant's vote for the support of his own political party; and if that temptation were withdrawn, you would have much more inducement to grant leases to many of your tenants, and you would take a step highly favourable, not to the prosperity of your tenants only, but to your own prosperity and your own honour. Now, Sir, I shall say no more upon that question except this, that I feel myself at a disadvantage in making a proposition of this nature to a House where landowners are so numerous and so powerful, but I have disarmed them in so far that they will see that I mean them no harm, and that what I propose is not contrary to the principles of political economy; and that if Government is at liberty to lend money for all the purposes to which I have referred, Government must be equally at liberty to lend money for this greater purpose; and, farther, I venture to express my opinion, without the smallest hesitation or doubt, that if this were done to the extent of creating some few scores of thousands of farmer proprietors in Ireland, you would find that their influence would be altogether loyal; that it would extend around throughout the whole country that whilst you were adding to the security of Government you would awaken industry in Ireland from its slumber, and you would have the wealth which you have not had before, and, with wealth, contentment and tranquillity in its train.

Now, Sir, it may appear egotistical in me to make one remark more, but I think if the House will not condemn me I shall make it. Last year you did, under the leaders.h.i.+p of the right hon. Gentleman, accept a proposition which I had taken several years of trouble and labour to convince you was wise. On Wednesday last, only two days ago, by an almost unanimous vote you accepted a proposition with regard to another matter, exactly in the form in which six or seven years ago I had urged you to accept it. You in this House recollect when Mr. Speaker had to give the casting vote, amidst vast excitement in the House, on the miserable question of Church Rates; but now, on Wednesday last, you accepted that Bill almost without opposition; and I presume that, except for the formality of a third reading, we have done with the question for ever. Now if you would kindly, I ask it as a favour--if you would kindly for a moment forget things that you read of me which are not favourable, and generally which are not true, and if you would imagine that though I have not an acre of land in Ireland, I can be as honestly a friend of Ireland as the man who owns half a county, it may be worth your while to consider for your own interest, the interests of your tenants, the security of the country from which you come, for the honour of the United Kingdom, whether there is not something in the proposition that I have made to you.

Now, Sir, perhaps the House will allow me to turn to that other question which, on the authority of the n.o.ble Lord the Chief Secretary for Ireland, and the n.o.ble Lord the Member for King's Lynn, and indeed on the authority of the Prime Minister himself, is considered the next greatest--perhaps I ought to have said the greatest--question we have to consider in connection with Irish affairs; I mean the Irish Church question. What is it that is offered upon this matter by the Government?

The n.o.ble Lord himself said very little about it, but he is not easy upon it; he knows perfectly well, and cannot conceal it, that the Irish Church question is at the root of every other question in Ireland. The n.o.ble Lord the Member for King's Lynn said also that it was, along with the land, the great and solemn question which we had to discuss, and he turned round--I could discover it from the report in the paper, because I was not, as you may suppose, at the Bristol banquet--he turned round almost with a look of despair, and implored somebody to come and tell us what ought to be done on this Irish question. And the Prime Minister himself, in speaking of it, called it an 'Alien Church.' Bear that phrase in mind. It is a strong phrase, a phrase we can all understand, and we know that the right hon. Gentleman is a great master of phrases-- he says a word upon some subject; it sticks; we all remember it, and this is sometimes a great advantage. 'Alien Church' is the name he gives it; and now, what does the n.o.ble Lord, acting, no doubt, under the direction of his Colleagues and the Prime Minister, offer upon this question? He rather offered a defence of it; he did not go into any argument, but still, at the same time, he rather defied anybody to make an a.s.sault upon it; he believed that it would not succeed, and that it was very wrong; but what does he really propose? Only this: to add another b.u.t.tress in the shape of another bribe. He says that he will make an offer to the Roman Catholic hierarchy and people of Ireland-- some say that the people do not want it, and that the hierarchy do want it, but I say nothing about that, because I hope the Catholic people of Ireland are at least able to defend themselves from the hierarchy, if the hierarchy wish to cripple them too much--he says he will endow a Roman Catholic University in Ireland. As the n.o.ble Lord went on with his speech he touched upon the question of the Presbyterian _Regium Donum_, and spoke of it, I think, as a miserable provision for the Presbyterians of the North of Ireland; and evidently, if he had had the courage, the desperate courage to do it, he would have proposed, whilst he was offering to endow a new Roman Catholic University, to increase or double the _Regium Donum_. The n.o.ble Lord does not express any dissent from this, and I rather think he wishes that it were safely done. The object of this, and what he would like to have said to the hon. Gentlemen about him who came from Ireland to represent the Roman Catholic population, and to the Presbyterians of the North of Ireland, was this: 'If you will continue to support the Protestant Church in Ireland and the Protestant supremacy, we will endow you (the Roman Catholics) a University, really, if not professedly, under clerical rule; and as to you (the Presbyterians), we will double your stipends by doubling the amount of the _Regium Donum_.'

Now, why do you offer anything? Why is it we are discussing this question? Why did the n.o.ble Lord think it necessary to speak for three hours and twenty minutes on the subject? Because the state of Ireland is now very different from the state which we have sometimes seen, and very different, I hope, from that which many of us may live to see hereafter; because Ireland has a certain portion of its population rebellious, has a larger portion disloyal and discontented, but has a still larger portion dissatisfied with the Imperial rule. Now I must say--I hope the n.o.ble Lord will not think I am saying anything uncivil--but I must say that his proposition appears to be at once grotesque and imbecile, and I think at the same time--though I do not like to use unpleasant words-- that to a certain extent it must be held to be--in fact, I think the hon. Gentleman the Member for North Warwicks.h.i.+re hinted as much--not only very wrong, but very dishonest. At this moment it seems to find no favour on either side of the House, although I can understand the Catholic Members of the House feeling themselves bound to say nothing against it, and perhaps, if it came to a division, to vote for it; but I believe there is not a Catholic Member on this side of the House who could in his conscience say that it was right in him to accept this proposition as a bribe that he should hereafter support Protestant supremacy. In fact, it appears to me exactly in the position now that the dual vote was in this time twelve months, and there are people who say that it has been brought forward with the same object, and that by- and-by, as n.o.body is for it, the right hon. Gentleman will say that as n.o.body is in favour of it they will not urge it upon Parliament. Now, does anybody believe that a Catholic University in Ireland could have the smallest effect upon Fenianism, or upon the disloyalty, discontent, and dissatisfaction of which Fenianism is the latest and the most terrible expression? It is quite clear that for the evil which we have to combat, the remedy which the right hon. Gentleman offers through the Chief Secretary for Ireland is no remedy at all.

It reminds me of an anecdote which is related by Addison. He says that in his time there was a man who made a living by cheating the country people. He was not a Cabinet Minister,--he was only a mountebank,--and he set up a stall, and sold pills that were very good against the earthquake. Well, that is about the state of things that we are in now.

There is an earthquake in Ireland. Does anybody doubt it? I will not go into the evidence of it, but I will say that there has been a most extraordinary alarm--some of it extravagant, I will admit--throughout the whole of the three kingdoms; and although Fenianism may be but a low, a reckless, and an ignorant conspiracy, the n.o.ble Lord has admitted that there is discontent and disaffection in the country; and when the Member for one of the great cities of Ireland comes forward and asks the Imperial Parliament to discuss this great question--this social and political earthquake under which Ireland is heaving--the n.o.ble Lord comes forward and offers that there shall be a clerical-governed endowed University for the sons, I suppose, of the Catholic gentlemen of Ireland. I have never heard a more unstatesmanlike or more unsatisfactory proposition; and I believe the entire disfavour with which it has been received in this House is only a proper representation of the condemnation which it will receive from the great majority of the people of the three kingdoms.

Do not let any one suppose that I join in the terms which I regretted to hear from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Stroud, and still less that I join in the, in my opinion, more offensive terms which fell from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Calne. There can be no good in our attacking either the Catholic population or the Catholic hierarchy of Ireland. We have our duty straight before us, which is to do both the hierarchy and the people justice. We are not called upon to support the plan of the Government, and I believe the people of Great Britain, and a very large portion of the people of Ireland, will rejoice when the House of Commons shall reject a proposition which is adverse to the course we have taken for many years past, and a proposition which would have no better effect in tranquillising Ireland in the future than the increase of the grant to Maynooth did more than twenty years ago. Sir Robert Peel at that time, with the most honourable and kindly feeling to Ireland, proposed to increase the grant to Maynooth, and it was pa.s.sed, I think, by a large majority of the House, I being one of a very few persons on this side of the House who opposed the grant. I was as kindly disposed to the Catholics of Ireland as Sir Robert Peel, but I was satisfied that was not the path of tranquillisation, and that if he trod that path it would before any long time have to be retraced; and I think, if you now proceed upon the course recommended by the right hon. Gentleman, you will fail in the pacification of Ireland, and the time will come when you will have to retrace the steps he invites you to tread in now.

Now, Sir, I think we have arrived at this point of the question--that we have absolutely arrived at it, and there is no escape from it--that it does not matter in the least whether the right hon. Gentleman sits on the Treasury Bench, or whether the right hon. Member for South Lancas.h.i.+re takes his place, or whether the two should unite--which is a very bold figure of speech--but I say that if the two should unite, it could not alter this fact, that the Protestant supremacy, as represented by a State Church in Ireland, is doomed, and is, in fact, at an end.

Whatever are the details, and I admit that they will be very difficult details in some particulars, which may be introduced into the measure which shall enact the great change that the circ.u.mstances of Ireland and the opinion of the United Kingdom have declared to be necessary, this, at least, we have come to, that perfect religious equality henceforth, and not only religious equality, but equality on the voluntary principle, must be granted.

Some hon. Gentlemen opposite have spoken about a pamphlet which has recently been written by Lord Russell. I would speak of Lord Russell, as the House knows, as I would always of a man older than myself, and whose services to the country have been so long and so great; I speak of him with great respect, and I say that the pamphlet is written with wonderful fire, that it contains in it very much that is interesting, and very much that is true, but its one fault is that it should have been published about forty years ago. Lord Russell's proposition is politically just in the division which he proposes of the property of the Church in Ireland, and, if public opinion had not condemned the creation of new Established Churches, it might have been possible to have adopted his scheme as it is. But I say the time has gone by for the establishment of new State Churches. They will never again be planted as an inst.i.tution in this country, and I suspect there is no other country in the world which has not an Established Church that would wish to possess one. But, if the House will allow me, I should like to advert to a little scheme on this matter which I was bold enough to explain to my countrymen on the occasion to which I have referred. It is not a new scheme in my mind, for the whole principle of it, with an elaborate argument in its favour, were published very widely in the year 1852, in a letter which I wrote to my hon. Friend the Member for Kilkenny (Sir John Gray), who was one of certain persons, Members of Parliament and others, who met in conference in Dublin on the question of religious equality in Ireland. I only state this to show that it is no new idea, and that I have had plenty of time to consider it. There have been great objections to the plan, and amongst those who have objected to it, as might possibly have been expected, were gentlemen of the Liberation Society. Now, I know many of the leading members of that Society, and they are very good men. Even those who may think they are mistaken would, if they knew them, join with me in that opinion. One of them, at least, who was once a Member of this House, and, in all probability, will be here again--Mr. Miall--is not only a good man, but he is a great man. I judge him by the n.o.bleness of his principles, and by the grand devotion which he has manifested to the teaching of what he believes to be a great truth. I take criticisms from them kindly, as we ought to take them from our friends when they are honestly given.

What is the condition of Ireland at this moment with which you have to deal? There is not only the Church which it is proposed to disestablish, but you have the _Regium Donum_, which, if the Church be disestablished, must necessarily be withdrawn; and you have, if these two things happen, a grant to Maynooth, the Act conferring which must necessarily be repealed. Now, in doing these things the House will observe that we shall disturb all the three princ.i.p.al sects or Churches in Ireland, and we can only do it, or attempt to do it, on the ground that we are about to accomplish some great public good. Well, my proposal, which some hon. Gentlemen, I dare say, will have some vague idea of, was made with the view of easing Parliament in the great transaction, from which I believe it cannot escape. It is a great thing in statesmans.h.i.+p, when you are about to make a change which is inevitable, and which shocks some, disturbs more, and makes hesitating people hesitate still more--it is a great thing, I say, if you can make the past slide into the future without any great jar, and without any great shock to the feelings of the people. And in doing these things the Government can always afford to be generous and gracious to those whom they are obliged to disturb.

We have found that this has been the case when needful changes have been proposed; for instance, hon. Gentlemen will recollect, when t.i.the commutation for Ireland was pa.s.sed, that there was a certain concession made to the landowners of Ireland, to induce them to acquiesce in the proposition of Parliament. We know that when slavery was abolished a considerable sum of money was voted. Lord Derby proposed in this House that compensation should be given to the slaveowners. If it had not been for that, slavery would before long have been abolished by violence. But Parliament thought it was much better to take the step it did take, and I am not, at this period of time, about for a moment to dispute its wisdom. In all these things we endeavour, if we are forced to make a great change, to make it in such a manner as that we shall obtain the acquiescence and the support, if possible, of those who are most likely to be nearly affected by it. Suppose we were going to disestablish the Church of Scotland--and I understand that there are a great number belonging to the Established Church of Scotland who are coming round to the opinion that it would be much to their benefit, and I think for the benefit of their Church, if it were disestablished--if we were going to disestablish the Church of Scotland or the Church of England, no person for a moment would suppose that, after having taken all the t.i.thes and all the income from these Churches, you would also take all the churches and all the parsonage-houses from the Presbyterian people of Scotland, or from the Episcopal Church people in England. You would not do anything of that kind. You would do to them as we should wish, if we were in their position, that the Government and Parliament should do to us. Do what you have to do thoroughly for the good of the country, but do it in such a manner as shall do least harm, and as shall gain the largest amount of acquiescence from those whom you are about to affect.