16. The Union has failed absolutely to conciliate Ireland. Every generation there have been rebellions and shootings and agitations of a vehement and exhausting character carried continually to the point of lawlessness before Irish grievances could be redressed. A form of government which requires a succession of rebellions to secure reforms afterwards admitted to be reasonable cannot be a good form of government. These agitations have inflicted grave material and moral injury on Ireland. The instability of the political system has prejudiced natural economic development. Capital will not be invested in industries where no one is certain about the future. And because the will of the people was so passionately set on political freedom an atmosphere of suspicion gathered around public movements which in other countries would have been allowed to carry on their beneficent work unhindered by any party. Here they were continually being forced to declare themselves either for or against self-government. The long attack on the movement for the organization of Irish agriculture was an instance. Men are elected on public bodies not because they are efficient administrators, but because they can be trusted to pass resolutions favoring one party or another. This has led to corruption. Every conceivable rascality in Ireland has hid itself behind the great names of nation or empire. The least and the most harmless actions of men engaged in philanthropic or educational work or social reform are scrutinized and criticized so as to obstruct good work. If a phrase even suggests the possibility of a political partiality, or a tendency to anything which might be construed by the most suspicious scrutineer to indicate a remote desire to use the work done as an argument either for or against self-government the man or movement is never allowed to forget it. Public service becomes intolerable and often impossible under such conditions, and while the struggle continues this also will continue to the moral detriment of the people. There are only two forms of government possible. A people may either be governed by force or may govern themselves. The dual government of Ireland by two Parliaments, one sitting in Dublin and one in London, contemplated in the Home Rule Act, would be impossible and irritating. Whatever may be said for two bodies each with their spheres of influence clearly defined, there is nothing to be said for two legislatures with concurrent powers of legislation and taxation, and with members from Ireland retained at Westminster to provide some kind of democratic excuse for the exercise of powers of Irish legislation and taxation by the Parliament at Westminster. The Irish demand is that Great Britain shall throw upon our shoulders the full weight of responsibility for the management of our own affairs, so that we can only blame ourselves and our political guides and not Great Britain if we err in our policies.