Ireland -- Politics and government -- 1901-1910; Land tenure -- Ireland
would have led to even more disastrous results; it must, in many
instances, have caused a complete paralysis of the State. This in-and-out
plan, as it was derisively called, must have made Parliamentary government
well-nigh impossible; if Irish members were to have a right to vote in the
same House of Commons on Imperial and Irish questions, but were not to
have a right to vote on British questions, to vote, say, upon a war with a
Foreign Power, and upon the domicile and status of Irish subjects, but not
to vote on matters of purely British commerce, there might, and very often
would be, two conflicting majorities in the leading House of Parliament;
Parliamentary affairs would be brought to a stand; the tenure of even the
strongest Ministry would be utterly insecure. It is needless to point out
that the relations between Great Britain and Ireland would almost
certainly have been more strained, under the Bill of 1893, than they would
have been under that of 1886; and that the government of Ireland by the
Irish Parliament, would, under both, have been much of the same character.
The British nation would have been indignant at the humiliation of their
ancient Parliament, which would be sometimes placed at the mercy of Irish
members; it would have condemned the weakening in Ireland of its
authority, through the mere establishment of an Irish Parliament; it would
have been sorely vexed that Irish smuggling would filch away a large part
of British revenue. It should be borne in mind, too, that the Irish
members, who would have been let into the Imperial Parliament, would have
been more difficult to deal with, by many degrees, more openly disloyal,
more obstructive, than Irish Nationalists could be, as affairs stand at
present; they would have the support of the Irish Parliament; the Imperial
Parliament could hardly impose a check on them. As for the rule of the
Irish Parliament, within its proper domain, it would have been the same,
or much the same, under either measure; that is, it would have been a
succession of angry wranglings with England and oppression in Ireland,
leading to anarchy and general ruin.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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