The Annual Register 1914: A Review of Public Events at Home and Abroad for the Year 1914Anonymous
History
The Annual Register 1914: A Review of Public Events at Home and Abroad for the Year 1914
Anonymous
History, Modern; History, Modern -- Periodicals; World War, 1914-1918
Mr. John Redmond (N.) said he would not waste time by replying to Mr.
Bonar Law's speech. But the settlement was not a party triumph, but a
severe disadvantage for the Nationalists, owing to the delay of the
Home Rule Bill. But the moratorium was necessary, and he hoped it would
lead to a very different Amending Bill. The two things he cared for
most were, (1) that autonomy for Ireland should extend to the whole
country, (2) that no county should be coerced into Home Rule. These
things were then incompatible, but when Nationalists and Irishmen had
fought side by side on the Continent and drilled together for home
defence, he believed a real Amending Bill would be offered to the
Government by agreement. Meanwhile the Nationalists must cultivate a
spirit of conciliation. His speech (Aug. 3; p. 173) was not an offer
of conditional loyalty, but an appeal to the Ulster Volunteers to
allow the Nationalist Volunteers to fight by their side in defence
of their country, and to the Government and the War Office to enable
the Nationalists to do their duty. He regretted that it had found
no response. Ireland had furnished proportionately a larger quota
to the Army than Great Britain. In 1885 the numbers per thousand of
the male population were Irish born 76, British born 42; in 1893 75
to 47, in 1903 69 to 44, in 1913 42 to 32. That was the record when
Irish sentiment was completely out of touch with British; what would
it be now, when Irish sentiment was wholly with Great Britain in the
war? The little groups of Irishmen who were opposing enlistment were
the bitterest enemies of the Nationalists. Ireland felt now that the
British democracy had kept faith with her; she was specially moved by
the fact that the war was undertaken in defence of small nations and
oppressed peoples. Like South Africa, Ireland had been transformed from
"the broken arm of England" into one of the strongest bulwarks of the
Empire.
After other speeches, the Bill was brought in amid cheers.
In the House of Lords, meanwhile, the second reading of the Home
Rule Bill was moved, but ultimately adjourned by 93 votes to 29.
Violent attacks were made on the Government by Viscount Midleton
and the Marquess of Londonderry, and its course was defended by the
Lord Chancellor and the Marquess of Crewe. The latter said that
any expectation on the Continent of civil war in Ireland had been
encouraged quite as much by the threats from Ulster as by any action of
the Government. What was important was that the Home Rule Bill and the
Amending Bill should come into operation at the same time. The Marquess
of Lansdowne said that the Unionist complaint was that the Government
were enabling the Nationalists to obtain without a struggle what
would otherwise have cost them a very serious struggle. They desired
adjournment, partly because prolonged and minute discussion of Irish
questions would just then be futile or mischievous, partly because they
had no security that there would be an Amending Bill.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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