ILLINOIS
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN
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Rare Book & Manuscript Library University of Illinois Library at Urbana-Champaign 2015SPEECH.
HOUSE OE COMMONS,
Tuesday, SOth June, 1874.
Mr. SULLIVAN : Sir—It is very necessary to be remembered tbat in this debate the Irish Members are not pleading before a tribunal the judgment of ■which can be held to be independent, or the decision of which can fairly be accepted upon the merits of their case. To accuse a man to himself, to ask of him a verdict upon his own actions, is hardly to consult an impartial authority. _ And just so do we stand here to-night in this debate—60 men before 500 ; but 60 men, almost two-thirds of the [Representatives of the Irish nation, to plead this case, not before an impartial tribunal, but before the [Representatives of the nation that has done us the wrong. [‘‘No, no! ”] I do not say not impartial as imputing anything against your fair dispositions to hear our case, and judge it as fairly as men may be expected to judge their own wrong-doing. I confide largely in your good-natured desire to understand our demand ; but I do say, human nature being just what it is that is to say, not being angelic nature, but human nature, you cannot call yourselves, nor can I, with sincerity, call you — being, as you are, one of the parties in the suit, being the defendants in the case, an impartial tribunal to try this great international issue between your land and ours. On theverythreshold, I desire this matter clearly understood and well remembered. I want it understood that I address myself not to my judges, but that I accuse my wrongers ; glad, indeed, to let their reply and my accusation be weighed by public opinion—the public opinion of the world ; but quite refusing to let the decision of
I plead. The front benches—at least the subordinates of the front benches on either side—have, apparently, competed in eagerness to combat the Irish demand. We understand all this- ItJ is a part of the game of parties. Until a cause is understood to be a winning cause—a cause out of the support oi i which more political capital is to be made than out of its resistance your outs and ins will each seek to fasten on the other, or each seek to thrust from themselves the imputation of befriending it. And so we have seen the rivalry between a converted Irishman on the Treasury bench and an English noble man on the ex-Ministerial bench ; suchj a rivalry as many questions once decried, but subsequently supported, called forth between the same political parties. It was all the more necessary, I suppose, for the noble Marquess to make such a
strong speech against the Irish demand, ||| ■ because his Leader, the late Prime Mi-Wa nister, in some of those oracular utter- H 3 ances for which he is famous, is alleged, Kl by his political antagonists, to have saidr i something which, according to the light®
| in which it is viewed, might mean Home Pule, or Imperial Pule, or neither. Perhaps the Liberal Chief is, in this case as in others, the prescient statesman of the future, who desires to keep the future open; or, perhaps, our cause 1S IjH deemed so weak just yet, that a lieu- 1 tenant is put up to clear his chief of suspicion of favouring us. Be this as it may, I heard with admiration, for its ability, the speech of the noble Marquess. I think it was almost the only] speech as yet delivered in this debate1 that really touched our case so as to call for serious answer. There was one portion of it, however, which was certainly unstatesmanlike. A real statesman, ini these days, in com^aPngachang^mU
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Never! It is a formidable word. We Members for Ireland bave beard tbe noble Lords’ dread ultimatum “ never,” ' and are in no way disquieted. And I | will tell bim why. It is because we bave beard that ultimatum, that same word before, in reference to Irish demands, 'and we know what came of it. So the word does not hurt us, though it may ■ harm greatly the party of which the noble Lord is a Member. He alluded to what he called the almost hopeless : exclusion of his party from office, as 1 lending disinterestedness to this won-i clrous eager attack upon us. Perhaps c it throws the light the other way. Be ( that as it may, I can tell him that, what-c ever might have been the hopelessness t of that party attaining to office before 1 his speech this evening, it has been made 1 a bitter reality for many a long day now. 1 He tells us our demand can “ never” be 1 granted. The people of Ireland will t only laugh when they recollect—it is i within the memory of most of those who 1 sit around me at this moment—a mo-A mentous occasion, upon which not merely Iithe son of a Duke, but the son of a 1 King, and the brother of the reigning ^Sovereign, used that same word of Ca-^ tholic Emancipation, and clinched it ^ with an oath—“My Lords, this Bill I shall never pass ; so help me God! ” said t York. The incident is within our own (i memory : the words are on public record. | Well, the Irish people lived through, r and triumphed over the “ never ” of the V Eoyal Duke ; they will live through and I triumph over the “ never ” of the noble dMarquess. We do not believe in any if“ never ” in this business, as availing to [put us down. All we care for is to be (morally and politically right; and, being in the right, we face the future confidently. We do not come here to propose any novel scheme for altering ancient constitutional usage. We do not come here to plead about a plan for pleasing a county or a score of counties. We do not come here to debate, as it were, a Bill—that is, an ordinary Bill, in reference to which the House rightly puts the promoters of the innovation on their proof that the new Act will be better than the old. No; we deny that we are called upon to project our claim from that level, for ours is not a question between counties and coun-
ours is the ancient constitutional apd indefeasible claim of a nation to their birthright—a right which they never surrendered—a right wrested from them by terrorism and intimidation the most brutal, and by corruption the most flagitious—a right the illegal overthrow of which they have never sanctioned or condoned, and with which they are today equitably and morally as fully endowed as before that crime had been done. That is our case. And what is yours ? Two of our positions are not disputed. It is, of course, admitted that Ireland possessed these independent legislative rights, which, with some modifications suggested by the growth of n; and common interests, ,we now dema.au in her name. It is not denied that shvi was some 74 years ago deprived of those rights, by scandalous and immoral means, by force and by fraud. So much, you say, is granted; but if it be, then I say our whole case is granted. For take any case you like in everyday life. Take an election to this House. Do you not here, in this House, every Session apply the doctrine that corruption or intimidation vitiates an election ? You say the constituency has not chosen freely or legally, and you quash the election and declare it null and void. Well, is the election of a single Member of Parliament of more importance than the question of abolishing a national Legislature altogether? Will you tell me that the question of whether the Whig Mr. Brown or the Tory Mr. Jones is returned for a small borough to this House, is of greater moment than the life or death of a nation, the extinction of its Legislature, the abrogation of its autonomy ? Why, you know the thing is too absurd, too ridiculous, too monstrous for serious argument. You would not allow a man to take his seat in this House; you would declare his election for ever illegal, for the millionth part of the fraud, corruption, and intimidation by which the Irish constitution was overthrown in 1800. So, we say then, the act was vitiated from the first was never legitimatized. The protests ot the Irish nation have ever kept the claim alive; and as you cannot pleac against us the effect of mere force and violence by you in our own wrong, we stand here to-day as if the Act were -	~	- of these.
5 «useu. msome oi me speccnes maue ims vening—as, for instance, the speech of ie Attorney General for Ireland, one alf of which answered the other. He :old ns of funny Petitions presented 80 l,r 90 years ago to the Irish House of Commons. Why, Petitions _ far more Absurd are presented here in our own '[ay. “Oh, hut,” says the right hon. Gen-'leman, “ it is only in an Assembly like his, by coming in contact with Englishmen, Irish Members can become great tatesmen.” Well, consider the Irishmen ¡rho rose to fame in the Irish Legislature, and consider the Irishmen who lave had this wondrous advantage of ' nixing here with Englishmen. I look 'ic^s the House this moment to survey tr e Treasury bench or elsewhere 1 ;he t uperiors of the men whose names 1 ivLi never die. Well, I see an Irish f attorney General. Once an ^ Irish At-1 :orney General appeared in this House : ie had made his fame in an Irish Par-iament. Oh, what a giant he! While aow, under the system of all those “ advantages”—well—what shall I say.
Oh, what a falling off is here . I 'shall moderately content myself with n merely stating that with all those aa-" vantages of contact with statesmen in ij ihis arena, we have not another 1 lunket >i the Attorney General for Ireland. isThe noble Marquess occupied himself ^'considerably and with undoubted ability toxn imagining or suggesting the possible^ difficulties or inconveniences in way oi 18 our demand. We do not underrate those :g difficulties, though they may be exagge-■ rated. We candidly say, yes there will is be many difficulties to be solved; but i{ we say their solution is not beyond the ».capacity of British statesmen. I answer kail those ingenious puzzles and difficui-i? ties of the noble Marquess by the words O' of his now absent chief, who, in this li House a few months ago, said that if is it were once shown that the concession )» of Home Eule were advisable, he would i be a poor statesman who could not 8 readily devise the means for satisiac-s torily settling those details. In this , .there spoke out the mind of a states-s man; and it is common sense, too.^ Let f us only agree upon the other portion oi ! the case, and this will not bar us long.
I Let us only in good faith and good feel-I ing approach the question of Ireland s title to these rights, and many a seem-
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level, and to deal with the main principles of the question, and not to waste its time peddling over paltry quibbles and petty details, which no true statesman believes would stand a moment^ in the way, once you found such a solution of the case necessary for Ireland, for England, and for the Empire. We have heard wonders about Ireland’s prosperity since the Union. Fallacious comparisons have been used—the Ireland of 1790 being compared with the Ireland of 1874—and the system of London legislation has been coolly credited with all the result. To be sure, Ireland has grown and progressed something fiom where she stood 90 years ago ; but does that prove she has progressed in a natural healthful ratio of improvement r Why, Mrs. Harriette Winslow, the celebrated English baby-farmer, would be vindicated by such a line of argument, instead of being condemned to death for cruelty. “ Here,” she might say, “ is a child of two years; when you gave it to me 23 months ago it weighed only 9 lbs., and now it weighs fully 15. It measures fully three inches more in length, and it can almost walk.” And all that was true of some of the children whom she was punished for starving nevertheless. Yet the child’s mother would, I am sure, say, the real question was not had the child grown so much, but ought it to have grown much more if it had been as fully fed and as truly cared for as if it were under a mother’s care ? So with all this talk about Iie-land’s progress and prosperity since the days of the Irish Parliament. We ought not to compare Ireland of 1782 with Ireland of 1874 absolutely; but rather compare the progress of Ireland between 1872 and 1795—when the English Minister once more got our Legislature under his influence—with the progress of Ireland from 1800 to 18/4. We challenge you to that comparison— the true comparison — or compare the England of 1782 with the England of 1874, and compare the Ireland of 1782 with the Ireland of 1874. We challenge you that comparison. I myself have made it. I have, as far as I was able, looked into the facts and figures of that comparison, and what does it show . Why that wherever Ireland’s prosperity was doubled, England’s was at least• S' f=} r'y ft H P
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land’s had quadrupled, England’s had increased more than twenty-five fold. I invite hon. Gentlemen to grapple with this state of facts if they can. In truth, in this rich and fair land of yours, the accumulation of capital within the past 70 years has almost surpassed comprehension. Contrast it with the measure of advance Ireland has been able to make in chains. [“ Oh ! ”] Men who make only a very superficial study of this question are always profuse with statistics of the many excellent things Ireland has now, which in the days of an Irish Parliament were unknown; as if that necessarily discredited an Irish Legislature. The hon. Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Ritchie) was overflowing with such statistics this evening. Why, ^ I can considerably help him in that line. He forgot to parade for us how many post office telegraph stations Ireland has now, whereas she had not one in 1782. The hon. Gentlemen could have made a grand point out of so many millions of postage stamps sold now in Ireland, and not one at all in the time of our'own Parliament. But really was not this sort of thing very small ? The rule of the Imperial Parliament might as well be credited with the general progress of the world, and with all the improvements flowing from the application of steam and electricity. All the world has been moving in these 74 years; and England has certainly been proudly foremost in the advance. The question then is not—Does Ireland stand now where she did 74 years ago; but where does she stand relatively with England, or with Home Ruled Belgium, in their rate of progression ? In truth, there is a graver issue than all this, at best. It is not a question of postage stamps or telegraph stations, or exports or imports, or more or less pigs and oxen, though all these have their weight. The true question for a Ministry responsible to the Sovereign for the safety of the Realm, and for the contentment and happiness of her people, is—“Are you governing Ireland against her will ? Is the Irish nation discontented or satisfied ? ” A prosperous and educated, but disaffected, nation is more dangerous any day than a poverty-stricken, ignorant, and discontented nation. There never was a more dangerous fallacy than that
said in the powerful journals of tJ? country that as the Irish farmer af1 citizen rose to comfort, his ideas political regeneration and his love f nationality would pass away. I wf! ask hon. Members on my own side of tllr^ House, what has been their experieni^ at the late elections in Ireland ? Exact)®’ as a county or district was prosperous well-to-do, there the cause of Home Ru ^ triumphed. [“ No, no ! ” “ Yes, yes and an hon. Member—“ Ulster ! ”] 01er I will deal with the inevitable Ulstie by-and-by. I state a fact which id within the knowledge and experience scores of hon. Gentlemen here, that whe: bl the people were poor and struggling Pe the Home Rule cause was most weal®1 and was most boldly attacked; whereare in the rich and prosperous counties (f1 Meath, Westmeath, Limerick, Oorles Tipperary, Queen’s County, King: ia' County, Louth, and such places, th10 Home Rule majorities were largest, cta^ else no opposition to Home Rule W»10 attempted ; for the passion for natioi ph ality was found to be imperishably im ra! planted in the breasts of the people. Aiur a people progress in education an ^ increase in comfort, the less will the ^ tolerate subjection or wrong. TldJ0V great question, then, for this House is- ^re Whether it is ruling Ireland in accord f ance with the will and desire of the Irisl *n people ? [“ Yes yes!” “No no! ”] Well,^ assertions are cheap, being easily made but what test will the hon. Members!001 who have “yes, yes!” so ready—whatr? test, I say, will they be satisfied to take ip1 Will they be satisfied with a vote of|7e the population, as the Bonapartists arch11 ready to take in France ? Was thereF any one year, any one month or dayp41 since 1800, wherein or whereupon youf^ would have dared to take a vote of the™1 Irish people on your rule in that country ? Not one; no, not one. Oh ! but in such a case you will, no doubt, find some grand excuses—some great faults with a plebiscite. You found none with it, however, when even abase parody of a plebiscite was declared by you all-sufficient to overthrow the rule of the Sovereign Pontiff, and create this new power called Italy. Well, but if you will not have a plebiscite, what else will you have—what other way will you seek the verdict ? Will you take the voice«son for shunning this. But, I say ain tell us what resort or process (1 hold to be efficacious for ascer-a natiou’s will? We, on our rt, say, “ Try it.” Will you take the [irliamentary representation of _ £gdom? At the last General Elec-,n° for the first time, the electors, isving the shield of the ballot, could uely declare their will. And how have ¿y expressed it? By returning an ijerwhelming majority of Home Eulers.
¿ majority of Home Eulers m the ’ ish representation is proportionately er larger than the majority which envies right hon. Gentlemen opposite to jjeak for and to rule the British Em-«re. Would the Parliamentary vote ot Iceland be taken on this question . One the greatest of your public authorises in the Press— The Times—has told us ¡jiat the merits or demerits of a governmental rule is a question solely for the ;• ation ruled by it to decide, and not for tLose who impose that rule, or 01 oso .ticho are outside of its operation, iha • ;,as propounded for another case, to be ire ; but we claim its benefit. If you /ill have neither of these tests, nor any pst, do you expect the world to believe tou when you say that you are ruling I reland according to the will and desire 'J its people ? No, you are not Even 7'a this Parliament, how stands the case . Within my memory there has not sat a ' Parliament here which approached, the consideration of Irish questions in a /¿fetter temper, or with, _ on the whole, i dndlier feeling than this one has; an /et what has it done on purely Irish Questions? On every Irish question m .which there has been a division, you nave voted down, by English and Scotch /otes, the constitutionally represented desire of the Irish nation. Take the figures. Dll the Amendment to the Address on fthe 19th of March, the Irish vote was— ¿Ayes 43, Noes 25—carried by nearly two ‘ to one, but overborne by your British ‘““hundreds. On the 17th April, on the Irish “"Municipal Franchise Bill, a purely Irish ^question, the Irish vote—Ayes 43, Noes ¿12—was overborne by your English '“hundreds. On the question of Irish ^railways, the Irish vote—Ayes 46, Noes f a—was overborne by 185 British votes. $ On the Sunday closing question — a f purely Irish question, and not a political
vote—Ayes'34, M oes 10—was m me same way overborne by English votes. I might go on through the whole Session ; the division lists tell the same story. Even in this Parliament you are ruling Ireland against her will, and overbearing her desires. And if this be so, what is your position before the public opinion of the civilized world? You may ask—What do the Irish people want l Are they not clothed and fed ? Have they not post office telegraphs, and postage stamps, and all the fine things o science and civilization ? Are not, m fact, their chains gilded ? All. I will appeal to the men I see before me 1 wifi appeal to Englishmen, m whose breasts surely must survive memories ot greatness, and glory, and heroism. I appeal to you, and shall I appeal in vain to the men whose country s banner once led the way in giant struggles for blessed liberty on the battlefields of Europe? I appeal to you to recognize the fact that there is, after all, something greater, and grander, and nobler than mere animal life-something a nation, ought to sacrifice and struggle for besides mere bread and butter and clothing! I, for one, refuse to allow the question of my country’s life and hberty, as a nation, to be lowered to the mere level of the pocket, or the stomach considerations. Take any man m the world around you, I care not humble or lofty, only let him be, indeed, in intellect and soul, a man—feed him, clothe him, rule his affairs, curb and direct his actions, chastise his children, domineer in his home ; doing, it may be, all for the best, as you think. Ask him, is he satisfied . Ask him, what does he want; has he not food and raiment, and perhaps luxuries m the home in which your authority has displaced his ? What does he want . He will answer you in one wore! -Liberty ! He will prefer “ a crust of bread and liberty.” So with a nation—if it be not an aggregation of slavish creatures, all stomach and no soul—they will any day prefer even poverty and liberty rather than to fatten in gilded chains. Some one has sought in this debate to make an argument against us out of the allegation that there is a more violent antl extreme party behind us. The allegation is a fact; there is such a party. -It is the accurate fact that we are a third
party ol separation on the other. «0 far from hiding that fact, so far from it being an argument against us, we wish you to note and study it. We stand in Irish politics where the Deak party stood in Hungarian ; they stood between the Imperial Austrian party on the one hand, and the Kossuth separationists on the other. We, too, have our Deak; we, too, have to withstand our Kossuth party on one side, and our Imperial factionists on the other. It is a difficult and often a painful task, this endeavour of ours amicably and honourably to settle this question. We must be assailed from each extreme. Be it so. Whatever the vote of this House to-night
advantage of our own chiinffy ft is trtu but at the same time not less for the aj vantage of yours also. Surely, surel it were true statesmanship to harmoni Ireland’s desire for national autonorj with the requirements of Imperial w< fare and safety. I reject the word possible, ’ ’ which would throw Ireland in the arms of the party of separation, on the contrary, have full faith in t future of the cause I plead. This Hon of Commons may vote it down to-nigh but as long as we command a majori of the Irish representation, so long your voting all in vain, so long will yo hundreds against us be only your oi condemnation.
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LONDON : CORNELIUS BUCK, 23, PATERNOSTER ROW. E.C.