THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY From the collection of James Collins, Drumcondra, Ireland. Purchased, 1918. 94I.J8 MI2(5 Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2017 with funding from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Alternates https://archive.org/details/speechesonirishqOOmacc SPEECHES ON IRISH QUESTIONS. BY JOHN GEORGE MAC CARTHY, M.P. DUBLIN: E. PONSONBY, n6, GRAFTON-STREET. 1877. DUBLIN : miNTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, BY PONSONBY^ AND MURPHY. ^ S' ‘J< 5S’ i l\l, \-xlfu CONTENTS. PAGE. Home Rule, i Denominational Education, 20 Fixity of Tenure, 29 Railway Reform, 43 Reclamation of Waste Lands, 51 > / O HOME RULE. Permit me to submit to the House a view of this question, which is gaining ground amongst thoughtful men of all classes and parties in Ireland. The communities which inhabit Great Britain and Ireland are in many respects similar. They speak the same language, read the same literature, and are con- nected by ties of friendship, kinship, and association. It is their interest to pull' to- gether as one Imperial State. But they are also in many respects dissimilar. Their social conditions are dissimilar. Their pre- dominating religions are dissimilar. Their predominating races are dissimilar. Their domestic institutions are dissimilar. The in- B 2 SPEECHES. ternal arrangements which suit one do not suit the other. Moreover, each island has from immemorial time claimed the right to manage its own domestic affairs. This right was more or less preserved by Ireland until the year 1800, when, by means which are admittedly indefensible, and by a contract notoriously tainted with fraud, the Irish Le- gislature was abolished. Both islands have since been ruled by the British Parliament on the assumption that they form one homo- geneous state. From some cause this plan has not worked well. The two commu- nities have not been fused into one. They no more amalgamate than oil and water. As Mr. Lecky puts it : “ Pitt’s measure cen- tralized, but did not unite, or rather by unit- ing the legislatures it divided the nations.” The contingent of representatives which Ire- land sends to London is necessarily divided and out-numbered. The result is that Ire- land has ceased to have that control over HOME RULE. 3 its own affairs which is the very essence of civil liberty. Great Britain virtually rules Ireland, nominates her administrators, and decides on every detail of her domestic life. At first she ruled very badly. Latterly she has been trying to rule well. But somehow she does not “ hit it off.” You, English and Scotch representatives, complain that you cannot understand Ireland. You are quite right. You do not understand Ireland. Your rule has been a failure. You have given us neither prosperity nor peace. Industries are dying out. Manufactures are falling away. Agriculture Is deteriorating. The popula- tion is fleeing to other lands. Loyalty is declining. Discontent is still rankling in the hearts of the people. Moreover, we object to our domestic affairs being governed by another community, whether it govern well or ill, whether it be well Intentioned or ill intentioned. We claim, as of right, the li- berty to manage our own affairs. The de- B 2 4 SPEECHES. sire of National Freedom has never left the Irish national heart. It often rises to pa- triotism. It sometimes sinks to rowdyism. But it is always there — a vehement, deep- seated, widespread, apparently indestruc- tible national instinct, underlying ever}^ agitation, outliving every concession, flash- ing in the eye and flushing in the cheek of most Irish men and 'women, rich and poor. Catholic and Protestant, of Celtic descent and of Saxon descent. On the other hand the Imperial Parlia- ment finds itself overwhelmed with all sorts of work : and parliamentary authorities have repeatedly declared that some division of legislative labour must be made if the pub- lic business is to be effectively done. Such are the essential facts of the case. Now, I submit that an impartial person, if asked to suggest a remedy for this state of things, would make some such proposal as that which is now before the House. He HOME RULE. 5 would say in effect : “ Discontinue this un- successful experiment of over-centralization, which is only a recent experiment at best. Seek no longer to treat as absolutely ho- mogeneous two communities which are thus geographically, socially, and historically dis- tinct. Let there be a division of legislative labour. Relieve the Imperial Parliament of the management of Irish internal affairs. Let an Irish Assembly look to these. Let each country manage for itself what con- cerns itself only. Let both manage in a common assembly what concerns both col- lectively. Thus healthy national aspira- tions will be satisfied, and the ‘deadlock’ of Imperial business prevented. Thus will a desirable middle-course be found between the separation of two countries which have so many interests in common, and the over- centralization which has been found to work so badly for both. Thus will National free- dom be combined with Imperial strength.” 6 SPEECHES. This, I submit, is the common sense of the matter. But though common sense counts for much, political philosophy, which ought to be the quintessence of common sense as ap- plied to political affairs, counts for a great deal more. It is unwise to approach this question as if it were something new, as if the circumstances were unprecedented, or as if the way of dealing with such circum- stances had never before been considered. I need scarcely remind you that this ques- tion is nearly “as old as the hills.” The state of facts we have been considering is of frequent occurrence. The mode of deal- ing with it has engaged the heads of the best political thinkers from the earliest ci- vilized times until now ; and now in some of the greatest countries in the world we find communities so united by circumstances of geographical position, of race, of com- mercial interests, and of civil institutions HOME RULE. 7 that it is their interest to be joined in one common state, yet so distinct in internal structure, habitudes, and characteristics, or so separated by physical boundaries and natural idiosyncracies, as to render it de- sirable that each should retain the man- agement of its own domestic affairs, and impracticable to fuse them into one homo- geneous community. To suit this state of facts a political system was devised two thousand years ago, and has since been per fected by many a wise statesman in many a famous state. It is known technically as the Composite system, popularly as Fede- ralism, by German writers as Bundcstadl. Like every political system it suits only the state of facts for which it was devised. To apply it to any other state of facts, as was latterly insanely attempted in France, is to misapply it. Indeed, more than most systems, it needs caution in application. To what state of facts does it apply ? Let 8 SPEECHES. Mr. Freeman, the distinguished historian of the system, answer; and we are the safer to take his answer because it is given with- out reference to Ireland, and because his opinion would appear to be adverse to Irish claims. “The Federal system,” says Mr. Freeman, “ requires a sufficient degree of community in origin, or feeling, or interest, to allow the members to work together up to a certain point. It requires that there should not be that perfect degree of com- munity, or rather identity, which allows the members to be fused together for all pur- poses. When there is no community at all, federalism is inappropriate ; the cities or states had better remain wholly independent. When community rises into identity, fede- ralism is equally inappropriate ; the cities or states had better both sink into the coun- ties of a kingdom. But in the intermediate set of circumstances Federalism is the true solvent. It gives as much union as the HOME RULE. 9 members need, and not more than they need.” Such is the canon of fitness for Fe- deral government which the historian of Federalism lays down ; and he is in sub- stantial accord with every great authority on the subject. But it is evident that the English language could not summarise with more neatness the very state of facts we have been considering. Ours is precisely “the intermediate set of circumstances” for which political philosophy prescribes the Federal system : and Federalism is precisely what we propose for this state of facts. I submit, therefore, that it is not the Fe- deral proposal that needs to be justified in the face of science. It is the resistance to it that needs such justification. Our pre- sent arrangement is clearly defective inas- much as it forces a system suitable only for one homogeneous community on two com- munities which are clearly not homogeneous, and because the practical result is the sub- lO SPEECHES. jection of the domestic affairs of one distinct^ idiosyncratic and ancient community to the management of another community which admittedly does not understand these affairs and has not time to attend to them, which confessedly has failed to manage them to the satisfaction of any one concerned, and whose interference in them is notoriously at variance with the deepest national instincts of the subject people. But what has historical experience to say to this system of local Self-Government com- bined with Imperial unity? I shall not trouble the House with detailed historical retrospects. But I beg to remind you that this, so far from being a fanciful or new-fangled system, is one of the oldest and best-settled systems of national life. It worked well in the Achaian League of early times. It worked well in the United Netherlands of the Middle Age. It has thriven for seven hundred years in Switzerland. Under it the United States of HOME RULE. I I America have grown from a few despised colonies into the greatest of modern States. It has prospered in Sweden and Norway since i8i6. Austria and Hungary have recently adopted it ; and the “ Times” told us, yesterday, that the Austro-Hun- garian experiment has succeeded beyond all expectation. The new Imperial Ger- man Constitution has adopted it so far at least as to provide that the representa- tives of one community cannot vote in what concerns only the domestic affairs of any other community. Self-Government has been reconciled with Imperial unity under the British Crown in the Channel Islands and in the Isle of Man. Parliament has adopted this system in dealing with all its colonies of European race : — Canada, Aus- tralia, New Zealand, and others. Some of the shrewdest political thinkers concur with Mr. Laing in holding that the Federal system is that towards which civilized society is na- 12 SPEECHES. turally tending all over the world. “ Nature forbids,” says Mr. Laing, “by unalterable moral differences between people and peo- ple, that one government can equally serve all. Federalism is a principle more akin to natural, free and beneficent legislation than this forced centralization.” I have shown that the Federal proposal is in accord w'ith common sense. I have shown that it is in accord with political sci- ence. I have shown that it is in accord with historical precedents. Permit me briefly to note, in conclusion, the practical advan- tages which may be expected from it. One very obvious practical advantage is that it would relieve the plethora of busi- ness in this House. “ If England ever fail as a nation, ” says Sir Arthur Helps, “ it will be from too much pressure of business on Parliament. ” “ The union of several Parliaments in one, ” said Sir George Grey, “ has thrown upon that one HOME RULE. 13 Parliament an amount of business it can- not perform. ” Under the present system the work of the House of Commons is plainly getting beyond its powers. How can it be otherwise? Consider the differ- ence between the Parliament of 1800 and that of 1874. In a few years more the expansion and requirements of to-day will be equally left behind. Now, I put it to any Honourable Member, is there any one arrangement which would so tend to lighten the pressure of business and set English and Scotch members free to consider their own most pressing national affairs as the proposed transference of Irish domestic business to an Irish Assembly ? Would it not be a pleasure to eveiy Briton to know that the domestic affairs of his coun- try would be transacted by his own repre- sentatives and no others ? What can we, Irish Members, know about the internal affairs of England ? How can our inter- u SPEECHES. ference in them be other than a disturb- ing element in the equilibrium of parties, and an inconvenient interference in other people’s domestic affairs? Another practical advantage would be that the domestic affairs of Ireland would be transacted by men who know all about them, who have time to attend to them, and who would have no other public busi- ness to attend to. Even in these high- pressure days time and knowledge are es- sential to the proper conduct of business. Is it not evident that the Imperial Parliament has neither the time nor the knowledge ? As to time, we know that the most urgent affairs of Ireland are put off, sometimes for years, often indefinitely, because Parliament cannot spare time to attend to them. As to know- ledge, how can Honourable Members from England and Scotland know very much about the details of Irish life ? I hope it is not discourteous to say that since I came into HOME RULE. 15 the House I have been deeply impressed with this lack of knowledge. I hear Honour- able Members speaking of Irish affairs ably, eloquently, and kindly. They have every element of suitability for legislating for Ireland, except the one indispensable ele- ment — knowledge. You really do not know Ireland. You only guess about it ; and you generally guess wrong. You insist on managing our affairs ; you make a mess of them ; and you blame us for the result. Again ; there is the important practical advantage of accustoming Irishmen to put their heads together about their own affairs. It is only by self-government that a country gains political experience, tolerance, and self-control. Again; there is the practical advantage of •checking the present tendency to over-cen- tralization. As it is, the intellectual, artistic, and social life of Ireland is dying out. Ire- land is being gradually reduced to the con- i6 SPEECHES. dition of an outlying farm for the supply of the English markets. The national wealth, material and moral, is directed into foreign channels. Nearly every Irish interest is in a muddle — Agriculture, manufacture, edu- cation, railways, law, literature, art, science. Surely it is only reasonable to let Irishmen consult together about these exclusively Irish affairs, the nature and requirements of which none can understand as well as themselves. But over and above all these material advantages is the great moral one of Civil Liberty. If there be any one thing about which it is safe to say that all the civilized world and all political thinkers are agreed, it is that, ordinarily speaking, a community gets on better when it manages its own affairs than when those affairs are managed for it by another community ; just as, ordina- rily speaking, a man gets on better when he has the management of his own affairs than HOME RULE. 17 when he is in bondage or tutelage to any one else. This thought underlies all the praises of civil liberty that were ever said or sung. Unless the community or the man be mad, they know their own business better than any one else knows it. Unless they be incapables they will do it better than any one else can do it. Unless they be sneaks they will feel as an intolerable grievance the pretension of any one else to supersede them in it. Keep a man in such bondage or tutelage and you will make him a milk- sop, All inventiveness, all brightness of genius, all force of character, all aspiration to achievement will die out in him. No such man does any real good for himself or any one else. Keep a community in such bondage and tutelage and you emasculate it for all good purposes, and put it in the way of temptation to all bad ones. Public spirit, self-reliance, self-control, self-know- ledge, national faith, national hope, national SPEECHES. l8 charity will decline. No such community prospers, or ever yet really prospered, since the world began. Lastly, there is the immense practical ad- vantage of removing Irish disaffection by removing its cause. It must be plain by this time that Great Britain can never be really safe while Ireland is discontented, and that Ireland must remain discontented so long as she is denied that control over her local affairs which, as Grattan said, is the very essence of civil liberty, and without the possession of which, as Sir George Grey admits, “ no nation can be contented or prosperous.” The concession of such control may have dangers of its own. But there is no danger so great as persistent defiance of the reason- able requirements, the ancient instinctive longings, and, as I venture to say, the plain and certain rights of the Irish community. Of old, Grattan warned Pitt that in destroy- HOME RULE. 19 ing the Irish Parliament he was pulling down one of the pillars of the British Em- pire. Foster predicted that its consequences might be the “ utter ruin” of both countries; and Charlemont declared that “ it would, more than any other measure, contribute to the separation of two countries, the perpetual connexion of which was one of the warmest wishes of his heart.” Let us be wise before it is too late. God made the two Islands neighbours, and separated them from all the world beside. History, race, kinship, social intercourse, individual friendship knit them together by many a strong and tender tie. There can be no “practical advantage” so great to both Nations as to make both friends, to end the miserable quarrels of the past, and to enable them both to enter on the future with combined strength and individual freedom. DENOMINATIONAL EDUCATION. I BEG to second the motion just proposed in the able and thoughtful speech of my honourable and learned friend, the Member for Limerick (Mr. O’Shaughnessy). Of all the anomalies of Irish life there is none greater or graver than that to which my honourable friend has called attention, and for which his motion suggests a partial and tentative remedy. Shortly stated, the anomaly is this : that the State, so far from promoting education amongst Irish Catho- lics of the middle class, excludes them from its intermediate, collegiate and university institutions. This may seem an exaggeration. It is in reality an accurate and measured state- ment of the fact. DENOMINATIONAL EDUCATION. 2 I The middle classes in Ireland may be considered as divided into three sections. The first, a small but wealthy and influ- ential Protestant minority, reasonably de- sires that its sons should be educated in accordance with the tenets of Protestan- tism. The second, a small but influential minority, chiefly Protestant, desires that its sons should be educated in accordance with the secular system. The third section, being the great majority of the middle class, and many times more numerous than both the other sections put together, desires that its children should be educated in accordance with the tenets of Catholicity. Now, assum- ing that the evil days of religious disabilities have passed, I submit that these three classes are equal before the law. All bear the burthens of the State in equal proportion; all are entitled to its benefits in equal measure. It is, simply, unjust to refuse to any one of these classes educational privi- 22 SPEECHES. leges or advantages which you concede to the others. This is the theory of law ; but ''what is the practice of the State ? To the wealthy Protestant minority that desires to have its sons educated under Protestant auspices, the State from old time has given for educational purposes broad acres, rich revenues, endowed schools, an endowed college, and an endowed university. To the influential minority, chiefly Protes- tant, that desires to have its_^sons educated on the secular system, the State has recently given superb colleges whose external struc- tures grace the cities in which they are built; professors whose eminence would give lustre to any institution, libraries, and museums, and palatial lecture halls, prizes and scholar- ships that enable any student of average ability to receive his education almost with- out expense, and an university administered in the name of the Queen. To the Catholic DENOMINATIONAL EDUCATION. 23 majority, which far outnumbers both the Other classes, and which has equal rights with them, the State gives — “ Hobson’s choice.” No endowed schools for Catho- lics. No endowed colleges for Catholics. No professors, or lecture halls, or libra- ries, or museums, or prizes or scholar- ships for them. No endowed university for them. Not even the naked permission to grant degrees. Now, I submit that this is a grave and pe- rilous anomaly. We Irish Catholics have no quarrel with our neighbours ; but we demand equality for ourselves. To the wealthy and influential Protestant minority we say : “We don’t grudge you your broad lands and rich revenues, your endowed schools and colleges and university. We do not even inquire into the origin of these endowments. We say let bye-gones be bye- gones. It is time to have peace in Irish life.” 24 SPEECHES. To the small and chiefly Protestant mi- nority which desires secular education, we say : “ We do not grudge you your colleges and scholarships and university.” But to the State we say : “We claim for our sons advantages and privileges equiva- lent to those conferred on our fellow-citi- zens. Equal before the law, certainly equal before the tax-collector, we claim to be equal in educational rights and privileges. Whoever fears knowledge, we love it and we claim it.” It may be said that this is merely a senti- mental grievance. Permit me, as a parent, to assure Honourable Members it is a ver)^ practical and real grievance, involving many pounds sterling per annum, involving social status, involving that thoroughness of edu- cational culture which to a young man is more important than either wealth or social status. See how the system works. Take the cases of my Protestant neighbour, my DENOMINATIONAL EDUCATION. 25 Secularist neighbour, and my Catholic self. We are all good friends — friends not in name only but in heart and in deed ; friends who associate in business and in life, agreeing whenever we can agree, and when differ- ences must come, agreeing to differ. How do we stand in this matter ? To my Pro- testant neighbour the State supplies for his sons a splendidly endowed college and uni- versity. To my Secularist neighbour the State supplies colleges which are worked both as intermediate schools and as col- leges. To my sons the State offers no in- termediate schools, no college, no libraries or museums or lecture halls, no prizes or scholarships, no universities, no degrees. But honourable gentlemen may say, “ All these places are open for your sons : why not avail of them?” Permit me to answer frankly. I do not avail of them for the same reasons that my ancestors did not avail of educational facilities a hundred years ago — 26 SPEECHES. because of conscientious objections. The disability, less in degree, is identical in principle. But it will be said, or only for the forms of the House it might be said : “ Conscien- tious difficulty ! Conscientious fiddlestick 1 You don’t propose to send your sons to the Queen’s College or Trinity College because you are afraid of the priests and bishops!” Permit me emphatically and sincerely to repudiate this suggestion. I desire that my sons should be reared religiously, because I believe in my religion, and I would desire this, not the less but a great deal the more, if there were not a priest or a bishop in Ireland. The State supplies the humbler classes with education, though, indeed, some hon- ourable gentlemen were lately near smash- ing up our system of primary education under the fascination of a suspended priest. And here I may observe, parenthetically. DENOMINATIONAL EDUCATION. 27 that as long as a priest does his duty quietly and devotedly he is considered by some peo- ple the most uninteresting of men ; but if by any chance or error he be suspended he becomes crowned with an aureole of irresist- ible fascination. Well, the humbler classes in Ireland are supplied with educational fa- cilities. I warn the House that in refusing such facilities to the middle class it is pre- paring grave troubles for the future. I therefore support the motion of my hon- ourable and learned friend. The remedy it proposes is partial and tentative ; but it is a move in the right direction. It proposes to afford educational stimulus without inter- fering with religious conviction. Great will be the merit, great the fame, of the states- man who approaches the whole problem of Irish education in the same spirit. I care not whether it be he who has taught us so well the grace and strength of intellectual culture in the world’s youth, or he who has 28 SPEECHES. filled our libraries and our thoughts with works which are themselves the flowers of intellectual culture. Be he whom he may he will deserve well of Ireland and the Em- pire, if, without interfering with religious convictions, he rallies the young men of Ire- land of all sections and parties to strive in honourable rivalry for that sound intellec- tual training which, more than fleets or armies, is the strength and safeguard of a State. FIXITY OF TENURE. I HOPE that my honourable friend, the Member for Kerry (Mr. Herbert), whose able speech we have followed with so much interest, will forgive me for expressing regret that he did not maintain the calm- ness of tone and sobriety of language which characterised the address of my honourable and learned friend, the Member for Limerick (Mr. Butt). Violent language proves nothing except that the speaker is angry ; and an angry frame of mind is not conducive to useful discussion. “Landlord robbery,” “Landlord pillage,” are phrases that should not have been used without justification. I challenge Honourable Mem- bers to state in what respect such phrases 30 SPEECHES. are justifiable. This bill does not propose to deprive one single landlord of one single acre of his land, of one single pound of his rent, or of one iota of his right, except it be the so-called right which Laurence Bloomfield satirised, but which my honourable friend, the Member for Kerry — to his honour be it spoken — neither claims nor exercises : — “ By George ! I leave no man of mine in doubt ; Vote as I bid you, or I turn you out.” This is not a question of class against class. Landlords and tenants, viewing this matter from opposite stand-points, are naturally tempted to believe that their interests are opposed. It is never- theless certain that their interests are iden- tical. They are in fact partners. What- ever injures one partner injures the other. If this House violate, or permit to be vio- lated, the landlord’s true rights, it will curse Ireland for generations to come FIXITY OF TENURE. 31 with that sense of insecurity which of all things is most injurious to the tenants themselves. If this House violate, or permit to be violated, the tenant’s true rights, it checks culture, diminishes -rent, endangers peace, and depreciates the value of every acre the landlords own. To do evil that good may come, is a policy of disaster as well as of dishonour. Equally irrelevant is my honourable friend’s revival of the old stock charge of hos- tility to social order. If the present sys- tem be good, all good citizens should uphold it; if it be defective, all good citizens should assist in rectifying it. The maintenance of abuse is the promotion of disorder. No friend of order is so true as he who, in the old spirit of the Con- stitution, guards against the revolutionary violence which respects no right, by the legal and peaceful reform which permits no wrong. 32 SPEECHES. Still more irrelevant is the controversy about race which a right honourable gen- tleman seeks to introduce from the Trea- sury Bench. If the Irish race were as bad as the right honourable gentleman be- lieves it to be, it would be the more neces- sary to secure for it a good agricultural system. But in fact the Irish community is made up of several races — all about the best the world holds, and all more or less commingled in most Irishmen’s blood and lineage. The Saxon and Nor- man races need no apologist, and after seven centuries they may be considered at home in Ireland. As to the Celts, only very hasty theorists can contend that the race which taught the world in Greece, and led the world in France, is incurably defective. Moreover, we need not enter, as some eminent publicists would have us, on the vast fields of Irish his- torical inquiry. Let us deal with the facts FIXITY OF TENURE. 33 as we find them here and now. If these be satisfactory no impeachment of history can affect them : if these be unsatisfactory no sanction of history ought to maintain them. Recriminatory eloquence and cross- indictments may be omitted at both sides. Whoever is to blame for the past let us make the future right. Too much mud has been thrown. I know both landlords and tenants by a long and intimate ex- perience. Both classes have grave faults; both classes have been dishonoured by some crimes ; but, allowing for exceptions, and making all just deductions, both classes are above the average of men in most of the qualities which, when rightly deve- loped, create individual welfare and na- tional prosperity. One only needs to know Irish gentlemen to find them, for the most part, high-minded, cultivated and kindly. One only needs to know Irish peasants to find them, for the most part^ D 34 SPEECHES. industrious and thrifty, gentle and pious, keen-witted and true-hearted. Keeping clear of such irrelevancies, per- mit me to suggest to you that the debate may be narrowed to three questions. First : what were the defects of the Irish system of Land Tenure before the Act of 1870? Second: in what respect did the Act of 1 870 fail to remedy these defects ? And third : how does the present Bill propose to supply what is wanting? Before 1870 over twenty millions of avail- able Irish acres were owned by about nine- teen thousand landlords ; they were occupied by about six hundred thousand tenants ; and they supported an agricultural population of more than four millions. About a third of the tenants pursued their industry under the protection of the Ulster Tenant Right custom, or of leases. The remaining two- thirds were tenants from year to year, or as they are popularly termed, tenants-at-will. FIXITY OF TENURE. 35 To the Tenant Right custom it was objected that it was a custom merely, and had not the force of law. To leases it was objected that they were often so arbitrary and one- sided that tenants were better without them. To tenancy-at-will it was objected that it dealt with the three great subject-matters — rent, tenure, and improvements — in the fol- lowing manner : — As to rent, it could be raised at any time, so that no tenant-at-will could tell what rent he should have to pay in any future year. As to tenure, it was completely precarious, and could be termi- nated at any time by a few months’ notice, so that no^ tenant-at-will could know whe- ther or not he would be permitted to occupy his holding any succeeding year. As to agricultural improvements, the characteristic of the system was that improvements were generally made by the tenant, and as soon as they were made they became the pro- perty of the landlord. These evils were D 2 36 SPEECHES. intensified by the circumstance that, owing- to the absence of manufacturing industries, agriculturists were obliged to accept almost any terms that were demanded. The tenant was not a voluntary contractor, and the sys- tem of occupancy was well described as a collection of terms imposed by the strong upon the weak. Such was the system before 1870; and it was a system admittedly bad. It was condemned by nearly all leading statesmen, by nearly every great politico- economic authority, by most of the great organs of public opinion, and by repeated majorities of this House. Let us now pass to the second and third questions ; namely. In what respect did the Act of 1870 fail to remedy these defects, and how does the present Bill propose to supply what is wanting? As to the Ulster Tenant Right : though the Land Act legalized it in principle, it left it open to grave legal doubts and diffi- FIXITY OF TENURE. 37 culties in detail. It is the object of the first part of the present Bill to remove these dif- ficulties and set these doubts at rest. In this respect at least I submit that it is clearly entitled to your favourable consi- deration. It only follows the line of what you have already decided, and secures the objects the Legislature proposed to itself. As regards improvements effected by the tenant, the Land Act of 1870 reversed the previous inequitable presumption of law, and recognized the tenant’s right to the re- sult of his own labour and expenditure. But this theoretic recognition failed to accom- plish its object, by reason of several over- sights, and especially by reason of its per- mitting the bulk of the tenants to be forced to contract themselves out of the very be- nefits that the legislation intended to secure for them. The present Bill would prevent the law from being thus evaded. In this respect, also, I submit it is clearly entitled 38 SPEECHES. to your support. It follows your own line and tends to secure what you have decided to be desirable. As regards the two main evils of the land system — precariousness of tenure and un- certainty of rent — the Land Act sought to prevent them by the imposition of statutory fines in case of capricious disturbance. But it has been found by experience that in-com- ing tenants are always ready to relieve the landlord of loss by paying such fines or an increased rent in lieu of them. These two evils, therefore, — uncertainty of rent and pre- cariousness of tenure, — prevail as before the Land Act. To afford a remedy for them is the object of the third part of this Bill. This part contains some provisions to which I object. It omits others which I desire to see inserted. But in the main I believe it to be worthy of the great lawyer who pre- pared it, and deserving of the acceptance of this House. FIXITY OF TENURE. 39 As to the clauses affecting the ascertain- ment of rent, I submit that, though capable of improvement in detail, they are in prin- ciple right. The higgling of the market is a fair criterion when the market is free, but it ceases to be fair when one class of dealers must accept whatever terms the other class of dealers imposes ; and the principle which justifies the State in enforcing all fair con- tracts justifies it in taking reasonable pre- caution that in so important a matter as the land tenure of an agricultural country the contracts shall be fair. It would be futile to confer on the cultivator security of tenure, if to that tenure there could be attached im- possible or unreasonable conditions. The principle of valuation works well in North Italy, In many parts of France and Belgium, and in India. I submit that it Is worth a fair trial In Ireland. The most important portion of the Bill, however. Is that which proposes to confer 40 SPEECHES. on the tenant a right to continuity of oc- cupancy, subject to the payment of a fair rent, to the obligation to cultivate properly, and to certain other reasonable restrictions. Now, I submit to you that, subject to proper modifications, this is a sound and equitable arrangement. The first principle of Political Economy is the right of the producer to what he has produced. But in agriculture this right cannot be secured without giving the agricul- turist some certainty of continued occupancy on fair conditions. This continuancy of oc- cupancy may be effected by custom as in England, in Ulster, and in Northern Italy ; by lease, as in Scotland, parts of Belgium, and parts of France ; by the agriculturist being himself the proprietor as in most European countries ; or by statute, as here proposed : but secured in some way it must be if agriculture is to prosper. The reason is this. Of all arts agriculture most requires time. Its chief products are the slowest. FIXITY OF TENURE. 41 Its best industries demand longest time. The agriculture that thinks only of next year is the agriculture of the savage. Real agri- culture sacrifices the present to the future — the immediate petty gain to the large ulti- mate advantage. It is, as has been well said, the product not of the land but of the farm, and the farm is created only by the labour that looks years ahead for its reward. To ripen the sower’s richest harvest it is not only one summer that is required, but many summers. A proper succession of crops and a higher state of cultivation are becom- ing every day more and more necessary to the successful prosecution of agriculture. Hence, to deprive the agriculturist of a rea- sonable certainty of continuous occupancy is either to paralyse his industry or to submit its results to confiscation — in either case, to violate the fundamental principles of pub- lic policy. “ Confine a tenant,” said Ed- mund Burke, “ to temporary possession, and 42 SPEECHES. you cut off that laudable avarice which every wise State cherishes as a first prin- ciple of its greatness.” For these reasons, which I thank the House for having heard with so kind a courtesy, I submit that this Bill should be read a second time. The majority of Irish representatives will probably support it. I hope it may not be rejected by Honourable Members from this side of the Channel. Surely you may trust us in this exclusively Irish matter to know best the real interests of Ireland. There has been a great deal of sorrow in Ireland for many ages. These sorrows have been largely owing to your mistakes. Be- ware how you continue to make such mis- takes. It cannot conduce to the honour, any more than to the interests, of a great com- munity to refuse Irishmen the management of their own affairs, and then to mismanage those affairs so flagrantly that they become a scandal to the civilization of the world. RAILWAY REFORM. Appreciating the generous and kindly dis- position of the Honourable Baronet who has just addressed the House (Sir Eardley Wil- mot), I submit the following reasons in sup- port of the motion of my honourable friend, the Member for Kerry. (Mr. Blennerhas- sett.) Permit me in the first place to point out that his motion refers exclusively to Irish Railways. It has no reference whatever to English Railways. This distinction dis- poses of the arguments put forward so en- tertainingly by the Honourable Member for Rochester (Mr. Goldsmid), and dissipates the bugbear of an expenditure of a thousand millions with which he has been frightening 44 SPEECHES. US. Nothing can be gained by discussing false issues. The only investment proposed is that of twenty-five millions of Irish money to be administered by Irishmen for the ad- vancement of Irish interests, — for every shil- ling of which expenditure ample value will be given. Restricting our consideration to the Irish problem, let us consider what it is. The most recent statistics available are those of the Committee of 1868. These statistics have been somewhat modified since that date, and we must take them as being sub- ject to such modification. They disclose a Railway system — if system it can be called, where system there is none — of about two thousand miles, with a capital of twenty-four millions, and traffic of about two and a quarter millions. In most continental coun- tries such a system would be managed by one official. In England single companies manage a mileage nearly as great, capital RAILWAY REFORM. 45 considerably larger, and traffic three times as large. In Ireland it is administered by thirty-nine corporations, with thirty-nine se- cretaries, thirty-nine solicitors, thirty-nine engineers, seventy auditors, and three hun- dred and thirty-three directors. The late First Lord of the Treasury said eight years ago ; “ There cannot be the least doubt that the immense waste of resources which results from the extreme division and sub- division of interests should be got rid of” It is this “ immense waste of resources” which my honourable friend proposes to stop. It is this “ immense waste of re- sources” which the Member for Rochester proposes to maintain. But what are the results of this system ? As regards passenger traffic it combines the minimum of convenience with the maxi- mum of charge. The rates are usually higher than those of England, almost invariably higher than those of Scotland, 46 SPEECHES. and considerably in advance of even the highest continental rates. In Belgium the average rate for one hundred miles, third class, is 3^., in Italy 45 ., in Russia 6^. 6«/., and in Ireland 8^. 4