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measures being taken which should bar out those chances and strengthen our weak points. I have often stated, and I still hold the opinion, that the defective organisation of our naval administration is responsible for the shortcomings of our naval efficiency, and that our present system never can produce a really adequate and efficient navy; but it is not now possible to discuss this subject. My object in this paper has been to bring home to ourselves an exact knowledge of our strength and of our weakness as a naval power. Unfortunately that cannot be done without a reference to the other navies of the world; and the second naval power in Europe-if indeed it be the second-naturally comes into greater prominence than any other. Should a conflict arise between us-which I deprecate as a calamity to the human race-as in its earlier stages we might possibly meet with the fate of Entellus :

Ipse gravis, graviterque ad terram pondere vasto

Concidit

let us hope that the poet's lines might prove prophetic, and the conclusion be:

At non tardatus casu neque territus heros

Acrior ad pugnam redit .

Præcipitemque Daren ardens agit æquore toto.

VOL. VII.-No. 37.

EE

ROBERT SPENCER ROBINSON.

THE COMMON-SENSE OF HOME RULE.

WHо first applied the phrase 'dismemberment of the Empire' to the Home Rule scheme? Whoever he was, he may consider himself a fortunate man, if his ambition was only to do injury to the proposed measure, or even to do mischief in a general way. For a practical people the English are strangely governed by words and phrases. In political affairs this influence of phrases is specially remarkable. With certain minds a phrase settles a whole question. A few years ago any possible suggestion of electoral reform was made odious to a vast number of respectable persons by the terrible words, 'Americanising our institutions.' The three words were enough; the question was settled once and for ever. None of those over whom a phrase has this magical influence would think of stopping to consider whether, first, the proposed reform would really tend to Americanise our institutions, and next, whether it might not have some good points in it even though it had such a tendency. Then again, who can have forgotten the cabalistic power exercised at one time by the words setting class against class'? The lightning conductor does not draw down the lightning more surely than the recitation of these words could call forth a burst of cheers from the Conservative benches of the House of Commons. In the minds of thousands, Mr. Bright was for a long time only a man engaged in the reprehensible task of setting class against class. Any proposal coming from him was settled by the words, "I am opposed, Mr. Speaker, as an Englishman, to an agitation which would set class against class.' 'Dismemberment of the Empire' is the phrase which stands in the place of argument against Home Rule. It appears in every leading article, it is repeated in every speech. In drawing-room, in debating society, club-room, bar-room, on every platform, on every hustings, the words are to be heard, and they constitute for thousands, probably millions, of people, a sufficient and unanswerable argument.

Let us see what is this proposal which is to dismember the Empire. Perhaps it will be well to find out in the first instance what is meant by dismemberment of the Empire. What is the Empire? Is it only England, Ireland, and Scotland? Surely not; we must admit the right of the colonies to be considered part of the Empire.

Was then the Empire dismembered when Home Rule was given to Canada and to Australia? One after another the colonies develope into States with a complete system of Home Rule. We are all in the habit of saying, and surely those of us who have any capacity for judging must believe, that the Empire is strengthened and not weakened, consolidated and not dismembered, by the changes which reconcile the colonists to their place in the Imperial system. It is not so very long since the Empire was near being dismembered, in that sense, by the growing discontent of Canada and the strength of the feeling among Canadians in favour of annexation to the United States. Home Rule settled so completely all those discontents, that annexation is no longer reckoned among existing political questions in Canada. Empires are, in truth, much more likely to be dismembered by concessions refused, than by concessions granted, to some of their populations. Again, one is tempted to ask whether the Empire has only existed as a complete organisation since the beginning of this century. That is the length of time during which Ireland has been without Home Rule. I dare say there are many Englishmen not unaccustomed to political discussion who regard the proposal for Home Rule in Ireland as some daring and monstrous innovation, some wild new idea born of Fenianism and obstruction or other such progenitors. Even Lord Hartington, speaking of Home Rule during the autumn, seemed to treat it as some portentous novelty in our political conditions. Yet there are many men still living who might have heard O'Connell denounce the Act of Union because of its crude newness, and because of the manner in which it had been thrust upon Ireland to the subversion of the ancient constitutional system of the country. If Home Rule would mean dismemberment of the Empire, it follows that the Empire has only had its members in cohesion for exactly eighty years. Chatham, Burke, Fox, were the statesmen of a dismembered empire.

Let us see, however, what is Home Rule. I hear it said commonly among Englishmen that no one can explain what Home Rule means. The other day a friend asked me what the Home Rulers proposed to do with the House of Commons. He thought, I believe, that I was jesting when I replied that, so far as I knew, the Home Rulers proposed to leave it exactly as it is. 'But there would be no Irish members there,' he said. I asked him why not. He said: "Why, because of Home Rule, you know.' But I did not know. I knew of no reason why Irish members should not be in the Imperial Parliament, while at the same time a domestic legislature was managing Irish business in Ireland. Home Rule, as I understand it, would leave the Imperial Parliament constituted exactly as it is at present. Irish members would be elected by the constituencies which elect them

I do not know whether Englishmen would be glad or sorry to hear that, even after Home Rule, there would still be Irish repre

sentatives addressing the Speaker in Westminster. Even with Home Rule in Ireland, Imperial business would have to be got through in London. Better still, it could then be got through. The Imperial Parliament, made up of English, Irish, Scotch, and Welsh members, just as it is at present, would have to discuss and decide all questions of the common interest, all Imperial questions, as we may call them-Imperial taxation, commercial policy, treaties of all kinds, the army, the navy, foreign policy, all subjects that belong to the making of war or the conclusion of peace. What it would not have to trouble itself with, are the questions of strictly domestic interest to Ireland. I do not wish Englishmen to understand that all we want for Ireland is a sort of overgrown county board. What we want is a legislature to deal with questions of domestic interest. Take the question of University Education for Ireland. That would have been settled long ago, and with the most perfect accord, by a domestic legislature. The Catholics and the Protestants in Ireland have long been agreed as to the general principles of the arrangement. The Catholics did not desire to interfere with the University of Dublin; the Protestants, as a whole, would have been well content that the Catholics should have a university of their own. The difficulty in this matter of education has come altogether from the Dissenters in England. It has not come from the Churchmen. English Dissenters have set up for themselves a fetish in the shape of a principle that the State shall not endow denominational education, and they try to make every other body of men in the Empire bow down to it. Ireland would settle for herself what regulations were suitable for public houses and the liquor trade. She would decide for herself whether the Ulster tenant system, which has done so much to make a province, once the very nursery of rebellion, contented and prosperous, should or should not be extended to other provinces as well. She would make the arrangements for applying relief in the case of exceptional distress. Of course it is needless to say that all questions affecting what we call private bill legislation for Ireland would come under the jurisdiction of the Home Rule Parliament. The House of Commons was engaged the other night in a long discussion concerning the terms on which Poor Law guardians in Ireland should be authorised to assist the rural population of Ireland in distressed districts to obtain seed potatoes for the coming season. The debate was carried on during parts of successive evenings. The question was one of great practical importance, and it was discussed in the most rigidly practical way; not one word, so far as I heard, was wasted on any subject not belonging to the strict business of the discussion. As I listened, I could not help asking myself: 'Is it possible that any English member could fail to see that such a subject as this is purely for the consideration of an Irish legislature? What possible advantage can it be to England to have it debated in Westminster Palace? No English

member, except the Chief Secretary for Ireland, will take any part in the discussion, or could be supposed to be qualified to take part in it. Irishmen understand it; it is their business altogether; they are discussing it, not, as comic periodicals in London assume that Irishmen discuss everything, with wild and whirling words, furious recriminations, and discursive eloquence, but in the quietest, most practical, driest manner possible. Of what advantage can it be to Ireland to have this discussion going on in the Imperial Parliament? Of what advantage can it be to England to have the time of the Imperial Parliament thus occupied ?'

The order-book of the House of Commons is overcharged with the titles of measures of strictly Imperial or common interest which could only be discussed properly by representatives of the three countries; and every one knows that session after session such measures have to be scamped or thrown aside because there is not time to pay attention to them. In the list of public bills for the session, thus far, there are some twenty-five upon Irish domestic subjects-questions which have absolutely no practical interest for any but Irishmen or residents in Ireland. Some of them are not only of great practical interest to Ireland, but of urgent and immediate interest. They could be dealt with promptly and effectively by an Irish legislature. In the Imperial Parliament they are jammed up with a crowd of other measures, jostling and jostled, each stopping the way of the other. A very important bill for the relief of Irish distress has just been under discussion. It was urgent, if any measure can be called urgent. The Government were sincerely anxious to press it on to completion. The Irish members were naturally anxious for the same thing. It was easy to urge on both sides that speed should be made with the bill; it was easy for one side to charge the other with being the cause of delay. But the plain fact was that there were parts of the bill which had to be discussed. Some of the Irish members were strongly of opinion that the guardians in Ireland ought to be allowed, during this season of temporary distress, to give outdoor relief occasionally in money as well as in food and fuel, as they were allowed to do, I believe, in Lancashire during the cotton famine. The Government did not see their way to consent to this demand. Great part of a night was taken up with the discussion. Now I should like to ask any reasonable Englishman if he thinks an Imperial Parliament is well occupied in deciding the question whether the Poor Law guardians of certain districts in Ireland should or should not be allowed to give outdoor relief in the form of money as well as of food. Is it possible to think of any question which could more legitimately and more effectively be decided by local authorities? I look at the matter naturally from the Irishman's point of view. But I am quite willing to admit that there is also the point of view of the Englishman and of the Scotchman. I can easily understand the impatience of an Englishman who

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