402 



GREAT BRITAIN" AND IRELAND. 



erals, and was compelled to select his associates 

 entirely from the Tory party. 



The Session of the New Parliament. The newly 

 elected Parliament assembled on August 5. In 

 a brief speech from the throne read on August 

 19, the completion of the financial business of 

 the year was denounced as the only legislation 

 to be proposed by the Government, Lord 

 Randolph Churchill was made Chancellor of 

 the Exchequer, with the leadership of the House 

 of Commons. Both wings of the Unionist Lib- 

 erals sat on the Opposition side of the House, 

 but it was understood that they would sup- 

 port the ministry so long as there was any 

 danger of the restoration of a home-rule gov- 

 ernment to power. The Prime Minister said 

 that the Government expected to restore law 

 and order in Ireland by more vigorous work- 

 ing of the police system in disturbed districts; 

 and Lord Randolph Churchill explained that 

 they regarded Mr. Gladstone as the leader of 

 the Nationalists, and therefore took it for 

 granted that the agitation had become consti- 

 tutional. The Parnellites and their allies 

 among the English and Scotch Radicals at 

 first threatened to recognize Lord Randolph 

 Churchill as the leader of the House or to treat 

 Lord Hartington and his followers as still 

 members of the Liberal party, but Mr. Glad- 

 stone discouraged these tactics. 



The ministers declared that they did not ac- 

 knowledge that judicial rents in Ireland were 

 too high, or that the fall in the prices of agri- 

 cultural produce had caused general inability 

 to pay. They were determined to maintain 

 the land act as a settlement of the land ques- 

 tion, and to enforce the- decrees of courts of 

 law. The appointment of a number of royal 

 commissions was announced. One was to in- 

 quire into the working of the land act and as- 

 certain how far the non-payment of rent was 

 due to the depression of values and how far to 

 the action of the National League. Another 

 was to study the means of developing the nat- 

 ural resources of Ireland, including means of 

 communication and arterial drainage. The 

 Parnellites and Radicals ridiculed this system 

 of "government by inquiry." Other commis- 

 sions were appointed to study the currency 

 question, the organization and the working of 

 the spending departments, the condition of 

 the ordnance, and the riots in Belfast. 



Mr. Parnell moved an amendment to the 

 address attributing the non-payment of rents 

 to the fall in prices, condemning evictions, and 

 deprecating the extension of the purchase sys- 

 tem. ^ Mr. Gladstone protested against the 

 commissions and against schemes for the re- 

 lief of the Irish peasantry, the cost of which 

 would have to be borne by the British tax- 

 payers. Mr. Chamberlain expressed himself 

 in favor of a measure establishing a sliding 

 scale of rents, varying with prices, as suggest- 

 ed by Mr. Parnell, and of the suspension of 

 evictions. In the vote on the amendment the 

 Government were sustained by 304 to 181. 



An amendment touching the Belfast rioting 

 was moved by Mr. Sexton, who threw the 

 blame on Lord Randolph Churchill's speeches, 

 denounced in the last Parliament by Mr. Glad- 

 stone as an incitement to " contingent trea- 

 son," but it was rejected by 225 against 128 

 votes. Sir William Harcourt delivered a bit- 

 ter speech against the Chancellor of the Ex- 

 chequer. On amendments condemning the 

 Burmese war, and on motions to reopen the 

 crofter settlement, the Government ohtained 

 large majorities. Sir Michael Hicks -Beach 

 met Mr. Dillon's amendment, representing the 

 land question as urgent, with the explanation 

 that the Government could not move in that 

 matter without inquiry, but would demand ex- 

 traordinary powers for the preservation of so- 

 cial order if the necessity should arise. While 

 Mr. Gladstone was in Bavaria and Mr. Parnell 

 absent, Sir William Harcourt and Mr. T. P. 

 O'Connor divided the leadership of the Oppo- 

 sition. The Parnellites and Radicals attacked 

 numerous items in the estimates, and prolonged 

 the session till near the end of September. 



Mr. Parnell introduced a bill to give lease- 

 holders the benefit of the land courts, and en- 

 able fair rents to be fixed for them like oth( 

 tenants. He also proposed the revision of , 

 dicial rents that had been fixed before 

 and a suspension of proceedings that might 

 begun by landlords ngainst tenants applying 

 for an abatement, provided the latter paid int 

 court one half of the rent due. The bill 

 rejected by a majority of 297 against 202. 

 Besides the voting of supply, only two meas- 

 ures, which were not contested, were passed. 

 One of them created and defined the powers of 

 the Belfast investigating commission, and the 

 other repealed the acts sanctioning the issue 

 of secret-service money out of the consolidated 

 fund, because it has been sometimes employed 

 for party purposes. 



The policy of the new Government in respect 

 to Ireland was indicated in Lord Salisbury's 

 speech at the Lord Mayor's feast on August 11. 

 He said that the first duty of the Government 

 was to free the loyal people from illegal re- 

 straints and constraints, and that, representing 

 the mandate of the people against separation, 

 whose motto was "social order in Ireland," 

 the primary task was to maintain law and 

 order. 



Deputations, consisting of the Mayors of 

 Cork, Limerick, Clonmel, and Waterford, bring- 

 ing the freedom of those cities, and hndies bear- 

 ing an address, signed by 400,000 Irishmen, 

 waited on Mr. Gladstone on October 4, and elic- 

 ited from him a reiteration of his declaration 

 in favor of Irish autonomy. 



In October Mr. Gladstone published a pam- 

 phlet on "The Irish Question," in which he 

 discussed the history of the idea embodied in 

 his home-rule scheme, and drew the conclusion 

 from the results of the elections that the ver- 

 dict of the people had been given for the prin- 

 ciple. 



