Leading Articles in the Reviews. 



553 



out is given short shrift. " The failure to carry 

 out the intention expressed in the preamble to 

 the Parliament Act cannot be held to invalidate 

 that Act itself, or to deprive of legal force any 

 Act passed under its provisions." Furthermore, 

 the writer shrewdly points out that if the Govern- 

 ment give legislative effect to their preamble, the 

 result would be an Upper House without the 

 powers of postponement given to the present 

 unreformed House of Lords, and more likely to 

 carry out without delay the bidding of the 

 majority in the House of Commons. 



MINISTERS NEITHER ILLEGAL NOR 



UNCONSTITUTIONAL. « 



The platform thunder about Home Rule not 

 being an issue at the last General Election is 

 even more coolly pooh-poohed. The writer says, 

 " Everyone knew that the first use Ministers 

 would make of their new powers would be to 

 pass a Home Rule Bill. Surely no warning was 

 needed of their intention. And if a warning was 

 needed, it was surely supplied by the speeches 

 of Opposition candidates." Equally cruelly the 

 reviewer remarks that if the theory of mandate 

 held, it would be hard to defend the Education 

 Act of 1904, the election of 1900 being fought 

 almost solely with reference to the Boer War. 

 An appeal to the people before Home Rule was 

 passed would be desirable in the judgment of 

 the reviewer, but he concludes, " We cannot 

 charge Ministers with illegal, or even unconsti- 

 tutional, action in declining the ordeal." He 

 therefore recommends that such arguments 

 should be abandoned. 



THE REAL CASE FOR ULSTER. 



Nevertheless, he thinks that Ulster is justified 

 in maintaining that a people cannot be rightly 

 transferred from its chosen allegiance to another 

 which it detests ; that if the Parliament of Great 

 Britain withdraws its protection in any real sense 

 from loyalist Ulster, Ulster is thus released from 

 its obligation to obey the Parliament of Great 

 Britain ; that if Ireland has a right to demand 

 separate government from the rest of Great 

 Britain, Ulster has a stronger right to demand 

 a government separate from that of the rest of 

 Ireland; that an Irish Legislature is almost cer- 

 tain to attempt to make wealthy Ulster pay for 

 legislative assistance to the poverty-stricken 

 remainder of Ireland. The only argument in 

 the reviewer's judgment for coercing Ulster is 

 that Ireland without Ulster would be a bank- 

 rupt country from the start. The writer asks, 

 ** Are we to enslave Ulster in order to save our- 

 selves a smaller sum? We are to pay two 

 millions a year to Ireland under the Bill. Let 

 us make it four, or six, or whatever sum is 



necessary, and leave Ulster out of count." We 

 paid thirty millions to emancipate the. slaves. 



ABETTING REBELLION IS TREASON. 



Rebellion, the writer thinks, is possible, and 

 he cannot exempt his own leaders from a share 

 in bringing about the impasse. He says, " There 

 is no doubt that to aid and abet rebellion is trea- 

 son, or at least, in the old phrase, misprision of 

 treason. It would certainly lay the actors open 

 to impeachment in due form and on strictly legal 

 grounds." He says: — 



It occurs to the impartial observer to ask — and the 

 question must be faced — whether the leaders of Con- 

 servative opinion^ the heads of the party which claims, 

 and rightly claims, to nourish a particular respect for 

 law and order, a special regard for constitutional pro- 

 cesses, should at this juncture have so fully identified 

 themselves with a movement which contemplates, in 

 certain circumstances, a violent breach of the public 

 peace. 



• WAIT AND SEE BEFORE YOU REBEL. 



The writer goes on to urge that, in accord with 

 all precedents of rebellion, 



In the case of Ulster, a rebellion against the evils 

 apprehended as likely to flow from Home Rule, when 

 they appear, would have a better hope of success than 

 a rebellion against an Act of Parliament which made 

 them possible. After all, we cannot be certain that 

 they would emerge. It is, as we have said, highly 

 probable ; it is not inevitable. 



He therefore cannot help doubting whether in 

 the present case an error has not been com- 

 mitted by the Unionist leaders. For he urges :— 



These very leaders may, no long time hence, be called 

 on to hold office, and to bear sway, among other things, 

 over an Ireland disappointed of Home Rule. What 

 will be the consequences in Ireland if Home Rule is 

 uncompromisingly put aside? Have we not, in that 

 case, another organised rebellion to fear, and that, not 

 from one-fourth, but from three-fourths of the popula- 

 tion? And with what arguments will the Conservative 

 leaders, who have sanctioned the rebellion of Ulster, 

 meet the rebellion of the rest of Ireland? 



COMPROMISE CALLED FOR 



The upshot of the whole matter is that the 

 reviewer hopes for the defeat of the Home Rule 

 Bill, but wisely points out that the defeat of the 

 Bill will not settle the Irish question. A com- 

 promise of some sort must eventually be 

 found : — 



It is obvious that at least one form of compromise 

 is open, on the most dangerous point of all, that of 

 Ulster. The four counties, at least, should be omitted 

 from the operation of the Bill ; and the Imperial Ex- 

 chequer should boldly and generously face the question 

 of supplying the deficiency which such an omission 

 would cause in the Irish Exchequer, 



Fle pleads that even now " these accursed Party 

 feuds may for a little space be laid aside." 



Every Conservative not rabid with partisan- 

 ship will feel his self-respect increased by the 

 perusal of these pages. 



