Introduction. The late Conservative Government announced on its last day in office its intention to introduce further repressive criminal legislation. Gladstone accepted this was necessary, but asked whether England could establish good relations with Ireland on the same just principles as those with Scotland. Gladstone introduced the Home Rule Bill of 1886 in a speech which was partly historical and partly explanatory.

His object was to prove that since the Act of Union in 1800 all efforts to govern Ireland through the Parliament at Westminster had failed, and to propose for that reason a system of governing her through a legislative body sitting in Dublin. He argued that Catholic Emancipation, with which Pitt intended to accompany the Act of Union, but which was postponed for nearly thirty years, had failed to reconcile the Catholics. The Disestablishment of the Irish Church had put an end to the legal recognition of Protestant ascendancy. The Land Acts of 1870 and 1881 had relieved the Irish tenants of serious grievances. Subsequent Purchase Acts had created a large class of landed proprietors who were as secure in their small holdings as the wealthiest landlord.

But the bulk of the Irish people were still discontented, because they had no part in the administration of their own affairs. For the greater part of the time since the Union special laws for the suppression of political and agrarian crime had been enforced in Ireland. Crime was put down with a strong hand. Discontent and disloyalty remained. How could they be met?

In his opinion the only way of meeting them effectively was to entrust Irishmen with the conduct of Irish legislation and administration, so far as it did not conflict with British or Imperial interests. An Irish Legislature, with an Irish Executive responsible to it, would, he thought, be able to solve the problem of combining local autonomy with the supreme authority of Parliament over the United Kingdom. Ireland would no longer be represented at Westminster, and would pay a share of taxation, raised by her own Legislature, proportionate to her financial capacity.

The powers of the Irish Legislature would be limited by the express provisions of the Act creating it, and would not extend to any matter not exclusively Irish. There would be, for instance, no right to a protective tariff, or to customs duties upon British goods at the Irish ports. The army and the navy would be unaffected. There would still be a Lord Lieutenant, responsible to the British Ministry, with control over the forces of the Crown in Ireland. Gladstone avails himself in this speech of various analogies, and in particular appeals to the Colonial Empire of Great Britain as the noblest example of Home Rule furnished by the history of the world. It was the first time on which a concrete proposal for Home Rule had been authoritatively presented to the British Parliament, and the speech treats the whole subject in an exhaustive manner.

 

Source. William Ewart Gladstone, edited by Arthur Tilney Bassett, Gladstone’s speeches: descriptive index and bibliography (London 1916) 601-644; Hansard 3 (Commons), 3rd series, cciv, 1036-81, 8 April 1886.

I could have wished, Mr. Speaker, on several grounds, that it had been possible for me on this single occasion to open to the House the whole of the policy and intentions of the Government with respect to Ireland. The two questions of land and of Irish government are, in our view, closely and inseparably connected, for they are the two channels through which we hope to find access, and effectual access, to that question most vital of all—namely, the question of social order in Ireland. ... is it or is it not possible to establish good and harmonious relations between Great Britain and Ireland on the footing of those free institutions to which Englishmen, Scotchmen, and Irishmen are alike unalterably attached.

... The crime of Ireland, the agrarian crime of Ireland—I rejoice to say, is not what it was in other days—days now comparatively distant, days within my own earliest recollection as a Member of Parliament. In 1833 the Government of Lord Grey proposed to Parliament a strong Coercion Act. ... In 1832 the homicides in Ireland were 248, in 1885 they were 65. The cases of attempts to kill, happily unfulfilled, in the first of those years were 209, in 1885 were 37. The serious offences of all other kinds in Ireland in1832 were 6,014, in 1885 they were 1,057. The whole criminal offences in Ireland in the former year were 14,000, and, in the latter year 2,683.

… agrarian crime has become, sometimes upon a larger and sometimes upon a smaller scale, as habitual in Ireland as the legislation which has been intended to repress it, and that agrarian crime, although at the it is almost at the low water-mark, yet has a fatal capacity of expansion under stimulating circumstances, and rises from time to time, as it rose in 2885, to dimensions, and to an exasperation which become threatening to general social order, and to the peace of private and domestic life.

… It is impossible to depend upon the finding of a jury in a case of agrarian crime according to the facts as they are viewed by the Government, by the judges, and by the public, I think, at large. That is a most serious mischief, passing down deep into the very groundwork of civil society. It is also, Sir, undoubtedly a mischief that, in cases where the extreme remedy of eviction is resorted to by the landlord—possibly, in some cases, unnecessarily resorted to, but in other instances, resorted to after long patience has been exhausted—these cases of eviction, good, bad, and indifferent as to their justification, stand pretty much in one and the same discredit with the rural population of Ireland, and become, as we know, the occasion of transactions that we all deeply lament. Finally, it is not to be denied that there is great interference in Ireland with individual liberty in the shape of intimidation. Now, Sir, I am not about to assume the tone of the Pharisee on this occasion. There is a great deal of intimidation in England, too, when people find occasion for it; and if we, the English and the Scotch, were under the conviction that we had such grave cause to warrant irregular action, as is the conviction entertained by a very large part of the population in Ireland, I am not at all sure that we would not, like that part of the population in Ireland, resort to the rude and unjustifiable remedy of intimidation. ...

Intimidation does prevail, not to the extent that is supposed, yet to a material and painful extent in Ireland. The consequence of that is to weaken generally the respect for law, and the respect for contract, and that among a people who, I believe, are as capable of attaining to the very highest moral and social standard as any people on the face of the earth.

[There were only eleven years without coercive legislation between 1800 and 1832, and only two years between 1833 and 1885].

… Law is discredited in Ireland, and discredited in Ireland upon this ground especially—that it comes to the people of that country with a foreign accent, and in a foreign garb. These Coercion Bills of ours, of course for it has become a matter of course—I am speaking of the facts and not of the merits—these Coercion Bills are stiffly resisted by the Members who represent Ireland in Parliament. The English mind, by cases of this kind and by the tone of the press towards them, is estranged from the Irish people and the Irish mind is estranged from the people of England and Scotland. … If coercion is to be the basis for legislation, we must no longer be seeking, as we are always laudably seeking, to whittle it down almost to nothing at the very first moment we begin, but we must, like men, adopt it, hold by it, sternly enforce it, till its end has been completely attained— with what results to peace, good will and freedom I do not now stop to inquire. Our ineffectual and spurious coercion is morally worn out. ...

… Almost immediately after the lapse of the Crimes Act ‘Boycotting’ increased fourfold.

… The case of Ireland, though she is represented here not less fully than England and Scotland, is not the same as that of England and Scotland. England, by her own strength, and by her vast majority in this House, makes her own laws just as independently as if she were not combined with two other countries. Scotland—a small country, smaller than Ireland, but a country endowed with a spirit so masculine that never in the long course of history, excepting for two brief periods, each of a few years, was the superior strength of England such as to enable her to put down the national freedom beyond the border—Scotland, wisely recognised by England, has been allowed and encouraged in this house to make her own laws as freely and as effectually as if she had a representation six times as strong. The consequence is that the mainspring of law in England is felt by the people to be English; the mainspring of law in Scotland is felt by the people to be Scotch; but the mainspring of law in Ireland is not felt by the people to be Irish.

… Something must be done, something is imperatively demanded from us to restore to Ireland the first conditions of civil life—the free course of law, the liberty of every individual in the exercise of every legal right, the confidence of the people in the law, apart from which no country can be called, in the full sense of the word, a civilised country. [The Government must decide] how to reconcile Imperial unity with diversity of legislation. Mr. Grattan not only held these purposes to be reconcilable, but he did not scruple to go the length of saying this

‘I demand the continued severance of the Parliaments with a view to the continued and everlasting unity of the Empire.’

Was that a flight of rhetoric, an audacious paradox? No; it was the statement of a problem which other countries have solved; and under circumstances much more difficult than ours. We ourselves may be said to have solved it, for I do not think that anyone will question the fact that, out of the last six centuries, for five centuries at least Ireland has had a Parliament separate from ours. That is a fact undeniable. Did that separation of Parliament destroy the unity of the British Empire? Did it destroy it in the 18th century? Do not suppose that I mean that harmony always prevailed between Ireland and England. We know very well there were causes quite sufficient to account for a recurrence of discord. But I take the 18th century alone. Can I be told that there was no unity of Empire in the 18th century? Why, Sir, it was the century which witnessed the foundation of that great, gigantic manufacturing industry which now overshadows the whole world. It was, in a pre-eminent sense, the century of Empire, and it was in a sense, but too conspicuous, the century of wars. Those wars were carried on, that Empire was maintained and enormously enlarged, that trade was established, that Navy was brought to supremacy when England and Ireland had separate Parliaments. Am I to be told that there was no unity of empire in that state of things?

[Gladstone accepted Parnell’s demands for local autonomy or Irish autonomy as the legitimate wish of the majority of the Irish people].

… If he speaks, as I believe he speaks, the mind of the vast majority of the Representatives of Ireland, I feel that we have no right to question for a moment, in this free country, under a representative system, that the vast majority of the Representatives speak the mind of a decided majority of the people. … The term ‘Dismemberment of the Empire’, as applied to anything that is now before us, is … simply a misnomer. To speak, in any meditated or possible plan, of the dismemberment of the Empire is, in the face of the history of the eighteenth century, not merely a misnomer, but an absurdity.

… There have been several plans liberally devised for granting to Ireland the management of her education, the management of her public works, and the management of one subject and another. [However, there are] … two obstacles—first of all, that those intended to benefit do not want it, do not ask it, and refuse it; and, secondly, the obstacle, not less important, that all those who are fearful of giving a domestic Legislature to Ireland would naturally, emphatically, and rather justly, say

‘We will not create your Central Board and palter with this question, because we feel certain that it will afford nothing in this world except a stage from which to agitate for a further concession; and because we see that by the proposal you make you will not even attain the advantage of settling the question that is raised’.

Well, Sir, what we seek is the settlement of that question, and we think that we find that settlement in the establishment, by the authority of Parliament, of a Legislative Body sitting in Dublin, for the conduct of both legislation and administration under the conditions which may be prescribed by the Act defining Irish, as distinct from Imperial, affairs. There is the head and front of our offending. Let us proceed to examine the matter a little further. The essential conditions of any plan that Parliament can be asked or could be expected to entertain are, in my opinion, these: The unity of the Empire must not be placed in jeopardy; the safety and welfare of the whole—if there is an unfortunate conflict, which I do not believe—the welfare and security of the whole must be preferred to the security and advantage of the part. The political equality of the three countries must be maintained. They stand by statute on a footing of absolute equality, and that footing ought not to be altered or brought into question. There should be what I will at present term an equitable distribution of Imperial burdens.

Next I introduce a provision which may seem to be exceptional, but which, in the peculiar circumstances of Ireland, whose history unhappily has been one long chain of internal controversies as well as of external difficulties, is necessary in order that there may be reasonable safeguards for the minority. I am asked why there should be safeguards for the minority. Will not the minority in Ireland, as in other countries, be able to take care of itself? Are not free institutions, with absolute publicity, the best security that can be given to any, minority? I know, Sir, that in the long run our experience shows they are. After we have passed through the present critical period, and obviated and disarmed, if, we can, the jealousies with which any change is attended, I believe, as most gentlemen in this House may probably believe, that there is nothing comparable to the healthy action of free discussion, and that a minority asserting in the face of day its natural rights is the best security and guarantee for its retaining them. We have not reached that state of things.

I may say, not entering into detail, there are three classes to whom we must look in this case: We must consider—I will not say more on that subject to-day—the class immediately connected with the land. A second question, not, I think, offering any great difficulty, relates to the Civil Service and the offices of the Executive Government in Ireland. The third question relates to what is commonly called the Protestant minority, and especially that important part of the community which inhabits the Province of Ulster, or which predominates in a considerable portion of the Province of Ulster.

I will deviate from my path for a moment to say a word upon the state of opinion in that wealthy, intelligent, and energetic portion of the Irish community which, as I have said, predominates in a certain portion of Ulster. Our duty is to adhere to sound general principles, and to give the utmost consideration we can to the opinions of that energetic minority. The first thing of all, I should say, is that if, under any occasion, by any individual or section, violent measures have been threatened in certain emergencies, I think the best compliment I can pay to those who have threatened us is to take no notice whatever of the threats, but to treat them as momentary ebullitions [violent outpouring], which will pass away with the fears from which they spring, and at the same time to adopt on our part every reasonable measure for disarming those fears. I cannot conceal the conviction that the voice of Ireland, as a whole, is at this moment clearly and constitutionally spoken. I cannot say it is otherwise when five-sixths of its lawfully-chosen Representatives are of one mind in this matter. There is a counter voice; and I wish to know what is the claim of those by whom that counter voice is spoken, and how much is the scope and allowance we can give them. Certainly, Sir, I cannot allow it to be said that a Protestant minority in Ulster, or elsewhere, is to rule the question at large for Ireland. I am aware of no constitutional doctrine tolerable on which such a conclusion could be adopted or justified. But I think that the Protestant minority should have its wishes considered to the utmost practicable extent in any form which they can assume.

Various schemes, short of refusing the demand of Ireland at large, have been proposed on behalf of Ulster. One scheme is, that Ulster itself, or, perhaps with more appearance of reason, a portion of Ulster, should be excluded from the operation of the bill we are about to introduce. Another scheme is, that certain rights with regard to certain subjects—such, for example, as education and some other subjects—should be reserved and should be placed, to a certain extent, under the control of Provincial Councils. These, I think, are the suggestions which reached me in different shapes; there may be others. But what I wish to say of them is this—there is no one of them which has appeared to us to be so completely justified, either upon its merits or by the weight of opinion supporting and recommending it, as to warrant our including it in the Bill and proposing it to Parliament upon our responsibility. What we think is that such suggestions deserve careful and unprejudiced consideration. It may be that free discussion, which I have no doubt will largely take place after a Bill such as we propose shall have been laid on the Table of the House, may give to one of these proposals, or to some other proposals, a practical form, and that some such plan may be found to be recommended by a general or predominating approval.

... I have spoken now of the essential conditions of a good plan: for Ireland, and I add only this—that, in order to be a good plan, it must be a plan promising to be a real settlement of Ireland. ...The great settlement of 1782 was not a real settlement. ... [because of] the mistaken policy of England listening to the pernicious voice and claims of ascendancy. It is impossible, however, not to say this word for the Protestant Parliament of Ireland. Founded as it was upon narrow suffrage, exclusive in religion, crowded with pensioners and place-holders, holding every advantage, it yet had in it the spark, at least, and the spirit of true patriotism. It emancipated the Roman Catholics of Ireland when the Roman Catholics of England were not yet emancipated.

... There cannot be a domestic Legislature in Ireland, dealing with Irish affairs; and Irish and Representatives sitting in Parliament at Westminster to take part in English and Scotch affairs. … Is it practicable for Irish Representatives to come here for the settlement, not of English or Scotch, but of Imperial concerns. No. There may be conflicts of interest. It would be extremely difficult to decide on which matters Irish representatives were entitled to vote. Irish representation would have to be reduced and this would be opposed. It would be difficult for Ireland to run a domestic parliament and participate effectively in Westminster.]

… I will now tell the House—and I would beg particular attention to this—what are the functions that we propose to withdraw from the cognizance of this Legislative Body. The three grand and principal functions are, first, everything that relates to the Crown—Succession, Prerogatives, and the mode of administering powers during incapacity, Regency, and, in fact, all that belongs to the Crown. The next would be all that belongs to defence--the Army, the Navy, the entire organisations of armed force. I do not say the Police Force, which I will touch upon by-and-by, but everything belonging to defence. And the third would be the entire subject of Foreign and Colonial relations. Those are the subjects most properly Imperial, and I will say belonging, as a principle, to the Legislature established under the Act of Union and sitting at Westminster. … We propose to provide that the Legislative Body should not be competent to pass a law for the establishment or the endowment of any particular religion.

… It is commonly said in England and Scotland—and in the main it is, I think, truly said—that we have for a great number of years been struggling to pass good laws for Ireland. We have sacrificed our time; we have neglected our own business; we have advanced our money—which I do not think at all a great favour conferred on her—and all this in the endeavour to give Ireland good laws. That is quite true in regard to the general course of legislation since 1829. But many of those laws have been passed under influences which can hardly be described otherwise than as influences of fear. Some of our laws have been passed in a spirit of grudging and of jealousy. It is most painful for me to consider that, after four or five years of Parliamentary battle, when a Municipal Corporation Act was passed for Ireland, it was a very different measure to that which, in England and Scotland, created complete and absolute municipal life. Were I to come to come to the history of the Land Question I could tell a still sadder tale. Let no man assume that he fully knows that history until he has followed it from year to year, beginning with the Devon Commission, or with the efforts of Mr. Sharman Crawford. … The whole labours of that Commission were frustrated by the domination of selfish interests in the British Parliament. Our first effort at land legislation was delayed until so late a period as the year 1870.

… The passing of many good laws is not enough in cases where the strong permanent instincts of the people, their distinctive marks of character, the situation and history of the country require not only that these laws should be good, but that they should proceed from a congenial and native source, and besides being good laws should be their own laws. …

The principle that I am laying down I am not laying down exceptionally for Ireland. It is the very principle upon which, within my recollection, to the immense advantage of the country, we have not only altered, but revolutionised our method of governing the Colonies. … the colonies said

‘We do not want your good laws; we want our own’.

We admitted the reasonableness of that principle, and it is now coming home to us from across the seas. We have to consider whether it is applicable to the case of Ireland. Do not let us disguise this from ourselves. We stand face to face with what is termed Irish nationality. Irish nationality vents itself in the demand for local autonomy, or separate and complete self-government in Irish, not in Imperial, affairs. Is this an evil in itself? … It is not. …

I hold that there is such a thing as local patriotism, which, in itself, is not bad, but good. The Welshman is full of local patriotism—the Scotchman is full of local patriotism; the Scotch nationality is as strong as it ever was, and should the occasion arise—which I believe it never can—it will be as ready to assert itself as in the days of Bannockburn. I do not believe that local patriotism is an evil. I believe it is stronger in Ireland even than in Scotland. Englishmen are eminently English, Scotchmen are profoundly Scotch; and, if I read Irish history right, misfortune and calamity have wedding her sons to her soil. The Irishman is more profoundly Irish; but it does not follow that, because his local patriotism is keen, he is incapable of Imperial patriotism. …

I say that the Irishman is as capable of loyalty as another man—I say that if his loyalty has been checked in his development, why is it? Because the laws by which he is governed do not present themselves to him, as they do to us in England and Scotland, with a native and congenial aspect; and I think I can refer to two illustrations which go strongly to support the doctrine I have advanced. Take the case of the Irish soldier and of the Irish Constabulary. Have you a braver or a more loyal man in your Army than the Irishman, who has shared every danger with his Scotch and English comrades, and who has never been behind them, when confronted by peril for the sake of the honour and safety of his Empire? … The Constabulary are largely taken from the Roman Catholic population and from the very class most open to disaffection; where disaffection exists, they form a splendid model of obedience, discipline, and devotion such as the world can hardly match. How is this? … They are placed under an authority which is to them congenial because freely accepted.

…We have no right to say that Ireland, through her constitutionally-chosen Representatives, will accept the plan I offer. Whether it will be so I do not know—I have no title to assume it; but if Ireland does not cheerfully accept it, it is impossible for us to attempt to force upon her what is intended to be a boon; can we possibly press England and Scotland to accord to Ireland what she does not heartily welcome and embrace. There are difficulties; but I rely upon the patriotism and sagacity of this House; I rely on the effects of free and full discussion; and I rely more than all upon the just and generous sentiments of the two British nations.

Looking forward, I ask the House to assist us in the work which we have undertaken, and to believe that no trivial motive can have driven us to it—to assist us in this work which, we believe, will restore Parliament to its dignity and legislation to its free and unimpeded course. I ask you to stay that waste of public treasure which is involved in the present system of government and legislation in Ireland, and which is not a waste only, but which demoralises while it exhausts. The concession of local self-government is not the way to sap or impair, but the way to strengthen and consolidate unity. …

The best and surest foundation we can find to build upon is the foundation afforded by the affections, the convictions, and the will of the nation; and it is thus, by the decree of the Almighty, that we may be enabled to secure at once the social peace, the fame, the power, and the permanence of the Empire.

Tomás O’Riordan