Introduction
Irish Unionists have pressed for a republication of A Leap in the Dark. They hold that it will be of some service in their resistance to the Coalition of Home Rulers, Socialists, and Separatists formed to force upon the people of England and of Scotland a virtual dissolution of the Union between Great Britain and Ireland. It would in any case have been a pleasure to afford aid, however small, to the Irish Unionists, whether Protestants or Catholics, engaged in the defence at once of their own birthright and of the political unity of the United Kingdom. Yet for a moment I doubted whether the republication of a forgotten criticism of a forgotten Bill would be of essential service to my friends. On reflection, however, I have come to see that, though the Unionists of Ireland probably overrate the practical value of my book, yet their hope of its serving the cause whereof they are the most valiant defenders is based on sound reasons.
A Leap in the Dark is a stringent criticism of the Home Rule Bill, 1893.[1] But the book has little to do with the details and intricacies of that Bill. A Leap in the Dark was published before the Home Rule Bill of 1893 had reached the House of Lords, or had assumed that final form, which made patent to the vast majority of British electors that a measure which purported to give a limited amount of independence to Ireland, in reality threatened England with political ruin. My criticism is therefore in truth an attack upon the fundamental principles of Home Rule, as advocated by Gladstone and his followers eighteen years ago. These principles, moreover, have never been repudiated by the Home Rulers of to-day. Some members of the present Cabinet, notably the Prime Minister and Lord Morley, were the apologists of the Bill of 1893. In that year A Leap in the Dark, or Our New Constitution, was, I venture to say, accepted by leading Unionists, such as Lord Salisbury, the Duke of Devonshire, Mr. Balfour, Mr. Chamberlain, Sir Henry James (now Lord James of Hereford), as, in the main, an adequate representation of the objections which, in the judgment of such men and thousands of Unionists, were fatal to the acceptance of any scheme whatever of Home Rule for Ireland. The battle over Home Rule lasting, as it did for years, and ending with the complete victory of the Unionists, has been forgotten by or has never become known to the mass of the present electors. It is well that they should be reminded of the solid grounds for the rejection by the Lords of the Home Rule Bill of 1893. It is well that they should be reminded that this rejection was in 1895 ratified by the approval of the electorate of the United Kingdom A Leap in the Dark will assuredly remind my readers that in 1893 the hereditary House of Lords, and not the newly elected House of Commons, truly represented the will of the nation. This is a fact never to be forgotten. It is of special import at the present moment. Another equally undoubted fact deserves attention. Home Rulers themselves despair of carrying a Home Rule Bill until they shall have turned the Parliament Bill into the Parliament Act, 1911, and my readers ought never to forget that the passing of the Parliament Bill into law destroys, and is meant to destroy, every security against the passing of any Home Rule Bill whatever which the present majority of the House of Commons choose to support. This gives an ominous significance to the obstinate refusal of the Government to alter or amend any of the material enactments contained in this ill-starred measure. A Leap in the Dark, combined with a knowledge of the Parliament Bill and the legislative dictatorship with which it invests the existing Coalition, suggests at least four conclusions which must at all costs be forced at this moment upon the attention of the nation. They may be thus summed up:
First.—If the Parliament Bill passes into law the existing majority of the House of Commons will be able to force, and will assuredly in fact force, through Parliament any Home Rule Bill whatever (even were it the Home Rule Bill of 1893), which meets with the approval of Mr. Redmond, and obtains the acquiescence of the rest of the Coalition.
The Coalition need not fear any veto of the House of Lords. There will be no necessity for an appeal to the electors, or in other words to the nation. The truth of this statement is indisputable. The legal right of the majority of the House of Commons to pass any bill whatever into law, even though the House of Lords refuse its assent, is absolutely secured by the very terms of the Parliament Bill. That the leaders of the Coalition, such as Mr. Asquith, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Mr. John Redmond, will press their legal right to its extreme limits is proved to any man who knows how to read the teaching of history, by the experience of 1893. Mr. Gladstone used every power he possessed, and used it unscrupulously, to drive a Home Rule Bill through the House of Commons. He was a man trained in the historical traditions of Parliament. He assuredly did not relish the use of the closure and the guillotine. He was supported in the Commons by a very narrow majority, never I think exceeding forty-eight, and often falling below that number. The power of the party system, or as Americans say, the "Machine," was admittedly much less in 1893 than it has become in 1911. Yet Mr. Gladstone used such power as he possessed to the utmost. He hurried through the House of Commons a Bill which had not in fact received the assent of the nation. He made the freest use of every device for curtailing freedom of debate. A large and most important portion of the Home Rule Bill was not discussed at all in the Commons. And this Bill contained provisions, not appearing in its original form, for the retention of eighty Irish members at Westminster with full authority to take part in every kind of legislation which might be laid before Parliament; though Mr. Gladstone himself held the fairness to England of this provision dubious[2] and Mr. (now Lord) Morley had in 1886 demonstrated by reasoning which to my mind is absolutely conclusive that under a system of Home Rule the presence of Irish representatives in the Imperial Parliament at Westminster would work fatal injury to Ireland and gross injustice to England.[3] Can any man able to draw from political precedents their true meaning believe that Mr. Asquith, and the allies who are his masters, will be more scrupulous in forcing the next Home Rule Bill through the House of Lords than was Mr. Gladstone in forcing the Home Rule Bill of 1893 through the House of Commons? Mr. Asquith is supported by a large though incongruous majority. His almost avowed aim in pushing the Parliament Bill, unchanged and unchangeable, through the Houses of Parliament is to force the Home Rule Bill on the people of Great Britain against their will. Hesitation to make use of this dictatorial authority, should he ever obtain it, will to himself mean political ruin; to his English supporters it will seem political pusillanimity; by his Irish confederates it will be denounced as breach of faith and treachery. As certainly as night follows day the passing of the Parliament Act will be succeeded by the attempted passing of a Home Rule Act.
Secondly.—Mr. Redmond and the Home Rulers, or Separatists, of whom he is the leader, will exact under any Home Rule Bill of say 1912 or 1913, at lowest, every advantage which was demanded by Irish Nationalists in 1893.
Why, in the name of common sense, when Irish Nationalists are absolute masters of the situation, should they demand lower payment for their support than was offered to them twenty years ago when the Home Rule majority was every day losing strength, when every one knew that nothing but the show of moderation gave the slightest chance of a Home Rule Bill escaping the veto of the House of Lords, when every one, except perhaps Mr. Gladstone, foresaw that the next General Election would give to Unionists a crushing majority? Every advantage conceded in 1893 to Irish Separatists at the expense of England will assuredly reappear in one form or another in the next Home Rule Bill. Thus Ireland will, we may anticipate, under the next Home Rule Bill send to the Parliament at Westminster at least eighty members armed with the fullest legislative authority, so that, to revive the language current eighteen years ago, Ireland will govern and tax England whilst England will retain no right either to govern or to tax Ireland.
Thirdly.—Every question to which in 1893 Gladstonians could discover no answer satisfactory to Unionists or to the electorate of Great Britain requires an answer in 1911 as much as in 1893. The answer favourable to Home Rule has not as yet been discovered.
Is it possible to combine the effective supremacy of the Imperial Parliament with Home Rule or the substantial legislative independence of Ireland? Can Ireland, close to the shore of Great Britain, occupy the position of a self-governing colony, such as New Zealand, divided from Great Britain by thousands of miles of sea? Is it possible to create, or even to imagine, a Court which shall decide whether a law passed by the Irish Parliament violates the provisions of the proposed Home Rule Act? Above all, can the wit of man devise any scheme of constitution which shall at once satisfy the aspirations of Irish Nationalism and the patently just demand of Ulster that Protestants shall retain the freedom and the rights secured to them as citizens of the United Kingdom? Is there any form of Home Rule which will satisfy the desire of Irish Nationalists for something approaching national independence without the urgent peril of rousing civil war between Ulster and the Parliament at Dublin? All these inquiries, and others like them, harassed the Parliament of 1893; they were all answered by Unionists, that is by the majority of the British electors, with a decided negative; they will all be raised and will all need an answer when the leaders of the Coalition condescend to produce their next Home Rule Bill or even to reveal its fundamental principles.
Fourthly.—England in the circumstances of to-day is threatened with two perils which did not exist in 1893, and yet are of stupendous gravity.
The first is, that in the case of a measure of Home Rule the opportunities for discussing its provisions which are contained in the Parliament Bill may turn out nominal rather than real. It is not at all certain that for such a Bill, even though it be abhorred by the electorate of the United Kingdom, the House of Lords will be practically able to secure the delay and elaborate discussion to which Mr. Asquith professedly attaches immense importance. Unionists will believe that the measure passed by a large majority of the House of Commons is detested by the majority of the British electors. But how will it be possible to carry on the government of Ireland, to maintain order, or to save a loyal minority from gross oppression after a Home Rule Bill applauded by Separatists has been passed through the House of Commons, and for the first time has been rejected by the House of Lords? Every official in Ireland, down from the Lord Lieutenant to the last newly appointed member of the Irish Constabulary, every Irishman loyal or disloyal, will know that the Bill will within a year or two become law and that Irish Nationalists will control the Parliament and the government of Ireland. Will not the House of Lords be urged by every alleged consideration of good sense and humanity to close without delay a period of uncertainty which is threatening to turn into a reign of anarchy or of terror? The question supplies its own answer. The second peril is one whereof nobody speaks, but which must occur to any man who has studied the history of the past eighteen years or reflects upon the condition of public opinion. The peril, to put the matter plainly, is that Home Rulers will not stop at attaining Home Rule for Ireland, and that they may, and probably will, attempt to undermine the political predominance of England. Everything points in this direction. The agitation for Home Rule has fostered in Ireland, and to a very limited extent in certain other parts of the United Kingdom, a feeling approaching to jealousy of English power. England or Great Britain is the predominant partner. England is wealthy, England is prosperous. England, as the language of common life imports, is the leading member of the United Kingdom. Lord Rosebery announced with wise foresight that Home Rule in Ireland could hardly be established with benefit to the United Kingdom until the assent thereto of the predominant partner had been obtained by force of argument. The idea was grounded on common sense. Will it not suggest to Irish Nationalists that their moment of authority must be used for obtaining far greater privileges for Ireland than the extravagant political power offered by Gladstonians in 1893? Is it not natural for Home Rulers to think that the predominant partner ought to be deprived of his predominance? The conduct of the Coalition and some of its leaders points in this direction. They will have obtained through the Parliament Act temporary, but strictly unlimited and dictatorial, power. They will have obtained it by intrigue; they have rejected and treated with scorn the idea of an appeal to the people. They have claimed, not for Parliament but for the existing House of Commons, an absolute legislative power superior to that of the nation, a power which I assert with confidence is not possessed by the elected Assemblies of the United States, or of the French Republic, or of the Swiss Confederation: And by a strange combination of circumstances one method for depriving the predominant partner of legitimate authority may seem to a Home Ruler to lie near at hand. Raise the cry of 'Home Rule all round,' or of 'Federalise the British Empire.' Turn England into one State of a great federation, let Wales be another, Scotland a third, the Channel Islands a fourth, and for aught I know the Isle of Man a fifth. Let the self-governing Colonies, and British India, send deputies to the Imperial or Federal Parliament. You may thus for a moment, under the pretence of uniting the Empire, not only divide the United Kingdom, but deprive England or Great Britain, in form at least, of that political supremacy and predominance which is the real bond of union and peace not only throughout the United Kingdom, but also throughout the length and breadth of the British Empire. I do not tremble for the power—the lawful and legitimate power—of England. Political devices, however crafty, break down whenever they are opposed to the nature of things. I know that unity is increasing throughout the Empire not through the cunning or the statecraft of politicians, but through the whole course of events. One part of our Imperial system becomes daily under the effect of railways, steamers, telegraphs, and the like, nearer and nearer to every other part. The sentiment of unity which is more valuable than any law aiming at formal federation each year gains strength. What I do fear and insist upon is the danger that a legislative dictatorship conferred on a party, and therefore necessarily taken away from the nation, should be employed in the attempt, vain though it ultimately must be, to deprive the predominant partner of a predominance requisite for the maintenance both of the United Kingdom and of the British Empire.
The four reflections at any rate which may be suggested by A Leap in the Dark are well worth the consideration of the loyal citizens of the United Kingdom.
A.V. Dicey.