A Leap in the Dark / A Criticism of the Principles of Home Rule as Illustrated by the / Bill of 1893

by A. V. Dicey

Chapter III—Why The New Constitution Will Not Be A Settlement Of The Irish Question

'We believe that this measure [the Home Rule Bill] when improved in Committee will be, at all events in our time, a final settlement of the Irish question.'[95]

'Five speeches were made from the Irish benches ... there was not one of those speeches which fell short of what we have declared to be in our opinion necessary for the acceptance of this Bill. That is where we look for a durable and solid statement as to finality. We find the word finality not even eschewed by the generous unreserve of the honourable member for North Longford[96] who attached the character of finality to the Bill.... What said the honourable member for Kerry[97] last night? He said, "This is a Bill that will end the feud of ages" This is exactly what we want to do. That is what I call acceptance by the Irish members of this Bill.... What we mean by this Bill is to close and bury a controversy of seven hundred years.'[98]

This hope of ending the feud of ages has been for years dangled by Gladstonians before the English electorate. It has gained thousands of votes for Home Rule. But it is doomed to disappointment. The new constitution will never be a settlement of the Irish question: and this for three reasons, which can be definitely stated and easily understood.

First. The new constitution satisfies neither Ireland nor England.

It does not satisfy Ireland.

Ulster, Protestant Ireland, and indeed, speaking generally, all men of property in Ireland, whether Protestant or Catholic, detest Home Rule. They hate the new constitution, they protest against the new constitution, they assert that they will to the utmost of their ability resist the introduction and impede the working of the new constitution. Their abhorrence of Home Rule may be groundless, their threats may be baseless; their power to give effect to their menaces may have no existence. All that I now contend is that the strongest, and the most energetic, part of Irish society is in fact and in truth bitterly opposed, not only to the details, but to the fundamental principle, of the new polity. It avails nothing to urge that the Protestants and the educated Catholics are in a minority. This plea shows that in Parliament they can be outvoted; it does not show that they will, or can, be pacified by a policy which runs counter to their traditions, their interests, and their sentiment. You cannot vote men into content, you cannot coerce them into satisfaction. Let us look facts in the face. The measure which is supposed to gratify Ireland satisfies at most a majority of Irishmen. This may be enough for a Parliamentary tactician, it is not enough for a far-seeing statesman or a man of plain common sense. When we are told a minority are filled with discontent, we must ask who constitute the minority. When we find that the minority consists of men of all descriptions and of all creeds, that they represent the education, the respectability, the worth, and the wealth of Ireland, we must be filled with alarm. Wealth, no doubt, is no certain sign of virtue, any more than poverty can be identified with vice; a rich man may be a scoundrel, and a poor man may be an honour to the human race, but the world would be much worse constituted than it is, if the possession of a competence were not connected with honesty, energy, adherence to duty, and every other civic virtue. When it is said or admitted by Gladstonians that the propertied classes of Ireland are against Home Rule we know what this means; it means that the energy of Ireland is against Home Rule, that the honesty of Ireland is against Home Rule, that the learning of Ireland is against Home Rule, that all that makes a nation great is against Home Rule, and that the Irishmen most entitled to our respect and honour implore us not to force upon them the curse of Home Rule. This is no trifle. Let us at any rate have done with phrases; let us admit that the satisfaction of Ireland means merely the satisfaction of a class, though it may be the most numerous class of Irishmen, and that it also means the bitter discontent of the one class of Irishmen who are specially loyal to Great Britain. If we are closing one feud we are assuredly opening another feud which it may at least be as hard to heal.

But is it true that even the Home Rulers of Ireland are satisfied? Their representatives indeed accept the new constitution. Their acceptance may well, as far as intention goes, be honest. Mr. Davitt, I dare say, when he sentimentalises in the House of Commons about his affection for the English democracy, is nearly, though not quite, as sincere as when he used to express passionate hatred of England.[99] But acquiescence is one thing, satisfaction is another. There is every reason why the Irish members should acquiesce in the new constitution. They obtain much, and they gain the means of getting more. Quite possibly they feel grateful. But their gratitude is not the gratitude of Ireland, and gratitude is hardly a sentiment possible, or indeed becoming, to a nation.

England saved Portugal and Spain from the domination of France. Do we find that Portuguese and Spaniards gladly subordinate their interests to the welfare of England? France delivered Italy from thraldom to Austria; French blood paid the price of Italian freedom. Yet France is detested from one end of Italy to the other, whilst Italians rejoice in the alliance with Austria. In all this there is nothing unreasonable and nothing to blame. Policy is not sentimentality, and the relations of peoples cannot be regulated in the same manner as the relations of individuals. Thirty, twenty, ten, five years hence all the sentiment of the year 1893 will have vanished. Irish content and satisfaction must, if it is to exist at all, rest on a far more solid basis than the hopes, the words, the pledges, or the intentions of Mr. M'Carthy, Mr. Sexton, or Mr. Davitt. Note that their satisfaction is even now of a limited kind. It absolutely depends on the new constitution being worked exactly in the way which they desire. The use of the veto, legislation for Ireland by the Imperial Parliament, any conflict between the wish of England and the wish, I do not say of Ireland, but of the Irish Nationalists, must from the nature of things put an end to all gratitude or content. But we may go further than this: the new constitution contains elements of discord. It denies to Ireland the rights of a nation; it does not concede to her the full privileges of colonial independence. No genuine Nationalist can really acquiesce in the prohibition of Ireland's arming even in self-defence. Where, again, is the Nationalist who is prepared to say that he will not if the Bill is passed demand that every conspirator and every dynamiter, who is suffering for the cause of Ireland, shall be released from prison? Is it credible that the Land Leaguers have forgotten what is due to the wounded soldiers of their cause? Are they prepared to forget the imperative claims of evicted tenants or imprisoned zealots?[100] I cannot believe it.