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

by A. V. Dicey

This line of defence may, as against Home Rulers, be disposed of at once by an argumentum ad hominem. No politicians have made freer use of prediction. Every Gladstonian speech is in effect a statement that is a prophecy of the benefits which Home Rule will confer on the United Kingdom. Gladstonian anticipations no doubt are prophecies of future blessings; but whoever foretells the future is equally a prophet, whether he announces the end of the world or foretells the dawn of a millennium. And history affords no presumption in favour of the prophet who prophesies smooth things. The prognostics of a pessimist may be as much belied by the event as the hopes of an optimist. But for one prophet to decry the predictions of another simply as prophecies is a downright absurdity. Even among rival soothsayers some regard must be had to fairness and common sense; when Zedekiah, the son of Chenaanah, smote Micaiah on the cheek, he struck him not on the ground that he prophesied but that his gloomy predictions were false. Zedekiah was an imposter, he was not a fool, and after all Micaiah, who prophesied evil and not good, turned out the true prophet.

But an argumentum ad hominem is never a satisfactory form of reasoning, and it is worth while considering for a moment what is the value of prophecy or foresight in politics. Candour compels the admission that anticipations of the future are at best most uncertain. Cobden and Bright foretold that Free Trade would benefit England; they also foretold that the civilised world would, influenced by England's example, reject protective tariffs. Neither anticipation was unreasonable, but the one was justified whilst the other was confuted by events. All that can be said is that on such anticipations, untrustworthy though they may be, the conduct no less of public than of private life depends. Criticism on anything that is new and untried, whether it be a new-built bridge or a new-made constitution, is of necessity predictive. But there is an essential difference between foresight and guessing. The prevision of a philosophic statesman is grounded on the knowledge of the past and on the analysis of existing tendencies. It deals with principles. Such, for example, was the foresight of Burke when he dogmatically foretold that the French Constitution of 1791 could not stand.[108] Guessing is at best based on acute observation of the current events of the day, that is of things which are in their nature uncertain. On January 29, 1848, Tocqueville analysed the condition of French society, and in the Chamber of Deputies foretold the approach of revolution. On February 21, 1848, Girardin said that the monarchy of July would not last three days longer. February 24 verified the insight and foresight of the statesman, and proved that the journalist was an acute observer. The difference is worth consideration. Tocqueville's prophecy would in all probability have been substantially realised had Louis Philippe shown as much energy in 1848 as in 1832, and had the Orleanist dynasty reigned till after his death. Girardin's guess would not have been even a happy hit if one of a thousand accidents had averted the catastrophe of February 24. The worth of the arguments against or for the new constitution depends upon the extent to which they are based upon a mastery of general principles and upon a sound analysis of the conditions of the time, and in these conditions are included the character of the English and of the Irish people. But to object to criticisms simply as prophecies is to reject foresight and to forbid politicians who are creating a constitution for the future to consider what will be its future working.

Another Gladstonian argument is that because the English constitution itself is full of paradoxes, peculiarities, and anomalies, therefore the contradictions or anomalies which are patent in the new constitution (such for example as the retention of the Irish members at Westminster) are of no importance.

The fact asserted is past dispute. Our institutions are based upon fictions. The Prime Minister, the real head of the English Executive, is an official unknown to the law. The Queen, who is the only constitutional head of the Executive, is not the real head of the Government. The Crown possesses a veto on all legislation and never exercises it; the House of Lords might, if the House pleased, reject year by year every Bill sent up to it by the House of Commons; yet such a course of action is never actually pursued and could not be dreamt of except by a madman. There is no advantage in exemplifying further a condition of things which must be known to every person who has the slightest acquaintance with either the law, or the custom, of the constitution. But the inference which Gladstonian apologists draw from the existence of anomalies is, in the strict sense of the word, preposterous. On the face of the matter it is a strange way of reasoning to say that because the constitution is filled with odd arrangements which no man can justify in theory, you therefore, when designing a new constitution, should take no care to make your arrangements consistent and harmonious. But the Gladstonian error goes a good deal deeper than is at first sight apparent. The anomalies or the fictions of the constitution are in reality adaptations, often awkward enough in themselves, of some old institution, and are preserved because, though they look strange, they are found to work well. Thus the King of England was at one time the actual sovereign of the State, or at any rate the most important member of the sovereign power, and the Ministers were in reality, what they are still in name, the King's servants. The powers of the Crown have been greatly diminished, and have been transferred in effect to the Houses of Parliament, or rather to the House of Commons, and the Ministers taken from the Houses are in fact, though not in name, servants of Parliament. This arrangement leaves an undefined and undefinable amount of authority to the Crown. It is not an arrangement which any man would have planned beforehand; but it is kept up, not because it is an anomaly, but because it has, as a matter of experience, turned out convenient. What even plausible argument can thence be drawn to show that a new constitutional arrangement, on the face of it awkward and inconvenient, will for some unknown reason turn out workable and beneficial? He who reasons thus, if reasoning it can be called, might as well argue that because an old shoe which has gradually been worn to the form of the foot is comfortable, therefore a shoemaker need not care to make a new shoe fit.

These two general replies to strictures on the new constitution are in themselves of no worth whatever. They deserve examination for two reasons only. They are, in various shapes, put forward by politicians of eminence, they exhibit further in a clear form a defect which mars a good deal of Gladstonian reasoning. Ministerialists seem to think that arguments good for the purpose of conservatism are available for the purpose of innovation. This is an error. A conservative reasoner may urge the uncertainty of all prevision, or the fact that the actual constitution, though theoretically absurd or imperfect, works well, as reasons of some weight, though not of overwhelming weight, for leaving things as they are, but it must puzzle any sensible man to see how either the uncertainty of prevision or the fair working of existing institutions can be twisted into reasons for taking a political leap in the dark.

Let us dismiss then objections which as they are fatal to all criticism are in reality ineffective against any criticism of our new constitution. When this is done it will be found that the Gladstonian pleas in favour of Home Rule, for such are in reality their apologies for the new constitution, may be brought under two heads. They are intended to show, first, that the concession of parliamentary independence to Ireland is a necessity, and, secondly, that at worst it involves no danger.[109]

A. Necessity for Home Rule.

That the concession of Home Rule to Ireland is a necessity, forms the implied, if not always the asserted, foundation of the case in favour of Gladstonian policy.

Ireland, it is argued, has for generations been discontented and disloyal. Every sort of remedy has been tried. The rule of the ordinary law, coercion, Protestant supremacy, Catholic relief, the disestablishment of the Anglican Church, the maintenance of the English land tenure and English landlordism, the introduction of a new system of land tenure unknown to any other country in the world and more favourable to tenants than the land law of any other State in Europe, the removal of every grievance which could be made patent to the Imperial Parliament, every plan or experiment which could approve itself to the judgment of English politicians has been tried, and no scheme, however plausible, has ended in success. Concession has proved as useless as severity, and the existence in the Statute Book of a permanent Coercion Act is a standing proof of failure. He who asserts that Irish disloyalty or discontent has not declined understates the case. It has increased. Grattan was a statesman of a more exalted type than O'Connell, and Grattan was more zealous for connection with England than was the Roman Catholic tribune. And though in Grattan's time the grievances of Ireland were in every man's judgment far more intolerable than, even on the showing of Home Rulers, are the wrongs which Ireland now endures, the Ireland of Grattan was loyal to England. O'Connell was a nobler leader than Parnell, and it would be absurd to suppose that any Parnellite or Anti-Parnellite exerted a tenth of O'Connell's influence. Yet Parnell and Parnell's followers have achieved a feat which the hero of Catholic emancipation could never accomplish; O'Connell never obtained for Repeal more than half the votes of Ireland's parliamentary representatives; Parnell and his followers have rallied the vast majority of Irish members in support of Home Rule. Meanwhile year by year the government of England is weakened, and (though the argument comes awkwardly from the mouth of English constitutionalists who are allies and friends of conspirators and boycotters) the morality of English public life has been undermined, by the presence at Westminster of Irish members who, regarding the English Parliament as an alien power, weaken its action, despise its traditions, and degrade its character. One remedy for Irish miseries and for English dangers has not been tried. No English statesman before Mr. Gladstone (it is urged) has offered to Ireland the one thing which Ireland desires—the boon or right of parliamentary independence. Be the desire for Home Rule reasonable or not, it is Home Rule for which Ireland longs. Ireland feels herself a nation. Satisfy then Ireland's wish, meet the feeling of nationality, and Ireland will be at rest. This experiment must at least be tried; its perils must be risked. The present situation is intolerable, the concession of Home Rule to Ireland is a necessity.