The true solution of this matter is to get the lands out of the hands of men who are the nominal, and not the real, possessors. But Parliament maintains laws which act most injuriously in this particular. The law and practice of entails tends to keep the soil in large properties, and in the hands of those who cannot perform their duty to it. It will be said that entails exist in Scotland and in England. Yes; but this Session a law has passed, or is passing, to modify the system as it has heretofore existed in Scotland; and in England many of its evils have been partially overcome by the extraordinary, and, to some degree, the accidental extension of manufacturing industry among the people. In Ireland there are no such mitigations; a code of laws exists, under which it is impossible for the land and the people to be brought, as it were, together, and for industry to live in independence and comfort, instead of crawling to this House, as it does almost annually, to ask alms of the hardworking people of England.
The law and practice of primogeniture is another evil of the same character. It is a law unnatural and unjust at all times; but in the present condition of Ireland it cannot much longer be endured. Were I called upon—and it is a bold figure of speech to mention such a thing— but were I called upon to treat this Irish question, I would establish, for a limited period at least, a special court in Ireland to adjudicate on all questions connected with the titles and transfers of landed property. This court should finally decide questions of title; it should prepare and enforce a simple and short form of conveyance, as short almost as that by which railway stock is transferred; and, without regard to the public revenue, I would abolish every farthing of expense which is now incurred in the duties on stamps, for the purpose of facilitating the distribution of land in Ireland, and of allowing the capital and industry of the people to work out its salvation. All this is possible; and, more than this, it is all necessary. Well, now, what is the real obstacle in our path? You have toiled at this Irish difficulty Session after Session, and some of you have grown almost from boyhood to grey-headed old men since it first met you in your legislative career, and yet there is not in ancient or modern history a picture so humiliating as that which Ireland presents to the world at this moment; and there is not an English gentleman who, if he crossed the Channel in the present autumn, and travelled in any foreign country, would not wish to escape from any conversation among foreigners in which the question of the condition of Ireland was mooted for a single moment.
Let the House, if it can, regard Ireland as an English country. Let us think of the eight millions of people, and of the millions of them doomed to this intolerable suffering. Let us think of the half-million who, within two years past, have perished miserably in the workhouses, and on the highways, and in their hovels—more, far more than ever fell by the sword in any war this country ever waged; let us think of the crop of nameless horrors which is even now growing up in Ireland, and whose disastrous fruit may be gathered in years and generations to come. Let us examine what are the laws and the principles under which alone God and nature have permitted that nations should become industrious and provident.
I hope the House will pardon me if I have said a word that can offend any one. But I feel conscious of a personal humiliation when I consider the state of Ireland. I do not wish to puff nostrums of my own, though it may be thought I am opposed to much that exists in the present order of things; but whether it tended to advance democracy, or to uphold aristocracy, or any other system, I would wish to fling to the winds any prejudice I have entertained, and any principle that may be questioned, if I can thereby do one single thing to hasten by a single day the time when Ireland shall be equal to England in that comfort and that independence which an industrious people may enjoy, if the Government under which they live is equal and just.
* * * * *
IRELAND.
IV.
RATE IN AID.
HOUSE OF COMMONS, APRIL 2, 1849.
[On February 7, 1849, a proposal was made by the Chancellor of the
Exchequer that a sum of 50,000_l_. should be granted to certain
Irish Unions, in which distress was more than usually prevalent. The
resolution was passed on March 3. On March 27 the second reading of the
Bill founded on this resolution was moved, and the debate continued till
April 3, when the second reading was affirmed by 193 votes to 138. The
third reading was carried by 129 to 55, on April 30. The Bill passed the
House of Lords on May 18.]
I ventured to move the adjournment of the debate on Friday night, because I was anxious to have the opportunity of expressing the opinions which I entertain on this most important subject. I am one of the Committee appointed by this House to inquire into the working of the Irish poor-law, and on that Committee I was one of the majority—the large majority—by which the resolution for a rate in aid was affirmed. In the division which took place on the same proposition in the House, I also voted in the majority. But I am not by any means disposed to say that there are no reasons against the course which I take, or against the proposition which has been submitted to the House by the Government. On the whole, however, I am prepared to-night to justify that proposition, and the vote which I have given for it.
As to the project of raising money for the purpose of these distressed Unions, I think there can be no doubt in the mind of any Member of the House, that money must come from some quarter. It appears to be a question of life or money. All the witnesses who were examined before the Committee; the concurrent testimony of all parties in Ireland, of all the public papers, of all the speeches which have been delivered in the course of this debate, go to prove, that unless additional funds be provided, tens of thousands of our unfortunate fellow-countrymen in Ireland must perish of famine in the course of the present year. If this be true, it is evident that a great necessity is upon us; a grave emergency, which we must meet. I am not prepared to justify the proposition of a rate in aid merely on the ground of this necessity, because it will be said, and justly, that the same amount of funds might be raised by some other mode; but I am prepared to justify the proposition which restricts this rate in aid to Ireland, on the ground that the rest of the United Kingdom has, during the past three years, paid its own rate in aid for Ireland; and this to a far larger amount than any call which the Government now proposes to make on the rateable property in Ireland.