1850-1855. Crime and Outrage (Continuance) Act.
1856, 1857. Peace Preservation Act.
1858-1864. Peace Preservation (Continuance) Act.
1865. Peace Preservation (Continuance) Act.
1866-1869 (off and on). Habeas Corpus Suspension Act.
As Parliament treated the land question, so it treated the church question, and every question in which the Irish people were interested. Their complaints, as Bright said, “were met with denial, with contempt, with insult.” Ministers, indeed, slumbered peacefully as if there were no Irish question, until they were rudely [pg 326] awakened in 1867 by the ringing of the “Chapel bell.” Fenianism—a Society founded to sever the connection between England and Ireland—brought Liberals and Tories to their bearings; and under the pressure of that great revolutionary organization (which set Ireland in a blaze), the Church was disestablished in 1869, and the first Land Act (which in the slightest degree served the interests of the tenants) passed in 1870. This Act provided that tenants, when evicted, should receive compensation for improvements, and in certain cases, for disturbance. It also contained clauses for the creation of a peasant proprietary, and recognized and legalized the Ulster custom of tenant right. But the Act was a failure. The peasant proprietary clauses did not work; rack-renting continued, evictions increased, and the general discontent remained the same as ever. In these circumstances the Irish members demanded fresh legislation, and introduced several Bills for this purpose between 1876 and 1881. They were all rejected by overwhelming majorities. Then the Land League came; lawlessness and outrage came; treason and anarchy came; and the Land Act of 1881 was passed in a storm of revolution. The reasons given by Lord Salisbury for not opposing the Bill in the House of Lords are too remarkable, and too little known not to be quoted. He said:
“In view of the prevailing agitation, and having regard to the state of anarchy (in Ireland), I cannot recommend my followers to vote against the second reading of the Bill.”
and in the same speech he added:
“What will be the attitude of the tenant all this time? He, like the landlord, will be looking to the future, but in a very different temper. He knows perfectly well that all he has hitherto got he has [pg 327] not got because he has moved your convictions, but because he has moved your fears.”
“The pivot of the Act of 1881,” to use the language of Mr. Forster, was the “Land Court” established to stand between landlords and tenants, to fix fair or judicial rents. Previously, the landlord was master of the situation. The competition for land placed the tenant at his mercy, and he accordingly fixed the rent at his own pleasure. But henceforth rents were to be fixed by legal tribunals; and while the tenant paid the rent so fixed, he could not be disturbed in his holding for a period of fifteen years. Roughly speaking, the Act changed Irish tenancies from tenancies at will practically to leaseholds, renewable every fifteen years, subject to revision of rent by the Land Courts. It also recognised the tenant's right to sell his holding, and provided facilities for the creation of a peasant proprietary.