Sir Henry Elliott has well pointed out, that what success the experiment has had is in no small degree due to the large powers still enjoyed by the Crown, and to the personal character and influence of the Emperor Francis, the connecting link between the two dominions; but apart from this actual result, the feasibility of the dual scheme depended on the following considerations. In the first place, there was no alternative in the condition in which the House of Austria found itself in 1867, defeated in battle and bankrupt in finance. Without some such arrangement civil war was inevitable, with the ultimate prospect of the absorption of the various races by the hostile neighbouring Powers. In the second place, the allies were pretty nearly equal in strength as regards each other, whilst they were each similarly weighted by the difficulty of holding their own within the respective territories assigned them. They were each so busy with their subordinate territories and the less advanced populations inhabiting them, that it was not their interest or their inclination to bring about conflicts with each other. Hungary boasts a larger area than Austria, and a population equal to three-fourths that of the Western Monarchy. On the western side of the Leitha the dominant race, dominant by force of nature, by brain power, and the traditions and acquirements this power has given them, are 36 per cent. of the whole population. In the Transleithan provinces the race similarly situated, the Magyar, constitutes about 40 per cent. of the whole population.
There is not a single circumstance in the relations between England and Ireland to make reference to the creation of the Empire-Kingdom anything but an absurdity. Ireland never can compare with Great Britain in material resources. Her population is hardly one-sixth that of the larger island, whilst her area is little more than a third. She is deficient in climate, in soil, in mineral resources, and in population. Not only is she without a well-organized aristocracy skilled in political science, such as Hungary boasted; Ireland, as the term is understood by the National League, is without an educated class. Her intellect is represented by the moonlight maurauder and the fanatic priest. As regards England, the parallel is still more preposterous: She is not a military despotism, but a well-organized community, boasting parliamentary traditions of a thousand years. Her shores are guarded by sea from foreign interference. Notwithstanding many scandalous shortcomings in her rulers, her influence and her power are still unrivalled in the world. However long Mr. Gladstone may rule, her Sadowa is yet to come; and, if it did come, the example of the Dual State would offer no solution of our Irish difficulties, for none of the conditions which made the Dual State possible exist in the case of the two chief British Islands.
The delusive character of Mr. Gladstone's reference to the Dual State is best illustrated by the facts, that the council for common affairs consist of an equal number of representatives from each side of the dominion, that this council is concerned with military and foreign affairs, two subjects on which, according to the new scheme, Ireland is to have no vote.
It will be found, on a little examination, that appeals to the example of the foreigner are as misleading as the theory of nationality. All such arguments are only endeavours to divert the public from the exercise of their own judgment and common-sense in dealing with the mischiefs which the perverse genius of Mr. Gladstone has created. Recognized principles of government, the ordinary traditions of England applied with the happy immunity from friction, which the commercial policy of modern times makes possible, would have long since settled the difficulty, but it would have been settled in disregard of that popular Irish feeling which, in 1867, Mr. Gladstone pledged himself to follow. He would have had to admit that his new Irish policy was a mistake; and he never admits that he has made any mistake—unless it be in Egypt—or in acting on the opinion of other people. When he has discovered a new line of policy, he believes himself infallible. Let us assume for a moment, that the combination of the personal adherents of Mr. Gladstone and of Mr. Parnell enables the Prime Minister to pass some measure on the lines he has selected, or on those laid down by Mr. Davitt, and that the rowdy treason of a Dublin Cabinet proceeds to bring within the sphere of its operations what wealth and civilization has hitherto escaped the National League.
In the struggle which must ensue, we shall have within three hours of our shores a raging volcano of revolution, threatening the peace of Europe and our own. Fenians, Nihilists, and Irish Yankees, will flock to the new vantage ground. The conflict between Socialism and property, between infidelity and superstition, will be fought out amidst the strangest complications of local hatred and of fiscal disorder. If foreign governments abstain from interfering, and we escape consequent difficulties with them, are we sure that we ourselves will be able to remain passive spectators? Many of us are old enough to recollect the agitation which shook this kingdom during the struggle between North and South on the other side of the Atlantic. No question of Home politics for generations past had so deeply moved our people. It required all the exertions of the most sober part of the nation to prevent our becoming involved in the conflict, and we recollect the help this party of wisdom got from the impulsive statesman who has undertaken for the third time the final settlement of the Irish question. If the great American Civil War, desolating a country three thousand miles away, thus stirred popular feeling, what will be the result of a Civil War between, on the one side, the Irish Celt animated by religious hatred and love of plunder, and supported by the Irish American, and on the other the loyalty, endurance and Protestantism of Ulster—a Civil War almost within sight of our shores?
But, if we turn from the suggestions of empiricism and vanity and come to those practical considerations which affect men's minds in matters so important as political organization, the main argument pressed on English people is that we cannot go on as we are. 'Irish Government is a failure.' 'We must close this terrible crisis as rapidly as possible.' 'Separation itself, could not be worse than the present state of things.' 'The Act of Union has completely failed. After eighty-four years it has given an Ireland more hostile to England than at any period of its history.' Mr. Gladstone recites the number of Coercion Acts, which have been passed since 1832, and declares 'we are like the man who, knowing that medicine may be the means of his restoration to health, endeavours to live upon medicine.'
Before considering whether this confession of failure is true, we would remind our readers what it implies, what it leads up to. It is now proposed as an argument for establishing a separate Parliament in Dublin. The establishment of this separate Parliament is necessary, because we must give Ireland the opportunity of doing what we ourselves are unable to do, to find the best machinery they can to carry on the business of government. But, when this machinery is once found and invested with the resources and influence of a Government, we cannot suppose that our troubles will be at an end. If disputes arise in the working out of the new Irish Constitution, the popular majority will not be slow to call in the aid of the American Irish who have founded the National League. Mr. Jennings, whose opinion on this matter is entitled to great weight, from his long residence in the United States, reminded the House that
'one consideration which they must bear in mind was that of the formidable difficulties which would inevitably arise from the action of the great body of Irish Americans. If this Bill granted to Ireland a free and independent Parliamentary Assembly with full powers over the Executive, as proposed by the Prime Minister, there would inevitably come a time when either the payment of the interest due, or some other cause, would bring the Irish Parliament into antagonism with the English. If they were to endeavour to demand what was necessary, whether payment of interest or what not, and to threaten to use force, could any one suppose that the great body of Irish Americans would stand by silently and see that done? He believed that the United States would say to them: "You have acknowledged your incompetence to govern Ireland; you have given her practical independence, now you must take your hands off her; we will not stand by and see her crushed." He believed that there was no government in the United States which could withstand such pressure as that which would be brought to bear on it by the Irish Americans, especially if a Presidential election were near.'
But is this allegation of failure actually true? For our part we are inclined to agree with Lord Hartington, that the argument founded on the paralysis of government in Ireland in recent years is allowed more weight in this question than it should have. In the first place, it is difficult to see how any government conducted as ours has been during the last few years, could be other than disastrous, Mr. Gladstone, at the commencement of his career as leader of the Liberal party, pledged himself to the policy of Irish ideas, ignorant, if not reckless, of what the term meant. Year by year he has been getting a closer view of the creed he had unconsciously adopted, and, after a struggle, he accepts one dogma, then another. The great dogma of all in the Home Ruler's creed, that Englishmen should be sent bag and baggage out of Ireland, has not yet been adopted; and naturally the Home Ruler keeps his resources ready for that ringing of the chapel bell to which Mr. Gladstone alluded in speaking of the Clerkenwell explosion and its effect on the question of the Irish Establishment. The 'dynamite and the dagger,' to which Mr. Morley recently appealed as conclusive reasons for passing the Cabinet scheme, retain their fascination for the Irish mind.
As long as Mr. Gladstone is a power in English public life, and his pledges given in Lancashire are unredeemed or unrepudiated, the Home Rule party will press him without mercy; but it is not reasonable to argue from their success, a success which Mr. Gladstone has given them, that they exercise a permanent influence on Irish affairs. When the Southport pledges were given, the Irish land laws were yet without that reform which a series of Governments, Tory as well as Whig, had admitted to be necessary. It could not be said until after 1870 that the book of English neglect of Irish interests was finally closed, and that is only sixteen years ago. During this period we have seen the great English Parliamentary Ruler continually plunging after coercion, and returning to make some other big concession to agitation. Thus Ireland has had no chance of trying what a good system of laws consistently administered could supply. The principle of the Land Act of 1870 was a provision for the protection of property—the tenants' property recognized by custom during a long course of years, although ignored by the law and exposed to confiscation by the reckless Whig legislation of 1850-2. The Land Act of 1881 was an arbitrary attempt to remedy the misfortunes of an improvident agricultural interest by legislative interference with contract. Contracts were readjusted and finally settled for fifteen years to come. Political economy was bidden to take itself off, but prices varied quite regardless of Mr. Gladstone's arrangements, and the weather did not pay them the least consideration. The passion for revolution was stimulated, and a large number of Mr. Gladstone's clients are as badly off as before. Might it not be worth while to try for a time how far good government, after the removal of all substantial grievances, might supply that 'real settlement,' 'that finality,' which the country is now asked to find in Dublin Parliaments, First Orders, and bribes at the cost of the English taxpayer?