The second argument appears to be more plausible; but it is mischievous, in a high degree, and dangerous; except to a slight extent, it is completely fallacious. Ireland, it is allowed, contributes from £7,300,000 to £7,800,000 to the exchequer; but of this sum £5,000,000 and upwards are expended on her; she really hardly pays £2,000,000 to the State; the £5,000,000 therefore, or nearly all this sum, create a just counterclaim against her, even admitting she is excessively taxed. This expenditure on Ireland, it is contended, is for Irish ‘local’ purposes; it is not expenditure for ‘Imperial’ purposes; the account, as between Great Britain and Ireland, is to be taken as if all this expenditure, or nearly so, were purely local. But is not the expenditure for keeping up the Lord-Lieutenant and his Court, is not the expenditure on the government and administration of Ireland, essentially, and in the main, Imperial, and not local in a legitimate sense, so long as the United Kingdom exists? Is it not as Imperial, at least for the most part, as the expenditure on the British army and navy and on the government and administration of England and Scotland is Imperial, and not, properly speaking, local? This argument could be retorted with decisive effect, if urged in the interest of Ireland against Great Britain. If this kind of expenditure in Ireland is held to be local, not Imperial, the same rule must apply to England and Scotland; this expenditure in their case must be local and not Imperial. Why, then, should Ireland contribute to such charges as public works in Edinburgh and London, as the maintenance of the great English dockyards and harbours, as the cost of the army and navy outside Ireland, and of the government and administration of England and Scotland? Clearly on the Treasury hypothesis she should not contribute; and if she does, she has an immense counterclaim, so far as her contributions are applied to these local objects. But, in truth, this whole argument, when examined, is a mere sophism. The revenues of the Three Kingdoms are paid into a common exchequer; they are distributed according to the uses of the State; this expenditure, as a general rule, must be held to be Imperial, not local, and cannot give a part of the Three Kingdoms a right to make a claim against another. The State spends millions on London which it does not spend on Surrey; it spends millions in Hants which it does not spend in Berkshire: does this circumstance give Surrey or Berkshire a title to say we can make a demand on London and Hants? Precisely in the same way, the expenditure of the State on Ireland, as contra-distinguished from that on Great Britain, cannot, at least as a general principle, give Great Britain a right to make a counterclaim on Ireland.
It is unnecessary to point out how this theory has a tendency to create local and even national ill-will; to set parts of one country against other parts, and two countries against each other; it distinctly alienates Ireland from Great Britain; as I have said, it is full of mischief and peril. In truth, however, it is a mere device to excuse the overcharge of Irish taxation; it has never entered the minds of statesmen. Nothing can be more certain than that every great British financier, from the day of Pitt to the day of Peel, and to the day of Mr. Gladstone, has regarded the expenditure of the Three Kingdoms, as this is paid into a common exchequer, as a general fund to be allocated as the State requires; and has not regarded it as a fund, under local heads, to be laid out in separate districts, so as to give any one district a counterclaim against another. I quote from a report of one of the members of the Childers Commissions: ‘A division of the expenditure of the United Kingdom into “charge for Irish purposes” and “Imperial expenditure,” cannot be made under the system of finance embodied in the constitution established by the Legislative Union. All expenditure under that system is “expenditure of the United Kingdom,” or, to express it more briefly, “Imperial expenditure;” and all Imperial expenditure is defrayed from the common fund of the Imperial Exchequer. If a part of the Imperial expenditure be described as a charge “for Irish purposes,” this classification does not affect the fact that it is Imperial expenditure, and charged as such upon the whole Imperial revenue. To regard this expenditure as non-Imperial, to deduct it from the particular revenue contributed by Ireland to Imperial expenditure, to treat the fraction of Irish revenue left as if it were the whole of the Irish contribution to Imperial expenditure, and to regard Imperial expenditure itself as not including “the charge for Irish purposes,” would be to do what the Constitution does not sanction: it would be to deal with the revenue and expenditure of the United Kingdom as if the revenues of Great Britain and Ireland were raised and administered by separate authorities, each of which, having first, out of its own revenue, defrayed its separate charges, then applied the balance to payment of common expenses, which, in that case, would be properly classified as Imperial.’[176] And the evidence of Sir Robert Giffen is to the same effect: ‘The opinion which I have formed is that, on the whole, it is not possible to make the distinction between the different objects of Imperial expenditure which is made in some of these discussions; that, in fact, all the expenditure by an Imperial Government is to be considered expenditure for Imperial purposes, and although part of it may be spent locally, you cannot in any way call it expenditure for the special benefit of that locality. It is expenditure for the general objects of the Imperial Government.’[177]
The theory of the Treasury is thus essentially false; but accidentally, it contains, I think, a residuum of truth. When, as between two countries, one pays a considerable sum, exclusively or mainly from local rates, and the same charge in the other country is for the most part defrayed from Imperial taxation by the State, it appears to me that a portion of the sum so paid by the State may give one country a counterclaim against the other to some extent. This is the case as between Great Britain and Ireland; the cost of national education and of the police force is largely discharged in Great Britain by local rates; in Ireland it amounts to about £2,700,000, and is mainly defrayed from Imperial taxes; this may create a counterclaim against Ireland within reasonable limits at least. No doubt the charge of bringing up the young of the poorer classes and of maintaining public order by a suitable force, ought largely to be an Imperial charge; but when in one community it is chiefly borne by local funds, and in another it is chiefly borne by the common Exchequer of both, this seems to give the first community a partial claim against the second. This counterclaim, such as it is, has been reckoned, in addition to a sum for free grants, at about £500,000 a year by the Childers Commission; but it did not thoroughly go into the subject; this estimate is believed to be too low by well-informed persons; the counterclaim has been calculated to be about £1,000,000 sterling. Lord Salisbury’s Government, we have seen, promised to appoint a second Commission to examine this question at length, besides some other financial questions suggested by the Report of the Childers Commission; for some unknown reason it has not redeemed its pledge; it is very desirable that it should redeem it. Apart from the mischief of a delay approaching a breach of public faith, the only inference that can be drawn, if this promise is broken, is that the Government accepts the view in this matter of the Childers Commission.
The Childers Commission has conclusively proved that Ireland is much too highly taxed; whatever counterclaim may be made against this excess, the overcharge can be little less than two millions a year. The arguments urged against this conclusion are mere leather and prunella that may be brushed aside; the Report of the Commission has had the sanction of nearly all economists of a high order. By all means let another Commission strike a balance after making every fair allowance; but if it shall be struck, as it must be in Ireland’s favour, the only real question for impartial men will be how it shall be best discharged. Ireland has practically acquiesced for years in fiscal injustice; in any view of the case she has no right to call for a change in our whole system of finance for her special benefit. Still less has she a right to demand that her customs and excise duties should be placed at a lower level than those of Great Britain; this would raise a mischievous barrier between the two countries; this policy would be, perhaps, impossible; if possible, it would probably injure Ireland greatly in the long run. The only remaining alternative is to leave our existing fiscal system intact, but to make an annual grant from the exchequer for Irish uses, as compensation for excessive taxation; this has the support of the Childers Commission. ‘The third method, and that which most strongly recommends itself to our judgment, is to give compensation to Ireland by making an annual allocation of revenue in their favour, to be employed in promoting the material prosperity and social welfare of the country.’[178] It is difficult to suppose, should a large yearly sum be found to be due to Ireland, as affairs now stand, that Parliament will refuse to pay honourably a just debt; it would be a shameful act to repudiate an obligation of the kind. Years ago Pitt declared in his characteristic style that ‘Ireland might safely rely on Great Britain for the discharge of any fair claim on her; the liberality, the justice, the honour of the people of Great Britain have never been found deficient.’ The time has come to test the value of this pledge; it has been announced by the highest authority, in which English opinion largely prevails, that Ireland has been immensely overtaxed for years: will the ‘people of Great Britain’ give effect to this judgment, and make good a claim which hardly admits of a doubt? The demand of Ireland, no doubt, is not sustained by violent agitation and the shouts of multitudes; but it is backed by all that is best in Irish opinion; it rests upon the simplest financial justice. It is dangerous to treat a demand such as this with contempt, and still more so with weak sophistry; not that Ireland can make an effective resistance to fiscal wrong, however clearly proved; and I for one deprecate rhodomontade about ‘the Boston tea-ships.’ But a claim may have great moral force, though it be not supported by physical power; the disregard of this claim would provoke well-informed Irishmen, and weaken the Union perhaps greatly; and, after all, is it a seemly sight, is it becoming in the eyes of the world, that the richest country in Europe should practically impose an iniquitous burden upon the poorest?
CHAPTER VIII
THE QUESTIONS OF IRISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT AND EDUCATION—OTHER QUESTIONS—CONCLUSION
Irish county government—The grand jury system in the eighteenth century—Its merits and defects—The grand jury system in the nineteenth century, and especially since 1836—The Irish poor law system—Elected and ex-officio guardians—The local government of cities and towns in Ireland—Municipal institutions founded in Ireland by the Norman kings—Why they did not prosper—Boroughs and municipalities founded by James I. and the Stuarts—Their condition in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries—The Municipal Reform Act of 1840—The Towns Commissioners Acts—Attempts to reform the municipal system of local government in Ireland—The Local Government of Ireland Act, 1898—Complete change in Irish local government—The County Councils—The County Borough Councils—The District, Rural, and the Urban District Councils—Their functions, rights, and duties—All these bodies placed on a democratic basis—Attitude of the County Councils in the southern provinces—Education in Ireland—History of primary education—The national system of education—The principles on which it is founded—How it has worked, and what its results have been—Secondary education in Ireland—Its history—Its present condition very imperfect—The Intermediate Education Act—University education in Ireland—Its history—Trinity College—The Queen’s Colleges and the Queen’s University founded by Peel—Their comparative failure—Mr. Gladstone’s Bill to reform University education in Ireland—Its glaring errors and failure—Trinity College thrown open in 1873—The Royal University founded in 1879—Present state of University education in Ireland—The true principles of reform—Other Irish questions—Conclusion.
That local government in Ireland should still be a ‘Present Irish Question,’ may appear strange to persons only versed in the mere routine of politics. The subject has been before Parliament for nearly thirty years; it has engaged the attention of more than one of its Committees; Butt endeavoured, to no purpose, to legislate on it. In 1892 Lord Salisbury’s Government brought in a measure which aimed at transforming the whole system of administering local affairs in Ireland; but it had unquestionable defects and was vehemently opposed; unfortunately, as I believe, it was permitted to drop. Six years afterwards, that is, in 1898, the greater part of a parliamentary session was employed in dealing with the question again; a Bill became law which placed Irish local government, in all its departments, upon a new basis, and completely changed the characteristics it had had for centuries. The measure was to be a ne plus ultra; it was extolled by applauding partisans as a magnificent scheme of popular reform; these have since, over and over again, declared that its success has been more than manifest. It is too soon to pronounce, with anything like confidence, on what its ultimate results may be, or even to say, with certainty, how it will practically work; but enough has already been made apparent to cause thoughtful and fair-minded Irishmen to regard the changes it has effected with grave misgivings; to question the principles on which it rests, or at least the wisdom of applying them to Ireland as she now is; and to ask whether it must not be amended if the social structure of Ireland is not to be still more violently disturbed, than it has been by the experiments that have been made on it. Besides, the local government and administration of every community, especially if formed on a popular type, affect its existence in many ways; strongly indicate what its opinions are, what its qualities, what its evident tendencies; in a word, largely represent its essential nature. It was not for nothing that in his survey of the Revolution in France, Burke did not confine himself to the sovereign assembly at Versailles, but turned his penetrating glance on the petty assemblies which had been set up in the new-made departments, for the conduct of their local affairs; these, he insisted, formed the truest expression of the mind of the people and of the leaders at its head. For these reasons, therefore, if we would understand Ireland, her local government is a ‘Present Irish Question;’ it is a question, moreover, which, whatever may be said, in all probability has not been finally settled.