LIBEL ON THE KING.

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 10998, 22 June 1901, Page 3

LIBEL ON THE KING.

AN IRISH PAPER SUPPRESSED: j SCENE l* -PARLIAMENT.. j (FROM OUR OWN - COXRBSPOXDEJJT.) LOXDOX, May IS. On Friday last an Iri?h Nationalist newspaper. 'The Irish . People," published a most scandalous and'outrageous"article—or rather series' of "notes"'—upon King Edward VII. ' Information was at once tele- s qiaphed to the Government, and Mr Wyndi»am. Secretary for Irelard, instantly, on his own responsibility, suppressed that issue^. v and also caused the entire issue to be seized so fir as it was feasible to get hold" of the | copies.

I need hardly say tiat this caused an immediate and eager demand for all that had sscaped the hands of the police, and that high prices were freely offered, fcscally in vain. One of the papf :*s came into any" possession, and this I now forward in order that you may be able to judge whether the strong condemnation bestowed upon it has been at all excessive: Its detestable vulgarity, gross p3rso'r.ality, and foul saggestiveness ara simply-disgusting to every decent reader, and all respectable journalists must feel a sanse of shame that the profession has bsen discredited by a descent to such obscene depths of degradation.

It will hardly be credited that the Irish Nationalist M.P.'s actually had the liardiUood to champion, in the House of Commons, tlie cause of the disreputable rag, ar.d to attack the Government violently for the course taken in preventing the circulation of the brutal libel. Yet such is tlie lamentable fact.

.Indeed,- the Nationalist members actually

;iu the assurance to initiate the discussion 1.7 taking exception to the seizure of the alley newspaper. Mr Dillon moved in the :itter, asking if it were true that "The

ris.i reople" was seized; under what law .his was done, and whether it was done by ..arrant. Mr Wyndham . replied that the 'paper-had been seized in order '"to prevent tha continued commission of criml by the further dissemination of a seditious libel, and to seiza the instrununt by which the crime was bang committed." He added that this was dons under the common law which authorised the prevention of crime and the preservation of evidence ; the seizure: was made without warrant. . . .•■ ; .

Mr iMllon at. once moved lac adjournment; of tha House in order that he might caJl attention to a matter of urgent jjubiic importance, namely, the isczure o,!; the Duolin newspaper. All the Nationalist members and about a dozen Liberals rose to supnort him, whereupon he proceeded formally to move the adjournment. He declared that the paper in que.'tiou was the recognised organ of a /neat national organisation, represented in that House by many membsrs, a-nd for the Executive" Government, acting under the common law, to take sucli a "step as this was one of the gravest things of which they couiu be guilty. This, he said, was not a solitary incident in the recent history of .Ireland, It was pai't of a deliberate policy to strike at and destroy every newspaper which opposed the policy of the Government. He challenged the right of the Government to try and to sentence the paper without taking any proper legal proceedings. If criticisms of the Sovereign were objected to, the matter should bs tried before a proper tribunal. He went on to maintain that great English writers had employed, in bygone days, still coarser abuse of a Sovereign, but very wisely no notice was taken. He contended that the present action of the Government was a blow struck at the liberty of the Press, and he demanded some justification for Ministers' "extraordinary and most arbitrary action." Mr XV. Redmond seconded in a characteristically venomous speech, declaring that the paper was seized not because it attacked the King, but because it contained ' four columns of denunciation of Mr Wyndham himself.

■■■Mr Wyndham made a powerful cisive reply, pointing out that Mr Dillon declared the 'Irish People" to Hold a position in Ireland comparable to that of the very best English paper, and he described the article in question as "a seditious libel, a scandalous, scurrilous, gross, brutal, and false attack on the person of the Sovereign." In repiy to the question as to whether the article was adjudicated upon here, that is to say in London, or at Dublin Castle, Mr Wyndham said: "It was here. lam responsible to this House for the conduct of Irish affairs, and have no wish to evade that responsibility. It was on my personal responsibility that this article was telegraphed over, and in consultation with my colleagues, but on my own motion, and on my own wish, I telegraphed that in my opinion the paper containing such an article should be seized, and that every effort should be made to prevent its going into the hands of the subjects of his Majesty." These words were received with enthusiastic cheers, not only from the Ministerial side of the House, but also from what may be very fairly be termed the more repectable portion of the Liberal party. An attempt was made to get Mr Wyndham to read the article in question, but Mr Wyndham was not to be "drawn." He pointed out that Mr Dillon, when moving the adjournment, did not venture to read it because the strength, of the language /would not help, his case. ''It would 'help my case," exclaimed Mr Wvndham;" "it would carry it. Bub I decline to soil my lips with such language. I decline to offend the ears of hon. members.

and to wound the feelings of millions of people throughout the world by making myself tue channel for further publication of such gross, outrageous, scurrilous, false and loathsome language." Here the cheering became tremendous.

Mr Wyndham declined to-.sav whether the Government would prosecute or hot. It might be, he thought, that a prosecution might do more harm tbah because it would assist in publishing the vile language. But he held that his bounden duty was "to immediate and stringent steps to abate that nuisance, and' to save my fel-

low-countrymen horn, having their feelings wounded again in a moic outrageous manner by language more foul even than* that employed in some foreign newspapers last year. ,J

JVext arosa Mr J. Redmond, who taunted Mr Wyndliam with liavinc the means of c-dvertising the hbd by the coarse ho had taken. Mr Rrdiuon-d declared that the issue cf "Tire Irish' People" ha-d. been, largely, circulated in spite of its suppression, and contended 1 that if the newspaper were guilty of publishiiig a seditious lvbel, it was amenable to the k\7, and should bs punished by the law ci" the , country-. He thoutrht such a (juostion ought not to be decided "bj" tlie Executive Government. He was certain that the Irish peopl© would rsnlise the witole meaning of the trovftrnment's action. ; It was simply a move in iJie game yrbicli the Government was cal'ryinp on, but ;he could tell the Cravernm°.nt "that the organisation and the paper of the movement they were attacking were too. strong for them,* and.had-at their back tat- jfreat mass of the Irish people in Ireland and out of.it, andwhether they had to fac« in the future persecution or prosecution, fines, penalties, and imprisonment, this movement would jrp on, and would make short work of Mr VV'yndham and his new policy, sooner, perhaps, than the Government expected. As many New Zealanders may remember Mr J. Redmojad and his eloquent oratory when he visited the colony to raise subscriptions in aid of Home flule, they will probably be interested to read his views with regard to this infamo'iis libel on the British Sovereign. : "'

Mr Arthur Balfour was prompt to "spot" the weak point in the Irish Nationalist case. .Hβ asked scornfully, "Is the publication of an obscene libel a necessary weapon in the armoury of Irish agitation? Is that part -of the:r equipment, which they cannot do without? Ih .that, an essential method of carrying on their faith?" Hore Mr Redmond jumped up and excitedly shoubed in the "negative," apparently forgetting his own words uttered a. minute previously. Mi , Balfour promptly retorted upon ihim that if he disclaimed that why was the newspaper which be claimed to be the. leading newspaper in Ireland, "permitted to use its foul" and poisoned' weapons"? Mr Balfour declared that any gentleman would admit that mo epithet was too strong to describe the article in question. It was "a foul, seditious and obscene libel." Mr Balfour went on to point out that the Sovereign, from his public position was unable to protect (himself against such gross attacks, amd he declared that the Government could not with propriety "sit quietly by and see this gross offence against .public decency and public morals, as well as against law and loyalty, committed;" He asserted that those who defended the newspaper were "dragging in the mud the great and sacred cause of the liberty of the Press to say that it is bound up with the unchecked publication of these nauseous productions, not directed against any responsible Minister, not in favour of any cause great or small, but levelled at tbe head of the State in hie private character, and going beyond every decency of expression—using language so gross that there is not a single gentleman on the opposite side of the House who would either in, public or private venture to defend dt. The liberty of the Bress," said Mr Balfourj "is not aided bj r pleadings such as this," a remark which was loudly cheered. Mr Ascpith cordially supported the Government. Mr Dillon tried to speak again, but was greeted , with a storm of interruptions. Mr Labouehere, of course, opposed the Government, and denied that it had a right to sjize the paper because an. attack was made on the Sovereign. Then Mr John Burns endeavoured to brine; in, a former experience of his own, when, asi he said, he had been prosecuted for what was termed seditious conspiracy. The Speaker stoppsdi him, whereupon Mr Burns accused the Speaker of "circumscription and suppression." He was called upon by the Speaker to withdraw ,the observation, and alter fencing a little-in compliance with the shouts o.f the Nationalist members, who urged him not to withdraw,, he was a second time called upon by the Speaker to withdraw, and then he hurried'lv said that he did so, "as applied to fhe Chair."

Hβ admitted that the attack on the King was a vulgar and ouc. but he felt sure that (he King himself would merely have smiled aril pvit \\ Mo his wastepaper ba.-ket, intfea.-l of giving it tlie "gratuitous ar.d world-wide a<lve-ri.\yinent" it had now received frum the Govi-nnnent. Mr Burns was going on to predict that the King would fwn call his advisers to account, but ii?re again he was stopped by tlw »Sp?akor, en tl',3 ground that li-e was not in ordsr in introducing nry remarks nbout th-a personal opinions of the King. After <nmo further discussion tlio motion for fidjonrnmsnt wns lost by a maijority of IS3, 64 voting for it, ar.d 252 against it. In its next issus "The Irish People" referred to the eeiaur-a of its-previous issue by the Government, undur the heading, "Fools'? or As<\isins? or Both T It comments: —"If wo hnd any in seeing English law respected we should bs iw angry as some of our suner English .Jiipnds at the contempt for law and oixte.r jimt by Mr Wyndham and iiis.pals in hw q"ua.n-el witi this newspaper. Being, on the contrary, .well assured that English law in Ireland "is a compound of villainy and hyprocisy, which canniiot too of fan- be li eld up to contempt o.nd loathing pending tilw hour when it can be blotted off the fa<;a of this islar.d' altostether, wo rejoice that Mr WyndJiam should constitute himself the foremost and clumsiest of law breakers, and, we liumblv fdioitate ourselves Tiponthavhig been th« cause of tlrua driving our chief administrator to trample on his own laws, and to confess that in no otherwise can England prolong her hated , rule in Ireland.".

The incident has cxcitsd a deal of strong feeling and certainly has not improved the positioin of the Nationalist party in public estimation. ' It- is satisfactory to learn t3ia,t the oocnrrence has had a good effect on American opinion. Even the ''New York Sun," tJje most Irish of the American papers, seeing clearly >tbait the Irish, cauae is not helped but hindered, in America, by such means, warns •its Dublin friends that "there is no American sympathy for the publisher of so foul and -wanton an attack, constituting as it does a violation of all public decency/ Moreover,, examining 'the law precedents, the "Sun" declares that even in America a paper containing a. -criminal libal,' as this is, may be seized by order of a Magistrate, or even by the police, without warrant, on ihe ground that by its circulation a crime is comniitted. If, therefore, Messrs Dillon and O'Brien counted on obtaining American or Irish-American support by this new deevice they have failed. "Which us extremely gratifying to all loyal subjects of King Edward VII.