TEMPERANCE COLUMN.

Evening Post, Volume XLI, Issue 138, 13 June 1891, Page 1 (Supplement)

TEMPERANCE COLUMN.

♦ DEINK THE CAUSE OP IRELAND'S DISTRESS Have all these efforts failed ? Certainly not. Lord Shaftesbury, who knew the working people as well as any man of our generation, who knew the state of the country, and who spent his noble life in trying to benefit his poorer fellowcountrymen, said, in his opinion, that had it not been for the efforts of the temperance societies of this country, it would hardly have been worth living in. Yet we see the evil raging round us here in England and in Ireland. This very afternoon I have read an important, appeal from the Irish Chief Secretary calling on all benevolent persons to put their hands in their pockets and come forward and subscribe to relieve tho harrowing distress that has fallen on the Irish people. Distress! But what causes that distress ? I suppose some of your wild radicals would say it is bad Government, or something of that sort. I will tell you what it is. It is the drink that causes the distress in Ireland. (Hear, hear, and cheers.) What did my friend Mr. T.W- Russell say a few days ago? He said the rent roll in Ireland is about 9 millions, but the expenditure upon drink is about 12 millions. There you are. Such an outcry about this rent in Ireland, governments upset, parties disrupted, confusion worse confounded in the political world, all about the nin« millions of rent that these Irishmen are paying ; while all the time they are paying twelve millions a year into the pockets of the publicans. If ever there was an honest politician it was the late Mr. Biggar ; and Mr. Biggar, two or three hours before death suddenly called him away, was speaking to a friend in the tea-room of the House of Commons on political matters, and he said they may do as they like with Ireland ; they may have Home Rule or make what changes they like ; but they will never make apermanent improvement in that country so long as drink is allowed to reign among the people. (Cheers.) LORD SALISBURY AND THE DIRECT VETO. Mr. Lock wood, M.P., said at the request of the chairman be would say a word about the case of Sharp and Wakefield. The compensation clauses they were awaro, were twice introduced and twice thrown overboard. He hoped to show them that not only Mr. Roundell, who, they knew, was an honest man, was in favour of a Direct Veto, but he hoped to show them that if Lord Salisbury was politically an honest man, he was also in favour of a Direct Veto. What did the case of Sharp and Wakefield mean ? 'We now knew that when a man came to get his license renewed it was absolutely in the discretion of the magistrate as to whether he renewed it or not, and therefore when these compensation clauses were being introduced the proposal of the Government was this: — They call upon the taxpayers to pay to the brewers a large sum of money for something which the brewers had not got to sell. In speaking at Newport in 1885, Lord Salisbury said, "I am prepared to grant to the people the same power as the magistrates now enjoy." He asked them to make a note of that for Mr. Morrison. It was only fair to remember that Sharp v. Wakefield had not been finally decided, and probably the Solicitor General had informed Lord Salisbury that the decision in the court below was quite wrong. But there was a well-known legal maxim that everybody in the country was supposed to know the law, and therefore we must assume that Lord Salisbury knew the law. There was no doubt that the justices possessed the Direct Veto, and therefore, Lord Salisbury having said he would give the same power to the people as the magistrates possessed, he must be in favour of the Direct Veto in the hands of the people. (Cheers.)