IRISH HOME RULE

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume I, Issue 1, 12 December 1910, Page 11

IRISH HOME RULE

ULSTER’S OPPOSITION.

The Belfast correspondent of the oLndon “Daily Telegraph” sends the following telegram indicative of the attitude of Irish Unionists w» recent utterances on Home Rule: “Ulster does not change on the question of Home Rule, no matter by what name it is called. Unionists and Orangemen believe, rightly or wrongly, that the moment Home Rule become an accomplished fact their lives would not be worth living in the country; and to-day, from countless tongues throughout Ulster, there is echoed the phrase contained in Mr. Walter Long’s latest letter to Belfast Orangemen: ‘We will not have Home Rule.’ ” A leading Unionist expressed surprise, at being asked whether or not Ulster had changed on this subject. He emphatically stated that the province has not departed one inch from its old position. The danger was just as palpable as five or ten years ago. With Home Rule the position of the Protestants ,)f Ulster would become intolerable. That being so, they must continue, as of old, to protest in every possible way against the passing of such a measure. The Grand Orange Lodge bf Belfast, in a resolution which they had passed, had voiced the sentiments of every Irish Unionist by declaring that under no circumstances would they support Home Rule, no matter in what guise it came. ■ The following is the text of the resolution passed by rhe Grand Orange Lodge of Belfast, the leading body of Orangemen in Irealn 1:

That in view of the statements which are being widely circulated that Irish Unionists are prepared to accept a measure of Home Rule all round, we, the amalgamated districts of the Loyal Orange Institution, representing the entire Orangemen of Belfast, in meeting assembled, hereby again assert our unswerving attachment to the British Constitution as at present by law established, and solemnly declare that we will submit to no kind of Home Rule whatever.

We are determined to be governed by the British Imperial Parliament in the future as in the past, and we appeal once more to our fellow Protestants in Great Britain not to desert us and hand us over to those whose avowed desire ib the disintegration of the Empire. We will resist any such scheme to the utmost of our power, and are prepared to defend ourselves should such a betrayal be forced upon us. At the same meeting of the Grand Orange Lodge of Belfast, a letter was read from Mr. Walter Long, who, after thanking the members for their letter congratulating him on his recovery from his illness, added that the old talk of Home Rule was being revived, but; the result would be the same — "We will not have Home Rule.” Nationalist View. A well-known Nationalist to whom

YA VVCII-K.IIUVVU US ULlVllttll&V LU WUUIU I spoke said Mr. Redmond’s opinions were the same as those thau prevailed amongst the Nationalists of Ulster on the question of Home Rule. He thought the fact ought to be stated plainly, and proclaimed from the housetops, that Ulster was not entirely Unionist, and that at the last election, out of thirtythree members returned, eighteen were Unionists and fourteen Nationalists. When the Unionists claimed that Ulster was wholly in favour - of the maintenance of thjx Union, as at present established, could not be too_„offaen that such a