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Hokitika Guardian, 10 February 1934, Page 4

In a letter to the Manchester Guardian; Mr John F. .Williams says:—ln

the discussion of the relations of Ireland, or. the greater part of it, to Great Britain and the British Commonwealth, let us not lose sight of one fact of cardinal significance. As things' arc, ali Irishmen/North and South, are fellow-citizens with ourselves, not strangers or aliens, when they land in England. Some Irishmen seem to envisage this relationship as a common subjection. I would rather call it a common fellowship. And its abolition reeds something more than action in Ireland. No legislation enacted by an Irish Parliament and no act done by an Irish authority can destroy in our. law the common nationality of our Irish fellow-citizens unless , and until the Government of Great Britain accepts or recognises the destruction 1 . And we might well pause before impoverishing our national heritage by exclusion from out nationality of a stock which has produced some of the most. distinguished names in the common histoiy of these islands! ,We should be bidden to agree that the countrymen of Burke, of Goldsmith, of Bishop Berkeley, of John Nicholson, of Lord Russell ot Kiilowen, not to speak of Lord Wellesley and bis greater hro.her, would he foreigners in our law and, subject as such to the regime of the Aliens Act. If it be' objected that only a minority of Irishmen to-day value their common citizenship (and the tru'h of the objection remains to he proved), wo may remind ourselves that in this age rights of minorities have .obtained special international recognition. Wc cannot well claim to protect minorities in Eastern Europe' if wc- destroy their rights in the- case of Ireland,