THE CONCESSIONS TO ULSTER.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXV, Issue 16492, 6 March 1914, Page 6

THE CONCESSIONS TO ULSTER.

If Mr Asquith is really contemplating concessions to Ulster as extensive as those indicated in the cable message we published yesterday he may shortly have to face a disruption scarcely less serious than that which split the Liberal Party nearly thirty years ago. .doth the Nationalists and the extreme Home Rulers may decline to accept a mutilated Bill, believing that unless the full measure of Home Rule is secured now the opportunity will be lost for many decades. This view has been stated emphatically by speakers and writers on many occasions lately, the argument being that to give Ulster the option of withdrawing from the Irish State after a term of probation would simply mean that the agitation would he kept alive and that Ulster would inevitably be lost. The concessions, however, are not so flagrantly opposed to true Liberal principles as they appear to be at first sight. Liberalism has never ignored the rights of minorities. Every section of the community that enters into a bargain compulsorily at what it conceives to be a disadvantage is entitled, under the principles of Liberalism as Mr Gladstone stated them, to special consideration at the hands of the State, and Ulster unquestionably has a case for consideration. This problem of minorities is full of perplexities, and the position to bo faced to-day is that although the Imperial Parliament may shelve it in regard to Ulster now, it will certainly have to be dealt with subsequently by the Irish Parliament. Broadly, Mr Asquith’s task is, in professor Robhouse’s words, “to discover what mode of government is best reconcilable with liberty and least liable to be driven constantly to special methods of coercion.” Liberalism, that 's to say, is required • not only to satisfy the acquiescing Irish majority but also to conciliate the resisting Irish minority. In all probability, however, Mr Asquith’s concessions, whatever they may be, will bo rejected, and in that event \the Liberals will be faced with a still more perplexing problem, that of dealing with a minority that declines to bo conciliated.