THE HOME RULE PROBLEM.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 15892, 11 October 1913, Page 8

THE HOME RULE PROBLEM.

Regaedep as an official statement of the attitude of tho Government towards Ulster and in respect to the passage of the Home Bule Bill, the speech delivered by Mr Winston. Churchill at Dundee possesses considerable importance. It, is interesting because it indicates the kind of front the Government is showing in face of the increased activity on the part of Ulster in making preparations for resistance and in face of tho narrowing period of time which intervenes between tho present time and the date when the translation of the Home Rule Bill into law will tring mattere to a definite issue. According to Mr Churchill, the Government is determined that tho Bill shall be passed as soon as the infallible legislative machinery brought into operation largely for that purpose shall accomplish the process, but we gather that it is ( not i necessarily determined to reject any alteration of tho measure such as might be the outcome of an agreement between the antagonistic parties—so long, doubtless, as that alteration is not inconsistent with the decision, that the Bill shall oome into law during the present Parliament. Moreover, the Government is apparently disposed to give the claims of North-east Ulster "special consideration "—a suggestion which has already had a good deal of scorn poured upon it in Ireland. Mr Churchill's speech conveys the impression that the Government is by no means free from apprehension respecting the future in relation 'to Irish Home Rule. It makes, indeed, an appeal to Ulster to come and talk the matter over. The Government would seem to have found that the situation is very much as outlined by Lord Dimrnven in a recent letter to The Times, in which, after scouting the idea of the exclusion of Ulster from tho scope of the operation of Irish self-government, he declared that to force the Act upon vigorously protesting Ulster was equally impossible, for coercion could never be legitimate until every effort for compromise and a friendly settlement had been exhausted. It is as well that the Government recognises that the possibilities in the direction of compromise and friendly settlement cannot be 'held to be exhausted. It is not easy in its mind, but it is prepared to accept the responsibility of cqjiverting the Home Rule Bill into the law of the land. It could escape much of that responsibility by submitting the issue to the country, but it claims to have already the nundate of the electors in favour of Home Ride for Ireland, and in all the circumstances it could hardly, without a direct confession of weakness, relinquish thn claim. In the ordinary course'of events a general election will come round after the Bill is passed, but by consenting to an election at an earlier date the Government would be sanctioning the stultification of tho Parliament Act in respect to one of the most important purposes for which it was created. This constitutional argument in favour of the passage of the Bill carries undoubted weight. As Mr Churchill points out, however, if a general election following the passage of the Home Rule Bill should affect the transference of political power from the Liberals, it would be open to the Union-, ists to take prompt steps to repeal the measure. It is within the bounds of possibility that an Irish Parliament established at Dublin, might find its career cut short before it had had time, to do much either for good or bad. Against the argument that, whatever th 9 upshot, it is necessary that Home Rule should be brought into actual operation during the life of the present Parliament, there is the contention that the adoption of this course may mean a precipitation, to perhaps little ultimate purpose, of all the worst evils threatened on the day that an Irish Parliament seeks to assert its authority over Ulster. This was the lino of reasoning effectively adopted by Mr Balfour in a recent speech at Waddington. " The Government," he said, " might appeal to the country befpre passing Home Rule, or after it became jaw but before it came into operation, The first course might reconcile Ulster, but would make it impossible to say that Ulster was the victim of a revolution upon which the people had not been consulted. ,It was rumoured that the Government had hitherto been inclined to follow the second course', but he would not believe, ( until he was forced to do so, that the Government" was capable of such gross political immorality. He could not conceive a policy 60 atrocious as refusing the country 'an opportunity to pronounce judgment until all the passions had been aroused in the North and South of Ireland, and until all the administrative inconveniences had occurred which would be inevitable if the Bill were repealed after it had been passed." There is no denying that this argument is one to which, in the light of Ihe evident temper and determination of Ulster, a gTeat deal of force is attachable. But the Government evidently does not despair of coming to terms with Ulster, and ' tho statement of the Daily Mail, that Mr Churchill has expressed a strong belief that the settlement of the Irish question, will be attained before long, will be hailed as an important and somewhat reassuring announcement.