IRISH FREE STATE.

Waikato Times, Volume 116, Issue 19352, 4 September 1934, Page 9

IRISH FREE STATE.

STATE OF THE COUNTRY. A MISLEADING REPORT. (From an Irish Correspondent.) DUBLIN. July 22. We have been honoured by the visit of a party of Scottish Home Rulers. Sir Alexander Me Ewan was the leader, and the Duke of Montrose a •distinguished member. Their object was to study economics rather than politics, though it is not easy to see how in these days the two can be separated. They were received by the leaders of botli parties, were greeted by Dublin’s popular and never-failing Lord Mayor, and visited Balls Bridge, the Agricultural College at Glasnevin, and the Forestry School at Avondale. A hurried survey of this kind has its dangers, though flrst impressions are just as likely to be right as more prolonged study. After Twelve Years. Few Irishmen can be found to agree upon where we stand to-day and what has been achieved during 12 years self-government. For this reason our Scottish friends will be well advised to be cautious on their conclusions. Dublin is not Ireland, and the life in the capital may give a totally wrong impression of the true state of the country. There are in the capital cinema queues, motor-cars in abundance, and every evidence of prosperity. It is a very different story in the country, where many farmers are in real distress and wages are on the bare subsistence level. The conditions here, moreover, are very different from those in Scotland. Our problem is to create industries to balance agriculture, whereas there the balance is the other way. Scotland has, however, the great advantage that education is widespread and part of the plan of life. Here higher education is regarded as an escape from the land and a stepping-stone to the professions. That is why our country’ life is so often stagnant and commonplace, and why the obliteration of what, for want of a better term, is called the gentry has been so unfortunate. One thing at least our visitors must have learnt, and that Is the curse of economic frontiers. When they came they were believed to be averse to Customs on the Tweed, and it is to he hoped that nothing they saw here induced them to change their minds. Grotesque and Untrue. Tn contrast to this voyage of inquiry, another and anonymous visitor has been recounting his experiences to the public. lie seems to have had no 'difficulty in making up his mud that the country is on the verge of revolution and collapse. According to his account, all the most gloomy prophecies of 12 years ago have come to pass. Law and order have broken down, revolvers are drawn in the manner of the Wild West, and sectarian persecution is rife. Protestants are not only excluded from publlo life, but more active measures with an antiSemitic flavour are being organised against them. All this is borne out, so he contends, by evidence. Motorcars are scarce and misery is abundantly evident. ■No picture could be more grotesque or untrue. It would be just as fair to describe Fascist and Communist clashes as typical of the state of England. But for week-end party encounters and attacks on Blue Shirts, the country is as quiet as it was under the 'Cosgrave regime. And distress is not visible to any casual observer. On the contrary, most visitors are impressed by the outward signs of prosperity—cinema queues, motor-cars and boat sailing, bathing and constant amusement.

The Dublin Horse Show, moreover, io everybody’s surprise has entries to the full extent of accommodation. Nobody can explain this evidence of wealth, but there it is. The distress is remote from the city and largely unrevealed. The accusations of sectarian bias and persecution are mischievous, and very much resented by those in whose interests they are presumably made. The minority want no such advocacy. There is the good feeling between all denominations,- and whatever a few fanatics on one side or the other may say or do the Government has been just and even generous towards the minority Churoh. In the matter of education it has gone out of its way to preserve and encourage Church schools, and has given flnanoial assistance to the transport of Protestant children in scattered areas to a central school. Old ideas and labels are inclined to cling, but the term Irish loyalist, In the sense of ex-Unionlst, has lost all meaning, A few exiles may accept the description and charitable people may organise drawing-room meetings to help them. A New Loyalty. Loyalty has thus acquired a different ■hue. ” The old Unionists no longer look towards West-minster, but range themselves as a matter of coursc with those whose interests arc identical with their own. In this way a lot of I lie old .shibboleths arc forgotten, and the need for common defence has led to new alliances. Out of all this has emerged a new and different loyalty—a loyally not -to Westminster or to British rule, but lo the larger conception of King and Commonwealth. In this respect Ireland is in the mass far more loyal than it, was in pre-Trcaty days. How much of this loyalty is true affection and how much of party opposition it is hard to say. This at least'is certain. The vacillating altitude of the President and his party towards the Treaty and his refusal to play the game or quit the Commonwealth has done much to strengthen and consolidate British prestige. This is a real spiritual advance, and may bring us in course of time to follow South Africa in closer co-operation and sympathy with the oilier Dominions. Sir Dunbar Plunket Barton. A pleasant echo of old days ami associations is offered by the visit of Dial vigorous octogenarian, Sir Dunbar Plunket Barton, once a familiar and popular figure in Irish life. He is one of our most distinguished sons. The greater pari of his working life was spenl in Dublin, llrst as private secretary lo the Lord Lieutenant, then as lecturer in law, and, later, as Solicitor-General, and Dually as a judge. Ills life of Bernadolle has made him known to many as a writer of charm and distinction, lie is now resident Bencher of King's Inn and lives in l.undon. hut he slill keeps alive an inleresl in this enwnlry. Though a I wavs a I nionih. lie has

been a member of the Senate of the National University since 1909, and lie now comes to visit and encourage the University rowers at the Metropolitan Regatta. It is well we should have such reunions to remind the younger generation that in the old days political adversaries were not so estranged as some would have us believe. Indeed, in this matter of toleration between political opponents we have sadly deteriorated.