WHY MR. PARNELL IS POPULAR IN IRELAND

New Zealand Tablet, Volume VII, Issue 352, 16 January 1880, Page 9

WHY MR. PARNELL IS POPULAR IN IRELAND

The Spectator is not so blind as some of its London contemporaries pretend to be on the subject of Mr. ParneU's popularity in Ireland, lnat journal says in a recent issue :—: — To the English, who know Mr. Parnell best as a kind of political sapper, to whom nothing is sacred, it seems at first sight hard to understand how such a man sfiould succeed in supplanting a political leader of the approved type like Mr. Butt. But the matter is easy enough of explanation. The Home Rule party when it began its career m the House of Commons, well organised and admirably led as it appeared to be, was in reality composed of the most incongruous elements. The majority of its members were ordinary Irish Liberals who had "accepted Home Kule," and remained in all other respects what they had always been. Side by side with these were a few, like Mr. Butt himself, who on every subject but one were genuine CoT>serX% c remailld er> with an exception here and there, such as Mr. Sullivan, were "dark" men, of whom little was known, and perhaps not very much expected. Once every session Mr. Butt was wont to deliver a mellifluous dissertation on the advantages of Home Bule, and to receive the congratulations of the leaders of both parties on the excellent taste and moderation which never failed to characterize his harangue. But, beyond this annual display, Ireland derived no appreciable benefit from the existence and exertions of the Irish party. It was not until Mr. Parnell and Mr. Biggar mutinied and began their independent guerilla campaign that anything worth battling for was won. Even if nothing had come of it, Irishmen would at any rate have had the inspiriting feeling, to which they had for so long been strangers, that some real fighting was going on, in which their representatives were contending courageously against overwhelming odds. But the results have been substantial enough to justify a far more desperate enterprise. The Intermediate Education Act, the repeal of the Convention Act, and the University Act bear witneßS to the vigor of the onset and the collapse of the defence. Mr. Parnell may well contrast the fruits of two sessions of the " active policy " with the barrenness of the four which preceded them. Nor can we be surprised that, under the circumstances, he is at present the most popular man in Ireland. In the eyes of the Irish, the means which he has employed are dignified by the ends which they have achieved. Indeed, the state of semi-paralysis to which he has reduced the Parliamentary machine is doubtless regarded as a more effective argument for Home-Kule than any number of Mr. Butt's well-turned periods.