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New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIV, Issue 39, 21 January 1887, Page 3

The Marquis of Ripon, speaking at a Liberal demonstration at Whitby on the 18th ult., alluded to the Irish question, and said he had nothing to retract. He was not called upon to give up opinions deliberately formed because they had not commended themselves to the judgment of a majority of the electors at a particular general election. He had the greatest respect for public opinion, but it had never been a tenet of the Liberal party that they should abandon their principles, or that they should give up their deliberate judgment, on account of the verdict of any particular election. He condemned the proposed removal of Sir Robert Hamilton from his post of Permanent Irish Under Secretary, for such an act would strike at the very root of the independence of the Civil Service. No Government could let the Irish question slide. To do so would be a confession of flagrant political incapacity. The best method was the establishment of a statutary Legislature in Ireland for the management of purely Irish affairs. The confidence of the Liberal party in Mr. Gladstone was unshaken, and this great question would not be settled by the arts of political jugglers, or the devices of astute opportunists, but only by bold and honest dealing.