RESULTS OF THE UNION.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XV, Issue 21, 16 September 1887, Page 9

RESULTS OF THE UNION.

(From Mr. Shaw Lefevbe's " Review of the Irish Policy of Parliament.") Twenty-nine years had now elapsed since the Act of Union. What had Ireland gained by the Act ? What had been the effect of it on English politics ? So far as Ireland was concerned, it was impossible for anyone to point out a Bingle advantage which had accrued to iti people. The country had been in a disturbed and distracted condition ever since. It had been impossible during almost any two consecutive years to govern it by the ordinary law. Every year, with rare exceptions, brought the demand on Parliament for coercive laws for Ireland, differing only in method and degree. The mon common forms were the suppression of trial by jury, the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act, the prohibition of public meetings, and the right to carry arms ; but occasionally there was added tht provision of martial law and the curfew clauses. No attempt had been made to apply remedial measures to the country. The grievances which the people suffered under the tithe system were allowed to pass unchecked. No proposal was made to interfere with the arbitrary power of landlords ; on the contrary the Acts of 1815 and 1817 greatly increased the powers of landlords, and facilitated ejectment. During the interval, also, the taxes in Ireland had been nearly trebled in amount, and without equivalent benefit to the English exchequer, and without adding materially to the resources and power of the Empire. Previous to the Union, the Irisk Parliament had r&rely voted more than| 12,000 men for the army, subsequent to it, the force maintained in Ireland during the war with France was increased to 40,000, and after the peace was never less than 25,000 men. During the same period the Irish Government was carried on under the old principle of Protestant ascendancy ; nothing was done to give practical effect to the remedial legislation of the Irish Parliament in 1793. All avenues to public offices or to municipal government were closed to the Catholics. The magistracy was ex* clusively appointed from Protestants. The Acts of 1793 might at well have remained in force for any practical results to them; Catholics were habitually excluded from juries. The people were shown that Parliament and the Government of England wonld not listen to any claims put forward in a constitutional way. It was due to O'Connell, and to him almost alone, that a method was discovered of forcing the hand of the British Government and Parliament. It was by his indomitable courage and perseverance, by his fervid eloquence and appeals to popular sympathies, that the road to success was pointed out. He alone had conceived the plan of organising the people of Ireland in a manner which would make

it impossible to refuse their demands, and hed induced the priests to take a part in politic, and lead their flocks in a political campaign. . . Two results, therefore, of great import and of lasting effect on Irian politics accrued from the broken promises of Pitt and the long delay in the concession of the Catholic claims : the one was that the Irish people were taught that agitation and civil disturbance, vergiug on civil war, would alobe succeed in inducing the Impeiial Parliament to give way to their claims ; and the other was the introduction into politics of the Catholic priests in supercession of (he landlords. The destruction of the landlords' power and the substitution for it of that of the priests' was the main result of the agitation for Catholic Emancipation . The landlords have never recovered their position. The priests have continually advanced in influence. Even these results might have been modified if the Catholic measure had been dealt with in a different spirit and conceded with a bet er grace. Everything, however, was done to make it as little a healing measure as possible. The suppressson of the Catholic Assoc aturn was needless and impolitic in the highest degree. The disfranchisement of the forty-shilling freeholders was equally unwise ; it was avowedly for the purpose of preventing the Catholics obtaining political power and securing representation in the British Parliament in proportion to their numbers. It made an invidious distinction between Ireland and England, and reduced the constituencies of Irish counties to the most meagre proportions. The measure was not only a grave political mistake, it was also a failure. The county constituencies, even thus reduced, were still largely composed of Catholics ; the influence of the priests was not much diminished, and it will be seen that the representation of Ireland was greatly changed. The Bense of injustice arising from the Act was one of the causes of this. Not less unwise also was the personal treatment of O'Connell already referred to. What, again, was the effect of the Act of Union on English politics ? A retrospect will show results equally unfortunate. The Catholic question was the rock on which successive Ministries were driven and wrecked ; and for years it excluded the ablest and best of statesmen from the Government. Apart from Ireland and the Union there would have been no Catholic question in Great Britain, or at most it would have been one of little importance. It was only in connection with Ireland that it assumed the highest importance among State questions. Mr. Pitt resigned in 180lfbecause he could not pursuade the king to assent to the Catholic claims ; with him went the ablest of hid colleagues— Lord Grenville, Lord Spencer (who had organised the fleets which won for England tbe battles of Camperdown and the Nile), Mr. Wyndham, and Mr. Dundas ; and for three years the Government of the country was carried on by the incapable Ministry of Mr. Addington. In 1807 Lord Grenville and Lord Howick— the successors of Fox — were dismissed by the king for refusing to sign an undertaking that they would not under any circumstances bring forward the Catholic question. Iv 1812, on the death of Mr. Perceval, Lord Liverpool was unable to obtain the cooperation of Lord Wellesley and Mr. Canning in forming a Ministry because they held that the Catholic question must be dealt with. Fur Sesame reason, Lord Grenville and Lord Grey were unable to form a Ministry with Lord Moira ; and finally Lord Liverpool was compelled to return to office with a Ministry of Eldons, Sidmouths, and Bathursts. On the death of Lord Liverpool the Duke of Wellington and Mr. Peel refused to serve under .Mr. Canning because of their grave differences with him on the Catholic question. These instances include nearly all the Ministerial changes within the period ; they show the unfortunate effect of the intrusion of a purely Irish question, r j -i