IRELAND'S CAUSE IN ENGLAND.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XVII, Issue 36, 27 December 1889, Page 13

IRELAND'S CAUSE IN ENGLAND.

London, October 28. The election at Brighton last Friday was the exception that proves the rule of a general tendency towards the endorsement of Mr. Gladstone's Home Rule policy. Toe contest was to fill the seat made vacant by the death of Sir Win, Tindal Robertson, Conservative. Mr. Loder, the Unionst candidate, received 7,132 votes, and Mr. Peel, Gladstonian, 4,625. Sir Wm. TimUl Robertson wa9 elected in November, 1886, wiihjut opp>-iiion, but in the previous election the Conservative candidate received 5,963 votes, and ihe Home Rule candidate, 2,633.

Compared with the election of 1886, the figures are comf irting enough, btciuse the Liberal p"ll has increa'ed by 2,000 votts, as against a Tory ii crease of 1,100, and the Tory mnjoiity has r.eea pul ed down irom 3,500 to 2,2i>0. But it is no use disguising the fact that, the general election ot 1885 wmch, there being no Home Rul-j q lestion to divide the pir.y, resulted in the return ot a (Jonstrvative ui.jjiit)Ol 2,100, sthc real criterion, and by that the Brighton result is not so satisfactory. The figmes show that about 300 Liber ils have desertei their leader. Of these 100 vo'ei lor the Toiy ciudidat j , and the remainder abstained al'o£( ther. Bitth > election has proved that the nuuitnr of Liber ils still alienated by H ime Rule at Bi ighton is proportionately muchsanler Uwin was the case ihroughou the country in 1886, when pirty de-iertions raiSJtl the Cons-^rvat ye majority of 2,100 to a Toi) -Urionist majorny of over 3,200 It is evident, thcretore, that the flawing tide, it it has not submerged Brighton, bas at any rate touche 1 it. But, cf course, the Liberals require tor a complete victory simply to win back the seats lost in 1886 ihiough tha Home Rule schism, and Biighton was not one of these.

Mr. Gladstone made a powerful speech at Souihport on the previous Wednesday, before a crowded house. He reviewed the Liberal party during the past twenty-one year-*. Hj ptid a tribute to the laudable auxiety of the Powers to po'tpone a European crisis. He rtferred to the Cretan question as a formidable menace to the peace of Europe. He ci incised at length the Government's work, and claimed that all its useful measures were liberal. He made a point by declaring that the. principles of the dock-3tnkers, applied to tenants and tiadesmea in Irelani, would have been peual He was toucued by the election gains, and be ieved that if they could c id the Septenuial Act ani appe.pl to the people to-morrow the verdict would be in favour of the Liberals aud justice to Ireland.

The bulk of the speech was devoted to Irish grievances. He said that the necessity of the continued proclaiming of new districts was evidence of the failure of the coercion po'icy, and declared that the crime rate w<*s now ihe s-ame as in 1884, when, in order to secure tha support of the Parnelhtes, the Tories declared that coercioa was no longer necessary.

Mr. Gladstone said he was unable to lay before his hearers a scheme of liberal policy for the tuture beyond the outlines already well known.