THE ELECTION STRUGGLE AT HOME.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XX, Issue 37, 1 July 1892, Page 17

THE ELECTION STRUGGLE AT HOME.

HE British Parliament is dissolved, and the two great political parties are in the midst of a contest of the utmost importance. Mr Gladstone and his party, to whom we ardently wish success, place Home Bule for Ireland in the forefront. Lord Salisbury and his Unionists place the denial of Home Rule to Ireland in the forefront. This is the situation. All other considerations are only secondary. Until Home JRule is granted to Ireland, there is no hope for the peace and prosperity of Ireland, or for the amelioration of the condition of the masses in Kngland. As Mr Gladstone has truly said, Ireland blocks the way. The tyranny of English legislation and administration lias so impoverished and exasperated the Irish people everywhere in that country, and thus embittered their compatriots a) I the world over, that until Home Kule is granted, the British Parliament can never expect to have time to duly consider social questions demanding solution in England. This is not the fault of Ireland, but her misfortune, and is entirely owing to the attitude of the Tory party and their allies, the Liberal Unionists, who, for the sake of Protestant ascendency, refuse common rights and liberties to the Irish people. Lord Salisbury has appealed to the no-Popery instincts of ignorant and unthinking people to help him to keep his heel upon the necks of the Irish people, because he hates the majority of the Irish people for being Catholics. This, diveßted of verbiage, is the policy of Lord Salisbury, who, in this the last quarter of the nineteenth century, can rise no higher as a statesman than his ancestor and the founder of his family in the bad, cruel, and persecuting days of Queen Elizabeth. This man, who refuses to Ireland what justice, good sense, and wise policy demand, has no scruples, whilst he declaims against the ridiculous bugbear of Catholic ascendency in continuing the disability which excludes all Catholics, simply because they are Catholics, from the offices of Lord-Lieu-tenant of Ireland and Lord-Chancellor of England. A Turk, Jew, or atheist is eligible for these offices, but not a Catholic. He makes no effort to secure fair play for the Catholics of Belfast, who are excluded from all offices and situations in the power of the majority of Protestants there to bestow. Seventy thousand Catholics in Belfast have not a single representative in the Town Council, which would not appoint even a Catholic scavangei. And these are the men who inveigh against religious ascendency and exclusion not dreamt of.

The whole thing is absurd and in a sense ridiculous. "Wherever in Ireland Protestants are in the majority/no Catholic ever is or ever has been appointed or elected by that majority to any situation whatever. Whereas, on the contrary, wherever Catholics are in a majority nothing is more common than the election of Protestants to office in the gift of the majority. Thus we constantly see Protestants Lord-Mayors of Dublin and even councillors and aldermen, and the same can be said of all the other corporations of the kingdom in which Catholics constitute the majority. Even so far as Parliament is concerned a similar state of things prevails. Some of the most Catholic constituencies of the country are represented by Protestant gentlemen. But in Belfast, for the sake of which the Tories refuse justice to Ireland, not a single Catholic is to be found in the Town Council or in any office over which the Belfast Corporation has control. What a lesson is there not here ? And there is not the slightest reason for saying that the Catholic majority would in any way inflict the least injustice or disability om their Protestant fellow-coutrymen. But it serves Lord Salisbury's purpose to persuade English Protestants to the contrary, in order to forward his political plans, and accordingly he hesitates not to do so. It is ignoble warfare and cannot fail to stamp infamy on his name and policy. We hope the English masses will understand that the refusal of Home Rule to Ireland means the postponement of all measures of amelioration so far as their social condition is concerned, and that the granting of Home Rule to Ireland means the speedy settlement of the questions social and political, in which they are most interested. Only let Lord Salisbury and his Unionist party succeed at the next general election and the English masses may look forward to a long continuance of all the evils of which they complain at present. His success means the undue ascendency of the classes over the masses.