Home Rule

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXIV, Issue 25, 21 June 1906, Page 2

Home Rule

Col ton has well said that bigotry is ready to murder religion in order to frighten fools wit«h its ghost. There is in Ireland a form of sectarian passion which strangles truth in order to mate a scarecrow for the imperial public opinion that would accord to the most distressful country tlie right— enjoyed by all these oolonies— ' of managing its own affairs. The scarecrow is the religious ascendancy bogey. Aftier the recent- elections, Captain Donelan (a Protestant M.P.) said on the occasion of his unopposed return for East Cork :— ' I am pnoud to know that my relations with my true-hearted constituents have always been of the friendliest and pleasantest character ; and time only serves to strengthen the ties of goodwill that have so long united us together. I am, indeed, a very striking specimen of those poor, benighted Protestants from the South of Ireland, whose future fate is an object of such extremely tender solicitude to the Tory Party. And it is certainly little wonder that English electors should hesitate to vote for Home Rule when they have such shocking examples of Catholic intolerance before their eyes. Mine is indeed a very sad case of cruel persecution, for on four consecutive occasions I ha\e suffered the martyrdom of being unanimously elected to represent one of the most overwhelmingly Catholic constituencies in Ireland in the British Parliament.' But Captain Donelan is only one of many. 'Is it possible,' said Mr. De\lin, M.P., in Melbourne recently, ' for the Irish Party to be working and fighting to establish the ascendancy of any religious party in Ireland while they themselves have been instrumental in rerturning nearly one-fourth of their own members — Protestant Irishmen— in overwhelmingly Catholic constituencies ? ' 4 It has been said,' added Mr. Deylin^ ' that Protestant Ulster is opposed to Home Rule. I waul-d point out in reply to this that Protestant Ulster returned 17 out of 32 Members to the House of Commons pledged to Home Rule, and that Protestant Ulster is not opposed to Home Rule ; for out of the fifteen, four members would not touch the bigoted party with a fortyfoot pole. Who are these gentlemen in Ulster who are opposed to Home Rule ? First we have a young gentleman of twenty-five, a son of the Duke of Abercorn, who is drawing £1200 a year, and he draws.it very well too. Then comes Mr. Arnold Foster, drawing £2500 a year with hardly any effort. Then Mr. Gordon drawing £800 a year, which he accepts because it is a posit/ion with great hopes and possibilities. And there are several others drawing sums between £1500 and £5000 per year. Of course these gentlemen cannot be blamed because they watch their own interests first and the interests of the country take second placs, ' are, of course, opposed to Home Rule, bedause under the present system they have a fine opportunity of making money without very much effort.' Addison was right-^-goJd is a wonderful clearer of the understanding !