ST. PATRICK'S DAY IN LONDON

New Zealand Tablet, 8 May 1913, Page 15

ST. PATRICK'S DAY IN LONDON

j. IRISH NATIONAL BANQUET SIR JOSEPH WARD’S SPEECH Mr. John Redmond, M.P., presided on Monday, March 17, over the Irish National Banquet in London in honor of St. Patrick’s Day. - The gathering, which was held at the Hotel Cecil, was exceptionally large, and the Grand Hall was filled to overflowing, tables having to be provided for the guests in the adjoining rooms. The company included Mrs. Redmond, Sir Joseph Ward (ex-Premier of New Zealand), Lady Ward, Mr. Joseph Devlin, M.P., the Lord Mayor of Dublin, the Hon. Mr. O’Loughlan (Speaker of the South Australian Parliament), Mr. H. O. Holman (Attorney-General for New South Wales), Mr. Martin Kennedy (New Zealand), Mr. Thomas Lough, M.P., Captain the Hon. Fitzroy Hemphill, Mr. Swift Mac Neill, M.P., Mr. M. J. Murphy, M.P., Mr. Molloy (ex-Mayor of Perth, West Australia), Mr. J. J. O’Shee, M.P., Mr. Clement Shorter, Mr. J. MacVeagh, M.P., etc.

A cablegram was read from the United Irish League of America as follows: —'America joins with you and London Irishmen celebrating National Festival. Another remittance ten thousand dollars gone to-day. God Save Ireland.'

On rising to propose ' Ireland a Nation,' Mr. John Redmond had an ovation. He said it had been customary with them at those great gatherings for many years past to utilise the opportunity for taking stock of the National movement, and for giving expression to their hopes for the immediate future. Last year they were truthfully able to boast of the great and signal advance of their movement, and were able to anticipate a still greater advance in the immediate future. The year which had passed since then had been a year of steady and uninterrupted advance, and had witnessed, he believed he could truthfully say, , the realisation of every one of the confident hopes and predictions for the immediate future to which they then gave expression. Speaking last year, he took upon himself the heavy responsibility of making

A Political Prophecy.

He said then he believed that the Home Rule Bill would be a great measure, and would be passed by the House of Commons by a majority of over one hundred, that the Bill would solidify and enthuse the entire Liberal Party and would make for real union and strengthen the permanent loyalty in the Empire, that it would receive the unanimous acceptance of the Irish Nationalist Party, the Nationalist Convention, and

the Irish Party 'throughout the world—quite as enthusiastic an acceptance as was accorded to Mr. Gladstone's Bills of 1886 arid 1893. ' 'To-night I claim,' continued Mr. Redmond, .' that every word • of what was said there has Q been verified by/facts. The Home Rule Bill holds . the field. Itvis^admittedly the most popular, of all measures in the Democratic Party in this country! ! It; has behind it the devoted and, unbroken support of the Liberal Party in 'the House of Commons and every effort to galvanise again into life the old bitter.;/-,-.. • , ;,, - : u /3',:'-^,>/■ , -

Opposition -to ! Home Rule

in this country has failed. The opposition to Home Rule i£ Great Britain to-day is dead, and, in my judgment, the universal feeling is one of impatience that under the Parliament Bill the House of Lords has still the power so long to delay the passing .of that measure into law. But we have this consolation: we know that the sands are rapidly running through the glass. We Irish men and women have to possess our souls in patience for a few short months more, and the automatic process—for that is all it means now — have run its course, and Home Rule will be the law of the land. It will be the law of the land with the goodwill and sympathy of the whole Empire. At this board to-night there are sitting some of the most distinguished statesmen of all the great colonial dependencies of ■ the Empire. The Dominion of New Zealand is represented here by Sir Joseph Ward, for many years its Prime Minister. The Commonwealth of Australia is represented here by the Speaker of one of its Parliaments; and by other distinguished Aus-. tralians from other portions of the Commonwealth. Canada is represented by a man in thorough accord with our cause. The whole Empire, on which, we are told, the sun never, sets, is an. .Empire . where .the .sun never sets upon sympathy and goodwill to Ireland.' And what was true of the Empire was true of the nations of the world. Mr. Bryan,

The Head of the United States Cabinet,

had declared in a speech reported in all the newspapers that day, that humanity owed a debt to Ireland for being the means of ending once and for all the hereditary principle in the Government of the British Empire. And he further expressed his delight that before two years—he might have said fourteen months —had passed, the Irish people in every quarter of the habitable globe would be able to rejoice upon the re-establishment of freedom upon Irish soil. That was «

The Centenary of the Birth of Isaac Butt,

who became the Apostle of Irish Liberty when all their ranks were thinned and broken. It was in 1870 that he founded the present Home Rule movement; and, though Butt disappeared after years of magnificent labor and eloquence and self-sacrifice, those to whom he left the banner emblazoned with Home Rule had still carried it on ; and they were about to plant it once more, as he foretold, over the portals of a free Parliament. Butt substituted a demand for Home Rule for the demand for Repeal : and that demand had never varied from that day to this. , Butt was a great link in the chain; for, though Butt's movement would have been impossible were it not for the movement of O'Connell, the movement of Parnell would have been impossible but for that of Butt.

'To-day, in his centenary year,"" he concluded, ' and in the hour of triumph for a movement he founded, let us in common gratitude turn to his memory. Though we have heard little of Isaac Butt of recent years, I believe I speak the sentiments of those who knew him and. loved him as I did as a boy, and of those of the younger, generation who have only read about him, when I say that his name will occupy a niche of imperishable honor for all time in the hearts of an emancipated Irish people. With that hallowed memory in our hearts, and with the light of victory actually shining upon our cause, I ask you to rise and drink with me the toast of "Ireland a nation."'

Mr. Joseph Devlin, M.P., responding to the toast of The Irish Pai-liamentary Party,' proposed by the Lord Mayor of Dublin, said when Ireland had her own

Parliament ; he would have no fear for her triumph in the immediate future, and he was convinced that the present unnatural differences would be settled in the desire to further National interests. That cause, which had cost so much sacrifice, had at last seen the blessed day when the .war was. over, the battle ended, and Ireland free. .

Sir Joseph Ward's Speech.

Sir Joseph Ward, proposing the toast of the chairman, said Mr. Redmond had earned a great reputation as a wise and courageous leader. His name would ever be honorably associated with the history of his country and,its great struggle for freedom. With unflinching courage and loyalty to his race and country, he had brought Home Rule closer and closer to realisation than it had been since the movement started, a movement which assuredly would soon be converted into a win. He (Sir Joseph) had lived in British self-govern-ing countries all his life, and the great majority of the public men had been sincere and earnest supporters of Home Rule for-Ireland. It mattered not whether they were Englishmen, Scotsmen, or colonial born, or whatever their creed, with rare exceptions they were supporters of Home Rule. The Prime Ministers with whom he attended the last two Imperial Conferences were all, by honest conviction, supporters of, and believers in, Home Rule for Ireland. Nor could it be wondered at, for they lived in countries where Home Rule existed, and where, under the widest freedom, the feelings of loyalty to the Sovereign and the British Empire had not only never weakened, but had grown stronger and stronger as the years had rolled by. He had heard it said that Ireland's nearness to England put it in a different position to that of the ..free young rising nations across the sea. He was unable to subscribe to or admit the soundness of that doctrine. He wanted to see all parts of the British Empire working unitedly in the interests of the whole. There was no room for an ugly wound near to the very heart of the Empire to be kept open. The festering sore should be healed with as little delay as possible. Having referred to the beneficent effect the granting of Home Rule would have as between this country and America, Sir Joseph said when he was Prime Minister of New Zealand he stood on the platform by the side of the Irish delegates and supported their eloquent appeals on behalf of their fellow-countrymen. He was responsible for New Zealand giving a Dreadnought to the Imperial Navy. What of the attitude of the so-called enemies of England? Not "an Irishman in New Zealand took the slightest exception to the presentation of that Dreadnought, but willingly bore his portion for supplying it. In Canada, Australia, South Africa, Newfoundland, and the Malay Straits the Irish race and their descendants were greater in numbers than they were in Ireland to-day, and they were willingly co-operating with their English and Scottish kinsmen in helping to build up and preserve, this great and glorious Empire. He knew there was a strong feeling existing between the men of the North of Ireland and the Irish Nationalists upon the question of an Irish Parliament. It was a thousand pities it was so, and everything possible should be done to show there was no ground for the fears they entertained. If he thought an Irish Parliament meant any danger to the minority, or any.interference with their religious convictions, he would be one of the strongest opponents of Home Rule. He did not believe it was possible for anything of the kind suggested to happen. As one who wanted to see conditions existing within the Empire which would make for unity and strength, he would do much to see Ireland satisfied. It was necessary in the interests of Ireland, of the overseas Dominions, and of the whole civilised world.