THE HOME RULE BILL.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1664, 3 February 1913, Page 4

THE HOME RULE BILL.

Ai/thotjgh it was generally expected that the House of Peers would reject the Home Rule Bill, there was. some reason to believe that it might have been so amended as to leave Ulster in.tho Union. At the least, it was not supposed that, it would be summarily turned out > of doors. As a' result of the 1 rejection the Government will hiive to bring the Bill in again, and subject it to a second term of critical examination, with all-the risks attendant upon the increasing tendency of the Coalition to weaken over other leading questions. The temporary distraction of the Unionist party on the tariff issue seemed for a time to contain for the Radicals the promise-'of a disorganised arid divided ehemy, but the breach in the ranks appears to have been healed, and Mr. Austen Chamberlain, who appeared likely, in De- ; comber, to smash his party, is reported to have made a speech which indicates his readiness to leave food taxes out of the tariff reform' programme. Tho chances of a Unionist success are greatly raised . by this adoption of ,a more moderate programme, for those who oppose _ food taxes can vote for the Unionist party at the next election, reserving to themselves the right to vote against them at any future time. The healing; of the internal dissensions of tho Unionists upon tariff details will enable the party 1 to unite, as the Spectator puts it, "on the Union, on tho Church, and on opposition to socialistic tyranny." The result. of the by-election for the Londonderry seat will, of course, be hailed by tho Government's supporters as a vindication of the Home Rule policy: But Mr._ Asquith will be unlikely to take this viow of the conversion of a narrow Unionist majority into a narrow Nationalist majority. That there is a very large majority in Ireland as a wholo in favour of Homo Rule is a fact of which all are aware. What the Government would like to see, and what its Irish policy really requires if it is to be justified, is a clear majority of the same kind in Great Britain. So far as there are any data on this point, they indicate that Great- Britain has not any anxiety to dissolve the Union. The Nationalists voted for the disestablishment and disendowment of tho Church in Wales, and can be relied upon to support the Government in any other measure of policy which any section of the Coalition demands. They may be in their hearts and on principle opposed to these policies, but it is their business to sccure Home Rule by any means, and wc do not blame them for subordinating everything to a cause which they regard ns supreme. The other groups of the Coalition are in precisely the same position, so that there is hardly any policy of the Government's for which thcro is a gonuino majority in the Houbo or in tho country, In Londonderry opinion ia almost oyonly

divided, and it was made clear enough that feeling runs very high. The remarkable incidents of tho election are unpleasantly significant of tho trouble that will follow the passing of a Homo Rule Act.