The Chronicle LEVIN. SATURDAY, MAY 6, 1916. THE REBEL IRISH.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 6 May 1916, Page 2

The Chronicle LEVIN. SATURDAY, MAY 6, 1916. THE REBEL IRISH.

lii « stormy seven hundred years, and iu all its centuries, Ireland, lias been in a vortex of political storm. Evjry eflort to coerce lior has been but partiaMy successful!each cuidearour to win her to complaisance with existing conditions futile. As far back as the reigns of the. l'lanta-ganets efforts were made to populate her with English emigrants to the end that a leaven of enduring regard for Englvid and her administration might be fostered and inculcntedi in the populace, but the researches of Fronde •and other English historians have proved th.t t the English emigrants soon imbibe I . 11 > country's spirit of latent discontent, and (in Fronde's illuminating phrase) became more Irish Mian the Trish themselves." Under Cromwell's iron rule the spirit of revolt was subdued! in cruel fashion, the hangings being so numerous that ordinary methods had to be departed from, and the rebels were hanged from cart sharros made vertical in the paddocks and on the roadway. Later on. Ireland gained self-government (in 1872) but the unfortunate spirit of mutual distrust and petty jealousies that has brought to nought so many endeavours for Ireland's emancipation caused the National Parliament to reach the nadir of incompetence, andi the ontbreat of a rebel'ion in "Wexford, in 1708. male matters worse ; till finally the Irish Parliament reached extinction By an Act of Union with Great Britain (in 1801) that gained its approval in the Irish House through means that will not bear the light of day without the casting ol great discredit- upon certain men amongst both parties to the compact, Ever since that union, Ireiandi lias been tile "distressful country" of modern times; and although her lot has been ameliorated consulerabdw by the agrarian legislation passed within file 'n-st i tivn decades, the concessions obtained i-n this way always have been regarded by the Irish as "sops to Corhpru*. ' and the Trish Nationalists have fought at the ballots year in and year out, to the goal oT a self-governed; Ireland. Three years ago, this objective seemed to be attained ; but English political methods barred the way for a time, until within a few months of -he declaration of the present world-wide war the British nation was faced with th<* unwonted spectacle of "a loyal North" in arms, aindi -ready to declare a civil war for maintenance cf conditions of British Government which (fairly or otherwise) had been brought

about by legislative eiia.uneni in 1801, &iid fur the recission ot which, at two successive genera! elections, Great Britain and Ireland colllectively had given a majority vote. It is aa actional commentary upon the weakness of both sections of political thought in Ireland, —that the Orangemen and their supporters in 1913--14 wero prepared to tlefy the British Crown and Parliament, by overt war, in the manner that the Wexford rebels of 1798 did, on which occasion the northerners, naturally enough, were on the side of law and order.

If any local Orangeman or other partisan of the Union, at Any Price Party inquires why The Chronicle drags up in the present time of stress these ancient and modern instances from Ireland's chequered political history, our answer is that the latest development in Ireland fully justifies the reference. We say unreservedly, and we challenge contradiction, that the evil oxamolc of Sir ICdward Carson and his fellow rebels in spirit, dining 1913—14. must have had; a contributing effect towards development of the lamentable (and fortunately abortive) rebellion through which Ireland has passed during April and tlio present May. What other effect could .such an example have upon the excitable and easily-led Celts of the South. They hadi seen a political fight, twice waged succors fully at the ballot boxes, brought to nothingness by the covert and overt acts of the rebellious Carson ft es; and then, toulost act in England's modern political history, they had to look, impotently, on the self-proclaimed rebel Sir Edward Carson elevated; to the rank ol Cabinet Minister in a Coalition Govei nment, and; endowed with administrative powers over a Great Britain that he and others had banded themselves together to defy, with arms imported from Germany, America, and other places abroad. These things were done at the instigation of men as high ly placed as himself and just as dead to the moral responsibilty they to the sovereign head and the 'Parl'-a-ment of the country, to obey its laws; and to our mind, their offence was lesser than that of tile present rebels only to the extent that when the Carsonitre made their active preparations for rebellion, Great Britain was not at war with any foreign power. And, on the reverse pide of the case, it has to lie borne in mind that the misguided rebels of the present year certainly would have hadi in their memory 'he fact that a minority party in Ireland by vexatious party warfare and delays had defeated them in their fairly earned right to self-government, and nad succeeded; a year later in placing th°ir rebel leader in the administrative head of the Parliament that is Great Britain's only law-giver and that exists basically through it* ability to enforce by arms the proper observance of .t« majority decisions. # -

While military law remains. and capital punishment is the law of the land, it is idle to challenge the right <>/ i/lie iSritisn administration, civil or military, to inflict the death penalty upon the rebels of Dublin and ltis vicinities.' ISut the thought that the Carson rebels in posse escaped this risk merely by the fortuitous course of events in 11H311 is disquieting, when one reflects upon the moral fact that their then evil deeds must have conduced in some measure to the later rebellion that .ias brought Ireland to its present ghastly condition. The application of philosophical thought to -such a situation (with the British Empire engaged, in an internecine war at home ;.nd abroad) may seem unpatriotic to some; but to any who pass the comment we fling back the taunt tFint proper patriotism a few years back might have averted the present Irish crisis. Misgnidied though the latest rebels were, they fought for what they regarded as an ideal; and it is only the fortune of war (not to say three-year-old political chicanery) that has prevented certain dead rebels from going down to posterity linked in fame with Goorge Washington and other such rebels who successfulily fought England!, while she was embroiled "in war abroad: or Sir Edward Carson, who reviewed his declared potential rebels in military parade, and lived to gain Cabinet Office within a. year of his act of at least covert rebellion.