THE GOVERNMENT OF IRELAND.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVII, Issue 79, 3 December 1913, Page 4

THE GOVERNMENT OF IRELAND.

j Mr Harold Cox, discussing the Home Rule for Ireland issue rec-\.:)v, reI marks that the rejection of the present Bill would not by any moans involve a refusal to consider other schemes for improving the gor?rnmMit of Ireland, for no one with any cognisance of the facts can fail to recognise that the government of Ireland, as of other parts of the United Kingd-nn. might be very greatly improved. Whether the primary need is deeentvalisi ation is another matter. "Whatever I else is done in Ireland, the mistake l ought to be avoided of reproducing ' there the system of government which has grown up in England, he thinks, land continues: "The form which the j internal government of Ireland should | take is a matter which should be first I thrashed out by the inhabitants of Tre- | land themselves. In his valuable hook on 'The Making of the Australian , Commonwealth,' .Mr Bernhard Wise has shown how the difficulties in the way of federation were gradually overcome, not by forcing the views of one] party into law regardless of opposiiion, hut by open conferences and by | inviting the people themselves to express their wishes by means of the referendum. Not on grounds of prejudice, but on grounds of equity, Croat Britain is entitled to decide in Favour: of the Flster ideal of a United King-j (loin and against the Nationalist ideal ' of an Irish nation. Once that decision has been pronounced, the way will be clear for the work of construction."