ULSTER PROTESTANTS AND HOME RULE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 24, 18 June 1914, Page 6

ULSTER PROTESTANTS AND HOME RULE.

(To tho Editor.)

Sir,—ln your hsue of yesterday is a eab'.o to the effect "that there is no Protestant man, woman or child (.sic) in Ulster who does not vow implacable and unuying hostility to Home Rule." I know that the "re-.pon-ibilitics of the editor of a newspaper are very great; and that he is not accountable for what the table-crammer sends through, but while admitting tlr.it, I trust you will give a little space to reply to the above cable, and al.-'o to let me state that the .sender of such cables pnHst think that we members of the British Empire residing at the Antipodes are an ignorant people. In the' first place, Ulster scn&a to the British Parliament 33 representatives. .Seventeen of theso axo Home Rulers, and eight out of the 17 are Protectants. Secondly, i fully 15 to 20 .per ei nt. of the Protestant population or Ulter, including Lord Pirie, Sir Charles Ala elf, 'Mr-/J. W. Kempstcr (managing director of Ilarlandl and Wold'), two of the largest linen manufacturers in t'lster, etc., are upholder:! of Homo Rule, There was the annual meeting of the Ulster Überal Association in Belfast recently, held in the I'lster Hall, and this was attended by 20(1 delegates from all part? -of tie- North. This delegation comprised K.C's., leading solicitors, wholesale and retail merchants, and some of the n-ost prominent farmers of the province; and it was an eye-opener to the reporters of souk- English .papers that attenle'l the meeting. "This f-nthe.-ing," fates the Liverpool lhiilv Post, "had a Quaker-like dcterminaliMi ahont if. which T have never known about Ireland.' 1 Thirdly, the Ulster Protestant liisiness man' knows, outside of his belief in self-government, that the Ni'.fonalists have" the power to cripple Ulster trade, as the. Irish Nationali-ds deposit's in the UI-iter Hank blanches aggregate more than the combined capital of three Ulster .banks doing business in the south of Ireland. Excluding Ulster deposits, the lister branch .banks have over £33,000,000, twothirds of which are the of Nationalist farmers, merchant*, and the Catholic Church. The. above. I hope, will be considered bv your impartial readers a sufficient i-onlv to the piffling cable which appeared veslonlav,I am. etc.,

PERM AX AG 11.