The Temuka Leader TUESDAY, OCTOBER 29, 1889. IRISH AFFAIRS.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1962, 29 October 1889, Page 2

The Temuka Leader TUESDAY, OCTOBER 29, 1889. IRISH AFFAIRS.

A cablegram some time a go informed us that Mr Balfour, Chief Secretary for Ireland, had disavowed any intention on the part of the Government to establish a Catholic University in Ireland. Subsequently wo learned through the same source that Mr Gladstone had characterised Mr Balfour's disavowal as the meanest thing he had ever heard of. A little information on the subject may therefore prove interesting. The University question has for a long time been a sore point as regards Ireland’s grievances. The country is practically Catholic, but while there is a Protestant University Catholics have no such institution, with the exception of one supported by themselves. This has been a vexed question in Ireland, but the Radicals of England have no sympathy with it. They do not believe in any assistance being given to any denomination. The leading tenet of their creed aims at a complete divorcement of the Church from the State, and on no account would they support the proposal of giving State aid to a Catholic University. The Government believing that Irish members would vote for the University, while Radical members, would vote agaiast it, hit upon this plan of creating disunion between the Irish and the Radicals. .They thought that by doing so they would completely break up the alliance between them, and thus destroy Home Rule. The triok was seen through. On August 28th last Mr Balfour said in the House of Commons that a scheme for a Catholic University was under the consideration of the Government, and that it was “such a scheme as would satisfy.the legitimate aspirations of the Catholics, he had no doubt.” This astonished the House and the country, and Mr Parnell congratulated the Chief Secretary on the announcement. A Radical i member, Dr Wallace, sounded the alarm at once, and said he would rather hear “ purlings of defiance to these billings and cooings between the Government and the Irish members.” The Tories, however, hailed the proposal with songs of joy. They said it was splendid generalship; that it would separate the Irish from the Radicals, and thus put an end to Home Rule. Mr Chamberlain was interviewed on the subject, and said—“ For some time past it has been realised by the Ministers of the Crown and their advisers that some plan of higher} education for Ireland, which would be |

acceptable to the Roman Catholic Church, was necessary to put an end to what, to many minds, is a perfectly legitimate Irish grievance.” A writer in the Globe said—“lt is but just that Ireland, practically a Catholic country, should hare a Catholic University of equal status with Trinity College, and that a lair share of the general education grant should, subject to State inspection, be awarded to Roman Catholic schools.” Sj on the chorus went amongst those who thought they had struck oil, but they had counted without their host. Mr Davitt saw through it immediately, and denounced the Irish members for thinking of it. In a letter to the paperja he said—“ We hare made the whole world ring again with our impassioned protests against the tyrannies, barbed with insulting references, that; were practised by the Chief Secretary; while we have sworn any number of political oaths from altar, and platform, and press, that the malice and meanness of our Tory rulers only made us more resolute in the fight against those who gave us Coercion instead of Home Rule. This abandonment of the single plank position of Home Rule for a mess of Catholic University pottage is, together with the vote of the Royal grants, a sorry exhibition of Parliamentary opportunism, and it will bo matter for little surprise if the Democracy of Great Britain., who have helped us to convert the Liberal party to Home Rule principles, should turn their whole attention now to pressing social reforms affecting their own material welfare and leaving us to carry on our peddling policy with the Tories under the more potent auspices of the Sacred College of Propaganda.” United Ireland, Mr O’Brien’s paper, was equally emphatic, and so the Government found out that astute as they thought themselves the Irish were not to be caught with chafi. Another reason which weighed with the Government was the fact that the ultra-Protestant portion of Ireland would at once turn against them if they were to grant such a concession, and thus they were reduced to the position of the old man and his ass. Their proposal pleased nobody, with the exception of their own, party, and so they abandoned it, and it was such abandonment Mr Gladstone denounced as the meanest thing he had ever beard of. One lesson this matter teaches, and it is that nothing less than Home Rule will be acceptable to Ireland, It is no use tinkering with the matter ; there is no way out of the difficulty, except one, and that is to give the Irish the Parliament of which they were fraudulently deprived 89 years ago. The Conservatives of England may delay this for some years, but it must come, and when it does the Irish difficulty will be a thing of the past.