Irish News

New Zealand Tablet, 10 April 1913, Page 39

Irish News

GENERAL. In a case heard at Killylea, Co. Armagh, the other day, a man when asked what his occupation was replied —' I live private. I am. an old age pensioner.' Mr. Martin J. Murphy was on February 15 returned unopposed as Member of Parliament for East Waterford, in succession to the late Mr. P. J. Power. The total emigration from Ireland in 1912 (29,344 persons) was the third lowest total for any year since that of the Great Famine. Ulster continues to suffer most from the emigration. The citizens of Chicago and Montreal are each giving £IOOO, and an anonymous donor in Canada has guaranteed £2500 for the proposed municipal gallery of modern art in Dublin. • The Benedictines, who some time ago were introduced to Ireland by the establishment of a Benedictine monastery in Co. Wexford, have been very successfully devoting themselves to the growing of tobacco on thenlands there. The Castlederg Guardians, on a vote, have elected Miss Mitchell clerk of the Union and District Council, and executive sanitary officer, at a salary of £95, by 15 votes to 2 for Mr. Robb. There were eight applicants for the position. The Legislature of the State of Massachusetts- has unanimously passed a resolution congratulating Ireland and Great Britain on the passing of the Home Rule Bill by the House of Commons. The message was cabled to Mr. Redmond. Lord Hythe, in a letter to the Freeman's Journal, says that, while opposed to the Home Rule Bill as at present framed, ho would favor a settlement by consent on Federal lines, which would give England Home Rule as well as Ireland. Replying in the House of Commons on February 13 to various members, Mr. Birrell said nothing new had been discovered to throw any light on the theft of the Dublin Crown jewels, nor was there any evidence in existence which would justify an arrest or prosecution. The members of the Third Order of St. Francis, Waterford, have decided to perpetuate the memory of the late Rev. C. F. Begley, 0.P.M., by the erection of a marble pulpit in the Franciscan Church, with which Father Begley was connected for a long number of years. Mr. R. M. Smythe, of New York, writes to say that the old Bible on which Members of Parliament were sworn in the old Irish Parliament in College Green over 100 years ago, has been for many years in the possession of his family, and if a restored Irish legislature would like to have it back, he thinks it could be secured. Mr. Charles Dromgoole, K.C., has been appointed County Court Judge for Kerry. This places another Catholic on the Irish County Court Bench placed there by the Liberal Ministry. Twenty vears of Tory administration—from 1886 to 1906—had almost cleared the ranks of Irish Judicature from the presence of any mere Papist. HONORING AUSTRALIAN PRELATES. On Thursday, February 13, the Most Rev. Dr. Manmx, Coadjutor Archbishop of Melbourne, and the Right Rev. Dr. Shiel, Bishop of Rockhampton, were entertained to dinner at the Holborn Restaurant, London, by the Irish priests in and around London. Right Rev. W. J. Cotter, D.D., Bishop of Portsmouth/presided. THE RICHEST COMMONER IN IRELAND. The death, occurred at his residence, Faithlogg House, County Waterford, on February 18, of Mr. Patrick Joseph Mahon Power, in his 87th year. Mr. Power was reputed to be the richest commoner in Ire-

land. In addition to owning a great deal of land in County Waterford, he had a large amount of property m Dublin, being ground landlord of Sackville street and Grafton street. He was a J.P. and D.L. for County Waterford, and served the office of High Sheriff in 1855. In 1859 he married Lady Olivia Jane Nugent, daughter of the ninth Earl of Westmeath. She died in 1903, leaving issue one son and four daughters. The son is Mr. Hubert Power, who was born in 1860 and was High Sheriff of County Waterford in 1888. A CASE IN POINT. If the Catholic minority in Scotland objected to Home Rule for Scotland and declared they would fight against it if proposed, what would the Scotch majority say or do? The question is easily answered. It caused great amusement when Mr. Redmond once put it at a meeting in Scotland. He repeated it as an « example' in his speech the other day at Coventry and there was much laughter at the idea. They (said Mr. Redmond, referring to Orange claim) will not permit Home Rule for Ireland, and they say plainly to you the people of England, that if both your parties here, Liberal and Tory, united m passing a Home Rule Bill, it would not affect them. They still would stand out and by force of arms would prevent the will of the Kingdom from being carried out. That is the claim of the minority m Ireland and the minority in Ulster An \ absolutely intolerable claim,' as Mr. Redmond describes it—a claim which 'goes deep down into the whole system of democratic and representative institutions.' A MEMORABLE SESSION. L' The Session of the House of Commons which has now practically terminated will rank as one of the most memorable in the history of Parliament (says the Irish Press Agency). It was the greatest Session for Ireland since the Act of Union, because it witnessed the passage of the third Home Rule Bill by majorities which make it certain that before many months, not to say years, the Bill will become operative as an Act, and an Irish Parliament will again be sitting in College Green. That Parliament will have the full and free consent of the British people; the Act establishing it will be in the nature of a treaty of peace and friendship between Ireland and the Empire; and, therefore, it will have a sanction and a guarantee which Grattan's Parliament, forced at the point of volunteer bayonets, never possessed ; and which will be the pledge and the assurance of its permanency and success. Constitution : jnaking is a very difficult job, as the founders of the American and of the Australian Commonwealths were taught by bitter experience, and as the history even of Grattan's Parliament proves. The Constitution provided for Ireland under the Home Rule Bill may not satisfy the idealists. It could never satisfy the cranks, the critics, or the factionists, but every man ,of common sense will agree that, under all the circumstances, it is a triumph of Statesmanship, honorable alike to Ireland and to Great Britain. Both countries have accepted it as such, and even the most extreme of the Unionists recognise that it must pass into law. THE NEXT STEP. The Home Rule Bill will be passed a second time by the House of Commons early in the new Session, and will be sent forthwith to the House of Lords. The rejection of the Bill by the Peers at the first offer was of no consequence. The Parliament Act ensured that'. But the rejection of the Bill by the Lords on the second offer would only mean that it would pass as it is, without, practically, the alteration of a comma, into law automatically in May, 1914. There are very few politicians who believe that the Lords will reject the Bill a second time. Mr. John Redmond has already expressed the view that they will endeavour to effect a compromise, and no man speaks with greater prescience on this subject than the Irish Leader. Mr. Redmond's view has been confirmed by Mr. Birrell, the Chief Secretary for Ireland, who, speaking at Warrington on February 15, said: "

' I believe that this question is approaching its solution. There is still a possibility of a settlement to this question with the other House. There will be every opportunity in a month or two to reconsider their judgment, somewhat hastily arrived at. We shall be more anxious to see what they are going to do than alarmed at what they do do. I hope they will approach the question the second time in a spirit of Statesmanlike consideration, and will ask themselves what will be the consequence of not recognising the demands of the Irish people.' MR. CHURCHILL'S VIEW. Not less important than the speech of Mr. Birrell was the speech delivered by Mr. Winston Churchill, M.P., at the Hotel Cecil, London, on February 11, on the occasion of the luncheon given in honor of Mr. Hogg, the new Home Rule Member for Deny City. After condemning the bellicose utterances of Mr. Bonar Law, the Unionist leader, he contrasted that gentleman's attitude with that of the Irish leader' On the one hand, folly, spite, and venom in defeat; on the other, statecraft, generosity, and goodwill, marching to victory.' The threats of Bonar Law and ' Ulster ' have no terrors for Mr. Churchill: 'We cannot be turned from our path by threats. Half a province cannot claim to stand for all time against not only the demands of a nation, but of the needs of an Empire. . . We are met at this moment under conditions which entitle us to be confident and hopeful as to the future of the Home Rule Bill. That Bill has been rejected by the House of Lords, but that is not the end of the story. In the next Session the Bill will be promptly sent to the House of Lords, and I trust without undue waste of time; and we are satisfied that the great majorities which through all its passages through the House of Commons have sustained it will not fail it in the Parliamentary support which is necessary to carrying it through the various stages before it passes into law. We ask our friends or our enemies who use such violent language to believe that we also have our purposes to carry out, and that mere violence will not turn the State from its course, nor destroy on its path a measure of long-needed justice and reform.' That is a most satisfactory statement, coming from a member of the Cabinet- who has not at any time sought to minimise the ' Ulster ' difficulty, but whose moderation is equalled by his determination"to see the Bill through.