The New Zealand Tablet THURSDAY, AUGUST 4, 1921. BRITISH FAIR PLAY IN ULSTER

New Zealand Tablet, 4 August 1921, Page 25

The New Zealand Tablet THURSDAY, AUGUST 4, 1921. BRITISH FAIR PLAY IN ULSTER

HEN it was decreed that the pro-German JSm gun-runners who threatened to kick into the Bn e the Crown of England were to get a Parliament of their own in reward for their treason, we were told that Lord Bimavaddy, alias Massey the ** Orangeman; sent a wire of congratulation to the traitor Craig. Later, when the Parliament, as the six-county council is called, was formed, the King, guarded by armed men and protected by the British fleet, made a dash to its opening and said the sort of things a King is usually told to say on such occasions. Our day-lies told us many nice things about all this, as they did about the big Orangeman’s wire to Craig, but our day-lies did not tell us the story of the elections that preceded that visitof the King, just as they do not tell us anything, that' discredits the corrupt and detestable system for which they stand. The story is however worth telling, if only for the additional light it throws on the characters of the New Zealand pressmen who are hired to defend the paymasters of the Hooligans whose noble deeds we are going to commemorate. * Even in the six counties that are called Ulster by A our day-lie men there is a minority of thirty-three perl cent, of Nationalists and Sinn Feiners. ( That the « Orange majority was afraid of this minority is clear from the fact that the remote preparation for the election was an organised drive against the Catholics. White * police and soldiers stood by, the followers of Mr. Mas- 1 sey s friends Craig and Carson, burned down convents, wrecked the homes of the people, and looted the presby-| terms in the Catholic districts. They killed many ; they! maimed and beat many more; they drove defenceless\| women and children" into the mountains and vallevs * where, among the beasts of the fields, they found more $ compassion than among the Orange savages. Having ' thus made North-East Ulster safe for savagery the": elections were duly staged. It was thought, no doubt, that after such an exhibition of bloody and inhuman I brutality no Catholic would attempt to come forward ! and vote against an Orangeman. But the Catholics Ji did come and once more the savage fury of Mr. Massey’s friends found victims. Of course the “4JL :

H in ’ a 'hopeless minority, and of course the Orange - -special constables, armed by the Lloyd George r Government, were against them, which was quite as it ought to be from the Orangeman’s point ■of view; for, as we know, taking the lives of other people for the sake of religion is his idea of What martyrdom means. The Ulster Parliament was ushered in by letting mob-law loose in Belfast. Catholic voters • were wounded and beaten all over the city. Polling places were dominated by Orange ruffians. Ambulances were busy all day carrying away the bodies of Catholics who went to vote under British rule for the candidate they wanted. In the hospitals the doctors and nurses had their hands full attending to the serious cases that kept pouring in from all parts of the city. Stones, knives, revolvers were used by the brave men of Carson’s army against the Catholic minority that the Union Jack was unable to defend from Mr. Massey’s friends. The elections . for that Parliament, concerning which Orange William of Limavaddy wired his congratulations S.O Craig, were marked in red by dastardly and brutal f scenes such as never took place in the history of British |, elections in any preceding age. There was open murder > in, many cases. Even old women were not spared by . those brutes who are bravest when their opponents are women and children. Catholic voters were attacked and beaten by furious mobs. Motors carrying Catholics to gfllhe polls were overturned and their drivers fired on. ■Neither age nor sex was respected by the ruffians. The ■City Commissioner (Mr. Gelston) was asked for military ■ protection for the voters and replied that the military ■ would take no part in connection with this election, r It is true that the police tried to keep order, but they were hopelessly outnumbered, and among the attackers many of Carson’s special constables, armed with W their , German guns. That is the way in which Mr. W Massey’s friend Craig got his Parliament. Such was F| the origin, of the so-called Ulster Parliament which ; v neither Massey nor Lloyd George would go over to p open but to which they sent the King, with the British v fleet to protect him on sea and the British army to surround him in his rush through Belfast. Were they so keenly conscious of their guilt that they preferred to remain away * Now this thing is not a Parliament at all. It is h packed council of Orangemen. It pretends to be an I; Ulster Government, but half the area of Ulster repudiates it with scorn, and it does not attempt to claim y. power to legislate for several Ulster counties. , Feril- managh and Tyrone have mocked at it; only half Arv,,magh supports it; Derry City is opposed to it; even Antrim and Down have returned members in opposition | to it, notwithstanding the pogrom organised there in its behalf. It has begun in crime, and in that crime | the Government of England participated. The Orangeman, Massey, made himself accessory to it also : and a g terrible insult was put on the King by sending him over to give his blessing to the men elected by such means as we have mentioned. As might be expected it has the hfcuipport of our New Zealand day-lie men; and that in Hpeif is in the eyes of thoughtful people sufficient conOne thing is certain, whatever may come of the conference between Sinn Fein and the English 1 Government, the Ulster Parliament is doomed. It is Bankrupt from the start and even the protection of George and the approbation of Lord Limavaddy flvill not save it from starvation. It has, however, a , : lertain historical value, inasmuch as that it marks’ in |p Hood another step in the Empire’s road to ruin.