132 PROCEEDINGS OF IRISH PARLIAMENT. CH. XXXVIIL merge in the Imperial Parliament of Great Britain. So long as the Irish Chambers were content to leave the initiative of their legislation to the English Government, to submit to the supremacy of English law, and to a standing army, they differed little from the old French Parliaments, and might have prolonged their harmless existence for many a year; but when they broke loose from the law of Poynings, which kept them under the control of the Crown, and demanded the repeal of the Declaratory Act of George the First, which subjected them to the Parliament of England, and claimed the right of passing an annual Mutiny Act, which secured their independence, the relations between the two kingdoms were completely changed. Canada and Australia, separated from Great Britain by vast seas, are permitted the free exercise of legislative rights, because the connection of those great dependencies with the mother-country is not necessary to her existence; but if Ireland, separated from Great Britain only by a narrow channel, was to be passing protective tariffs, while England was declaring freetrade; if Ireland was to admit universal suffrage and vote by ballot, while England was carefully guarding her parliamentary constitution from the inroads of democracy; if it was to depend on a vote of the House of Commons, in College Green, whether Ireland should send her contingents of seamen and soldiers to a war with France or America, in which Great Britain might be engaged; or, lastly, if the Parliament in Dublin was permitted to debate the question of independence, the integrity of the British Empire would be destroyed. The measures of 1782, by which the English Government acknowledged the independence of the Irish Parliament, had not yet been fatal to the Irish Parliament, only because its corruption rendered it wholly subservient to the dictation of the Crown. On one occasion only, during the eighteen years of Irish independence, when the British Government 1798. PARLIAMENTARY REFORM. 133 was, for a moment, in abeyance, from the incapacity of the King, did the Irish Parliament act upon its own counsels; and on that occasion it transferred the whole power of the Crown, without restriction or condition, to the heir-apparent, while the Parliament of England had accompanied a similar offer with restrictions and conditions of the most binding quality. Here was a signal proof, if proof were wanting, that a free Parliament in Ireland could not work harmoniously with a free Parliament in England. All the energies of the Irish patriots were, nevertheless, directed to a state of affairs, which must bring about a collision fatal to the independence of the country. They demanded a reform of Parliament, which at present was a Parliament only in name, and the admission to civil privileges of the majority of the people of Ireland, who were kept without the pale of the constitution, as necessary parts of the policy of 1782. It was impossible to deny the justice of these claims, and they had always been admitted by the Whig party on either side of the Channel. Lord Fitzwilliam would have carried these measures; and had he been permitted to pursue this honest policy, the rebellion would not have taken place. But though the rebellion would have been prevented, the day of reckoning between England and Ireland would only have been postponed; and it was better that the weaker country should at once be told that two sovereign Parliaments cannot exist in the same political sphere, than that another military conquest should complete the series of wars, in which Ireland has been crushed in the attempt to achieve her independence of Great Britain. Parliament. On the assembling of the British Parliament at the commencement of the year, the question Opening of of the Union was recommended by a message from the Crown; and the address, after some opposition, was carried without a division. Pitt, at 134 OPINION OF LORD CORNWALLIS. CH. XXXVIII. this, the earliest stage, pronounced the decision at which the Government had arrived to be positive and irrevocable. 'I see the case so plainly,' said he,' and I feel it so strongly, that there is no circumstance of apparent or probable difficulty, no apprehension of popularity, no fear of toil or labour that shall prevent me from using every exertion which remains in my power to accomplish the work that is now before us, and on which, I am persuaded, depend the internal tranquillity of Ireland, the interest of the British Empire at large, and the happiness of a great portion of the habitable globe.' Chancellor Lord Cornwallis also expressed his conviction that union was the only measure which could preserve the country.* The Chancellor Clare, the ablest of Irish statesmen, went over himself to urge upon the English Cabinet, that, unless the Union could be effected, there was little hope of maintaining the connection between the two islands.† No person of note in England, beyond the narrow circle of the regular Opposition, expressed any doubt as to the policy of the Union; but there was a very large party in both countries, who would not consent that the measure should be accompanied by any concessions of the Catholic claims. Royal message. The day before the intended Union was signified by a royal message to the English Parliament, the Irish Houses assembled; and the Viceroy's speech, of course, contained a paragraph relative to the project. The House of Lords, completely under the control of the Castle, agreed to an address, in conformity with the speech, after a short and languid debate, by a large majority; but the Commons were violently agitated. A debate pitched * Lord Cornwallis to Mr. Pitt, 20th of July, 1798.-Cornwallis Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 364. † Lord Cornwallis to the Duke of Portland, 8th of October, 1798. Cornwallis Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 416. 1799. DEFEAT OF THE MINISTERS. * 135 in a tone of exaggerated sentiment and high-flown eloquence, was so much the ordinary key of that assembly, that a temperate discussion of an important question would have been an extraordinary occurrence; but what was remarkable, and indeed unprecedented, in the Irish House of Commons, was the result of this debate. An amendment to the address, pledging the House to maintain the Union, was lost by one vote, after the House had sat twenty-one hours; but on the report, the amendment to omit the paragraph referring to the Union was carried by a majority of four. That a Government, in the height of its power, should be defeated and out-voted in a House of Parliament, the great majority of whose members were registered and priced in the minister's book, was one of those events which denote a crisis in the history of a nation. Ireland. The truth is, that the project of Union had, at first, attracted little attention; and many per- Revival of sons of mark had, at first, yielded a half agitation in assent to a proposal of the Government which they did not believe to be seriously entertained. The Irish people, with habitual indolence and procrastination, troubled themselves little about a measure which was not of immediate moment. But when it was understood that the Government was in earnest, and that the Union was to be recommended from the Throne to the Parliaments of both countries, there was little difficulty in alarming a people, among whom the machinery of political agitation had, for some years, been extensively organised. The bar of Dublin took the lead, and it at once became evident that the policy of the Government had effected a union among Irishmen far more formidable than that which all the efforts of sedition had been able to accomplish. The meeting of the bar included not merely men of dif *The numbers were 105 to 106. Nearly one-third of the members absented themselves from the di- 136 OPPOSITION OF THE IRISH BÁR. CH. XXXVIII. ferent religious persuasions, but, what was of more importance in Ireland, men of different sides in politics. Saurin, the leader of the Four Courts, a Protestant and a Tory, who subsequently became Attorney-General, summoned the meeting, in his character of Captain of the Lawyer's Corps of Yeomanry, and was with difficulty dissuaded from attending in uniform.* Nearly the whole body assembled, and, by a majority of five to one,† agreed to a resolution condemning the project of a legislative union between the two countries. In the majority, besides Saurin, were Plunket, Bushe, and Joy, with other eminent men; the minority contained hardly a name of any reputation. It was said, and probably with truth, that the leaders of the bar were opposed to the Union, because attendance in Parliament, and the regular practice of their profession, would no longer be compatible, if the seat of legislation was transferred to London. But, however conclusive the argument in favour of Union may appear to Englishmen, it was difficult for an Irishman to regard the Union in any other view than as a measure to deprive his country of her independent constitution, and to extinguish her national existence. Mr. Foster, the Speaker, took this view. It could hardly, indeed, have been otherwise. He was the last person who could consent to the final dissolution of that assembly, which had elected him as their chief. The Speaker's adhesion, however, was so important that every effort was made to conciliate him. He went to England, and had several interviews with Pitt. He was assured of high advancement under the new system, and might, indeed, have named his terms; but Foster, though hitherto a firm friend of the Government, under which he had, at one time, held high office, proved incorruptible. He returned to Ireland the declared Mr. Cooke (Under-Secretary of State) to Lord Castlereagh, Nov, 8, 1798.-Memoirs of Lord Castle reagh, vol. i. p. 427. † 166 to 32. |