THE HOME RULE SPLIT.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXV, Issue 1985, 22 January 1907, Page 1

THE HOME RULE SPLIT.

Commenting on tlio split that lins occurred in the ranks of tlio Irish Nationalist party, tlio Irish Times of November 27th says It is not always wiso to advertise good fortune too much. Tlio Nationalist Party, which has given way effusively to this' temptation, is now rominded that property has its duties as well as its privileges. For many weeks past' tlio public has been rogaled with stories of vast wealth flowing into the bottomless purse of the Nationalist Parliamentary Fund. Never was a political mission so successful as those on which Mr. Redmond’s eloquent envoys are now engaged in the United States and in the Antipodes. Gold has been thrust in largo quantities on Mr. Joseph Devlin in Australia. Huge audiouces of American millionaires, having pledged themselves to raise enjirmous sums for tho Nationalist- wart chest, listened for five minutes to M}v T. P. O’Connor, and then, in a passion of uncontrolled enthusiasm, doubled tho pool. It may he remembered that when those -golden tidings wore first recordoil in tho Nationalist Press wo made a very obvious suggestion— namely, that if all these stories were true, Messrs. Redmond and Dillon wore at last in a position to come to tho relief of the “wounded soldiers of the land war.” For years, those unhappy victims of a cruel and .misenimiloos agitation have enjoyed the intense verbal sympathy of every Nationalist orator. Not only are Messrs. Redmond and Dillon pledged up to the hilt, to help the evicted tenants, hut they are under tho strongest moral obligation to do so. Here was their opportunity, and we gave thorn the credit' of supposing that they would leap at it. They made no sign, however, until our suggestion was supported from a quarter which they could not venture to ignore. Some time ago the Cork County Council forwarded to the trustees of the Parliamentary Fund—the Roman Catholic Bishop of Raphoe, Mr. John Redmond and Mr. O’Mara—a resolution asking that a portion of the funds collected in America and Australia should be allotted to the needs of tho evicted tenants. Tho reply was not merely unsatisfactory—it was bewildering. Bishop O’Donnell wrote that his co-trustees and himself would ho glad to do “everything in their power for the wounded soldiers”—-“but we are of opinion, in all tho circumstances of the caso, that the resolution is one aimed at tho Irish Party, and we are, therefore, unable to identify it with the cause of evicted tenants;” upon which the Freeman’s Journal made tho comment—infinitely consoling to the wounded soldiers—“the tricksters may try again.’ Tho meaning of Dr. O’Donnell’s letter and of the comment, of the Freeman’s Journal is less obvious than its intention. Tho intention—amazing as it may appear—clearly is that tho Nationalist Party absoltoly declines to devote even a fraction of its boasted wealth to the necessities of men for whose condition its own leaders are primarily responsible. The evicted tenants, having made their sacrifice, are to be left in the ditch, or to the charity of those same landlords whom, to save tlieir leaders’ purpose, they conspired to to ruin. Mr. Redmond’s attitude represents tho acme of political cynicism, and the cynicism is made all the more flagrant By the absurd excuse with which the Nationalist leaders seek to justify their heartless refusal. The poor protonco is put forward that this most timely and natural claim oil the abundant resources of the Party is a device of Mr. William O’Brien’s “to -stir up strife.” Mr. O’Brien lias political influence in Cork, and we are asked to helievp that he has induced the County Council to take up tho case of tho evicted tenants in order “to deplete tho war chest in the interests of Whiggery and Devolution.” Wo pye assured that the attempt will be a failure. “Funds subscribed for the defence of the National cause,” the Freeman’s Journal sternly tells Mr. O’Brien, “will be applied to that purpose and no other.” Tlio nobility of this sentiment probably would make a more effective appeal to the evicted tenants than it is now likely to do if our contemporary has condescended to tell them what the “National cause” has over done for them beyond throwing them on the roadside. So far as Mr. Redmond and Mr. Dillon are concerned, it is pretty clear that they are to remain there. The Interests of the gentlemen who serve “the cause” on “the floor of the British House of Commons,” are too' sacrosanct to tho embarrassed by the awkward claims of men who have served their purpose, and whose sufferings are now only useful in a peroration. To -'note again from tho righteously indignant Freeman’s Journal, “the attempt to set the claims of the evicted tenants against the public interest .... .receives its quietus from the hands of tho Bishop of Raphoe.” We do not profess to know wliat ■tlio rank and filo of the Nationalist' Party will think of Mr. Redmond’s attitude to the evicted tenants, or of his excuso for that attitude. To us they seem to make a demand upon its credulity which can hardly bo honored by the least intelligent partymail in Ireland. We cannot help thinking that Mr. Redmond—no doubt he has some excuses for it—underrates his party’s capacity for thought!, and that he is pushing to perilous extremes tho policy of making Mr. O’Brien a scapegoat for his own sins of commission and omission. We have no very high ideas of Mr. O’Brien’s qualities as a statesman, hut we believe him to be an honest Nationalist, sincerely anxious for the peaceful settlement of outstanding public questions, and ready to make many sacrifices in Svhat he has just as good a right as Mr. Redmond to call the “National cause.” It must surely occur to many thoughtful Nationalists that the party which not only can find no room for this man, but pursues him with a mean and relentless hostility, is not animated by tho pure and patriotic motives of which it claims a monopoly. Intelligent Nationalists must have noticed tho refusal, of the entire National Party and of its official Press to comment upon Mr. O’Brien’s generous offer on behalf of higher tsdus cation in Munster, and must have drawn their own conclusions. It is, in fact, obvious enough that at tho present moment Mr. Redipom! apd Mr. Dillon are playing for their own hand, and that they are far more concerned to gain a selfish personal victory over -Mr. O’Brien—whom tboy suspect of undue influence with the present Executive—than to serve anything that can be called, by any stretch of imagination, the “National cause.” The pi'espnf situation provides both an illuminating commentary on the prospect of Irish government under Home Rule, and an encouragement to Irish Unionists to cooperate heartily in the defence of a cause which Is hampered by no dissensions and subordinated to no personal ambitions.