THE
EDITED BY EOIN MAC NEILL. V o l. 2 .
No. 39
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 4, 1915.
(New Series).
I=------------------...:I NOTES.
What ago ny it must haYe been for some of
. our :National
J .P.'s and others like them to keep their true sentiments suppresscl1 until the
arr iYal of H ome R ule on the S tat ute Book ! M.r. Seu11y demands resolute g0Yem111ent <111d Since las l writing, there is nothing rel!larktlie imprisonment of educateJ Irishmen who ablc Lu report from the theatre of the war in ca nnot see the grandeur of -sitting with folded Irela nd. There is stil l increased activity in the a rms expres ing acts of hope in the British organising of Volunteers, a crime which, when · Democracy. lt would still further relieve Mr. folly admitted and gloried in, is punishable by Birrell of responsibility if he wou ld made a a seat in the Cabinet, and by the handsome R esponsible Military Authority of th .is stalwart sa la ry and position of chief legal adviser to the supporter of Mr. Redmond, and thus give full Crown, but which, in the event of no evidence scope to the splendid ]JOlicy of sen ding to ja il ueing produced, entails only the minor penalty every educated man who refused to accept ·t11e of three or four months imi:>risonment. The new doc.trine of " trust the Briti h Go1·ernment Irish Volunteer I ri soners are still held in prison and k t them keep your powder dry. " by those sterling advocates of Irish liberty, :Mr . * * * Asquith, Mr. Birrell, and Lord Wimbqrne. Notwithstanding his zeal for resolute government and the imprisonment of educated Irish* * * . We have not yet learned the coutenh of the men, Mr. Scully had an eye to the way things I rish l'arty's resolution on the subject of the ,are shaping in Ireland, and agreed with the Government's " senseless prosecution " of Iri sh protest which ~1is Board adop_ted by a majority Volunteers. The resolution was nut add ressed of twu to une, against the pro;ccutiun aml lo the public, for it has never been p ublish d. imprisonmeut · of educated men now in jail. The Irish P arty must not be acc~1se<l of When Lhe day of reckoning comes, Mr. Scully adJ ressing its pronouncements to the winds. will lJc able to prove that he did tbe rigbl thiug.
Their resolution dealt with the misconduct of the Government. It must .therefore have been comm unicated to the Government. What has the Government replied to this demarche ? Has it replied at all ? Many people are saying that there_might as .well be po Irish Party these ' days. I s that the Government's idea? Does the Government . ignore . the Irish Party and treat their resolutions as scraps of paper? Or has there been a private reply to the p rivate resol u tiou ?
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Frum the "action " taken by the . Party in private, let us pass to the declarations · made on behalf of the Party in public. We read in the newspapers that Mr. Scully, one of our N a tion~l J.P. 's · and- Cha·irm an of the South Dublin- Poor Law· Guardians, complains that, in dealing _wit!{ the Irish Volunteers, "the CuYernment have been weak all through the wl1ole thing." They might have exµec ted better from a Government who e legal action is aclvise·d by the H ead Centre <:rf Volunteering,, Sir · Edward Carson. Mr. Scully says that "there are among them (the Irish Volunteers) some ~ducated men, and I would send .these men· to ··jail;" Now we see where the new N ation,alist policy of the new Nation is leading.
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The ·ame protest was adopted, with three disse ntients, by the North Dubl in Board of Guardians. One of the noble-hearted three was Mr. H enshaw, J. P., who sa id that "the Government's hands were full enough providing this country with food, and they should not ue interfered with." ~s s ure dly Mr. Asquith, Mr. Birrell, Sir Matthew Na than, General F riend, Chief Intelligence Officer Major Price, ·and Lord Wirnbornc an; grossly maligned 111e11 . There they arc ruuni1ig about with their baucls full of the loaves and fishes , feed ing poor Ireland, if Denis M'Cullougb, H erbert Pim, Sean MacDermott, Ernest Blythe, and Liam Mellows w~uid: let .them ~lo~;e. . if the . .only . people once get it into their - heads that -the. . British G~v~rn~1c.nt. is responsible ~~/ doin·~ auything· about Irebnd's food supfJly except. app.ropria~ing a~ mud~ · of it as they can ~~c~rc. with the . help . o~· connivance of their Irish friends, Mr, H enshaw will stand in -danger o{ pr~s~c?ti~n .. under :the.H ome ~1:1le ~ct ~n~v,; in ope~ation for . ~reati?g disaffe~ti?n · among_ His Majesty's subjects. The suggestion· is little short of .treason . . · *· * Mr. Nugent, M. P., who took the !en cl 111 urging and inviting the Government lo go to
Price One Penny.
extremes against the Irish Volunteers, actually supported the vote of protest passed by the ~o r th Dublin Guan:lians. Mr. ~ ugent, like Mr. Scully, is reading the signs of the times and · t ryi ug to face both 1r;ys. More artful tha11 Mr. Scully, be pul an " if " in tu his demands that the Irish Volunteers" should ue p unished." Mr. Nugent also qualified his vote b)' associating his victims with " a class of men who deemed it the acme of patriotism to attack the men who had brought more reforms to Ireland within the past thirty years than was secured for a hundred years previously.'' This game of . making the National issue a i)ersonal one is rather played out. If _the p reserit policy, the new po licy, with which Mr. Nugent is assuciatecl, could be uefended on its own merits, there would be no need to appeal to the reforms of the past thirty years, with which Mr. Nugent was not associated as a helper. It would be well for Mr. N ugent if he was able to show that the reforms of _the past thirt y years, ·or a single une uf them, had been secured by the sort of policy which he is now supporting, or that such· a policy had ever at any time brought I reland auy res ul t but disappointment and disas ter. The reform s of the i)ast thirty years were secured by men who stood firm against British Government policy and suffered prosecution and imprisonment, like the Irish Vol unteer organisers, not by men who lived upon Government doles and asked other men to live upon hopes for British gratitude.
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Mi-. R eJmonJ has gone to Waterford, ma:de another speecb, ·a nd secured another vote uf cuufiJeuce from the indumitable Ba!1d of H upe . Whoever reads the " Freeman's Journal " will nu doubt have learned that Mr. Redmond's Waterford _speech, like all his recent speeches and letters, was a " statesmanlike pronouncement. " · ." Statesmanlike_"··may be explained to mean lil.e a ·man in a ·i tate. The London "Times /' whicl1 reporteLl ·Mr. Redi1r~mF~ pro1~uunc~nH:?11ts \VU~J fo r word !~st _yeaT \\'hrJe he '''as gradually unfolding his _new Impei-falist policy,· bas now no further use for :M~. Redmond, and did ·not spend ·even _sixpence on a tel~gram abou_t_ the . W_a tet~ord mee_ting' · .And that latest vote of confidence ! It amuses t hose \vho :Know· tlie ~exact amqunt of ccmfidence th at fills the inward bosoms of the Waterford contingent of the Band of H ope:
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H ope on, but <lon·t ask why.
Di s~ppoinl -