Part 7 (2/2)
And to make the exact meaning of the phrase ”National Independence of Ireland” quite clear, he soon afterwards stated that their object was the same as that aimed at by Emmett and Wolfe Tone--in other words, to place Ireland in the scale of nations with a const.i.tution resembling that of the United States.
By March 1908 (that is, about two years after the present Government came into power), to quote the words of Mr. Justice Wright, ”the only law feared and obeyed was the law not of the land but of the United Irish League”; and before the end of that year Mr. Redmond was able to report to his friends in America:--
”We have in Ireland an organization which is practically a government of the country. There is in O'Connell Street, Dublin, a great office managed by the real Chief Secretary for Ireland, J. Devlin, the Member for Belfast.”
The organization of the League is admirable. The country is covered with a network of branches, to which people in the district are obliged to contribute under penalty of being boycotted; these branches are united under provincial executives, whilst the Directory in Dublin controls the whole. The union between the League and the Roman Catholic Church is as complete as the union between that Church and some societies started on a non-sectarian basis became during the rebellion of 1798; as we have seen, a bishop is one of the trustees, and other bishops are amongst the subscribers; the Sunday meetings of the various branches, at which boycotting and other measures of the kind are arranged, are usually presided over by the parish priests. On the other hand, few laymen, whatever their religion may be, who have any stake in the country, can be got to join the League; in the words of A.J. Kettle, M.P.:--
”On its roll of members.h.i.+p there are no landlords or ex-landlords, few merchants, fewer Irish manufacturers. There are few of the men who are managing the business of Ireland in city or town, connected with the League. The bankers who regulate our finances, the railway or transit men who control our trade, internal and external, even the leading cattle men who handle most of our animal produce, are not to be found in its ranks.”
In further evidence of this it may be noted that in spite of all the efforts of the League at collecting money, the subscriptions to the Irish Parliamentary Fund do not amount to a halfpenny per head of the population; as J. Dillon has remarked: ”The National cause in Ireland could not live for six months if it were deprived of the support of the Irish across the Atlantic.”
Closely allied with the League is the Ancient Order of Hibernians, a secret political and exclusively Roman Catholic a.s.sociation, of which J. Devlin, M.P. (the Secretary of the League), is President. It is also called the Board of Erin, to distinguish it from the American branch. The American branch, I may remark, is also known as the Molly Maguires, as it was under that name that it conducted the series of murders and outrages at the Pennsylvanian mines thirty years ago.
Hence the Irish branch is sometimes nicknamed the ”Molly Maguires.”
The Order is very religious, in the sense that part of its programme is to deprive heretics of every means of earning their livelihood; as a Nationalist who did not sympathize with the operations of the Order expressed it: ”If Protestants are to be robbed of their business, if they are to be deprived of public contracts, and shut out of every office and emolument,--what is that but extermination?” The political principles of the Order can be gathered from the Address presented by them to Captain Condon on the occasion of his visit to Dublin in 1909.
Captain Condon, I may explain, had been a prominent Fenian and member of the Irish Republican brotherhood, and had taken part in the riot at Manchester in 1867 which resulted in the murder of Sergeant Brett; he now resides in America. In 1909 he visited Ireland on the invitation of J. Redmond; and the address presented to him by the Ancient Order of Hibernians contained the following words:--
”In you, O'Meagher Condon, we recognize one of those connecting links with the past which all nations cherish, and you are ready to-day with voice and pen to give your unflagging support to Ireland's leaders with as much enthusiasm as you grasped the sword to lead Ireland in the dark but historic '67. We are sure it will interest you to know that the ranks of the Hibernians to-day are composed of the men and children of those who swore allegiance to the Irish Republic with you.”
The Order has lately acquired additional strength by becoming an ”Approved Society” under the Insurance Act of 1911. In Ireland it is no more possible for life insurance than for anything else to exist without being dragged into the vortex of religious and political quarrels.
The ”Clan-na-gael”--that is, the Dynamite Club--still flourishes in America; but for obvious reasons it does not make any public appearance in Ireland; and the exact part which it takes in the movement at the present time, it is impossible to say.
”Sinn Fein” (which means ”Ourselves”) is another Separatist a.s.sociation, aiming at the establishment of Ireland as a Sovereign State, and teaching that the election of Irishmen to serve in the British Parliament is treason to the Irish State. As its name implies, it desires to make use of the revival of the Irish language as a means towards the end for which it is working. It was founded in 1905.
Why this Society and the United Irish League, whose objects seem identical, should be ready to fly at one another's throats, is one of the things that those who are outside the Nationalist circle cannot understand. But the Clerical leaders, who do their utmost to further the operations of the League, look askance at Sinn Fein; its ultimate success therefore is very doubtful.
Then, working in conjunction with these societies is the ”Gaelic League,” founded for the ”de-Anglicizing” of Ireland, as helping towards separation. As J. Sweetman (who, besides being a prominent member of the Gaelic League, is also Vice-President of Sinn Fein and Vice-Chairman of the Central Council of Irish County Councils and may therefore be regarded as speaking with authority) has expressed it:--
”Out of the Gaelic League's de-Anglicizing propaganda have already grown a series of movements not only strongly political but each and all making for a separate independent Irish nation, freed from every link of the British connection.”
Were it not for its political object, the folly of this ”revival of the Irish language” would be past belief. The language of Shakespeare and Milton, of Gibbon and Macaulay, ought surely to be good enough for ordinary people; and it must be obvious to every reasoning being that at the present moment of the world's history, English is one of the most useful languages in existence. It is spoken by 40,000,000 of people in Europe and twice that number in America, not to mention Australasia and South Africa. It is the language of commerce, of science, and of a vast amount of literature. Europeans of various nationalities learn it, for the sake of its convenience; although, as we all know, one of the difficulties of modern life is that boys and girls have too much to study; educationalists everywhere complain that the curriculum is overloaded. Its position in Ireland can be seen exactly by the census returns; for the papers contain a ”language column,” each person being required to state whether he speaks English or Irish or both. According to the returns of 1891, the total population was in round numbers 4,725,000; of whom 4,037,000 spoke English only, 643,000 both languages, and 44,000 Irish only. And that trifling minority existed only in certain localities, and was confined to the less educated cla.s.ses. The only counties in which a majority of the population spoke Irish (including those who spoke both languages) were Mayo and Galway. Yet now it is solemnly said that Ireland, being an independent nation, must have a language of its own; even in counties where no language but English has been spoken for centuries, and where probably none of the ancestors of the present population ever spoke any other language, Irish is being taught in the Roman Catholic primary schools, and the unhappy children who might be studying arithmetic or elementary geography, are wasting their time over a totally useless language. I say ”totally useless” deliberately; for the arguments usually brought forward in favour of the study, apart from the political one--that Irish is of use in the study of philology, and that the MSS. of centuries ago contain fine specimens of poetry--are too absurd to be worth discussing. The real object of the Nationalists in ”encouraging the revival of the Irish language”
is clearly set out in the following words of T. MacSeamus in a recent number of the _Irish Review_:--
”Most important of all, the Irish language is one of the things that distinguish us from England. It is a mark of that separateness which it is the business of every Nationalist to maintain and emphasise on every possible occasion. It is one of the signs--perhaps the chief sign--of nationality.... The Irish language is a weapon in our fight against England, and we cannot afford to throw away even the smallest weapon that may serve us in that struggle.”
And the policy of the League as regards the primary schools is made quite clear by the resolution pa.s.sed unanimously at their annual meeting in 1912:--
”That we re-affirm the demand of the last Ard Fheis in regard to the position of Irish in the primary schools, viz., that Irish be the sole medium of instruction in the Irish-speaking districts; that it be the medium as far as possible in all other schools, and that it be a compulsory subject in every school throughout the country where parents are not opposed to it; furthermore, that a knowledge of Irish be required from all teachers entering for training as teachers, and that no certificate be issued to those who fail to qualify in Irish at the final examination, and that none but inspectors having a knowledge of Irish be employed to inspect schools where Irish is taught.”
It will be seen therefore that if the League carry their point (as no doubt they will under a Home Rule Government) no graduate of the Belfast University who wishes to become a teacher in a Belfast school will be allowed to do so unless he pa.s.ses an examination in a language which not one of his pupils will ever wish to learn; and this, not for the purpose of ensuring general culture, but to further a political object with which he has no sympathy.
The League leave no stone unturned in their efforts to subst.i.tute the Irish for the English language. For instance, it is usually considered in other countries that the names of the streets of a town are put up in order to help people who want to find their way, and not for political reasons. But in Dublin, where not one per cent. of the people can read Irish, the names have recently all been painted up in that language, in the hope of de-Anglicizing the rising generation. An incident occurred recently which will show how the movement is being taken up. There is in Dublin an excellent regulation that children may not become ”street traders” without a licence. A bright little boy came to apply for one. The magistrate, being a kindly man, enquired of the lad what his circ.u.mstances were. The boy explained that part of his earnings went towards the support of his widowed mother; and that he was trying to keep up his education by attending a night school.
”And what are you learning there?” said the magistrate. ”Irish,”
replied the boy. Even the magistrate could not resist telling him that he thought his time would be better spent at Arithmetic. Yet from the boy's point of view, there is something to be said. Irish may be of use to him in obtaining a Government appointment, however small; for local bodies (such as the Dublin Boards of Guardians) now refuse to appoint clerks who cannot send out notices of meetings in Irish, though no member of the Board to whom they are sent can read them; and the League fully expect that the Home Rule Government will do the same with regard to every appointment in their gift. If the railways are taken over by the Government (as they probably will be) it can be seen what an immense impetus can be given to the movement.
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