one suppose that
Northerners indignant at recent treachery, and Catholics mindful of
ancient oppression, will not join, and justly join, in denouncing as at
once ignominious and ruinous the payment of a tribute raised for
Imperial purposes at the moment when Ireland ceases to have any voice in
the direction of Imperial policy? Irishmen again will find to their
surprise that the Constitution intended to give them independence
imposes annoying fetters on their freedom of action. They wish for a
protective tariff, and they come across the prohibition to make laws
affecting trade; they desire that the country shall defend herself, and
they discover that they cannot raise even a body of volunteers; they
wish to try the plan of concurrent endowment, and they are thwarted by
the article of the Constitution prohibiting the endowment of religion.
These restrictions are the more annoying because none of them are
imposed upon the Colonies. Irishmen will further discover that great
achievements of constructive legislation require for their success the
command of large pecuniary resources, and that exemption from British
control involves the withdrawal of all assistance from the British
Treasury.

[Sidenote: Constitution will cause friction.]

The Constitution will produce irritation and friction.

Every scheme for uniting into a political whole States which are
intended to retain, even when connected together, a certain amount of
independence, aims at minimising the opportunities for constitutional
collision, or for friction between the different States which are
connected together, and also between any State and the Central power.
If we compare the mode in which this end is attained, either under the
Federal system or under the Colonial system, with the arrangements of
the Gladstonian Constitution, we shall easily see how little its authors
have attended to the necessity for avoiding occasions of constitutional
friction.

Where Federalism, as in America, appears in its best form, the skill
with which opportunities for collision or friction have been minimised
is almost above praise. The Federal or Central power is so constructed
as to represent the whole nation; its authority cannot by any
misrepresentation be identified with the power of one State more than
another. The Federal Government acts through its own officers, is
represented by its own Judiciary, and levies its own taxes without
recourse to State authorities. Every