expectancy which, while that decision was
uncertain, Englishmen were forced to maintain. We had not long to wait.
Early in December it was known that five-sixths of the members returned
from Ireland were Nationalists, and that the majorities which had
returned them were crushing. If ever a people spoke its will, the Irish
people spoke theirs at the election of 1885. The last link in the chain
of conviction, which events had been forging since 1880, was now
supplied. In passing the Franchise Bill of 1884, we had asked Ireland to
declare her mind. She had now answered. If the question was not a
mockery, and representative government a sham, we were bound to accept
the answer, subject only, but subject always, to the interests of the
whole United Kingdom. In other words, we were bound to devise such a
scheme of self-government for Ireland as would give full satisfaction to
her wishes, while maintaining the ultimate supremacy of the Imperial
Parliament and the unity of the British Empire.

Very few words are needed to summarize the outline which, omitting many
details which would have illustrated and confirmed its truth, I have
attempted to present of the progress of opinion among Liberal members of
the Parliament of 1880.

1. Our experience of the Coercion Bills of 1881 and 1882 disclosed the
enormous mischief which such measures do in alienating the minds of
Irishmen, and the difficulty of enlisting Irish sentiment on behalf of
the law. The results of the Act of 1881 taught us that the repression of
open agitation means the growth of far more dangerous conspiracy; those
of the Act of 1882 proved that even under an administration like Lord
Spencer's repression works no change for the better in the habits and
ideas of the people.

2. The conduct of the House of Lords in 1880 and 1881, and the malign
influence which its existence exerted whenever remedial legislation for
Ireland came in question, convinced us that full and complete justice
will never be done to Ireland by the British Parliament while the Upper
House (as at present constituted) remains a part of that Parliament.

3. The break-down of the procedure of the House of Commons, and the
failure of the efforts to amend it, proved that Parliament cannot work
so long as a considerable section of its members seek to impede its
working. To enable it to do its duty by England and Scotland, it was
evidently necessary, either to make the Irish members as loyal to
Parlia