t was that in 1782, in order to save Imperial unity,
we altogether relaxed the local tie and made Ireland legislatively
independent. The Empire was thus saved, but difficulties naturally arose
between two independent legislatures. The true remedy would have been to
have imposed on Grattan's Parliament the conditions imposed by the Irish
Government Bill on the statutory Parliament created by that Bill; the
course actually taken was that, instead of leaving the Irish with their
local government, and arranging for the due supremacy of England, the
Irish Legislature was destroyed under the guise of Union, and Irish
representatives were transferred to an assembly in which they had little
weight, and in which they found no sympathy. The result was that from
the date of the Union to the present day Ireland has been constantly
working for the reinstatement of its National Legislature, and has been
governed by a continuous system of extraordinary legislature called
coercion; the fact being that between 1800, the date of the Act of
Union, and 1832, the date of the great Reform Act, there were only
eleven years free from coercion, while in the fifty-three years since
that period there have been only two years entirely free from special
repressive legislation. So much, therefore, is clear, that Irish
discontent at not being allowed to manage their own affairs has
gradually increased instead of diminishing. The conclusion then would
seem irresistible, that if coercion has failed, the only practical mode
of governing Ireland satisfactorily is to give the people power to
manage their local affairs. Coming, then, to the principle of the Bill,
the first step is to reconcile local government with Imperial supremacy,
in other words, to divide Imperial from local powers; for if this
division be accurately made, and the former class of powers be reserved
to the British Crown and British Parliament, while the latter only are
intrusted to the Irish Parliament, it becomes a contradiction in terms
to say that Imperial unity is dissolved by reserving to the Imperial
authority all its powers, or that Home Rule is a sundering of the
Imperial tie when that tie is preserved inviolable. Imperial powers,
then, are the prerogatives of the Crown with respect to peace and war,
and making treaties with foreign nations; in short, the power of
regulating the relations of the Empire towards foreign nations. These
are the _jura summi imperii_, the very insignia