ess.

Nor can the coming Bill for Ireland make any preparation, technically,
for a general Federation. Morally, as I shall show, it might have an
important effect in stimulating local sentiment, not only in England,
Scotland, and Wales, but in Ireland, towards a general Federation in the
future, but in its mechanical structure it must be not merely
non-Federal, but anti-Federal. One often hears it carelessly propounded
that Irish Home Rule, so devised as to be applicable in later years, if
they so desire, to Scotland, Wales, and England, will give us by smooth
mechanical means a General Federation. This is a fallacy. At one stage
or another, the earliest or the latest, we should have to create a
totally new central Parliament, still elected by the whole people, but
exclusively devoted to Imperial affairs, and wholly exempt from local
business, before we possessed anything in the nature of a Federation.
But, whatever the future has in store, it would be a scandal if Irish
Home Rule were to be hampered or delayed by the existence of Scotch or
Welsh claims, and it is earnestly to be hoped that no action of that
kind will be taken. The case of Ireland is centuries old, and more
urgent than ever. It differs radically from any case that can possibly
be made for Scotland and Wales.

The Bill, I repeat, must be anti-Federal, centrifugal. In the case of
Ireland we have first to dissolve an unnatural union, and then to revive
an old right to autonomy, before we can reach a healthy Federal Union.
Such, exactly, was the history of Canada. If, in that case, the
dissolution of the Legislative Union and the construction of the Federal
Union were consummated simultaneously in the British North America Act
of 1867, they were nevertheless two distinct phases, and of these two
phases the first, implying the revival of the old separate autonomies,
was the indispensable precursor of Federal Union. This antecedent
recognition of autonomy was not peculiar to Canada. Every Federation in
the world arose in the same way, by the voluntary act of States under
one Crown or suzerainty, but independent of one another, and it is of
the essence of Federalism that this psychological condition should
exist. Compulsory Federation would not last a year. It would indeed be
practicable to federalize the United Kingdom by one Legislative Act, but
the prior right to and fitness for complete Home Rule on the part of
each of the component parts would have to be