not accepted by the
Standing Committee without considerable discussion, but in the end the
decision was unanimous, and the resolution adopting it laid it down that
"in taking this course the Standing Committee firmly believes the
interests of Unionists in the three other provinces of Ireland will be
best conserved." In order to emphasise that the course resolved upon
implied no compromise of their opposition to the Bill as a whole, Sir
Edward Carson wrote a letter to the Prime Minister during the Christmas
recess, which was published in the Press, and which made this point
clear; and he pressed it home in the House of Commons on the 1st of
January, 1913, when he moved to exclude "the Province of Ulster" from
the operation of the Bill in a speech of wonderfully persuasive
eloquence which deeply impressed the House, and which was truly
described by Mr. Asquith as "very powerful and moving," and by Mr.
Redmond as "serious and solemn."

Carson's proposal was altogether different from what was subsequently
enacted in 1920. It was consistent with the uninterrupted demand of
Ulster to be let alone, it asked for no special privilege, except the
privilege, which was also claimed as an inalienable right, to remain a
part of the United Kingdom with full representation at Westminster and
nowhere else; it required the creation of no fresh subordinate
constitution raising the difficult question as to the precise area which
its jurisdiction could effectively administer.

Carson's amendment was, of course, rejected by the Government's
invariably docile majority, and on the 16th of January the Home Rule
Bill passed the third reading in the House of Commons, without the
smallest concession having been made to the Ulster opposition, or the
slightest indication as to how the Government intended to meet the
opposition of a different character which was being organised in the
North of Ireland.

When the Bill went to the Upper House at the end of January the whole
subject was threshed out in a series of exceedingly able speeches; but
the impotence of the Second Chamber under the Parliament Act gave an air
of pathetic unreality to the proceedings, which was neatly epitomised by
Lord Londonderry in the sentence: "The position is, that while the House
of Commons can vote but not speak, the Lords can speak but not vote."
Nevertheless, such speeches as those of the Archbishop of York, Earl
Grey, the Duke of Devonshire, and Lord Londonderry, wer