United States or Kiribati ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Redmond that evening put on the notice paper a motion adopting Lord Midleton's proposals provided that they "be adopted by His Majesty's Government as a settlement of the Irish question and legislative effect be given to them forthwith."
Cobb that "she for one wouldn't lay it down like Medes and Persians, that we should have nothing to do with a woman because her husband had made a fool of himself. I'm not a Mede nor a Persian, Mrs. Cobb. I say let us wait and see what she is like." Mrs. Bingham was of the same mind. She dwelt much to herself on the fact that Mrs. Midleton's great-grandfather must have been a lord.
The combination of Ulstermen and extreme Nationalists was thirty-four strong; those who adopted Redmond's policy and Lord Midleton's were thirty-eight. We had in our lobby sixteen of the Nationalist County and Urban Councillors; they had eleven. If that vote had gone otherwise, we were told plainly that the Southern Unionists would be no parties to the rest of the compromise.
But for the first time an influential body of Irish Unionists had agreed, not as individuals but as representatives, to accept Home Rule, in a wider measure than had been proffered by the Bills of 1886 and 1893 or by the Act of 1914. Limitations which were imposed in all these had been struck out by Lord Midleton's proposals.
Murphy, at once gave signs of his hostility by putting on the paper an amendment to Lord Midleton's resolution which amounted to a direct negative. The reassembly of the Convention was fixed for Wednesday, January 2nd. Redmond came to Dublin on the Monday.
He enlarges it out of his own head, and instructs his silly, ignorant friends to do the same. He will not be satisfied with what God and the Church tell him." "God and the Church, according to Dr. Midleton's account, have not been very effective in Langborough." "They hear from me, madam, all I am commissioned to say, and if they do not attend I cannot help it"
The Executive Committee was then entirely reconstituted, by the rejection of every one of Lord Midleton's supporters; and the new body issued a statement explaining the grounds of dissatisfaction with Lord Midleton's action in the Convention, and declaring that he had "lost the confidence of the general body of Southern Unionists."
The first clause in the Bishop of Raphoe's scheme, establishing a Home Rule constitution for all Ireland, having been carried with Lord Midleton's help against the vote of the nineteen representatives of Ulster, the latter proposed an amendment for the exclusion of the Province, and were, of course, defeated by the combined forces of Nationalism and Southern Unionism.
The debates in full Convention were animated, but somewhat unreal by comparison. Lord Midleton's motion had been dropped, by consent, for a series of resolutions tabled by Lord MacDonnell which were in substance an acceptance of Government's proposal. But neither in the private councils nor in the public debates had we Redmond's presence.
A Southern Unionist Committee was formed which before the end of May was able to publish the names of 350 well-known men in all walks of life who were in accord with the "Call," and to announce that the supporters of their protest against Lord Midleton's proceedings numbered upwards of fourteen thousand, of whom more than two thousand were farmers in the South and West.
Word Of The Day