art with the executive power, all checks and "safeguards" are
futile. Mr. Redmond[43] eagerly "accepts every one of them," and will
accept others if desired; for he knows that they must prove ineffective.
"If," said Lord Derby in 1887, "Ireland and England are not to be one,
Ireland must be treated like Canada or Australia. All between is
delusion or fraud."

IRISH REPRESENTATION AT WESTMINSTER.

The hybrid form of government proposed in the Home Rule Bills of 1886
and 1893 gave rise to a further difficulty, and one which went far
towards wrecking them both. Should Ireland under Home Rule be
represented at Westminster by its members and representative peers?
Under a system of Gladstonian Home Rule there appear to be only three
possible answers to this question. The Irish representatives may be
excluded altogether, they may be retained altogether, or they may be
retained in diminished numbers and with some limitation on their voting
powers.

The total exclusion clause in the Bill of 1886 was one of the most
unpopular parts of an unpopular Bill. It was immediately urged that this
arrangement was virtually equivalent to separation, and Mr. Gladstone
admitted[44] that the argument had force. Since 1886 public sentiment
has advanced in the direction of a closer Imperial unity, and it is
unlikely that the country will recur in 1912 to a proposal which in 1886
was admitted to be intolerable. Moreover, if the British Parliament is
to retain control of the whole foreign policy of the kingdom, and--what
is likely to be of enormous importance in the future--of its whole
fiscal policy, it would be manifestly unjust to deny to Ireland a voice
and vote in such matters. How would it be possible, for instance, to
discuss the effect upon agriculture of a Tariff Reform Budget in the
absence of competent representatives of the Irish farmers, or to
consider the yearly grant to be made (as it is said) in aid of Irish
finance without the assistance of any representatives of Ireland?

A recognition of the difficulties in the way of total exclusion led Mr.
Gladstone to propose, in 1893, what was known as the "popping-in-and-out
clause," under which Irish members would have sat at Westminster, but
would have voted only on Imperial measures. The best criticism of this
attempt to distinguish between local and Imperial matters was supplied
on another occasion by Mr. Gladstone himself:--

"I have thought much, reasoned much, and inquire