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London; that these offices should have the sole and separate transaction of all Irish home business; and briefly that whereas we have at present a Secretary of the Home Department for England and Scotland, we should henceforth have a similar but distinct and co-ordinate Secretary of the Home Department for Ireland also.
Nothing can be simpler,—I would rather venture to say, more elementary,—than this proposal. It lies upon the very surface of the whole question, and must be the first to suggest itself to any one either unwilling to bestow much thought upon it, or anxious to escape trouble. It is in point of fact a mere extinction of the Irish Executive, and a proportionate inflation of the Irish office in London. Any one,—a child,—might have conceived it,—the least possible adjustment will suffice to accomplish it. But is it the most judicious, and the most useful mode of effecting the change? This is the important question for Parliament to decide; and I cannot help entertaining a strong persuasion, that in this proposal her Majesty's Government is committing a great and serious and durable error. Let me explain my reasons for so thinking.
The proximate inducement,—the immediate occasion,— of the abolition of the Irish Vice-Royalty and its appendages, is no doubt the marked and decisive revolution which has taken place in the circumstances of its position, political and social. It was justly observed by Lord John Russell, that the
