All powers not specifically reserved will belong to the Irish Legislature, subject to those restrictions, constitutional or statutory, which in matters like Trade and Navigation, Copyright, Patents, etc., bind the whole Empire.

Section 32 of the Bill of 1893, borrowed from the Colonial Laws Validity Act, will no doubt be applied.

2. Minority Safeguards.—­This point, too, I dealt with in Chapter X.[173] Let the Nationalist Members come forward and frankly accept any prohibitory clauses which the fears of the minority may suggest, provided that they do not impair the ordinary legislative power which every efficient Legislature must enjoy.  Almost every conceivable safeguard for the protection of religion, denominational education, and civil rights was inserted in the Bill of 1893, including even some of the “slavery” Amendments to the United States Constitution.  The list may require revision—­(a) in view of the recent establishment of the National University, and the disappearances of all apprehension about the status of Trinity College, Dublin; (b) in regard to an extraordinarily wide Sub-clause (No. 9) about interference with Corporations; (c) in regard to the words, “in accordance with settled principles and precedents,” which appeared in Sub-clause (No. 8) (Legislature to make no law “Whereby any person may be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law[174] in accordance with settled principles and precedents,” etc.).  A debate on this question may be found in Hansard, May 30, 1893.  The words italicized were added in Committee on the motion of Mr. Gerald Balfour, though the Attorney-General declared that they gave no additional strength to the phrase “due process of law,” while they certainly appear calculated to provoke litigation.  Sir Henry James appeared to think that they made the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act ultra vires. If that is their effect, there is no reason why they should be inserted.  Even a Canadian Province, whose powers are more limited than those of the subordinate States in any other Federation, has “exclusive” powers within its own borders over “property and civil rights,"[175] and can, beyond any doubt, suspend the Habeas Corpus Act, if it pleases.

The same superfluous words appeared in Sub-clause (No. 9) about Corporations.

THE IRISH LEGISLATURE.[176]

As I urged in Chapter X., this is a subject in which large powers of constitutional revision—­much larger than those contained in either of the Home Rule Bills—­should be given to the Irish Legislature itself, corresponding to the powers given by statute to the self-governing Colonies, and to the powers always held by the constituent States of a Federation.  In the Bill itself it would be wisest to follow beaten tracks as far as possible, and not to embark on experiments.  Present conditions are, unhappily, very unfavourable for the elaboration of any scheme ideally fit for Ireland.