The thing is of no public interest or importance whatever.  What we want to know is where the power lies.  Who is going to exercise supremacy?  Who is going to be the de facto ruler of Ireland?”

Special importance attaches to these considerations owing to the heavy liabilities undertaken by this country in respect of land purchase in Ireland.  At the present time many millions of British money are sunk in Irish land, and the amount may increase to a sum approaching two hundred millions.  The tenants now pay their annuities because, in the last resort, the Government can turn them out.  Under Home Rule the powers of Government would rest with men who have led “no rent” agitations in the past, and who would be dependent upon the votes of those personally interested in repudiating the debt.  The British Treasury can hardly run such a risk; and some sort of concurrent control, with all its evils and risks, seems to be necessary.  And yet financial independence is the first essential to genuine autonomy.

But, it may be said, if the Irish Government go beyond the law, the Irish Courts may be asked to interfere; and in the event of their refusal, the Bill provides an appeal to the Judicial Committee in London.  No doubt it does, but in practice the person aggrieved might have very great difficulty in making the remedy effective.  He must obtain a decision in his favour from the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, at no small cost of money and personal odium; and the decision of that “alien” tribunal (as it would be called) must then be enforced under the jurisdiction of a Government which (on the hypothesis which we are considering) would be unfriendly, by judges and executive officers appointed and perhaps removable by that authority, and in the midst of a population hostile to “foreign” interference.  Is it extravagant to suppose that the complainant would not gain much by his appeal to Caesar?

And even if we suppose the Irish Legislature and Executive to confine themselves within the letter of the Act, are the checks of any real value?  The Irish Parliament might still interfere with contracts, or might validate contracts now held to be void as contrary to public policy.  They might defeat the Mortmain Acts.  They might deal as they thought fit with internal trade; and the great industries of Belfast and its neighbourhood might find their views on trade questions of no avail.  The Irish Legislature might create new offences and institute new tribunals; and the reference in the Bill to “due process of law” would not necessarily secure trial by jury or by an impartial tribunal.[38]

It is said that legislation of this character would be subject to the veto of the Crown.  But that veto is to be exercised on the advice of the Irish Ministry subject to any instructions given by the Sovereign; and so long as an Irish Legislature is entitled to withhold Irish supply, a veto against the advice of the Irish ministry would surely tend to become impossible.