Handbook of Home Rule | Page 4

life.
The chief peculiarity of the Irish Administration is its extreme centralization. In this two departments may be mentioned as typical of the whole--the police and administration of local justice.
The police in Dublin and throughout Ireland are under the control of the Lord-Lieutenant, and both these forces are admirable of their kind. They are almost wholly maintained by Imperial funds. The Dublin force costs about ￡150,000 a year. The Royal Irish Constabulary costs over a million in quiet, and a million and a half in disturbed times. Local authorities have nothing to do with their action or management. Local justice is administered by unpaid magistrates as in England, but they have been assisted, and gradually are being supplanted, by magistrates appointed by the Lord-Lieutenant and paid by the State.
This state of things arose many years ago from the want of confidence between resident landlords and the bulk of the people. When agrarian or religious differences disturbed a locality the people distrusted the local magistrates, and by degrees the system of stipendiary, or, as they are called, resident magistrates, spread over the country. To maintain the judicial independence and impartiality of these magistrates is of the highest importance. At one time this was in some danger, for the resident magistrates not only heard cases at petty sessions, but, as executive peace officers, to a very great extent took the control of the police in their district, not only at riots, but in following up and discovering offenders. Their position as judicial and executive officers was thus very unfortunately mixed up. Between 1882 and 1883 the Irish Government did their utmost to separate and distinguish between these two functions, and it is to be hoped that the same policy has been and will be now continued, otherwise grave mischief in the administration of justice will arise. The existence of this staff of stipendiary magistrates could not fail to weaken the influence of the gentry in local affairs, and, at the same time, other causes were at work to undermine still further their power. The spread of education, the ballot, the extension of the franchise, communication with America, all tended to strengthen the political leaning of the tenants towards the National party in Ireland, and to widen the political differences between the richer and poorer classes in the country. The result of this has been, that not only have even the best landlords gradually lost their power in Parliamentary elections and on elective boards, but the Government, which greatly relied on them for support, has become isolated.
The system of centralization is felt all over the country. It was the cause of weakness in the disturbed years of 1880 and 1881, and, although the Irish Executive strengthened themselves by placing officers over several counties, on whom they devolved a great deal of responsibility, they did not by these steps meet the real difficulty, which was that everything that went wrong, whether as to police or magisterial decisions, was attributed to the management of the Castle.
In this country, local authorities and benches of magistrates, quite independent of the Home Office, are held responsible for mistakes in police action or irregularities in local justice. The consequence is that there is a strong buffer to protect the character and power of the Home Office.
The absence of such protection in Ireland obviously has a very prejudicial effect on the permanent influence and popularity of the Irish Government. But as long as our system of government from England exists, this centralization cannot be avoided, for it would not be possible to transfer the responsibility of the police to local representative bodies, as they are too much opposed to the landlords and the Government to be trusted when strong party differences arise; nor, for the same reason, would it be possible to fall back on local men to administer justice. The fact is, that, out of the Protestant part of Ulster, the Irish Government receives the cordial support of only the landed proprietors, and a part of the upper middle classes in the towns. The feeling of the mass of the people has been so long against them that no change in the direction of trust in any centralized government of anti-national character can be expected.
It would be difficult, perhaps impossible, to find any Municipal Council, Boards of Guardians, or Local Boards, in Leinster, Munster, or Connaught, whose members do not consist of a majority of Nationalists. At nearly all such assemblies, whenever any important political movement takes place in the country, or when the Irish Government take any action which is displeasing to the Nationalists, resolutions are discussed and carried in a spirit of sharp hostility to the Government.
In Parliamentary elections we also find clear evidence of the strength of the Nationalists, and the extreme weakness of their opponents. This