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MR. SPEAKER: Order, order! must ask the hon. Gentleman not to interrupt so constantly, or else I shall have to take further notice of his conduct.

what was the official information that we | knocked off, the men kicked, stoned, had received from Mitchelstown, and it and beaten with the sticks which were was stated that we had not got the offi- in the possession of the crowd. All the cial report of the circumstances, but that facts of the case will be necessarily the moment we received it we would more fully in our possession on Monday submit it to the House; and now we than at present, and I have no doubt that are told that the necessarily imperfect all the circumstances will be very fully distelegraphic summary which was read cussed, and on the Motion which we are by the Chief Secretary to the House was told will be made by the right hou. Memnot worth hearing, because it comes ber for Derby (Sir William Harcourt) a from a tainted source. Why did they very considerable debate will take place. ask us to get official information at all? I will, therefore, suggest that this disMay I ask why it should come from a cussion, which has now gone on for tainted source? Why are we told it a considerable time, may now with comes from an incriminated quarter? advantage be allowed to close. No Are the police any more on their trial in doubt many hon. Gentlemen would like this matter than anybody else? [Inter- to be heard on the question, because ruption from a Home Rule Member.] The they feel a great interest in the matter, conduct of the police in this case-[Re- and may think they will not have annewed Interruptionother opportunity of speaking. What I good will be obtained by discussing the question on imperfect information? The arguments have been well placed on the one side by the hon. Member for West Belfast, and the police have been adeMR. GIBSON: The conduct of the quately denounced. On the other side police has been denounced without their of the House we have stated our views having an opportunity of being heard. as clearly and simply as we could withThe only statements which the House out exaggerating the facts on the has heard against them were state- material we have received. Our informents which have been made by hon. mation is from the County Inspector on Members. The Government, however, the spot. There is no doubt that when rely, and I think they are entitled to the discussion takes place all hon. Memrely, and that the facts will show they bers will have a very full opportunity are entitled to rely, on the statement of going through the circumstances of communicated by my right hon. Friend, this occurrence, which has resulted in a which appears to be marked with the loss of life, which every one, no matter stamp of truth. Why is it hon. Mem-in what part of the House he sits, must bers on the reports of newspapers de- most sincerely deplore. nounce the police as Bashi-Bazouks and as being unworthy of the name of Christian men at all? The statements in this morning's newspapers, when they come to be examined carefully, will be found not very different from the statement made by my right hon. Friend. They show that there was a severe and prolonged attack by a very superior and apparently organized force upon a comparatively insignificant body of police. What were the forces brought upon that field? On the one side were 3,000 men, a great number of them armed with blackthorns, and a peasant cavalry who proceeded to break up the order of the police. On the other side were about 50 policemen to whom, in the discharge of their bounden duty, in a few moments resistance was offered. You find them flying for their lives, their helmets

MR. O'KELLY (Roscommon, N.) said, he was sorry to have heard from the Treasury Benches a few moments ago so romantic a defence of what he considered to be a very illegal act. The right hon. and learned Gentleman who had just spoken had given them a very coloured and picturesque account of how these occurrences took place in Mitchelstown. The right hon. and learned Gentleman. rested his justification of the action of the police on the necessity of getting a report of the speeches, but he had not explained to them why it was necessary to take this report in any particular part of the crowd. The right hon. and learned Gentleman failed entirely to understand that this police reporter could have taken his report just as well on the edge of this crowd as he could

in the middle of it-in fact he could police barracks the mass of the people have taken it a great deal better on the were listening to the speeches at some edge than in the middle. Therefore distance from the police barracks. there was in the first place no absolute There was no collection of men of such necessity for the police forcing their way force or of such importance near the into the crowd. Then the right hon. barracks as could by any possibility have and learned Gentleman conveniently placed the lives or even the persons of mixed up the events of the day. So the policemen in danger. They could not far as their information went, and the have been in the slightest danger from information they were now relying on the attacks of the few persons who might was the independent information which have advanced to the barracks. Thereappeard in the Press generally, there fore there was no legal justification in were three stages in these proceedings the action of the police. But all the in Mitchelstown. There was first the Gentlemen who had spoken from the advance of 20 police with the police re- Ministerial Bench had also skimmed porter. Now, anyone who was in the over another most important point, and habit of attending meetings in Ireland that was that from the beginning to the knew it was utterly unnecessary to send end of these proceedings they missed 20 policemen with the Government re- the presence of any commanding officer porter. He had never seen 20, but he whatever. What were these magistrates had often seen three or four who were for? Who were in command of these sent to protect the reporter from being armed policemen? If these men were pushed whilst he was in the middle of left to run loose among the people and the crowd. There was no necessity for use their deadly arms without control sending these 20 policemen, but that they ceased to be soldiers and police, was only the initial stage of the pro- and became brigands. He said the ceedings. When these men came into action of these men was rather the action the crowd they forced their way in and of brigands than the action of peace there was no riot. But these 20 police officers in defence of order. The fact men retired from the field and came that some of the police were injured had back reinforced, and that was the time nothing to do with the question at issue. this fighting arose which so shocked the The question at issue was how this right hon. and learned Gentleman. They trouble arose. The right hon. Gentlehad undoubted testimony that this man the Chief Secretary for Ireland fighting began with the action of the rein- said when the people attacked the police forced body of police attacking the people, the police defended themselves. If men and that was the essential point of the went into a fight they must expect to be whole case. These men made no peace- hurt; but the fact that they had escaped ful effort to report the meeting. They without serious injury was a contradicdid not pretend they could not have tion of the highly-coloured statements reported it without this appeal to of both the Chief Secretary for Ireland violence, which resulted in the collision and the Attorney General for Ireland, between the crowd and police. The because if the crowd had been of the police then retired to the barracks. They nature which it was represented-if had the further effort on the part of the there had been any organized attempt Ministry to create the impression that or intention to hurt or injure the police the people who formed the mass of the it would be impossible for those men meeting pursued the police and attacked them in the barracks. All the information which the Irish Members had received contradicted that statement. There was no such movement of the people on the barracks. The police were allowed to retire into the barracks, and the fact that a few policemen retiring before such a mob were all of them able to get back into the barracks was a proof that they was not pursued by the mob. Therefore they had come to this position -that when the firing began from the

to have got off as they had got off. But the point after all, and the essential point, upon which this discussion turned, was what right had these men to attack the meeting in the beginning? That was the point to which the Government had to address themselves to justify their conduct in Ireland. He warned the Government that if the spirit which was displayed by the Chief Secretary for Ireland and the Attorney General for Ireland spread among the subordinate officials in Ire

land, they would find, and properly find, that they would not be allowed to commit these outrages with impunity. MR. HUNTER (Aberdeen, N.) said, he did not rise to prolong the debate, but to ask a question upon a point which had been left ambiguous by the Attorney General for Ireland. He wished to ask him whether he contended that a police reporter had any right of interference at a meeting different from that of a reporter of a newspaper; and whether, if that were so, the right depended upon Statute or upon Common Law?

MR. GIBSON said, that he did not know whether he was quite in Order in answering the question, or whether the hon. and learned Member was in Order in asking it; but his view of the law was that if the Government had reason to believe that the meeting was a meeting which would be attended with disorder and breach of the peace or illegality, they were bound, if they thought that speeches were to be made at that meeting which might require the notice of the law, to have a reporter present, and that that reporter was entitled to be admitted, and persons who resisted the reporter were guilty of a violation of the law. He would call the attention of the hon. and learned Member to the fact that this meeting was held in the public streets of a town.

MR. HUNTER: Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman give any authority for that opinion?

MR. SPEAKER: Order, order! The hon. and learned Gentleman is not entitled to speak twice.

DR. TANNER (Cork Co., Mid) said, he had once had the curiosity to read a very celebrated pamphlet called Killing no Murder. It was written, he understood, by a celebrated man, Oliver Cromwell, the Protector of Great Britain. It appeared to him that the right hon. and learned Gentleman had adopted the argument of that pamphlet in his defence of law in Ireland. The right hon. and learned Gentleman told them that at the meeting there was great difficulty in getting the police reporter through the crowd, and that it was in consequence of the opposition offered by the people that the police batoned the people, and that it was by these circumstances that the lamentable occurrences were brought

about. The speakers always, or nearly always, spoke from waggonettes. He had again and again listened at meetings, and if he had the necessary stenographie power he could certainly from the bottom of the street have easily reported speeches. He mentioned this to show that there was no necessity for the note-takers to push up through the crowd. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said there was a great number of people there. Well, if there was a great number of people there, they would be incensed by the shorthand reporter pushing into the centre of the crowd. But was it the object that the meeting should pass off peacefully? Distinctly not, because they heard that the first commencement of the attack was in consequence of the police batoning horses. They knew perfectly well that if they batoned horses they would sway in one way or the other. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said they upset the order and ranks of the police. The people probably tried to prevent the horses going on one side, and thus upset the ranks of the police on the other. That was the more natural outcome of the circumstances, and the police should have borne it with good temper. did not appear to be the case. The right hon. and learned Gentleman repeated three times that the people were armed with blackthorns in profusion; but the right hon. and learned Gentleman knew that in Ireland the commonest thing in the world was to go about with a blackthorn. He (Dr. Tanner) come down to the House every afternoon with a blackthorn, although he did not consider that he went about armed with a blackthorn. It was one of the commonest sticks for walking purposes in those districts. The right hon. and learned Gentleman should have known that those peasant cavalry, as he called them, came from the counties of Limerick and Tipperary. Why should they not travel such a long distance by horses when they had them? The right hon. and learned Gentleman's meaning was that they came there to attack the armed forces of the Crown, but he (Dr. Tanner) said that was not the case. He should like to know whether in this instance the police note-taker had applied for admission to the waggonette? He had attended numerous meetings, and where such application was made it had always been acceded to. The action

But it

of the police in firing on the people from the upstairs windows was, in the first place, unnecessary; and, secondly, disorderly. They had such proceedings backed up by responsible Ministers in the House. They knew that the outcome of such speeches as had been made by the Chief Secretary for Ireland when such laws existed in Ireland as at present was sure to be violence. After the meeting at Ennis the people of Ireland had been taunted with cowardice by the newspapers of this country. Now the hounds of the law had been sated with bloodshed, and let the huntsman cheer them on in their bloody course.

MR. NOLAN (Louth, N.) said, he desired to read an extract from the accounts of the proceedings which appeared in one of the London papers of that morning, which would remind the House of the real facts of the case after the garbled account that had come from the Treasury Bench.

MR. SPEAKER: I must ask the hon. Gentleman to withdraw the word "garbled."

MR. NOLAN: I think, Mr. Speaker, you are under a misapprehension.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Gentleman charged the Chief Secretary for Ireland with supplying garbled accounts to this House, and I must ask him to withdraw the word "garbled."

MR. NOLAN: I do not apply the term to the right hon. Gentleman, or any Member of the House.

MR. SPEAKER: The expression could have no meaning if the hon. Gentleman did not apply it to any Member of the House.

MR. NOLAN said, he might not have made himself understood. What he intended to convey was that accounts supplied by officials to the Government were garbled. The account which he wished to read stated that the people who assembled in the square were perfectly peaceable and orderly until the police attacked them wantonly and cruelly with their batons, and that had the police not interfered no disorder whatever would have occurred. account, short as it was, would appeal eloquently to hon. Members on the other side of the House, and would convey what he was convinced would turn out to be a truthful account of what occurred. That was written by the hon.

VOL. CCCXXI. [THIRD SERIES.]

Member for the Northwich Division of Cheshire (Mr. Brunner). It was of the utmost importance that statements communicated to this House should be correct and impartial. The language of the Chief Secretary that afternoon would be an incitement to the police, who read their newspapers every day, and who were greatly influenced by the tone of their masters. When, for instance, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian's policy was before Parliament, and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle was Chief Secretary, the attitude of the police towards the people and the leaders of the people became exceedingly mild. The worst enemy of the Chief Secretary for Ireland could not wish to take a word away from, or to add to, his speech. He, however, regretted to find that none of those who had spoken from the Government Benches had expressed any regret at the circumstances that had occurred. There was one thing which ought to go home to the minds of the British people, and make them more keenly sensible of the terrible nature of this deplorable event, and that was that one of the unfortunate men who were killed was not a rioter, but was discharged home from the British Army after, perhaps, serving Her Majesty in various parts of the world, and on his return to Ireland he was shot down by the very men who were paid by the taxpayers of this country for the protection of life and property.

Question put.

The House divided:-Ayes 85; Noes 25: Majority 60.-(Div. List, No. 476.) Bill read a second time, and committed for Monday next.

ADJOURNMENT.

THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. W. H. SMITH) (Strand, Westminster): In fulfilment of the pledge which I gave to the hon. Member for Cavan (Mr. Biggar), I now beg to move that this House do now adjourn.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn.". (Mr. W. H. Smith.)

K

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE-VACANT
GROUNDS (NUISANCES PREVENTION)
BILL.

MR. J. ROWLANDS (Finsbury, E.) inquired what course the Government intended to take with respect to the Vacant Ground (Nuisances Prevention) Bill?

HOUSE

OF

LORDS,

Monday, 12th September, 1887.

MINUTES.]-PUBLIC BILLS-First Reading-
Bankruptcy (Discharge and Closure) * (261);
Expiring Laws Continuance* (263); Local
Government Boundaries* (259); Prison
(Officers' Superannuation) (Scotland) * (264);
Superannuation Acts Amendment* (262);
Technical Schools (Scotland)* (260).
Second Reading-Committee negatived-Merchant
Shipping (Miscellaneous)* (257).

WOMEN'S SUFFRAGE (No. 2) BILL.

PERSONAL COMPLAINT.

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. MATTHEWS) (Birmingham, E.) said, that the measure was really directed against certain transactions in connection with a particular graveyard near the Tottenham Court Road. The Government strongly reprobated the shocking chaLORD DENMAN said, he had to comracter of the use to which the burial plain that a Bill he had introduced for ground of Whitfield's Tabernacle had conferring the franchise on women had been put; but they felt that they could been excluded from the Notice Paper not interfere in the matter proposed in for that day as requested on the 9th inthe Bill without giving compensation to stant, at the instance of the Clerk; and the owners of the ground. The land he thought it was extraordinary that had ceased to be used as a burial ground the Clerk should have opposed the privi for many years. It had been leased, leges of a Peer of 32 years' experience. had reverted to the owner in fee, and When the days for an Address to the had then been sold under an Order of Crown against the abolition of the Chief the Court of Chancery. The parties to Justiceship of the Common Pleas and whom it now belonged desired to make office of Chief Baron of the Exchequer use of the property. The Home Office had expired, he (Lord Denman) wished having interfered to prevent the land to bring it forward again on the 29th from being built upon, the owners had day; but Sir William Rose told the noble resorted to the shocking expedient of Earl (Earl Granville) that he could not permitting fairs to be held on the do so. However, he (Lord Denman) ground. The Government intended to found that there was no precedent enforce any existing law that was appli- against it, so, at the last day, it was recable to the case, and would inquire peated, but adjourned, by Lord Campwhether they could not put a stop to the bell on the Auchterarder case. exhibitions of which the burial ground had also been told by the present was the scene by enforcing the provi- Chief Clerk that he could not bring sions of the Open Spaces Act and the forward a Notice as to the opening Disused Burial Grounds Act, 1884. But of museums on Sunday; but on an should the law fail to meet the case, application to the noble and learned they could not undertake to interfere Lord (Lord Herschell) it was allowed. with the rights of private property unless On the 11th of August last Mr. Woodall compensation were given. He thought withdrew his Women's Suffrage Bill; that the hon. Member would agree with therefore, on the 12th of August, he (Lord him that in these circumstances it would Denman) asked the Chief Clerk to put not be right to press this Bill upon the it on the Paper issued on a Tuesday for attention of the House. the next Tuesday, hoping to ask the House on the Monday if it might remain on the list for the next day, which application was refused, so that three weeks had been lost. The Women's Suffrage (No. 2) Bill was now on the list of Bills in progress; and he wished to know if a Clerk of less experience than Sir William Rose could exclude it?

MR. SEXTON: Will the Committee stage of the Appropriation Bill be taken as the first Order of the Day on Monday?

MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Yes.
Question put, and agreed to.
House adjourned at a quarter after
Eight o'clock till Monday next.

He

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Viscount CROSS) said, it would

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