Page:Abolition of the Vice-Royalty of Ireland.djvu/17

13 and of position. He must be co-ordinate in all these with his colleague at the Home Office. He need refer to him upon nothing. He may pursue his own policy upon Irish affairs without any further reference to that of the rest of the internal administration, than is necessarily involved in his belonging to the same Cabinet; or than occurs with respect to the Colonial and Foreign Office. And wherefore this separation? Once shew that it would be in any way possible to arrange so as to entrust the conduct of Irish affairs, like others, to the Home Office, and no reason can be given for the continued, and indeed widened, separation, except that they are Irish; and that because heretofore, in consequence of bygone difficulties, it was found necessary to maintain for their conduct a separate machinery, that severance should be perversely maintained when the causes for it have expired. I cannot but flatter myself that you will agree with me in thinking, that this artificial, and I may say causeless disunion, is of the most pernicious tendency.

But it is so for no reason more, than that so long as the Irish Executive, whether here or in Ireland, is altogether confined to Irish affairs, and its office the sole resort of those interested in Irish business, it will continue to offer,—perhaps in some less degree, but still to offer,—the same attractive focus for interested applications, for unreasonable demands, and for partial representations, which has so often been described by those best