Page:History of the Radical Party in Parliament.djvu/474

 460 History of tJte Radical Party in Parliament. [1859- absolute silence of 1863. Certainly the list of matters referred to was not of a very exciting character, consisting as it did of the concentration of the courts of justice, the revision of the statute law, patents, poor law relief, and the reform of endowed schools. There was little in this to challenge con- troversy, and the addresses in reply were passed in both Houses without division. The unhappy condition of Ireland, the distress which had caused the wholesale emigration, and the disaffection amount- ing to attempted rebellion which had resulted from it, forced upon the early attention of Parliament the two great questions by which the country was agitated. It was not yet understood in England how unjust and cruel it was to impose a land law on the Irish people which neither accorded with their senti- ments nor recognized their fair proprietary rights. That the Act of 1860 had failed began to be admitted, but why it had failed was not so well known. A demand for inquiry, at least, could not be refused, and after some preliminary discussions and divisions had taken place, Mr. Maguire moved, on the 3 ist of March, for a select committee to inquire into the laws regulating the relations between landlords and tenants in Ireland, with a view to their more equitable adjustment. The resolution was seconded by Mr. W. E. Forster ; but, on Palmerston's suggestion, the scope of the inquiry was narrowed to the result of the Act of 1860, and on that condition the committee was granted. The other Irish question which was once more taking its place in the region of active agita- tion, was that of the maintenance of an alien Church. On this point the Radicals again originated a discussion, which led to the taking by Mr. Gladstone of another step in the rapid progress of Liberalism on which he had entered. On the 28th of March Mr. Dillwyn moved a resolution " That the present position of the Irish Church Establishment is unsatisfactory, and calls for the early attention of her Majesty's Government." In his speech on this motion Mr. Gladstone admitted that the position of the Church was unsatisfactory, but he could not support that part of the