When discussing the question of
Parliamentary Reform, I have often heard it asserted that the people of
Ireland, and I am not speaking of those who are hopeless of good from a
Parliament in London, but that the people of Ireland generally imagine
that the question of Parliamentary Reform has very little importance for
them. Now I undertake to say, and I think I can make it clear to this
meeting, that whatever be the importance of that question to any man in
England or Scotland, if the two islands are to continue under Imperial
Parliamentary Government, it is of more importance to every Irishman.
You know that the Parliament of which I am a Member contains 658
Members, of whom 105 cross the Channel from Ireland, and when they go to
London they meet--supposing all the Members of the House of Commons are
gathered together--553 Members who are returned for Great Britain. Now,
suppose that all your 105 Members were absolutely good and honourable
representatives of the people of Ireland--I will not say Tories, or
Whigs, or Radicals, or Repealers, but anything you like,--let every man
imagine that all these Members were exactly the sort of men he would
wish to go from Ireland,--when the 105 arrive in London they meet with
the 553 who are returned from Great Britain.
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