The Premier here
uses the far-famed sentiment, almost the very words, of Secretary
Drummond, that property has its duties as well as its rights; but a
sentiment, however just, is but an empty form of words, unless it
receives a practical application at the proper time. The threadbare and
almost insulting platitudes--insulting from the very frequency of their
use--about developing resources and improving the social condition of
the people, were strangely out of place at a moment when coroner's
juries, in various parts of Ireland, were beginning to return verdicts
of "Death from starvation." Lord John, now that he was Minister, talked
of difficulties in legislating for Ireland, especially with regard to
the reclamation of land; when he was only an expectant of office, his
expressed sentiments were quite different. In his speech on the Coercion
Bill, two or three months before, he said:--"There is another source of
benefit, namely, the cultivation of the waste lands. On that subject I
do not see the difficulties which beset the propositions in the regard
of the Poor-laws." Now it is the very reverse. He sees difficulties in
reclaiming the waste lands of Ireland, but finds none in putting into
operation the most objectionable part of the Poor-Law system--- outdoor
relief; for, his Labour-rate Act was, substantially, a gigantic system
of outdoor relief.
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