A History of Ireland.

Volume 2

by Eleanor Hull

1931

XX.—REMEDIAL LEGISLATION

It is not to be supposed that Ireland as a whole had shown itself permanently averse to the Union, or that there was a general desire for fresh changes. The educated classes had, with few exceptions, accepted it as a settlement which they had no wish to see upset. Many of them, both Catholics and Protestants, honestly held that the Union with England was the best solution of the country's difficulties and that, in particular, it kept peace between the North and the South as no other system of government could do. In general, they looked on the malcontents as troublesome agitators. Held quiet by the influence of the priests, the South had refused to rise on the appeal of Smith O'Brien and the Young Irelanders; and when, in 1849, Queen Victoria paid a belated visit to Ireland she received an enthusiastic welcome.

Dublin from about 1830 onward was a pleasant place to live in. The upper classes had been stirred by the patriotic ardour of Davis and his companions, without always attaching themselves to their advanced political views; and Irish history, antiquities, legend and poetry were studied with interest even in strongly unionist circles. Members of the two faiths met in a sympathy born of love of country, which led them to forget differences of religion; and the efforts made to stem the tide of famine suffering drew all parties together. Between 1855-1860, O'Curry was lecturing to delighted audiences on the resources of Irish literature at the new Catholic University, O'Donovan was seeing the Annals of the Four Masters through the press, and, following in the steps of McGee, Davis, and Mangan, Ferguson and others were pouring forth ballads and lectures expressive of the sentiments and longings of the Irish race. Even at an earlier date the Government had been showing its desire to support these peaceable efforts for the good of the country in a variety of ways. In 1824 Griffith's land valuation survey had given for the first time secure ground for estimates as to the actual value of properties and fair rents. In 1826 the Ordnance Survey under Captain Larcom obtained the expert help of John O'Donovan, Petrie, and O'Curry in making a survey of the country on the six-inch scale, accompanied with notes on place-names and traditions of which full use has not yet been made.[1] In 1852 the Ancient Laws and Institutes of Ireland or "Brehon Laws" were published by a special Royal Commission, and grants were made to the Royal Irish Academy for the purchase and preservation of Irish manuscripts and of objects found about the country as treasure-trove.

[1] A large part of O'Donovan's notes have not yet been published; but they are now being issued in sections by rototype process by private enterprize.
Ameliorative measures on a wider scale had been carried through under Peel's administration. The question of education in Ireland, in all its grades, was one urgently demanding attention. The poorer classes were, so far as any adequate provision went, totally neglected. The old and excellent grammar schools seem to have dwindled out of existence, owing to the refusal of the Government to give any encouragement to Catholic teaching; and the children of the poor picked up what scanty scraps of knowledge they could gather from wandering bards or poor curates or schoolmasters under hedges or in disused cabins or chapels. The "hedge schools" became an institution, each child bringing his sod of turf or coin for the scanty support of his teacher and getting in return a smattering of Latin, grammar and poetry, for which the teacher's fees ranged from 1s. 7d. to 2s 2d. per quarter. But in their efforts to prevent the population from remaining Catholic the Government had forced it to become illiterate. The class of books most in favour for school reading shows the sort of education these poor children were receiving.

Among the titles of a list of school books found in County Clare at the beginning of the nineteenth century were the following: Irish Rogues and Rapparees; The Seven Champions of Christendom; Francis, a Notorious Robber, and the Most Dexterous Way of Thieving; History of the Most Celebrated Pirates; Fair Rosamond and Jane Shore; Ovid's Art of Love; Dame Rozina, a Spanish Courtesan; History of Witches and Apparitions; nor was there anything of a more elevating character to correct the pernicious influences of such reading.[2] The few State-aided schools, such as the Charter Schools and the Schools of the Association for Discountenancing Vice, were, like the Irish Foundling Hospital, abodes of death, disease, and misery. The Board of Education recognized that the system pursued in them was chiefly a proselytizing one at a vast expenditure of public money.[3]

[2] Dutton, Survey of Clare; E. Wakefield, An Account of Ireland, Statistical and Political (1812) gives a similar list found in Wicklow. See also C. Gavan Duffy, Young Ireland (1896), p. 45.
[3] E. Wakefield, op. cit., pp. 413, 425-440; Thomas Newenham, Natural and Political Circumstances of Ireland (1809). Both these writers give a terrible account of the neglect and cruelty practised in these institutions.
The question of national education was taken up in 1812. A Commission reported that schools should be established in which no attempt should be made to propagate the religious tenets of any denomination of Christians. This was a step in advance, but the body into whose hands the charge of the instruction of the poor was now placed was not well adapted to carry out this proviso. The Kildare Place schools, though they gave an excellent education, gradually fell into the hands of persons more bent on sectarian objects than on general knowledge. The principle that the Bible should be read without note or comment was objected to by the Catholic clergy and certainly left openings for abuse; and though in 1824 the society had 15,000 schools, with over 100,000 pupils, the agitation organized against them led to a rapid fall in numbers. Probably the schools by themselves might not have been attacked, but they synchronized with the rise of other societies having purely proselytizing purposes in view and gave aid to them, thus departing from their original object.[4] The question was taken up again by a Commission in 1825 and embodied in the Education Act inaugurated by Stanley in 1831.

[4] In recent years excellent work has been done by the Kildare Place schools which are now used as the Training College for teachers of the Protestant Church of Ireland.
From 1832 to 1852 the Catholic and Protestant Archbishops of Dublin, Doctors Daniel Murray and Richard Whately, worked side by side to frame a scheme of general instruction that should be acceptable to all parties, and to draw up a course of Scriptural extracts, partly from the Douay and partly from the Authorized Versions, for the use of schools. Where these versions differed a new translation was made by the two divines, after a comparison with the original. The plan adopted was to leave all definite religious teaching to the different bodies, but to give general education to all the children together, including the reading of the selected passages of the Bible. Undoubtedly the leading spirit on the Board was Archbishop Whately, who bent the whole force of his intellect to the framing of the school syllabus and supervised every detail even down to the writing of the headline mottos in the copy-books. Dr. Murray, a gentle and accommodating man, though he fought for the retention of explanatory notes in the Scriptural courses, does not seem to have objected to the general scheme or even to the inclusion of "several essays on religious subjects by Archbishop Whately and other eminent divines." According to English standards of the day, the curriculum was excellently calculated "to furnish instruction of a moral and intellectual kind." But all references to the past history of their own country were rigorously excluded and all patriotic songs, including even some of Moore's Melodies, were taken out of the reading books.

That the range of knowledge imparted was wide, a study of the courses obliges us to admit. That it did not include any instruction in the Irish language or history was only to be expected from the circumstances under which the time-tables were drawn up. One practical result, however, was that over considerable parts of the country districts Irish speaking children received instruction in a language almost unknown to them, and a fresh blow was given to the survival of the old tongue among the peasants. For this, and for his efforts to meet the other members of the Board in the compilation of the school courses, Dr. Murray was fiercely attacked by Dr. MacHale, archbishop of Tuam, a native speaker, whom O'Connell styled "The Lion of St. Jarlath's," but he was almost alone in his views, preaching in Irish having been practically given up by the Catholic clergy. But the syllabus was disputed on all sides, the more angrily of the two by the Evangelical party, who considered Dr. Whately latitudinarian in his views; while a fire of pastorals was discharged by his fellow bishops at the head of Dr. Murray.[5] In 1840 the work of the Board was on the point of being condemned at Rome, but an enquiry into the teaching being given in the schools by a Legate sent over to report was considered satisfactory and the objections were withdrawn. Meanwhile the schools had been carrying out their work and the annual reports testified to the appreciation of their teaching. The first report appeared in December, 1833, and gave the number of schools in actual operation as 789, and the number of children on the rolls was stated to be 107,042. The reports in the succeeding years showed that there was a continuous increase. In 1845 there were 3,426 schools with 432,844 scholars; and in 1860 the number had risen to 5,632 schools in operation, with 804,000 pupils attending them.

[5] Sir Robert Peel declared that Dr. Murray in his person and manner completely realized his ideal of a Christian Bishop. He was a man of great simplicity of heart and an earnest and eloquent preacher.
The system, though supposed to be undenominational and carefully arranged for that purpose became in fact rigidly denominational. Education was paid for partly out of the rates and partly by the Treasury. The local contributions involved representation and a share of control by those who paid the rates. The managers were in most parts of the country clerical, the laity being chiefly concerned to keep down the rates. Thus the education of the people fell into the hands of the clergy and, in spite of regulations, the schools became denominational in character. In County Clare the National Schools dotted the country, but no Protestant attended them, though the Inspector was a Protestant and on good terms with the Catholic clergy; the Catholic emblems and pictures in the schools resulted in the exclusion of all children of other forms of belief.[6] The schools were ill-equipped, the teachers ill-paid and without any pension system or security of tenure. The instruction given was unsuited to the needs of the pupils and was in consequence half-heartedly given and inefficient; little interest was shown by the parents in the work of their children, who emerged worse prepared for life than the scholars of any other part of the British Isles.

[6] W. J. Fitzpatrick, Memoirs of Richard Whately, Archbishop of Dublin (1864).
So far as the Catholics were concerned, an effort was made by them to introduce a voluntary system more in accord with the views of the church in the Christian Brothers' Schools, which provided a good secondary education at a cheap rate, and had its own curriculum. These schools have been well spoken of even by authorities in the opposite camp.

A cognate question was that of the endowments of Maynooth College. It first came before the House of Commons in 1845, by a motion of the Duke of Wellington, and was fiercely debated. This College had been set up by the Irish Parliament in the days of its independence and was intended to give instruction to laymen as well as to priests, some of the governors being chosen from the laity. The importance of having a college in Ireland for higher education was increased by the closing, under the French Revolution, of the French Colleges to which Irish students were accustomed to resort; St. Omer, at which O'Connell had received his education, had been disestablished since his time. But the endowment of Maynooth was quite inadequate to its needs. The original grant made in 1795 was £6,000 a year, raised in 1813 to £9000 a year, annually voted. In 1844, Peel proposed to raise it to £26,000 a year, three times the original amount, and to make the grant permanent. He also offered £30,000 for buildings. But the institution quickly dropped its general character, such as was contemplated in the original grant and became a purely ecclesiastical seminary for the education of priests, and as such it was disendowed in 1869. The founding of Maynooth may be said to have changed the whole character of the Irish Catholic clergy, whose foreign education had hitherto given them a wide European outlook, and induced in them a political convervatism which on many occasions had made them the supporters of order in times of rebellion and the strength of the established government. Henceforth they partook of the strong insular outlook of their people and they became avowedly nationalist and anti-English. As priests in their parishes and managers of the national schools they exercised an immense influence, political and educational.

In 1845 Peel pushed his educational schemes another stage forward by the foundation of the Queen's Colleges of Belfast, Cork, and Galway, and later by the establishment of the Queen's University, with which they were affiliated. From the English point of view the proposal was of the most tolerant and large-minded nature. The Colleges were to be open to students of all denominations, and in all secular subjects the professors were to be chosen for their qualifications only, without regard to their religious faith. No religious teaching was to be imparted in the classes for general instruction and no theological chairs were to be founded by the State, but encouragement was given to the establishment of such professorships by private means and the foundation of denominational residential halls was proposed. Catholic bishops were invited to serve on the Board and Senate and though the appointment of professorships was kept in the hands of the Government the selection recommendations were to be made by the Board. No interference of any kind with religious belief was to be allowed. A Catholic priest was appointed President in Galway and a Catholic layman in Cork; a Presbyterian held the same post in Belfast. It was an honest attempt to come to some fair solution of the problem of higher education in Ireland. The plan was strongly supported by the Nation newspaper; the enlightened men whose opinion it represented, Davis in particular, taking up the matter with enthusiasm, and several of the Catholic bishops, including Archbishop Murray, Dr. Crolly of Armagh, and also Cardinal Wiseman, did all they could in its favour. But the times were hardly ripe for those principles of united education by which alone toleration and mutual respect can be attained and a sense of common nationhood instilled into the minds of the young.

The principle of the Bill was violently attacked by the English Conservatives, and Sir Robert Inglis's description of the new institutions as "godless colleges" was eagerly caught up and repeated as a slogan by O'Connell and the old Catholic party. The discussion was long and acrimonious. Archbishop MacHale denounced the plan as "a penal and revolting measure," and in 1847-48 he brought back from Rome a rescript declaring the colleges to be "dangerous to faith and morals." Dr. Derry of Clonfert went so far as to refuse the Sacrament to the parents of boys who attended them, and in 1850 the Synod of Thurles condemned them. The Colleges entered upon their chequered career in adverse circumstances, with Dr. Cullen, Archbishop of Armagh, who was translated to Dublin on Dr. Murray's death in 1852, throwing the whole weight of his powerful influence against them. The feud shook the Catholic Association to its foundations, O'Connell declaring that he saw in Davis's advocacy of mixed education the cloven hoof of secularism and the French Revolution.

Equally adverse was Dr. Cullen to the Model District Schools which were opened in 1849, the year in which the Queen's Colleges began their work. He took in hand the revision of the National school curriculum and prohibited the use of Dr. Whately's lessons; and he had a large part in founding the Catholic University in St. Stephen's Green, of which Newman was appointed the first Rector. This college, which came under the control of the Jesuits, was ultimately absorbed into the National University of Ireland, founded by Royal Charter in 1908, and became one of its constituent colleges, along with Cork and Galway. But as a University it had no power to grant degrees; and it was not until the foundation of the Royal University by Lord Beaconsfield that Catholics could obtain degrees without entering either the Queen's Colleges or Trinity. The Royal University was only an examining board and did not give teaching to students, who had to seek their instruction elsewhere; and attempts to fill the gap, such as the foundation of the Intermediate Board system in 1878, were not satisfactory from the educational point of view. They tended to degenerate into cramming and prize-winning institutions for the pupils and into a rush for result fees on the part of the teachers. Nevertheless, in spite of clerical opposition, the Queen's Colleges turned out many distinguished men in various walks of life. Belfast naturally remained a college chiefly attended by Northern Presbyterians; and it was raised by Birrell's Bill in 1908 to the status of a University, endowed with moderate funds for its support. At the same time the National University was founded, with the Colleges of Cork and Galway as autonomous institutions, having their own curriculum and their own teachers, but obtaining degrees by examinations arranged by a common Senate.

A number of excellent secondary schools, such as Clongowes, Blackrock and Milltown, have been established by the Catholic orders to feed the Universities; and on the Protestant side, schools such as St. Columba's on the Dublin mountains for boys and the Alexandra School and College in Dublin for girls, provide sound education for large numbers of students. The tendency to keep young people apart in separate teaching institutions is becoming less rigid in recent years; similar courses of study, with increasing competition and mutual interest in games are tending to draw the students together into a natural and healthful association.

The foundation of the National University in 1908 brought the long series of experiments in University education to a satisfactory conclusion. The colleges at Cork, Galway, and Dublin remained under separate governing bodies, with Maynooth as an affiliated college. No religious tests are permitted; though they are, in fact, predominantly Catholic in their atmosphere, owing to the number of Catholics on the Governing bodies and Senate. Several of the professorships are held by Protestants and the statutes, as originally framed, showed a marked freedom from any sectarian bias. The introduction of Gaelic as a compulsory subject for entrance has served to give the University a definite complexion, as was to be expected, and its tone is strongly nationalist. At first most of its students followed the constitutional leading of Redmond and they readily responded to his call for recruits for the war. But the growing tendency of the young men towards republicanism was accentuated when Mr. de Valera, a teacher of mathematics in the University, became first "President of the Republic" and Chancellor of the University in which he had held a chair, and when Professor MacNeill organized the Irish Volunteers. Its Senate consists of thirty-five members, mostly elected from the Professors of the different colleges, but four are nominated by the Crown and one, at least, must be a woman. Women are equally eligible with men for all offices; there is an excellent medical school well equipped with apparatus; and the University is undoubtedly exercising a very considerable cultural influence over the younger generation and bringing University teaching into its natural relation with home and social life.

At various times proposals had been thrown out to add a Catholic College to Dublin University, but the project met with violent opposition and had to be abandoned. Catholics have been admitted to Trinity College from 1793 onward, but they could receive no scholarship without submitting to a sacramental test, until Mr. Fawcett's Act of 1879 abolished all tests for fellowships or scholarships, except for Lecturers in Theology. Though it was established as a definitely Protestant place of education, and has always kept a preponderating Protestant influence, Catholic students have entered its courses ever since they were thrown open to them.

The question of education was only the first of a series of measures of a remedial character which occupied the attention of the House of Commons during the second half of the nineteenth century. The Irish Church question was one of the most important of these. Since the passing of the Tithe Commutation Act of 1838, which had shifted the responsibility of the support of the Protestant clergy from the peasants to the landowners, this matter had been quiescent. But the relief was only indirect, for rents had in many cases been raised to meet the additional charge upon the landlords. Sheil had warned them that in accepting the position of intermediaries they were digging their own graves; and, in fact, as the tithe war dwindled the struggle between owner and tenant became more fierce and embittered. The condition of things in some districts was commented on in a speech delivered in 1849 by George Henry Moore, an Irish Catholic landowner. He said that he paid tithes in eight parishes, in not one of which was there a Protestant church, service, or clergyman, nor a single member of the Church to require them; and he mentioned a hundred and ninty-nine parishes in similar conditions.

From 1865 onward the question of the Established Church was annually mooted in the House, especially by Sir John Gray, Member for Kilkenny and proprietor of the Freeman's Journal. But the Ministry firmly opposed any discussion of a question which they declared had been finally closed by the provisions of the Act of Union. It is remarkable that Gladstone's first Irish speeches were directed against the motions of Dillwyn and Sir John Gray; he did not think that the time for Parliamentary action had arrived. But on March 16, 1868, he launched the declaration that the time had come for the alliance between the State and the Protestant Church to cease; and a week later he gave notice of three resolutions to the same effect. The controversy aroused by his action led to a dissolution on November 11, but Gladstone's election for Greenwich showed that there was a popular feeling in favour of his views. The Church had nearly sixteen millions worth of property to be dealt with, and the struggle, especially in the Lords, was long and acrid. Their amendments, in the fullest House in living memory, would have reduced 'disendowment' to a shadow, but the decisive and conciliatory intervention of Lord Cairns brought about an agreement. About £10,840,000 was restored to the Church of Ireland, and was administered by lay commissioners, who have carried out their trust with great ability.

The claims of the Presbyterian church and of Maynooth were first considered and were met by the allocation to them of certain sums; but the Lords were steadily opposed to what was known as "concurrent endowment," or the application of the surplus to religious purposes only. Finally it was agreed that the residue should be applied "mainly for the relief of unavoidable calamity and suffering" not touched by the Poor Law. Such was the compromise arrived at. The Bill received the Royal Assent on July 26, 1869, and thus a great measure of justice was placed on the Statute Book. So far from having had the disastrous results foretold by its opponents, the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland has had the effect of bringing the clergy into closer touch with their congregations, putting an end to clerical absenteeism, and reviving spiritual and national life in the Church at large. It also gave the laity a position of responsibility with regard to the affairs of their Church which had the best results in attaching them to its welfare, while it removed a long-standing and well-founded grievance from the Irish Catholic people, clergy and laity alike.

The next struggle was to be the still more crucial effort to remove the existing anomalies in the relations between landlord and tenant. Before the Church Disestablishment Bill was out of the way Bright was already prophesying that North and South alike would combine in a demand for "something on the land question much broader than anything hitherto offered in compensation Bills." He had in mind the gradual transformation of the tenants into owners, such as has come about in our own day. Once more the North and the South are found banded together, to exact a reduction of rents, security of tenure, and right of sale. These demands became popularly known as "The Three F's," viz., Fair Rent, Fixity of Tenure, and Free Sale. But remedial legislation moved slowly. The chief stumbling-block to the landlords was the question of compensation for retrospective improvements; and it was on this ground that several attempts made during Lord Palmerston's Ministry failed to pass the House.

The solitary Bill passed in 1860 was dead against compensation, yet till 1870 it was held by English legislators to have settled the matter. It was followed by a period of "murders, homicides, beatings, and outrages" more appalling than at any time for thirty or forty years. Catholic landlords were no better off than Protestant, or Irishmen than Englishmen; they suffered impartially. A good Bill introduced by the Tories in 1867 was rejected, but on Gladstone's return to office the Irish Church Bill was followed up by a Land Bill which became law on August 9, 1870. It legalized the "Ulster Custom," rendered the landlord liable to pay compensation for improvements to an evicted tenant, and facilitated the creation of a peasant proprietary. But the Act did not prevent rack-renting, which became worse in view of possible compensation demands, nor did it check evictions. Many landlords set themselves to circumvent the working of the Act in every way in their power, and Isaac Butt, who proposed an amending Bill in 1876, spoke of the failure of the landowners to carry out the intentions of the legislature. His Bill was introduced again and again, but always rejected, and the same fate met Forster's excellent Compensation for Disturbance Bill of 1880, which passed the Commons, but was thrown out by the Lords.

END OF CHAPTER XX