Indebted Fenians flock to Land League

NEWTON'S OPTIC:FAR BE it from me to suggest the mortgage forgiveness debate reveals the Irish to be a shadow of their former fighting selves. So instead let me retell the history of the Land League, as it might have been if led by today's bold Fenian men.

1873The first Great Depression begins with the failure of an American investment bank, the collapse of a European property bubble and the new German Empire forcing everyone on to the gold standard. Uncanny, isn't it?

1876As incomes slump across the world, Irish farmers are unable to pay the high rents they agreed during the previous agricultural boom. From his prison cell, Irish Republican Brotherhood leader Michael Davitt writes: "Let's face it, we all partied."

1877Evictions leave estates across Ireland practically deserted, echoing only to the screams of abandoned women. Touring one such "banshee estate", Home Rule MP Charles Stewart Parnell promises: "remedial landscaping and streetlights where possible to protect the value of your crofts until prices recover".

1878Poor harvests cause localised famine with many families forced to choose between eating or paying the rent. Davitt and Parnell meet to discuss the "moral hazard" of helping those in need without helping those who can still eat and pay the rent.

1879The Land League is launched with a "monster rally" of 20,000 tenant farmers who march through Co Mayo chanting: "What do we want? Lower rents. When do we want them? Until the situation returns to exactly the way it was before, without any effect on the rents we charge our subtenants, which is a completely separate issue."

1880The league begins a tactic of boycotting landlords, then stops because it is "unfair to scullery maids and other frontline domestic servants".

1881The league switches focus to resisting evictions, offering landlords an "indentured servitude holiday" or a debt-for-equity swap of one guinea per tenant's daughter. Landlords are allowed to inspect the daughter for any signs of frivolous spending.

1882Davitt, Parnell and the other league leaders are thrown in prison and tortured with a lesson on the Liberal party, including detailed descriptions of its internal rivalries and how they relate to its reform proposals. On their release, they are prepared to accept almost anything, including the argument that rent reductions would be "socially divisive".

1883The league calls for a radical overhaul of Ireland's bankruptcy laws, so that people who want to walk away from their debts and emigrate to Australia will no longer be arrested and transported to Australia.

1885The Government says a scheme for lower rents is impossible because, although Irish landlords might co-operate, English landlords would have to be compensated. William Redmond says: "Fair enough."

1886League secretary Timothy Harrington considers a plan for a general rent strike, forcing landlords to accept lower payments from those in financial difficulty. However, he decides a "one-size-fits-all" approach is impractical and tenants will have to negotiate rent restructuring on a "strictly case-by-case basis".

1887As the global economy starts to recover, everyone stops caring and goes back to exploiting their subtenants.

1889Capt William O'Shea names Parnell in his divorce, citing moral hazard.