FROM THE ARCHIVES:Among the hundreds of amendments tabled for the committee stage of the Home Rule Bill were these ones reported by the London correspondent which foreshadowed future events. – JOE JOYCE
THAT PORTION of the Parliamentary papers of this morning which contains the notices of new amendments to the Home Rule Bill is largely monopolised by Mr. Lionel N. Rothschild, the Unionist member for the Aylesbury Division of Bucks, a constituency that has been continuously represented by a Rothschild since 1865.
A Rothschild would seem to have a kind of hereditary right to oppose Home Rule, as the kinsman of Mr. Lionel Rothschild, Baron Ferdinand Rothschild, who held the seat in 1886 and 1893, was a vigorous opponent of both the Home Rule measures for which Mr. Gladstone was responsible. Judged by the nature of the amendments which Mr. Lionel Rothschild has now handed in, he is clearly opposed to a nominated Senate, and in the elected one which he would set up he takes clear note of Ulster. The Government proposal at present is that the Irish Senate shall consist of forty members, nominated in the first instance by the Lord Lieutenant, subject to the advice of the Crown. Mr. Rothschild’s proposal is that there shall be only thirty-two Senators, who are to be elected according to the principle of proportional representation by the electors for the Irish House of Commons entitled to vote in any Parliamentary constituency within the boundaries of the constituencies, which Mr. Rothschild names in a new schedule which he proposes. In such an election each elector, it is declared, should have one transferable vote. From the representation of Ulster in the Senate Mr. Rothschild would withdraw the Counties of Antrim, Armagh, Down and Londonderry.
Having in this way made provision for the composition of the Irish Senate, Mr. Rothschild proceeds to take the Irish House of Commons in hand. That House, according to the Government scheme, is to consist of 164 members. Mr. Rothschild would cut this number down to 124 members, as he would exclude the forty members which the Government bill says should be returned to the Irish House of Commons by the Boroughs of Belfast and Londonderry and the Counties of Antrim, Armagh, Down and Londonderry. These Ulster members whom he would exclude from the Irish House of Commons Mr. Rothschild would send to the Imperial Parliament at Westminster, where they would sit as the only Irish representatives
The principal amendment of the remaining ones of which Mr. Rothschild has given notice deals with the construction of the Irish authority which is to co-operate with the Imperial Parliament [...]
Passing from the constitution of the Irish Parliament [...] Mr. Rothschild proposes that “there shall be forthwith established in Ireland a Court with jurisdiction in Probate, Divorce, and Admiralty.”