“The Imperial Parliament has created many Parliaments and given to them power to deal in general as they wish with local affairs, but it never parted with its own overriding authority—­it has no power to do so—­and in several of the colonies it has exercised that overriding authority from time to time.

“Gladstone spoke of the Irish Parliament which he proposed to set up as ‘practically independent in the exercise of its statutory functions.’  But the overriding authority of the Imperial Parliament would always be there in the background to arrest injustice or oppression, just as it is in regard to every Dominion Parliament in the Empire to-day.

“That position was specifically laid down and accepted by Parnell in 1886.

“Lord Midleton demands that the rights and authority of the Crown shall be preserved and safeguarded.  There is no difference whatever between us on this, and no difficulty can arise upon it.

“As to the control of Army and Navy, no one suggests any interference with the Imperial authority over the Army and the Navy.  I include in that such naval control of harbours as is necessary for security.

“Captain Gwynn has proposed that Ireland should have power to raise a force for home defence.  In other words, to pass a Territorial Act for Ireland.  My policy about the Volunteers is known:  I proposed at the beginning of the war that the Government should utilize the existing Volunteer forces; and had this proposal been acted on in 1914 there would have been no rebellion in 1916.  If I understand Captain Gwynn, he did not suggest that Irish Territorials should be under an Irish War Office and an Irish Minister for War, but that in his opinion a system of Irish Territorials was desirable, and inasmuch as the English Territorial Acts are not suitable to us, the Irish Parliament should be given the power to raise under Imperial authority a force for itself and on its own lines.

“If this is his view, I agree with it.  But this is a matter on which no one would think of breaking off.

“Speaking generally, I think the Archbishop of Dublin and those who agree with him may take it for granted that upon all those questions which he grouped under the heading of Imperial Security there would be little difficulty in arriving at an agreement with, at any rate, men like myself.

“Now let me deal with the second group of subjects put forward by the Archbishop of Dublin under the heading of Fiscal Security—­or a reasonable prospect of national prosperity.

“The first objection is to what is called fiscal autonomy, although, after listening most carefully to his speeches, it seems to me that the real objection is not so much an objection to fiscal autonomy as establishing the full power of the Irish Parliament over the collection and imposition of Irish taxes, as an objection to giving that Parliament power to set up a tariff against Great Britain.”