The noble and learned Lord (Plunkett) said, that many of the evils that afflicted Ireland, and for which the Church Temporalities Bill was intended as a remedy, were occasioned by the delay of the measure of Emancipation, after the year 1825.  Why, I ask, by its delay after the year 1825?  I beg to know from that noble and learned Lord how long the system of agitation existed in Ireland both before and after the year 1825?  Why, my Lords, it has existed ever since the commencement of the discussion of the Roman Catholic Question—­that is to say, ever since the days of the restrictive regency.  From that period to the present moment, there has been nothing but agitation, except during parts of the years 1829 and 1830.  Agitation commenced in Ireland upon the conclusion of events in Paris, and in Brussels.  Those events occasioned such agitations and discussions as obliged the noble Duke, who was then at the head of the Government in Ireland, to carry into execution the Proclamation Act.  Then came a change in the administration, and the noble Earl assumed the reigns of power.  He immediately chose for the Lord Lieutenant (Lord Wellesley) a nobleman for whom I entertain great respect but who certainly was nearly the last person who ought to have been selected for that office.  After the Roman Catholic Question was settled, what ought the government to have done?  Most certainly they ought to have done everything in their power to conciliate—­whom?  The Protestants of Ireland.  Everything had already been granted to the Roman Catholics which they could possibly require; and the object of the government ought to have been to conciliate the Protestants.  But, instead of that, the noble Earl sends over to that country, as Lord Lieutenant, the noble Marquis, who was the very last person that ought to have been appointed; because, when holding that situation previously, and on receiving information that his Majesty’s government entertained views favourable to the emancipation of the Catholics, he did, immediately, before his departure for Ireland, issue a sort of proclamation to the people that agitation should be continued for the purpose of obtaining the desired boon.

July 19, 1833.

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Irish Agitation Characterized.

Now, my Lords, in order to enable your Lordships to understand what this “agitation” is, I beg leave just to describe it to your Lordships.  It is, first of all, founded upon a conspiracy of priests and demagogues to obtain their purpose—­whether justifiable or not, is not the question—­by force and menace, and by the use of terror and of mobs, wherever that terror and those mobs can be used to produce an effect upon his Majesty’s Government favourable to their views.  This agitation they have maintained by orations, harangues, and seditious speeches at public meetings—­by publications through a licentious press—­by exaggerations—­by forgeries—­and by all other means which it