On June 17 and 18, 1882, Gladstone wrote to me. The letter of the 17th was little more than a formal acknowledgment, but in his note of the following day he referred me to something which had passed at our last interview. He had on that occasion directed my attention to the proposal to amend certain severe clauses of the Crimes Act.
Meanwhile the Irish were fighting the Crimes Bill inch by inch. It had been read a second time on May 25 after three nights' debate. The most drastic clause, from the legal point of view, was the suspension of the right of trial by jury in all grave cases of agrarian crime, which (and the Government would decide when) would be tried by a Court of three judges, in such district as the Attorney-general might decide. Public meetings could be proclaimed and newspapers suppressed. The police were vested with power to search private houses and arrest night wanderers. Finally, and against this the Irish Party especially protested--magistrates were empowered to convict summarily on charges of incitement, boycotting, and membership of a secret society.
This was the iron heel with a vengeance; it took from the Irish the last vestige of citizen right. Parnell opposed, { 175} yet not violently; the remembrance of the Phoenix Park murders held him back. But the speeches of his followers were bitter in the extreme. "What profit," cried Dillon, "can you ever expect from governing a nation which nothing conciliates, and nothing can subdue?" Of all the fifty Coercion Acts passed in the eighty-eight years since the Union this was the worst.
The second reading was carried by 383 votes against 45.
Parnell expressed a desire that Gladstone should have his (Parnell's) views distinctly put before him by me--not in writing. This did not suit Gladstone. He had no intention of giving away his hand in regard to the Crimes Bill, and, in the then temper of his own Party and of the Conservatives, was not at all desirous of making any further private concession that would certainly place him in a too favourable light (as regards this Bill) in the eyes of the Irishmen.
He was determined not to see me again with reference to the Crimes Bill, and on June 23 he wrote me to that effect. It was obvious from the tone of his letter that he was annoyed by the continued opposition of the Irish Party, which, from his point of view, only served to impede the progress of the Arrears Bill.