Mr. Balfour, who, in the month of March, had become Chief Secretary,
proclaimed with equal force that it would be folly and madness to break
these solemn contracts.[8] In the Bill, as at first brought in, the
Court had, in fact, power to vary contracts by fixing a composition for
outstanding debts and determining the period over which payment should
extend. In May the Government accepted the principle that the Court
should not only do this (settle the sum due by an applicant for relief
for outstanding debt), but also should fix a reasonable rent for the
rest of the term. The Ulster tenants insisted on this, but, at the
bidding of the landlords, it was subsequently withdrawn, and, finally,
in July the Premier summoned his party and, telling them that if the
Bill were not altered Ulster would be lost to the Unionist cause, passed
into law a Bill sanctioning a general revision of judicial rents for
three years, and in this way did the Tories lower rents in breach of a
clause in the Act of 1881 that guaranteed rents fixed under its
provisions for a term of fifteen years.

As a speaker of the day put it--"You have the Prime Minister rejecting
in April the policy which in May he accepts, rejecting in June the
policy which he had accepted in May, and then in July accepting the
policy which he had rejected in June, and which had been within a few
weeks declared by himself and his colleagues to be inexpedient and
dishonest, to be madness and folly, and to be laying an axe to the very
root of the fabric of civilised society."

When the advance of five millions for land purchase under the Act of
1885 was nearly exhausted, a further sum of equal amount was earmarked
for the same purpose in 1888. Lord Randolph Churchill in 1889 expressed
the opinion that something like £100,000,000 of credit should be pledged
to effect purchase. In 1891 Mr. Balfour authorised the devotion of a