Lloyd George put a new fighting spirit into Liberalism: but the objects
which he had at heart could only be achieved by a great expenditure of
electoral power, and among those objects Irish self-government found
only a secondary place. When Mr. Gladstone spoke of liberty he thought
of what he had helped to bring to Greece, Italy, Bulgaria and
Montenegro--what he had tried to bring to Ireland. When Mr. Lloyd George
spoke of liberty, he thought of what he wanted to bring to England
first, and to Ireland by the way; his conviction that Ireland needed
self-government was not so deeply rooted as his conviction that the poor
throughout the United Kingdom needed help.

Old Age Pensions had been popular, but had not been a fighting issue.
Mr. Lloyd George provided the fighting issue with a vengeance when he
set himself to pay for them. Unfortunately, Nationalist Ireland had no
enthusiasm for the Budget which English Radicalism made its flag. A
country of peasant proprietors was easily scared by the very name of
land taxes. But above all the Finance Bill dealt drastically, and many
thought unfairly, with the powerful liquor trade, which in its branches
of brewing and distilling included the main manufacturing interest of
southern Ireland, and on its retail side was incredibly diffused through
the whole shopkeeping community.

The dissident Nationalists saw their chance. Mr. O'Brien emerged from
one of his periodic retirements to lead a whirlwind campaign against the
"robber Budget." Redmond and our party were obliged to oppose a measure
which pressed so hard as this undoubtedly did on Ireland. Our opposition
to the land taxes was withdrawn when valuable concessions had been made,
but no such compromise was considered possible on the liquor taxes. On
the other hand, it grew clear that the measure was likely to produce a
conflict in which the power of the House of Lords might be challenged on