A form of government which requires a succession of rebellions to
secure reforms afterwards admitted to be reasonable cannot be a
good form of government. These agitations have inflicted grave
material and moral injury on Ireland. The instability of the
political system has prejudiced natural economic development.
Capital will not be invested in industries where no one is certain
about the future. And because the will of the people was so
passionately set on political freedom an atmosphere of suspicion
gathered around public movements which in other countries would
have been allowed to carry on their beneficent work unhindered by
any party. Here they were continually being forced to declare
themselves either for or against self-government. The long attack
on the movement for the organization of Irish agriculture was an
instance. Men are elected on public bodies not because they are
efficient administrators, but because they can be trusted to pass
resolutions favoring one party or another. This has led to
corruption. Every conceivable rascality in Ireland has hid itself
behind the great names of nation or empire. The least and the most
harmless actions of men engaged in philanthropic or educational
work or social reform are scrutinized and criticized so as to
obstruct good work. If a phrase even suggests the possibility of
a political partiality, or a tendency to anything which might be
construed by the most suspicious scrutineer to indicate a remote
desire to use the work done as an argument either for or against
self-government the man or movement is never allowed to forget it.
Public service becomes intolerable and often impossible under such
conditions, and while the struggle continues this also will continue
to the moral detriment of the people. There are only two forms of
government possible. A people may either be governed by force or
may govern themselves. The dual government of Ireland by two