Before I continue my speech on this matter, I would like to draw the attention of the House to the speech which I made here last Wednesday evening, and the report of it that appeared in the "Irish Times" and the "Irish Independent." Both of these papers stated that the remarks which I made were to the effect that none of the Erasmus Smith endowments should go to Trinity College. What I did say—and the Official Report will bear me out—was that Trinity College got very large sums out of the endowments although they were entitled to only a small part, according to the original wills of Erasmus Smith, and that only for the education of the children of his tenants or those who went to the three Grammar Schools. To be fair to Trinity College, I would like to point out that Erasmus Smith stated in one of his endowments: "That such other tenants as shall be made fit for Trinity College shall have towards their maintenance £10 apiece for the first four years." I do not like to go into the history of the Erasmus Smith endowments very fully. It would take a very long time if I were to trace the different confiscations, from 1641 to the reign of Charles II., under which grants amounting to close on 47,000 acres were given to Erasmus Smith. I will just state the amount of acres which he got in nine counties. In my county of Tipperary the first grant was for 21,067a. 3p. In a subsequent grant he got 621a. 3r. 14p. Under another grant he got 1,670a. 3r. 4p. Under 21st Charles II., on 15th May, he got 1,041a. 2r. 7p. In County Meath, under the reign of Charles II., on 18th June, he got 728a. 1r. 32p. In County Louth he got 12.596a. 2r. 34p.
Private Deputies Business. - Erasmus Smith Endowment.
Would the Deputy explain what he means by "grants"?
Grabs.
I will call it confiscation if you like. If it does not take up too much time, I will go into the history of that confiscation. Under the Rebellion of Rory O'Moore and Sir Phelim O'Neill in 1641, it would appear that the English Government thought that it would be a great pretext or opportunity to come along to this country, confiscate the lands of the native Irish and drive the native population out of the country. They succeeded to the extent that they confiscated two and a half million acres, and the amount of land which fell to the share of Erasmus Smith, for the payment of a very small sum, was, as I have said, close on 47,000 acres. Does that make my meaning sufficiently clear to the representatives of Trinity College? In Limerick he got 2,193a. 3r. 22p. in one grant or confiscation. In the same county he got a further grant of 1,113a. 1r. 38p.; in Kildare, 372a. 2r. 9p; King's County, 752a. 1r. 12p.; in Queen's County, 440a. 3r. 7p.; Roscommon, 176a. 2r. 9p.; Tipperary (further grant), 3,020a. 1r. 7p.; Limerick (further grant), 4,195a. 2r. 18p.; Galway, 2,415a. 2r. 38p.; Sligo, 2,025a. 1r. 20p.; Westmeath, 751a. 1r. 28p. He got another small property in King's County, and in Dublin he got some tenement houses, the names of the owners of which I can give to the representatives of Trinity College.
The owners?
The owners at that time. I suppose they were not left there long once he got control. I pointed out last Wednesday that according to the endowments of Erasmus Smith practically all the proceeds should go to the education of children on these different estates and twenty other poor children who lived within two miles of the schools which he set up in Galway, Tipperary, Drogheda, etc. This matter, as was pointed out when this question was under discussion before, was brought before a judicial or semi-judicial Commission appointed by the British Government. It would appear that, in order to have a binding agreement, the two judges who controlled that Commission, Lord Justice Fitzgibbon and Mr. Justice O'Brien, should agree on their verdict. We know that they did not agree and so the matter rests where it was when the British Government set up that Commission. Nothing has since been done. We know that Lord Justice Fitzgibbon gave what we Catholics, or representatives of the different tenants on the different estates, might be called an adverse verdict, but in portion of it you will find that he was quite willing to allow a sum of £2,000 a year to be set aside to give technical education to the children on Erasmus Smith estates.
How this money has been dealt with was pointed out by me to some extent last Wednesday, but perhaps I might be allowed to amplify the matter now. The trustees built a number of schools with this money, and in almost every case they were not built on the Smith estates. In 1868 they built the High School in Harcourt Street, for the purchase and equipment of which they paid £8,900, and for several years following they paid towards its upkeep £1,000 a year. None of the boys attending this school were tenants' sons. The endowment of Erasmus Smith was of private origin and restricted to a particular class, namely, his tenants, and to particular districts, namely, his Irish estates, and the neighbourhood of his schools. Our reason for asking for this Commission is in order to bring back the Endowment to the purpose for which Erasmus Smith intended it, namely, for the free education of the tenants' children. We appeal to the Government to appoint a Commission to finish up the work entrusted to Lord Justice Fitzgibbon and Mr. Justice O'Brien. As Mr. Morley stated, it cannot be let rest where it is. The Commission was appointed by the British Government in 1885. It continued its sittings for years, and at a meeting held in January, 1891, the principles on which the scheme should be prepared came up for discussion, and the following resolution, proposed by Professor Dougherty and seconded by Mr. Justice O'Brien, was passed by a majority:
"That a draft scheme be prepared on the basis of a neutral or mixed governing body to manage the Endowments and of the benefits of the Endowments being available for all denominations without any religious test."
That is our contention. Erasmus Smith never intended or, if he did, he did not put it into the legal documents which he drew up that Catholic children should not be educated at these different schools. We know that as a result of the existing system of education Catholics did go to these schools for centuries, but attempts were made later to proselytise them. If you read Hardiman's "History of Galway" you will find that Catholic children had to leave the schools because of attempts to proselytise them to other faiths. If the House would allow me, I would like to read some extracts from the judgment of Mr. Justice O'Brien. He says:—
An estate which at present yields £6,700 a year and at one time had grown to a rental of over £10,000, and which, having regard to the time of its origin and increase, must have produced during a period of two centuries and a half more than a million sterling, was given by Erasmus Smith mainly for the education of the tenants on his estate, and that vast fund, without indeed any ground for personal reproach, and in fact with one conspicuous example of self-sacrifice on the part of distinguished men connected with it, has nevertheless through inherent tendencies to abuse been cast into a gulf from which no proportional return has come—lavished, wasted, and cut up and carved upon mistaken projects or upon the incessant cravings of personal interests, given away to one institution or another, or in abuse, or excess of legal authority, and a prodigious amount of it sunk in a vain and idle war against progress, in maintaining the rivalry of the so-called English schools with the national system which, is now admitted, must be abandoned, with all the oceans of money spent on them; while if anyone were asked what part of this immense sportula found its way to the tenants of Erasmus Smith, whether a single ray of the light ever reached the class for whom such a munificent provision was made, to dispel the darkness of ignorance, the question would be considered simply as one of irony. The lands are there, the tenants are there, the education is wanted, but the money is carried away, as it were, into exile with consequences, and hardly less than bitterness, of conquest.... Reason, natural right and public policy therefore being all the other way, in order to make out that this is a Protestant Endowment to be managed by a Protestant body and for a Protestant education, and to arrest the hand of the State in applying it for the objects for which it was created, some ground must be found in the original constitution of the Endowment as affected by the law under the statute which we have to carry out. Can any such ground be found which will stand the test of a real examination? ... I would say the true motive of his conduct—(that, is, of Erasmus Smith)—of his conduct and charters alike, was to secure and consolidate his title to his land in Ireland, then in jeopardy as appears by the Act of Parliament, the Act of Settlement, referred to in the charter itself, and in the situation in which he stood it was of great importance to him to draw the bonds more closely between himself and the tenants; and that fact is not without great influence upon the argument in their favour.... And in the beginning of that deed, in the part that determines what was his real motive and object, he introduces the statement of his intention by these words (that is, the intention of Erasmus Smith):
"And the intention of all parties to these presents is that the children of the poor tenants inhabiting on the lands aforesaid and the children of such as are poor or live by their labour are to be taught at the said schools free and without paying anything for their teaching to the said masters."
That is taken from the original document drawn up by Erasmus Smith. Mr. Justice O'Brien goes on to comment:—
Now in the multitude of conflicting arguments upon the question, one point stands out particularly clear and is removed from all doubt or ambiguity. Erasmus Smith did not intend to exclude Catholics but to proselytise them by means of education. The indenture of 1657, the charter of 1669, the letter of 1682 and the ‘Lawes' that he made, as he called them, are all absolutely inconsistent with any other idea. That, therefore, is the object which the opponents of the scheme must avow they are bound to carry out ... But the charter is no less explicit and positive as to the object, for it declares that the said free schools shall from henceforth be, remain, and continue to be connected, employed, and used for the teaching or instructing of twenty such poor children or scholars who shall dwell or inhabit within two English miles of the said respective schools and also for the teaching and instructing of all and every of the children of the tenants of the said Erasmus Smith, his heirs, executors or assigns, at what distance soever from said schools such tenants shall dwell or inhabit. ... They were in possession (that is alluding to the Protestant ascendancy who had control of the fund). All power was on their side. The party of ascendancy had it all their own way for more than a century at least. They had the fleshpots and the sword in reserve. Erasmus Smith did what the fanaticism of the times and unchallenged power could lead him to do, to kill and stifle conscience—with the result of which all ages bear witness. Conscience survived him. Catholics would not have his schools. They turned away with loathing from the Syren cup that was offered to them. "The bread," they said, "which you have tendered to us is poison. Your light of education is the darkness of the soul. Come ignorance, come night of the mind, come poverty, come tyranny, come rack and rope we will have nothing to say to the iniquity of the lure you have held out to us." This is the demonstration of time that buried so many fallacies and errors. Centuries have come and gone since then. Force has been tried, art has been tried, oceans of money has been spent, the fabled stone of endless and impossible labour has been rolled up the hill, sometimes pushed up with the bayonet, only to come crashing down again like an avalanche, with missions and societies and Kildare Street Schools and English schools, all hurled into the abyss of disastrous failure. Vast palaces have been constructed out of this endowment which the tenants view like haunted houses and never enter.
Alluding to the number of children who were entitled to education in the schools, Mr. Justice O'Brien said:
During the long night of persecution, when complaint was silenced by terror or by law, the barrier of religion was set up under colour of keeping the Catholics out, but in reality to keep the Protestants in—that barrier which the State is now called upon to raise, and to throw open the portals of liberty and justice and admit the rightful heirs to their kingdom. And the heirs are in crowds ready to enter. For by the calculations which were laid before the public meeting of the Commission by the Rev. Mr. Humphrys—of whom I must say in justice that he has exhibited a zeal and ability upon this question that far surpasses anything, in my experience, shown by anybody upon any public question of late years—calculations supplemented at the request of the Lord Justice with further information, showing still more striking results, which I have not immediately at hand—there were 242 Catholic tenants on the estate of Erasmus Smith in the Tipperary Union and but 16 Protestant tenants, several of the latter holding official positions, or Protestant clergymen, and on the whole it is stated that the Catholic tenants were not less than 98 per cent; and in one district of Tipperary, comprising a radius of six miles, there were 157 boys receiving Intermediate education in Catholic schools, and in a Catholic Intermediate school at Bruff, where the estates were, there were 58 boys. And it was also stated, as a proof of the extent to which higher education was required, there were, in 1887, 250 professional men who had come from the district, and in two parishes alone where the estates lay there were 50 professional men and 21 students in colleges— all which numbers alike, there can be no doubt, have greatly increased since 1887; while if we admit into the calculation the females who are educated in the convent schools in the locality, the total would be raised to a prodigious aggregate. These are the persons for whom Erasmus Smith intended to provide, and who behold themselves, in the interests of such a minority, deprived of their birthright. Let any man in the community, in whom prejudice or interest has not quenched the light of reason, boldly stand up and declare in the face of day whether such a state of things can be justified.
In summing up, Mr. Justice O'Brien said:
I am of opinion that, according to the true principles of the Court of Chancery, the intention of Erasmus Smith to provide for the education of his tenants must prevail, whatever other intention he had, even if there were no statute at all upon the subject. I am also of opinion that the statute, having regard to the exceptions, gives no authority whatever to this Commission concerning religion, either in the government or the education. I am still further of opinion that, if such a power existed, it would be an improper discretion to exercise it. I am, moreover, of opinion that it cannot be a compliance with the requirement of the Act of Parliament to make endowments more available for education, to establish a system which shall exclude persons from availing themselves of it. And I am of opinion, in conclusion, that the proposition to establish a Protestant government, with the power to direct religious teaching for schools to which Catholics may find admission, either by right or by concession is, to the last degree, arrogant and unjust.
Further on, Mr. Justice O'Brien said: "Nothing remains, therefore, in this conflict of interests and views"—he was referring there to the conflict between Lord Justice Fitzgibbon and himself—"but the arbitrament of the supreme power of the State to remedy a crying and intolerable grievance, that has come up again and again for years, and most certainly never will be silent." Proceeding, he said:
In arriving at a conclusion upon this question different from that of my eminent colleague, it was my duty, at least, whether or not imperfectly performed, to remove from my mind all conscious influence from difference of religion that might lead me into error— might cause me to do any wrong to my Protestant fellow-countrymen, or to be wanting in the trust of justice confided in me. That trust makes me the enemy of all wrong, of all spoliation whatever, committed against any class or institution or religion. So does ineradicable personal feeling. So does, not less, the conviction of the mischief that finally results from all interference with other persons' rights. Spoliation or restitution— that is the question; and restitution, by inexorable law, follows spoliation. We can, perhaps, even in our own experience and country, follow down invasions of right, from remote time, into consequences of disaster that have fallen even upon the innocent. Time, like the sea which is said to gather its own wrecks perpetually, collects from distant periods all the results of wrong and violence, and reserves them for final quittance, sooner or later, in one way or another, sometimes by law, sometimes by lawlessness, sometimes by revolution, confounding, by the excesses of the retribution, all reason and justice, until by the final operation of that instinct of justice that nature has planted in men, and that outlasts all wrongful power, all things are set right in the end, and the web that wrong and injustice have woven, with whatever subtlety or strength, is slowly, but surely and perseveringly, unwoven to the last thread. That may happen in this case. For I am persuaded that the claim of the tenants of Erasmus Smith to the benefit of this Endowment never can or never will be shaken off.
Recently, a good deal of additional light has been thrown on this subject, as I will prove later on. The late Governor-General of the Free State, Mr. T.M. Healy, has recently published a very interesting book, and no one I think knew more intimately than he how this Erasmus Smith endowment was going. He had introduced all the deputations personally to Mr. Morley. I quoted Mr. Morley's reply the other night, but I would ask the House to bear with me while I read some extracts from Mr. Healy's book which was published recently. The title of the book is "Letters and Leaders of My Day." At page 245 Mr. Healy states:
Greatly as we rejoiced in the appointment of Archbishop Walsh it led to an unlucky change in the "Educational Endowments Bill." Lord Randolph Churchill had accepted Sexton's amendments, including one which doubled the salaries of the Commissioners. Father Finlay, S.J., a professor in the Royal University, was to be named as a Commissioner. The Archbishop preferred the Rev. Gerald Molloy, D.D., a genial soul, as fit to cope with the Chairman, Lord Justice Fitzgibbon, as a shrimp with a shark. The Erasmus Smith Endowment was a vital question. Its funds came mostly from rents paid by Catholics on confiseated estates. Yet no Catholic was educated in its schools and, though forty-four years have flown, things as regards the endowment remain as they were in 1885.
Referring to the recall of Mr. Gerald Balfour from the ChiefSecretaryship of Ireland, in the same book, at page 435, Mr. Healy says:
To try to make clear why he was sent home one must delve back to 1885. In that year the Irish Party defeated Gladstone and brought in a Tory Government. Lord Randolph Churchill then promoted an Educational Endowment Act to provide that the income from estates confiscated in Cromwellian times and dedicated to education should not go exclusively to Protestants. The chief endowment came from the wills of Erasmus Smith, who oscillated in belief under the political changes which shook the creeds of sectaries between the execution of Charles I. and the restoration of Charles II. (1649-1660). Lord Randolph passed a Bill which enacted that a Commission should decide how the income of such foundations should be spent, in order to remove the bar which devoted it exclusively to Protestants. His Commission included Lord Justice Fitzgibbon, who was his close friend, and though a leader of Freemasonry, was favourably disposed towards Catholics. Fitzgibbon in 1868 voted (before the Ballot Act) for a candidate favouring the disestablishment of the Protestant Church, but in the case of the Erasmus Smith trust held that, as the founder's intentions were Protestant, his three schools must remain Protestant, although when their needs had been supplied any surplus income from the estates might be spent on technical or agricultural institutions from which the children of Catholics could benefit. A scheme prepared by Professor Dougherty, a Presbyterian clergyman (afterwards Under-Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant), which had the support of the majority of the Commissioners, had been published, but the Act required that the two Judicial Commissioners must concur in approving it: and unfortunately the Second Judicial Commissioner, Judge William O'Brien, a fervent Catholic, would not consult or discuss the matter with Fitzgibbon. Though fiercely pro-British, O'Brien delivered a powerful and learned judgment, on the grievances of Catholics, and maintained that Parliament was bent on repealing every remnant of the Penal Laws. His eloquence was unavailing; and had it been applied in private to his judicial colleague it would have been more effective. By reason of the disagreement between the judges, the Act became a nullity as far as the main endowment was concerned. Fitzgibbon confided to me (when we served together on the Trinity College Estates Commission) that if O'Brien had sought a compromise, he would have awarded a general share of the rentals to Catholic uses.
A learned and determined Catholic priest, Father David Humphreys, P.P., made up the history of the case in pamphlet form, and I, therefore, brought in a Bill to enable the issue on which the judges disagreed to be retried. It seemed a question merely of procedure. Lord Randolph's Act of 1885, which remitted the destination of the endowments to judicial determination, was passed without objection by any Conservative. I could not have foreseen that to give a further "airing" to a legal controversy would provoke an explosion—Gerald Balfour at first opposed my Bill, but one night, very late, he consented reluctantly to withdraw his "block" to the second reading. Thenceforth enemies buzzed round him, and sectarian passion blazed forth. ... He became a "traitor to Protestantism," though his opponents cared as little for the destination of Erasmus Smith's rents as for the evangelization of the Cannibal Islands. Most of them hailed from the North; and were the kernel of the party which in 1920 deserted the Southern Protestants, contrary to the declaration of Colonel Saunderson, M.P., in the debates on Gladstone's Home Rule Bill of 1886, that they would never be forsaken by the Orange leaders.
Further light has been thrown on this matter by the recent biography of Archbishop Walsh. The reference is rather long, and I do not like to give it in full, but it is proved quite clearly that during the time that Lord Justice Fitzgibbon was dealing with the Erasmus Smith Trust Lord Randolph Churchill was in a private correspondence with him. "Churchill, no longer in the Cabinet, collaborated with his friend Fitzgibbon in an abortive scheme to solve the Irish education question by means of a private Bill. The views of Archbishop Walsh were to be a decisive factor in determining the final draft of the measure. In a letter from Lord Randolph Churchill to Lord Justice Fitzgibbon, dated November 21, 1887, the following passages occur:—
1. Draw your Bill as per documents forwarded to me.... For strategic purposes, leave alone Erasmus Smith Incorporated Society, Irish Society, and London Companies, so that if I am troubled by factious opposition from those interests I may threaten reprisals by moving to appropriate radically their resources."
In other words, the British statesmen behind the scenes did not want the question of the Erasmus Smith Schools finally settled. They wanted to use it as a lever afterwards to forward their own political interests. I do not know what justice the Catholic children of these estates could expect from this endowment when we find a man in the position which Churchill held in the British Government asking in what was then a private letter to Lord Justice Fitzgibbon to leave alone the Erasmus Smith endowment for strategic purposes? I have taken up the time of the House at considerable length, but I would like to point out that we, as representing the tenants on the Erasmus Smith estates, scattered over nine counties, appeal to the Government to have a judicial or semi-judicial commission appointed to finish this question of the Erasmus Smith endowment on a satisfactory basis, and if representatives of other religions, and the representatives of Trinity College, would co-operate with us, I think it would be best for themselves in the long run. We are asking nothing but what we are legally and morally entitled to, and I must say that no one can charge me with bigotry in introducing this matter here. I have never been a bigot. Some of my greatest friends are Protestants, and if I have said anything which might touch the feelings of the representatives of Trinity College it is because I feel strongly on this matter. I appeal to the Trinty College representatives here to see that we, the representatives of the Catholic tenants on the Erasmus Smith estates, shall have justice secured to them after the centuries that have passed.
The question of how this Erasmus Smith endowment should be disposed of is obviously entirely a legal question, and in any remarks which I am about to address to the House I do not intend in any way to express any opinion upon one side or the other, because this seems clearly to me to be a matter which must be determined by some tribunal, and which must be determined by a tribunal skilled in law and in the interpretation of documents. There are clearly three ways in which a decision could be arrived at. One would be, if any member of the public considers himself to be aggrieved he could bring the matter into court and have a determination as to how the funds of the Erasmus Smith endowment should be disposed of. Another method would be if the existing governors of the Erasmus Smith Trust at the moment themselves went into court and got from the court an interpretation of the various charters and document under which they hold, and in that way have determined the proper disposal of the funds. The third way would be to set up a judicial commission, because, as I have pointed out, it is only judges could decide this question, which is purely a question of law. The tribunal would have to be a tribunal of three judges selected by the Chief Justice, so that we would have an agreement, and being selected by the Chief Justice, a tribunal like that would be beyond any suspicion of partisanship in any findings it came to.
We have already pointed out to the persons interested, and who are bringing forward this motion, and to the persons interested on behalf of the trustees of the endowment, that these three courses were at present open. If the first course is adopted, that is, action by an aggrieved person, or the second course, action by the Governors, is taken, it would be necessary for the Attorney-General in both these instances to be a party to the suit, and the interests of the public generally would be looked after by the Attorney-General appearing through counsel before the courts. That would be, to my mind, the most satisfactory way really to have this matter determined—that would be an action in the courts. But, if steps are not taken to bring this matter before the courts, if there is delay about bringing this matter before the courts, other considerations would arise. If this matter is not brought before the courts within a reasonable time, and if the promoters of this resolution bring forward a resolution different in terms to this resolution, because it would be setting up a different kind of tribunal, but carrying out in other respects their intentions, we would accept it and give them the fullest assistance. To set up a judicial commission would require a special Act of the Oireachtas. If proceedings are not taken to have this question determined in court— because there is a question to be determined—and if this motion is brought forward in a different form, requesting the Executive Council to take such steps as may be necessary to set up a judicial tribunal, we will introduce the legislation necessary to set up that tribunal. The tribunal which appears to us to be the correct tribunal would be a tribunal of three judges nominated by the Chief Justice. A commission appointed by the Executive Council, as suggested, would not be a satisfactory tribunal, because a commission is not the best way of determining a question of law. You must have a legal tribunal to determine a question of law. I am positively certain that the promoters of this resolution will agree with that. They, I take it are not very much interested in the form of the tribunal, provided it is a completely satisfactory tribunal which will give a just determination upon the question which arises out of the various charters, statutes, and documents which are the title deeds of the Erasmus Smith foundation.
I have not a single word of fault to find with what the Minister has said, or of criticism to make on it. I think he has stated the whole position in a nutshell. These are the three courses which ought to lie before the Dáil. I absolutely agree with his view, that this is entirely and purely a legal matter. I can state with confidence that not a single one of those who are administering the endowment at present would have any wish to hold on to this endowment, if it were legally established that it was not what they clearly and solely believe it to be, a purely Protestant endowment. I can add to what the Minister has said in this respect, that so anxious are those for whom I speak in this matter that a definite decision should be reached on the question, that they have already proceeded to consult counsel as to the possibility of bringing the matter, on their own account, into court. In view of the fact that they have taken that step, without having formally decided yet that they will do so if possible, although I am not able to give a positive statement that they will bring it into court, I have no doubt whatever, and I have the assurance of the Chairman of the Board to that effect also, if the decision of the lawyers on the queries that they have put is favourable as to their powers and possibilities in the matter, that that is the course which they will adopt. I would ask, with the Minister, the proposers to withdraw the motion on that understanding—to see if immediate steps will be taken to get this legal decision reached. If they would so undertake, it would avoid what, I think, would be a very regrettable procedure in this House, namely, that we should have to go through the various statements which have been made, and which really require contradiction, but which will get that contradiction when the matter comes before the courts, and it is much better that that should be done in the courts than in this House, where it is desirable we should avoid, so far as is possible, all sectarian references and unpleasantness.
In saying that I am not to be taken for a moment as admitting that anything that has been said in support of the motion is accepted. These statements are so grossly inaccurate or incomplete to such an extent that that course, I have no doubt whatever, would lead to totally different conclusions from those which have been drawn by those speakers. But, if possible, I wish to avoid going in detail into these remarks, because I think it is very likely, from the history of the agitation over this endowment, that any such contributions or speeches in the House would be likely to produce bad effects rather than good effects.
I do not want anyone to go away from listening to this debate, or from any remarks which I have to make, with the slightest feeling that there is a deisire on anyone's part to hold on to this endowment against the strict interpretation of the law in the matter, or even to cause any delay in the getting of that strict interpretation of the law. I think it would be better for all parties that this matter should be closed by a definite legal opinion, and a decision once and for all reached so that the endowment might be used in the way in which the founder wished it to be used. I deprecate very strongly the attempt that was made to lead us to view this matter from the point of view of the endowment itself being at all connected, except indirectly, with the grant of lands or confiscation of lands in the seventeenth century. I should like, in a very few words, to wipe out, so far as I can, that impression which was attempted to be given to Deputies. The endowment dates from the attempt of a London merchant to invest his money in a way that he was aware was very precarious, by the purchase of lands which had been confiscated.
Or were about to be.
The confiscations of land had nothing whatever to do with the endowment. He thought he was going to get possibly £300 per year out of the investment and he even made allowance in the distribution of that money for what was to happen if it did not produce so much. But to say that the endowment is connected with these confiscation incidents is giving quite a wrong impression of it. I do not want to go, if I can, into controversy about it; I do not want to go in detail through what I believe to be the various sure and substantial grounds on which the Protestant nature of this endowment, and the founder's intentions in regard to it, are, to my mind, apparently clear.
I would not proceed further in that direction at all if I had any assurance that the suggestion made by the Minister for Justice was going to be adopted, and the matter, temporarily at any rate, withdrawn with a view to bringing it up again at some early date if steps such as are desired were not going to be taken. Before I ask definitely if that assurance can be given, so that I might limit my remarks, I do want very definitely to disconnect this question from being a Trinity College question. It is not a Trinity College question at all. Trinity College's interest in the matter at present is confined to something like £150 or £200 a year which it is obliged to receive from the Erasmus Smith endowment under Acts of Parliament. It is not a vital matter to Trinity College if that £150 or £200 a year is withdrawn.
£200 Irish.
£200 Irish, so I am right in saying between £150 and £200 a year. Deputies in this House, and others interested, can count upon the co-operation of Trinity College members in securing justice in this matter. We only desire it shall be justice, but we look for justice in accordance with the founder's clear wishes and intentions. I want those who look at it from that point of view to take every step they can to find out what the founder really desired.
I can easily understand members of the Roman Catholic Faith treating this endowment as something that was an anathema to them. I can understand that point of view. I can understand them saying; "This man gave that money in order to convert, or as they would put it, in order to pervert members of our faith to another faith, and we will have nothing to do with the money at all." I can understand them being indignant with the administrators of the Trust because they did not take steps, in view of the feelings and views of modern days, to see that they could administer the Trust without that expressed wish of the founder being acted upon, but I cannot understand anybody going through the different papers that are available upon this matter and not coming convincingly to the conclusion, as Deputy Hassett himself stated, that the founder of this trust gave the money in order to turn the children of the tenants from being Roman Catholics into being Protestants, and having them taught in the principles of the Protestant faith, and sent up to the University as a result of the education that they received in the schools which were to be set up by this endowment.
Reference has been made to certain points of maladministration which I must refer to briefly. I was immensely surprised, and I read the notice of this motion with very great regret, because it seemed to me that it was regrettable that an attempt should be made to settle this sort of thing in this House. The proper place to settle it, in some way or other, is, as the Minister said, the Courts, but I am bound to say these feelings of surprise and regret were increased rather than lessened by the speeches of the mover of this motion and of Deputy Hassett. The mover of the motion proceeded to accuse the Board of maladministration, in various respects, because they had set up English schools and spent large sums of money upon them, because they had given money to King's Hospital, because they had set up another English school in the form of a High School, and because, I think he said, they had given money to Trinity College. One would think he never read the Act of 1723 which gave the Governors power for the express purpose of spending their surplus money in that respect. Deputies may wonder why this trust, if it was such a clear trust, at the very start was varied by various Acts and Commissions. The history of that is very simple. Instead of the endowment turning out to be a small endowment it turned out to be a very substantial endowment, and there was a very large surplus of money, and these various Acts and successive Charters were Acts and Charters dealing with the disposal of this surplus. Now, unfortunately, that surplus has very largely, if not entirely, disappeared, and it is a question of what is to be done with the original endowment. I do not think that at any stage has there ever been any alteration made by any Act of Parliament or Charter or Commission, or suggestion even, until you come to the Education Commission, for the distribution of those funds as laid down in the original Charter. Commissions sat in 1791, in 1807, in 1813, in 1833, in 1858, in 1870 and 1878.
These Commissions sat and went into this question and not a single one of these Commissions, on which members of both Churches were often represented, found fault with the administration of the trust. Many of them definitely laid down as unquestioned the fact that this was a private endowment in the first place and a private endowment for the benefit of the Protestant Church in the second. Even the doubt to which the Minister has referred, namely, that in the Education Commission there were two judges giving opposite opinions, only arose because of the death of Mr. Justice Nash who was the Roman Catholic legal member of the Endowment Commission. The Judicial Commissioners were Lord Justice Fitzgibbon and Mr. Justice Nash, and both these Commissioners had already, in the clearest way, agreed as to the private character of the endowment and to its Protestant nature, and that agreement of theirs appears on the Minutes of that Commission dated 14th January, 1890. The words are clear:—
"That the endowments in question were of private origin; that it was the intention of the founder that the schools and their government should be Protestant in their character, and that a draft scheme should be settled upon this basis."
That was the conclusion arrived at by the two original Judicial Commissioners appointed under the Education Endowments Act, 1885, and it was only the death of Mr. Justice Nash that led to the difference of opinion that occurred when Mr. Justice O'Brien was appointed to succeed him. As the matter stands at present, there have been three judges expressing their views—two of them, one a Protestant and one a Roman Catholic—expressing the view that the matter was unmistakable, and the third differing. But so far as there is any doubt regarding the matter, let it be settled by all means in the proper place, where the question of law can be argued and debated in a purely legal way.
With reference to the further remarks that were made as to the allocation of moneys to Trinity College, it is only necessary to say about that, I think, that the moneys referred to as grants for premises were given for a very definite purpose, namely, to help in building rooms for a quid pro quo that was going to be received. It was, that the scholars who were sent to Trinity College by the Governors of the Erasmus Smith Schools might live in these rooms free of rent, and that has been carefully and accurately observed since. The grants of money were really to provide rooms in which scholars coming from the Erasmus Smith schools might live without being charged rent. Instead of being a grant to Trinity College, if you like, it was an investment of the endowment moneys. But it is an utter misrepresentation to say that Trinity College has been subsidised, because the proceeds of the money are nil. The rooms are allotted to scholars coming from the Erasmus Smith schools and rent is not charged for those rooms in the way it is charged to ordinary students. There were other grants which were not quite on that basis, but all the grants were made specifically in accordance with the Act of Parliament of 1723.
I have not a shadow of doubt that a legal investigation would acquit the Board of maladministration in any way. It is worth while mentioning that the English schools, to which reference has been made, which were also set up in accordance with that Act of Parliament, have now almost ceased to exist as schools under the Board. All these buildings have been handed over to the State, and in almost every instance are now national schools, belonging to the State. But the English schools were schools built out of surplus moneys, and not out of the original endowment. I would like very much if I could to refrain from going into the sectarian question which was raised as to the intentions of the founder, and if I could get any kind of suggestion from Deputy Fahy, as the mover of the motion, that the motion is likely to be withdrawn I would not enter into that question.
Those who instigated the introduction of this motion would probably agree to the course suggested by the Minister for Justice, but I am largely in the position of counsel who has not the opportunity of immediately consulting his clients. I would ask that I should be left free to decide that on Wednesday, which I could do in five minutes' time, on getting in touch with those who are chiefly concerned.
Would I be in order in moving that the debate be adjourned?
Then I move the adjournment of the debate.