University of Wisconsin Superior - Gitche Gumee Yearbook (Superior, WI)

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CARI. H. DALLY

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GITCHE GUM EE Page 6 EDNA E. PARK. Domestic Science. DR. C. J. ROLLEFSON. Physiology- Medical Impeciion. IRENE CURTIS. Music. MARION PIERCE. Pliysicnl Tmining for Women. GEORGE E. KEOGAN. Physical Training for Men. HELEN A. HILL. Clerk. ATHALIE DIFFOR. Awiftam Librarian. RAE SCHNEIDER. Assistant Clerk.

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GI TONE CUM EE V 8 IRELAND AND HOME RULE The stage on which the tragedy of Irish life is being acted is a country ‘‘piteously eloquent of its hapless history. It is an island about two-thirds the size of Wisconsin, one great farm of romantic hills and picturesque fields which sorely need the touch of the husbandman. The pathetic record of its political mismanagement is written in the dilapidated cottages which clot its plains and valleys, and in the drooping shoulders of its men grown old in servitude. “Always and everywhere one feels the brooding presence of the lives that have been lived, of the history made, and of the problems remorselessly bequeathed.” Into this island, one beautiful May morning in the twelfth century, came Henry II. of England on a conquest for land. He plundered the farmhouses where contented peasants lived in simple happiness, and left the island a desert marked by ditches containing the bodies of thousands of martyrs. From this visitation dates the beginning of Ireland's most difficult problem—the problenv of the land; for, during the next six centuries, practically all of the tillable land of the island was taken from the people by force, and conferred upon the titled and adventurous favorites of the crown of England. And to-day this condition is no better. The tillers of the soil, comprising eight-tenths of the people, own but one-tenth of the land, and that the poorest soil of the island. Within an hour’s ride of these impoverished districts where starving humanity suffers, slaves, and slowly dies on stony hillsides, are thousands of acres of beautiful rolling fields of green upon which graze bur a few scattered herds of cattle. The land laws permitting the existence of such conditions arc the most unjust that ever disgraced any statute book in a civilized country. Nor is this the only evil condition in the little island. Equally pernicious is the system of administration and taxation. With a population about the same as Scotland, Ireland is forced to maintain a police system twice as large, and to pay five million dollars more for its maintenance. Her judicial system costs her one million a year more. The cost of her total civil government amounts to nearly twice as much, and she enjoys the privilege of supporting five times as many officials. That Ireland, in proportion to her ability, is paying fourteen million dollars too much annually, is the verdict of a commission appointed a few years ago to investigate her condition. England overtaxes Ireland, she inflicts her with vast unnecessary burdens, she squeezes out of her about twice as much, in proportion to her means, as she exacts from her own countrymen, and the net result of the whole is an increasing loss. The indignation of Ireland’s sympathizers is further aroused by the chaotic condition of her school system. Poorly equipped schools costing less than the amount paid for her police system, underfed and undertrained teachers administering a curriculum wholly divorced from the economic needs and realities of the country; and to crown all, a National Hoard of educational amateurs insensible to Irish ideas:— such are the prominent features of the Irish system of education. In our country, the first lesson that the young American learns is to love ar.d cherish the stars and stripes. He is told of the Father of his Country ar.d of the great Emancipator.