And now a clause
in the second bill, binding the Irish Parliament to reenact the
Navigation Laws existing in England, called up an opposition from
Grattan[132] as furious as that with which Mr. Brownlow had denounced
the original measure. To demand the enactment of the English Navigation
Law, he declared, was "a revocation of the constitution;" and his rival,
Flood, in his zeal to emulate his popularity with the mob, surpassing
him in vehemence, inveighed against the clause, as one intended to make
the Irish Parliament a mere register of the English Parliament, "which
it should never become". All the arguments brought forward in favor of
the measure by the supporters of the government--arguments which,
probably, no one would now be found to deny to have been
unanswerable--failed to make the slightest impression on a House in
which the chief object of each opponent of the ministry seemed to be to
outrun his fellows in violence; and eventually the measure fell to the
ground, and for fifteen years more Ireland was deprived of the
advantages which had been intended for her.
And even yet the danger from the Volunteers was not wholly extinguished.
Though their Convention had been suppressed, its leaders had only
changed their tactics. Under the guidance of a Dublin ironmonger, named
Napper Tandy, they now proposed to convene a Congress, to consist, not,
as before, of delegates from the Volunteer body, but of persons who
should be representatives of the entire nation; and Tandy had even the
audacity to issue circulars to the sheriffs of the different counties,
to require them, in their official capacity, to summon the people to
return representatives to this Congress.
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