The Tithe Question in Ireland

The late discussion in the British Parliament, on the condition of Ireland, in reference to the Tithe System, has brought forth some detailed statements of the real nature and pressure of that system upon the people of that country, which we do not recollect to have met with before. The census book compiled by the Catholic Association is the source from which most of the facts are derived, and judging from the extracts we have seen, a more grinding, unjust, and indefensible extortion could scarcely be devised, by individual malice and rapacity, than that by which the substance of the whole Irish people is taken from them to support a religious establishment, which does not comprehend much more than one tenth of the population. It may be remarked that the census book of the Association is founded upon returns made for every parish in the country, by the Catholic Clergymen, and that their correctness is beyond dispute. We have selected a few of the facts which it gives, as specimens of operation of the system, and the injustice and manifest oppression which it effects. We commence with the lightest of abuses.

In three parishes in the diocese of Armagh, the census gives the number of Catholics,– 11,626,– of those not Catholics, 6,089. Of this last number, the members of the established church, for whose benefit alone the tithes, &c. are levied, may be one half, or about three thousand. For the benefit of this three thousand, the other fourteen thousand are burdened to pay £1,383 per annum for tithes, and other charges of glebe lands, churches, &c. amounting to £2,000 per annum.

These, however, glaring as is the injustice, are favorable, compared with most of the other cases. The disproportion of catholics to protestants, though so obviously great, is fair and decent contrasted with many other parishes. For example, in three parishes of the diocese of Ferns, the catholics are to the protestants, as 17,520 to 1,517, about half of whom belong to the establishment, and the tithes alone are £2,675. In Doneraile the catholics are 11,707, all others 413, — tithes £1,600.– In Kildorrery, the catholics are 5,578, all others 74, tithes not stated. In another parish the catholics are 5,960,– all others 84;– tithes £760.– In another, the catholics are 5,070,– all others 38;– tithes &c £1,165. In another, the catholics are 7,441; — all others 127; –tithes £1,600. In another, the catholics are 2,798; –all others 72;–tithes £1,081. To all these amounts must be added, glebes, houses for clergymen, churches, &c.

But stronger cases of oppression are yet to be found. In Kinvana, the Catholics are 4,376 in number, and all others but two! )the clergyman and his wife probably) The tithes are £360 a year– raised entirely from catholics,– and in Killmoon, the catholics were 779,– and others none,– tithes £300 per annum.

Such are a few specimens of the operation of the “Establishment” in Ireland, — the effects of which have so much impoverished the Irish people, alienated their feelings, under an exasperated sense of perpetual oppression and plunder, and have now led them into combination for defeating the laws, and redressing their own wrongs by violence. Surely, they will have the sympathies of all lovers of political and religious freedom.
[Baltimore American.