If there be, as is certainly the case, a fair doubt as to what is meant by the supremacy of Parliament, let the doubt be cleared up.

This is required by the dictates both of expediency and of honour.

Meanwhile we may assume that the supremacy of Parliament, or the 'supreme authority of Parliament,' means in substance the kind of sovereignty which Parliament exercises, or claims to exercise, in every part of the British Empire.
For the maintenance of such supremacy, be it valuable or be it worthless, Great Britain pays a heavy price.

For the sake of 'an outward and visible sign of Imperial supremacy' we retain eighty Irish members in the Imperial Parliament.[35] B._The Retention of the Irish Members in the Imperial Parliament_ This is now[36] an essential, or at least a most important part of the ministerial policy for Ireland, yet it is a proposal which even its advocates must find difficult of defence.

In 1886 every Gladstonian leader told us that it was desirable, politic, and just to exclude Irish members from the Parliament at Westminster; this exclusion was pressed upon England (plausibly enough) as a main advantage to be derived from the concession of Home Rule to Ireland.