Charles Kickham on Debt Defaulters

Writing to a friend in 1881, Kickham, Chairman of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (better known as "the Fenians"):

Apropos of the banks - the Irish World wants to abolish credit - no power to recover debts, no interest, no gold or silver currency, merely green-backs issued by the State.

Some may think that this reform may be helped in Ireland by the refusal to pay debts. But people who refuse to pay lawful debts next take what they want. The law that is prevailing in the case of debts will be equally so a case of robbery.

'Tis no joke to appeal to the lower instincts of an enslaved people. That's what these Land agitators have been doing all along.

Disclosure: Kickham was a cousin of one of my great-great-grandfathers.