I have to suggest that to say that "it is not by virtue of the resolution of this Dáil," is to suggest that this Dáil had no option but to pass the resolution. Now that might be said about every line and letter of the Constitution. It was made perfectly clear here that anything that was put up in that Constitution was put up for consideration of the Dáil, and the Dáil was perfectly free to do what it liked in the matter. It did certain things, and amongst other things it passed this resolution. If it had not passed this resolution the money could not have been paid. I merely put it that it is not calculated to increase the dignity of this Parliament to suggest that it was not a deliberative assembly, and had not a choice. It had the choice with regard to the Constitution, and with regard to every clause of it, the choice that it had further back last December in the matter of the Treaty. But we here in this building discussed the matter. We were free to consider all the consequences, and we were free to come to our own decision both with regard to the Treaty and with regard to the Constitution. To those who were putting forward the Constitution, and were standing for it, it was urged that in this particular matter you might very well by standing on small points, by showing a difficult thorny disposition, lose something that was more than a point of wording, more than a point of phraseology, more than a point of abstract, of academic aesthetics, and that you might lose the selection that would be approved by the majority of the people of the country for that particular position.
Now there was a disposition on the other side, when the late Mr. Griffith and myself were across negotiating, to be thorny on this matter on the grounds that it was the one thing they had left, that they had abandoned everything else, and that for them this was a valuable point, as for us it was the objectionable point of the Treaty. That was the view they were entitled to take up, and we merely advised the Dáil that not giving way to their inclination with regard to those particular Clauses, and showing a rather truculent outlook on that matter, might not be the height of political wisdom. The Dáil considered the representations that were made, and decided on a particular thing. It is not true that they were not free to decide otherwise. They were free, but they had decided this way, and it is by virtue of their resolutions that those things are set out now, they having considered representations made to them by those standing for the Constitution.
