Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 15 Dec 1925

Vol. 13 No. 19

TREATY (CONFIRMATION OF AMENDING AGREEMENT) BILL, 1925—THIRD STAGE.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Before we take up this Order, I would like to make some remarks about the principles of order in general, and some specific directions, perhaps, for the debates that may take place in Committee to-day. It is my ambition to be able to take up the Official Report of a day's proceedings, and not to find in it any remarks from the Ceann Comhairle. My ambition was not realised last week, on any day, and I am endeavouring now, since it is my settled policy not to intervene, if it can possibly be helped, to make this intervention do duty for the whole day.

In discussion on the Second Reading of a Bill a certain latitude is allowed, and on the discussion of a very important measure, such as this is—a measure which is undoubtedly one of first class importance—considerable latitude is allowed. I think Deputies will agree that, last week, very considerable latitude was allowed.

In Committee, the principle of a Bill having been accepted, the Committee considers the details and machinery— that is, speaking generally. On Report, in theory, at any rate, the Dáil is considering what has been done in Committee, and, on the Fifth Stage, the Dáil is considering the Bill, as a whole, and the discussion is confined to what is in the Bill, not to what Deputies would like to have seen in the Bill.

So much for general principles. Besides that, I would like to define a few things, out of many, which will not be in order in Committee to-day. I begin with Pontius Pilate; Irish history in general, and the history of the Boundary Question, or what is known as the Partition question in particular; the Boundary Commission; the Boundary Commissioners, including our own Commissioner, will be out of order. The Irish Party will be out of order. Buckingham Place Conference will be out of order; so will the Rising of 1916; the Sinn Fein Party, the Cumann na nGaedheal Party, the Republican Party, the Labour Party, the Farmers' Party, not excluding the Farmers' Union; Group of Independent Deputies, not excluding any Deputy who may or may not be a member of that group.

It will not be in order to refer to "the magnificent achievements of the Executive Council, which deserve the general support of all true Irishmen." It will be equally out of order to refer to "the gross ineptitude of the Executive Council, against which all patriotic citizens should revolt," and, last but not least, the Shannon scheme, in all its bearings, with all its works and pomps, will be out of order.

Mr. GOREY

There is nothing left.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

There is left a very important thing—the Bill. I hope the discussion will be confined to the Bill, and I hope I will be able to read the account of the debate without seeing myself interfering in it any more after this.

SECTION 1.

The Agreement set forth in the schedule to this Act, being an Agreement amending and supplementing the Treaty of 1921, is hereby confirmed and the said Treaty of 1921 shall have effect accordingly.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

With regard to amendment 4, it is simply declaratory. I take it Deputy Esmonde will agree that his point will arise on Deputy Magennis's amendment at the beginning.

Mr. ESMONDE

Do I understand, sir, you consider my amendment is out of order?

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Yes.

Mr. ESMONDE

While I bow to your ruling, I do not agree that it has exactly the same bearing as Deputy Magennis's.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

I did not say "exactly."

Professor MAGENNIS

I move as an amendment:—

Section 1: In line 17 after the word "Agreement" to insert the words "entered into between the Governments of Great Britain and Ireland (the parties to the Treaty of 1921) and subscribed on behalf of the Government of Northern Ireland" and before the words "Treaty of 1921" to insert the word "said."

The purpose of this amendment is to make it clear and unmistakable that notwithstanding anything that may appear to the contrary, from any interpretation of this Agreement Bill, we do not, as a matter of fact, and do not intend to be taken as entering into Treaty relations with the Six County Government. The Bill, and more particularly the schedule, refers to a conference, to agreement and goodwill reached as a result of the conference, and to the Articles of Agreement, apparently issuing from that, on behalf of the Six County Government to which the signatories have set their hand.

It might appear, inasmuch as this is to take effect, when passed by both Houses of the Oireachtas, as part and parcel of the original Treaty, that the Six County Government in some measure or to some extent becomes a party to the Treaty. I have introduced these words to read with Section 1:— After the word "Agreement" to insert the words "entered into between the Governments of Great Britain and Ireland (the parties to the Treaty of 1921) and subscribed on behalf of the Government of Northern Ireland," and before the words "Treaty of 1921" to insert the word "said." That is to say, the section, as so amended, would read:—

"The Agreement set forth in the Schedule to this Act being an Agreement entered into between the Governments of Great Britain and Ireland (the parties to the Treaty of 1921) and subscribed on behalf of the Government of Northern Ireland amending and supplementing the said Treaty of 1921"...

I submit that with these words, whatever ambiguity might exist in the mind of a reader of this Bill would be removed. At any rate, the purpose of the amendment is that it should be clearly set out in the first section of the Bill, as it passes through our Parliament, that the high contracting parties to the Treaty, which for convenience I call Treaty No. 2, are as before the high contracting parties to the original Treaty No. 1, and that while the Northern Government is brought into this and referred to, and actually signs what is set out in this Bill as its Schedule, that that in no way involves an admission on our part that they are parties to the Treaty.

The Act of 1920, which set up the Northern Government as the Government over a certain area set out in that Act, north of the Border-line, is still effective in so far as it has not been repealed. Under that Act the Parliament which sits in Belfast is a subordinate Parliament, and the Six-County area over which it is the legislature is a subordinate province under the Imperial Parliament at Westminster. In 1917 that was precisely the position of what is now known as the Union of South Africa. It was declared so by General Smuts in a speech at the Imperial Conference of 1917. Between 1917 and 1920 constitutional developments went on so rapidly as regards the status of Canada that in 1920 the absolute equality of nationhood of all states in the British Commonwealth was declared officially by Lord Milner on behalf of the British Government in these words:—

"The United Kingdom and the Dominions are partner nations, not yet indeed of equal power, but for good and all of equal status."

One of the arguments used by Sir Robert Borden, who, as everyone is aware, is the most distinguished of all protagonists in the fight for the recognition of the equal nationhood of Canada, was that the very fact of Canada being called upon to enter into treaty relations at the peace settlement in Paris and subscribing in its own right to the Treaty of Versailles was world-wide recognition of its equal nationhood, its equal status with Great Britain. Now, what I dread is, rightly or wrongly, that this Agreement will have set in train agencies which will ultimately enable the Six County subordinate province to be declared a dominion. One of the arguments on behalf of Treaty No. 1 was that the mere fact of Great Britain, the Imperial Government, having entered into Treaty relations with this country, was in itself a recognition of our nationhood, and that whatever we might dislike in this or that particular of the Treaty, at any rate there was that much gained, that much to the good.

It has been repeatedly stated by publicists who write in the interests of the Six County Government status that it is a State, and not so long ago a leading article in the "Irish Times" referred to it as "the youngest of our dominions." I do not attack the "Irish Times"; I regard the "Irish Times" as one of the finest of our journals, and its leading articles are always able, masterly, and actuated by a spirit of fair play and justice. But it was the organ of those who opposed the claims of Ireland, and it still retains, and I will say, unmistakably exhibits traces of its former political position. The claim is made that the Six County Government is a Statelet, and alternately that it is not a Statelet but a full-blown dominion. If it is a dominion it has equal nationhood and is a co-equal partner, and if that were so, partition in excelsis would have been created. Whatever may be the view and the hopes of the advocates of Northern Ireland, at any rate it is incumbent upon us to make it clear that while a majority vote carries this Agreement, there is not implied in that, even to the remotest extent, any of the implications which it is sought to put into it by those who advocate the growth in status of the Six County Government.

It may be said that my words are unnecessary; it may be alleged that they are not requisite for the purpose I have in view. At any rate, they are suggested as an amendment in the sincere belief that an explicit declaration as to what is the real relation in this document of the signature on behalf of the Northern Government should be made on our part. It is in the Schedule, "Signed on behalf of the Government of Northern Ireland." That is merely to indicate that though, under the control as a suzerain of the Imperial Parliament at Westminster, they agreed to this in so far as they are affected. I take it that because they claimed in regard to Article XII. of the original Treaty they were not bound because they were not privy, that now the effort is made, by having their signature subscribed to this document, to bind them. But it is one thing to bind a subordinate province to an agreement entered into on its behalf by the Government to which it is subordinate, and another thing to argue from the fact of its signature being an element in the document that it has acquired a status that, but for that, it could not lay claim to. Many people are impressed by the fact that portion of the ratification of this Agreement, part of the process of the ratification, has been the submission of the document to the Parliament in Belfast, that everything that has been done in Westminster has, in effect, been done in Belfast, and the impression may be left in the public mind that the necessity for its being done in Belfast was on all fours with the necessity for its being done in Westminster. It will allay a great deal of apprehension and it will clarify many minds otherwise disturbed to have it declared here and declared in the other House of the Oireachtas, that we do not regard this Treaty No. 2 as having more than two high contracting parties, those who were the contracting parties to the original Agreement, to wit, Great Britain and Ireland.

The PRESIDENT

This Agreement which is set out in the schedule is governed by Clause 6 of that schedule which really disposes of the whole of the case we have just listened to. Last week we had a considerable amount of English and this week we are getting more. It is not the extent of the English that exists in an enactment or statute of the Oireachtas, but rather the stuff that is in it, that really counts. This is really a Treaty between Great Britain and the Irish Free State. That is made clear in the last clause of the Agreement in the Schedule which provides for the ratification of the Agreement by the British Parliament and the Oireachtas. There was a reason, an excellent reason, for having the Treaty signed on behalf of Northern Ireland, because Northern Ireland was affected, but the Parliament of Northern Ireland was not set out in the instrument as one of the parties to the Agreement which would require to pass legislation.

As far as the dominion question is concerned, it is expressly provided by the Treaty of 1921 that the provisions of the Government of Ireland Act would continue to apply to Northern Ireland. These provisions have not been altered except in relation to the Council of Ireland, and it is quite clear, I think, on the face of it, that Northern Ireland is not a dominion. Dominions do not send representatives to the British Parliament. Northern Ireland does. I think that is a sufficient answer and these are the objections which I register as far as this amendment is concerned.

Mr. JOHNSON

The President has not justified the insertion of the signatures of Sir James Craig on behalf of Northern Ireland, and Charles H. Blackmore, Secretary to the Cabinet of Northern Ireland, on behalf of Northern Ireland. If it were an agreement only and, on the face of it, between the Government of the Irish Free State and the Government of Great Britain, then on the face of it there would be no necessity for these third signatures. It will be noted that the Agreement was signed on behalf of the British Government, on behalf of the Government of the Irish Free State, and on behalf of the Government of Northern Ireland, each treated on an equality so far as the signature goes, it not being apparent that the signatures of the representatives of the Northern Ireland Government are associated with either the British Government or the Irish Free State Government. If it could be said that the signature on behalf of the British Government was five British Ministers and Sir James Craig, that could be understood, or if it was said that the signature was on behalf of the Government of the Irish Free State, treating the Irish Free State as Ireland, as the Treaty expressly provided for, and that Sir James Craig was speaking on behalf of Ireland in association with the Ministers of the Free State, that could be understood, but I am not yet able to understand why the three groups of signatures should apply, and I agree that there is a danger that it may be misinterpreted in the future.

I am supported in that view by a recent statement of the Premier of Northern Ireland. He said that the two States were by this Agreement co-equal so far as all the services were concerned. A statement of that kind may not have any legal effect, but, nevertheless, it indicates a state of mind, and if that is the view of the Premier of Northern Ireland it would be well if we inserted in the Bill some provision which would ensure that in our view at any rate the Agreement that is referred to is an agreement between the Governments of Great Britain and of Ireland, the parties to the original Treaty.

I take the view that Ministers are not thinking very seriously of the constitutional position and that they entered upon this Agreement and upon the method of confirming the Agreement without sufficient regard to the constitutional implications. I think this amendment of Deputy Magennis would, at least, be one effort made to safeguard the constitutional position of the Free State.

Mr. ESMONDE

Perhaps it would clarify matters if the President would be willing to answer now the same question which I asked him on the Second Reading—it would clarify matters in connection with this amendment —as to whether it is the intention of the Executive Council to register this Agreement at the League of Nations, and if so, how this Agreement is to be described, whether it is to be described as an Agreement as between Great Britain and Ireland, as the former Treaty was, or by what other title it will be described. The President is doubtless aware that the State has formally undertaken and promised to register all its international agreements and engagements of every kind at the League of Nations. Furthermore, it has agreed that any international engagement which is not so registered shall not be binding. If this agreement is not registered, we will be faced by the curious situation that the Government, by accepting the covenants of the League of Nations, has bound itself to the previous Treaty but has declared that the subsequent amending Treaty is not binding. If the President would answer the question I put him during the previous debate, it would clear matters in connection with this amendment.

The PRESIDENT

The answer to the question as to whether the Government intends to register this Treaty at Geneva, is in the affirmative. As regards the particular description of it, I cannot answer.

Professor MAGENNIS

I am glad the President has brought out clearly what is in the mind of the Executive Council by referring to Article 6 of the Schedule. As a matter of fact, the marginal note that I have made on Section 6 of the Schedule is my amendment. I am quite alive to the fact that Article 6 declares that this Agreement is subject to confirmation by the British Parliament and by the Oireachtas of the Irish Free State, but let us not forget that it was, likewise, confirmed by the Northern Parliament, and furthermore the signatures following the date—"the 3rd day of December, 1925"—are set out as if on an equality. The only objection, therefore, to my amendment is that it dots the i's and crosses the t's, for the purposes of our nationals, of all that is signified by Article 6 of the Schedule. The important thing is that the Schedule is common to the ratifying documents or instruments of the other two Parliaments, whereas, as I conceive, this portion to which I am moving my amendment is our expression. To me, it seems not merely desirable but most advisable to utilise this portion to express our mind in unmistakable language with regard to what is the character of the new Treaty—that this is an amendment of the original Treaty and that the parties thereto are the original parties; notwithstanding the introduction of a third Government signature, that that signature is merely subscribed so as to make the Government in question bound by whatever refers to it in the instrument. If, however, the House is satisfied to have it recorded in the official transactions of the Dáil that the President has declared that the meaning—I take it that is the only possible meaning of Section 6—is that the Agreement is subject to confirmation by the British Parliament and by the Oireachtas of the Irish Free State and not subject to confirmation by any other, then, of course, I should be merely arguing for what others would call a surplusage of words. But I am not quite sure yet that the President would say that the formula here—"This Agreement is subject to confirmation by the British Parliament and by the Oireachtas of the Irish Free State"—carries with it the meaning that it is not subject to confirmation by any other Parliament or any other State. The value that I claim for the amendment is that it sets out distinctly that the reason why the confirmation requisite is merely the confirmation of those two Powers is because they alone are the contracting parties and that the other party merely subscribes in its subordinate capacity.

Amendment put.

The Committee divided. Tá, 21. Níl 42.

Tá

• Pádraig Baxter.
• Seán Buitléir.
• Séamus Eabhróid.
• Osmond Grattan Esmonde.
• David Hall.
• Connor Hogan.
• Tomás Mac Eoin.
• Pádraig Mac Fhlannchadha.
• Risteárd Mac Liam.
• Liam Mag Aonghusa.
• Patrick J. Mulvany.
• Tomás de Nógla.
• Ailfrid O Broin.
• Tomás O Conaill.
• Aodh O Cúlacháin.
• Liam O Daimhín.
• Donnchadh O Guaire.
• Mícheál O hIfearnáin.
• Pádraic O Máille.
• Domhnall O Muirgheasa.
• Nicholas Wall.

Níl

• Earnán Altún.
• Earnán de Blaghd.
• Thomas Bolger.
• Séamus Breathnach.
• Próinsias Bulfin.
• John J. Cole.
• Bryan R. Cooper.
• Sir James Craig.
• John Daly.
• Máighréad Ní Choileain Bean
• Uí Dhrisceóil.
• Desmond Fitzgerald.
• John Hennigan.
• Patrick Leonard.
• Liam Mac Cosgair.
• Maolmhuire Mac Eochadha.
• Pádraig Mac Fadáin.
• Patrick McGilligan.
• Seoirse Mac Niocaill.
• Liam Mac Sioghaird.
• Pádraig Mag Ualghairg.
• Peadar O hAodha.
• Mícheál O hAonghusa.
• Seán O Bruadair.
• Risteárd O Conaill.
• Parthalán O Conchubhair.
• Conchubhar O Conghaile.
• Máirtín O Conalláin.
• Séamus O Cruadhlaoich.
• Séamus O Dóláin.
• Peadar O Dubhghaill.
• Eamon O Dúgáin.
• Aindriú O Láimhín.
• Séamus O Leadáin.
• Fionán O Loingsigh.
• Risteárd O Maolchatha.
• Séamus O Murchadha.
• Pádraig O hOgáin (Gaillimh).
• Pádraig O hOgáin (Luimneach).
• Máirtín O Rodaigh.
• Seán O Súilleabháin.
• Caoimhghín O hUigín.
• Patrick W. Shaw.

Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Esmonde and Morrissey. Níl: Deputies Dolan and Sears.

Amendment declared lost.

Motion made:—"That Section 1 stand part of the Bill."

Mr. JOHNSON

I do not know to what extent the ruling that you have given would prevent a discussion on the merits of the schedule, but I would point out that the schedule itself creates, as between the Twenty-six Counties constituting the Free State, and the Six Counties constituting Northern Ireland, a severance greater than the severance as between Ireland and Great Britain. There are in the House men, if not women, who have declared themselves in the past separatists, who advocated independence, who applauded the phrase which is attributed to Parnell about severing the last link which bound Ireland to the British Empire. The Treaty of which this is intended to be an amendment arrived at certain relationships between Ireland and the British Empire, but this Agreement severs, in a way which the Treaty of 1921 does not, any connecting link between the Free State and the Six Northern counties. You have the clean cut that the separatists preached and advocated, brought into operation, not as between Great Britain and Ireland but as between six and twenty-six counties out of Ireland's thirty-two. There is not left even a symbol of unity or of union between the Six Counties and the rest of Ireland. There is not a judge or a court of justice left as a link, unless, forsooth, it is to be said that the judicial committee of the Privy Council is now the bond of union, or is it to be said that the bond of union is the King? If that is said, then the symbol of unity as between the Six Counties and the Twenty-six Counties is only the same as that between the Twenty-six Counties and Australia, or South Africa, or India. There is no other bond of union. You have, as I say, a severance cleaner than any separatist ever thought likely to come in his lifetime between Ireland and Great Britain, but that severance, that cut, is between Ireland and six of its counties. Between the people of the Twenty-six Counties and the people of the Six Counties, if this Agreement becomes law, as no doubt it will, there will be no political union. The last link will have been severed, and I wonder whether the separatists who may be here are pleased with the operation. This is the outcome of their separatist propaganda. This is the outcome of the demand for a separate and independent Republic. It is well that we should understand what is the effect of the passing of this section of the Bill.

I am taking this opportunity to draw attention to the facts that are revealed by any proper examination of the situation. You had in the Treaty a certain position arrived at, which did not sever the Northern counties from the twenty-six counties. The President said on Thursday that in certain eventualities the Treaty provided for partition, the severance, the clean cut. I deny that and I would ask any member on the Government benches to tell us what they think would have been the position in the Dáil of 1921-22 had the position, that they now say was embodied in the Treaty, been revealed to the men and women who then were discussing the acceptance or rejection of the Treaty. Had it been revealed that, in certain circumstances which were implicit in the Treaty, the clean cut was involved we would have had no Treaty. There was, of course, the provision of Article XII. which provided for a Boundary Commission, and there was a second provision which provided for the continuance of one of the provisions of the 1920 Act, that is, the Council of Ireland. This was the second barrier against partition, and against the clean cut, but now we are told that there was implicit in the Treaty, in certain eventualities, the complete severance of the six counties, eventualities which were not unexpected, which were threatened and avowed on the part of the Northern Government. We were told quite clearly and explicitly by Sir Edward Carson, as well as by others, that in one hour after the Treaty had become ratified the Northern Government would decide to opt out. That was said before there was any ratification or approval of the Treaty. Yet we are calmly told by the President, with an audacity which I never expected to hear anywhere, that there was implicit in the Treaty, in certain eventualities, complete and absolute severance. Had either the Dáil or the people at that time been told by those who were proposing and supporting as well as by those who were condemning, the Treaty, that there was implicit in the Treaty this complete and absolute severance, there is not a single member of the Dáil would dare to say that the Treaty would have had a majority of votes in January, 1922.

The separatists in the House will, however, understand now that they are separating the Six Counties from the Irish Free State clearly and absolutely, in a way far more direct and definite, far more nearly absolute, than is the position of Ireland or the Free State as compared with Great Britain. It is said, of course, that ultimate unity is more likely to be achieved by the provisions and working out of this Agreement. I will not risk your displeasure, sir, by arguing that point, but I would say that that was the argument of those who said that Ireland and Great Britain would, by virtue of their ordinary commercial and social communications, be bound to be one political unit, and that they would inevitably come together as one political unit. The question of nationality and national life was not supposed to enter into it.

The implications of this section approving of this Treaty are that all the denials of the two-nations theory, which are contained in the Government's handbook on the Ulster question, were so much fudge, that there is there admittedly now existing in this island two nations which ought not to be brought into one political unity, or ought not remain one political unit. but that, so far as this Agreement will secure it, so far as it can be secured by political action of this Dáil, the severance is going to be complete and we are to trust to the chances of social and commercial associations to bring about political unity. How any advocate of Irish independence can argue that way in respect of Ireland when they deny it in respect of England and Ireland I cannot understand. However, it is all embodied in this Section 1, which the House is asked by the Minister to approve.

Hopes have been expressed by Ministers of the North that Ireland will be united, and the symbol of unity is to be the Union Jack, and the not-an-inch policy, of course, will find its expression in that very resolutely and very definitely. The assurances of goodwill and concord, of course, will be given due value, but we must not forget the avowal of Sir James Craig that there was no necessity for any such protestation on his part, that, so far as the Nationalist and Catholic population of the North is concerned, they have had equal and fair treatment, and he really puts his position quite clearly when he says that it is of vast importance that the Free State Government was desirous of working in more harmonious relationship with the North. It is the Free State Government that is showing its desire now to work more harmoniously with the North. If there is not any promise of any more harmonious working from that side, the blame and responsibility rest with the Free State Government. That may, or may not, be true. It really does not matter on whose shoulders lies the responsibility for the absence of harmonious working in the past. We do know that there has been a clearly expressed determination on the past of the Northern Government that they would not come under the jurisdiction of an Irish Parliament, that they would not allow their people to be ruled by any Parliament for the whole of Ireland, and their demand for the recognition of Ulster's "nationality," for the severance from the control of Ireland. The acceptance by the people of Ireland of that policy of renunciation of Ireland is now being confirmed by this State and this Parliament. I hope the separatists, the Irish Nationalists, those who always thought and taught that Ireland was a nation and that Ireland should be a united people with a united Government, with a single political authority covering the whole country, are pleased with the work which is being done in their name.

Professor MAGENNIS

Those of us who oppose this measure are described by the Press and by supporters of the Government as disruptionists. Let us examine the so-called amending of the Treaty, that is spoken of in Section 1 as amending and supplementing the Treaty of 1921. How many of those who support this have adverted to the fact that Article 1 of the Treaty is cancelled? It is stated in the Schedule, which is covered by this Section 1, that Article XII. is revoked as regards certain things, and that Article V. is no longer obligatory on the Free State. There is no mention whatever of the effect of the Agreement on Article I. It reads: "Ireland"—not the Irish Free State, not the Twenty-six Counties, not any other designation whatsoever, but "Ireland"—"shall have the same constitutional status in the Community of Nations, etc., with a Parliament having powers to make laws for the peace, order, and good government of Ireland." What becomes of that provision of the Treaty? Ireland we contended, and at that time we were all one, had as its value as a designation reference to the geographical and historic entity, not the 26 Counties but the entire of Ireland, and all the area and all the people within the four seas of Ireland. Ireland has no other meaning and could have no other meaning. It was never until now contended that it had another meaning.

The moment this becomes an Act will there be the possibility of the provision of a Parliament for all Ireland? On the contrary, we shall have the Irish Free State no longer a synonym for Ireland as described here. The Irish Free State would be the proper cognomen of the 26 Counties, and no more. The last clause of Section 1 of the Treaty is the following declaration of:

"A Parliament having powers to make laws for the peace, order and good government of Ireland, and an Executive responsible to that Parliament, and shall be styled and known as the Irish Free State."

Hereafter Ireland shall not be styled and known as the Free State. That would be to contradict Treaty No. 2—"hereafter styled the Irish free State" shall be applicable exclusively to the 26 Counties. You will have divided Ireland by this Agreement, and that entity which we have always declared one and indivisible is now by our own act severed into two. Why is it not stated exactly and explicitly in this document that the Agreement specified in Section 1 carried with it a revocation of Article 1? The original Treaty is eviscerated of most of what was valuable in it. I, therefore, say deliberately and advisedly that in so much as, and in so far as, it is not stated that Article 1 of the Treaty is hereby revoked the document is a fraudulent document.

Mr. ESMONDE

You stated, A Chinn Comhairle, that my amendment was out of order, but I do not know on what grounds you so decided. I think it was on the point which Deputy Professor Magennis has been referring to, and I had hoped that possibly my amendment, which I did not know was not in order, would be acceptable to the President. It is for that reason I put down the amendment, as I had concluded that apparently it was not the intention of this Agreement to modify the provisions of Article I. of the Treaty. With a lack of knowledge as to the reason why my amendment is out of order, I am not at liberty to discuss the matter, except to point out that if it is true that this Agreement does modify Article I. of the Treaty, then it is high time that this Assembly changed its name. Surely the title Dáil Eireann is no longer applicable to this Assembly if the provisions to Article I. of the original Treaty have been modified by this Agreement? It was for that reason I hoped that the President would be willing to accept some such amendment as that I put down.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Deputy Magennis is quite in order, and so is Deputy Esmonde, in raising his point on Section 1.

The PRESIDENT

I was just thinking, when listening to the statements we have listened to, how this country would progress with an Executive Council staggering under the wisdom of the three expounders we have just had of this particular first Article. Taking them in the order in which they spoke, Deputy Johnson taunted people who undertook a great personal risk at a great sacrifice of time and with a wonderful exhibition of patriotism, so as to do something useful for the country. They worked hard and they got little for it, and now, having failed perhaps to achieve the summit of their ambition, they are taunted by a person who, while his sympathy was with them, certainly never bore the brunt and the heat of the day when the contest was taking place. As for the wordy Professor who has just spoken, I was just wondering how many sleepless nights he passed during this great struggle and what contribution he gave towards making the thing possible. And then he can come down here and state that this document is a fraudulent document. What is there fraudulent in it, except what he seeks to impose or to make appear fraudulent? Is it an honest man who stands up here and says that Article I. of the Treaty is not to be read in conjunction with Article XII.? Is it an honest man who states that the Treaty, as it was signed, had not in it the implications that are here in this Treaty No. 2—when it was well known to him when he was accepting it that if the Northern Government opted out neither he nor ten million like him could alter the partition of this country? No ten million Magennises piled on top of one another, with all the resources of their wordy warfare at their back, would have altered by one inch the Boundary that was to be drawn between the Twenty-six Counties and the Six Counties.

One thing that has run through this debate, that is evidenced now at this stage, is the effort to make bad blood now between Dáil Eireann and the Parliament of Northern Ireland for the first time—for the first time nakedly and unashamedly. Having failed to get any support outside they say: "We will antagonise the Northern Parliament; we will make this Agreement and this union and this amity impossible." Dáil Eireann is not the name of this Assembly! That is very new. The Irish Free State is a term of opprobrium—it is not Ireland! All the speeches that the three Deputies could make from this until the day of Judgment, if each of them lived to be as old as Methuselah, would not affect the name of this Assembly, the name of the Irish Free State or the name "Ireland." If they want any lesson from Irish history I can tell them that there was a stronger Pale in this country than the present Pale of the Six Counties— a Pale which history has wiped out—and the speeches we have just listened to are not going to conduce to the unity of the country. When listening to them I was imagining whether they were three judges sitting in judgment upon the people who endeavoured to make this country free, united and prosperous—the three judges, the three wise men, whose efforts were not perhaps as great as those they are criticising to make it better than it is.

Do we not regret that there is partition in this country? We do, and we have the courage to say that if there is anybody to draw a line we are prepared to draw it; we are not going to shelter behind other people who are drawing it; we are not going to say: "No, we will not draw it; it will never be said to us that we drew a line; we will not be the people who will fix a Boundary, or to show that the people were powerless to prevent its being done." I can imagine Deputies Johnson, Magennis and Esmonde shouldering machine guns to prevent their country being partitioned. Their brains have not prevented it, their valour will not prevent it; their military genius will not prevent it.

Mr. HALL

It might be possible.

The PRESIDENT

I am waiting to see the possibility—I am waiting to see the fruition of it.

Mr. MORRISSEY

That is cheap.

The PRESIDENT

Any help I can give towards making the Boundary between Northern Ireland and the rest of Ireland a thing of the past I am prepared to give. We have been here now for a week listening to many criticisms of this Agreement and we have not yet heard a sensible alternative to it—not one.

Mr. HALL

The alternatives were there before you made a blunder of the present situation.

The PRESIDENT

I can imagine the Deputy as President of the Executive Council faced with the situation with which we were faced, with all the difficulties of it—not during the last four years only, but during the last twelve or thirteen years that I referred to the other night—and the Treaty, Article XII. as well as Article I., and I am waiting to hear what the Deputy's able contribution is towards preventing partition. If you do not pass this Agreement, have you done away with partition? If you do not pass this Agreement, what is to be done? What is the proposal? Are we to accept the Boundary Commission's Report? No.

Mr. HALL

What is the Report? We did not get it yet.

The PRESIDENT

I gave the Deputy all the information I had on the subject—every word of it. Are we going to test the legality the Boundary Commission?

Mr. HALL

Yes, test the legality of it.

The PRESIDENT

While we are testing the legality of it, are you going to object to moving out and moving in?

Mr. HALL

Accept its findings, and test its legality.

The PRESIDENT

The Deputy and his constituency are a long way from the scene of any possible conflict that may arise out of this. That is the question that has to be decided. Here is the difficulty that requires to be solved without delay—a difficulty that must be solved on lines of statesmanship. The contribution that we get here is criticism, abuse, odium and allegations of fraudulency against people who during the last ten or twelve years suffered a great deal to be in a position to say that they contributed something towards making an Irish Parliament function in this country.

Mr. MORRISSEY

There is one matter I should like to have made clear in connection with the President's speech and I want to have it made clear in view of the fact that a somewhat similar speech was made the other night by another Deputy. Are we to understand from the President that no one has the right to speak in this House unless he can dub himself a gunman or be dubbed a gunman?

The PRESIDENT

I have not said so.

Mr. JOHNSON

That is what it means.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Allow Deputy Morrissey to proceed.

Mr. MORRISSEY

Let us be clear as to the position. If a Deputy is elected and exercises his right to make a contribution to anything that is under consideration in this House, he certainly ought not to be insulted. I certainly suggest that the primary qualification for membership of this House is not whether a man used a gun or did not use it. There are many men, as the President knows, who never used a gun, but did more useful and valuable work.

Professor MAGENNIS

I did not think that a discussion on partition, in all its bearings, would have been in order. The President has returned to the question which seems to be the great stock-in-trade of all the defenders of the Agreement: what is your alternative? All the Ministers spoke of the Feetham Commission only as from the moment at which its report was expected but there was a time here in the Dáil when the Executive Council were aware of what was coming, when, according to their conception of it, it was a menace to the peace of the State when—as the Minister for Finance, who always speaks candidly and honestly what is in his mind—said their interpretation of the situation was that it was a menace. What did the Executive Council do then? They are trying to get away with this with the people by bluster and stage thunder. Such thunder does not frighten us from doing our duty here. They came here not in sackcloth and ashes, as they should have come, nor in the white robes of the penitent, but with something of the penitential spirit. They declared there was a critical situation and they asked for our patience and forebearance in criticism so that they might have ample time to determine a policy.

Probably everyone is aware we have a parallel to that situation at the present moment in France. There is a financial crisis in France which threatens the stability of the State in precisely the same fashion, it is alleged, the Feetham report threatened our stability. How does French patriotism propose to meet that difficulty? By precisely the same agency that when suggested in this House, meets with nothing but jibes, jeers and personal imputations. "Le Matin," which is one of the four independent Paris newspapers, devoted two columns of its front page to a proposal for a union sacre, for a Coalition Government to meet the emergency. Deputies may laugh, but why do they laugh? Because in their hearts they know that the country was not menaced in this way and that the menace, if it were at all in any proportion, is simply amplified by the terrors of certain Executive Ministers beyond its due proportion into colossal dimensions.

Here is what "Le Matin" says:

"The economic difficulties which we are now encountering, the crisis of lack of will-power—the almost complete breakdown of the French spirit, are they to be allowed to lead us to the abyss which we can already see ahead? ... Are we to witness that lamentable spectacle of France vanquished by herself, stricken down by that sleeping sickness, which has for its name politics? Enough of politics. The country is sick of them. It does not wish to plunge into adventures—"

I repeat that because it is an essential part of our case also—

"Disaster is in sight ... The situation is mingled tragedy and comedy—tragedy on account of its consequences and comedy by its pettiness. Imagine giants trembling when they are threatened by nothing at all. There is nothing wrong except that the nation is being badly led by those who sought the honour of defending it ..."

What did the Government do? Did it hold a secret session and did it call into conference representatives of the various groups in the House? No.

A DEPUTY

You did.

Professor MAGENNIS

I am speaking of the period anterior to this debacle. After all if Irishmen meet in conference is it more shameful than a conference between another type of inhabitant of the country and the Executive Council? Those who live in glasshouses ought be very slow to throw stones. There was an alternative policy, namely, to act constitutionally, to keep faith with the Dáil. The Dáil honourably and patiently gave the time it was asked for. Deputy Johnson asked how long and the answer was an indefinite time. How was that truce, as I might call it, utilised by the Executive Council? They go over and enter into this compact of surrender. After that it is useless for the President to ask, what is our alternative. The case is prejudiced. Are we therefore to be silent? Are we to say nothing? Are we not to speak our honest convictions with regard to what the Government did and what we foresee is the consequence of what it has done?

The President wishes us to subscribe to this extraordinary kind of Ireland that began to be and received services from her sons in 1916. No one who lived before that time served Ireland in any way and there is no way of serving Ireland except by way of military service of some form. It is not the first item of the new gospel that has been vouchsafed us by the prophet of the front bench. I say and it has not been met by argument that the manifest and undeniable effect of this Agreement on Article I. is to make the term "Ireland" no longer applicable to the entire island, but to confine it to the Twenty-six Counties. No unifying bond is left, no germ that might grow into a means of unification. That, as we shall see later, is done away with in Section 1 of the Schedule.

I challenge the President to leave aside this vapouring method of his and come down to the lower level of common sense and plain argument and deal with arguments. Here is language that never was questioned until now: Ireland shall have the same constitutional status in the Community of Nations known as the British Empire as the Dominions, with a Parliament having powers to make laws for the peace, order and good government of Ireland. Does it say "with a Parliament having power to make laws for the peace, order and good government of whatever portion of the area Ireland shall hereafter remain after a bargain affecting it had been entered into"? There is no such language there. The President is thinking of Article II. of the Treaty, which says "subject to the provisions hereinafter set out." One of the conditions hereinafter set out that modifies Article II. of the Treaty is Article XII. There is no such overriding condition or reservation with regard to Article I. Article I. is an absolute declaration that Ireland is the Free State and the Free State is Ireland; that Ireland shall have a Parliament with powers to make laws for the peace, order and good government of Ireland. Not only that, but a responsible Government with the Executive responsible to that Parliament. Not a Parliament of the Twenty-six Counties, but a Parliament of Ireland. Will the President deal with that instead of this repartee which belongs to other spheres than a deliberative assembly?

Mr. JOHNSON

The President has thought it not beneath his dignity to deal with in a personal way——

The PRESIDENT

May I say that I would not have mentioned that were it not that Deputy Johnson referred to the separatists.

Mr. JOHNSON

—and has descended to the language of the fish market.

The PRESIDENT

I knew one who died in 1916 at the hands of British soldiers. It is the insult to the memory of these men I resent, nothing else.

Professor MAGENNIS

Will the President say in what respect I insulted the memory of the dead?

Mr. JOHNSON

I was endeavouring to honour the lives and the advocacy of the separatists, and to defend them and their advocacy from the kind of thing that is happening now as a result of their work. Most of what I know of the Irish national movement was derived from the separatists. The President thinks, as I said before, that it is not beneath his dignity to use the language of the fish market rather than the language of a deliberative assembly in dealing with me. I have no reason to be ashamed, though I have no special need to be proud of any part I took in the work of the Irish national movement after or before 1916. But it was not beneath the dignity of the President's colleagues of that time to approach me on many occasions asking me to do what I could with the organisation in which I had some authority to assist in that work.

Mr. COLOHAN

We are getting thanks for it now.

Mr. JOHNSON

And it is not for the President, considering the people who are supporting him in this movement, to throw stones at me because of my inaction with the gun. I was never a member of a military organisation and I am not claiming any credit due to members of a military organisation. I do not claim any credit at all except for having done work for the Labour movement of which the President's colleagues were very glad to take advantage. If there were any risks in doing that I took the risks. I have no particular reason for being proud of it. I certainly am not ashamed of it. The President might well have thought that the cause that he is endeavouring to serve would be better served if he had adopted an entirely different tone.

Now the President has reiterated the case that there was, implicit in the Treaty, and in the Constitution, in certain eventualities, absolute partition. Will he deny that there was more in Article XII. and the consequential Articles than the area of administration or the area of authority, either of the Northern Government or of the Free State Government? It may be said that there is partition between Cork and Kerry, or between any other two counties in the country because they are different administrative areas. It may be said that there is partition between the provinces of Canada. But there is also a unifying authority. There is the Federal Authority governing the whole country, and, while there may be partition for many services, there is, at least, a single unifying authority in respect of others, and, therefore, partition is not absolute. Under the Treaty and under the Constitution there was reserved to Ireland a single authority. There was some kind of union retained, and all the Boundary Commissions in the world would not alter that.

You have talked about the Council of Ireland as being something that you would throw overboard in any case. If you are prepared to cut six or four counties or any portion of Ireland—if you are prepared to cut them away, then you are entitled to say that the Council of Ireland is useless. The Council of Ireland, at least, retained authority as an all-Ireland institution in respect not merely of railways, that very important function, but in respect of Private Bill legislation. It retained a single authority, and whatever was faulty in its mechanism, it undoubtedly maintained not merely the symbol but the machinery of unity. That was contained in the Treaty, and the very fact that it was there was used as a refutation of those who alleged that the Treaty brought about partition. It is this overthrowing, this renunciation of that section of the Treaty, in addition to the other section of the Treaty which deals with the Boundary, that is the final and clean cut, and I say it is creating a position for which you will look in vain for support in any writings and speeches of any advocates of Irish independence, self-government, Home Rule, or even in the Council Bill. You will look in vain in any such writings or speeches for any proposition of that kind which signified a clean cut. It is the proposition only of those who were against anything in the nature of self-government for Ireland. It is the proposition of those who were absolutely opposed to Home Rule in any of its phases. It is the proposition of those who put it forward because they believed that Irish feeling was so absolutely and so intensely opposed to it, that the very insertion of such a proposal would destroy the prospects of Home Rule. And we have it at the behests and proposal of a Government that came into power and authority on the wave of a demand for independence.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Before any other speeches are contributed to this debate, Deputies might regard anything approaching a personal nature as being definitely precluded. Any Deputy who may be deemed to have a grievance has been given an opportunity to speak. Perhaps we might now confine ourselves to the arguments that are relevant to the motion before us and that is that this section stand part of the Bill. The arguments themselves should be dealt with and there should be no dealing with personalities.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

The Treaty in its first Article unquestionably establishes the Irish Free State as a single political entity embracing all Ireland.

"Ireland shall have the same constitutional status in the community of nations known as the British Empire as the Dominion of Canada ... with a Parliament having powers to make laws for the peace, order and good government of Ireland and an Executive responsible to that Parliament, and shall be styled and known as the Irish Free State."

The next relevant Article of the Treaty is Article XI., which provides:

"Until the expiration of one month from the passing of the Act of Parliament for the ratification of this instrument, the powers of the Parliament and the Government of the Irish Free State shall not be exercisable as respects Northern Ireland; and the provisions of the Government of Ireland Act, 1920, shall, so far as they relate to Northern Ireland, remain of full force and effect ..."

They shall not be exercisable as respects Northern Ireland. I invite, in passing, the attention of Deputies to the exact words used in that Article concerning the powers of the Government and the Parliament of the Irish Free State—"shall not be exercisable as respects Northern Ireland." There is no question of their existence. The very wording seems to imply their existence. It does not say that they shall not exist over, or shall not extend to, the area defined by the Act of 1920 as Northern Ireland, but merely that they shall not be exercisable. There is, therefore, so to speak, an artificial suspension or paralysis of the powers of the Government and Parliament of the Irish Free State over a particular area, pending certain decisions to be taken by the Government which was in existence in that year and which had been in existence during the year prior to the Treaty.

Article XI., therefore, gives us the suspension or paralysis of the powers of the National Government and Parliament over a particular area. During the time over which that suspension took place, a decision, a very important decision, fell to be taken by the Government which existed within that area. The decision lay as between Articles XII. and XIV. of the Treaty. Under Article XIV. it was open to the Government of the area defined by the Act of 1920 as Northern Ireland to retain intact the Six-County area of jurisdiction, to retain the substantial powers of local autonomy conferred by the 1920 Act, to remain within the political system of the Irish Free State and to accept the same relationship with the National Parliament that was about to be established here as had previously existed with Westminster.

It is, I suggest, unfortunate that, in or about the time that decision was about to be taken, conditions here were not calculated to induce a decision in favour of unity, in favour of remaining within the political system of the Irish Free State. I do put it to Deputies that if a section of our countrymen had sat down in grave council to consider how best they could deter the Government of the area known as Northern Ireland from taking the road of political unity rather than the road of secession, they could not have sketched out a programme better calculated to promote that end than the programme which, in fact, to the tune of many patriotic slogans, they enacted and carried out in the early months of 1922. The President put it vividly and picturesquely the other evening when he said that the invitation to the North was to come in and warm their hands at the fires of Mr. de Valera's kindling. One by one every inducement, or possible inducement, to take the road of Article XIV., the road of political unity, rather than the road of secession as set out by Article XII., was sedulously sought out and smashed. There was not, at the time that that decision fell to be taken, security of life or property within the 26-county area. Taxes were soaring and bade fair to soar further as a result of the material damage that was occurring, and, generally, those elements of stability and security which civilised man is rather prejudiced in favour of were lacking when the choice fell to be made between Articles XII. and XIV.

The road of Article XIV., the road of political unity was not taken. Instead, there was taken the road of Article XII., which provides—and again I would direct that special attention be given to the words—the following:—

If, before the expiration of the said month, an address is presented to His Majesty by both Houses of the Parliament of Northern Ireland to that effect the powers of the Parliament and the Government of the Irish Free State shall no longer extend to Northern Ireland and the provisions of the Government of Ireland Act, 1920, shall——"

Mr. JOHNSON

Read the parenthesis.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

"And the provisions of the Government of Ireland Act, 1920 (including those relating to the Council of Ireland), shall, so far as they relate to Northern Ireland, continue to be of full force and effect, and this instrument shall have effect subject to the necessary modifications ..."

Mr. JOHNSON

Can the Minister say why that was put in if it meant nothing?

Mr. O'HIGGINS

I will deal with the parenthesis presently. At the moment I am simply on the broad difference between the wording of Article XI., providing for the suspension of the powers, and the wording of Article XII., which provides that in a certain contingency these powers shall no longer extend to Northern Ireland. In the face of that wording, and in the face of that provision, we are told that in some occult way it was open to us within the last few weeks to abolish partition and that by a strange perversity we refused or omitted to do so. That is, of course, nonsense, utter nonsense. Let me say that no one realises more clearly or more fully that it is utter nonsense than the two Deputies who had recourse to it.

Mr. JOHNSON

Will the Minister say at what point, and when and where, any recourse was made to such argument?

Mr. O'HIGGINS

It seemed to me to be the thesis of a great many of the speeches which we have heard within the last week or so on this matter, and, in particular, the thesis underlying the speeches of both the Deputy himself and Deputy Professor Magennis.

Mr. JOHNSON

The Minister is entirely wrong, whether it is his fault or my fault, so far I am concerned.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

I am very glad to hear it.

Professor MAGENNIS

I dissent from the statement that it was nonsense.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

With regard to the parenthesis, the reference there is to the Council of Ireland. I am not forgetting the parenthesis. The Council of Ireland, as contemplated by the Act of 1920—assuming that Act had come into force and operation throughout the country—was a real piece of machinery, and, no doubt, in this measure, and in the measure of the Act of which it formed part, a valuable piece of machinery. There, at any rate, you would have had a Council constituted of an equal number of representatives from both areas administering certain services throughout the entire country, throughout the twenty-six county area and the six-county area, those services being of a nature common to the entire country. But under the Treaty this truncated lopsided survival of the Council of Ireland, as envisaged by the Government of Ireland Act, 1920, was, as the Deputy correctly remarked, rather more of an irritant than a useful piece of legislative or administrative machinery.

Mr. JOHNSON

The Deputy did not remark that at all. I would like the Minister and his colleagues to be as accurate in their quotations and references as their opponents are.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

Well, I did think that the Deputy on some occasion in the Dáil said that he loved this thing and that he valued this thing because it was an irritant. If he did not say that, and I am not quite sure that he did not say it, then I certainly withdraw the suggestion.

Mr. JOHNSON

Does the Minister want to know what I said?

Mr. O'HIGGINS

Yes.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

I would like to hear what Deputy Johnson said.

Mr. JOHNSON

I said that this was an instrument which could be used for negotiation or bargaining. If it was not used for its true function of unifying the work of Government in Ireland —that is to say, in extending and utilising the power of the Free State Parliament in respect to certain things in Northern Ireland, and if they refused to have that—then it was an instrument for bargaining and negotiation. The Minister used the word irritant, and I accepted the term in those circumstances.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

You accepted the term?

Mr. JOHNSON

Yes.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

If the Deputy accepted the term, I do not know what the fuss of the last few minutes has been all about. I should not have been corrected if, in fact, the Deputy had accepted the term as a correct description of his outlook on this particular piece of machinery. Now he says that as well as being an irritant it was a useful thing to form part of the bargaining—to form part of and to figure in the result of negotiations, and in face of that point of view it is rather difficult to understand where exactly the Deputy's grievance is. This gem of his has been used precisely as he himself suggested it ought to be used—as part of the bargaining and figuring in. The Deputy has had his wish; it is figured in in the negotiation embodied in this Agreement. You have the Deputy's Council of Ireland figured as the Deputy would have it figured. I think that the Deputy did well to accept the description of the Council of Ireland as an irritant and to make the term his own. In fact, it was so and would be so.

Mr. JOHNSON

As long as they made it so, and so long as they would not use it, it would irritate them.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

Twenty representatives from this State going to meet twenty representatives from Northern Ireland to consider the administration of certain services. Where? Common to the entire country? No, no! Within Northern Ireland, and anything more calculated to breed friction, stubbornness, bad blood and ill-will between two peoples could not be devised or designed. It was an irritant, and because, as I suggest, we are moving away from the frame of mind when things have any value as irritants, we parted with the Council of Ireland without a sigh, but not simpliciter: not without substituting some provision for contact on services which undoubtedly, whether administered in this area or that, might have reactions throughout the entire country.

There is substituted for this irritant of the Council of Ireland a provision that the Governments of the Irish Free State and of Northern Ireland "shall meet together as and when necessary for the purpose of considering matters of common interest arising out of or connected with the exercise and administration of the said powers." I do put it to the Deputy as something to reflect on, whether that conception there of the Minister for Industry and Commerce meeting, I think it is, Mr. Andrews of the Northern Government, the Minister for Lands and Agriculture meeting Mr. Archdale of the Northern Government is not a wiser, a saner, a more constructive and a more healing solution than the irritant of the Council of Ireland: whether, in fact, business, real business, is not more likely to be done between Ministers meeting in that way, in friendly contact, than between twenty tough men of ours meeting twenty of theirs to carry on a wrangle about services lying wholly within their area.

Mr. JOHNSON

The Minister does not know what the Council was.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

And, yet all is lost, and Deputy Cassandra Johnson and Deputy Cassandra Magennis stand up to bewail what we have done, to ululate about the loss of this Council of Ireland and to suggest that with it goes all that we strove for, hoped for, and prayed for back through the decades and generations. It is an absurd contention, a contention definitely unworthy of any or all of the Deputies who have urged it: it is unworthy of people who profess to think soberly, coldly, and in a responsible way about public matters.

I am sorry that to any degree I have treated Deputies to something approaching a repetition of the Second Reading debate on this Bill, which was very full, but points were raised and urged again with renewed vigour as if they had not been disposed of effectively and satisfactorily on Second Reading. I simply want to put that definitely, that it is untrue to say that hic et nunc we are perpetrating partition and becoming the fathers of a partition which was there before. Anyone reading and contrasting Articles XI. and XII. of the Treaty will see that whereas in one you have a suspension of powers, in the other you have a definite and explicit statement that these powers shall no longer extend to a particular area of this country if a certain choice were made, and as to the Council of Ireland, this magic link, this symbol, this germ that might grow into a means of unification, I consider that in removing it we have removed an obstacle to that goodwill which can alone bring unity, and that we have substituted for it a saner, a wiser, a more constructive and a more healing provision than ever that irritating Council of Ireland, as envisaged by the Treaty provision, could have been.

Mr. GOREY

The suggestion has been calmly made during this discussion to set this section aside. References have been made in the course of the debate by those who opposed the section and by those who favoured it, from which it would appear that one is looking for trouble as well as the other. I do not consider that either have covered themselves with glory by these personal suggestions.

Professor MAGENNIS

On a point of order, if Deputy Gorey accuses us of making personal references I think it is his duty to specify some of them. I am quite sure that I did not make such suggestions, and that if I had done so they would have been pointed out by you, sir.

Mr. GOREY

We have had them here. I cannot recall the exact words, but if you go back to the speeches made last week you will find plenty of them there. It is suggested that this clause should be set aside, which is, practically speaking, suggesting that the whole Bill should be set aside. Very well. Let the suggestion be made that the Bill be set aside, but let Deputies who say these things point out to the House how we are to face the new situation which would then arise. Let them tell us some of the one or two things that we can do, and let them point out the course we can take. Two things must happen if this scheme is not ratified. One is we will have the threatened Feetham report, and, as to the other alternative, are Deputies Johnson and Magennis prepared for that situation? Are they prepared to tell us that there are one or two courses open to the people of the country? Will either of these Deputies say "I propose to point out the particular way and I propose to show you how the position can be faced"? Are they prepared to tell us that there is a way out? I think it is the duty of every Deputy to ask Deputy Magennis and Deputy Johnson to take us into their confidence, and tell us what they have in their minds, and what their alternative way out is. I can promise them from these benches, at any rate, that if they do that their proposals will get due consideration. I think it is our due, and our right, to be told these things. I would like either Deputy Johnson or Deputy Magennis to say "I suggest there is a means," and then I would like them to proceed to show us the means, and whether there is a new situation and what they propose we should do. Let them show us the way to preserve that unifying bond they are talking about.

Professor MAGENNIS

We had a way. Do not do away with it.

Mr. GOREY

Where is it? Am I to be told that the Council of Ireland is the unifying bond? If not where is the unifying bond that they want to preserve to meet the new situation? Is it not right to say that we were faced since early 1922 with the concrete fact of definite partition? Since the North of Ireland opted out in 1922 we have had that concrete fact. It is said that this Dáil, by its own act, created partition, and drew a line, when we know that that line was already drawn, and that the only difference is whether it is to be the line drawn since 1922.

The Article in the Constitution is there, and the Article of the Treaty is there, and they leave no doubt, in any man's mind, as to what their meaning is. How can that position be avoided? How can this Dáil avoid that position? That is a question we have been asking ourselves since the vote taken last Thursday. We have been asking ourselves what truth, or what possibility, there is about the argument of the opposition. Not one scrap of light has appeared, not one shred of an idea has been presented to my mind; perhaps I am dense, but I could not see anywhere any light or leading given. They do not point to any alternative way, or any alternative method. It is due to every Deputy in this House to be taken into the confidence of Deputies who have a plan, if they have one, and told what is in their minds and what is it that they propose to do.

I did not want to intervene in this discussion. It is more or less a Second Reading debate that has gone on up to now, in which things are said that should have been said on the Second Reading. But to come down to the hard facts, we ask, with all due respect to Deputies who opposed this particular Agreement and clause, to take the House into their confidence and to show how far they are prepared to lead us on the new way.

Mr. JOHNSON

Let me deal with this point. The Minister for Justice read Section 5 of the Bill in which it is provided that the Governments of the Free State and Northern Ireland shall meet together as, and when, necessary. The Executive officers of the Free State and the British Government meet as, and when, necessary, to discuss similar things as affecting Great Britain and Ireland. The Minister for Industry and Commerce, through his officers, the Minister for Finance, through his officers, and the Minister for Agriculture, through his officers, meet the Ministers of these several Departments, through their officials, to discuss matters affecting the common interests of the two countries.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

"Arising out of"?

Mr. JOHNSON

Arising out of matters of common interest or connected with the exercise and administration of the said powers.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

That does make a difference.

Mr. JOHNSON

I think not. What you are binding yourself to is this: that the Governments will meet and discuss matters such as might have been discussed at meetings in the last year or two, such as those in connection with railways, unemployment, national health insurance, and other matters, and I may tell the House that in these matters the Northern Government always professed itself willing to do what the Free State refused to do. The Council of Ireland had an entirely different kind of powers. It was that the representatives of the Parliaments should meet and discuss matters of common interest and make recommendations to their respective Parliaments in respect of legislation as well as administration in matters of common interest. In these matters it had no legislative powers, but it had power to meet representatives of the Parliaments, not merely the Governments, and discuss matters of common interest and to make recommendations to their respective Parliaments in regard to legislation. Now, apart from powers over any part of Northern Ireland, that in itself was a more valuable provision towards unity than any proposal for the Governments to meet, because the representatives of the people directly, not as Executive officers, but as Deputies and members of Parliament, would be meeting and discussing these matters of common interest and would make their recommendations, which would be public and subject to the criticism and support, or otherwise, of the people. That was one of the functions of the Council of Ireland which the Minister derides. With regard to the other functions, such as railways, surely Deputies in business realise the importance of having a single authority to administer and from which should be sought powers in regard to legislation respecting these things. It is true, of course, that when this provision had been acquiesced in, under protest, by the Northern Parliament, it might refuse to work amicably with this Council of Ireland. In such a case, no doubt, it would be an irritant, but in such a case there would be no powers within the Northern Parliament; there would be no powers of any kind, outside this Council of Ireland, to deal with matters of private legislation. It was the only authority set up in the Government of Ireland Act in respect of Private Bill legislation. There could be no extension of legislation respecting fisheries, railways or diseases of animals with regard to Northern Ireland except through this Council.

Surely that was a tremendous leverage, a tremendous power, for unification. It was a tremendous power in the hands of the Free State in respect of these services, and as a matter of negotiation, if it were recognised by both sides that this particular machinery was not well oiled, was not going to work easily, then the bargaining value of this was to enlarge the powers, to improve the machinery, retaining a national organisation, retaining a national political institution. If those powers had been retained, instead of being thrown away, they would have been used as a means for unification, because the Northern Government and Parliament were not in a position to extend or develop except through the Council of Ireland under the 1920 Act, and there was an assurance that Ireland was going to remain a unit. The very phraseology of the Treaty, both in Article XII. and in Article XIII., shows that that was considered by the framers of the Treaty and was recognised by them as important in the event of the Northern people opting out. The Minister supported the Treaty, he argued for the Treaty containing these clauses, and bear in mind that it was that Treaty containing these clauses that the Provisional Parliament approved, and it was made the basis of the Constitution—not any revision of the Treaty. The suggestion of the Minister that this power over certain functions of Government was of no use will not stand any analysis at all. If it were to be an irritant, it would be because the Northern Government chafed under it and because they refused to use it.

Deputy Gorey has asked for some light as to an alternative. If this Council of Ireland was recognised as being difficult in its working, surely instead of being thrown away it was possible to improve it, if there really existed a desire for amity and concord, if there really existed a desire to move towards unity. I suggest that the Council of Ireland, if it was to be amended, could have been amended in such a direction as would have brought agriculture within its purview, perhaps to have given this Council, even with equal membership from each side of the Border (a fifty-fifty arrangement with regard to membership), authority over agriculture and agricultural matters would be better than throwing this away. It might have been amended by creating what is conceived of as a possibility in the Constitution, a Vocational Council, a Council of Agriculture, a super-Parliament if you like, a National Economic Council, such as has been established in Germany, to which matters affecting trade, commerce, agriculture and economic affairs would first of all be submitted for consideration and then come to the respective Parliaments for approval or disagreement. If matters of trade and commerce were to be relegated to a Council of this kind, representing the whole country—

Mr. GOREY

Education.

AN LEAS-CHEANN COMHAIRLE

took the Chair.

Mr. JOHNSON

Possibly education, if you wished, but education is a matter which might be postponed for the present because of peculiar differences. There are differences of views in regard to education, but there are no differences of views in regard to agriculture. Agriculture might very well have been under a unified authority covering the whole country.

Mr. GOREY

What about finance?

Mr. JOHNSON

Deputy Gorey asked for some light, and I am endeavouring to give it to him.

Professor MAGENNIS

He does not want it.

Mr. GOREY

I do.

Mr. SEARS

What is the alternative to the Border? That is the question.

Mr. JOHNSON

I am not dealing with the whole Bill at present. I say that if you were going to deal with and improve the Council of Ireland, recognising its value as a unifying authority, you might at least have put forward the suggestion, as a positive alternative, to improve the Council by giving it additional powers, and even by giving it wider powers as well as additional powers. If thought had been directed to the improvement of the Council, while holding to the principle that there must be a single national authority, there were infinite ways in which matters might be discussed. What I suggest as a very definite proposition is that on the lines of a National Economic Council you might have got far to meeting any reasonable objection on the part of the business men in the North-East corner that their interests would be swamped by an entirely agricultural interest in the South. I say that the whole theory, the whole framework, both of the Treaty and of the Constitution, was based upon the assumption that there was going to be a united Ireland, and the proposition in your Constitution, which was passed after the opting-out decision, that the Free State might set up subordinate Parliaments, contemplated unity. The Vocational Councils contemplated unity, contemplated the whole of Ireland being brought into them, and every provision of the Constitution was based on the assumption that you would retain for Ireland a single authority in respect of legislation over at least some matters, and that that authority would gradually add to itself powers over other functions by the goodwill and acquiescence of the two Parliaments.

Major COOPER

I agree with one thing and with only one thing that Deputy Johnson has said. I agree that the framers of the Treaty did contemplate in Article XII. the Council of Ireland as a unifying force. I think that particular clause came mostly from the mind of the then Prime Minister of Great Britain, because both Mr. Lloyd George and Deputy Johnson share a peculiar quality of mind that promotes unreality to the highest quality of statesmanship. Articles XII. and XIII. were, as I saw them described in a newspaper this week "a Welsh rainbow over an Irish bog." I was very much interested to hear Deputy Johnson's caoine raised at the wake of the Council of Ireland, because I am in a certain sense one of the fathers of the Council of Ireland. The Council of Ireland was introduced into the 1920 Act as a result of steps taken by a small group of members of the British Parliament with whom I was then associated. We thought it very desirable then to have some machinery that would cover the whole of Ireland and that might possibly make for union. It has not covered the whole of Ireland and it has not made for union because there was not the spirit of goodwill, and I realise that my efforts were futile. But if the Council of Ireland is so valuable why did Labour not work it? If the Labour Party recognised the surpassing merits of the Council of Ireland why did they not seek election to the Parliament of Southern Ireland? Why did they not become members of the Council of Ireland, as they could have done with the greatest ease? They did not. This is a case of discovering the extreme merits of the Council of Ireland as a political organisation five years after the date——

Mr. MORRISSEY

Would the Deputy say that the Council of Ireland was of no value, when the Northern Government apparently insisted upon getting control of it themselves?

Major COOPER

I think that has already been dealt with—that it was of some value as an irritant. Naturally it has not been used as an irritant by the Government of the Free State. The Northern Government naturally felt that they should get rid of it lest there might at some future date come into power a Government in the Free State that might use it as an irritant. What would it do? Twenty Deputies from the Free State would meet twenty members from the Northern Parliament, I suppose, at Dundalk.

Mr. JOHNSON

Perhaps at the Boyne.

Major COOPER

Perhaps at Drogheda. What would they do? They would pass resolutions and they would bring back these resolutions to their respective Parliaments. It is a great misfortune for this country that there is a large number of people in it who think they can dispose of problems by passing resolutions. That is not the case. The Council of Ireland would have no power to carry out any of its decrees so far as Northern Ireland is concerned unless it had the absolute co-operation of the Government of Northern Ireland. How can you enforce orders under the Diseases of Animals Acts or about the preservation of fisheries, unless you have police? Is it contemplated that the Council of Ireland should send down their own separate police to enforce their decrees? They could not rely on the cooperation of the Northern Constabulary. Unless the law courts recognise the validity of their decrees you could not enforce them with regard to railways or any other matter. No; it was an illusion. It was a well-meant illusion but a vain illusion. As Deputy Gorey has said, there is no alternative to the course we are now taking. He is absolutely right. I, for one, rejoice that we have given up riding the rainbow, and that we are walking on solid ground to the only goal we can hope to attain.

Mr. JOHNSON

What is that?

Mr. BAXTER

Back to England.

Professor MAGENNIS

I desire to compliment the Vice-President on the good example he has shown to his Chief. He has thought fit to descend to the level of argument, to meet argument with argument. I return to Article I of the Treaty, which we were taught to believe, and always held steadfastly was, with two limitations of it, a very excellent settlement for Ireland at the hour in which it was consummated. That Article I. provided for a Parliament of all Ireland, a Parliament to make laws for Ireland with an Executive responsible to it. The area over which it was to have jurisdiction technically, theoretically if you like, was within the four walls of Article I., the island, Ireland, but the jurisdiction of it for a temporary period was suspended, as the Vice-President rightly states, referring to Article XII.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

Article XI.

Professor MAGENNIS

Eleven and XII. In fact, I might even add XIII. Very good, then. That Parliament of all Ireland was not to exercise jurisdiction over the Six County area during a period of a month within which their option was to be made to come in or to stay out and after the time at which they had exercised their privilege of choice by Article XII. the powers of the Parliament and the Government of the Irish Free State were no longer to extend to Northern Ireland. That is to say, there shall not be the Parliament of the Free State, otherwise Ireland, exercising jurisdiction over the thirty-two counties. There shall be a Parliament for Northern Ireland as provided therefor under the Act of 1920, but what our opponents are continually ignoring is that that is not absolute, unqualified control of Northern Ireland. They insist in all their arguments here in using language that implies, and sometimes explicitly declares, that from and after that date referred to in Article XII., not only is the jurisdiction of the Free State Parliament withdrawn but that there and then unqualified jurisdiction over the Six Counties is provided to the Parliament in Belfast. That is not so. There are two limitations upon it, one of which only is relevant to the present discussion, to wit:—

"The powers of the Parliament and the Government of the Irish Free State shall no longer extend to Northern Ireland and the provisions of the Government of Ireland Act, 1920 (including those relating to the Council of Ireland) shall so far as they relate to Northern Ireland, continue to be of full force and effect."

Now we have the father, as he styles himself, of the Council of Ireland claiming paternity of the child and repudiating it in the same breath. It is not the first time in history that first thoughts were best. In that much-abused Act of 1920 there was a very important provision with regard to the Council of Ireland. There were three important provisions, but the one on which I dilate now is that after a certain period, by a joint resolution of both Houses, a Parliament of Ireland was to take its place. It should then be the very type of Parliament that is indicated in Article I. of the Treaty. That Parliament of all Ireland, under the Act of 1920, was to be created by a joint resolution of both Houses. That is, the goodwill about which we hear so much, was to have brought it into being. The Minister for Justice objects to the continuation of the Council of Ireland on the peculiar ground that the Northern Government did not like it.

Let us analyse that for a moment. We find that here is a principle that if there be any arrangement of State, making for the advantage of all Ireland both now and hereafter, and that it proves a subject of dislike to the Northern Government, then it must go. I have already said in another debate—I hope I will be forgiven for quoting myself— that as regards disputes between nations there are only three ways, or modes, of settlement—settlement by war, by arbitration or by surrender. Surrender is the easiest way out of all those. That is what we have had here. The men who signed the Treaty on our behalf stipulated for that clause in Article XII.—at least, we have been always told so and my habit is to believe, rather than disbelieve, until I have seen, or been given, very excellent reason for disbelieving. That was not put in as aimless verbiage. As a matter of fact, we have the authority of Lord Birkenhead, a few evenings ago in the House of Lords, for the statement that they—the English signatories to the Treaty—did not like this provision but that they could not have passed the Treaty without it. Now, when it is possible to undo it, it is undone. That was the very doctrine of British statesmanship that was laid down, long ago, by Lord North in regard to the revolt of the North American Colonies. Whatever England is obliged to concede in her hour of weakness, she reserves the right to withdraw again in her hour of strength. This is surrender. Now, the extraordinary thing is that, in support of the surrender, you have the revelation of the bureaucratic mind in the Vice-President once again. He declares that better than a democratic system of responsible Government—of an elected Parliament, with an executive responsible to it—is conference between two Governments. Here we are back to the eighteenth-century heresy of government—the dynastic idea, not peoples, through their representatives in Parliament, but Ministers acting on their own.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

Responsible Ministers.

Professor MAGENNIS

Yes, "responsible Ministers"—responsible on paper and irresponsible in fact; irresponsible in so far as they can go to other governments and enter into agreements which they sign, and, thereby, paralyse the action, to a great extent, of the representative assembly, which is afraid of what might happen. Deputy Gorey has told you what is in his mind. Is he an enthusiastic supporter of this settlement? No; but he does not see his way out. He is confronted with the accomplished fact; he does not see how he can get a way out of it, and, therefore, he votes for it. That is what I stigmatise here as a crime against our liberty—that our Ministers at the very moment, or within an hour of the time, at which this Assembly was deliberating on the right or power of the Executive to alter the Treaty, were altering the Treaty. And we had here the Minister for External Affairs, whose business it was to communicate with them. Did he communicate with them? That is for him to answer and it is for them to say, if he did communicate with them, whether they paid the slightest attention to what he had to say.

Does the Vice-President know the history of the Constitutional development of the Dominion of Canada? If he did, he would know that there were progressive steps in Canada from mere occupied territory, held by military force, to a colony, then to a dominion and the status of a State with complete internal sovereignty and quasi-sovereignty that entitled it at the Peace Conference to sign the Treaty of Versailles. If he knew the history of that dominion, he would know that British aggression had to be faced, again and again, by Canadian statesmen, and that if they had yielded, as our Ministers yielded, Canada would still be a self-governing colony, a dependency of the Empire and not in the family of nations.

I join with Deputy Johnson in maintaining that at this hour of the day it is reactionary to go back to a preference for conference between Governments of independent States instead of having the instrument of government. Neither Deputy Johnson nor I have ever pretended in the Dáil, when this subject of the Council of Ireland came up, that it was a perfect thing. Of course, it was not a perfect thing. In some respects it was anomalous. I am quite willing to concede all that. In some respects it was anomalous, but in British constitutional arrangements it has never been the case that that which had, to the logical mind, an anomalous character was cast aside as a thing that should not be made to work. This could have been made to work. The satisfaction evinced by the Northern Government over its removal is sinister. So long as there was, let me call it, a shadow of a Parliament of all Ireland, then the drawing of a boundary line was not that type of partition which we abhor. This discussion about partition ignores that there is partition and partition— the partition which reduces the only bond of union between the State in which there is such a large minority of men who think as we do with regard to the Motherland, to a provision that the only bond of union between that State that contains our nationals and this State is to be occasional conferences at the goodwill of the respective Governments. That is not the shadow of a Parliament or the pretence of union. If it were, then Locarno would mean the unification of all the sovereign States of Europe into a unitary Power. It is only necessary to mention that in order to have it understood. All the arrangements and the contentions and the claims, in virtue of which now we see the culmination of intrigue and negotiation, have ended in making the Six-County Government a thing which is meant by them to endure. And when we protest against it here—here, before the thing is finally accomplished—we are told that our object is to stir up strife and to stir up disunion. Surely that is the wisdom of the coward, that says "Better yield, better concede in presence of threats, because if you don't the threat may be carried out." I quite admit, with Deputy Johnson, that when this Dáil, by a vote such as they gave on the Second Reading, declared in favour of this Agreement, it is useless to talk about alternatives. There was a time when an effective alternative could be made, when the whole of those who represent Ireland in this Assembly might have been ranged together, with a solid front, to resist the aggression. How it might be done I will deal with on another Article here, because I am anxious to observe all the laws of order. I cannot deal with Article V. properly until we reach it in the Schedule. If Deputy Gorey would bear with me at that time, I think I could show him again, from Lord Birkenhead, that the case was not so hopeless as he has been led to believe, and that the situation could have been met in a far more effectual way than it has been met. I think I could convince Deputy Gorey that this is an exceptionally bad bargain.

Question put.

The Committee divided. Tá—56. Níl—16.

Tá

• Earnán Altún.
• Earnán de Blaghd.
• Thomas Bolger.
• Séamus Breathnach.
• Próinsias Bulfin.
• Séamus de Burca.
• John J. Cole.
• Bryan R. Cooper.
• Sir James Craig.
• John Daly.
• Máighréad Ní Choileain Bean
• Uí Dhrisceóil.
• Desmond Fitzgerald.
• John Good.
• Thomas Hennessy.
• John Hennigan.
• William Hewat.
• Patrick Leonard.
• Liam Mac Cosgair.
• Maolmhuire Mac Eochadha.
• Pádraig Mac Fadáin.
• Patrick McGilligan.
• Risteárd Mac Liam.
• Seoirse Mac Niocaill.
• Liam Mac Sioghaird.
• Pádraig Mag Ualghairg.
• James Sproule Myles.
• Peadar O hAodha.
• Mícheál O hAonghusa.
• Seán O Bruadair.
• Risteárd O Conaill.
• Parthalán O Conchubhair.
• Conchubhar O Conghaile.
• Máirtín O Conalláin.
• Séamus O Cruadhlaoich.
• Eoghan O Dochartaigh.
• Séamus O Dóláin.
• Peadar O Dubhghaill.
• Pádraig O Dubhthaigh.
• Eamon O Dúgáin.
• Donnchadh O Guaire.
• Mícheál O hIfearnáin.
• Aindriú O Láimhin.
• Séamus O Leadáin.
• Fionan O Loingsigh.
• Risteárd O Maolchatha.
• Domhnall O Mocháin.
• Séamus O Murchadha.
• Pádraig O hOgáin (Gaillimh).
• Pádraig O hOgáin (Luimneach).
• Seán O Raghallaigh.
• Máirtín O Rodaigh.
• Seán O Súilleabháin.
• Mícheál O Tighearnaigh.
• Caoimhghín O hUigín.
• Patrick W. Shaw.
• Nicholas Wall.

Níl

• Pádraig Baxter.
• Seán Buitléir.
• Séamus Eabhróid.
• Osmond Grattan Esmonde.
• David Hall.
• Tomás Mac Eoin.
• Pádraig Mac Fhlannchadha.
• Liam Mag Aonghusa.
• Patrick J. Mulvany.
• Tomás de Nógla.
• Ailfrid O Broin.
• Criostóir O Broin.
• Tomás O Conaill.
• Aodh O Cúlacháin.
• Pádraic O Máille.
• Domhnall O Muirgheasa.

Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Dolan and Sears. Níl: Deputies Magennis and Morrissey.

Motion declared carried.

Agreed to report progress.

The Dáil went out of Committee.

Progress reported; the Committee to sit again to-day.