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Dáil Éireann debate -
Friday, 26 Feb 1926

Vol. 14 No. 13

NEGOTIATIONS WITH EXTERNAL GOVERNMENTS. - DEBATE RESUMED ON MOTION BY DEPUTY MAGENNIS.

At the conclusion yesterday evening I had reached this point in the disclosures made both by the special correspondent and by the editor of the "Morning Post" that "it is permissible to say that the three Governments were ready to cap the London Agreement with an economic treaty." The President's letter, commending the special correspondent for the good work that he did, expresses his appreciation of the efforts made "to facilitate a more comprehensive agreement between this Government and those of Belfast and Westminster." As you will recollect, the special correspondent had explained that more comprehensive reference to the Agreement, now known as the London Agreement, or which I prefer to describe always as the infamous Pact——

The Deputy's opinion upon the London Agreement is well known. I do not want to interfere with his opinion on it, but the London Agreement is incorporated in an Act of the Oireachtas, and it would be more suitable in the Dáil if, when referring to it, the Deputy would do so in non-committal terms. I do not ask him to praise it.

I thank you, sir. The term, the London Agreement, will serve. There were certain difficulties in the way of promoting this more comprehensive agreement. What the difficulties were the special representative of the "Morning Post" goes on to explain. You will see that I am connecting the President's letter, piece by piece, with the revelations of the "Morning Post." The President says: "The work of your special correspondent in endeavouring to smooth away difficulties which still remained after the London conference of December last has been of great advantage." Naturally, one reading this letter will ask, what difficulties? The President gave no answer to the Federation of Irish Industries except to assure them that they were quite right in not reading into his letter anything more than was in the letter. He burked their references to interviews, meaning this interview as set out here, and the interview, I take it, with the political correspondent of the "Irish Independent."

Now here are the difficulties: "Before negotiations could begin, however, it was essential that there should be a clearer understanding between the Belfast Government and the nationalist communities of Ulster. As long as those communities stood aloof from their Protestant fellow-citizens, it was impossible for the Free State and Belfast to meet in the proper atmosphere. Accordingly, on representations, of which I was the agent and the mouthpiece"—he was the agent and the mouth-piece, and it has never been denied. That he came over from London at the instance of other principals than the President, I have very little doubt. There is room for some doubt, and that is why, in the motion set down on the Order Paper, I speak of those negotiations with external Governments as carried on, if not at his instance, with his knowledge and consent. We have it here that once Mr. Bradstreet came as the agent of the policy of the "Morning Post," of the diehards of Great Britain, he became at once the accredited agent and mouth-piece of the President and Executive Council of the Free State. "Accordingly, on representations of which I was the agent and mouth-piece, the Northern administration refrained from publicly urging the Dublin Government to readjust the fiscal arrangements on the Boundary."

That is the only sign, shall I call it, of gentleness on the part of the victor, Sir James Craig. He was diplomatic enough not to press his advantage in public, but you will see that the pressure was exerted in private. I am speaking of what I know, sir, I know the views expressed by two Ministers of the Belfast Parliament upon the later stages of this transaction. "Everything thereafter depended on whether it were possible to induce the eight elected representatives of the Ulster nationalist communities to accept the new position created by the London settlement in December." The special correspondent has a poor sense of humour, for he says: "It was a difficult task." That, I think, might have been left to one's imagination to realise. "It was a difficult task. The Ulster Nationalists were full of resentment both against the Free State"— a thing which I have prophesied—"for not having insisted that the nationalists contiguous to the boundary should have been transferred to Dublin's jurisdiction, and against the Ulster Government on account of certain alleged grievances connected with the representation of the Catholic interests, both on national and local administrative bodies."

You will recollect that the alleged grievances were the gerrymandering of constituencies, the plantation of North Fermanagh with "Specials" which converted what was a huge majority of Nationalists in 1918 to a Nationalist minority, so that no matter what unit of voting existed there would always be a Unionist majority. The other alleged grievance is the doing away with proportional representation. Another alleged grievance is the detention of political prisoners and the exile of Nationalists from their own homes. In that connection perhaps you will permit me, sir, to read a telegram apropos of these negotiations which I received in the House from one of the biggest merchants in Newry, Mr. John Quinn: “My son, Malachy, deported a year ago, no charge; returned home on release of prisoners and strength of leaders' assurances as to peace and goodwill prevailing.” There were some people who believed in these protestations of comradeship and good-fellowship being restored by the London Agreement. This young man of 22, who had been deported, was foolish enough to return home, believing that he could resume his home life in Newry. The telegram concludes: “Re-arrested to-day. Is this the peace promised through the Boundary settlement and price for Nationalist entry into the Northern Parliament?” Flushed with victory, Sir James Craig is in no humour to make concessions. Before the London Agreement the slogan was “not an inch of territory.” Now it is not an inch, referring to pacts or relaxations in regard to the Nationalist minority. What is there in the President's letter with regard to removing those difficulties?

I give him credit and believe that when he speaks of the special correspondent "endeavouring to smooth away difficulties which still remained," that he had some lingering hope that the special correspondent would put it up to the Northern Government to make some concession, but so far as I can gather from the special correspondent's own words, no such idea ever entered his mind. He did not regard himself as commissioned to do anything but to arrange for surrenders on our part. He speaks of all those matters, in which we are so gravely concerned in relation to the Nationalists in the six ceded counties, as "alleged grievances." Now, it might be said that what he was smoothing over was sowing the seeds of peace which, judging from the telegram I have just read. do not seem to be germinating very swiftly in an uncongenial soil. It may be said, too, that what was in question was double income tax, but most of us are aware that negotiations in regard to double income tax had been proceeding in the days of the Provisional Parliament. What then, is left to fill the Bill of "the more comprehensive agreement"? Nothing but what the special correspondent tells us was "to cap that agreement with an economic Treaty." What is the nature of that economic arrangement? What is the idea behind that, that prompts the proposal of it?

The "Morning Post," with satisfaction, reminds its readers that on December 5th it put forward the idea of a settlement and pointed out that there was an economic root to the discontent existing between Great Britain and this country, and suggested that the best way to improve political relations was to improve economic relations. Now, here are the precise words from the issue of December 5th: "What after all do the Irish people or the British people care about the Boundary? Their store cattle, their bacon, their merchandise, their trade—these are the questions which ought to occupy the attention of their representatives. If Great Britain were to offer the Dominions an Imperial preference which would include Irish produce, and Ireland on her side were to give British manufacturers and British capital a favoured position, then we should have a real approach to a better feeling between the two countries." That is Ireland as an economic whole to be governed by the same economic and fiscal policy.

The "Morning Post" says:

"We are glad to say that these words found an echo in Irish hearts. The statesmen of both Southern and Northern Ireland made an encouraging response. They both see, as Mr. Cosgrave's letter suggests, that through the promotion of the interests of the people a better settlement might be reached between the three countries."

Not between the three Governments, but, as I mentioned in passing yesterday, already the Six Counties is a separate and distinct country and, after all, as it is ceded territory and is under a distinct Government, it is in a fair way of becoming a State, and why not call it so? Now, these words "found an echo in Irish hearts." That may be an impudent and baseless fabrication. but is it not an extraordinary thing to read that, in the leading article in a paper by way of response to the President's felicitations on the good work done by it in the cause of the "more comprehensive agreement"—"the more comprehensive agreement between this Government and those of Belfast and Westminster"? That is why I ask the Dáil to vote that it learns with alarm and disapproval from the revelations that have been pro voked, elicited rather, by the President's extraordinary letter, that secret negotiations with an external Government have been carried on of late, if not at his instance, with his knowledge and consent, directed to cap the London Agreement with an economic Treaty.

This fiscal arrangement which is advocated of reciprocal preference between Great Britain and this State may seem very plausible. I wonder, if the President has given it a moment's reflection, does he realise what it involves, how far it takes away from whatever fiscal freedom and direction of its own economic policy this State now enjoys? Great Britain is to be made the favoured nation. We are to take off the tariffs on British motor cars. Reciprocally what is Great Britain to do for us? In that interview, the product of which is declared by the Political Correspondent of the "Irish Independent" to be on Ministerial authority, we are told that the quid pro quo would be the remission of the 22½ per cent. of tax on parts of Ford manufactures, exported to England. Now, anyone who knows any thing is well aware that one of the great industries in Great Britain in which millions and millions of capital are invested is the motor trade, the production of motor cars and motor lorries, and the steel works behind them like those of Vickers, for instance, and if we agree to remove the tariff upon the importation of these goods, then little advantage would be given. Now, I prefer to put alongside, to test this thing, an industry established in Ireland and of vital consequence to Ireland for its promotion. Suppose this reciprocal preference were to be extended to farmers' produce, dairymen's produce, that would be nearer equity. Very good. To give us that preference the British Imperial Parliament every year its Budget is introduced will have to propose to impose a corresponding tax. Whereupon those who favour it and those who do not will debate the position, and be in a position to debate the position, of the imposition of duties and the conduct of our fiscal affairs Does the Free State like that? Does the Executive Council desire that? Now, I know the opinion at any rate on that of one member of the Executive Council.

The Minister for Justice told the Seanad what he thinks of having the domestic concerns of this country canvassed, debated and voted upon in an alien Parliament. His answer to the Cathaoirleach of the Seanad as to what was the urgency for his Land Bill was that a motion has been put down in the British House of Lords to discuss what we in the Oireachtas are doing. Reciprocal preference invites that sort of thing. Some of us spoke here in favour of tobacco-growing and tobacco-curing in Ireland, and the Minister for Finance has just set up a Committee of Inquiry to see how the Excise in that regard can be modified. South Africa also wants Imperial preference for her tobacco-leaf. Whether South Africa or the Free State is to get the advantage, which of them is more worthy, which contributes most to Imperial defence. and which is more likely by being helped to promote the chains of Empire, would have to be discussed in the British House of Commons when the question of the imposition of duties to give the reciprocal preference would arise. Surely, anyone with ordinary intelligence who considers this matter will see what is behind Mr. Amery's proposals,

We all know how the Dominions, particularly Canada and South Africa, grew to Statehood. When Canada was only a self-governing colony, we all know the great ideal of the die-hards was Imperial federation. I have spoken in this House in praise of Lord Milner. I said that he had greatness of soul. Though he had been high priest of the Imperial federation cult, he advocated, in view of the new developments that so swiftly evolved themselves during the period of the European War, and adopted, the idea of a Commonwealth. But there are forces at work, and the die-hards do not regard themselves as defeated by the setting up of the Commonwealth. They did all they could to frustrate the granting of Dominion status to this nation, and they are still at work to undo what was done. Here is the intrigue: to remit taxes in view of a remission of taxes. There is the thin end of the wedge.

There is to be an Imperial Conference in 1927. It can be faced with the settlement that has been arrived at on this matter between the Free State, Great Britain and its subordinate Parliament. That is very insidious. I wonder did the President ever reflect on that, or give it one moment's consideration, before he proceeded to write this approval of the great work of the special correspondent of the "Morning Post," the diplomatic agent of the die-hards?

I pass from this letter with just one comment; I am glad to be done with it. In the background is the secret negotiation carried on with the knowledge and approval of the President. In the forefront of public affairs here —in the Parliament—what is there? The Minister for External Affairs discussed with us on Friday last the position of Ireland in the case of Great Britain being involved in war. Nothing could be more national, nothing could be more purely expressive of the national position, than the pronouncement of that member of the Executive Council on this grave question. On the question of the final appellate, jurisdiction of our courts resting with us here, what could be more national than the position taken up by the Minister for Justice? On the question of fiscal freedom and the right to control our own taxation, what could be more national than the position taken up by the Minister for Finance in answer to Deputy Sears?

There are three members of the Executive Council facing one way, and here is the President facing the other way. Yet, we are assured by the President that all is well because in the Constitution there is an Article which says that nothing can be done, and there can be no final commitment of the State until the matter has been ratified by the Oireachtas. As if we had not the London Agreement before our eyes! Why, the ink of that agreement is yet hardly dry. Does the President think we forget about it? Does he think those of us who are still suffering in heart and soul over the desertion of our fellow-countrymen in the North, have forgotten it so readily? In the amendment, he tells us what we know: according to the constitutional fiction—according to the constitutional proprieties, I should say—we should not be committed. But we have been committed.

Confronted with the fact that what was euphemistically called a provisional acceptance of the agreement had been made in London, what did Deputy Heffernan say in this House? Deputy Heffernan examined every detail of the Bill endorsing the agreement. He found nothing but fault with every item of it. There was nothing in any one section followed up by any other section that would commend itself to him for approval. When he added nothing to nothing, the sum, instead of being nothing, was something to vote for. My friend, Deputy Connor Hogan, did the same. He analysed it, too, and found it wanting, and he declared that he voted for it with shame. "With shame," he said, "I vote for this." Those are the exact words of the Deputy. Deputy Gorey, who was disposed to adopt a valiant attitude towards it and opposed it, turned towards this quarter of the House and said: "After all, the thing is done; what alternative is there?" That I consider a reasonable, or rather not an unreasonable, attitude to take up. What is the good of kicking against the traces? What is the good of hitting your head against a stone wall? The thing is done; you cannot undo it, and, therefore, let us try to make the best of it. I take it that was the policy adopted by Deputy Gorey, Deputy Heffernan, and Deputy Connor Hogan. That is the situation that is created for us by all these secret negotiations.

We used to hear a lot about German autocracy, an all-highest Emperor and his Imperial Chancellor, responsible to no Parliament. Are we a bit better off to-day under the guise of a free Government in a free State? Our President and the members of our Executive Council go to London at the bidding of the Imperial Parliamentary chiefs. Yes, and as I know from an inner source, these British Ministers were amazed with their pliability. Of the President it was said he was a ball of wax in their hands. They were amazed he should be so weak. I am glad to say there is a somewhat different story to be told about the Minister for Justice, who followed him over. We may bid goodbye to liberty if we allow secret negotiations to dictate our fiscal policy. In 1917, which is not so long ago, there was an Irish Convention held here, and though it came to an agreement on many things—for example, the Agricultural Purchase Act that we had last year or the year before in this Dáil— it split upon the question of the right of Ireland to control its customs. In those unregenerate days when there was only the Irish Parliamentary Party to represent us in the House of Commons, there was national vitality enough and strength enough to say: "We must have control of our customs, or you cannot call it liberty or an approach to liberty." But if a plausible young gentleman comes over from London and puts up a few plausible recommendations to one of our irresponsible Executive Ministers, fiscal freedom can disappear in time, inch by inch.

I notice, I do not know what the significance of it can be, there may be no significance in it, that of late the Vice-President has been making speeches here and there, and always the tenor of them is that tariffs are not much use, that tariffs are not quite the fairy gifts that the childlike people in the Free State seem to believe. Tariffs may even be dangerous things, it will be said by-and-by—we will get on to that—and that fiscal control is a dangerous thing. This is the policy of little by little. Relax in this regard, relax in that regard, and then we will be reminded that though the Minister for Finance did impose tariffs it was merely an experiment, it was merely tentative; the thing was tried and has been found wanting; we had better do away with it; England does not like it. That is the eternal chorus of the "Irish Times" leading articles. Our best customer is being offended. They never say that we are England's excellent customer, one of her best customers.

How does England pay for the produce she buys from us? In gold or with protestations of good-will? Do we not take her manufactures in exchange? Why is it always to be thought how we offend Great Britain and never how she may offend us? We have no rights! We are helots in the political world, apparently.

Now the second portion of this motion asks the Dáil to condemn and forbid this kind of procedure and that we shall have no more of it. I call it a commitment of the State by covenants entered into on its behalf by Ministers of the Executive Council. It is perfectly true that this State cannot be finally committed, but that is the theory. In practice it is committed from the moment that members of the Executive Council enter into covenants with Ministers on the other side of the Channel. You cannot get away from that fact. It is a fact and there is no good telling us what the theory is. If the theory were lived up to it would be another story. I hold, and I ask the Dáil to agree, that before these provisional arrangements are entered into the Parliament's view upon the matter should, in some wise, and to some extent be consulted. The stand I take briefly is this: We have a democratic Constitution; we profess to be a democratic State; we have set up the machinery of responsible government. We are only at the beginning of our days. We are a young State. It is far more necessary for us to create traditions of good government in these early days and to be true to ideals of good and responsible government than it is for those other long-established States. They may, at times, with some advantage, depart from the ideal. We have not that advantage of being a long-established State. Until recently—and I am sure the President will dwell long and ecstatically upon this—we had no stability.

There are two forms of anarchy, and the form of anarchy that I hold him a participant in is a worse form of anarchy than the anarchy that resorts to armed force and violence to upset a State. There is this other form, destructive of its liberties from within, by negotiations being entered into without authority or mandate committing the people beforehand to something they abhor and dislike but from which they cannot escape.

I quite admit, as regards the second portion of my motion, that an answer can be made that there must be Ministers, and Ministers must have something to do. There need be no dispute about that. I do not propose in the name of responsible government to take the direct actual control of affairs out of the hands of the Ministers, but I do propose to curb their autocratic tendencies and to leave them little, if any, room for the exercise of autocracy. There ought to be some indication of the feeling of the people with regard to matters before an Executive Minister should take upon himself to enter into agreements. That is what general elections are for, for example. That is what Press articles in Government organs are for. That is what public meetings in constituencies are for— to feel the pulse of the people. That is done in every country where representative government holds sway. The people would stand for nothing else. But here it is quite sufficient for a Minister to be summoned to London, for a case to be put to him in London by British Ministers for him to succumb and then come along here and demand ratification.

I say that that ought to stop. Is it feasible to stop it? The President will, I am sure, tell us that you cannot carry on diplomacy in an open chamber with the Press and the public in the galleries. That, of course, is true. The man who declaims against secret diplomacy declaims against diplomacy altogether. There are, however, degrees. Before the diplomatic approach is made at all, the Minister ought to be sure of his ground, knowing what the people would stand for and what they would support him in, and he should take counsel with men who can speak for various parties and what they themselves are representative of. That is the provision in other countries who have learned from experience. I made a note which I did not intend to use until the President had spoken, but, on second thoughts, I think I had better mention it, lest it be thought, when he uses the point, as no doubt he will, being well informed upon these matters, that I have borrowed it from him. In the United States there is a Committee on Foreign Relations—a Committee of the Senate. It is regularly informed of every important step meditated by the Executive. It cannot absolutely veto a proposed step; it can petition the President of the Republic, and the Executive that perseveres in a course against which it has advised will do it at its peril. It would be possible in any State, such as this, to set up an Advisory Council on Affairs. Particularly it would be useful in this country where access to London is so ready. It would be easy to have a Council of the Oireachtas of representative men who would put a check upon the self-will and the self-opinionatedness of some of our Ministers and who would provide that necessary bond between the Executive Council and Parliament so that what would be done in the name of the people would be the people's act. I put down my motion in order to give an opportunity to protest against this growing practice by which responsible government is becoming a mere figment in the State, and we are having government by what I characterised before as a junta of autocrats.

I formally second the motion.

I rise to move the following amendment, of which I have given notice:—

To delete all the words after the word "Dáil" in the first line and substitute therefor the words "recognising that Saorstát Eireann cannot be committed to or bound by any Agreement with an external Government without the prior sanction and consent of the Dáil, has no desire to limit the Executive Council in the exercise of its functions or in the discharge of its duty to defend and promote the interests of the State and its people."

We listened for an hour yesterday to Deputy Magennis and for practically three-quarters of an hour to-day, and before I deal with the resolution and the amendment I would like to say that if the Deputy intended to convince me or the Dáil that he was sincere and truthful when he said that nobody would be more satisfied than he if I were in a position to settle this matter satisfactorily, he did not convince me. He did not succeed in convincing me that he was sincere and truthful in that statement. I think it right to say that, because whatever attitude he may assume, so far as I am concerned, I wish him to be under no misapprehension either in this or in any other matter regarding my view of him. So far as the letter is concerned, the Executive Council has no responsibility for it. It is mine, mine only, and I accept fullest responsibility for it. Some years ago a celebrated Irishman said that there was a paper wall built around Ireland. On one side was written whatever those who denied the national aspirations of the Irish people wished to write. It will be necessary to delay the Dáil while I quote at some length what one of Ireland's most renowned living historians published in 1912 in a book, "The Old Irish World." This is the passage:

It is very certain that Ireland of all countries, if left to itself, would never of its own will allow history to lie in a backwater among the flotsam of the current. History was the early study of the Irish, the inspirations of their poets and writers. Every tribesman of old knew, not only the great deeds and the famous places of his own clan, but of the whole of Ireland. In the lowliest cabin the songs of Irish poets lived on for hundreds of years, and dying fathers left to sons as their chief inheritance the story of their race. When war, poverty, the oppression of the stranger, hindered the printing of Irish records, there was not a territory in all Ireland that did not give men to make copies of them, hundreds of thousands of pages, over and over again, finely written after the manner of their fathers. Through centuries of suffering down to within living memory the long procession of scribes was never broken, men tilling small farms, labouring in the fields, working at a blacksmith's forge. And this among a people of whom Burke records that in two hundred thousand houses, for their exceeding poverty, a candle, on which a tax lay, was never lighted.

Those are the people who are to be deprived of the flesh-pots Deputy Magennis has consumed all his life.

Would the President elaborate that a little more? He suggests that I have been receiving some things which he would suggest are bribes from the British Treasury. It is true that, like Deputy Dr. MacNeill, I have received a salary which was voted by the British House of Commons. Does the President suggest that that is really a bribe to my nationality?

I do not think that you ever had any nationality to be bribed. I think the interruption is irrelevant. If you think, sir, that it is due to me to answer what Deputy Magennis has said, I will do so. He spoke for an hour and three-quarters and he was grossly, maliciously, and determinedly insulting to me and I did not utter one single word in protest.

Deputy Magennis was not grossly insulting to the President in his personal capacity. Had he been so I would have stopped him. I listened to Deputy Magennis very carefully. He used strong language about the President in his public capacity, but nothing he said could have exception taken to it on the ground of what could be called unparliamentary language.

I agree, but may I remind you, sir, that in a statement made by the Deputy here he said that he had inner sources of information from a country which, according to his statement, one would be inclined to think, was hostile, and that the President of the Executive Council was like a ball of wax. I put it to you that that statement was very offensive.

I put it to you, sir, that the President has just conveyed that I have been enjoying the flesh-pots unlike the poor Irish people. What he seeks to convey by that, I think, he ought to explain. As you have very properly said, I have attacked the President's public conduct, and I began with a protestation of regret, not that I should have to attack him in his public capacity, but a protestation which was genuine and sincere, that if he could clear himself from the accusation, which it was my duty to build up against him, no one in the Dáil, or outside it, would be more glad than I. That was perfectly sincere, and I reiterate it now, but I am entitled in justice that he should not hint, or insinuate, that I have been enjoying the flesh-pots of Egypt while the Irish people were poor. There is a significance in that which, I think, the majority of the people will say is unmistakable.

It is hard exactly to analyse what those well-worn metaphors may mean. I cannot undertake to say exactly what this one does mean, but if the President meant to insinuate, which I did not gather myself from what he said, that Deputy Magennis was in receipt of bribes from the British Government. I take it that the President will withdraw that imputation. I have in my own mind an idea of what the President did mean, but I have established a practice here of never explaining what people have said, except in so far as a question of order may arise. I did not gather from the President's statement what Deputy Magennis takes out of it.

My interpretation is the same as yours.

The President is not able to say that his interpretation is the same as mine as I have not given mine. I have no intention of interfering between the President and Deputy Magennis on that.

Am I bound to enter into an explanation? I did not interrupt the Deputy.

The President is not bound to enter into an explanation, but perhaps he might say whether he is accusing Deputy Magennis of accepting bribes from the British Government, as Deputy Magennis has taken to himself that accusation.

I have not made that statement and I did not intend to convey that impression. This is another extract from the same book:—

"The Gael, as we know, ever faithful to the tradition of his race, while he sang and recited and wrote and copied his story with an undying passion, did these things in his own speech. The Norman or `Frank' settlers, true `citizens of the world,' adopted his tongue, his poetry, and his patriotic enthusiasm. When the English arrived, however, they, according to their constant insular tradition, refused to learn a strange language, so that the only history of Ireland they could discern was that part of it which was written in English—that is, the history of the English colonists told by themselves. In this contracted record they have worked with industry and self-congratulation. They have laid down the lines of a story in which the historian's view is constantly fixed on England. All that the Irish had to tell of themselves remained obscured in an unknown tongue. The story of the whole Irish population thus came to be looked on as merely a murky prelude to the civilising work of England—a preface, savage, transitory, and of no permanent interest, to be rapidly passed over till we come to the English pages of the book. Thus two separate stories went on side by side. The Irish did not know the language which held the legend of English virtue and consequent wealth. The English could not translate the subterranean legend of Irish poetry, passion, and fidelity. Religion added new distinctions. Virtues were Protestant, the sins of the prodigal were Catholic. Finally, class feeling had its word. The upper class went to the university, and their manners and caste instincts entitled them, as of course, to the entire credence of their own social world; the lower class were alleged to be men whose manners were common and their prejudices vulgar."

I mention those things to bring back people's minds to the fact that there was that paper wall which was pierced by the Sinn Fein movement, and there was put up for world consumption and attention a nation's demand. At the time of the signing of the Treaty Irish stock stood high, but civil disturbance and other causes further operated, and between hostile critics outside Ireland and the friends of Mr. de Valera inside and outside Ireland, every fantastic story that could be devised was published to damage and belittle our country. One of the newspapers most disposed to criticise and to be hostile to Saorstát Eireann was the "Morning Post." During the recent Boundary crisis a new spirit was evolved, and an attitude more friendly and well-disposed appeared to me to be adopted. I am a man of peace. I saw war, not much of it, and suffering—more than Deputy Magennis saw. I wish to spare my country war and suffering. I met the peaceful attitude and friendly gesture of the "Morning Post" half way. I believe, and still believe, that it is in the best interests of the country. We had made peace. I wish to keep it. It takes as much, and perhaps more, courage to make peace than to make war. I am not concerned with British politics. I am not concerned with any member of the British Government, past or present, who during a decade, or any portion of his lifetime, was bitterly opposed to what we wanted. With the British Government and the British people our peace is made.

That letter to the "Morning Post" may not have been the best way to contribute to peace, but I thought it was a good way, and I still think so. The Deputy's motion is in two parts. The first part asserts that a communication by me to an English newspaper disclosed that secret negotiations were being carried on to cap the London Agreement with an economic treaty. It disclosed nothing of the sort. There have been no negotiations, secret or otherwise, for an economic treaty. No proposals on fiscal matters have been initiated since the London Agreement. The letter referred to is an acknowledgement by me of efforts made to develop a more friendly atmosphere, a much clearer and more sympathetic appreciation of the difficulties which are and were inevitable, to moderate the tone of carping criticism, to induce respect for this State, to minimise the hostility to us and our produce which still exists in certain quarters and, in a nut-shell, to promote a disposition to accept the Treaty and its institutions in the spirit as well as in the letter. For efforts such as those directed to smooth away difficulties, I have always been, and shall always be grateful. I have said that there have been no negotiations for an economic treaty, consequently the Deputy's alarm and disapproval are based upon misunderstanding and upon something that exists only in his own imagination. I could leave the Deputy's resolution at that were it not for the implication that any negotiations for an economic treaty with Great Britain met with his disapproval, without any reference whatever as to whether the result of such negotiations would benefit this State or not. The Deputy, in effect, asks the Dáil to say, once and for all, that there must be no economic treaty with Great Britain. The Executive Council must be prohibited from considering any business arrangement with a country which is our best customer and from which we purchase probably 90 per cent. of our commodities. That is the Deputy's position as stated by himself in the resolution.

Secret negotiations.

The Deputy had one-and-three-quarter hours to himself absolutely and he was not interrupted. There was not a whisper from anybody. Now he is dissatisfied.

Because I misrepresented no one and misquoted no one. The words of my motion are "secret negotiations."

The Deputy had one-and-three-quarter hours during which he was not interrupted. I believe from the tone of his statement he was hoping he would be interrupted. We disappointed him.

And Deputy Magennis will disappoint the President by not interrupting him. Everyone will then be happy.

I apologise if it was an interruption. I thought it was a correction.

I would like to know if the Deputy thinks that a pronouncement by this House that there must be no economic treaty with Britain, that we must be prohibited from considering any such matter, is going to promote our trade, improve the demand for our cattle, butter or eggs across the channel? I do not think he will find many to agree with him in that. In the second part of his resolution the Deputy invites the Dáil to condemn and forbid

"the commitment of this State to changes of its fiscal policy and surrender of its fiscal freedom by covenants entered into on its behalf by Ministers of the Executive Council without previous authorisation and specific mandate from the representatives of the people."

Yesterday, the Deputy quoted from Burke. "The laws," Burke said, "reach to a very little way. Constitute Government how you please, unfortunately the greater part of it must depend upon the exercise of powers which are left at large to the prudence and uprightness of Ministers of State. Even the use and potency of the laws depend upon it. Without them your Commonwealth is no better than a scheme on paper and not a living, active, effective organisation." I would like to inform the House that the Executive Council is every bit as jealous of the fiscal freedom of this country as the Deputy is. The members of the Executive Council, during a long and trying period, made greater efforts to achieve that fiscal freedom than the Deputy. Deputy Professor Magennis knows full well that the State cannot be committed to any change in its fiscal policy without the express consent of the Dáil. He knows that the Constitution provides for that and that Articles 35, 36 and 37 make it plain. He knows that the Dáil spends a long period in discussing the terms of financial resolutions and the Finance Bill and that no alterations can take place in fiscal policy in any other than in that way. What then is meant by the resolution? It was not put down apparently to waste the time of the Dáil discussing something which is already explicitly dealt with in the Constitution. I take it that the real intention is that which is much better expressed in Deputy Johnson's amendment, and that the Deputy's wish is to prevent the Executive Council from discharging one of its elementary and fundamental duties, namely, the examination of trade relations with other countries, and the conduct of negotiations in regard to tariffs and duties which may promote or interfere with its development. What would be the position if the resolution or if Deputy Johnson's amendment were adopted? If we wanted to make a trade treaty with any country we would have to come to the Dáil and say, for instance: We want to get the tariff on our fish taken off and we must give something in exchange. What would we give? What would we offer in the first instance and what would we keep in the background to play with? Then with all that information broadcast we are to begin negotiations. We would be in the position of a man putting a house up for sale who tells the prospective purchaser "I am asking £500 but I am prepared to let it go for £400." To Deputy Magennis that might appear good business. To me it does not so appear. I am satisfied that it would be impossible to conduct the affairs of State in that way.

There is only one other matter mentioned by the Deputy that I intend to refer to. He read out a message he had received from a gentleman in Newry. A member of this House had already seen me with regard to that matter. It is a matter which is not now a responsibility of ours. It must be dealt with in another place. Assuming that it is true it is a case made against the efforts that were made towards peace in December. It is just one case, assuming it to be true. I am not at all impressed with the sincerity of the Deputy's concern for his fellow-Ulstermen, as he calls them. He is a long way from his base; he is keeping very safe down here, and the speeches he makes down here are not going to do much towards promoting a better atmosphere up there. The Dáil has already approved of the agreement that we made and it passed through the Oireachtas with all its implications and all that it meant. A good deal still remains to be done. The contribution made by the Deputy in his speech here to-day is not a contribution towards better relations, or towards more peaceable conditions between the people on both sides of the Border.

I am not concerned with the information that Deputy Professor Magennis has from inner sources—or however he described it—from the other side; not in the least. He is perfectly welcome to his secret service. But I do repudiate strongly the insinuation which he made, that in negotiation on behalf of my country I was like a ball of wax in the hands of British Ministers. That is one of those things that are difficult to answer, but the fact that it is made by a person so irresponsible as the Deputy is, is perhaps the best answer I could make to it.

If the President's amendment is put in its present form and carried, or if it is put in its present form and defeated, Deputy Johnson's amendment will not, in its present form, come before us. The Deputy may be able, perhaps, to get at it in another way.

I thought that the amendment was one which should be put before the Dáil and that we should have a decision upon it, whether it was taken as an amendment to the original proposition or as an amendment to the President's amendment when it became a substantive motion. If my amendment be put to the House as No. 1, the same thing would, as I view it, apply to the President's amendment. It is entirely for you, a Chinn Comhairle, to say what form can be devised to secure that the House shall be able to express its opinion on the relative merits of the three propositions which are before it. I take it that it should be possible for the Dáil to declare, if neither the motion nor the amendment in its present form meets with general acceptance, that some alternative—which I suggest should be No. 3, my own amendment— would be accepted. We ought, in our forms, make it possible for that to be resolved by the House.

Deputy Magennis's motion was circulated in ample time. The President's amendment was circulated, and Deputy Johnson's amendment, in its present form, was later given to me. If Deputy Johnson's amendment and the President's amendment had arrived at the same time, it would have been possible to consider them and put them on the Paper so as to allow Deputy Johnson's amendment—or the purport of it—to be voted upon. As the amendments on the Paper are framed—and I have no responsibility for the farming of amendments—there are only two ways of dealing with the question. One is a way which we have not adopted but which is adopted in another place— simply to put the question first: "That all the words after `Dáil' be deleted." If not deleted, they stand, and then Deputy Magennis's motion is put. No amendment can be moved because the Dáil has decided that the words remain. If the words be deleted, the President's amendment can be put in the form: "That these words be there inserted." If they are inserted, they cannot be taken out. That is to say, Deputy Johnson's amendment could not be put but the two amendments could be discussed during the debate. The other method which we have always adopted, heretofore, is to put the President's amendment in the form in which it is, which would mean that we take out the words in Deputy Magennis's motion and insert the words suggested by the President. That having been done, it would again exclude Deputy Johnson. There is a method which I think would allow Deputy Johnson's amendment to come before the Dáil and be voted upon. We had this question before us on a previous occasion on an amendment by Deputy Tierney to a motion by Deputy Baxter in connection with agricultural credit societies. Before the President's amendment is put, Deputy Johnson's amendment could be discussed and put as an amendment to the President's amendment if the following procedure were observed: The President's amendment is moved. Deputy Johnson moves to delete all the words after "Dáil" in line 5 of the President's amendment and substitute the words "desires that there should be no agreements made, provisional or binding" and so on. In that case, the President's amendment would read, if Deputy Johnson's amendment were agreed to: "To delete all the words after `Dail,' " in the first line of the motion and substitute therefor the words "recognising that Saorstát Eireann cannot be committed to or bound by any agreement with an external Government without the prior sanction and consent of the Dáil, desires that there should be no agreements made provisional or binding," and so on. I think Deputy Johnson's amendment in that form, as an amendment to the President's amendment, would meet the case, if permission were given to alter it.

I am agreeable.

Leave granted to alter amendment.

If no other purpose were served by this debate, we have the satisfaction of knowing that the letter which the President addressed to the editor of the "Morning Post" was the end of an effort which did not succeed and that, on the President's showing to-day, the correspondent of the "Morning Post" was not telling the truth when he wrote his article in that day's issue. Perhaps one should express some surprise at the President's statement, that notwithstanding that he signed his letter "President" it was a personal letter and not one as representing the views of the Executive Council. That should be noted by the country and by the editor of the "Morning Post." It was a personal letter and not a letter by the President notwithstanding the fact that it was signed "President," so that we do not now discuss it as the view of the Executive Council and we may, perhaps, take it that no other member of the Executive Council approves of the letter. But let us examine the position. This was a letter sent to the editor of the "Morning Post" and one finds it difficult to subscribe to the proposition that it arose out of the void—that nothing had preceded it. It was an expression of satisfaction at the efforts made to facilitate a more comprehensive agreement. But, as the President has assured us that no negotiations had been entered upon and that no proposals had been under discussion, we have a right to assume that the efforts failed and that this letter of the President was a note more or less recording his regret that the efforts had failed. That must be the explanation, in view of the President's statement. It must also be true that the "Morning Post" was building entirely upon its imagination when its correspondent spoke of himself as the mouthpiece and agent of certain representations. According to these representations, the Northern Administration had refrained from publicly urging the Dublin Government to readjust the fiscal arrangements on the boundary. That was a matter that grew entirely out of the imagination of the "Morning Post." When the same correspondent said "I am able to state to-day that the Dublin Government has modified its original attitude"—that was the day on which the letter was written—he must have been drawing upon his imagination, in view of the President's statement to-day. That must have been the conclusion of any effort, inasmuch as no further negotiation has ever taken place.

It is permissible, I think, to say that when the London Agreement was under discussion the special correspondent of the "Morning Post" made plain that his position here was different from that of previous correspondents of the "Morning Post"; that so far from following the practice of the past and publishing defamatory matter he was entrusted with the duty of getting to know the real meaning of affairs in Ireland, the real facts, and to print them implicitly, and that in following that mission he adopted this method: Before printing anything he would submit the matter to the person who was responsible for the information, and would guarantee that it would be printed as it had been submitted. That was the avowed practice up to this date. We may take it that it ceased on the 13th February, and that the correspondent who wrote this matter for the paper on that date did not submit it to the President. It was entirely unauthorised; there was no basis for the propositions contained in it, and the "Morning Post" does not deserve the encomiums which the President had, in that day's letter, showered upon it. In view of the statement of the President to-day we can only conclude that it has resumed its old methods and is no longer to be considered as a friend of the President or of the country.

I do not want to take up much of the time of the House, but I want to deal with the issue that is raised, quite apart from the incident of the President's letter, though that provides the occasion and proves the necessity for raising the question of the wisdom of encouraging the Ministry to make departures on big questions of public policy affecting the country without having had previous public discussions in respect of these departures. We have emerged from a period of revolutionary activities, from a time when a great deal of the country's fortunes was in the hands of a revolutionary authority, which had to come to grave decisions committing the country, but decisions of a kind which, perhaps, could be said to have been impossible to have discussed. My feeling in regard to the conduct of the Government ever since we came into the region of Parliamentary government is that they have found it very difficult to get away from the revolutionary responsibility, or period, or habits of thought; that things which may be permissible or, shall I say excusable, in the case of a revolutionary authority, are not permissble under Parliamentary government. We had, of course, a succession of agreements, or pacts, or decisions which committed the country to certain courses during and immediately after the revolutionary period, and in some of those cases the country was involved in very grave liabilities and responsibilities. I allude, for instance, to the Craig-Collins Pact, to a later pact which was entered upon by a certain department of the Ministry and which was not discussed by any public authority, or council, or Parliament, which was not discussed, in the absence of a Parliament, by any method for eliciting public opinion. We had the decision regarding the five years' period during which the Council of Ireland was not to function. We had the decision regarding the land bonds. We had, then, the London Agreement, and the appearance, at least, of something happening in respect of fiscal autonomy.

I want to suggest that it is absolutely necessary that there should be no departure from normal public policy, that there should be no limiting of powers, even by way of reciprocal arrangements, when the general principles involved have not been discussed in the Dáil. The President uses the usual debating society methods of belittling the proposition by treating it in its extreme form. He uses the illustration of negotiations for the purchase of a house and suggests that it would be folly to come here and discuss whether the price should be £400 or £500, or in between. But surely it would be permissible to come here to see whether the house is to be sold or not? Similarly, in regard to the proposals for duties on fish entering America. Surely it would be permissible to ask the House whether it is in favour of negotiating for the reduction of duties, or freedom of access of certain goods from America only into this country in exchange for certain concessions regarding Irish exports to America? We have the whole question of the "most favoured nation" clause in agreements involved. We have very big questions involved, and it is not a mere matter of whether the price shall be 3d. or 3½d. It is a matter of whether there is to be a sale, or whether there is to be an agreement, and what the lines of the agreement are to be, and I submit that it is essential for the proper working of Parliamentary institutions that Ministers should sound the views of the community, through its elected representatives, on questions of public policy. Otherwise Parliamentary institutions are a mockery. We would have a succession of incidents, as Deputy Magennis has pointed out, and as other Deputies have pointed out privately, of the Government coming to the House with accomplished facts and asking the House whether they would approve of them or not, which would be merely to ask them whether they would prefer to be hanged or shot—a choice of evils. That is not the kind of control that Parliamentary institutions are supposed to exercise over the actions of the Executive in matters of public policy.

My amendment is directed to an expression of the view that the functions of the Executive Government are to carry out public policy, which public policy has previously been consented to by the public representatives, and that if there are to be departures, if there are to be important limitations placed upon the functions of the Oireachtas, and the Dáil, as the chief authority in fiscal matters, it should not be left only to the last moment when a Bill or a resolution comes before us asking us to approve of something which has already been decided upon by the Executives of two different countries, because we cannot blind ourselves to the fact that when Executives enter into propositions somebody else is involved besides our own Executive; another Executive is involved, and while it may be quite a simple matter for the other country, inasmuch as it will be no departure from common, well-understood policy in that country, it would be a distinct departure from our policy and our views as to what our policy should be. I put forward the principle that is embodied in this amendment, and I would not confine it to fiscal matters. I would extend it to matters affecting external relations of all kinds, but as we are dealing with these fiscal questions I ask the House to agree that there should be no departure on matters of general policy by way of agreement, of a reciprocal kind or otherwise, unless the matter in its broad, general aspect has been discussed and sanctioned by the House To say that it is merely a matter of detail is to mis-state the position. We are in a position to impose tariffs or to reduce tariffs; we are in a position to allow the free entry of goods or to prohibit entirely the entry of goods, and it is conceivable that it would be to the best interests of the country to make arrangements with one or other of any number of countries in regard to the imports or exports, free or bound, tied or restricted in any way. It is quite conceivable that it would be good policy to enter into reciprocal arrangements which, in effect, would limit our liberty. I say that it is wrong for the Executive Council even to propose to enter into such reciprocal arrangements until the principle of the matter has been discussed in this House, and it is on those grounds that I move this amendment.

The proposition of the President, that the Dáil has no desire to limit the Executive Council in the exercise of its functions, is a new Italian policy. It depends on what are its functions, of course, but are its functions to enter into Treaty arrangements with other countries and then present the accomplished fact to the country? That, surely, is not one of its functions; it is an Executive Council to do the executive work which has already been agreed upon as a matter of general policy by the Dáil. If we are asked to say we have no desire to limit the Executive Council in the discharge of its functions, and that the Executive Council are to decide what its functions are, that is another word for autocracy, and I think the House would agree that a fair examination of the President's amendment would be to hand over, to the Executive Council, absolute and complete authority to define its own functions, and then to say the Dáil has handed over complete discretion to the Executive Council because we have said we have no desire to limit their activities. I submit the President's amendment is not one which the House should adopt and that we should, in fact, express the view that before there is any departure in matters relating to our fiscal freedom the principle of any such departure should be first discussed by the House and the country.

I second the amendment.

I prefer to speak on Deputy Johnson's amendment rather than to the original motion. For one thing I prefer the spirit in which the amendment was framed and the spirit in which the amendment was put forward to that which surrounds the motion of Deputy Professor Magennis. Deputy Johnson has put forward a case from a point of view that, while I disagree with it, is at least natural in a member of Parliament vis-á-vis the Executive, and perhaps particularly natural in the leader of an opposition Party, vis-á-vis the Government. He says that the tendency has been to continue, a procedure that was understandable, perhaps even excusable, in revolutionary times, in chaotic conditions, into a normal situation when one would expect that parliamentary procedure would be more strictly constitutional than in times when the very existence of the State was menaced. He proceeded to lay down certain general principles, one of them being that the Executive Council must never confront the Dáil with accomplished facts, another being that the proper function of the Executive Council is to carry out public policy, previously consented to, and that any departure from that constitutes a claim to absolute authority.

I do not question that Deputy Johnson, when saying these things, believed them more or less, but I invite him and other Deputies to consider the reactions of an acceptance of these general principles which sound at first blush reasonable and plausible enough. Is it, in fact, the function of the Executive Council to carry out public policy previously discussed and consented to? Is it, at any time, the function of the Executive Council to formulate, and put forward, a policy for the consideration of members of the Dáil? Are we to take it that the Executive Council consists of glorified civil servants, people whose function it is simply to obey the orders of the Dáil, or is it, at any time, the function of the Executive Council to arrive at decisions on matters of policy and to bring these decisions before the Dáil, standing on them as matters of policy, defeat on which would involve their resignation? When Deputy Johnson speaks of the Executive Council confronting the Dáil with an accomplished fact, he is using the words "accomplished fact" rather loosely. When does policy become an accomplished fact? Surely when having been put to the Dáil by the Executive Council it receives the consent and endorsement of the Dáil. There and then is policy an accomplished fact.

I was rather impressed by Deputy Johnson's amendment, because if it were accepted by the Dáil as the position that is to prevail in future, then the position of the Executive Council and the position of the members of the Executive Council would become even more difficult than it is at present.

"The Dáil desires that there should be no agreements made, provisional or binding, calculated to limit in any way the freedom of the Saorstát in respect to fiscal affairs unless the proposals have previously been submitted to the Dáil."

I put it to Deputies that the acceptance of that amendment means one thing, and one thing only, that there could never be discussion, that there could never be negotiation, that there could never be agreement on any fiscal matters, because of all matters that do not bear open public discussion before the stage of unity of mind, before the stage of agreement is reached, fiscal matters stand out. One knows the secrecy that enshrouds the framing of a Budget; one knows that when it narrows down to the point of decision, the number of officials who remain in contact with the trend of things is very, very limited, and that up to the day when the Minister for Finance makes his statement to the Dáil, the strictest confidence, the greatest possible secrecy, surrounds the whole proceeding. Why? Clearly because if there is leakage, if there is a lack of secrecy, if there is an absence of the strictest confidence, there is forestalling; the whole purpose of the Budget is, to some extent, greater or less, defeated. That is the explanation of the secrecy.

Deputy Johnson's conception is that when, and if, at any time it becomes the view of the Executive Council of this State that some modification, some reciprocal arrangement, is advisable between this country and any other country in respect of any class of goods, then the Executive Council should come to the Dáil and tell the Dáil that they considered some such arrangement as this eminently desirable and ask permission to proceed. It seems to me that an Executive Council that would take on a task of that kind, after the matter had received public discussion in the Dáil, would simply be stultifying itself, and the Government of any other country that would agree to do business with the Executive Council on that basis, and after public discussion in the Parliament, would also be stultified. The matter cannot be approached in that way.

Will the Minister allow me to put the position, as it is a very important matter and I do not want any misunderstanding to arise. I am asking the Minister to accept the view that the general principle of a reciprocal arrangement regarding fiscal matters should first of all be agreed upon before any negotiations are entered upon. I am not foolish enough to imagine that the details of any proposal are going to be discussed publicly in the Dáil. But whether there should be a special agreement entered into, let us say, with America is a matter that surely is broad and general enough to have submitted to a public body of this kind.

The Deputy has not enlightened me very much. I do not know what the effect of his intervention has been on other Deputies, but it seems to me that he has made the position one degree more foolish, and one degree more difficult. The Executive Council then should come to the Dáil and say that it believed that certain reciprocal arrangements with regard to fiscal policy were advisable in relation to some other country—presumably we might give the name of the country but no more. We were not to say what is the nature of the arrangements; we were not to say what class of goods would be involved in any such arrangement. We were simply to come and say to the Dáil that we had a kind of hazy idea that a reciprocal arrangement of some kind with some other country was desirable, and the Dáil, in its wisdom, was to pronounce on that proposition and to say: "Yes, we think so; go ahead." How could the Dáil judge as to the desirability of an arrangement without some information as to the kind of arrangement which was to be sought, without some information as to the class of goods to be covered?

This is a matter in which there would have to be full knowledge or none, and if there were full knowledge negotiations could not take place, and the very object of the negotiations would be defeated. The Dáil has to consider whether it has not to accept the position that up to the point of agreement there could be none, and when I say agreement what do I mean? What does any agreement between governments mean? Simply that six or seven men with political responsibility here agree with another six or seven men who have political responsibility elsewhere, that a particular proposal shall be put to their Parliament, and that each government will stand on that proposal as a matter of major policy, defeated on which it would resign. There is no agreement in the full sense of the word until the matter is sanctioned and endorsed not by one Parliament but by two. What there is in fact, even when the signatures are appended, is merely an agreement between persons with political responsibility, agreement each to each, that they shall recommend a particular course to their Parliaments —each government regarding it as a matter of major policy. That is not an ideal position. It may be said, for instance, in connection with the recent London Agreement that had the Dáil not accepted it, the position was not quite so open as before the Agreement was made, that to some extent the position was prejudiced by the fact that such an agreement had been reached. But is there any better solution? Is there any ideal except you simply say that each country is to live in a watertight compartment, that there must be no contact, no discussion, no negotiation with the responsible Ministers of any other country, and that if tragedy is to develop let it develop rather than to endeavour to approach the question as a matter of common interest and avert it.

I query the wisdom of the Deputy in trying to lay down and secure acceptance for the general statement that it is the function of the Executive Council to carry out public policy previously consented to. That statement will not stand examination in the light of every-day facts, in the light of the burdens which the Government has to carry. It is not merely their function to carry out public policy previously consented to; it is their function to formulate their own policy and submit it for the consideration of the Dáil. They have the right—because even members of Governments have rights as well as members of Parliaments—to say what kind of policy they will and what kind of policy they will not carry out. They have the right, having probed and explored the situation, to give their considered view as to what policy they consider advisable and what policy they do not consider advisable. They have the right, as a matter of confidence, to put a particular policy to the Dáil and say:—"We believe that that is the course to take, and we believe that so strongly that rather than take any other course we would lay down our burdens and our responsibilities."

After you have entered into obligations.

What obligations? In so far as there can be obligation, it is merely a contractual obligation to submit the particular thing to the Parliament as a matter of policy. That is our obligation, if the Deputy wishes, but not his, nor the Dáil's, nor the country's. Let us be accurate; let us have clear thinking on a difficult matter. I put it to the Deputy that I am not standing over the position which I advocate as an ideal one. I put it to him that there is no ideal one, that you simply have to take the realities of the situation and to judge of them. I do not think he will find any ideal course. Is it an ideal course to attempt to make super civil servants of the Executive Council? Is it an ideal course to say that they must never probe or explore any position without having discussed it coram public with the Dáil and without having been told by the Dáil what to do, what objective to seek, what solution to take, as their objective? I simply put it to the Dáil that they should not be deceived by the surface reasonableness or the surface plausibility of Deputy Johnson's amendment; that they should examine its natural and necessary consequences; that they should examine its reactions, and, having done so, I do the Dáil the credit of believing that they could not subscribe to the Deputy's amendment.

The burdens and the responsibilities of any Government in any country to-day are great enough without Deputies adding to them without meaning to. If the Deputy's amendment were accepted no Government in this State would ever seek to make a reciprocal Customs arrangement, however much they might believe that it would be in the interests of the State and of its people. The very wording of the amendment would debar them from any such course. It does impose the limit that they must seek prior sanction and assent by the Dáil, not subsequent sanction and assent after they have found out what the possibilities are and decided that a particular course is the right policy for the country. There must be no contact, no consultation, no negotiation until the prior sanction of the Dáil has been procured. No other Government, approached after such a discussion, would do business. They could not. The matter would have been canvassed by a thousand interests in the meantime. All the reactions would have taken place, the kind of reactions that would take place if there were a leakage before the announcement of the Budget.

The Deputy meant well; he conceived the amendment in a reasonable spirit; he put it forward in a reasonable spirit; but, with all that. I submit to him that it is not a wise or proper amendment, and that its acceptance would not be in the interests of the State or of the people of the State. On these grounds I oppose it; I ask the Dáil to oppose it, and I ask them to take the view that you have no alternative to leaving your Executive Council free, knowing its responsibilities, recognising its responsibilities, recognising that it can arrive at no valid or binding agreement without the sanction or assent of the Dáil. You must leave, I submit, your Executive Council free to explore positions, even free to arrive at agreements in the sense of agreeing to submit matters to Parliament as their policy—the policy on which they stand or fall. If you do not, then you will limit them in what I believe to be a very real, a very vital. a very important portion of their true function, because it is not their function, as Deputy Johnson would have us believe, simply to carry out public policy previously consented to.

I understand that while I was absent Deputy Magennis handed out bouquets to certain members of the Executive Council, including myself. I just want to say that I distrust the Deputy's bouquets. I have the feeling that bouquests from the Deputy are likely to contain hidden daggers. After a long study of the Deputy I associate him with hidden daggers. Over a crowded and strenuous three years, my experience of the Deputy is that every time the ship rocked his one concern and preoccupation was to know what member of the crew he should knife and that in every crisis the dagger came stealing down from his sleeve. Knowing him as I do, holding the opinion of him that I do hold, I want no compliments from him and I value no compliments from him.

The Minister for Justice has covered practically all the ground that I intended to cover. Were it not for the repudiation of the bouquets I should say that I agree with every word he said. I do want to say a word about the doctrine laid down by Deputy Johnson, because it is a serious doctrine that ought to be seriously discussed. Deputy Johnson laid down the doctrine that previous consent by the Dáil and, presumably, also by the Seanad, is essential to the working of parliamentary institutions. Now, all my experience and all my reading go to show not only that it is not essential to the working of parliamentary institutions, but that it would reduce parliamentary institutions to absolute futility. The whole essence of modern parliamentary doctrine is that parliament recognises its limitations, that parliament or, to translate it into English, a debating society: a talking shop, cannot carry on government. It can check and can control and that is its duty. But it cannot carry on the task of government. It must entrust that task to certain of its members who should be closely associated with it. It should take them into its confidence—I am there with Deputy Johnson as far as possible—but they must act on their own responsibility and incur responsibility, knowing that they will require ultimate confirmation from the body for whom they are acting. I do not think the Minister disagrees with that. That is not only an essential of parliamentary institutions; it is an essential of democracy. Even in the purest democracies the world has ever known, the city States of ancient Greece, there were certain responsible people, certain magistrates and others, who negotiated on behalf of the State. Then they gathered the citizens of the State together, and told them what they had done. If they did wrong they were liable to be overthrown. That, I believe, is even an essential of trades unionism. So far as I know—I am open to correction because I do not pretend to know a great deal about trades unionism—when a trades union negotiates with an employer or with an employers' association, the whole body of the union does not negotiate or even the whole committee of the union. What they do is, they choose two or three persons in whom they have confidence to conduct the negotiations.

Yes, within limits.

Certainly. The question is: What are the limits?

I hold that the limit Deputy Johnson seeks to impose is an unreasonable limit, and one that would not be observed even by a trades union. Would the representatives of the trades unions in Dublin go into negotiation with employers or with an employers' association if they were to be bound beforehand by a resolution which said: "You are not to go any further than this"?

They do it every day.

Are these negotiations often successful?

I doubt it. The essence of all negotiation is that there must be freedom to give and take. In any case, the limits that Deputy Johnson seeks to impose are absolutely futile limits. They are of no value to the Dáil at all, because he wants assent for the general principle. Now Ministers are quite intelligent enough to be able to camouflage a general principle. What Deputy Johnson really objects to is the fact that when an agreement is entered into the credit of the Government Party is bound up with it, and that, therefore, the members of the Government party will follow their Whips. But they will follow their Whips much more readily on a general principle than on a question of detail which may affect interests in their own constituencies. They are much more likely to act intelligently when they get the details of a proposal than on a general principle. I attach no value to a general principle. A general principle can be interpreted subsequently in any manner that is convenient. It is of no value to us from the point of value of parliament. What we ought to get are the details and the facts, and that right we have already. It is not impaired by the President's amendment. Any agreement that the Government may enter into comes to us for confirmation. If it is a bad agreement, I am prepared to vote against it, and I have voted against the Government far more frequently than Deputy Magennis. We can examine the agreement on its merits. I do say that to trammel the Government as Deputy Johnson's amendment would trammel it, would mean that we should have no Government at all worthy of the name. It would mean, in practice, that the Government would ignore the amendment and would ignore the Dáil altogether. It would be paying the way for a dictatorship, and therefore I must oppose the Deputy's amendment.

I desire to say at the outset that while I am not a member of Deputy Magennis's party, I deprecate the extraordinarily virulent personal abuse to which he has been subjected by members of the Executive Council, and which I think is not worthy of this House. I support the amendment of Deputy Johnson not on the general principle as it has been developed by the Vice-President and Deputy Cooper. On general principles, of course, the Executive Council, in normal times, has the right to make external agreements with other Governments and then to present them to Parliament, but in the particular circumstances in which we are placed in this country, I think that the adoption of Deputy Johnson's amendment would be useful. It would be a useful reminder to the Executive Council. I think what is really in Deputy Johnson's mind in putting down the amendment is the desire that the Executive Council should adopt definitely some general policy with regard to fiscal matters, a policy which they have been very careful to avoid during all their time in office. The Government, as everyone knows, has no general policy. They considered, owing to the peculiar circumstances of the time, that it was not necessary to enunciate any policy at the General Election. Since then they have acted from day to day on no fixed principles. They have lived from hand to mouth, one day giving the impression that they were in favour of tariffs, another day giving the impression that they were in favour of free trade. They have, as I say, been living from hand to mouth, and consider that they are entitled to do whatever they like: that they have got a free mandate from the electorate to pursue whatever policy they choose, and even contradictory policies, which is inevitable, so long as there is no real dangerous parliamentary Opposition in the Dáil which would necessitate the drawing up of a definite economic and fiscal policy.

When I entered this Dáil I was interested not only in fiscal matters but in all other matters. I hoped for the best, and consequently I was nearly always disappointed, but since then I have grown old and now I always expect the worst from the Government so that occasionally I get pleasant surprises, but the Government, owing to the absence of a real Opposition, are enabled to do what they like and they feel no necessity to have any policy. I think that this amendment is useful as an expression of a desire of the House that the Government should have a policy. I support it on these grounds, although I realise that in normal times the argument of the Minister for Justice and of Deputy Cooper is quite sound, that the Executive Council must have a free hand in negotiating with foreign Governments in all matters until they are brought before the Dáil for ratification.

I think the Minister for Justice has really made an unanswerable case against the amendment before the House, more particularly as this amendment confines itself to the question of fiscal matters. It seems to me that if Deputy Johnson were selecting the one thing on which he could put forward the weakest possible amendment, he would select fiscal affairs. It is notorious that on the Continent and in all other places where tariffs have been put into operation, bargaining between the different countries has reached a fine art and has ceased to be political; it is commercial. In all these international conferences, including the Geneva Conference, the Governments go in largely dominated by the need for negotiating what they consider good bargains. It may not be the official business on the agenda, but it amounts to that in practice. To say the Executive are not to be allowed to enter into any negotiations with another country on the question of fiscal arrangements would be in essence to deprive them of their business power which is, after all, one of the important features of life at the present time. If the Dáil agree to this amendment, whereby you are not going to allow the Executive Council to negotiate agreements, it would be very much like putting a manager in charge of a business concern and telling him that he could not either buy or sell without waiting for the confirmation of the shareholders.

One has to recognise that in the country at present politics have been largely dominated by a controversy which has prevented the people expressing an opinion on the various matters of very great importance as regards policy. The Government of to-day has never enunciated a policy in regard to fiscal or other matters, but the Government has committed the country to an experimental fiscal policy, which, though experimental in its origin, has gradually grown along with the various Budgets until to-day in this House the general demand is for protection and tariffs all round. The country itself has never had an opportunity of expressing an opinion on that policy, and in so far as this House, following the lead of the Executive Council, has proceeded to commit the country to a policy of tariffs all round, I claim that they have not received any authority for that from the people in the country as a whole. If Deputy Johnson's amendment had been curtailed to an expression of a desire that at each stage of the House Ministers would, in the same form as is outlined in another House in the King's Speech at the various openings of Parliament, periodically review their policy as a whole, it would enable the country to understand what they were driving at. I think some limitations in that respect on their actions would be very useful. I think the people of the country have a right to know where the Government is leading them, and I do take exception to what has been the constant practice of this House— springing on the House important questions of policy which in my judgement at all events should have been prearranged rather than being thrown at the House as a decision of the Executive Council. The Executive Council to-day of course represents the Government. Behind the Government there is a Party, and that Party in this House has a preponderating vote, worked on Party lines whereby an individual is compelled in loyalty to his Party to vote with them on any proposition brought in by the Executive. That of course is Parliamentary procedure, but it goes beyond that, because I claim as far as this House is concerned, the Opposition should have some say in the regulation of the business or at all events a means whereby they would know legislation that is going to come before the House.

This is an important amendment we have had before us to-day. One would have wished that the personalities that were brought into the debate had been left outside. Some of us are no great admirers of personalities and to introduce them into the House is a very unfortunate state of affairs, whether they come from the Ministerial benches or other sources. I would deprecate the idea of bringing them inside the House when a debate is being carried on. There is a platform outside on which personal aspects of political matters can be fully dealt with. Apart from that I think this debate is helpful to us all as enabling us to from some judgment as to the lines on which this House should be worked in future. My opinion is that these amendments could not be accepted by the House. I think Deputy Johnson, who has moved one of the amendments, will recognise the impossibility of putting them into operation. On the other hand I think it is valuable to have the views expressed and I think these views will carry weight notwithstanding whether the amendments are withdrawn or defeated. They express the feeling that all is not right in our procedure at the present time and they are an indication to the Executive Council of the views of the Deputies. I express the opinion, at all events, that the Government up to the present has ignored too much the Opposition in this House, and that the Opposition, whether it constitutes three sections or three bodies, or whatever it may be, should be consulted in important matters like some which came before us recently. We are in the position that we have as much concern as the Government in the proper administration of the business of the country.

We are not people to be treated with contempt and ignored. The Government would be wise, when outlining their policy, to take into consideration the people represented by other parties in this House; they should extend to them the courtesy of giving them the information they are entitled to on important matters.

If my motion had nothing else to justify it than that it was the occasion of provoking this speech from Deputy Hewat, I should be eminently satisfied with having proposed it. Deputy Cooper said that Parliaments must recognise their limitations. That, undoubtedly, is true. So, too, must Ministers recognise their limitations. That is equally true. Now, the democracy of ancient Greece and the procedure of primitive communities before the development of the complexities of modern times, are altogether irrelevant. We are in the twentieth century. Not only are we an Irish Free State in the twentieth century; we are a creature of it, and a very important consideration is that we are so near geographically, politically and historically to a neighbouring power—one of the greatest powers of the world—that we are susceptible to influences and subject to pressure from that great power which might seriously interfere with any growth on our part towards settled responsible Government. That is the reason why it behoves us to be very watchful, to be very careful, that nothing is done in those early years in setting up traditions for a Parliament and Government of the Free State—that nothing should be permitted—that would encroach on liberty or create a trend towards autocracy.

Now, the Minister for Justice made precisely the speech I expected he would make. I am not referring to his irrelevant and disorderly conclusion. I take no note of that except to explain to him that I threw no bouquets to him. It is the last thing I should do. I should never forgive myself if I so dishonoured my sense of what is due and right. He declares for a position which is even worse than that of the President. The system that is preached and, what is worse, practised, by the President, is completely at variance with the spirit of representative Government. But the Vice-President ventures to defend it. And what is his defence? There is no ideal course, he says. Well, if we are to have metaphysical discussions here, in the actual order there is no ideal; that is just the difference between the ideal and the actual. But it needs no ghost to come from the grave to tell us that; it needs no Minister to come from his seclusion, to take his seat for a moment and flit away again after he has delivered this marvellously illuminating announcement that there is no ideal course.

Because there is absolutely no ideal course, are we to put up with the worst possible course? That is his recommendation to the House. He thinks that we are between two alternatives. One is the discussion of every detail of policy, of every proposition, coram publico; everyone listening to every point, every view expressed, every recommendation of caution, every query, every suspicion—all made in the presence of the public and reported in the Press. That is one alternative which, of course, requires only to be stated to be condemned. Then the other alternative is to give a go-as-you-please licence to a Minister, because he is a Minister. Deputies are to be called in merely as a registration machine after the Minister had done the deed.

This Parliament is first of all a debating society, according to one Deputy; according to another Deputy, its true function is found in registering with full servility and obsequiousness the decisions that the great men have come to. I suppose the sursum corda formula fits in here. When those who have honest convictions and who know something about history and public affairs and constitutional procedure in other countries, know this is wrong, they are to say sursum corda and walk into the division lobby courageously to vote for what they know is wrong.

We are to consider the reactions of these principles, the Vice-President tells us. What are the reactions of these principles? Would he first of all consider the principles that are enunciated in the amendment of Deputy Johnson? What are they but the elementary principles of responsible, representative Government? What the members here are requested to do when they are ordered to vote against that amendment is to declare for autocracy, naked and unashamed. The Vice-President made no attempt to hide that. I do him that justice. De l'audace en- core d'audace et puis de l'audace. That was the method, the audacity of making no attempt to hide what the thing really means.

Deputy Hewat thought there was a weakness in Deputy Johnson's position because it refers to fiscal matters. Deputy Hewat, of course, will remember that this is not a proposal by the Deputy nor by me out of the clear sky. It arises out of an incident that has caused alarm and uneasiness to bodies of business men—a letter that has suspended all the business in Dublin, and in the Free State for that matter, in regard to the sale of motor cars, and has absolutely paralysed the market for second-hand cars. I read the Federation of Irish Industries letter, pointing out the uneasiness of men who, under the impression that tariffs were to be continued as the fiscal policy were embarking capital in new ventures and are now afraid. That is what happens when we accept the Minister for Justice's invitation to consider the reactions of these principles. I consider the reaction of his doctrine. I know no man, I have never read of any man, big enough or great enough—and there were, in history, many great men—to whom one ought to give those unlimited powers that the Executive Council of the Free State demands for itself. There never was any man who was not corrupted by power to a great extent. But mention of ancient Greek democracy by Deputy Cooper reminds me we have outlived the age of the Solons, of the inspired prophets who spoke in the name of their people. We are not living in those days; we are not willing to go back to the conditions of those days.

Evidently neither the Minister for Justice nor the President is aware of what happens in France. They do not know of the bureaus of public affairs by which, in a country where the administration is changed from week to week, and from month to month, and where there is very little stability of Ministerial Government, there is the continuancy and the steadiness of control of affairs in these bureaus.

May I ask the Deputy is it not the case that these bureaus sit in private and that their proceedings are confidential and that they have now broken down because the Communists refuse to regard them as confidential?

I am coming to that. I spoke of this matter before, and I do not know whether I would be in order in dealing with it again. Deputy Cooper was not here and perhaps he deserves to hear my argument again.

And desires to hear it.

I thought that would be a punishment rather than an advantage. There is a middle course between those two extremes that have been outlined by the Minister for Justice; as between the conduct of affairs by Ministers who will pretend to ask the consent of Parliament, after Parliament has been committed in a way that it cannot draw back; and the public debate of details and the conduct of affairs by a debating society, as it is called. There is a middle course. I said experience had hammered out a via media between those two.

I think it was Macaulay who said that an army has been led to victory by a fool, or by a coward, but never by a debating society, and, of course, everyone admits that that holds good also in regard to diplomacy, and it is of diplomacy, I take it, that Deputy Cooper was speaking. I admit that at a certain stage of negotiations there must be secrecy. But what Deputy Johnson and I contend for is not the denial of that obvious fact—we are not so ignorant of psychology and history as to think that delicate negotiations on vital matters could be debated in public—we know very well how even news leaks out where the Press and the public are not invited to be present. Now the middle course that I mentioned with regard to the bureaus in the French parliamentary control are threatened with breakdown by the fact that there is now a strong political organisation in France whose object is to overthrow existing civilisation. I am quite well aware, and I have stated already that there are two forms of anarchy, and that is one of them. The Ministerial autocracy without control, committing the people, tying its hands, is quite as much in the nature and will ultimately prove to have the same results as the anarchial proceedings of the Communist.

Take the United States: The United States have, and it is functioning admirably, a committee of the Senate. It is a select body of representative public men. Projected measures, and propositions of other States are submitted to them in private—that is to say, they are consulted; they debate these proposals in private; they give their considered judgment upon them; they operate as a consultative and advisory committee in short. Surely it is a wise thing and a useful thing to have intervening between the Executive, who happens in the United States to be a single man, the President and the Congress, a body such as that. Now, it would be quite possible for us in reforming our Constitution, to set up a Joint Committee of the Seanad and the Dáil of that nature whose business it would be to assist Ministers. I have already disclaimed the desire to take from any Minister his proper duty and the discharge of his proper functions. The President does not desire us to limit the Executive Council in the exercise of its functions. No one wants to limit the Executive Council in the proper exercise of its proper functions. We have the Minister for External Affairs. What does he do when external affairs are in question? I have already protested against this on two occasions. The British Ministers do not like our having an external Ministry. We are the only one with Dominion status outside the British Government itself that has a foreign Ministry. Not to hurt British susceptibilities, when negotiations are being carried on on external affairs the Minister for External Affairs is left here at home in ignorance of what is happening.

I was a member of the Ministerial Party when we waited until 9 o'clock at night for some communication as to what Ministers had done in London, and the Minister for External Affairs was obliged, in public, in the hall of this building, to telephone to the "Independent" office to know what had happened. That is the blissful alternative that the Minister for Justice proposes instead of the wildly impossible scheme of debating the whole thing in the market place in the presence of everybody. It is a deliberate attempt on the part of the Minister for Justice to persuade the members of this House that there is nothing for it but to allow the course that issues in the London Agreement to be followed and that Ministers should be allowed to go their unbridled way. Deputy Johnson and those who support this amendment are determined at any rate that if members of the Dáil and those who support them outside are determined to sin, they shall sin if they sin against the light. They will vote with their eyes open for a pursuance of the autocratic course, with full knowledge of what they are committing the country to; for a system of things that enables commitments to be entered into by secret covenants, commitments from which they cannot withdraw, although there is a constitutional theory that the final commitment is only when the Oireachtas ratifies the action of the Government.

That is the difference between theory and fact. The fact is that there is no help, absolutely no help, for the Oireachtas once Ministers come back and say: "This is the best we could do for you. We did our best." They do not say: "We were overawed. We were incompetent because we had insufficient information. We were inexperienced." That is what it amounts to. What with that feeling, with that sense of defeat and with a conviction of helplessness there is nothing for it but to save their faces and vote for what they propose. Deputy Johnson's amendment is really a warning, if it be no more, that the country is tired of autocratic procedure and that it will have no more of it. If the Dáil votes otherwise, I invite the electorate to take note.

There are some remarks of Deputy Magennis which I rather resent. One of them is that when he suggested that we who voted for the London Pact did so through weakness, and that there was nothing more to be done. We did not do that, but we realised that the best course to adopt was to vote for the Pact. We did that as we had realised that the Treaty was inherently weak, and that the decision was a decision that was permissible within the Treaty, so far as it affected the Boundary question. The decision went against us, but that was not the fault of the Executive Council or those who negotiated in London. To my mind the terms of the President's amendment should be a sufficient safeguard to the country. It is suggested that we who support the Government are simply a lot of weaklings, that we are simply prepared to vote for anything to keep our seats. I do not agree with that, and it is improper to suggest it. I say that in the terms of the President's amendment there is perfect safety for the country if each Deputy discharges his duty properly.

resumed the Chair.

It is all very well for Deputies to say that the Opposition is treated with contempt. I do not see where the contempt comes in except the Government is to be under an obligation to accept every remedy suggested no matter how weak it is. The Government has a certain policy and it pushes it forward in the hope that those committed to it will support it. There is nothing more in the President's amendment than that we are asked to vote in accordance with the terms of the Constitution. That Constitution is, I believe, formulated so that we can do our duty, and I believe we are capable of doing it for the safety and protection of the State.

Now that the Deputy has finished, may I be allowed to point out that I have said nothing, even remotely resembling the words attributed to me by my friend, Deputy Dr. Hennessy. I did not suggest that members voted in order to keep their seats. I do not know how that found its way into my friend's mind.

I support Deputy Johnson's amendment. I think a good deal of misunderstanding has arisen in connection with it, but the phrasing shows that Deputy Johnson obviously had in his mind that no agreement, provisional or binding, should be made with an outside authority without the Dáil having been previously consulted. The Minister for Justice, in an endeavour, and I think it was a futile endeavour, to show the difficulty of adopting the course suggested by Deputy Johnson, told us of the difficulty that surrounds the keeping of budget secrets. He told us it was very necessary that the Government should initiate policy, keep that policy secret, and only release it when the opportune time arose. That may be the case so far as budget secrets are concerned, but I hold it should not be the case so far as agreements with outside bodies and outside nations are concerned. I do not think any speaker on the Government Benches has made any case against the proposal of Deputy Johnson to bring before the Dáil the principle of matters which they desire to discuss with other nations, and to ask the Dáil whether or not it is prepared to consent to the principle, as apart from the details, of the particular matter being discussed with a particular nation. We had an example of the policy of secret negotiation on the occasion of the London Agreement, and we on these benches, who are free to speak our minds openly on this matter, know only too well the consequences and cost to the nation of that sort of policy. The London Agreement shows the dangers and pitfalls that are inherent in secret negotiations, and it shows that even the Executive Council notwithstanding that it may pride itself on keen political acumen, cannot be trusted always to do the right thing. On the occasion of the London Agreement I think they gave evidence that they are not infallible on political matters, much as they would wish the Dáil to believe so. I think the case made by Deputy Johnson for bringing before the Dáil the principle of matters which it desires to discuss with outside nations has not been answered by any Deputy from the Government or any other benches.

It may be said that the London Agreement was negotiated, even though it was negotiated without authority, by the Government. The President's letter to the "Morning Post" shows that it is not proposed to limit the negotiations even to members of the Government, and that special correspondents can now be given the task to create an atmosphere and provide facilities for this, that, or the other thing. I think it is a sad spectacle for the Dáil to see entrusted to the special correspondent of the "Morning Post," a paper that has no sympathy with Irish aspirations, and that has a lifelong record of villification and defamation of this country, the task, and I am sure to that correspondent it was a congenial task, inasmuch as it was humiliating this nation, of creating an atmosphere and providing facilities for other people to be strengthened economically at the cost of the economic stability and political independence of this country. I am curious to know why the special correspondent of the "Morning Post" was entrusted with the task. Is it that the Executive Council feel that owing to the mess they made of the London Agreement they are not competent to enter into diplomatic matters such as those with Great Britain, or is it a gesture of satisfaction to the "Morning Post" for the manner in which it saved the Government from itself in the recent Boundary discussion? Whatever the answer to these questions may be I hope the Dáil will not give to the Government the autocratic powers which the Minister for Justice in open manner asked the Dáil to give it to-day. I think the best course for the Dáil to adopt in its relations with foreign powers would be that it should insist on, first, knowing the nature of the matters to be discussed, and that those matters shall not be discussed until the Dáil has given its consent to such discussion.

Deputy Johnson's amendment put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 18; Níl, 41.

  • Seán Buitléir.
  • Osmond Grattan Esmonde.
  • Séamus Mac Cosgair.
  • Tomás Mac Eoin.
  • Risteárd Mac Fheorais.
  • Pádraig Mac Fhlannchadha.
  • Liam Mag Aonghusa.
  • Tomás de Nógla.
  • William Norton.
  • Ailfrid O Broin.
  • Criostóir O Broin.
  • Tomás O Conaill.
  • Aodh O Cúlacháin.
  • Liam O Daimhín.
  • Eamon O Dubhghaill.
  • Pádraic O Máille.
  • Domhnall O Muirgheasa.
  • Tadhg O Murchadha.

Níl

  • Earnán de Blaghd.
  • Thomas Bolger.
  • Séamus Breathnach.
  • Seoirse de Bhulbh.
  • Séamus de Búrca.
  • Bryan R. Cooper.
  • Máighréad Ní Choileáin Bean
  • Uí Dhrisceóil.
  • James Dwyer.
  • Michael Egan.
  • Patrick J. Egan.
  • Thomas Hennessy.
  • John Hennigan.
  • William Hewat.
  • Liam Mac Cosgair.
  • Maolmhuire Mac Eochadha.
  • Risteárd Mac Liam.
  • Eoin Mac Néill.
  • Seoirse Mac Niocaill.
  • Liam Mac Sioghaird.
  • Martin M. Nally.
  • John T. Nolan.
  • Michael K. Noonan.
  • Peadar O hAodha.
  • Seán O Bruadair.
  • Máirtín O Conalláin.
  • Séamus O Dóláin.
  • Mícheál O Dubhghaill.
  • Peadar O Dubhghaill.
  • Pádraig O Dubhthaigh.
  • Eamon O Dúgáin.
  • Donnchadh O Guaire.
  • Mícheál O hIfearnáin.
  • Fionán O Loingsigh.
  • James O Mara.
  • Domhnall O Mocháin.
  • Séamus O Murchadha.
  • Máirtín O Rodaigh.
  • Seán O Súilleabháin.
  • Andrew O Shaughnessy.
  • Patrick W. Shaw.
  • Caoimhghín O hUigín.
Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Morrissey and Corish. Níl: Deputies Dolan and Sears.
Amendment declared lost.
Amendment (by President) put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 37. Níl, 19

  • Earnán de Blaghd.
  • Thomas Bolger.
  • Séamus Breathnach.
  • Seoirse de Bhulbh.
  • Séamus de Burca.
  • Bryan R. Cooper.
  • Máighréad Ní Choileáin Bean
  • Uí Dhrisceóil.
  • James Dwyer.
  • Michael Egan.
  • Patrick J. Egan.
  • Thomas Hennessy.
  • John Hennigan.
  • Liam Mac Cosgair.
  • Maolmhuire Mac Eochadha.
  • Risteárd Mac Liam.
  • Eoin Mac Néill.
  • Seoirse Mac Niocaill.
  • Liam Mac Sioghaird.
  • Martin M. Nally.
  • John T. Nolan.
  • Michael K. Noonan.
  • Peadar O hAodha.
  • Seán O Bruadair.
  • Máirtín O Conalláin.
  • Séamus O Dóláin.
  • Peadar O Dubhghaill.
  • Pádraig O Dubhthaigh.
  • Eamon O Dúgáin.
  • Donnchadh O Guaire.
  • Fionán O Loingsigh.
  • James O Mara.
  • Domhnall O Mocháin.
  • Séamus O Murchadha.
  • Máirtín O Rodaigh.
  • Seán O Súilleabháin.
  • Andrew O Shaughnessy.
  • Caoimhghín O hUigín.
  • Patrick W. Shaw.

Níl

  • Seán Buitléir.
  • William Hewat.
  • Séamus Mac Cosgair.
  • Tomás Mac Eoin.
  • Risteárd Mac Fheorais.
  • Pádraig Mac Fhlannchadha.
  • Liam Mag Aonghusa.
  • Tomás de Nógla.
  • William Norton.
  • Ailfrid O Broin.
  • Criostóir O Broin.
  • Tomás O Conaill.
  • Aodh O Cúlacháin.
  • Liam O Daimhín.
  • Eamon O Dubhghaill.
  • Mícheál O hIfearnáin.
  • Pádraic O Máille.
  • Domhnall O Muirgheasa.
  • Tadhg O Murchadha.
Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Dolan and Sears. Níl: Deputies Morrissey and C.M. Byrne.
Amendment declared carried.
Main Question (motion) as amended, proposed.

I feel called upon to make a short statement to explain my attitude with regard to this motion and the amendment. The amendments are drafted very adroitly and put a Deputy who wants to express an opinion in regard to the situation that has arisen in an extremely difficult position. I did not, in giving a vote against Deputy Johnson's amendment, want it to be regarded as approval of the action of the Government in regard to the fiscal question which arose or in regard to the negotiations carried on with the correspondent of the "Morning Post" as an intermediary. I have attempted, by giving a vote against the amendment by the President, to record to a certain extent my disapproval of the attitude and of the policy of the Executive Council in regard to the fiscal question. I recognise that the passing of Deputy Johnson's amendment would have the effect of placing the Executive Council in an impossible position, so that they would be forced to bring forward details of any fiscal changes they proposed. I also maintain that the Dáil has been placed in a most impossible position by the action of the Executive Council in regard to fiscal policy. Every Government is supposed to have a policy in regard to the fiscal question, but the Government here has one policy to-day and another policy to-morrow. Therefore, when the members of the Executive Council at any time enter into negotiations with regard to fiscal questions with an outside Power, members of the Dáil have no idea what direction the inquiries will take. We have no idea if the members of the Executive Council will be governed by any policy for or against protection or in favour of reciprocity between this country and other countries. For that reason, I have attempted, perhaps not very successfully, by my vote to show that while we cannot tie down the Executive Council in the way proposed by Deputy Johnson, yet we disapprove of the attitude the Executive Council has maintained in regard to the fiscal policy and very strongly disapprove of the President's means of negotiation with regard to possible fiscal changes by using the services of the correspondent of a paper which has been extremely hostile to the national ideals of the people of this country.

The policy enunciated by the Minister for Justice, by Deputy Cooper and other Deputies— and particularly that enunciated in the President's amendment— respecting the functions of the Executive Council, in my view is calculated to lead to the overthrow of Parliamentary Government and the removal of democratic control over Ministries. I have the view that if Parliamentary Government is to survive, it can only be by constant, regular public discussion of policies before they have been entered upon by a Minister, a Ministry, a Dictator or whoever it may be—that there must be an assurance before a new policy is entered upon that it has got the backing of the people and the people's representatives. That is not the policy enunciated in this proposal. It is diametrically opposed to that policy. Deputies are now asked to approve of handing over to the Executive Council discretion as to how they shall exercise their functions and, only when they have finished negotiations, will they come for ratification or approval. That is to say, they put themselves in the position of saying: "You must accept this or we go out, with all the consequences of going out." That is a policy that has been carried on in years gone by in this country and in other countries, but it is a policy which is leading to the renunciation of Parliamentary Government and the supersession of Parliamentary Government by dictatorships.

Question put. The Dáil divided: Tá, 35; Níl, 21.

Earnán de Blaghd.Thomas Bolger.Séamus Breathnach.Seoirse de Bhulbh.Séamus de Burca.Bryan R. Cooper.Máighréad Ní Choileáin BeanUí Dhrisceóil.James Dwyer.Patrick J. Egan.Thomas Hennessy.John Hennigan.Liam Mac Cosgair.Risteárd Mac Liam.Eoin Mac Néill.Seoirse Mac Niocaill.Liam Mac Sioghaird.Pádraig Mag Ualghairg.

Martin M. Nally.John T. Nolan.Michael K. Noonan.Peadar O hAodha.Seán O Bruadair.Máirtín O Conalláin.Séamus O Dóláin.Peadar O Dubhghaill.Pádraig O Dubhthaigh.Eamon O Dúgáin.Fionán O Loingsigh.Domhnall O Mocháin.Séamus O Murchadha.Máirtín O Rodaigh.Seán O Súilleabháin.Caoimhghín O hUigín.Seán Príomhdhall.Patrick W. Shaw.

Níl

Seán Buitléir.Osmond Grattan Esmonde.William Hewat.Connor Hogan.Séamus Mac Cosgair.Tomás Mac Eoin.Risteárd Mac Fheorais.Pádraig Mac Fhlannchadha.Liam Mag Aonghusa.Tomás de Nógla.William Norton.

Ailfrid O Broin.Criostóir O Broin.Tomás O Conaill.Aodh O Cúlacháin.Liam O Daimhín.Eamon O Dubhghaill.Mícheál O hIfearnáin.Pádraig O Máille.Domhnall O Muirgheasa.Tadhg O Murchadha.

Tellers:—Tá: Mr. Dolan and Mr. Sears. Níl: Mr. Morrissey and Mr. C. Byrne.
Motion declared carried.
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