Nomination of President of the Executive Council.

Mr. S.T. O'Kelly

I rise to move the Motion standing in my name that Deputy Eamon de Valera be nominated President of the Executive Council.

No doubt there are people who would deem it a high honour even to have their names proposed for that position. It is not with that thought in mind that I am making this proposition. I propose the name of Deputy de Valera as President of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State because I think that only a man of his great capacity can with any promise of early success show the portion of our country which the Free State Government is permitted to control a safe road out of the dangers and difficulties that at present confront it. I propose Deputy Eamon de Valera because he is the outstanding figure in our generation. No man of our time has proved himself more fitting to be the leader of the Irish people, and no man in this House is as likely as he to restore to our people that confidence in themselves, that pride in their race, that enthusiasm, that hope, that spiritual outlook, that determination to retrieve the fallen fortunes of their country and that will to victory that is essential before any progress can be made on the road to real freedom and prosperity.

Since first he dramatically entered Irish public life, Eamon de Valera has been looked to in times of greatest danger and difficulty to save the country from perils that threatened. His first great achievement as leader of the Irish race was to save the manhood of the nation from decimation, and at a later crisis it was he who, throwing all thoughts of place and power, personal advancement and popularity aside, stood with the virile youth who remained true to the national faith and tradition and fought to save the nation's honour.

He is the man under whose wise and courageous leadership the good name of Ireland was raised to heights unknown before, even in our history of great achievements. Under his guidance the fame of the Irish people for steadfastness to principle, for courage in facing fearful odds and for self-sacrifice in the national cause, became known in every city and town in the world, as well as in sparsely populated places in the less known continents. With him to lead us, we witnessed, in our own day, our national aspirations brought closer to complete realisation than at any time since the days of the great Owen Roe O'Neill. The name of de Valera, in fact, became synonymous, not alone with Ireland but synonymous with the freedom-loving, courageous and high-minded race that he represented.

To my mind we have to-day to face a situation which requires the ablest men of our race to deal with. During the régime of the late Government our country has been going from bad to worse, largely through want of proper leadership. Our green isle, one of the most fertile countries on the earth, sparsely populated as it is, has thousands of families in our cities, in our towns, and in our rural areas whose daily lot is hunger. Hundreds of thousands of our ablest and best young men and women have been forced to flee the country to search in the overcrowded cities of England, Scotland, the United States, Australia and Canada for the sustenance that is denied them at home. Many thousands of acres of fertile lands have gone out of cultivation, our industries are either declining or being allowed to be bought up and controlled by foreigners in the interest of foreigners. Despite the widespread unemployment in all classes of trades, vast numbers of our people are without proper housing. Sickness, disease, and a high mortality among our infants is the daily report from all quarters. In fine, the condition of the country is such that a radical change is necessary and must come soon if the nation is to be saved and if the people are to be afforded an opportunity to live and bring up their children with any prospect of even modest comfort in their own land. That change is not alone due—it is overdue, and I propose Eamon de Valera as President, because I believe that he is the man, and only man, in public life here to-day whose ability and whose personality will enable the Irish people to face the future with confidence.

As Eamon de Valera was the man, who, in the not so far off past, led us successfully through dangers and difficulties, and did so without in any way tarnishing our honour, so I believe he is the man who is best suited to be our guide to-day. If the grave unemployment problem is to be solved, if our lost industries are to be revived, if our remaining industries are to be saved for Ireland and developed for her benefit, if the land of Ireland is to be restored to tillage and the people of Ireland provided with a proper living in their own land, if the homeless and houseless thousands of families are to be given proper and sanitary shelter and the thousands of infants who die yearly be given a chance, under proper healthy conditions, to live and thrive, I believe it is under his talented and courageous leadership that this can best be achieved. As he has brought honour and credit to the name of Ireland in the past, so I believe will his ripe scholarship, his prudent statesmanship, his simple faith, and his ardent patriotism enable him to face unflinchingly the grave and pressing problems that confront our people. I believe that not alone will he face these difficulties with courage and capacity to solve them, but that he is the man who will, at the same time, successfully restore among Irishmen that unity of aim and of action which unfortunately has been lost to us in recent years. I am satisfied that he, more than any other man, to-day, will make it possible to see the national ranks close up once more and the men of our race who stand always for Ireland first, again massed shoulder to shoulder in a great all-embracing national movement whose object will be the restoration of the prosperity and the unity of our motherland through the attainment of that sovereign independence which is Ireland's God-given right.

Mr. Lemass

I formally second the motion.

An Ceann Comhairle

The question before the Dáil is that Deputy Eamon de Valera be elected President of the Executive Council.

Mr. T.J. O'Connell

On Thursday last the members on these benches formed part of the majority that carried the Second Reading of the Old Age Pensions Bill. The Government having decided to reject the views of a majority of this House, and to refuse to carry out the instructions of the House as expressed by that majority, took the only course that was open to them by resigning, and so we are faced to-day with the grave task of finding a successor to the Ministry that has just gone out of office. We must choose a Government which will be prepared, without question or subterfuge, to give legislative and administrative effect to the wishes of the people as expressed through their elected representatives in this House. That is the foundation of Parliamentary Government.

I take it that on this motion I must confine myself to the one nomination that is now before us. If this were a country with a long parliamentary history behind it, a change of Ministers—the selection of one set of individuals instead of another set—would be governed by comparatively simple considerations, because in that case certain fundamentals would be taken as granted and would be regarded as common ground by all engaged in the selection. That, unfortunately, is not the position here, because here the fundamentals themselves are an issue, and, in my opinion, just because they are fundamental they must be regarded as the primary issue.

It might be well to examine for a moment what these fundamental issues are. There is, first, the question of this Parliament itself—its rights and its powers.

This Parliament is a sovereign Parliament. No person and no power outside this country has a right to impose its will on this Parliament or to dictate to it what it should or should not do. Not only has the Oireachtas the power, but it has the right to make laws for the peace, order and good government of this country, and that right, and those powers, are derived and continue to be derived, not from any outside authority, but from the people. It is without question or equivocation a de jure as well as a de facto Parliament. Any person who denies or questions, or even doubts the sovereignty of this Parliament, who denies or questions or even doubts its moral right to make and administer the laws of this State, and to insist on the strict observance of these laws, is not, in my humble opinion, a suitable person to be entrusted with the control of the powers which are inherent in this Parliament. That I lay down as my first essential.

Applying this test to the candidate whose name is now before us for nomination as head of the Government, are we in a position to say, is anyone here in a position to say, that he accepts without question or reservation the proposition which I have just laid down? If there is any doubt on the matter, we have Deputy de Valera's recorded words, spoken here in this House, some twelve months ago, and never since retracted or qualified. I quote from his speech made on the Second Stage of the Central Fund Bill on March 14th, 1929, column 1,398:—

We are asked to state clearly what our attitude towards this House is. I have on more than one occasion said exactly what our attitude was. I still hold that our right to be regarded as the legitimate Government of this country is faulty, that this House itself is faulty.

In the same speech (col. 1,399), referring to the entry of his Party to the Dáil, he said:—

We came in here because we thought that a practical rule could be evolved in which order could be maintained; and we said that it was necessary to have some assembly in which the representatives of the people by a majority vote should be able to decide national policy. As we were not able to get a majority to meet outside this House, we had to come here if there was to be a majority at all of the people's representatives in any one assembly.

Later on, in col. 1,400, referring to a certain organisation of which he and his Party had been members up to 1925, and the circumstances in which he severed his connection with that organisation, he said:—

My proposition that the representatives of the people should come in here and unify control so that we would have one Government and one Army was defeated, and for that reason I resigned. Those who continued on in that organisation (that is, those who would not accept the principle of one Government and one Army) which we have left can claim exactly the same continuity that we claimed up to 1925.

There is no need to dwell at length on these declarations. They are, to my mind, clear and definite affirmations of Deputy de Valera's attitude to this House and to this Parliament.

In the first place, he regards any Government elected by this House, or that could now, or in the future, be elected by this House, as faulty and having no just or moral claim to be regarded as a legitimate Government. He and his followers are here, not because this is a sovereign Parliament, or indeed because it is a Parliament of any kind, but because it is an assembly of a majority of the people's representatives. If he could have got a majority of these representatives to meet outside this House and this Parliament he would have done so. It was only because he failed to get a majority to meet outside this House that he came in here. I do not know whether or not we are to assume from this that if and when he does get a majority he will then refuse to come in here, and will convene his assembly in the Rotunda or the Mansion House. That, in any case, would be the natural inference from this statement.

Finally, we have the remarkable, and, in my opinion, dangerous and mischievous statement that the legitimate or de jure Government is vested in an organisation outside this House and in those who continued on in that organisation after he had left it.

As I have said, these significant statements have never been withdrawn. They have, in fact, been repeated in somewhat different from by prominent followers of Deputy de Valera, like Deputy O'Kelly and Deputy Little. So long as these views are held by Deputy de Valera, no vote of mine will be cast to enable him to become head of a Government chosen by this House.

I now come to my second consideration, which, indeed, is related to the first and which unfortunately has to be taken into account in deciding the proposal now before the House. I use the word "unfortunately" advisedly, because it is an issue which many in this House and very many more outside this House would like to see placed in cold storage. I refer to the Treaty. On this issue there should be no need to reiterate our position or define where we stand, but we have to take account of the invincible ignorance of people like Deputy Heffernan or Deputy Seamus Burke or Deputy J. J. Byrne, to whom failure or hesitancy on our part to give our unqualified support to the Cumann na nGaedheal Party in everything it does, can mean one thing and one thing alone—viz., that we are opposed to the Treaty. According to these enlightened Deputies the Treaty "baby" belongs to Cumann na nGaedheal, and unless you are a member of Cumann na nGaedheal or give them unquestioned support in everything they propose you have no right to nurse the "baby" or to be regarded as having any feeling towards it but that of a desire to commit infanticide. Apparently, if we are to judge by this morning's papers, Deputy Lemass is likewise in need of enlightenment.

Now in regard to the Treaty, we stand where we have always stood— where we stood in 1922, when, despite the death notices which we all had in our pockets, we came in here in order to use to the fullest the powers which were given under the Treaty. We accept the Treaty, and we recognise the institutions set up under the Treaty. We accept it as the irreducible minimum, in the same spirit as Griffith accepted it, regarding it as no more the final word than we do this the final generation, keeping in mind Parnell's dictum that no man has a right to set bounds to the march of a nation. I hope that statement is sufficiently clear and sufficiently definite to satisfy even Deputy Bourke or Deputy Heffernan.

Mr. Heffernan

Why Deputy Heffernan? I think I am entitled to an explanation.

An Ceann Comhairle

I will hear Deputy O'Connell.

Mr. Lynch

One would like to ask if the Labour Party were the only Party who received death notices.

Mr. O'Connell

I challenge either or both of these Deputies to show wherein the Labour Party have ever departed from that attitude. I hope I have made myself equally clear and equally definite to my friends in the Fianna Fáil benches, and that henceforth neither Cumann na nGaedheal nor Fianna Fáil will have any doubt as to where Labour stands. Now I am afraid that in so far as the attitude of Deputy de Valera and his Party to the Treaty is concerned I am in the same position as the vast majority of the people of the country are. I do not know exactly what that attitude is. On this question the members of Fianna Fáil "speak with divers tongues," and I have long ago given up hope of being able to reconcile these various statements. But for the sake of my argument I am willing to believe that the Party is now beginning to realise, after a lapse of eight barren years, that the attitude taken by Labour in 1922 had much to recommend it, and that, despite all the talk to the contrary, that attitude was not inconsistent with the fostering of a national spirit and a national outlook. I doubt if I am justified in believing this, but it has been hinted at least in the speeches of some of their members that this will eventually be their attitude. Deputy Lemass' speeches would, of course, convey the contrary impression, and if one were to believe half what comes over the cables from the American itinerant, foolish or timid people could not be blamed if they assumed that Deputy de Valera's accession to power might involve immediate and terrible war. However, as I say, I will assume for the moment, whether justified or not, that their attitude is gradually tending towards Labour's view.

Mr. Lemass

Some hopes.

Mr. O'Connell

But even where that is said or hinted, it is always accompanied by the statement that until all the barriers set up or supposed to be set up by the Treaty are removed, there can be no hope of economic development. Now it is here we come to the second fundamental difference between Labour and Fianna Fáil. While we say in effect, "Forget for the moment the limitations imposed by the Treaty— these things can wait—there is no urgency about them—bend all your energies to the task of economic development," Fianna Fáil reverses this order of things. According to them, economic development is dependent on the securing of what is called complete independence. Although, according to Mr. de Valera himself, there is want and chronic misery in thousands of Irish homes, and although "tens of thousands of our children and young people are doomed to spend the critical years of mental and physical growth in squalor and semi-starvation, although thousands are unemployed and many thousands of our citizens live in slums, Fianna Fáil make the Treaty issue the first plank in their programme, and not only that, but they say in effect that they cannot even hope to make economic progress until that issue is got rid of, until partition has been removed and full and complete independence has been obtained."

Let me give a few quotations to show what the outlook of Fianna Fáil is in this respect.

At the last Ard-Fheis of Fianna Fáil held in October, 1929, Deputy Lemass is reported as having said: "Our first object is to establish a Republican form of Government in this country in our time. A victory at the poll will be only the first step in achieving that aim. The most difficult and strenuous part of the work will arise after that victory."

Speaking at Donoughmore, Co. Cork, about a month later, Nov. 11th, 1929, the same Deputy said: "Fianna Fáil were trying to establish the absolute independence of the country because they were satisfied that unless the people could be made to realise that absolute independence was essential to economic progress they would be merely wasting their efforts in attempting remedies themselves on any other lines."

Speaking in Edenderry on March 23rd, Deputy Lemass again said: "It is the purpose of Fianna Fáil to convince the people that economic prosperity and national progress are dependent on a revival of national self-respect, which in turn cannot be achieved until the degrading obligations of the Treaty are removed."

Nothing could be clearer or more definite than these statements on the part of Deputy Lemass. "The degrading obligations of the Treaty must be removed," before we can have economic prosperity.

I do not wish to weary the House with similar quotations from other members of the Party. But I might give just one other from Deputy deValera himself, which was made to the Chicago Press last Saturday in reference to the resignation of the Government.

"If a Fianna Fáil Government takes office it will proceed with the declared policy of the Party. First, the unity and independence of Ireland as a Republic; secondly, the rebuilding of Irish industry." ("Daily Mail," 31st March.)

Mr. G. Boland

What about the "Morning Post"?

Mr. O'Connell

Any Deputy opposite can deny if that represents the view. I think it is clear that if we are to accept the statements of the accredited leaders of Fianna Fáil as being sincerely and honestly meant, we can have no doubt that if Deputy de Valera found himself at the head of the Government he would consider it his first duty to remove the degrading obligations of the Treaty, to get rid of partition, and to sever the last link between this country and Britain. Labour, on the other hand, thinks that the first duty of any Government elected by this House is to tackle seriously, earnestly, and determinedly, the social and economic ills from which the country is suffering. In our opinion there is ample scope within the Treaty and the Constitution to enable us to institute every reform necessary for the social betterment of our people, and there is no need to wait until the last British soldier leaves Berehaven before we begin to make a serious attempt to use the powers we now have to make the lot of our people happier and brighter than it is under existing conditions. We are opposed to Cumann na nGaedheal because they have not used to the fullest advantage the powers which the Treaty has given them.

We are opposed to Fianna Fáil because they do not propose to use those powers until they have first got rid of partition and established complete independence. Why, in God's name, can we not all agree to make the fullest possible use of the powers we have got, face up to facts as we find them, recognise the practical difficulties in the way of securing the fulness of our ideals and all that may be involved in any attempt to remove these difficulties other than by friendly consultation and agreement between all Parties concerned? All this talk about "another round with England,""another battle of Clontarf," a show-down with Britain," and such like statements foolishly indulged in by supporters and leaders of Fianna Fáil and exploited for their own political ends by Cumann na nGaedheal, cause timid people very grave uneasiness and doubt. Such doubt and uncertainty are highly detrimental to national progress. People who take such statements at their face value (and there are many who do) and, justifiably or otherwise, believe that they can only mean ultimate revolution, will not settle down to the serious work of economic reconstruction and development. Not only can we not afford to run the risk of another revolution in this country, we cannot afford even to talk about it. Nations do not stand still. We have reached a certain stage in our national development. We have power to establish peace and order and good Government in this State, to develop its dormant resources and increase its material wealth, to ensure that every citizen in this State is adequately fed, housed, clothed and educated. If and when in the course of our development we find ourselves hampered by any limitations in the existing Treaty or the Constitution set up under it, we can then face up to the task of how such limitations may be removed. But it is more than likely that by the time we reach that point, or long before it, these barriers which now appear to some to be so formidable will have either completely disappeared or will present little, if any, difficulty in their removal.

I have said nothing so far about the economic programme of Fianna Fáil. I have confined myself to what I regard as fundamental political issues. While there are many matters in that programme on which there is general agreement between ourselves and Fianna Fáil, and still others which run more or less parallel with our own, I am not at all prepared to admit, what is sometimes suggested—viz., that there are no essential differences between their programme and ours.

I do not wish to go into these differences now in any detail. Suffice it to say that we do not believe in lowering the standard of life in this country as a means of solving our economic difficulties. We shall not say to our farmers or town workers that it would be more appropriate for them to adapt themselves to the standard of the small agricultural countries of Central Europe rather than seek to maintain the standard set by a large industrial country like England. Increased wealth production and more equitable distribution of that wealth among the people shall be our ideal. But there is no necessity to develop this point, because I think I have already shown why it is impossible for the Labour Party, holding the views it does, to do other than oppose the candidature of Deputy de Valera for the Presidency. I only refer to this matter of their economic programme, lest it should be assumed that on this point there were no essential differences between us or that we might be prepared to accept and endorse the Fianna Fáil programme if the other questions were not at issue. That is not the case.

Finally, I think it is my duty, in view of certain statements that have been made, to say very definitely and emphatically, that there is no alliance, and never was an alliance, between the Labour Party and either of the big Parties in this House. There are fundamental differences between the Labour Party and Fianna Fáil just as there are fundamental differences between Labour and Cumann na nGaedheal. There can be no alliance between Parties whose policies are fundamentally different. It is because of these differences that Labour feels compelled to oppose the election of Deputy deValera just as it has hitherto opposed, and will again, if necessary, oppose, the nominee of Cumann na nGaedheal.

In voting against Deputy de Valera the Labour Party are not motived by any desire for Party advantage. Party advantage might indeed dictate a different course from what is being pursued to-day. But even before to-day Labour has shown that it was not unprepared to sacrifice Party advantage to what it believed to be the national welfare.

If the action of the Labour Party to-day and the reasons which I have given for that action, have the effect of bringing Deputy de Valera and his followers to realise that what the country earnestly wants is an end to the barren controversies of the past eight years and the substitution therefor of what is sometimes disparagingly called a "bread and butter" policy, then Labour will, in my opinion, and not for the first time in the history of these years, have rendered valuable and lasting service to the national interest.

Mr. Cooney

Produced by Mortished and Johnson.

Minister for Defence (Mr. Fitzgerald)

The act the Dáil is called upon to perform to-day is the most important act that this Assembly can perform. I might even go so far as to say that it is almost a sacramental act. I will quote the words of Pope Leo the Thirteenth:—"Christians surround the idea of power with a religious respect in which, even when it resides in an unworthy mandatory, they see a reflection and, as it were, an image of Divine Majesty. They have for the laws the just respect that is due to them, not because of force and penal sanctions, but by duty of conscience." Again, he said:—"It is no more permitted to contemn the legitimate power, whosoever may be the person in whom it resides, than it is to resist the Will of God."

This Dáil to-day proposes electing a President and consequently electing a Government in whom shall reside the power to control the destinies of this country and of its people; in whom shall reside the power of life and death. For many generations the Irish people sought to establish their right themselves to exercise that power; that is to say, to exercise that power through a Government formed from among themselves. The name put before us is that of Deputy de Valera. Let us consider what is the primary and fundamental function of Government. The primary and fundamental function of Government is to maintain social order, to protect life and property and to maintain a condition of peace. We must consider this candidature now put before us from that point of view. If the various candidates put before us from the point of view of social order, of peace, of safety for life and property, are equal, then we could consider the differences between them upon less fundamental points.

The name of Deputy de Valera is put before us. Does anybody here know what his policy is? I know that many people in this country assumed that somewhere about the 10th or 11th March, 1926, Deputy de Valera made a radical change in his programme. Up to that time he had belonged to a certain organisation and had declared himself President of an Irish Republic, arrogating to himself and those with him power of life and death over the people of this country. On the 11th March, 1926, Deputy de Valera resigned from that Presidency. On the 12th April, 1926, he announced that he was forming a new organisation. On the 16th May, 1926, Fianna Fáil was publicly introduced at a meeting in the La Scala Theatre, and on the 24th November, 1926, the first Convention of Fianna Fáil was held.

When anyone in life is faced with a serious responsibility, that person has not the right to act blindly. We here are not merely citizens of this State, but are the elected and chosen representatives of the people, and in our hands to-day the destiny of our country is placed. Have we the right to say blindly that we will trust to luck? Is it not our duty to examine the past and to understand what is to be expected from the individual put before us and his declared policy? I admit that the Irish people, being denied for centuries the right to govern themselves, may be justified in showing a lack of political perspicacity that might be found in other countries, but that lack is not to be expected here. If it is shown here to-day we must recognise that we justify, to some extent at any rate, those people in this and other countries who for long periods of years said the Irish people were not capable of self-government. Can it be said that a people is capable of self-government when they elect a President and a Government which then would deny their own legitimacy and their own right to act? Could they be said to exercise political judgment when they elect a Government that, by their own words and their own policy, declare that if they executed a man for murder they themselves would be guilty of murder, whereas if a man outside "executes" another man— that is to say, committed ordinary murder—they would say that that man outside was justified, but that the Government here would not be justified in executing anyone?

I admit that the Irish people, and we here even, might have said when Deputy de Valera separated himself from the other body, as he appeared to do in that period in March and April, 1926, that he had abandoned that form of policy. He had not. It was generally assumed, and he gave face to that assumption, that he had entirely dissociated himself from that organisation outside. He had merely surrendered the office he held, but remained a member of that organisation outside. Not only that, but on the 18th and 19th of December, some six or nine months after that event, he even questioned the legitimacy of his own resignation. On the 18th and 19th of December a meeting was held of a body calling itself the Second Dáil, together with a body calling itself Comhairle na dTeachtaí. What was the line taken by Deputy de Valera? It was when Fianna Fáil existed as a political body. They had declared they were ready to come into the Dáil as soon as the oath was removed. Did their declaration that they would come into the Dáil mean that they accepted the authority of the Dáil? It did not. I will give you some of the remarks of Deputy de Valera at this meeting: "We must hold on to the constitutional position." Was that the constitutional position of this Dáil? No. It was the constitutional position of a body outside this Dáil claiming the powers of life and death and under whose authority death had been inflicted upon our citizens. The President of that body said: "Our whole constitutional position is built about and around it (the Second Dáil), and that constitutional position is playing a large part in the litigation on the question of the bonds."

Deputy de Valera explained that when he put forward the policy of Fianna Fáil he put it forward to that body on the assumption that that body was entitled to decide on it, and that was the fact that brought about his resignation. He felt that it had not the power to do that, and was expecting a meeting of the Second Dáil to be called to deal with that particular question. He said: "It is not for us to dissolve the Second Dáil. It is carrying on the functions until the new body comes into existence." That is, the new body to be called into existence by a body outside which denies the authority of this Dáil. Further, Deputy de Valera said: "We were really a sovereign body, very unlike a body that is governed by a written Constitution. I am assuming all the time that there is no fault found with the de jure position of the Second Dáil. We can continue on as we are, and for special cases having a meeting of the Second Dáil."

Not merely did he not sever his association with that body, but on the 19th December, 1926, he himself proposed the ratification of the election of the President of that body.

"Mr. de Valera: ‘If it is in order that the ratification of this election by Comhairle na dTeachtaí, I now propose the ratification of that election. I hold that the policy we stand for is the better policy for the Republic. No policy has been put forward by the present Executive—we who put forward a policy were defeated—the majority have not put forward any policy to make good, and I do not believe they can. I do not want to introduce that matter. I simply wish to propose the ratification of Art O'Connor as President.'"

After the election of the new President, Mr. de Valera said:

"There is only one thing, and that is that if at any time anything is decided... I will give an undertaking here that I will safeguard the Republican position."

As leader of Fianna Fáil, he gave an undertaking to the body outside this body to safeguard what he called the Republican position.

Mr. Cooney

You gave that in 1921.

Mr. Fitzgerald

Deputy Lemass had in this illegal body outside, which he knew had taken certain action against the laws of this country, posed as Minister for Defence. He said:

"I held a position on the Executive as the head of the Department of Defence. In that position I sanctioned certain military acts—for example, the raid on Mountjoy in November last. These acts were just as valid then as they are now. I, as one of this body, in giving my sanction to this act, gave it all the justification needed."

Mr. Lemass

Will the Minister say who supplied that report?

Mr. Fitzgerald

It is all a report of the one meeting which lasted two days, the 18th and 19th December, 1926.

Mr. Lemass

Whoever supplied it has a very fine imagination.

Mr. Fitzgerald

Deputy MacEntee was rather concerned that there might be a move in that organisation to expel them:

"Mr. MacEntee: ‘It would seem that so far as the second part of Decree No. 1 is concerned it is intended to formally expel from membership of Dáil Eireann those of us who have adopted the policy of Fianna Fáil.'"

Now, has Fianna Fáil departed from that policy which they held at this meeting of the so-called Second Dáil and of Comhairle na dTeachtaí? At that meeting one general line of policy on the other matters was put forward. It was put forward by a Communist named O'Donnell. He said:

"If there was a group controlling Comhairle na dTeachtaí who would decide that they would take one particular law on which the Free State Government is based and issue a decree saying that that particular law is to be dissolved—take, for example, a group calling themselves the Second Dáil to issue a decree saying that all form of payments to England should be refused—it would have several good things in its favour."

Later on he said:

"To my mind, the question of payment of annuities to England is a thing for it to take up. When you do things of this sort the people will understand you and the Government position will be assured again."

That is the position of the Government outside, not here.

"The Free State Army will have to be forced out. We have an opportunity to-day of definitely choosing a particular law and rely on yourselves to put it into force. I would like to know how many people would take up this question."

That position was taken up by the Fianna Fáil Party as it was laid down in the other organisation by Mr. O'Donnell. What are the indications upon which we must judge since that Party came into this House? They came in here following the murder of the Minister for Justice, the late Mr. Kevin O'Higgins. On the 28th March, 1928, in the Dáil I took the occasion of a debate promoted by the Fianna Fáil Party in which they talked a lot about generous gestures and assurances, to ask for an assurance if they had or should at any time get information that would be of assistance in bringing to justice the murderers of Mr. Kevin O'Higgins, that they would make that information available. What was their response to that? Deputy Little, of the Fianna Fáil Party, said that it was absurd to ask such a thing of them. Mr. McGilligan, the Minister for Industry and Commerce, took up the point and repeated it. What was their response? Deputy Little complained that to give such an assurance would bring odium upon them. Deputy Cooney, Fianna Fáil Deputy for North Dublin City, said that to act in this matter as an ordinary good citizen, was to become an informer.

Mr. Cooney

Would the Minister say if those are my words?

Mr. Fitzgerald

Yes, they are.

Mr. Cooney

"As a good citizen"? Are you quoting my exact words?

Mr. Fitzgerald

I think so.

"As the ‘Prisoners Notes' are often too gloomy, I am going to improve them this week by a few cheering items. If anyone wants an amusing sight let him venture out on a cold, wet day and view sad and shady looking C.I.D. men standing outside the houses and also the business premises where the jurymen live are employed, who were cowardly and misguided enough to convict of treason that Tipperary Volunteer, Con Healy, who has devoted his whole life to unselfish service of the nation, and thus handed him over to British vengeance—five years in Maryborough hell. The employers of some of these jurymen are not at all flattered by the assiduities of the C.I.D. They have to do business in the Irish nation, and it is never a good business advertisement to be watched by the police; people seem to take malicious pleasure in asking them why their premises are being watched."

That is the organ for which Deputy O'Kelly, the proposer of Mr. de Valera to-day, Mr. de Valera's lieutenant and a responsible member of his party, takes responsibility. He declares that a man who attempted the murder of the police of the State had devoted his whole life to the unselfish service of the nation, and that organ calls on the people to rejoice in the fact that the juryman who refused to commit perjury at the dictation of the gun bullies was likely to lose his livelihood. Shortly after that, in March, on the occasion of the election campaign of. I think, Deputy O'Higgins. Deputy Fahy said apropos of this murder and attempted murder:

"If they could not have an open march to freedom they were going to have secret efforts that would result in the occurrence of horrible incidents."

For myself I only regard it as a palliation of murder. On the 19th March last, arising out of these incidents I challenged Deputy de Valera to say if he recognised the authority of the Dáil, knowing that up to the last I had heard that he was still a member of a body outside, a body that had denied the right of the Government to function, and a body that claimed the power of life and death over the Irish people. Deputy O'Connell has already read out some extracts from Deputy de Valera's remarks on that occasion. There is this further extract:—

"Those who continued on in that organisation which we have left can claim exactly the same continuity that we claimed up to 1925. They can do it."

The date was put in to mislead the members of the Dáil and the people of the country. That is, he said, they claimed up to 1925, but to my knowledge he claimed it up to December, 1926. Here we have the position of a man being proposed here who, up to the last public knowledge that we have of him, recognised the authority of a body outside this Dáil, a man who actually promoted a legal action in the United States upon a question of money based upon a denial of the authority of the Dáil.

Mr. Aiken

And he beat you. The American courts upheld him.

Mr. Fitzgerald

If the Deputy wants information on that I will give it to him. Here we have the position of this man being proposed here posturing as the President of the Republic, claiming that the power of life and death, who may or may not have left that organisation and who, on the 14th March of last year, declared in this House that the other body was the legitimate Assembly here. On the Sunday before last Deputy Lemass, speaking down the country, said that time and time again the people of this country had decided to accept the Treaty.

Mr. Lemass

Go on.

Mr. Fitzgerald

"But," he said, "as far as his Party is concerned, he always regarded it with hostility." Now I said at the beginning that the primary function of government is to maintain social order, and consequently to maintain peace. If Deputy de Valera is elected here as President, what is the position going to be? He has said that he recognises the powers of this Dáil as faulty; that he recognises the powers of government in a body outside the Dáil. We know that we are bound by the moral law to be subject to legitimate authority. Is he going to be subject to legitimate authorities or is he not? There were people outside, while he was a member of that organisation, a body of armed men who claimed this right to use arms, to declare war and to wage war, to execute people in this country, and he tacitly assented to that claim on the part of those people. How is he going to enforce what we consider the law here? What law is going to prevail? Is it going to be the law that is promulgated by the Dáil, or is it going to be the law by people outside? Is not the proposal that he be elected here a denial of the right of the people of the State to decide what body of men shall hold power here? I maintain that unless Deputy de Valera comes out and makes it perfectly clear to the Irish people that he has abandoned his past programme, the Irish people have no right to elect him, because it would be a denial of their own right.

Deputy Lemass, on the Sunday before last, tried to reassure the people. The people of this country must recognise that in passing over the power of government, they have a right to be perfectly clear as to what is to happen. Deputy Lemass admits that they are hostile to the Treaty. He said:—

"We realise, however, that the people of the Twenty-six Counties have repeatedly, by a majority, accepted the Treaty in preference to what they believed the alternative to be—a renewal of the conflict with England."

He admits that the people are for the Treaty. He admits that the people anticipate a repetition of war. But he reminds them that in 1927 Deputy de Valera gave a pledge to the electorate. He gave two pledges—one, never to enter the Dáil until the oath was removed, and secondly, that a Fianna Fáil Government would not attempt to commit the people to a line of action involving a fundamental change in the constitutional position without getting their approval beforehand by means of the referendum. "That pledge," he added, "still holds good, and will be honoured."

Now, has Deputy de Valera the right to hold the pledge good? Mr. Lemass said that there could be no economic prosperity and no national progress until the degrading clauses of the Treaty are removed. If you elect Deputy de Valera as President to form his Government, what is going to be the duty of that Government? The duty of that Government is going to be national progress and economic prosperity as well as social order and peace. Can Deputy de Valera maintain that pledge? I assert that if he is elected and if he honestly believes what Deputy Lemass told us on the Sunday before last, that there can be no economic prosperity and no national progress with the Treaty in the way, his duty as a Government overrides whatever this pledge may have committed him to. Not only will he be absolved from that pledge, but it will be his duty as President to disregard that pledge, seeing that he asserts that under the Treaty there can be no economic prosperity and no national progress. Not only that, but unless he has radically changed his mind from the point of view that he put on the 14th of March last year, it will be his duty when the powers of Government are put in his hands to hand these powers of Government to the gunmen outside. Deputies come here and propose seriously to this Dáil, knowing what we do know, knowing his repeated statements and the statements of his auxiliaries, knowing that he has never formally renounced his previous programme and knowing what that commits us to, to accept him as a nominee for the Presidency. I suggest that such a proposal is to ask us to disgrace the Irish State and to disgrace the Irish people. Is there any case in history in which a people elected to a Government a man who, on the most fundamental point on which the existence of their State was based, differed from them fundamentally? Was ever such a thing heard of? Did we ever know of a case of people electing a Government that denied its own authority and recognised that the power of life and death, of Governmental authority, existed of right and continuously in a body outside? I know of no case in history. But, because our people have not had the opportunity that other people have had of exercising their political functions, it is thought that they can be misled into doing that. I suggest that we, the representatives elected by the people outside to safeguard the rights of our people and of our country, have not the right to allow this nomination to go forward and to be accepted. It would be nationally disgraceful.

There is one other little matter that I should like to touch upon. I said that when Deputy de Valera was President of this other government outside he challenged in the American Courts the right of this Government to be Government here. For the sole purpose of keeping this Government from getting hold of the money that it was this Government's right to possess, especially when we have the expense of paying it back, he promoted another movement that it should go back to the bondholders. We are called upon to elect a man here who took action to deny the authority that he himself will possess, if we vote for him, and he is at this moment trying to get into his hands, in a method which is so dubious that if it happened in this country we should probably have to take action, that money which the Government will itself have later on to pay. He asks people over there, who know very little about law and about these things, to sign a document in the following terms:

Assignment and Power of Attorney

In consideration of one dollar, lawful money of the United States of America, and other valuable consideration to me in hand paid, the receipt whereof is hereby acknowledged, I, the undersigned, hereby sell, assign, transfer and set over unto Eamon de Valera, his executors, administrators and assigns, all my right, title and interest in and to the Bond Certificate (or Bond Certificates) of the Republic of Ireland Loans, which was (were) heretofore filed by me with the receivers for the benefit of the Bond Certificate holders of said Loans, and all sums of money, both principal and interest, now due on, or hereafter to become due on, or because of the obligation set forth and/or referred to in said Bond Certificate (or Bond Certificates); and I do hereby constitute the said Eamon de Valera my attorney, in my name or otherwise but at his own cost, to take all legal measures which may be proper and necessary for the complete recovery on, and enjoyment of, the assigned Bond Certificate (or Certificates).

And I do by these presents, make, constitute and appoint said Eamon de Valera my true and lawful attorney, in my name, place and stead, to receive from the receivers for the benefit of Bond Certificate holders of Republic of Ireland Loans the payment or payments which is (are), or shall be, due and payable to me on said Bond Certificate (or Certificates) of said Republic of Ireland Loans....

It means that he promotes an action without this State to prevent this State controlling certain moneys. He is at this moment, under the pretence of these people being given shares in a newspaper, which they do not get by virtue of the article which they are asked to sign, asking them to hand over to him not merely the money that they will receive, but all the powers to take action against this Government for the recovery of this money. It means that he will, if elected here, take an action against himself to get out of the State funds here money which he has put us in a position to have to pay by virtue of that action; money which will actually be handed over to himself, not necessarily for the use of that newspaper, because the power of attorney and the assignment which he asks the people to sign merely hands the money completely over to him.

I merely mention this as a sideline. My opposition to the proposal put forward by Deputy O'Kelly is, that we are asked to elect a man who will not and cannot, in view of his previous pronouncements, stand for the maintenance of social order here, because he has consistently all through recognised the authority of a body of men to have the power of life and death over the people here. He does not fulfil the required conditions of maintaining peace, because his policy commits him to a renunciation of the Treaty, upon which we know, and the majority of the people know, the peace of this country depends.

It was quite obvious from the speeches we have just heard from Deputy O'Connell and the Minister for Defence that the two Parties for which they spoke propose to vote against the motion to nominate Deputy de Valera as President of the Executive Council, not because they think he has not got the ability to effect administrative improvements, not because they think he has not got the economic policy that would improve the conditions of the people and restore prosperity to our country, but because he took a different attitude to theirs eight years ago when the acceptance of the Treaty was under consideration. This matter of the action which individuals or parties took at the time of the Treaty controversy is constantly being dragged up in this year 1930.

The Minister for Defence who, having spoken, folded his tents like the Arabs and silently stole away, read a number of extracts from some mysterious document which was apparently furnished to him by some super-intelligent member of the Secret Service. It is, I think, the practice whenever a Minister quotes from a document in this House that the document is tabled in the Library so that all Deputies can learn what is in it. As the document in question appears to concern some of us in a very personal manner we should like to have an opportunity of perusing it.

Mr. P. Hogan (Galway):

Do you not know it already?

Mr. Lemass

Surely there are more interesting things in it than the Minister quoted.

Mr. Hogan

Much.

Mr. Lemass

I have no doubt about it. If all the persons to whom he referred spoke for two days we must have made some references to the gentlemen sitting on the Front Bench opposite. The Minister did not read any of those extracts. However, I do earnestly request and appeal that the document should be offered to a waiting nation. In a time of crisis such as this, public ill-feeling might be allayed by the perpetration of a good joke such as that.

Mr. Lemass

That is very interesting. I take it anyway that it will be laid on the Table. Would there be any possibility of adjourning the debate until we get an opportunity of reading it?

Mr. Duggan

You can give us the full report in the meantime.

Mr. Lemass

If I knew it, I would be glad to do so. I caught the meaning of some extracts read by the Minister. Apparently a pledge was given to this body, Comhairle na dTeachtaí, by Deputy de Valera, to the effect that he would do nothing to prejudice the Republican position. I have a very distinct recollection of a pledge in identical terms being given by members of the Government opposite, not to a body which claimed to be a Government, but to a body which admitted itself to be a secret society—a very definite and specific pledge given by members of the Government to an armed secret society in this country that they would do nothing to prejudice the Republican position.

Mr. Davin

Now it has come out.

Mr. Lemass

I hope the Minister for Local Government will give us his reminiscences before this debate is concluded.

Mr. Lemass

Then he talked about law and order and the shooting of jurymen in Dublin. These crimes were denounced by members of this Party long before members of Cumann na nGaedheal thought fit to make political capital out of them. Is it not an extraordinary thing that no one has been brought to justice for them? We are spending a million and a half on a police force. We have a Minister for Justice in this House. Every important crime that has been committed in this country since 1927 has not figured in the records of any police court.

Mr. Fitzgerald-Kenney

That is not correct.

Mr. Lemass

It is correct. All the sensational crimes that got headlines in the papers—the shooting of Dublin jurymen, the shooting of the late Minister for Justice, the shooting of these witnesses—has any single man been brought to justice for any one of them? Does the Minister for Defence think that we are to be criticised for that? Will he turn and look into the administration of justice by his colleague and find out what is wrong with it? I think he will find in that Department a true explanation as to why these crimes are possible. When you have the Minister deliberately ordering those under his control to break the law, when you have members of the police force charged day after day and week after week with assaults and fined by judges and juries, you cannot have, in the police force or in the country, that respect for law and order which the Minister claims to be anxious to promote.

We are not going to take any lectures from the Minister or his colleagues on the question of the preservation of law and the enforcement of justice. We are not going to take any lectures from him on the necessity for denouncing murder. We always denounce murder. We denounced murder at times when the Minister and his colleagues were very silent. We still denounce murder, and we do hope that all murderers will in the course of time be brought to justice.

Deputy O'Connell appeared very much concerned about our attitude to this House. I have said already that the outstanding characteristic of the Labour Party is that it is the most respectable Party in this State. The members of that Party desire to be respectable above everything else. So long as they cannot be accused of being even pale pink in politics they seem to think they have fulfilled their function towards the Irish people. That is why, with the exception of the National League Party, they are the smallest Party in the House. Deputy O'Connell said that Deputy de Valera would regard any Government elected by this House as having no legal or moral claim to govern. Deputy de Valera never said that. He never uttered any sentence inside or outside this House which allowed that implication to be drawn. We regard this House as an assembly to which the vast majority of the elected representatives of the people of the Twenty-six Counties come. We are prepared to recognise that all legislative power comes from the people and is exercised through their representatives. Because the majority of the people's representatives are to be found in this assembly we are prepared to recognise the legislative power of this assembly, but we do recognise that even in that respect its claim is faulty, because there is in existence a political test which debars one section of the population from being represented here. We are not anxious to go back and root out the faults in the title under which it is stated that it operates. We are prepared to accept it for what it is, an assembly of the elected representatives of the Irish people.

You are making a mistake. You are not the leader.

Mr. Lemass

That mistake appears to be made more often by others than by myself.

Mr. Hogan

The real trouble about the Fianna Fáil Party is the old trouble. There is no leader to that Party. There are three leaders. You have, at the present moment, Deputy de Valera in America, who stands for war. You have Deputy Lemass at home, who stands, temporarily, for peace, and you have the one consistent and sterling patriot, Deputy Seán T. O'Kelly, the leader in this House, who stands for patriotism always, and nothing else. That is the position we are in with this Party. And the three of them speak with different voices. Deputy O'Kelly says nothing. Deputy O'Kelly is in the position that he is so good that he is good for nothing. Deputy de Valera talks war, and Deputy Lemass, pro tem., talks peace. It is no consolation to me or to any other Deputy in the House, or to the average citizen of this State, to know that if the circumstances were different the rôles might be reversed, We might very easily have Deputy de Valera, one of the trickiest politicians that ever happened in this country, talking peace. We might equally easy have Deputy Lemass in America talking war, and it would be no consolation for us all that time to have Deputy Seán T. O'Kelly between the two of them talking patriotism. That might easily be the result.

Deputy Lemass is concerned about our raking up the Treaty issue and debating issues that happened in 1922, 1923 and 1924. We are not debating these issues. We are debating much more recent issues. I sympathise again with Deputy Lemass. I can well understand that Deputies opposite would be anxious that the events of 1922, 1923 and 1924 would not be raked up. They are a most disgraceful chapter—I agree with Deputy Lemass—in the history of this country. However, we are not reviving them here. We will deal with very much more recent events. What is the policy we are called upon to approve of in the person of Deputy de Valera? Whom are we to believe? There are three thimbles; under which thimble is the pea? We are electing, as the Minister for Defence has stated, a President who is to appoint the Executive to control the destinies of this country for good or evil and it is a queer commentary on the present position that the question which I asked now is a just question; that this thing is being done in an atmosphere so far as the proposer and seconder and principal are concerned of thimble rigging. It is being done in an atmosphere in which no Deputy here knows where Fianna Fáil stands. Deputy O'Connell made an attempt to get an answer from the Party opposite. Did he get a single answer from Deputy Lemass which has made any Deputy here one whit wiser than he was before? We know he has left us no wiser. Deputies opposite must realise that they have to be judged not by what they say they mean but by what they actually say. And I propose now to judge them by what they say. Lately we had Deputy Lemass, the leader at home, the peace-maker, the man of economic development, of old age pensions, tariffs, subsidies and doles, going so far that he bowed his crested head and tamed his heart of fire and made an incursion into English journalism. He gave a most interesting interview-article to the "Daily Express" recently, which I have here and from which I would like to make a few quotations. I will take them in order:—

Fianna Fáil is a Republican Party. The main reason for its existence is to secure the establishment of a Republican Government in Ireland in our time.

Quite good so far as that goes.

We do not think that this object will be speedily or easily attained but we intend to work consistently and determinedly in that direction. We will work by what are usually described as "constitutional methods," striving to extend the powers of the Twenty-Six County Government by the abolition of existing restrictions and to establish its authority over all the country.

In other words, we are back to the position that Deputy Lemass pro tem. is a constitutional Republican. He goes over to England and tells an English audience "we are only constitutional Republicans," knowing perfectly well that the one meaning of these words is: "We will take a Republic when you agree to give it to us." That is the position pro tem. of Deputy Lemass. I will come to the other leaders later on. He goes to the British and says: "We will take a Republic when you give it to us," a constitutional Republican.

I want to know on what policy we are electing Deputy de Valera. I come to Deputy de Valera's policy. I am not interested in Deputy de Valera one bit. In that article in the "Daily Express" Deputy Lemass continues:

Mr. Gorey

They could never run as fast as you, anyhow.

Mr. Hogan

And why not the Farmers' Party? As I say, the Party opposite has not Republicanism, separatism or any other ism. They merely want to break this Treaty because the Treaty broke them. That is their policy and no other. There is an additional uncertainty in the position. They know perfectly well —Deputy de Valera and Deputy Lemass know it—that Deputy de Valera was speaking the truth when he said in 1929—and the Minister for Defence quoted him to-day—that if that Party elect a Government, that Government will not be the real Government of this country. The Government of this country will be, to quote Deputy de Valera's statement, the people outside. And who are the people outside?

Mr. Lemass

The Army, according to the "Star."

Mr. Hogan

The people outside are the people with the guns, the people who shot jurymen and witnesses, and the people who have committed or attempted a long series of shocking illegalities over the past four or five years, and who have now been effectively controlled and stopped by the Minister for Justice. These will be the real masters of this country.

[An Leas-Cheann Comhairle took the Chair.]

It is an insult to the Dáil to have that position. After all, the Treaty was signed in 1922. I agree with Deputy Lemass, that this country was new to self-government, and I agree that a certain amount of mental and moral confusion was to be expected. But, after all, we have had eight years of government, and we ought to get proud of ourselves. We ought to realise that we are a white people who are expected to live up to our responsibilities. I say, meaning it, that it is a positive insult to this people, with its fighting traditions, and its traditions for fair play, and its traditions for realism, that in 1930, after eight years self-government, we should have such a proposition put up in this Dáil. We will not stand it, and the Deputies opposite will have to learn more.

Mr. Carney

Why do you allow an Army officer to advocate obstruction in the Government organ?

Mr. Hogan

Deputy Cooney asked about the Vote on old age pensions. This Dáil is sovereign. It has an absolute right to accept a Bill; alternatively, it has an absolute right to reject a Bill; alternatively, it has a right to elect a Government that will make that Bill its policy; and, alternatively, it has a right to elect a Government that refuses to make that Bill its policy; and, at the same time, to have another battle of Clontarf. That is the position about old age pensions. In all seriousness, I put it to every Party, to the Labour Party and to the Independent Party, that whatever else may happen at this stage of our history the Party opposite should not nominate the Government of this country. They have done already immeasurable material damage, damage caused by the civil war, but that is the very least of their damage. The moral damage, caused by their attitude, their propaganda, by deliberate lying by their spokesmen, has been far and away greater and will take a far longer time to heal than the material damage. In 1922 this country, like every new country, was faced with very special difficulties due to the moral and material waste of the Great War, and it required all the virility, all the courage, and all the work that all citizens of the country could put in in order to win through.

What has been the consistent lesson, the consistent doctrine, taught to the country during the last eight or nine years by the Party opposite? They told the country to spend their days looking for doles and their evenings talking politics. That particular campaign has done more damage to the country and caused more real demoralisation than even the civil war itself. I accuse the Fianna Fáil Party of preaching a policy of defeatism when a policy of virility and hard work was most needed. It has taken the heart out of the country. They have identified nationality with disorder and decay, everything that is noisy, everything that is inefficient. During all that time, during the past five or six years, we, the Government elected by Cumann na nGaedheal, have set our faces against that campaign. We have taught a different doctrine. We have taught the people that the foundations of progress are order first and, after that—while the people may be entitled to sympathy and help, financial, material and moral, from the Government—that the real greatness of the country will come only from courage, virility, a sense of honour, and a genuine nationalism on the part of the people. That is our doctrine. If we get a majority here to-day we will do what we always did, we will govern. We will show that there is equal law in this country. We will allow no gunmen outside to govern the country.

Mr. Corry

Do you mean that?

Mr. Hogan

We will see that the rightful obligations of this country, either due by it or due to it, are carried out. Our policy is known. We have never hidden it. We stand here, after eight or nine years, with everybody knowing exactly what we have done in the past and what our future policy is to be. We have equivocated in no way. We propose to continue in that direction and to give the country, as I have said, the benefits of equal law, fair play for every man, economical administration, and we propose to tell the people that no country can become great by government action but only by the virility, courage and genuine nationalism of the individual citizen.

Captain Redmond

The Minister for Agriculture opened his speech by remarking that he did not see the use of flogging a dead horse. Having listened to that speech, I fully agree with him in his opening statement, but I find myself in this somewhat difficult position, that with all the scorpions with which he has chastised this corpse, I do not see either the vertebrae, the head, or the tail of it left. The proposal before the House is that Deputy de Valera be elected President of the Irish Free State. In listening to the proposer of the motion I really wondered whether it was put forward in any seriousness whatever. In the first place, Deputy O'Kelly knows as well as the country knows that the great majority of Deputies in this House were elected in favour of the Treaty, as passed in 1922, and of the observance of our international and contractual obligations under that Treaty. He also knows that a proposition such as this at this time of the day in this House is bound to be defeated. Therefore, the first question I would like to ask is, what is the purpose of this motion at all? Does he or his Party think that as long as they pursue a line of hostility to the Treaty, because that is the word now used by Deputy Lemass, they can get a vote of confidence in this House or in the country? I think it is fooling, mere trifling with the House, and an insult to it to propose that Deputy de Valera be elected President of the Irish Free State.

I do not want to indulge in reiteration either, but perhaps it is necessary for me to say one or two words on this point of the election of this gentleman. We have had a striking eulogy of his personal qualifications from his proposer, Deputy O'Kelly. We certainly have heard nothing about his proposed policy. Whatever his qualifications may be, and I am not going to indulge in personalities in that respect, we have heard nothing about his qualifications as regards policy. Only as late as the last general election, in August 1927, I was personally and publicly challenged as to whether I would be prepared to support Mr. de Valera's candidature or his Government, if he chose to form one. I immediately answered emphatically in the negative. Therefore I think it would be almost wearisome to the House if I were in any way to endeavour to show what attitude I took up upon this matter from the moment the Treaty was proposed between these two countries. At that time I happened to be a member of the Imperial Parliament and I said in that Parliament, as well as outside it, that I was prepared to accept the verdict of the majority of my countrymen. I stand by that still. I accept the Treaty as such and, so far as I personally am concerned, I will never be responsible by my vote for putting in the extraordinary, anomalous and absurd position as President of the Irish Free State a gentleman who, by his word, his conduct and his action, has done everything possible to prevent the functioning of that State.

What is the position to-day? Are we any wiser now than we have been during all the years since 1922? I must say that in the early stages of the Treaty controversy things seemed slightly clearer, and those of us who were in favour of the acceptance of the Treaty knew definitely that Deputy de Valera and his colleagues were definitely opposed to it. Now we are undoubtedly in a somewhat vague and cloudy atmosphere. As has been stated, we hear different voices at different times in different tunes upon this question, but I want to put this question definitely to the Fianna Fáil Party to-day: if by any stretch of the imagination, if by the ghost of a chance, they were to be elected as the Government of this country to-morrow, would they come here and declare a Republic or not? Let them answer that question. It is all very well to make speeches in the country, in America, and in this House differing in this respect, but what the plain people of the country want to know is whether Deputy de Valera, if returned to-morrow as President of the Irish Free State, would declare an Irish Republic or would be not. I do not think that we are likely to get an answer to that question to-day. We have heard it stated, and we now understand, that Fianna Fáil are declared constitutional Republicans. What do they mean by that? Do they mean that the method which they are to employ in future is to be the conversion of the other Parties to the principle of an Irish Republic, because I maintain that the people of the country are not Republicans?

Do they say that they have to go further and convert by their persuasive propaganda and oratory the people of Great Britain, who were one of the parties to this Treaty, to the doctrine of a Republic for Ireland? Is that what they are prepared to do, or is it, when they come into office, as possibly by a stretch of the imagination they hope to, that they would declare a Republic? I say that it is only fair and right that the people of the Free State should know what they intend to do in such circumstances. As I said previously, I admit that such circumstances are exceedingly hypothetical. So hypothetical are they, with the Dáil constituted as it is at present, that in my opinion this whole proceeding of proposing Deputy de Valera as President of the Free State is nothing short of a farce and an insult to this House. Deputies know that outside the Fianna Fáil Party there is not a member on these benches, Cumann na nGaedheal, Independent, or Labour, who is not pledged to support the Treaty, or, if there was any necessity for altering the Treaty, to secure it by constitutional means. That being so, I ask what is the reason, what is the fairness to this House in bringing forward a proposal such as this? I think that it is merely wasting the time of the House and of the country, and certainly there is one thing that will go forth from this debate, namely, that from none of the speeches from Fianna Fáil, certainly not from those of the proposer of the resolution or the seconder, Deputy Lemass, has this House or the country been given any indication as to what the policy is, either in regard to future fundamental constitutional questions or to the domestic and social welfare of the people. We have not heard one proposal as to how the election of Deputy de Valera is going to improve the lot of the working man of this country, how it is going to alleviate unemployment, how it is going to find solutions for the hundred-and-one problems, social and domestic, that confront us. Above all, we have not heard, possibly because they do not know it themselves, what their policy is in regard to the Constitution and the Treaty, if they were by any stretch of the imagination to be returned to power by the election of Deputy de Valera to the position of President of this Dáil. For that reason I have no hesitation in saying that my vote will be cast in the way in which I have always cast it since I came into the Dáil, and that is in favour of upholding the Treaty and against a proposal that anyone should be put in the absurd position of being President of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State who himself has always opposed the existence of that State and whose principal lieutenant says to-day that his entire policy is one of hostility to the Treaty.

Mr. O'Kelly

I do not think there is much in the way of argument that we have heard here to-day to which I need attempt a reply. A great field has been covered in a short space of time, and speeches innumerable have been quoted by Deputies, made in this House and at different times. Documents were quoted, but we do not know where they came from, and some of them, at any rate, read like romances. However, it is, perhaps, no harm in winding up this debate that I should state definitely and clearly that we stand by the statements made by Deputy de Valera, not alone in America, but here in this House and outside it on many occasions, that Fianna Fáil's aim is the attainment of an Irish Republic. That is definite and clear, and I hope that even Deputy Redmond's intelligence is capable of grasping that statement.

Captain Redmond

I never denied that was his stated aim; that is the reason why I am opposed to this motion.

Mr. O'Kelly

That is our aim and object. It was made clear on every political platform by all our members during the two general elections in 1927 and during the by-elections that took place since 1927. That is our ideal, and that object we hope to realise. But I say here again, as I said outside this House, that we hope to attain it without shedding anyone's blood, either Irish or English.

Captain Redmond

Would the Deputy answer my question?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy O'Kelly must be allowed to make his speech in his own way.

Mr. O'Kelly

Deputy Redmond put a lot of questions.

Captain Redmond

I shall repeat them if the Deputy wishes.

Mr. O'Kelly

Mr. Hogan

I have a marvellous record.

Mr. O'Kelly

I did not interrupt the Minister. I think our political attitude is definite and clear. We do not accept the Treaty as a final settlement of Ireland's claim to nationhood, of Ireland's national aspirations. We did not accept it in 1921, nor in 1922, nor do we accept it now. Is that definite and clear? The Minister for Finance, in a discussion on the Central Fund Bill, on the 22nd March, 1928, as reported in columns 1645-6 of the Official Debates, said:—

"With regard to the point as to whether we are aiming at the establishment of an Irish Republic, we are not."

That is definite and clear. He said further:—

"We believe this country as a member of the British Commonwealth of Nations can enjoy greater freedom and greater security than she could outside the great British Commonwealth of Nations, and our policy within it is really to remove anomalies that exist in the relationship between members of it."

That is a clear statement of policy, but at the same time it is a repudiation of the authors of the Treaty. It is a repudiation of Griffith and Collins, and of all the other men who accepted the Treaty. It is a definite and clear repudiation. I ask any of the Deputies on the other benches—not on ours—who were members of the Dáil that accepted the Treaty whether that is not a repudiation of the men who were responsible for having that Treaty accepted in the Second Dáil. There are others listening to me who can say whether that is or is not correct. I believe it is absolutely correct: Deputy O'Connell, when he said that the Labour Party, having accepted unequivocally the Treaty, does not accept it as the ne plus ultra of the march of the Irish nation, was interpreting what I believe was, and what those in the Second Dáil, or the vast majority of them, accepted as the real interpretation given to the acceptance of the Treaty by Griffith and Collins and others who spoke in favour of it at the time. The issue, therefore, on the political question is definitely and clearly knit. I would say you have on the one hand a definite statement: no further shall we Irish Nationalists or Irish Republicans go. We have gone into the British Empire, as some pro-Treaty people said, with our heads up, and the Minister for Finance tells us we are going to remain there. I ask anyone with a spark of real nationalism left in him is he content with that position? We are not, at any rate.

I did not intend to occupy much time in replying. I would not possibly have replied at all were it not for the grossly improper statements of the Minister for Agriculture. Our economic policy is well known. Deputies on the Government Benches pretend that they do not know and understand what it is. Deputy O'Connell, the leader of the Labour Party, knows it so well that he says there is no very considerable difference between their economic policy and ours, and I agree. There are some differences, but I do not think they are fundamental differences. In connection with the economic policy, let me say again that while we are here to use the machinery of this Free State to the fullest for the political advancement and the advancement towards freedom of the Irish people, we are not going to remain here idle and dumb when economic questions arise. Every opportunity that has arisen here has been made use of to the fullest by us to advance the economic and social interests of our people. I defy anybody to deny that.

Take the issue on which the Government was brought down, that of old age pensions. That is one of the numerous questions that we have raised here, and we have had many debates here in endeavouring to advance the social, economic and industrial interests of our people. It is not fair to suggest, as, to my mind, Deputy O'Connell suggested, that our intention was to remain idle and quiescent, hands in pockets, watching and waiting perhaps for political advancement and letting people starve and rot and die of hunger in the meantime. Deputy O'Connell ought to know, and I am sure he does know, that there is no Party in this House that has bent its earnest endeavours more often than we have in the direction of securing better housing, better conditions of livelihood, the development of industries and progressive development generally on economic lines, so that the people in this country may have an opportunity not alone to live, but to improve their standard of living. We have not remained idle; we do not intend to remain idle. Every day that we sit here a political question may arise, but certainly economic questions frequently arise, and on these economic questions we will in the future, as we have done in the past, devote the best of our energies and abilities to securing everything that it is possible to get, within our limited resources, inside the Twenty-six Counties, for the ordinary, plain, common people of the country.

I do not think I have much more to say. The question of the army and their position towards the army and the control of the army arises here. To my mind, going back over the past, it comes with ill-grace from Ministers who were in the Government in 1923-4 to charge us with having doubts as to what attitude we should adopt towards an army that attempted to over-ride or threaten or dictate to the Government. We have definitely before our minds the attitude the Ministry adopted when a real mutiny was attempted in the Free State Army. The mutineers were bought off. They were paid and pensioned and kept by money out of the taxpayers' pockets. Although they were mutineers and had threatened the State, they are kept and every possible position into which their leaders—not all their leaders but some of them—could be put by the present Government they were put. They were put into every soft job in the State and they are still in them. Those who were not lucky enough, as there were not jobs enough to go round, got fat pensions. They are still drawing—some of them at any rate—generous doles out of the pockets of the poor taxpayers. Now nobody can charge us with ever having said to any body of men or to individual men who stand for disorder in this country that when we come into power you will get the best jobs the State can afford or the biggest pensions we can rob from the Exchequer and that we will not submit to the Comptroller and Auditor-General any of the details of evidence on which the pensions are granted. Before they make charges of that kind against us about suborning disorder or threatening a government with arms, the Ministers should look into their own records. Not alone did they not properly control their own army but they cannot to-day control their own police or, at any rate, their own C.I.D. In the recent past, many verdicts have been given against the Ministry of Justice for breaches of the law committed by their own peace officers. What respect can anybody in the country have for law and order when you have the paid peace officers of the country encouraged, clapped on the back, and when everything is done that is possible to be done by the Ministry to show that the men who broke the law, men who are daily committing crimes against the person, who are committing assaults against peaceful citizens are not to be brought to justice? Heavy fines are imposed on them in the Court and yet not one step is taken so far as we know, to see that these men are taught and made to obey the common law of the land like any other citizen.

Tá

Aiken, Frank.
Allen, Denis.
Blaney, Neal.
Boland, Gerald.
Boland, Patrick.
Bourke, Daniel.
Brady, Seán.
Briscoe, Robert.
Buckley, Daniel.
Carney, Frank.
Carty, Frank.
Clery, Michael.
Colbert, James.
Cooney, Eamon.
Corkery, Dan.
Corry, Martin John.
Crowley, Fred. Hugh.
Crowley, Tadhg.
Derrig, Thomas.
Fahy, Frank.
Flinn, Hugo.
Fogarty, Andrew.
French, Seán.
Gorry, Patrick J.
Goulding, John.
Hayes, Seán.
Houlihan, Patrick.
Jordan, Stephen.
Kennedy, Michael Joseph.
Kent, William R.
Kerlin, Frank.
Killilea, Mark.
Kilroy, Michael.
Lemass, Seán F.
Little, Patrick John.
Maguire, Ben.
McEllistrim, Thomas.
MacEntee, Seán.
Moore, Séamus.
Mullins, Thomas.
O'Dowd, Patrick Joseph.
O'Kelly, Seán T.
O'Leary, William.
O'Reilly, Matthew.
O'Reilly, Thomas.
Powell, Thomas P.
Ruttledge, Patrick J.
Ryan, James.
Sexton, Martin.
Sheehy, Timothy (Tipp.).
Smith, Patrick.
Tubridy, John.
Walsh, Richard.
Ward, Francis C.

Níl

Aird, William P.
Alton, Ernest Henry.
Anthony, Richard.
Beckett, James Walter.
Bennett, George Cecil.
Blythe, Ernest.
Bourke, Séamus A.
Brennan, Michael.
Broderick, Henry.
Brodrick, Seán.
Byrne, John Joseph.
Carey, Edmund.
Cassidy, Archie J.
Clancy, Patrick.
Coburn, James.
Cole, John James.
Collins-O'Driscoll, Mrs. Margt.
Colohan, Hugh.
Conlon, Martin.
Connolly, Michael P.
Corish, Richard.
Cosgrave, William T.
Craig, Sir James.
Crowley, James.
Daly, John.
Davin, William.
Davis, Michael.
De Loughrey, Peter.
Doherty, Eugene.
Dolan, James N.
Doyle, Edward.
Doyle, Peadar Seán.
Duggan, Edmund John.
Dwyer, James.
Egan, Barry M.
Esmonde, Osmond Thos. Grattan.
Everett, James.
Fitzgerald, Desmond.
Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
Good, John.
Gorey, Denis J.
Haslett, Alexander.
Hassett, John J.
Heffernan, Michael R.
Hennessy, Michael Joseph.
Hennessy, Thomas.
Hennigan, John.
Henry, Mark.
Hogan, Patrick (Galway).
Holohan, Richard.
Jordan, Michael.
Kelly, Patrick Michael.
Keogh, Myles.
Law, Hugh Alexander.
Leonard, Patrick.
Lynch, Finian.
Mathews, Arthur Patrick.
McDonogh, Martin.
MacEóin, Seán.
McFadden, Michael Og.
McGilligan, Patrick.
Mongan, Joseph W.
Morrissey, Daniel.
Mulcahy, Richard.
Murphy, James E.
Murphy, Joseph Xavier.
Murphy, Timothy Joseph.
Myles, James, Sproule.
Nally, Martin Michael.
Nolan, John Thomas.
O'Connell, Richard.
O'Connell, Thomas J.
O'Connor, Bartholomew.
O'Donovan, Timothy Joseph.
O'Higgins, Thomas.
O'Leary, Daniel.
O'Mahony, Dermot Gun.
O'Reilly, John J.
O'Sullivan, Gearóid.
O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
Redmond, William Archer.
Reynolds, Patrick.
Rice, Vincent.
Roddy, Martin.
Shaw, Patrick W.
Sheehy, Timothy (West Cork).
Thrift, William Edward.
Tierney, Michael.
Vaughan, Daniel.
White, John.
White, Vincent Joseph.
Wolfe, George.
Wolfe, Jasper Travers.

Tellers: Tá, Deputies Boland and Allen; Níl, Deputies Duggan and P.S. Doyle.

Motion declared lost.

Mr. Morrissey

Deputy O'Connell did not want to know what was the position of Fianna Fáil in 1922 or 1928 or 1929. He wanted to know what is their position to-day towards the fundamental issue. We are not concerned with what the attitude of Fianna Fáil or the attitude of Cumann na nGaedheal was to the Treaty before to-day. But we are entitled to know, and the country is entitled to know, what is their attitude here and now on the question that is to be decided by the Deputies of this House as representing the people of this country. That is the question which Deputy O'Connell asked, and that is the question which, I submit, he was entitled to ask. So far as we in the Labour Party are concerned, I want to repeat what Deputy O'Connell has stated that we accept the Treaty and the institutions we have under the Treaty in the same spirit and in the same way in which that Treaty was accepted by the late Arthur Griffith and the late Michael Collins; and we propose, if Deputy O'Connell is elected here to-day, to get for the Irish people the last ounce out of that Treaty. We propose to give that Treaty a really Irish interpretation. I was glad to hear from Deputy O'Kelly, in his concluding speech, that in that he differs very little from the Labour Party.

The question of the Army was introduced, and so was the question of the control of the Army. I want to say that if this House in its wisdom decided to give the Labour Party an opportunity of forming a Government, we would see that the Army would be the servant of the people and the servant of any Government appointed and elected by the people. We were told by the Minister for Agriculture that his Party, if President Cosgrave were re-elected, would govern. I want to say that if Deputy Tomás O Conaill is elected President of this House both he and the Executive he will submit to this House will govern as well as, at least, and perhaps much better than, the Cumann na nGaedheal Party governs. The Labour Party would insist and would see to it, no matter what the consequences were, that any laws passed by the representatives of the people in this House were obeyed in the country. What is the position to-day? I want to put this seriously to the members of this House. On Thursday last, on a major issue, an issue which the President considered called for the resignation of his Government, that Government was defeated by a majority of this House. The President refused to obey the will of the people as decided by a majority in this House. I put it to members of all Parties here that if they do not vote for Deputy Tomás O Conaill, then the only honourable course left to the House is to dissolve and go to the country.

Mr. MacEntee

Why?

Mr. Morrissey

For this reason. On last Thursday the House decided that Deputy Ward's Old Age Pensions Bill should be passed. The principle of the Bill was agreed to by a majority of the House. The Government then in office and having the confidence of the House refused to implement that Bill by introducing the necessary financial motion. If Deputy O Conaill is not elected as President here and now, it means that President Cosgrave will be re-elected on stating clearly to the House that he is not prepared to carry out the decision of this Parliament. The Deputy who does not vote for Deputy O'Connell and who voted for the Old Age Pensions Bill on Thursday last is going back of the vote which he then gave.

Mr. Lemass

Who introduced the Bill?

Mr. Morrissey

Mr. Anthony

He does not have to go to Russia?

Mr. Cooney

Johnson and Mortished.

Mr. Morrissey

As for the Deputy who made that interruption—

Mr. Everett

Leave him alone.

Mr. Morrissey

I decided a good many years ago to leave that Deputy very severely alone. I do say this, that I think it is unfortunate and not at all desirable that these interruptions should be made in the very serious matter under consideration.

Mr. MacEntee

This proposition is not serious.

Mr. Morrissey

Quite serious. So serious is this proposition which Deputy MacEntee says is not serious at all, that Deputy Lemass stated publicly on Sunday last that he and his Party were going to vote for it. Why did they consider it serious on Sunday and ludicrous yesterday?

I said that the Labour Party, if they found there was anything in the Treaty which would hamper them in giving full effect to their economic and social policy, were prepared to get the best brains of the country, go across to England and meet the other party to the Treaty in ordinary negotiations and use the machinery used by every civilised country in the world and so try to arrange our differences in that way. That is our policy, and unless we are able to do that in the ordinary way, having the best brains of the country employed in order to put our case against whatever case England may put up, I do not believe there is any other same way of doing it. That is the way we propose to do it, and I believe the country will agree with us in that policy. I do not want to go further into the matter now, but I say that if Deputy O'Connell is elected to-day, within twenty-four hours he will put before the House a Government which I believe will command the confidence not only of Deputies here but of the country. In conclusion, I want to say that so long as we are sent here by people who want the Treaty and who want us to get the last ounce out of the Treaty —which we are prepared to do—we have no right to endanger that Treaty either directly or indirectly, and we are not going to do it.

Mr. Davin

The redeeming feature of the events of the last few days, since the resignation of the Government, is the fact that the people as a whole have kept their heads cool, even though the Free State Government resigned on Friday morning. The citizens of this State have at least come to the conclusion that they must continue to work and earn their living—those of them who have the satisfaction of getting work, regardless of whatever government may be in power. The only thing that matters to the people, in so far as they are concerned with the Government, is whether the Government that has gone out was a better Government than the one likely to be put in as a result of to-day's vote. The so-called political crisis which led to the resignation of the Government on Friday morning was created by the weakness of those who normally support the Government. About thirteen or fourteen Deputies—I am not quite sure of my ground in this matter—who normally support the Government, suffered on last Thursday night from what I call a temporary nervous breakdown, and they failed to respond to Deputy Duggan's whip to vote against the Bill moved by Deputy Ward. I suggest they suffered from a temporary nervous breakdown because they were afraid they could not face their constituents and justify their vote against the Bill.

Let the country recognise and realise that the so-called crisis has been created as a result of the weakness of the supporters of the Government in this House. What is the good of our Ministers going around this country and boasting about the independent status of this State and the democratic nature of our Constitution if the majority of the Deputies here will re-elect the Government that has flouted the majority decision of this House. It is for that reason that I have very great pleasure in seconding the nomination of Deputy O'Connell. He will maintain the independent status of this State and interpret the democratic spirit of the Constitution.

What was the reason given for the resignation of Deputy Cosgrave and his Government? I will quote from the report of the short speech which Deputy Cosgrave read on that occasion: "Last evening the Dáil passed the Second Reading of a Bill entitled the Old Age Pensions Bill, 1929, by a majority of two. In the course of the debate the Government, through the Minister for Finance, indicated their opposition to that measure, which proposed to impose a burden of some £300,000 per annum on the taxpayer. The cost of old age pensions to the State is already two and three-quarter million pounds sterling per annum, and the Government, having given the matter the most careful consideration, are not prepared to take the responsibility in the present financial situation of providing a further large addition to that sum which, while imposing a heavy burden on agriculture, trade and industry." and so on. Now I will, with the permission of the House, make an endeavour to draw up a balance sheet of the Government's financial administration concerning this State since they came into office. On the one side I will endeavour to picture what the Government did on behalf of the working-class people; the injury they did to the poorer section of the people in the interests of national economy, and, on the other side, I will endeavour to show the people of this country how the savings effected at the expense of the poor were handed over to the rich.

On the one side we have the Government, a couple of years after it was elected, coming in here and, as the first example of the fruits of freedom, introducing an amending Old Age Pension Bill which brought about a cut of 1/- in old age pensions, but which in reality when put into operation had the effect of making an average reduction of 4/- per week to those entitled to draw the pension. Subsequently they came along and cut the pay of the Civic Guard only a couple of years after that force was formed by themselves. They then came along and made a cut of 10 per cent. in the teachers' salaries. They subsequently came along and in the name of national economy took off the boot allowance of 1/6 which the Civic Guards hitherto drew. Next they cut down the Estimates for social services, which provide work by means of Land Commission improvement schemes, rural drainage schemes, and other schemes which provide work from State sources at the lowest standard of wages provided for any section of the community.

On the other side of the balance sheet we find that the money which they saved, or pretended to save, by cutting the old age pensions, by reducing the allowances of the Civic Guards, by cutting down teachers' salaries by 10 per cent., and by cutting the Estimates for the social services by 50 per cent., was handed over to the British Government, in the first place by way of a financial settlement signed by the late Minister for Finance. They subsequently came along, and, through what is known as the Compensation Property (Amendment) Act, 1926, provided a sum of between £350,000 and £400,000 of the taxpayers' money to be handed over to the people whose property was destroyed in the civil war, over and above the sum granted by the judges in the courts set up by themselves. That was, in the words of President Cosgrave, a gesture of friendship to the monied classes in this country for the purpose of enabling him to retain the consistent support of Deputy Thrift and Deputy Good in this House. They subsequently reduced income tax and supertax, pretending, as far as I can remember, to help the development of industry. Is there any Minister who will get up and show in what way the reduction of income tax and supertax has helped to create employment and develop industry since that reduction was put into operation?

There are many people in this country, outside those who normally support the Labour Party, who believe that the only way out of the difficulty is to find some man outside those who have been actively associated with the civil war period. In putting forward the name of Deputy O'Connell we believe that we are endeavouring to find a man who, if elected, will bring us away from the associations and bitterness of the civil war period and who will nominate an Executive Council who will govern in accordance with the wishes of the plain people of the country. On that matter I hope Deputy Redmond will pardon me for reminding him of the speech he made in favour of that particular proposal. On the 16th August, 1927—I quote from the Official Debates of that date, columns 1686-7—Captain Redmond said:—

"We can hardly wonder, however, if the plain people of Ireland, tormented between the rival extravagances of President Cosgrave on the one hand and Deputy de Valera's on the other, are tempted to cry aloud ‘A plague on both your houses.'"

It is a matter on which we have no very strong opinions and, therefore, we do not propose to take any part either in this discussion or this division.

Captain Redmond

I am very glad to have the opportunity afforded me by Deputy Davin of explaining my attitude on this vote. Deputy Davin stated that on a similar occasion in the year 1927 I took a certain attitude. He did not say whether it was going to be a different one to the one I am about to take because, possibly, he does not know, and he did not say in what way the occasion was a similar one. Let me recall to the House the occasion on the 16th August, 1927, which is the one to which, I think, he referred. On that occasion there was a question of a Vote of Censure on the then Government. That vote was proposed mainly upon the grounds of opposition to what was known as the Public Safety Bill, afterwards the Public Safety Act. In supporting that Vote of Censure I made it perfectly clear that the main reason for my opposition to the Government at the time was my utter dislike of their proposals in the form of a Public Safety Act. To make that clear I used the following words: "The real gravamen of the case against the Government is the Public Safety Act." I then went on to describe the Act as being to my mind a complete abrogation of the constitutional rights of the citizens of this country. Whether I was right or wrong in my opinion as to the effect and nature of that Act the fact remains to-day that the Act has been repealed.

If Deputy Davin wants to know my reason for not opposing the election of the present Government Party on this occasion, it is because the Public Safety Act has been repealed, and I believe that the only Party that can successfully propose and constitute a Government in this House is the Party which is the largest in number and which can command the support of the majority of this House. I am aware that that is perhaps rather entering into what will possibly be the subject matter of our next debate, but Deputy Davin asked me my attitude and has suggested that it is a change of attitude. I merely desire to say that, having pressed for the repeal of the Public Safety Act, and the Government having for one reason or another—I am not claiming to have been the means of doing it—repealed the Act, I feel that I am entitled, as an independent Deputy, to support that Government now, which is the only Government that can possibly command a majority of the votes of the House.

I do not know whether Deputies remember the statement made by the late Mr. Kevin O'Higgins when Minister for Justice, on 23rd June, 1927, when there was a proposal made to elect the President of the Executive Council. He said that the motion of the Government Party to elect President Cosgrave would be withdrawn "if there is anyone in the Dáil who is prepared to form a Government and gives us reasonable prospects of securing sufficient support for that Government." I desire to support that statement to-day. What reasonable support is there for the election of Deputy O'Connell? Could he maintain a Government? It has been said he leads a small Party, and neither his proposer nor his seconder has in any way indicated how he is going to get the support of Deputies in any other quarter of the House. On the contrary, we have heard from Deputy Lemass, on behalf of the second largest Party in the House, that they will take no hand, act or part in the debate or in the division, and much less will they support Deputy O'Connell, if he is elected to the position of President.

I agree, to a large extent, with a great deal that has been said by the proposer and seconder with regard to Deputy O'Connell's personal qualifications for the position. That, however, does not enter into the matter at all. The question is whether he can, in his present position, command a majority of elected representatives in this House and whether he would in any conceivable way be able to carry on such a Government. I cannot see how he possibly could. The suggestion was made by Deputy Davin that if Deputy O'Connell was not elected it therefore followed that the Cumann na nGaedheal nominee must necessarily be elected. I do not follow that line of reasoning at all. I do not see why some member of the Independent group should not be proposed. I do not see why someone should not propose Deputy Coburn or myself for that matter.

A Deputy

You would get nobody to second it.

Captain Redmond

We would be in absolutely the same position as Deputy O'Connell would find himself. When he would be elected to the position of President he could not command a sufficient majority in this House to carry on the necessary public work and the affairs of the State.

Mr. Corry

The Party would not agree.

Captain Redmond

Therefore, I feel that it is out of the question to expect anyone at this stage to support the election of a Deputy, no matter how qualified personally he may be, for the conduct of the affairs of the House who is not able to carry on the affairs of the House by a majority of Deputies. Again, I desire to thank Deputy Davin for the opportunity he has given me to say now, as I have said elsewhere, for a considerable time, that my chief and main opposition to the Cumann na nGaedheal Government in 1927 was their introduction and passage of the Public Safety Act, and that because that Act has been repealed, on all main issues, especially those in connection with the safeguarding of the Constitution and the government of the country, and in the carrying out of our international and contractual obligations with others outside, I am at one with President Cosgrave. When the time comes to vote, if he is proposed, I shall support him, and I hope what I am saying now will be taken as meaning that I will not have to inflict any further words upon the House upon this subject at any other time this evening, which subject I think should be disposed of as quickly as possible in order to let us get on with the business of the country.

Mr. Blythe

It may be sometimes for the public good to entrust a minority Party with the formation of a Government. That may occur when efforts to form a Government which had a firm majority behind it have failed, or it may happen when it is only desired to have a group to carry on the Government for a week or two, or a month or two, pending a general election. But I can hardly imagine any circumstances in which it would be justifiable to entrust the formation of a Government to a Party as small as the Labour Party now is. There are 11 Departments of State, and there are two sub-Departments which have been recognised as requiring a Parliamentary head, namely, the Land Commission and the Board of Works. It is, therefore, necessary, apart altogether from the question of a Whip, to have 13 members in the Government. There are just 13 members in the Labour Party, so that they would be all generals and there would be no rank and file. We are assuming for the moment that every man will make an excellent Minister. The position would be that all the members of the Labour Party would be Ministers. They would be carrying out the policy of the Labour Party. I think it is recognised that all Governments really should have people in the Parliament to support their policy who are not in office, because a Government which had no support of this kind in the House would be very liable, I think, to find it impossible to ascertain what a Labour man not in office would think about any particular matter that would come before them.

I believe that even if we had to spend two or three days here voting upon various propositions and failed to elect a President it would be still undesirable to elect Deputy O'Connell unless Deputy O'Connell was in a position to assure the House that he had got promises of support from outside groups that would at least give a rank and file for his Government. I gathered from the speeches of Deputy Morrissey and Deputy Davin that that had not been done. We are asked simply to put the Labour Party into office. I am sure An Ceann Comhairle would not allow me to answer, at least at any length, remarks made by Deputy Davin with regard to the economic policy of the Government. It seems to me that the economic policy of the Labour Party is to increase the social services irrespective of the capacity of the country, in its present state of development, to pay for them without forfeiting the prospects of further development; and secondly to depend to an undue degree upon State action for getting economic results. The view of the Government which has held office for some time, has been that while probably social services will continue to increase for a long time to come in all countries we cannot expect in a country which is economically undeveloped to have social services on the scale of countries that have made considerable progress and have a much greater accumulation of wealth to draw upon and, therefore, have much greater productivity to enable them to meet the charges that will fall upon them. We believe that while the whole question of social services must be sympathetically viewed, an eye must be kept, on the other hand, on the sources of production, and everything must be done to allow those sources of production to increase. We also believe that there are definite limits to the utility of State action by way of increasing productivity and bringing about economic prosperity. If the State tries to do too much it only prevents individuals who can venture more than the State from undertaking enterprise that they ought to undertake. The sketch that Deputy Davin gave of the economic policy of the Government was, of course, a travesty of that policy. I think it would be more in order to deal with it at a later stage of the present proceedings. I do not want to scout the proposal for the election of Deputy O'Connell simply because it seems to be a foregone conclusion, but I wish to oppose it because I think even if the House practically saw no other alternative it should hesitate before putting an entire Party into office.

Mr. Tadhg Murphy

I am glad that the Government, through the Minister for Finance, overcame their evident reluctance to take part in the debate on this motion. Being asked to intervene in this debate in support of the nomination made by the Labour Party, is to me, personally, a very high honour. In the very brief contribution to the debate made by Deputy Lemass he asked us to regard this nomination as a joke. I would like to say that the greatest joke in the recent political history of this country that we remember was the excuse made by Deputy Lemass's Party when they entered this House. It seems to me now from their declared attitude on this motion that they are going to repeat the policy that they recanted when they came into the House—that is, abstaining from having any responsibility for decisions come to on national matters.

This unquestionably is a serious nomination. It is important, and very important, because of the fact that the Party that makes it, in all seriousness to the House, is on the threshold of big developments in the life of this country—developments that we are sure will mean that they will be given a bigger responsibility and a wider invitation to take a bigger part in the life of this country in the future than they had been able to take in the past. Though we are not, perhaps, in a position to dispute the view of the Minister for Finance, that this motion is going to be negatived proof is not wanting that there are signs available that a motion in some what similar terms might be made in this House at no very distant date in very different circumstances. I am sorry the Minister for Finance did not elaborate more than he did, in another place, on the incapacity of the Labour Party to govern.

Mr. Blythe

It would be unparliamentary.

Mr. Murphy

During the past few days we have heard epithets in connection with the Labour Party flung about like "inconsistency" and the term "ludicrous" was used. The term "incapacity" figured more than once in the contributions that have flooded the papers for the last few days. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance is absolutely convinced of the inconsistency of the Labour Party. In an extremely interesting address delivered in Nenagh on Sunday he ranged an attack over such interesting subjects as "race suicide,""divorce,""senile marriages," and proclaimed our inconsistency to his audience. My first comment on that would be this, that if Deputy Bourke had any regard for consistency, or even for public decency, he would refrain from talking about incapacity in connection with any Party or any individual. I say that because I doubt if there would be any serious contradiction of the fact that he himself presents the greatest example of floundering incapacity that this House has ever known since it was set up. Surely, in the course of the statement delivered, I have no doubt in the usual lucid fashion in which he approaches questions of this kind, the limit was reached when the superseded Minister for Local Government, who got what used to be termed an Irishman's rise in 1927 from his President, went on to talk about people of work-shy mentality. There, at any rate, I bow to the absolutely intimate knowledge he had of the subject. There is no question whatever about his right and qualification to speak upon that subject. I want to be merciful, and I only want to say a few words more. If Deputy Bourke has any capacity there was very little evidence of it manifested in this Chamber, and I want to say, in addition, that if a regrettable feature in the life of this country at present is the abnormal number of senile marriages, it is equally regrettable we should have the senile statements that Deputy Bourke has made. We give him credit for one thing, at least, and that is that he was endeavouring to make some atonement for his undoubted incapacity. Perhaps he was trying to make easy his lot for his absence here last week, and with an Executive which must be by now heartily sick of him indeed.

Deputy Heffernan, another lieutenant of the Minister for Finance, has no faith in our capacity either, but he has another fear, and it is this, that our policy would be dictated from outside. No doubt we recognise Deputy Heffernan's high qualification to speak of capacity to govern. We are also keenly conscious of his undoubted capacity for intelligent utterances both in this House and outside of it, and of course there are very few in this House better fitted to speak where the question of the independence and policy of a Party are concerned than Deputy Heffernan. Deputy Heffernan is very highly qualified in that respect indeed. In that connection, I think I could say safely that the chorus of highly hysterical utterances that have been given expression to about the Labour Party during the last three or four days would have been complete if we had had a contribution from such a highly constructive and consistent statesman as Deputy Esmonde. I think that the whole atmosphere, the whole chorus as it were, would have been absolutely complete if we had a statement of that kind from Deputy Esmonde also. I want to say this seriously, that this whole thing would be regarded as a capital joke if there were not still in the country a number of people who are inclined to take utterances of that kind seriously. There must be a large number of people down the country who do not know intimately the speakers whom I have referred to and who would be inclined to think, by reason of the position that they occupy, that they are capable of serious utterances. The fact that there are such people in the country renders statements of this kind somewhat more serious.

The Minister for Finance, when speaking on Sunday, was in a very different frame of mind to what he was in this evening. The howling lion on Sunday became the cooing-dove a few days afterwards. The Minister was certainly in his best jack-boot style on Sunday evening when he was tearing to pieces the jelly-fish Labour Party.

I am not very anxious to pursue the matter. I have no doubt but that I will get another opportunity of getting it out here or elsewhere. Deputy Lemass, during the last few days, expressed the view that the idea of a Labour Government was ludicrous. In the most ludicrous manner possible the Deputy proceeded to change his whole policy with regard to the nomination of Deputy O'Connell to be President of the Executive Council. I have heard no indication, in the course of this debate, as to why the Fianna Fáil policy on this matter has been changed. I heard no serious objection to the position of Labour on the Treaty as defined by Deputy O'Connell to-day. I heard no serious objection to the economic policy of Labour as defined, and I want to know exactly where the snag is in the whole story?

The newspapers this morning contained the statement that the change of front that has taken place within the last day or two was caused by the statement made by Deputy Davin in Malahide on Monday night last. I have not seen a word in that statement in any way different to the statement the Labour Party has made on this question. I made statements like it on dozens of occasions in my own constituency. I stand completely over the position he has taken up. If there is any word in it that Deputy Lemass is anxious to take objection to it appeared to me it is the word "equivocation" in connection with the question of the acceptance of the Treaty. Does the Deputy want the equivocation that has surrounded this whole question to continue? I am sick of equivocation in this matter, and I think it is quite time it should be definitely settled, and that we should know where we are in regard to the whole question.

If the statement by Deputy Davin would do nothing else than clear up all the slush that has been written about alliances between one Party and another it will do a great deal of good, and if it will help to prevent the fairy tales that reach unfortunate people down the country about dark and sinister alliances made here, there and everywhere, from being repeated it will have done a great deal of good. If it took all this time for either or both of the political Parties to ascertain what our attitude on this major question was or is it is a very poor tribute to their intelligence, but it certainly is not our responsibility. I would be very much surprised if the policy of Deputy O'Connell, put into operation—if this motion were carried by the House—would not effect more in as many months than other policies have effected in years. If Deputy O'Connell would not be capable of tackling with more vision and capacity than the Executive Council who are charged with responsibility in the matter the question of unemployment, I would be very much disappointed, and if there is anybody here who wants a discussion on the question of what has happened the Labour Government in England then we can arrange a time to have it discussed. Interjections of the kind we have had will not get us away from this particular point at all. I believe that Deputy O'Connell would be able to tackle the job and bridge the gap between our social services and the infinitely better services of other countries, and that prevail in another part of this country.

I want to come back to what the Minister for Finance said about the economic policy of the Labour Party, that it was to enlarge the social services without the smallest regard to the source of production. The agricultural policy of the Labour Party was published some years ago. That policy is indicated in the clearest possible terms. It was laid down that it would be the duty of the Labour Party to exploit the natural resources of this country and to develop production. The essential standard of services we visualise could be met without imposing any heavy burden on the State. The Minister is not going to get away with the clever camouflage that Labour suggests that all the drain should come out of the services, and that the natural result would be that the country would be run into national bankruptcy. The Minister deprecated State action, which he says is the policy of the Labour Party. The Government has been responsible for more schemes involving State action in the last three or four years than the Labour Party if given office could put into effect for a long time. It has been responsible for State intervention in connection with the purchase of creameries, the Shannon scheme, the railways, and in many other directions. The Government, I have no doubt, does not wish to disown State action.

I do not think Deputy O'Connell could be accused, if he were given responsibility, of doing things that others could be accused of having done, or of things such as have been started recently by the present Executive. Deputy O'Connell, I am sure, would refuse to give effect to a proposal, seriously made in this House, to revive the worst form of the old landlord system by reserving a corner on the public boards for the privileged class of this country, and I feel certain that no Labour Government—certainly not a Labour Government in this country—would sanction local government being transformed in the way it is in this country at the moment. Other Deputies than members of the Labour Party have given expression to that view. The control of local government in this country is being transformed into a detestable tyranny, and the Labour Party would be definitely and determinedly against that policy. Under a Labour Government we would have had no strike in the Post Office, or trouble in other directions where we have evidence of dissatisfaction and irritation.

There is another consideration, and perhaps it is one of the most important. In the opinion of this Party, and in the opinion of a growing number of people in this country, one of the greatest needs at the moment is a Centre Party Government. Deputy Redmond, in his speech this evening, was afraid to give support to a minority Government. Deputy Redmond went perilously near accepting that position two years ago in this House. I think it would not be an exaggeration to say that Deputy Redmond accepted that position. I do not want to say anything more in connection with Deputy Redmond's attitude this evening. I repeat, there is a growing volume of opinion in this country in favour of a Centre Party Government, and the relegation, for the time being, at any rate, to an arena other than political of the big figures in the two big Parties in this country. I am satisfied, from the course of the debate this evening, that the number of people who are thinking in that direction will be very largely increased when they read their newspapers to-morrow. Certainly there was material in the debate this evening for a conclusion of that kind. The policy of this Party is one of peace. The record of this Party since its inception has not been marred by anything such as could be mentioned in other connections. There are no bitter memories to be wiped out in connection with the Labour Party.

The wooden gun. I am sorry you did not grow a meigeal. You would look better like a goat all right, but you could not grow the whiskers. Anyway, I do not think that the introduction of 13 members here as a Ministry would do any good. I notice that the Minister for Finance made an allusion here a while ago to the fact that he was going to have two new Ministries. One of them was to be the Ministry of Public Works. I suppose that was, as a result of the suggestion to the Independents in the "Irish Times" that they should get their price. I hope when he is giving out this Ministry for Public Works that he will not forget Deputy John Good.

Mr. Haslett

I did not intend to contribute anything to this word-picture of all our heroes, but the proposer and seconder of this motion made certain allusions which I think need a reply. Deputy Morrissey, in proposing that Deputy O'Connell be nominated as President, offered some ready-made advice and gave a challenge; and we had the burlesque of Deputy Davin towards the Independents, especially those who voted for the motion on the Old Age Pensions Bill. As one of those, I want to say that I believe in what I did on that occasion. I advocated it before I came into this Dáil, and I feel consistent in continuing to advocate it. The other Independents can speak for themselves on that question, but, to my mind, both of these Deputies stopped short because they said if we want to put the Bill into operation we have got to vote here and now for Deputy O'Connell, while they gave us no indication of how Deputy O'Connell, with the best will in the world, was going to carry it out. As a great many of the speakers pointed out, the whole force at his command would be thirteen.

Mr. Davin

On that issue?

[Professor Thrift took the Chair.]

Mr. Haslett

The Labour Party has gone to great pains to show us that they have no alliance with any other Party in the House. They have not even thrown a gesture to the Independents. I think if they had offered them at least two seats in the Cabinet there would be something to be said for them. Instead of that, they go round in a hostile manner and shout denunciations of every Party in the House, and then they say they can carry out this measure that passed the Second Reading the other day. I do not think that anyone could believe that they mean serious business, because they do not give us any indication of how it could be carried out. Deputy Davin went very far in his speech in denouncing the Independent group. He told us that we had already got far too much and that the people whom we represented in this case had got far too much at the hands of the Government, and that there were people in another State who had not got nearly so much. There are people in other places who can reply to that, and reply satisfactorily, I am sure. I can only say that since I came into this House I have been in the Independent group and, to my knowledge, that Independent group have never asked for or got any sops from the Government. They have acted, as far as I know, in an independent manner, without any reward being held out, and it comes badly from a Party that must admit that they have got a few crumbs from the present Government.

I say frankly and openly that I admire Deputy O'Connell in many ways. He has shown great ability in the leadership of his Party and in his work outside this House. He is a man that no one can cast a stone at. Up and down the country he has been praised for his work, and deservedly praised, but the Labour Party is asking an impossible thing in asking to have him nominated President at the present time. If he were nominated it would only create a situation that we would have to meet in a day or two again. We were told that if Deputy O'Connell were elected President in 24 hours he would have a Ministry to carry on the Government of this country. What would be the position before the 25th hour would be out? The Cabinet would be gone and we would be asked to elect another President. As one of those challenged in regard to our votes on the Old Age Pensions Bill, I cannot support this motion that Deputy O'Connell be nominated President, because it leads nowhere. The proposer and seconder have not told us that they can deliver the goods. If there is no alliance how would they get a majority to carry the Bill through the House? I must oppose the motion. That does not mean, as far as I am concerned, that the one section in the Old Age Pensions Bill which caused all this will be lost sight of. There will surely be another day to reckon with that, instead of electing a President from a Party of thirteen.

Mr. Cooney

Having what I believe to be, anyhow, a slight appreciation of jokes, I would like to participate in this huge joke, the best joke of the evening, the nomination which is before the House. As Deputy Lemass has pointed out, we look upon it as nothing more or less than a joke. I want to reassure those in the country and in the House who have not the sense of humour which we claim to have lest they might misunderstand this hypocritical gesture on the part of certain Deputies in this House. First of all, we have Deputy Morrissey telling us that if Deputy O'Connell is not elected to the position of President of the Executive Council there is only one alternative and that is the election of President Cosgrave, and for those who do not agree with that there is an honourable alternative, namely, to dissolve and go to the country. He challenged those who supported the Old Age Pensions Bill which brought about the defeat of the Government and who are not prepared to support the implementing of it to go to the country. If there was any sincerity in that challenge why did he and his Party not take the only practical step which must be apparent to any intelligent member of this House and support the nomination made by the second largest Party in this House? I put that to any fair-minded Deputy. Deputy O'Connell's nomination I assert is nothing short of humbug. The attitude of his Party from the inception of this State has been one of humbug and neither he nor his colleagues ever intended to shoulder any governmental responsibilities in this country. Had they intended to do it they would have had the courage to nominate a sufficient number of candidates to give the people an opportunity of saying whether they wanted a Labour administration or not.

They did not do that on any occasion, and I am quite certain they never will. I hope to see the day that they will. Then we will know where the people stand in this matter. I want to make it perfectly clear that if I believed for one moment that the Labour Party represented real Irish Labour, that if we had as an alternative to the present administration a real Irish Labour Party, nothing would prevent me giving them my support and doing everything in my power to have them elected to administrative responsibilities in this State. In this connection I am referring particularly to the front bench of the Labour Party. The front bench of the Labour Party, as has been pointed out by Deputy Corry, was divided on a major issue some time ago, and quite recently on other issues. We had one outstanding issue which, to my mind, was in defence of a fundamental principle, the right of a Deputy to exercise his rights and privileges as a member of this House, and taking the only honourable course when he was denied that right, namely, to get out of the position which this House thrust upon him. What happened? His coleagues found a substitute on that front bench.

Mr. Davin

Did you vote against him for the position?

Mr. Cooney

Mr. Morrissey

They are good enough.

Mr. O'Connell

They are not good enough to be imposed upon.

Motion put.

The Dáil divided: Tá, 13; Níl, 78.

Tá

Anthony, Richard.
Broderick, Henry.
Cassidy, Archie J.
Clancy, Patrick.
Colohan, Hugh.
Corish, Richard.
Davin, William.
Doyle, Edward.
Everett, James.
Hogan, Patrick (Clare).
Morrissey, Daniel.
Murphy, Timothy Joseph.
O'Connell, Thomas J.

Níl

Aird, William P.
Alton, Ernest Henry.
Beckett, James Walter.
Bennett, George Cecil.
Blythe, Ernest.
Bourke, Séamus A.
Brennan, Michael.
Brodrick, Seán.
Byrne, John Joseph.
Carey, Edmund.
Cole, John James.
Collins-O'Driscoll, Mrs. Margt.
Conlon, Martin.
Connolly, William T.
Cosgrave, William T.
Craig, Sir James.
Crowley, James.
Daly, John.
Davis, Michael.
De Loughrey, Peter.
Doherty, Eugene.
Dolan, James N.
Doyle, Peadar Seán.
Duggan, Edmund John.
Dwyer, James.
Egan, Barry M.
Esmonde, Osmond Thos. Grattan.
Fitzgerald, Desmond.
Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
Good, John.
Gorey, Denis J.
Haslett, Alexander.
Hassett, John J.
Reynolds, Patrick.
Rice, Vincent.
Roddy, Martin.
Shaw, Patrick W.
Sheehy, Timothy (West Cork).
Thrift, William Edward.
Heffernan, Michael R.
Hennessy, Michael Joseph.
Hennessy, Thomas.
Hennigan, John.
Henry, Mark.
Hogan, Patrick (Galway).
Holohan, Richard.
Jordan, Michael.
Keogh, Myles.
Law, Hugh Alexander.
Leonard, Patrick.
Lynch, Finian.
Mathews, Arthur Patrick.
McDonogh, Martin.
MacEóin, Seán.
McFadden, Michael Og.
McGilligan, Patrick.
Mongan, Joseph W.
Mulcahy, Richard.
Murphy, James E.
Murphy, Joseph Xavier.
Myles, James Sproule.
Nally, Martin Michael.
Nolan, John Thomas.
O'Connell, Richard.
O'Connor, Bartholomew.
O'Donovan, Timothy Joseph.
O'Higgins, Thomas.
O'Leary, Daniel.
O'Mahony, Dermot Gun.
O'Reilly, John J.
O'Sullivan, Gearóid.
O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
Tierney, Michael.
Vaughan, Daniel.
White, John.
White, Vincent Joseph.
Wolfe, George.
Wolfe, Jasper Travers.

Tellers:—Tá, Deputies Davin and Cassidy; Níl, Deputies Duggan and P.S. Doyle.

Motion declared defeated.

Seosamh O Mongáin

Tá bród orm go bhfuil ainm agam-sa le cur roimh an Dáil mar Uachtarán ar an Ard-Chomhairle: fear tá mé cinnte agus atá me annso a toghfar—sin é Liam Mac Cosgair. O thainig an Dáil i réim, bhí an t-ainm sin faoi árdmheas ag an tír go léir. Tá raidhtigh ann "gur fearr an gníomh a cruthíutear ná an ráidhtigh bréige as béal na mbréagadóirí." Chruthuigh Liam Mac Cosgair an gníomh gach lá ó rinneadh Uachtarán de. Seacht mbliana ó shoin, toghadh é mar Chaptean ar an Saorstát nuair a bhí an long i measc maidhmanna agus fairrgí móra, stoirm agus gála. Anois, nuair a thug sé an long isteach ar an gciuineadas, tá daoine ag iarraidh an halamadóir do bhaint uaidh. Ach, sa tír seo, ar an gciuineadas féin, tá carraigreacha báidhte agus mara bhfuil eolas ag an gCaptaen ortha is contabharthach an rud é. Mar sin, ní maith an rud an Captaen d' atharú go mbeidh an long slán sábháilte feistithe sa gcéibh.

Anois, tar éis na mblian sin, chuaidh an tUachtarán go dtí an tír ag iarradh measa. Cuireadh air ais é. Chuaidh sé ann arís agus cuireadh air ais é, agus arís agus cuireadh air ais é, agus deirim-se dá dteigheadh sé go dtí an tír amáireach go gcuirfí air ais é dhá uair chó láidir. Nuair a hosclochas na daoine a gcuid páipéar amáireach agus nuair a fheicfeas siad go mbeidh Liam Mac Cosgair 'na Uachtarán ag stiúra na tíre arís beidh a gcroidhe ag preaba le spóirt go bhfuil sé air ais arís.

Ná ceapadh duine ar bith sa Teach seo gur amadáin an chuid is mó de dhaoine na tíre seo agus go meallfar le cáith iad. Ní meallfar. Teastuigheann an fíor-choirce uatha agus sé Liam Mac Cosgair atá in ann é d'fháilt dóibh. Ní choinneoidh mise moill ar an Teach ag iarraidh é do mholadh—tá a fhios ag an tír cé h-é féin. Tá a fhios aca céard a rinne sé ó thainig an Stát seo i réim; tá a fhios aca céard tá sé in ann a dhéanamh; teastuigheann sé uatha. Molaim-se é le bheith 'na Uachtarán ar an Ard-Chomhairle mar ní féidir linn duine chó maith leis d'fháil.

Mr. Davis

I formally second the motion.

Mr. MacEntee

I would ask the House to consider the political, social and economic effects of the proposition which is now before it. I am perfectly certain that there are considerable numbers of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party who do not wish to have the full implication of Deputy Mongan's proposal analysed.

Except to connive at partition and acquiesce in the presence in our harbours of the enemy forces and to ask this Dáil to approve of a report which virtually saddles the Crown of Great Britain upon this State for all time? Deputy General McKeon is in the House and he was also in the Second Dáil. I am perfectly certain that in December 1921 he did not want the Crown. I am going to ask him does he want the Crown now? I am perfectly certain that in December 1921 he did not want the enemy forces in our harbours. Does he want the enemy forces there now? I am perfectly certain that in December, 1921 he did not want this thing called partition. Does he want that thing now? If he is prepared to answer these questions then I think he is in honour bound to say "no" to the proposition which has been put before the House.

Mr. Connolly

What was your answer to Lloyd George's final offer?

Can we not have tabloid speech?

Mr. O'Kelly

Will the President guarantee that we will have tabloid speeches from his side? We have given some examples.

An Ceann Comhairle

Mr. T. Sheehy (Cork):

You are sneering at the Treaty which brought you in here.

An Ceann Comhairle

I want to know from the Deputy what use he proposes to make of the Treaty debates.

Mr. MacEntee

I shall make no more use of them now. At once the spirits of Cumann na nGaedheal are quelled and fall down to adore Deputy Cosgrave as the keeper of the constitutional cold mutton. That is what the Treaty has become—dead mutton—something to be kept in cold storage, as Deputy O'Connell says. Cumann na nGaedheal has no longer any use for the Treaty. It has become an embarrassment to them, because, in view of the circumstances surrounding its acceptance in this country, it imposed upon those who sponsored the Treaty the obligation of working for independence in this country. But Cumann na nGaedheal statesmen have now a much wider field than an island offers them. Their ambition has outgrown their insular environment. They are anxious to posture as Dominion statesmen. The whole wide world will henceforth be the range of their activities. They want to be leaders in Dominion affairs, real bigwigs in Buckingham Palace. A "thriftless ambition that will ravin up thine own life's means" compels them to destroy whatever there was in the Treaty which might enable that instrument to be used as a weapon to secure the independence of this country, and instead of the Treaty they are now substituting the vague and ambiguous declarations made at the Imperial Conference.

[An Leas-Cheann Comhairle took the Chair.]

Now, with regard to that, we come to another point, because it seems to me that there has been a deliberate change of policy in the Cumann na nGaedheal Party since 1926. The Report of the Imperial Conference of 1926 was not submitted to this House, but the Report of the Conference held in 1929 was submitted to this House, and for a very definite reason. Prior to 1929 British statesmen had admitted the right which Dominion statesmen claimed that the Dominions could, if they wished, peaceably, and of their own volition, secede from the British Commonwealth of Nations. Paragraph 60 of the Report of 1929 is designed to deprive members of the British Commonwealth of Nations of the constitutional right to secede which they previously possessed, and the reason why that document was submitted to this House was in order that the House, by ratifying it, might deprive itself of this constitutional right.

Now I do not wish to be misunderstood. The natural right which we possess to be independent is one thing. The constitutional right which the statesmen of other Dominions had won is another. If the people of this country desire to secede they have a perfect right and liberty under God to do so. Furthermore, they were in this strong position, that Great Britain had already admitted that right in the case of those with whom they were supposed to be co-equal. The point in regard to the Imperial Conference which I wish to make is this: that the late Government, under the Presidency of Deputy Cosgrave, got this House to renounce voluntarily that right which had already been conceded to the Free State. The House when it approved of that report, did wrong. It has the opportunity to-night of undoing that wrong; it has the opportunity now of retrieving that position because the person who was responsible for submitting this document to the House and for securing approval of this document, particularly paragraph 60 of it, is no longer in office, and the House can exercise its right and refuse to put him back in office. Having done that, the previous ratification of this document will be cancelled.

I have referred to the effect of paragraph 60 of the Report of the Imperial Conference. I would like to read that paragraph in order that the House may be fully aware of its implications:

If the Deputy wants to challenge the ruling of the Chair, then I suggest he ought to do it in an open manner or not challenge it at all.

Mr. MacEntee

The reason that I touch upon this point is that I must make it clear to the House what the present policy of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party is—that one of the sheet anchors of the Party is to preserve the Protestant succession in this country. Henceforth the King, the Constitution and the Protestant succession are going to be the sheet anchors of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party in this country. By an understandable coincidence, in view of the complexion of this House, those principles of the King, the Constitution and the Protestant succession happen also to be the fundamental principles of the Orange institution.

I understand that during the last few days the Cumann na nGaedheal Party have had some difficulty with the Independents who support them in this House. I understand also that the difficulties have been easily resolved. One cannot be astonished at that when one realises that the members who sit on the Government Benches have exactly the same principles in regard to the Constitution and the King and the Protestant succession as Deputies who sit on the Independent Benches. I am sorry that Deputies Haslett and Cole are not here in order that I might congratulate them on the success of their missionary labours. It has been awe inspiring. In less than three years they have converted Deputy Cosgrave and the heads of the Cumann na nGaedheal organisation, as I said before, to the fundamental principles of the Orange Order. It only remains for him and the leading members of his Party to make a pilgrimage to Belfast on the coming Twelfth in order that this new alliance may be solemnised in an appropriate manner.

I must confess though that I became a little uncertain of my ground to-day when I heard the Minister for Defence open his speech with a quotation from an encyclical letter from Leo XIII. I began to ponder in my own mind how Deputies Haslett, Cole and Myles might take that particular quotation. However, apparently Deputy Haslett has also advanced a little, and he is now prepared to support the Government whose political existence is based on the encyclical letter of Leo XIII. Whether his constituents in Co. Monaghan will be as wholehearted as he in support of that Government is a matter I leave to him to settle with them.

I would now ask the House to consider the economic effects of that proposition. The House, by a majority, approved of the principle of the Old Age Pension Bill which was introduced by Deputy Ward. The cost of giving effect to the proposals of the Bill would be something like £250,000 or £300,000. I would ask those who supported the Bill to bear in mind that if they now vote in support of the nomination of Deputy Cosgrave they are throwing their former vote to the winds, and that the Bill will not proceed further, but will remain on the Order Paper until it is removed by a vote of the House.

They will vote to put in office a man who refused to find £250,000 for the aged poor, while the country, in the Estimates which this House is considering, will be asked to make provision for £1,991,000 in respect of pensions for able-bodied people. If you vote for Deputy Cosgrave you are voting for a man who, while he refuses to meet the needs and assuage the wants of the destitute poor, has piled burden upon burden upon the whole tax-paying community until the people are staggering under the load. Last year the Government extracted from the taxpayers £21,470,000. If the Estimates which the late Government submitted are approved of, as they will be approved, if you elect Deputy Cosgrave, an extra £400,000 must be found in taxation next year. The simple thing in the figures which have been published recently giving the returns for the year 1929-30 is that without exception every significant tax has shown a diminished return, a sure proof and certain indication that the country is already overburdened. It is due to that fact that instead of having prosperity and progress in the Free State we have industrial and economic stagnation and decay. To vote for Deputy Cosgrave to-night is to vote to accelerate that process of decay. Any Deputy who feels any uneasiness in relation to the present economic condition of the country, if he wishes to allay that uneasiness, if he wishes to ensure that the country will be given a chance to pull around and recuperate, must vote for someone other than the Deputy whose name is before the House.

There is another question, a question of law and order. A great parade was made in the House to-day about the equivocal attitude of Fianna Fáil in regard to men with guns. I think, before the Independent Deputies vote in this House, they have a right to expect from Deputy Cosgrave some statement with reference to an article which appeared in the "Star" on March 23rd. I think I had better read to the House the significant paragraph from that leading article:

"The members of the Government are the servants of the people. If it were apparent that they were not obedient to the people, it would no longer be necessary that the Army should be obedient to them. In these circumstances the Fianna Fáil Government would be only a tyranny. It is difficult to destroy a tyranny, except with sword and rifle."

A Fianna Fáil Government, being the Government elected by the people, the Government elected with the approval of this house and responsible to this House, would be only a tyranny.

"It is difficult to destroy a tyranny except with sword and rifle. If it should become a duty to destroy a tyranny in the Saorstát, it would be the duty of the soldier to move first, as he is best equipped for the work. Thus, the position is: Fianna Fáil has nothing to fear from the Army if they are good boys; but if they are bad boys, the Army will be highly dangerous to them."

Who is to be the judge as to whether the Fianna Fáil Party are good boys or bad boys? Is it to be the majority in this House, which will ultimately put the Fianna Fáil Party in power, or is it to be a junta of Cumann na nGaedheal sitting outside through its personal contacts with officers and men of the Army? I want to know who was responsible for writing that article, and who was responsible for the paper in which it appeared. Is it true that Deputy Cosgrave has a part ownership in that paper? Is it true that the Acting-President wrote that article? I think the House before it votes on that issue should have an answer to this question, as to whether Deputy Cosgrave is a part owner of the "Star," in which the article inciting the Army to mutiny in a certain eventuality was published. If he is part owner is he a fit person to be President of the Executive Council of the Free State? Who are the men and what Government and Party are now appealing to the men with guns? The Acting-President has come in. I hope if he intervenes in the debate he will say whether he is responsible for the article or not. We know that other articles which have appeared in the editorial columns of that paper have been written by him. If he did not write them did the Minister for Defence? The Minister for Defence has a peculiar personality. Not only is he Minister for Defence but also an amateur theologian. One of the most dangerous things, and one of the sources of the greatest evils which have afflicted mankind have been amateur theologians in charge of armies. Did the Minister for Defence write that article?

Mr. Esmonde

I would ask the Deputy to quote the article in the language in which it was written.

Mr. MacEntee

Mr. MacEntee

I am asking Deputy William Cosgrave whether the people have or have not the right to elect Eamon de Valera, and if he declares to the House that they have a right to elect Eamon de Valera as President of the Executive Council, will he take into his Cabinet a Deputy who has already declared in this House that the Irish people have no such right? "The primary and fundamental function of government is to preserve social order," said the same Acting Minister. Now, on a number of occasions during the regime of the late administration Deputies on the Fianna Fáil benches brought before the notice of the House and before the notice of the late Minister for Justice a number of cases in which it was alleged that the forces under the control of that Minister were violating the law and outraging the rights and liberties of citizens, and the invariable reply from the Minister was to refer the Deputies to the courts, and to say that any possibility of redress lay there. Some people took the Minister at his word; they brought some cases to the courts; they have been heard there before a judge and jury, and in every single case in which the facts were submitted to a judge and jury the members of the police forces under the control of the late Minister for Justice, and therefore under the control of the Deputy who is proposed as President of the Executive Council, were found to have been guilty of outrages and assaults upon the citizens. In every single case that was found to be a fact, and I ask the Independents, whose position in this matter is peculiarly liable to attack, whether they can afford to vote to put in power a Deputy who, when formerly in a position of control and responsibility, permitted forces of the State to be guilty, as I have said, of outrages upon the rights and liberties of the citizens? Can they afford it? Can, they, in view of their responsibilities to the people who sent them here, cast their votes for that Deputy, because if they vote for Deputy William Cosgrave, they vote for the continuance of that violence, or will they vote for the constitutional and legal rights of the people who sent them here. "The primary and fundamental function of government is to preserve social order." Because the verdicts of the juries before whom the whole facts were placed have shown that the late Government, headed by Deputy William Cosgrave, failed in that primary and fundamental function of government, to preserve social order, I ask the House to vote against the proposal which Deputy Mongan has put before it.

No.

Mr. O'Hanlon

I am not arguing the point with the Deputy any longer. I am not going to delay the House very much longer than to explain my position. I voted for the Old Age Pensions Bill because I believed it was the correct thing to do, because I believe the administration of the Old Age Pensions Acts was not in sympathy with the pensioners, and that a necessary change should be made in the administration and tightening up of the Acts. We are asked now to elect a President. All the possible candidates with the exception of myself have been removed from the scene, and I was seriously thinking of proposing myself as a probable. I can assure the House that if I did I would have the wholehearted support of my Party. We are quite unanimous on the question, and I do not know if the candidate now before the House is defeated but that I will not step into the breach and form a Pooh Bah Government of my own. I think I could function as Minister in all the Departments myself, and no doubt I would have a very good try. I want to say here and now that I am not going to vote for the late President's return to office. I am not stating that for the reason that he is not qualified for the office, but from the fact that if I did so the vote I gave here last Thursday for the pensioners would be nullified, and I would be stultifying myself. I am not going to do that. I took no part up to this in the Divisions for either of the other candidates. I believe that the whole proceedings here to-day have been staged, for what purpose the Government know best. Perhaps, as some Deputies stated, it was time to have a show-down. We have heard a lot about show-downs here for the last three or four weeks, and people who asked for them—the late Government and possibly the future Government—can go to the country and underline the words: "There you are; there is no alternative in the country. We are back in power and we can do what we like for the next twelve months." It is not, in my opinion, a very creditable thing to have this crisis going on, except possibly for a display of the sort I mentioned. In any event, for the reasons I have stated—and I could say a lot more which I do not wish to say—I intend to keep intact the vote I gave for the old age pensioners and not to vote for Deputy Cosgrave.

Mr. Cassidy

I rise to oppose the motion that Deputy Cosgrave be elected President, and in doing so I may say that it is not my intention to endeavour to emulate the tactics that have been adopted by the majority of the Deputies who have spoken. Personally I believe, and I think I am voicing the sentiments of the man in the street when I say that there has been by far too much mud slinging by some of the Deputies whom we have listened to to-day. The front bench of the Government Party are not immune from that criticism. I noticed that many bricks were thrown from the Government Benches. I think it is a great pity that the Government cannot lay bricks as successfully as they can throw them, because if they did so during past years we would not have the housing scarcity that now exists.

I propose to advance briefly a few reasons why I am going to vote against the nomination before the House. In the first place the present Government have been in power for a number of years with Deputy Cosgrave as the head of the Executive Council. During that time many laws had been passed by this House, but I believe that the majority of those laws that have been passed during the time when the Government were in office have been in the interests of the wealthy classes of the people and detrimental to the poorer classes of the community. Deputy O'Hanlon has pointed out, and I agree with him when he says, that the crisis has been staged. What has been referred to as a crisis has been brought about by the action of the Government in refusing to abide by the will of the majority of the Deputies in this House to increase the old age pensions. Now, in passing I might say that Deputy Cosgrave, whom we are now asked to re-elect to the position of President, was a member of the first Dáil, and as a member of the first Dáil I would like to ask him, or any of the Deputies sitting in the benches supporting him, what steps has he taken to put into operation what was known as the democratic programme of the first Dáil. What steps have been taken by the Executive Council, by President Cosgrave to endeavour to remedy what we, on these benches at any rate, believe is one of the greatest problems facing this country at present, namely, the problem of unemployment?

Let us just examine the democratic programme of the first Dáil in regard to this question of unemployment. We find the democratic programme to which General Mulcahy, Minister for Local Government and Public Health, and Deputy Cosgrave subscribed, stated: "We affirm the duty of every man and woman to give allegiance and service to the Commonwealth, and declare it is the duty of the nation to assure that every citizen shall have opportunity to spend his or her strength and faculties in the service of the people. In return for willing service we, in the name of the Government, declare the right of every citizen to an adequate share of the nation's labour." It goes on further in the programme to state: "While undertaking the organisation of the nation's trade, import and export, it shall be the duty of the Republic to prevent the shipment from Ireland of food and other necessaries until the wants of the Irish people are fully satisfied." Has President Cosgrave, during the number of years he has been in office, lived up to that programme? I believe that if the Government had lived up to that programme we would not have the same amount of poverty and hunger existing in this country to-day. We would not have the same number of emigrants going away in the emigrant ship from the country. As I say they have not even endeavoured to live up to that programme, because it was re-affirmed in that programme that one of the first duties of the Government should be to look after the people. We allege that the Government have looked after the wealthy classes of the people much better than they have endeavoured to look after the interests of the poorer classes of the people.

Another question which has not been faced up to by the Government or by the outgoing President has been the question of housing. It is well known that not alone in Dublin City, or in the towns and the villages, but also in rural Ireland, there is a great housing scarcity at present. We believe that housing should have been met by President Cosgrave, President of the Executive Council, as a national problem, that a national housing council should have been set up in order to deal with this question of housing in the rural areas, cities and towns in a national way instead of endeavouring to deal with it through private enterprise in a piecemeal fashion.

Again, one of the reasons why I intend to oppose the nomination before the House is owing to the fact that the Government have, since the time they were put into office, endeavoured to reduce the social services of this country. For instance, what was the policy, what was the programme of Deputy Cosgrave as a member of the first Dáil in regard to social services? We find that as far as the democratic programme of the first Dáil was concerned, it reiterates that: "The Irish Republic fully realises the necessity of abolishing the present odious, degrading and foreign poor law system, substituting therefore a sympathetic native scheme for the care of the nation's aged and infirm who shall not be regarded as a burden, but rather entitled to the nation's gratitude and consideration."

Has that declaration to which President Cosgrave subscribed been carried out? We have, it has been pointed out, those crises or alleged crises at the present time, due to the fact that Deputy Cosgrave would not even carry out in a small way that declaration which he made in the year 1919.

Again, we have the question, as pursued by Deputy Cosgrave and the Executive Council, of their failure to deal with other social matters. This Party some time ago introduced a motion in the Dáil calling on the Government, through Deputy Cosgrave, to introduce a system of widows' and orphans' pensions. We find that the policy of the Government Party was at that time—acting, I presume, through the President—that they would not put into operation a system of widows' and orphans' pensions.

Again, the policy of the present Government, acting through Deputy Cosgrave, has been, and still is, to endeavour to lower and reduce the wages of the working-class people. Shortly after they were returned to power we find them reducing the Post Office workers' wages. They followed that up by reducing the teachers' salaries. They followed that up by a circular to the surveyors of all the county councils in the Free State, asking them to reduce the road workers' wages. I hope Donegal Deputies will pay particular attention to this—that even yet the Government, through the Minister for Local Government has refused to allow the county councils up there to pay to the road workers this very small wage of 30/- per week. He thinks 26/- per week is sufficient, and evidently the nominee put forward to-night must acquiesce in that. Otherwise he would instruct the Minister for Local Government to withdraw his ban and allow that particular county council to pay an increase on the 26/- per week. I hope, at any rate, that the Donegal Deputies on the Government Benches on this occasion will have the courage of their convictions, and not cast their votes in a machine-like way, because if they do, I believe it will be a vote in favour of a lower standard of old age pensions and a lower standard of wages than we have to-day. General Mulcahy, when Deputy MacEntee was speaking, made an interjection in Irish. I only wish that General Mulcahy had been so active when the Report of the Gaeltacht Commission was before the Dáil. When the White Paper that the Government issued, and which they refused to live up to, was before the Dáil, I only wish that General Mulcahy had been verbal to put up a fight for the Irish speakers.

Reference has been also made to the Government's policy in regard to the question of partition. I believe that the neglect of the Government in not having at least as good social conditions in the way of old age pensions, unemployment insurance and widows' and orphans' pensions, is doing a big lot to keep back the day when we will have unity in this country. I would point out in conclusion that the House is now asked to elect a nominee of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party—a Party that sacrificed the interests of the minority and agreed to the partition of this country, and upon that issue, if upon no other, I ask the House to vote against the nomination of the President.

Dr. Ward

I rise to oppose the nomination of ex-President Cosgrave. Deputy Cosgrave declared in intimating that he was tendering his resignation that he would not take responsibility for financing the Old Age Pensions Bill that received a majority of the votes of the Deputies in this House. Deputy Cosgrave apparently intends to slip out a side-door and to come in by another door and evade the responsibility placed upon him by a majority of this House to give effect to a Bill that was passed here. In the course of his statement here on Friday last the then President stated that the Bill would not benefit the most deserving classes. The fact that a majority in this House registered their votes in favour of the Bill is all the proof that Deputy Cosgrave should require to satisfy him that that Bill should be financed. I would like to know if the Deputies who believe that that Bill is desirable and necessary and who voted for it are now prepared to go back on that vote and allow ex-President Cosgrave to evade his responsibilities to the poor and to refuse to finance that measure. If any of these Deputies who believe that the Bill is a necessary one and that it would benefit the most deserving classes of old people in this country support the proposition to re-elect Deputy Cosgrave President of the Executive Council I think their interest in the old age pensioners will be apparent to the blind.

Deputy O'Connell stated here to-day in the course of the debate that we must choose a Government that will, without equivocation, give legislative effect to the expressed will of the majority. I think it is rather a pity that Deputy O'Connell did not see the wisdom of supporting the nomination of the majority Opposition Party in this Dáil, and the Party who introduced this measure and were responsible for having it carried through its Second Stage. Timid people are suffering, according to Deputy O'Connell, by being reminded of the effects of the defeat of the Danes at Clontarf. I do not know exactly what that has to do with it, but it makes one more or less sorry for Deputy O'Connell, because he must be having a very anxious time at present, and I think, from Deputy O'Connell's attitude in this debate, that one must class him amongst the timid.

Mr. O'Connell

He did not refuse, like others, to cast his vote the way he thought he ought to cast it.

Dr. Ward

It has been suggested by Deputy Cosgrave that the Bill that brought about the defeat of the Government would not confer benefits on the poorer classes. A solitary argument has not been advanced, and cannot be advanced, in substantiation of that contention. A majority of this House sought to secure that charity would not be estimated as means against an old age pension claimant. Deputy Cosgrave refuses to admit that people who live on charity and who have no means whatever in their own right are amongst the poorer classes, and Deputy Cosgrave refuses to provide the money to secure that people who are living on the goodwill or charity of their neighbours, or who are dependent on some charitable organisation to keep body and soul together, and who are over seventy years of age, should get a miserable old age pension. I hope that the Dáil will not acquiesce in that, and that if Deputy Cosgrave is to be elected to-night, or whenever the vote takes place, that at least he will give some undertaking that if he is allowed to take over the reins of government again he will give effect to the majority will of the people as expressed by the majority of Deputies in this House.

He has said that the poor would not benefit by the Bill. The people who are already in receipt of old age pensions, who have nobody to look after them and have to enter a poor law institution as paupers, are not deserving people according to the spokesmen on the Cumann na nGaedheal Benches. If people who cannot live outside an institution, even with an old age pension, are not poor enough for Deputy Cosgrave and for the Minister for Finance, well they are poor enough for the majority of this House, and that should be sufficient for Deputy Cosgrave. Deputy Cosgrave is not prepared to accept responsibility for financing a Bill that aims at securing that a poor woman who becomes a widow after she is seventy years of age should not have the pension that she enjoyed as a married woman taken from her. That person is not poor enough for Deputy Cosgrave, the man who is now proposed as President of the Executive Council. According to the Minister for Finance, if effect were given to the Bill £125,000 would be spent on farmers, farmers whose valuations range from £10 to £13 10s. These people are not sufficiently poor for the Minister for Finance. They are not sufficiently poor for Deputy Cosgrave, but, again, they are sufficiently poor for a majority of the Deputies in this House, and they ought to be accepted by ex-President Cosgrave as being sufficiently poor for him.

Deputy Morrissey lamented the fate of the old age pensioners if Deputy O'Connell were not elected. I do not like to characterise that as hypocrisy, but it appears to me to be approaching very near to it. If Deputy Morrissey was so anxious about the old age pensioners that legislative effect should be given to the Bill that was passed here last week, I think the obvious course for Deputy Morrissey would have been to support the leader of the majority Opposition Party in this House and the leader of the Party who introduced it.

The President

That is the best yet.

Mr. MacEntee

The President is like Humpty-Dumpty. All the king's horses and all the king's men cannot put Humpty-Dumpty together again.

Dr. Ward

I am glad that tickles Deputy Cosgrave's sense of humour.

The President

It did undoubtedly. It was a great effort on the part of Deputy Ward.

Dr. Ward

It is a great effort on the part of the ex-President to be humorous this evening. Of course, it was a snap division! The whips of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party were caught out and the very unpleasant fact had to be faced that the Cumann na nGaedheal Government had been defeated. It was a snap division! A full week before last Thursday it was announced in this House that that day would be given to Private Deputies' Business. Everybody in the House knew that the first business to be disposed of on last Thursday would be the Old Age Pensions Bill. It was debated in this House from about 3.20 to 6.35 p.m. Yet it was a snap division. The Government was taken unawares. A mean advantage was taken of them. The poor unfortunate innocent Cumann na nGaedheal Government was thrown out. I wonder would Deputy Cosgrave or somebody on his behalf tell us in what way would they spend this £300,000 that they say the Bill will cost to put into operation—in what way would they spend that £300,000 that would give the best return? One would gather from the statement which Deputy Cosgrave made when he was indicating his intention to resign that he was prepared to expend £300,000 on old age pensions and that there were at least half a dozen ways in which that could be done. But not one of these ways has been indicated by the spokesmen of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party. If Deputy Cosgrave is to be re-elected President, we should at least hear of some of these schemes for the relief of old age pensioners and we should hear definitely whether it is proposed that they should get any relief at all. We used to hear a lot throughout the country and in this House about majority rule. We hear nothing about majority rule now. When majority rule decided to give effect to this Old Age Pensions Bill that majority rule was evaded by a trick. At least an attempt was made to evade it, and I think it would be an eternal disgrace to this House if that attempt to evade the majority mandate of this House succeeded.

Minister for Local Government and Public Health (General Mulcahy)

I think the Deputies on the far side of the House will remember my saying from time to time that the Deputies here on these benches contain the people who were the business part of the movement, who rallied the Irish people after 1916, put their feet down on solid ground from which to work out their national destiny as far as they could; and put their feet on solid political ground in 1921 and as far as the Deputies on the far side are part of the nation, they subsequently put their feet in here on the only ground on which they can do anything for themselves or anything for the country. What Deputies in this House and what people outside have to take from this debate as far as the members of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party are concerned is that just as we put the people's feet down on solid national ground after 1916, and as we put the Deputies' feet on solid political ground later, we are going to put the feet of the country down on solid, financial ground now.

Mr. Flinn

A Daniel come to judgment! Buying at £7 and selling for half.

General Mulcahy

The people here have a certain amount of money to spend on social services and it is because we are not prepared at the present moment to spend £300,000 additional on old age pensions on any account, that the House here was offered to-night an opportunity of setting up a Ministry that would do that if after mature judgment they consider that it ought to be done. The Deputies on the Fianna Fáil side and on the Labour side have spoken of the tremendous amount of work that is required to provide more satisfactory social services for the country. And if we can understand them, one of the first things they would do would be to give another £300,000 to old age pensioners. At least, that is what we are asked to-night to believe that they would do. We have given the House as a whole an opportunity of saying whether they will do that or not. And I think that we are facing a House a majority of which, at any rate, will come to the conclusion after mature deliberation that they are not prepared to do that. I think that the Deputies both in the Fianna Fáil Party and in the Labour Party must be quite convinced in their hearts that if they themselves were responsible for the government of the country they would not do that. If the Fianna Fáil Party came in as a majority and got the confidence of the majority of the House to-night I doubt if they would give an additional £300,000 to old age pensioners. At any rate, we are not prepared to do it and we are not prepared acting as a majority Party in this House or acting as responsible leaders of any kind, whether in a majority or minority operating as responsible leaders before the country—we are not prepared to expend money in a direction in which we think it ought not to be spent.

Deputies want more money for child welfare; they want more money for the clearing of slums and for the building of houses. Deputies want more money for all classes of things. It is because we know that more money is required for these matters that we are not prepared now to spend £300,000 additional on old age pensioners. It has been explained already that there are £2,750,000 spent on old age pensions. I told the House some time ago that on the whole of our poor relief services including medical charities in the country, including hospitals, including county homes and including outdoor relief, we were spending £1,647,000. That is much less than we are spending on old age pensions. In addition to that, we are spending £720,000 on mental hospitals. When we take the services on child welfare, school medical attendance, the treatment of school children, school meals, treatment of the blind, treatment of tuberculosis, the treatment of venereal diseases and so on there is being spent, whether through rates or taxes, a sum of £290,000. So that if we take the poor relief, mental hospitals and all these miscellaneous social services together that are only being developed we are spending in all a sum of £2,662,000, or a less sum than we are spending on old age pensions at the present moment. And we are asked to vote another £300,000 for old age pensions. We are not prepared to do that. In addition to the services I mentioned Deputies want additional homes for the people. Probably, at the present cost of housing and by the present housing want in our urban districts alone it will take £250,000 for thirty-five years from both the State and from local rates to provide these houses. I wonder would Deputy O'Connell, if he had £300,000 for one year, put it to old age pensions, or would he put it to the building of proper schools in some parts of the country? I think the Deputy has an idea of the amount of money that would be required to make up the arrears for the provision of proper school-buildings in the country. I think the Deputy has an idea as to the amount of money that would be required to keep up the normal wastage in the country in the matter of school-buildings. I wonder would the Deputy consider that that matter should be left out of consideration entirely when dealing with the question of the expenditure of more money on old age pensions. We have to think not alone of the people in their old age but we have to think of the sick poor, the ordinary poor, the poor who are old and infirm, people in the country generally who are infirm, the mental and physical defectives among the youth of the country.

We have a limited amount of money to spend, and we want to apply it to those things that will give us the greatest possible constructive returns. That is the note I would like to strike over this debate. People may talk about their political sovereignty, their hopes of Republics, their hopes of sovereign independence, and all these glorious things that are flag-wagging, and nothing but flag-wagging to some people, because it does not seem to bring them down to constructive work of any kind. They may talk of those things, but unless they make proper use of their resources, men and money, they are not going to achieve the great things that they would like to achieve.

On the question of pensions, most Deputies have spoken of Deputy Murphy's motion in November, 1928, in relation to pensions for widows. I take it that Deputy Murphy and the people who spoke about pensions for widows considered the family burdens of widows who require relief. One would think that they ought to be dealt with at least as generously in the matter of pensions as are the old age pensioners to-day, even without an additional £300,000. The county from which Deputy Cassidy comes will serve as an example. The average old age pension paid in Donegal is £22 10s.; the average payment from the local board of assistance to widows in Donegal is £11 10s.

Mr. Cassidy

Does the Minister mean to infer that we on these benches are responsible for that, or does he forget that in the democratic programme of the First Dáil the intention was expressed to do away with the foreign Poor Law system?

General Mulcahy

Certainly. I have said here before, apropos of widows' pensions, that you cannot wipe out the poor relief system; that is, a system of relief based upon local taxation. If you do, responsibility in these matters goes at once. If the representatives of Donegal were paying the old age pensions in Donegal, I doubt if they would pay higher pensions than the amount of money now being paid to widows in Donegal.

Mr. Cassidy

They are paying their share of taxation for the sugar beet factory in Carlow, and other things for which they get no benefit.

General Mulcahy

I am talking of their probable action in matters over which they have full control and responsibility. As I have said, they pay widows in Donegal £11 10s. a year. In Monaghan, where the average old age pensions payment is £21 8s., the average payment to widows is £15 4s. To summarise it, there are only two counties in the country in which the average payments to widows are higher than the average payments to old age pensioners in these counties. There are eleven counties in which the payments to widows on the average are less than two-thirds of the payments to old age pensioners, and there are two counties in which the payment to widows is less than one-half the average payment to old age pensioners.

We are not asking you to support the election of President Cosgrave as President. We are asking you to take it from us that we want to keep your feet here and the feet of the people in the country down on solid financial ground. It is because we are awake to the matters that require the application of money to increase the social betterment of our people that we are not prepared to give another £300,000 to old age pensioners.

Mr. Derrig

The Minister for Finance stated down the country during the week-end that the Fianna Fáil Party were responsible for this cut in the old age pensions in 1924 which Deputy Ward's Bill proposed to amend. The Minister for Local Government and Public Health now tells us that the only anxiety of the Government in this matter is that the feet of the people in this country should be placed upon solid financial ground. I think if the people of this country examine the financial ground which the Minister tries to assure the House is so very solid, they will probably find that it resembles more a moving bog, and that if the expenditure on other matters not nearly as important to this country as the welfare of the aged poor is allowed to continue in its present proportions, then the country will find itself where it has been prophesied it would find itself, in a morass of insolvency. The Government Party, I am informed, have had sufficient finances available, although they can find no money to finance this measure, to put the large sum of £50,000 at the disposal of a body called the Investment Trust. The whole of that amount has been lost, just like another £50,000 which was placed in a glass bottle factory here in the city. Furthermore, whatever might be said about the enterprise in connection with the glass bottle factory wherein £50,000 was lost—perhaps it was some kind of effort to give employment here—the £50,000 invested in the Investment Trust was lost as a result of speculative enterprise in foreign film companies. I am told that corporation, the Investment Trust, has lost something like £70,000 as a result of these speculative deals. That is the way in which the Irish Free State Government spends the taxpayers' money. That is how they find firm financial ground for the Irish people, but they cannot find anything for the old age pensioners.

Deputies have referred in this debate to some of the items in the Estimates upon which money is being spent. I do not propose to do more than mention these items. I leave out of consideration the Army and the Civic Guards, which are costing £1,500,000 and £1,600,000 respectively. I say that out of those large sums some economy ought to be possible—some economy better than the cheese-paring economy which was initiated and carried into effect by the Deputy who now seeks re-election to the Presidency.

He says that that economy was necessary and should be made at the expense of the old age pensioners so that we might stand on solid financial ground. This House if it is honest will at least assure itself that if that cut is to be made, if this Bill which attempted to make up for it is going to be thrown aside, that similar economies will be insisted on when the new Estimates will be brought before this House within the next few months. You have a Governor-General costing £27,000, a Broadcasting Station costing £84,000, and a Ministry of External Affairs though nobody knows what it is doing. No report has been received from its foreign representatives or ambassadors. I say that the whole Department ought to have been scrapped in order to provide money for social services such as the service which would benefit under Deputy Ward's Bill. We have a sum of £3,000 spent on the Phoenix Park motor races and, in addition, we find —and I call the attention of the House specially to it—that under the Treaty, about which we have had so much talk to-night, this State is permanently committed to a payment of something like one and three-quarter million pounds annually for pensions, a great deal of which money is not even spent here and gives no benefit to the people. In all, we are spending something like two millions on pensions. Included in that is a sum of £208,216 for the present financial year for military service pensions.

I would ask the House to compare the conditions, to which this House is now going to give its sanction and to carry into law, under which these able-bodied men throughout the country are being treated and the manner in which the aged poor are being treated. A pensions officer can question old age pension applicants and just by looking at them say whether they are of the requisite age and, possibly, disallow their claims although they have produced the best evidence available. Further, the pensions officer can come along and arbitrarily estimate an income which is perhaps charity, as Deputy Ward pointed out, and can say that that charity is worth so much during the year, thereby depriving the claimant either of that charity or of his pension, as he cannot have both. That is going to continue in future.

The speeches of Ministers, I submit, show that they are absolutely out of touch with the situation in the country as regards the administration of old age pensions. Their back-benchers were not, however out of touch. They knew how rigidly and ruthlessly this law was being operated to the detriment of old age pension claimants. I say that it is up to those Deputies, if they are convinced that it is necessary, as the Minister for Local Government says, to hang up the Bill in order to find ourselves on solid financial ground, to assure their constituents that if money cannot be spared for that that no money shall be spent on less worthy purposes. Old age pension claimants are being treated in this manner, and, no matter what appeal is taken, and no matter what the local committees do, it all goes by the board because the Minister and his minions in Dublin will decide, as they have decided in the past, that these people are to be disqualified on some technical point. The whole of the £200,000 to be spent annually on military pensions is, however, to be spent without year or nay, even without allowing the Comptroller and Auditor-General, who has been appointed under the Constitution, to look into the matter.

Are the Party opposite satisfied that that is fair play, that the country will stand it, or whether, if there was a dissolution to-morrow, the country would not state quite clearly that the money should be found for old age pensions if it can be found for military service pensions? If the Government intend to persist with the Bill for the abolition of the powers of the Comptroller and Auditor-General, would the country say that these military service pensions are to be above investigation and that no court of appeal is to be allowed to investigate whether these claims are good and what evidence has been brought forward in support of them? The Government ought, at least—when it protects its own pets in that manner, saves them from the State, and is prepared, by even uprooting the Constitution, to shelter them —to have a more generous policy when dealing with the aged poor to whom Ministers on the opposite side openly acknowledged their responsibility and agreed, with others on this side of the House, that the care of the aged poor was to be the primary responsibility of this Government or of any Christian Government of which they might be a Party.

You have all that money spent. You have large funds which were at the disposal of the Exchequer, like the two millions held by the Intermediate Education Board and the £900,000 by the old Congested Districts Board, which have been absorbed into the Exchequer and have since disappeared. The Exchequer is empty and if you go through all the different Departments you will find that all the resources which ought to be there for reproductive work have been drained and exhausted. You find a merciless campaign for the collection of annuities and income tax. Where is all that money going? The people have a right to ask that question. They have got no answer but the best answer which the country can get and which it will appreciate most is the fact that throughout the whole discussion on Deputy Ward's Bill no serious argument was advanced against it, and the Government who were defeated on it, and who would have been defeated by a larger majority if they left the matter to a free vote of the House and to the generous instincts of their own Party, are seeking by discreditable methods to penalise the aged poor who cannot defend themselves. When they have spent money on purposes which are not really necessary for the good of the country they take every opportunity of saying, when suggested savings are pointed out, "Oh that does not count. That saving would not mean anything." They always protect the pensioners who are able to look after themselves and they always protect the officials but whenever they get an opportunity of jumping on the underdog they keep jumping on it until nothing is left except the parasites who are always battening on its dead carcase.

Yes.

An Ceann Comhairle

I have already called on Deputy O'Kelly.

Mr. O'Kelly

There are one or two matters that, despite the protest of Deputy Murphy as to the length and, perhaps, the variety of speeches, I would like to refer to before a vote is taken on the motion before the House. I desire to ask the President if he will state, before the vote is taken, that the policy of the Executive Council, the policy of himself and his colleagues, the policy that they now accept and in future intend to carry out, is the policy that was outlined very briefly by the Minister for Finance when he spoke on the 22nd March, 1928, on the Central Fund Bill. I have referred to it already this evening. I do not know whether the President proposes to speak on this debate, perhaps he does not, but as the Minister who spoke for him just now did not refer to the matter, although it was raised this afternoon, and as the Minister for Finance is now present, perhaps we could have a definite answer in regard to that matter of policy before the debate ends. The Minister for Finance said: "With regard to the point as to whether we are aiming at the establishment of an Irish Republic, we are not." The language is not as clear as it might be, but I think that everybody will understand what the Minister for Finance meant to say. "With regard to the point as to whether we are aiming at the establishment of an Irish Republic, we are not. We believe that this country, as a member of the British Commonwealth of Nations, can enjoy greater freedom and greater security than she could outside the British Commonwealth of Nations, and our policy within it is really to remove anomalies that exist in the relationship between the members of it." It would be well if it is the policy of the Executive Council, and if it is in future to be the policy of the new Government, for the House and the country to know definitely where we stand in the matter. Has the Government definitely thrown over, so far as it can, the old ideal of the Irish people down the centuries for absolute separation from England? Are they now, or are they not, a party that stands for separation?

If we did nothing for them we would not be here speaking for them. We are speaking for just as many people, just as many voters, as the three gentlemen and their Party who spoke already. However, it is not worth speaking about. They would not be here for the last seven or eight years in power, and they will not be in power here to-night unless they get the backing of the gentlemen in the centre of the House who stand for the Union Jack, who represent the old garrison of this country, who stand for the British alliance and keeping the gentlemen opposite in power, while the "Irish Times" rubs it in and lets them know where they are and, as the Americans say, where they get off. The "Irish Times" reminded them on Saturday last of their miserable position as a Government, their subordinate position in this House as a Government, the tail wagging the dog. As a matter of fact it really is the tail of whatever the number of Independents is which is wagging whatever kind of four-footed animal one can call the Cumann na nGaedheal Party opposite. The "Irish Times" says: "On the other hand, the Government has received a warning which should be salutary."

Mr. J.T. Wolfe

What does the "Nation" say about the Independents?

Mr. O'Kelly

Wait until I get a chance in the next week or two and I will let you know. "It has discovered that phenomenon of natural history which, neglected, has ruined many Governments—the fact that even a worm will turn. Passive revolt may not be less dangerous than flagrant revolt." Remember that, Cumann na nGaedheal majority in this House, when next you dare to propose anything that the gentlemen of the Independent Party, for whom the "Irish Times" speaks, would not like. You will know where you will be. Imagine Deputy Wolfe as a backer of President Cosgrave waving a Republican flag around Kilkenny! What a delightful comedy it would be! If you had President Cosgrave, the Vice-President, and the Minister for Local Government holding the principles to-day which they held in 1921 and for a certain portion of 1922 the Independent Deputy for West Cork, for whom the "Irish Times" speaks, one of the old British garrison in the country, might not be so readily at their back.

You are quite right. I am glad you have such a high opinion of my critical faculties. Article X. of the Treaty states:—

The Government of the Irish Free State agrees to pay fair compensation on terms not less favourable than those accorded by the Act of 1920 to judges, officials, members of police forces and other public servants who are discharged by it or who retire in consequence of the change of government effected in pursuance thereof.

There is not one word in that Article that obliges the Government that has gone out or the Government that is to come in to pay pensions to people who were not in the service of the Free State Government, because the words here are "judges, officials, members of police forces and other public servants who are discharged by it or who retire in consequence of the change of government." During the eight years from 1st April, 1922, to 1st March, 1930, this Government has paid to the British Government the following sums: Land annuities, £25,000,000 odd; pensions for civil officials who had retired prior to the Treaty, £1,101,000; pensions to the R.I.C. for which there is no Treaty obligation, £9,882,000. These sums alone make a total roughly of £36,000,000 paid out of this country, whose resources are comparatively poor, in eight years to the British Government without any legal obligation on us to pay them according to the terms of the bond here. Still we cannot find what is, in comparison with this, the miserable sum of £200,000 or £300,000 to restore to the aged pensioners what they used to get from the British and which was filched from them by the Free State Government in 1924. I should like the Acting Minister for Finance, before this debate closes, to say whether before paying the annuities for the first time in 1922 the British Government made any demand for this money and, if so, was the demand made in writing. If there was such a correspondence it would be most interesting if the Acting Minister for Finance would let the House see it. I should like to know did Deputy Cosgrave, when he was Minister for Finance in 1922, obtain the opinion of his law adviser before paying the annuities or the pre-Treaty pensions or the R.I.C. pensions. If he did, I am sure the House would like to know what the nature of that legal advice was.

It is possible that the Government of that day handed over that money because it had been the habit of the officials who had been in power here before to send that money to England. I would like to know if Deputy Cosgrave, in 1922, did himself pay away that money without having received any demand from the British Government, or if he got an opinion from his law advisers, I would like to know what that opinion was. It is extraordinary that a Government can pay out of this poor country's resources a total, in eight years, of £36,000,000 of hard-earned money. Every Deputy in this House has complaints from someone or other amongst his constituents about the harshness with which the income tax is being collected, and that income tax, to a large extent, goes to pay the £36,000,000 to britain, and now we are told that two or three hundred thousand pounds cannot be found to keep the impoverished and destitute poor alive for a few months in this country.

Mr. Jasper Wolfe

If England is paid out of income tax, what becomes of the annuities?

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy should not interrupt.

Mr. Cooney

What became of the Crown Prosecutors?——

An Ceann Comhairle

You are worse.

Mr. O'Kelly

The Minister for Local Government talked of putting the people's feet on solid ground. I would like to know if somebody would be kind enough to tell us from the Front Bench opposite whether the solid ground of Irish nationalism was no longer ground enough to stand upon, but that in future the people were to be encouraged and ordered, as far as the Government could order them, to forget about the past, to forget everything that generations of the people for centuries have stood for and sacrificed, and suffered for. We are to forget it, and to wrap the Union Jack round us, and to become good citizens of the British Empire, or the British Commonwealth of Nations, to give it its later name. If that is the policy it is just as well we are not in it. Is it the element of the Independent Party for which the "Irish Times" speaks that is to rule in this country? Are their ideals to prevail? Are the principles upon which these gentlemen opposite, or the major portion of them— they are a very mixed crew now— entered national life, when they pinned their faith to the old national traditions, to be forgotten? Is all they stood for to be cast aside? And are we in future to understand that a definite stage has now been reached in Irish history, with the country split in two, with our entrance into the British Commonwealth of Nations, otherwise the British Empire, and that we are to stand fast, and not to look for any progress towards the realisation of our national ideals, but thank God for the day that gave us the opportunity to walk into the British Empire, to reap the material fruits that our ability to swallow our principles enabled some persons opposite to gather?

Mr. T.J. O'Connell

When President Cosgrave was proposed as head of the Executive of the Free State in June, 1927, and again in September, 1927, we on these benches opposed his re-nomination and nothing has transpired since that would give us any reason to change the opinions we then held, and we propose to vote against the nomination of President Cosgrave to-day. When speaking against the nomination of President Cosgrave in September, 1927, I gave it as one of my main reasons that I regarded his action as a political manoeuvre to get out of his promised obligations to the country and this House. He is due for election to-night because of another somewhat similar manoeuvre. I shall only say, in that connection, that it reflects no credit on President Cosgrave or his Ministry and it will reflect little credit on this House if they implement the action of the President in what is nothing more than a subterfuge in his attempt to get out of his obligations to this House. I do not think that in any country there would be found an action of the kind to which we have been treated by the President and his Ministers in thus, as it were, dodging—and that is the only word I can get to describe it—the vote passed here on Thursday night. The opposition to the various aspects of the President's policy has been expressed from these benches and from other benches. On every occasion that has offered itself we have expressed our position by our votes and it seems likely that we will have other opportunities afforded us in the future of again expressing that position and explaining it.

I do not intend at this hour to go into any matters of detail in that regard. I wish to say, in a general way, that my main objection to the policy of the present administration is that no real effort has ever been made by them to tackle the social evils which we are all agreed exist in this country. Anything that has been done has been nothing more than patchwork efforts. There has been no recognition, on the part of the present Ministry, of the fact that the State is nothing more than a collection of individuals. There has been no attempt to organise these individuals for the production of the necessaries of life, no attempt to organise the resources of the country and no deliberate effort to see that the services of individuals who live in this State are used to the best possible advantage.

People require to be housed, fed, clothed and educated. These are the normal wants of the people, but, as I have said, no regular, organised, deliberate effort has been made at any time, or attempted in a big way, to see that the people of the country are set to work to provide these necessaries. The Government failed to appoint anybody whose specific work should be the encouragement and direction of economic development. We debated that point on more than one occasion in the House. We debated it on the Bill setting up the Tariff Commission, and on other matters relating to that Commission.

[An Leas-Cheann Comhairle took the Chair.]

We, from these benches, put forward the idea that it is not enough merely to have a body sitting who, if they are asked by some people interested in a particular industry, will consider the question whether or not that industry should be helped. They would then look into the question, but unless that question is put up to them they will simply take no action whatever. As I have said, in a general way, no action has been taken by the Government, and that is the main line of our objection to the present administration. One might very well think of the inhabitants of a country as something in the nature of a well-organised or well-ordered army marching to a recognised goal. Instead of that, we seem to have merely an undisciplined mob marching along if they are marching at all. They are certainly not all marching in the same direction. They are simply marching backwards and forwards, getting in one another's way, and generally hampering one another's efforts. We think it ought to be the duty of the body that is entrusted with the control and powers of the State to make a deliberate effort to see that some kind of order be brought out of chaos of that kind.

It has often been said, from both sides of this House, that we on the Labour Benches have no remedy for the social evils that exist, except doles and schemes of relief. That is not the case. We have never proposed these except as mere temporary expedients, and that is all we have ever regarded them as. They are necessary as such, but as a permanent solution of our economic problem we do not regard them as effective. The object of a Government, with the powers that a Government possesses, should be to organise the resources of the country so as to secure increased wealth production and so make it possible to maintain our social services at the level which we all profess to wish they should be at.

There is one other remark I wish to make. It arises in connection with this election and what happened here to-day. The point I want to make is that the Government is elected from this House and not from a party. The action of the Labour Party to-day, which in some quarters was not treated as serious, was intended to show, among other things, that this House is not elected as, say, the British House of Commons is elected. It is elected under a system of P.R., and it is possible under that system to have a collection of groups in which no party will have a majority. It would be quite possible to have here five groups of thirty members each. If we had that, I wonder what position Deputy Haslet would be in?

Mr. Haslett

Do not worry about him.

Mr. Lemass

He would not be here at all.

Mr. O'Connell

I am not ruling out Deputy Lemass from that class. The people who think and speak and make the observations that were made here to-day are really thinking of the British Parliamentary system with two or, possibly, three big parties, and not a collection of groups representing various interests in the country. What, after all, is Cumann na nGaedheal except a collection of people representing various interests in the country. That is the real binding link between us in this House. Deputies who talked as some Deputies did to-day, were really thinking of a system which is altogether different from the system under which this Parliament is elected. I think it is right that should be said. There would be nothing wrong, although the suggestion was treated in a humorous fashion, if, for instance, Deputy Murphy was chosen by the House to form a Government. If he got the support of a certain number of people he would be entrusted by the House with the control of the nation's affairs, and would get support so long as, and only so long as, he and his Ministry carried out the wishes of the House as expressed by its votes here. The Minister for Finance spoke as if——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I want to hear the Deputy on the proposal before the House.

Mr. O'Connell

I think I have said all I want to say on the proposal before the House. I will take another opportunity of dealing with the matter you have been so good as to allow me to develop to the extent you have. I seriously suggest that this is a matter the President or some member of his Ministry should give us some indication on, as to whether or not they intend to go on as they have been going, just continuing what I might call a hand-to-mouth policy on economic affairs, or whether they really intend to attack seriously and deliberately the question of organising our resources. There is no reason why we should not take into account the resources and the population of the country. We have not the same problems as they have in the great industrial country across the Channel. Ours is a different problem. We are in a better position to solve our economic evils than they are. The object of the Government ought to be to make a determined effort to solve our economic evils along the lines I have suggested.

Mr. T.J. O'Connell

Oh, no, I did not say that.

Mr. Lemass

Some Deputy on the Labour Benches said that the people kept their heads remarkably well when Deputy Cosgrave's administration was defeated on Thursday and when he resigned on Friday. It is a good thing to have it established that the earth did not stop revolving when Deputy Cosgrave ceased to be President. If this political crisis has produced no other result but to get that idea firmly fixed in the minds of the people it was worth while.

The members of the Cumann na nGaedheal Party will not be able to go around foretelling earthquakes and other dire calamities if the Government is defeated at the next election. The Government has been defeated and nothing unusual has happened, except as has been remarked, a particularly prolonged debate. The Government's days are numbered. It is only a matter of a few weeks or a few months before their final exit from office. I think this House would be well advised to prepare the people for the day of prosperity that is coming by permitting a sample to be given now, by the election of some other Government. A minority Government in this House would not be able to do a great deal for the people in existing circumstances, but they could do something; they could break them in gently to the possibilities of prosperity, the prosperity that will come when a pro-Irish Government, with a pro-Irish economic policy, sets out to repair the damage they have caused. I think the greatest mistake this House could make would be to pass the motion now before us. If there was one thing more than another likely to destroy all hope of improvement in the future, to encourage increased emigration, and possibly a few suicides, it would be the re-election of Deputy Cosgrave.

When it was announced on Friday last that he had resigned a great wave of optimism and hope spread over the whole country, and people seemed to awaken as from a sleep, to view the prospect of brighter days in the near future. Now their hopes are going to be dashed to the ground. I appeal to you not to do that. At one time Deputies sitting on the benches opposite must have had some interest in the welfare of the Irish people. Let them search down into the bottom of their hearts now, and see if they cannot find there some justification, some motive for opposing this motion. If we reject the motion now before us we will have produced a position of stalemate. We can reconsider the matter to-morrow and possibly hammer out a means of carrying on an efficient government until the people are given a chance at the coming election to clear out the Cumann na nGaedheal Party altogether, as I have no doubt they will. The proposer of the motion and Deputy O'Higgins referred to Deputy Cosgrave as the captain of a ship, guiding it into port. The "Irish Independent" published a photograph of him at the wheel this morning. The ship is a long way from port still and there are many rocks in the way and if I know anything about Deputy Cosgrave we are bound to hit every one of these rocks.

Professor O'Sullivan

As I understand this debate is going to conclude at 11.30, I have only a few remarks to make. Deputy Lemass spoke of the country waking up as from a sleep and seeing the great prospect that was before it, when it heard of the resignation of the President. Personally I would say that when I wake up every morning I wonder what new pronunciamento there is from Deputy Lemass as to what the new policy of the Fianna Fáil Party is. Hardly a day passes now in which we have not a full statement of what the policy is, not necessarily the same as the statement the week before, but, at all events, we have undoubtedly a rather long statement from him practically once a day.

The motion before the House is to elect William T. Cosgrave President of the Executive Council. I need not dilate on his qualities. The history of Ireland for many years past is, to a large extent, a biography of the candidate whose name is now before the House for election. He was called to look after the destinies of this country in a particularly troubled time, and, as far as he is concerned, I can say—and I think the majority of this House will agree—that there are very few people in any country that could have faced that particular task as well, as courageously, and as ably as he has done. It is easy to criticise, it is easy for one Deputy after another in the different Opposition Benches to get up and propose expenditure. What one of them will come down with the £30,000,000 Budget that would be necessary to carry through any of the policies, or half of the improvements, that they have outlined? It is very easy to demand money. The responsibility is not theirs for raising it. When it comes, as we have had occasion to point out again and again, to spending money we are faced in this House with opposition to anything in the nature of increased taxation. I heard the beginning of a speech of one Deputy on the Front Opposition Bench. I think he availed of the occasion immediately to start with the complaint that there was increased taxation. The same day that that complaint was made from the Front Opposition Bench, one of the members of his own Party proposed the Second Reading of a Bill that would increase expenditure to the extent of £300,000. It is easy to complain of high taxation on the one hand and to make various proposals for more and more expenditure on the other hand. Everybody would like to expend money on different social services. Nothing is easier than that. We have had many years' experience of that kind of demand from the different parties that will not accept the responsibility of imposing the necessary taxation on the people. This evening the Minister for Local Government pointed out the contrast there was between allowances paid to widows in certain counties and old age pensions. Why was there no agitation in these counties for increased pensions? The people who demand increased expenditure here know perfectly well they would incur unpopularity if they made any such demand, because in local matters the connection between expenditure and taxation is very clearly realised.

Deputy Lemass pretends—and how he could make the pretence after the speeches we have had to-day I do not know—that the Labour Party and this Party kept the 1922 issue alive. Not once was the 1922 situation referred to from these benches or from the Labour Benches. What we are insisting on is not the attitude of Deputy Lemass's Party to the Treaty in 1922; what we are insisting on—and we never got an answer to it—is his attitude to the Treaty in 1930. That is a question we would like to have answered. At all events, so far as our policy is concerned, it ought to be clear to the different parties in this House that not vague promises, not mere generalities, but the details of that policy is what is required.

Whenever the Parliament sits, practically every hour of parliamentary time is given to a discussion of the policy of the Government, directly or indirectly. Nothing else except an occasional Bill in which the Government is not interested one way or another is discussed in this House. So the one thing that ought to be clear in this House is the policy of the Government. I wonder have Deputies any conception at all of the extraordinary tasks undertaken by the Deputy whose name is now before the House for nomination and his Government for the last eight years? Have they any conception of the difficulties of taking a country that had emerged from different revolutions and wars and putting it on a solid foundation, putting it on the road to work out its own destiny in a sensible and orderly manner?

Posts and Telegraphs?

Professor O'Sullivan

Deputy MacEntee is disorderly when he makes his own speech. He is disorderly when anybody else is speaking. The habits of a schoolboy debating society should be kept out of this Dáil. As I say, we can urge on behalf of this nomination that of the different candidates proposed here to-day the one whose policy is known in detail and whose record can stand examination is the candidate who was proposed by Deputy Mongan and whose name is now before the House.

Mr. MacEntee

The Minister for Education tried to keep his face straight when he said that.

Question put.

The Dáil divided: Tá, 80; Níl, 65.

Tá

Aird, William P.
Alton, Ernest Henry.
Beckett, James Walter.
Bennett, George Cecil.
Blythe, Ernest.
Bourke, Séamus A.
Brennan, Michael.
Brodrick, Seán.
Byrne, John Joseph.
Carey, Edmund.
Coburn, James.
Cole, John James.
Collins-O'Driscoll, Mrs. Margt.
Conlon, Martin.
Connolly, Michael P.
Cosgrave, William T.
Craig, Sir James.
Daly, John.
Davis, Michael.
De Loughrey, Peter.
Jordan, Michael.
Kelly, Patrick Michael.
Keogh, Myles.
Law, Hugh Alexander.
Leonard, Patrick.
Lynch, Finian.
Mathews, Arthur Patrick.
McDonogh, Martin.
MacEóin, Seán.
McFadden, Michael Og.
McGilligan, Patrick.
Mongan, Joseph W.
Mulcahy, Richard.
Murphy, James E.
Murphy, Joseph Xavier.
Myles, James Sproule.
Nally, Martin Michael.
Nolan, John Thomas.
O'Connell, Richard.
O'Connor, Bartholomew.
Doherty, Eugene.
Dolan, James N.
Doyle, Peadar Seán.
Duggan, Edmund John.
Dwyer, James.
Egan, Barry M.
Esmonde, Osmond Thos. Grattan.
Fitzgerald, Desmond.
Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
Good, John.
Gorey, Denis J.
Haslett, Alexander.
Hassett, John J.
Heffernan, Michael R.
Hennessy, Michael Joseph.
Hennessy, Thomas.
Hennigan, John.
Henry, Mark.
Hogan, Patrick (Galway).
Holohan, Richard.
O'Donovan, Timothy Joseph.
O'Higgins, Thomas.
O'Leary, Daniel.
O'Mahony, Dermot Gun.
O'Reilly, John J.
O'Sullivan, Gearóid.
O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
Redmond, William Archer.
Reynolds, Patrick.
Rice, Vincent.
Roddy, Martin.
Shaw, Patrick W.
Sheehy, Timothy (West Cork).
Thrift, William Edward.
Tierney, Michael.
Vaughan, Daniel.
White, John.
White, Vincent Joseph.
Wolfe, George.
Wolfe, Jasper Travers.

Níl

Aiken, Frank.
Allen, Denis.
Anthony, Richard.
Blaney, Neal.
Boland, Gerald.
Boland, Patrick.
Bourke, Daniel.
Brady, Seán.
Briscoe, Robert.
Broderick, Henry.
Buckley, Daniel.
Carney, Frank.
Carty, Frank.
Cassidy, Archie J.
Clery, Michael.
Colbert, James.
Cooney, Eamon.
Corkery, Dan.
Corish, Richard.
Corry, Martin John.
Crowley, Fred. Hugh.
Crowley, Tadhg.
Davin, William.
Derrig, Thomas.
Doyle, Edward.
Everett, James.
Fahy, Frank.
Flinn, Hugo.
Fogarty, Andrew.
French, Seán.
Gorry, Patrick J.
Goulding, John.
Hayes, Seán.
Hogan, Patrick (Clare).
Houlihan, Patrick.
Jordan, Stephen.
Kennedy, Michael Joseph.
Kent, William R.
Kerlin, Frank.
Killilea, Mark.
Kilroy, Michael.
Lemass, Seán F.
Little, Patrick John.
Maguire, Ben.
McEllistrim, Thomas.
MacEntee, Seán.
Moore, Séamus.
Morrissey, Daniel.
Mullins, Thomas.
Murphy, Timothy Joseph.
O'Connell, Thomas J.
O'Dowd, Patrick Joseph.
O'Kelly, Seán T.
O'Leary, William.
O'Reilly, Matthew.
O'Reilly, Thomas.
Powell, Thomas P.
Ruttledge, Patrick J.
Ryan, James.
Sexton, Martin.
Sheehy, Timothy (Tipp.).
Smith, Patrick.
Tubridy, John.
Walsh, Richard.
Ward, Francis C.

Tellers: Tá, Deputies Duggan and P.S. Doyle; Níl, Deputies G. Boland and Cassidy.

Motion declared carried.

The President

I beg, sir, to return thanks to the Dáil for this great honour which has been conferred upon me. I propose, with the help of God, to carry out the duties of the office to the best of my ability. I move the adjournment of the Dáil till 3 o'clock to-morrow.

The Dáil adjourned at 11.40 p.m. until 3 o'clock on Thursday, 3rd April.

Dáil Éireann debate - Wednesday, 2 Apr 1930