We read in the newspapers this morning that an important concession had been made by the Director-General of the League of Youth towards the betterment of conditions, and particularly the preservation of order in this country. An order has been issued countermanding a previous order that supporters of the Blueshirt organisation should get their children to wear blue shirts or blue blouses or other blue insignia in schools. I wonder why the Party opposite did not consider, before the original order was issued, what the effects of it were likely to be. I wonder also why it is, if the Party opposite are so greatly interested in democratic rule as they pretend to be, that it has to be left to the Director-General of the League of Youth organisation outside this House to determine when, where, and how steps are to be taken to ease whatever difficult situations we have.
Wearing of Uniform (Restriction) Bill, 1934—Second Stage (Resumed).
Would the Minister say when the original order was issued or if he has any information?
The Deputy will get an opportunity of making his speech. If he will consult the statements made by a very prominent member of that organisation in West Cork he will be able to judge for himself whether orders were issued or not.
Deputy Hogan approved of it yesterday.
Then the Minister has no information.
I can only hope that this concession will extend to other matters and in other directions: that it will be recognised that, while Party advantage may accrue from certain manifestations that have taken place in the country recently, certain expressions of feeling and certain operations, that ultimately there is a loss to somebody. I question very much whether the Opposition Party are not going to lose quite as much as the Government on this matter. In any case one thing is certain: it is that the country as a whole is going to lose.
I have stated outside this House that, in addition to the campaign in respect of which orders were issued for the wearing of uniforms and badges in the schools, other very serious manifestations of this Blueshirt spirit are making themselves felt in certain areas of the country. There is, we know definitely, a campaign not to pay rates or annuities. In certain parts of this country labourers have been compelled by their employers to wear blue shirts, and if they refused to do so they lost their employment. In certain parts of this country business people in the towns and Fianna Fáil farmers at the fairs have been boycotted. When they stood with their cattle on the fair greens they were passed by because they were supporters of the present Government.
Who passed them by?
The buyers who supported the Deputy in South Tipperary. All these manifestations, which have accompanied the spread of this movement, undoubtedly tend to disturb public feeling and to create breaches of the peace, and if there was no reason whatever, except that these things have happened, I think the Government would have been sufficiently justified in introducing this Bill and trying to get it passed into law.
We are told in the newspapers this morning, in connection with this concession that has been granted, that the League of Youth propose to stand for their essential rights. Now are the essential rights of the League of Youth the same as the essential rights of the Parliamentary Opposition in this House, and what are these essential rights that the Opposition are striving for and that they say are being jeopardised by this Bill? That is the whole problem. That is what Government spokesmen have sought to find out in this debate. They have asked a number of questions to endeavour to elucidate that position and they have got no answers. In the first place, it is suggested that all the members of this organisation, with its Director-General issuing orders and countermanding them outside this House, with or without reference to his Parliamentary colleagues inside this House, are a perfectly harmless body of men—as harmless as Deputy Dillon. I should like to believe that, but I am afraid that Deputy Dillon finds himself in the position, although he will not admit it, that he has been rather misled in this matter. His statement yesterday, that he is very well pleased with his new colleagues and with his new situation, will not, I think, deceive anybody. We have seen cases recently at the Military Tribunal; they may have been exceptional cases; they may have been unusual cases; they may have been cases out of which it would not be proper for me to build a case against the Blueshirt organisation; but in any case, I submit to the House that these cases which have recently been heard in respect of members of the Blueshirt organisation in Limerick and in Leix, showed clearly that some members, at any rate, of that organisation are either in possession of arms or are carrying on a traffic in arms.
The Opposition must find themselves in a difficult position on this Bill. Which attitude are they going to take up? Are they going to take up the attitude that they are going to persist with this organisation even if this Bill finds its way to the Statute Book; or are they going to take up the position, which one would imagine they would have been driven to by a realisation of the facts that are staring them in the face, that the leadership of that organisation and the whole organisation itself should be on a proper democratic basis, and that there should not be the slightest tittle of doubt as to where they stand with regard to the democratic institutions they claim to have set up in this country—not alone to have set up, but for ten years to have carried on very effectively, as they say, and to have handed over to their successors in complete order?
Now this official Opposition in this House cannot claim that the events which have taken place recently in Europe, or the events which have taken place in this country, the incidents and occurrences that have accompanied the spread of the Blueshirt organisation, came to them unforeseen; that they did not anticipate this development, because I find that when the Constitution (Amendment) Act was introduced into this House, it was quite clearly foreseen, and it was explained to the House by both President Cosgrave and the then Minister for Finance, Mr. Blythe, that such an organisation as was growing up on the Continent of Europe might ultimately grow up here and that if steps were not taken to prevent that— some such steps as they were taking under that Act—such steps would have to be taken later on when conditions, probably, would have become very much worse. In fact, Deputy Blythe said at that time that even if the national unity which the present Minister for Defence spoke of, and which he suggested might be brought about, could be achieved, it was no safeguard whatsoever that in a few years time we would not have to deal with precisely the same conditions as those which were developing on the Continent and elsewhere. Deputy Blythe, the then Minister for Finance, column 352, volume 40, of the Official Debates, said:
"There is no use in failing to recognise the facts in the world to-day. There is no use in blinking the fact that there is a new sort of anti-democratic theory, a new teaching of a policy of a minority seizing power.
Mr. Derrig: Your policy.
Mr. Blythe: That policy is all through the world. I believe that as things are going in Europe and throughout the world even Governments and States that have had no cause, for a long time, to fear armed movements or violent attacks on the majority are liable now, and will be liable in the future, to fear them."
Speaking on the same occasion, Deputy Cosgrave said:
"A State based on parliamentary institutions requires, for its proper functioning, not merely the goodwill but the positive allegiance of all its citizens."
I should like to ask whether the Parliamentary Opposition, in their conduct in this country during the past few years, have based their policy and have worked towards an objective that had these considerations in mind; in the first place, that democratic government in many parts of Europe was threatened and might very easily be threatened here; and, in the second place, that if democratic government is to continue, it is not alone necessary that the citizens should be peaceful and law-abiding, but that they should be active in their co-operation with, and support of, that government. The example, I suggest, Sir, should come from the Party opposite, who have talked a good deal in past years about the will of the people and the supremacy of the people's Parliament.
The Minister for Justice pointed out yesterday that the Director-General of the League of Youth had quite different ideas with regard to this matter of semi-military organisations when he was Commissioner of the Gárda Síochána. The Minister pointed out that, not alone had General O'Duffy seen fit to call special attention to the British Fascist Party— a small Party of a dozen or a few dozen individuals in black shirts—but that he actually called special attention to the demonstration of the British Legion on the occasion of Armistice Day, and pointed out that if that parade were allowed to take place—marching in fours, words of command, and so on— and having regard to the general circumstances of the parade, it might give rise to serious disorder. If that was the contention of General O'Duffy on that occasion with regard to the parade of that body for that particular purpose that we know they have in mind, how can the Opposition get up here to-day and suggest that this Government, or the present Commissioner of the Gárda Síochána, should permit to continue marchings, mobilisations, assemblies, and travellings all over the country in lorries, of blue-shirted men, to the tune of several hundreds, to each one of their several demonstrations? How can they suggest that that state of affairs should be allowed to continue and to go on, not for one day in the year, but for every day? It was with a view to stopping the demonstration planned for the City of Dublin last August that we took action, because we believed that that demonstration would certainly lead to most serious disorder, if not to bloodshed; and we stopped it, on advice given to us, by the most effective means at our disposal.
Deputies opposite, I think, will have some trouble in showing their consistency in demanding to-day that they should be entitled—because, remember this: the demand, although nobody has voiced it, is there implicit, if not in this House, at least outside in the country wherever the Director-General makes a statement—that one political Party in this country should be allowed to set up a private force of a semi-military character, drilled, disciplined, marching under orders, wearing uniform or semi-uniform, and carrying weapons. That is the claim that is made. That is the implicit demand, but nobody on the opposite side of the House has the courage to say that that is the policy. The House would like to be quite clear, and the Government would like to be quite clear, in view of the responsibility that they feel upon them in this situation, as to what is the attitude of the Opposition and what is their real attitude in regard to that demand, which, I think, I have stated in very plain and very clear terms.
The Minister for Industry and Commerce, speaking yesterday, put some very pertinent questions. No reply has been given to them and I should like to repeat the questions. If we are to permit an organisation of that character—a private army, as it has been called, attached to a particular Party—to parade in uniform or semi-uniform, to carry weapons and to purport to take upon themselves the duties of the police, where is it going to stop? On what ground can the right to do the same be denied to other political Parties or other groups? On what ground is the old I.R.A. to be denied the right to come along with green shirts or the Communists to be denied the right to come along with red shirts or some other group or political Party to appear in similar guise and to do the same kind of thing that is being done in the streets of our towns at present?
Has your Government attempted to stop them?
Deputy Anthony has already spoken and I hope he will allow me to continue. Even if that question be disposed of, the question arises, why other movements and other organisations should not be allowed the same facilities. To what extent is the present organisation going to be permitted to continue to usurp the functions of the forces of the State? The Opposition talk very loudly of their allegiance to democratic government and their submissiveness to the institutions of the State, but do they seriously contend that this organisation ought to be allowed to go on and extend its powers until, in due course, it would take the protection of this House and the protection of the Government into its private keeping? According to Deputy Costello, this is the first occasion on which a political Party has been definitely mentioned in connection with a ban on uniforms in any country. I question whether in every case in which a ban on uniforms has taken place that ban has not been made against particular political groups or political parties.
Another argument we have heard is: "We are either illegal or we are legal. If we are illegal, why do you not proceed against us? If we are legal, why do you not allow us to continue?" Deputies know very well that Parliaments and Governments have had to deal with matters—I am not referring to political matters solely—which nobody foresaw ten or 15 years ago. New movements have sprung up and new circumstances have arisen. There has been a great change. These circumstances could not have been foreseen when Saorstát Eireann was set up. For instance, the ban on emblems worn by school children was taken out of the rules. Up to that time, the display of religious emblems was forbidden by the old National Board. It was thought —and rightly thought—that it was a proof of our new-found liberty and independence that the religious emblems of the majority of the Irish people could be freely and openly shown in the schools. The rule regarding emblems was, therefore, removed. Can anybody have the slightest doubt that if President de Valera or Mr. Peadar O'Donnell or anybody else who did not happen to have the same political creed as the gentlemen opposite set out to organise a movement having a distinctive type of shirt, going round protecting, mar eadh, their meetings, marching and parading under commands, mobilising and going to different parts of the country in motor lorries, and having the full paraphernalia of a private army—does anybody suggest that the late Government would have allowed that situation to exist for 24 hours? Were the late Government terribly worried about these constitutional points and points of law or the desire that everything should be legal? The Attorney-General gave some striking examples yesterday and I should like to refer to some of the statements made with regard to this question of the Government and the Constitution when the Constitution (Amendment) Bill—we all know its drastic character and its far-reaching powers—was going through this House.
Mr. Blythe then said:
"There is no use in talking about the Constitution in the way in which it has been spoken about in connection with this matter. The thing that is necessary when you are dealing with a conspiracy of this sort is to give the Executive the powers to deal with it. There is absolutely no other way of protecting the ordinary citizen. It is only by the weapons that the Executive Council has in its hands that the ordinary citizen can be protected."
Deputy Fitzgerald said:
"Deputy O'Connell talked about this Constitution of which we were so proud, this democratic institution, and so on. I think, so far as I can judge from the feeling of the House to-day, there does not really seem to be any divergence of principle between any of us who have spoken, but I think there is a tendency to stress what I might call non-essentials and to overlook essentials. Why have we a Constitution at all? Why have we a Government? Why have we a State? If the Constitution is going to interfere with the State performing the functions it exists to perform, obviously there is nothing in the Constitution to be proud about. If the State fails to perform the functions it was intended to perform, then we had better have something instead."
Hear, hear!
We are now, perhaps, getting the "something instead." Another aspect of this matter I should like to refer to is the unfortunate attitude the Opposition have taken up. They cannot rid themselves of the idea that in some way they are still responsible for the Government of this country, that we are here by their toleration, that we are only, as one might say, the Fianna Fáil Party in office, that we are not the Government, that they were the Government, of divine right, and that the present Government is to be the object of insult by every corner-boy in the country. Yesterday evening, we had Deputy Hogan making a most disgraceful speech. He talked about cheapjacks, but I should like to know what cheap-jack selling clothes at a country fair could have sunk to the level Deputy Hogan sank to and has tried to bring this House down to. I read an article this morning in the Irish Times telling us the depths of moral degradation we have suffered. A few months ago the Irish Times told us, because of a report that was not published—for very good reasons—either by this Government or by its predecessors——
They were right in what they said.
Because of that, the Irish Times thought fit to say that some abominable position had arisen in regard to public morality in this country. I should like to tell the Irish Times that the time has not yet come when the Irish people will take their standards of morality—public or private—from the old ascendancy gang. The Irish Times, like the Daily Express——
You are ashamed of it.
——and every other English newspaper will take their cue from what the Opposition are saying inside and outside this House. Yesterday Deputy Hogan asked a question: "Are the Irish fir for self-Government?" He put it in this way: "We are fit for self-Government, but you are not." But the Irish Times says, can anybody say that the Irish are fit for self-Government——
On a point of order. Did not a Deputy opposite compare this place to a circus? Deputy Corry called it a circus.
That is not a point of order. The Deputy must resume his seat.
One of the Minister's own followers——(Deputies: Order! Order! Sit down.)——compared this House to a circus.
A Deputy
And now we have the clown.
Yes, and the baboon on the other side, the lowest type of mammal.
When the Constitution Bill was under discussion, in the House, Deputy Cosgrave referred, and I have no doubt he had a good deal of sympathy from those who differed with him, to the efforts that had been made to poison the minds of the people against their representatives. Is there anybody in this House, or outside it, who has suffered more from attempts to poison the minds of the people against him in public and in private than President de Valera? Even to-day they are not content. What are those people who talked some years ago, so glibly, about democratic rule and the necessity of maintaining the supremacy of the people doing to-day? They are bullying and threatening the Guards, telling them that if they are not very careful they will not remain long in the force. They refer to the men taken into the Guards as the "Broy Harriers." Of course there is nothing about the Blueshirts: they are such quiet boys, and respectable young men. These recruits are men of character who did much for this country. But the men are abused and ridiculed by people who were not to be found when work had to be done. We have examples like the statements about "de Valera's bombers" statement at meetings in Cork, and elsewhere, that the Government of this country is deliberately bringing about a situation, reducing the people to utter economic helplessness, and trying to bring about such an economic collapse was never was known before, and so on. Is that reasonable or fair? Is that the type of fair play Deputy Hogan and others have in mind when they ask for fair play all around? Let us, by all means, have fair play all around. Let those who have experience, and who know the difficulties of the situation, give a good example to their followers and I assure them that matters will very quickly right themselves.
Deputy Dillon referred to the question of public meetings. Everybody knows that even when there were 15,000 persons connected in one way or another with this particular Party in jail, men like Deputy Hogan were not allowed a peaceful hearing in the country. But the reason was obvious. Any decent respectable citizen objects at times to things stated on platforms and when these things are flagrantly untrue disturbances occur, created by those on the platforms who are in my opinion often primarily responsible——
How says the Minister for Justice now?
Let me remind Deputies opposite that on a famous occasion, when Deputy Hogan was speaking in Ballaghaderreen, when Deputy Dillon, who talked here about public meetings, was put up in court and was cross-examined he had the same views about both wings of the Sinn Fein Party at that time—he was asked was the meeting an orderly meeting, and he said it was an orderly meeting so far as Sinn Fein meetings go. Everybody knows that it was anything but an orderly meeting; that there was a baton charge even into Deputy Dillon's own yard, much to the pleasure of Deputy Dillon. On the 27th April, 1932, I think it was, Deputy Dillon announced in this House his great and profound pleasure at the fact that the President and the ex-President, who in former times were united together against England, were now divided and were attacking each other. This is something like what he said on that occasion: "I am glad they have changed a little and attacked one another, and I must say, God forgive me for it, it sometimes gives me great satisfaction to see them at it." I am sorry to say the Deputy has disimproved in his new situation. Perhaps it is from the fact that he is growing militarist in his old age. He is getting obstreperous. Most of us have passed that stage, but apparently the Deputy is only now entering upon it, and due allowance has to be made for him. When the Deputy tells us that his Party "wiped the square of Macroom with their opponents," I would inform him that in that particular area there were several hundred men in arms at the worst period of the Black and Tan struggle, and that those men who have handled arms—no matter what Party their opponents belonged to—would not be put upon unduly and would retaliate, and we have had reprisals in this area, and when the Deputy says that his Party "wiped the square of Macroom with their opponents," he must remember the Government may have had a little "cleaning-up" to do afterwards. And this is the unfortunate position that has arisen in many cases where Deputies have instructed or allowed their followers to wipe the public squares with their political opponents. "We don't want to fight, but by jingo if we do." What a sad change for Deputy Dillon!
Now, in conclusion, I would like to ask whether the position really intended is, as we seem to gather from the statements of Deputy Costello and Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney, to pursue this policy of organising and extending this force and allowing it to presume to take over the functions that belonged to the services of the State? If that position be allowed to continue, there can be no doubt whatever, as the Minister for Industry and Commerce pointed out yesterday—I need not go over the ground covered by him—that it can only have one result, that it will add fresh fuel to whatever feuds and political passions there are already. One body is not going to remain inactive while their opponents, with all their organisation, appear in public marching up and down the main streets of Irish towns under the protection of the forces of the State. People would be more than human if they allowed that.
Another incitement!
If there is any improvement in the situation in the past six months, let us be clear it is not because of this manifestation of strength, but because the Government took measures, and strong measures, under the machinery they brought into operation, to deal with the situation. A very large number of men have been sentenced to imprisonment. We do not want to go further than is absolutely necessary, but our opponents could make the situation very much easier for themselves in this country if they would do the right thing now. I appeal to them to consider the matter carefully, whether it is advisable for the sake of transient political advantages, even if such there be, to continue this policy. I doubt very much if the Irish people will ever be got to rally to a movement that has nothing Irish about it, that is taken holus-bolus from Continental movements that have had their origin in entirely different circumstances.
What about Sinn Féin? Where did Sinn Féin come from?
We have a small country; we have adequate representation for the people, an excellent system of representation. We have a system which gives every Party due and adequate representation in this House.
Sinn Féin came from Hungary. What about Kossuth?
If the Opposition are not content with that, and they really see something in the corporative system——
Sinn Féin was imported——
Deputy Anthony having persisted in interruption will withdraw from the House for the remainder of the day.
I merely said Sinn Féin had its birth in Hungary. All right, Sir. I am not sorry to be away from some of the hooligans here.
Deputy Anthony then withdrew.
If the Opposition really think there is anything in an Irish corporative State, let them bear in mind that the natural Party to advance towards that State is the Labour Party, and that Irish democracy is not going to stand by while a State is set up in this country on the abolition of trade unionism and on the destruction of the political rights of the plain people. They are certainly not going to allow that state of affairs to arise here. They are certainly not going to allow it when it is plain to the people that the way in which it is sought to bring about the change is by the development of this private army which, in due course and in due time, when it gets the opportunity, will not alone overawe the citizens, but will certainly overawe the Parliament of this country and the Government of this country, if it is able to do so.
The Minister for Education is greatly daring when he reminds us that the Government have imprisoned a number of people during the last few months, and gives this as an explanation of the fact that there are not more complaints to be made against the behaviour of the Blueshirts. He has evidently overlooked the circumstance that at least 80 per cent. of the people whom the Government has found it necessary to imprison, have been friends and followers of their own, and that of those Blueshirts who have been in prison, I think practically all have been imprisoned for no worse offence than for the mere fact of being Blueshirts, or wearing blue shirts.
The Attorney-General
That is not so.
The vast majority.
The Attorney-General
If the Deputy wants the figures I can give them to him. I should like to know where anybody has been charged with wearing a blue shirt?
You tried to make it an offence and made a fool of yourself in the High Court.
I am well aware that no legal charge of wearing a blue shirt has been preferred as it would not have been possible to charge them merely with wearing a blue shirt. All I say is that these men were, in fact, imprisoned when their only offence was that of wearing blue shirts.
The Attorney-General
Practically every one of them was charged with the possession of guns.
What about O'Duffy and J. L. O'Sullivan?
Will the Attorney-General say how many of them are in jail at the present moment for the possession of guns?
The Attorney-General
How many Blueshirts?
Yes. I am putting the question and he can answer it later. Before I pass on to the main body of my remarks I want to refer to one or two remarks—
The Attorney-General
There were 14 imprisoned.
Out of 12? The Attorney-General said yesterday that there were only 12 Blueshirts in prison.
The Attorney-General
There were one or two more yesterday.
Is that the full number?
The Attorney-General
I shall give the Deputy the names if he challenges my statement. I merely gave the numbers roughly yesterday.
At any rate whatever charges these men are imprisoned upon, it is a known fact that the vast majority of the persons imprisoned by the Government under the Public Safety Act have been, not Blueshirts, but the friends of the Government, however much the Government may have disliked to have to imprison them. The Minister for Education made allusion to the matter of children wearing blue shirts in school and he alleged that there had been an order that that was to be done. I should just like to mention in passing that I am authoritatively informed that no such order was issued.
It was advocated at public meetings.
I am not talking of what was advocated. I am talking of the Minister's statement that there was an order to that effect when, in fact, the wearing of blue shirts by children at school has been out of the abundance of their enthusiasm for a good cause and has not been due to any order. The Minister made allusion to the disgraceful behaviour of the Opposition in suggesting that there were any flaws in the character of the "Broy Harriers". He used the expression himself. I have no wish to make any reflection on that body——
The officers whom the Deputy styles "Broy Harriers" are officers of the Gárda Síochána and should be referred to as such. Deputies of all Parties must realise the result, the repercussions, of bestowing on servants of the State, or sections of such, nicknames calculated to bring them into ridicule or contempt.
I was merely repeating a phrase the Minister had used.
I did not use it. I was quoting the phrase as an example of what is being said by the Opposition. I do not agree with it, and I was not using it.
I was quoting it and replying to the Minister. I only want to say on that head that, while in no way casting any general reflection on the character of that force, it is, at the same time, legitimate to point out that men have been recruited to it who have failed to get characters from their parish priests. A statement was made here the other day that recruits had to get characters from the parish priests. The next day I received a letter from a parish priest in which he stated that he had refused a character to a man who had been recruited to the force.
A Deputy
Did you get one?
I beg your pardon? I merely make that statement in passing because the Minister for Education has been unfair in suggesting that the Opposition have unjustly criticised the manner in which that force was recruited.
I am prepared to admit to those who are not familiar with the condition of affairs in this country that there is a prima facie case for this Bill. I share the dislike which has been expressed by many people for manifestations and movements on the Continent. I have no desire, far from it, to see this country go the way of Germany, or of Austria, or even the way of Italy. I think that the world during many years past has seen too much soldiering and too much playing at soldiers. I do not think that, in itself, prohibition of political uniforms is an act of coercion or an unjustifiable invasion of the liberty of the individual. I admit all that. But we have got to deal with the situation as it is in Ireland, and we have got to consider this Bill, not in isolation, but in reference to all that has gone before it, and in reference to the condition of things which, it is alleged, it is designed to cure.
The Government contend that in bringing in this Bill they are championing democracy and parliamentarianism against militarism and Fascism. If I could accept that contention I would support the Bill. I was called upon to decide the attitude to be taken on this matter much sooner than this. This question with regard to Blueshirts has not arisen for us now. It arose for us some months ago when the new Party was formed and when we had to decide very carefully to consider what was our duty and what attitude we should take towards what is known as the Blueshirt organisation.
The reason why we cannot support this Bill, and why my colleagues and myself took the position that we did some months ago, is because we do not accept either branch of the Government's contention. We do not agree that the League of Youth is a militarist organisation and we do not agree that the Government are the champions of parliamentarianism and democracy.
What is a military organisation? In what important sense can it be said that the League of Youth is military? It is not armed; its members are not trained in the use of arms; its members are not trained to believe in the use of force to overthrow the rule of law. Unlike various bodies on the continent with which they have been compared, they do not attack or try to discredit the institutions of the State. They have not, in fact, interfered with anybody's liberty; they have not sought to impose their will on anybody by force; they have not been rowdy or aggressive. Last Sunday I attended a meeting in Kildare where there was a very big gathering of Blueshirts. There was a procession of them which extended outside the town for a long distance; perhaps for three-quarters of a mile or a mile they were strung out along the road. The Minister for Local Government and Public Health arrived in his car and drove along the full length of the procession. There was not so much as a hoot or a jeer or a hostile demonstration of any kind.
He got the salute.
Later on it so happened that I had to leave the meeting earlier than most of the speakers and when I made my way out of the meeting I found, as I got to the outskirts, that there was a cordon of Blueshirts holding hands and separating those who wished to listen to the speakers from interrupters who were outside the cordon. Surely that is an example of a very excellent civic spirit on the part of the Blueshirts and is in definite contradiction of what the Minister for Justice suggested yesterday about their habit of unnecessarily creating rows with members of the audience at public meetings. In practically every speech that is made to the Blueshirts or by any of the Blueshirts emphasis is laid on the preservation of the rights of citizenship, on the liberty and dignity of the individual citizen and the duty of preserving the fundamental institutions of this State. Deputies opposite may feel like distrusting the sincerity of such speeches, but, even if they do, they must surely realise that such speeches cannot but be good propaganda for ideas that we ought to wish to see reverenced in this State and that are becoming more and more reverenced in this State in consequence of that propaganda. I think even persons like myself who dislike, by instinct, anything in the nature of regimentation or marching and counter-marching, may set against that superficial imitation of militarism, those signs and tokens of discipline that sppeal to the mind of youth, as a compensation, the good which is being done by turning all that youthful energy along praiseworthy channels, by turning the minds of the young people not to turbulence, not to revolt against the State, but to maintaining order and to building up the State.
Another thing we might bear in mind is that in the past the sort of organisations that we have seen evil resulting from have not been organisations like the Blueshirts, who have come into the open and proclaimed themselves for what they are. We have had much more to fear and suffer from organisations that preferred to work in the dark, to work under cover. We have had more to fear from the sort of mentality that enjoys writing anonymous letters or raiding people's houses wearing masks or threatening or even murdering people so bold as to identify them in the witness box. I think that is another very considerable compensation that we ought to bear in mind, those of us who dislike even the appearance of regimentation and militarism in a political organisation. It is a considerable compensation that young men are coming out into the open, into the light of day, and are proclaiming themselves for what they are. I scarcely share the fear or the hope of the Minister for Education that other bodies, such as the I.R.A., will imitate the Blueshirts in that respect and start wearing green or other coloured shirts, because unfortunately bodies which have as their aim the overthrow of the institutions of the State and which have as their methods the invasion of property and attacks on the person of private citizens, are very unlikely to advertise themselves to the public by putting on anything that could be called a uniform.
I think then I am justified in saying that in no important sense are the Blueshirts a military organisation and that in so far as there are superficial suggestions of discipline or drill or militarism about them, there are very considerable compensations to set against those. What now about the Government who wish to destroy the Blueshirts? Can we accept them as the champions of individual liberty, of parliamentarianism and of democracy? I think we must test their claim in that respect by considering their attitude on the one hand to the constitutional Opposition, and on the other hand to associations outside the law, such as that to which I have been referring. What has been their attitude to the constitutional Opposition? Even the soberest and most responsible minds among the Ministers opposite seem to have accepted it as an axiom that it is the duty of the Opposition to stop expressing their opinions as soon as those opinions have been rejected by the electorate of the country. They seem to think that it is the duty of the Opposition simply to sit still and admire, and occasionally to exclaim how astonishing it was that while they were in office they had not thought of all the brilliant things the Government have thought of. Consequently they go around complaining in the bitterest terms because the Opposition carries out the duties that every Opposition must carry out in any country where parliamentarianism is understood. Parliamentarianism and democracy would become an absolute sham if freedom of opinion and freedom of speech were wiped out in the way in which the Government would seem at times to wish them to be wiped out.
Moreover, the Government have this responsibility, that not confining themselves to reproaches of the sort they have made in this House, they have gone around the country attacking us in such intemperate language that the result is sure to be a perversion of the people's minds as to what liberty in a Parliamentary country consists in. I do not want to go through a long string of quotations. It would be perfectly easy to do so, but it would take up a very considerable time. The Minister for Finance is sitting there, and let me mention, as one instance, that in a speech made in Mallow in the summer of 1932 he used remarks about Deputy Cosgrave, and, indeed, about myself, of such a character that if either Deputy Cosgrave or I had been murdered the following day there is nobody but would have seen a connection between the speech of the Minister for Finance and our murder. If it is not egotistical—and after all it is more convincing to talk about one's own personal experience—I might also mention that Deputy Ben Maguire, who, I believe, is Chairman of the Fianna Fáil Parliamentary Party, made a speech down in the West in which he alluded to me several times as comparable with Judas Iscariot, and in which he went the length of using these words—in answer to an interrupter who had been audacious enough to call "Up MacDermot"—"MacDermot is betraying this country in exactly the same way as Judas Iscariot betrayed Our Lord." That is not just from a back bench Deputy. It is from apparently one of the most highly considered Deputies in the Fianna Fáil Party, or he would not be its Chairman. Similar speeches have been made in great numbers, and the danger of violence in this country against members of the Parliamentary Opposition, exercising their legitimate functions, arises, in my opinion, in the main from the fact that Deputies over there, who ought to know better, have used language of that type in regard to them.
The Attorney-General and the Minister for Justice think that they have satisfied all reasonable demands with regard to the preservation of law and order if they can prove that they have given proper instructions to the police; if they can prove that they have told the police to be impartial in the performance of their duties, and to be firm in the performance of their duties. I say that the responsibility of the Government does not end there, and that anything they can do in the way of instructions to the police is trifling and nugatory in comparison with what they could do by creating a proper public spirit in this country, and not the public spirit that in point of fact they have tried to create with regard to the exercise of the rights of the Opposition.
Take, on the other hand, the attitude of the Government to the I.R.A. I have not yet heard a single member of the Fianna Fáil Party, on the Front Bench or behind it, go the length of saying that he disapproves of the I.R.A.—not one; I heard some say they approve of it. I have read in the paper the utterances of, I think, their leader in the Seanad, to the effect that he hopes that organisation will continue to flourish until the day of the declaration of a Republic. I have myself repeatedly tried to extract from the President a definite statement as to his attitude to that body, and I have never succeeded in extracting it. It was not until after the National Guard came into being, with General O'Duffy at its head, that the President even went the length of saying that he advises young men not to join any military or quasi-military bodies. The fact remains, however, that with all his enormous prestige, and his responsibility, and his influence over the youth of the country, he has never, so far as I am aware—nor has any one of his followers—definitely said: "The I.R.A. is an institution that ought not to exist." As I have said, on the contrary there have been many utterances of quite a different tendency. It was only the other day that we had a Fianna Fáil Deputy saying, in connection with the Minister for Defence's new force, that he considered it should be recruited with the idea that the people who composed it should have a governing influence on the political opinions of the masses; in other words, that they should intimidate the masses. We had another speech some time ago, made in the presence of the President by a Deputy from Kerry, in which he referred to the members of the I.R.A. as "the real people who ought to be in control of this House and of this country."
If that is the atmosphere, it is perfectly idle for the Minister for Justice or any of his colleagues to get up and speak on an academic basis about the desirability of banning the Blueshirts, or interfering with such an organisation as the Blueshirt organisation. We have got a special situation here in Ireland—a special situation created by the fault of the Government if not by the intention of the Government, by faults of omission and by faults of commission. There is not a single member of the Opposition who is not conscious of a tremendous difference and a tremendous improvement throughout the country in the morale of the people as a result of the development of the Blueshirt organisation that has taken place within the last six months.
Hear, hear.
We were told by the Attorney-General yesterday that the last general election proceeded under ideal conditions—under as good conditions as any general election in the world. I utterly deny that. From my own personal experience I say that people were kept by threats from attending meetings all over the country. I know it is true that in my own constituency they were kept away by threats from attending meetings. That the number of meetings at which one was shouted down was relatively few, is perhaps true. I was prevented from speaking only once.
The Attorney-General
And I prosecuted the people who interfered.
Quite true, and I think the highest penalty imposed was a fine of ten shillings.
The Attorney-General
I was not the judge. That was a matter for the District Justice and not for me.
There is not the slightest doubt that a general spirit of intimidation prevailed, and there is not the slightest doubt that supporters of that Party which objects so much to badges and emblems congregated in scores with badges and emblems outside the polling booths on the polling day, and stood there and interfered with the people who came up to vote; that they made demonstrations—people wearing the official badges of the Fianna Fáil Party made and encouraged demonstrations against those who, they believed, were going to vote against them, and that they established, so far as in them lay to establish, an atmosphere of intimidation at every polling booth in the country. That will not happen at the next general election, and the reason it will not happen is because of the existence of the Blueshirts, and for no other reason. I could hold meetings in places to-morrow without people being afraid of attending them where I could not have held meetings under these conditions before, and it is not true that interruptions and interference have been the result of intemperate language by speakers on our side. I defy anybody to point to a speech of mine in the country which contained such intemperate language as is suggested by the Minister for Education. I was stoned in the City of Limerick on one occasion when there was not a single Blueshirt to be seen and where I had held a meeting indoors and in private. I have been interfered with over and over again before I had opened my mouth, and not in consequence of anything I said on that or any former occasion, but because it is the set policy of the great majority of the supporters of that Party all through the country to interfere with us and to frighten people from supporting us, and to suggest that we are bad Irishmen and that they are entitled to deal with us in that way because we are bad Irishmen.
For every act of blackguardism of that sort which they commit, they are able to point to the utterance not merely of a back bencher but of a front bencher, of a Minister, or, perhaps, even of the Chief of the Government, in justification for what they are doing. It is not the slightest use for Ministers to say in one breath: "We stand for free speech, and we do not want people interrupted," and the next moment to denounce these people and call them traitors and bad Irishmen, and say that they are committing an offence against all the laws of morality, and all the laws of constitutional government in venturing to express opinions at all that are disagreeable to the powers that be. That is the real condition of affairs in this country, and the Government ought to face it.
As I have said, if this Bill were regarded in an academic fashion, I can see much to be said in favour of its principle. It goes so far in certain details that I think it will be found impossible to administer if it passes into law, but, as regards its general principle, I quite agree that in a country where the proper conditions of parliamentary government prevail and where the foundations of democracy are in fact preserved, uniformed political parties or parts of political parties are something that one would rather be without.
The Government in this Bill are not taking the first step towards the achievement of their object. They are taking one of many steps. What exactly has decided the order in which they have taken those steps, I do not know. I wonder whether this Bill is being brought in now because they have become displeased with the operation of the Public Safety Act? I wonder whether it is because of the embarrassing necessity which that Act has placed them under of shutting up supporters of their own in prison, that they are now trying an alternative method which will enable them to confine their attentions to supporters of the Opposition. In any case, I find nothing at all unfortunately in the record of the Government to lead me to hope that this Bill represents a real effort to bring about in this country conditions of genuine democracy and genuine parliamentary government.
There have been a good many references in this debate on their side to a desire for more peace and harmony and co-operation. I wish I could take those expressions seriously. I wish I could hope that the Government would retrace their steps and try to bring about the harmony in this country which I think myself ought to be quite possible to bring about. I have suggested before now that it would be quite possible for members of this House to come together on the whole question of preserving ordered conditions in this country and I think it would be possible for them to come together on much more than that. I think it would be possible for them to come together on lines that would permit the settlement of our financial dispute with England and of our constitutional relations with England. I think that to a large extent we are fighting about shadows. I think that the fundamental differences between the various Parties in this country are not nearly as deep as they appear to be. I think that the Government is being dragged along a path which, in its heart of hearts, it must at times realise is not a wise or sane path to pursue and that it is being dragged along that path because of its own past and its own pronouncements that would be far better forgotten.
I wish to say again, in conclusion to my remarks on this Bill, that at any time the Government shows the slightest disposition to call the Opposition into consultation, to call the Opposition to their aid in arriving at a settlement of our difficulties with England, in arriving at a settlement of our economic difficulties and in arriving at a policy that will lead towards a reunion of the Irish nation as a whole, they will find the Opposition only too ready to co-operate, but as regards this Bill and as regards the spirit behind this Bill, it is impossible for anybody on this side of the House to respect either the objects or the methods of the Government.
The Attorney-General
Might I ask Deputy MacDermot how does he explain or defend the mobs organised by his Party to prevent an auction of seized cattle on three successive days in Waterford?
How does the Attorney-General explain the arrest of nine farmers from County Waterford and their being brought before the Military Tribunal on no charge at all?
I was unable to catch the Attorney-General's question.
The Attorney-General
In this morning's paper, there is the report of a third attempt to sell cattle in Waterford at an auction at which a large organised mob attended. This is the third attempt the auctioneer has made to dispose of the cattle and on each occasion an organised mob has prevented it. On the first day, there were Blueshirts present.
Who organised them?
The Attorney-General
I suggest that they were organised by the Deputy's Party.
I do not accept the statement that the crowd was organised and, without further information, I do not accept the statement that the crowd behaved improperly.
Why are 27 cattle seized for a debt of £35?
The Attorney-General is aware that they were blue cattle?
Yesterday evening Deputy Hogan in the course of his contribution to the debate on this Bill indulged at times in possibly a farrago of politics and at other times in a lecture to the Labour Party. I cannot help the Deputy's political manner in this House or outside this House, but I question the right of the Deputy to set himself up as one entitled to lecture the Labour Party on what it should do and does or on any other matter which comes before this House. The Deputy is not qualified either by his knowledge of working class conditions or by the personnel of the group which supports his Party in this House or outside it to advise the Labour Party on any matter in which the Labour Party is vitally concerned.
Again on yesterday evening Deputy Hogan emulated some other members of the Opposition and proceeded to treat the Dáil to the history of the Civil War. His speech yesterday was reminiscent of the bitterness associated with the Civil War period. It was an effort to rekindle the ashes of the Civil War which up to some time ago were happily dying. The Deputy indulged in an attack on the Government and not merely on the Government, but on the whole nation, and that attack was a disgrace, not only to this House, but to any responsible Front Bench. Yesterday evening Deputy Hogan described Irishmen as "brats, blackguards and hooligans." His admiration, if not his actual adoration, was retained for the British people and the British Government. One is tempted to believe on this question as to whether we were fit for self-Government, whether the Deputy would not, in fact, wish that we were still a province of Britain. Because it seems clear to me that, though the Deputy may live in Ireland and may represent a Galway constituency in this House, his spiritual home is across the Channel. I do not propose to follow the Deputy into the vituperation in which he indulged yesterday. I do not propose to follow him in that disgusting display of bad manners to which he treated the Dáil yesterday or to follow or imitate the Deputy when he described our people as "brats blackguards and hooligans," in order that the Irish Times may write leading articles upon the Deputy's measurement of the standard which he is so anxious to follow——
Talk about the Bill.
The Deputy is as disorderly this evening as he was yesterday.
I advised the Deputy to talk about the Bill. That is not disorderly.
I regret the necessity for the introduction of this Bill. I regret that it should be necessary in the year 1934, in a democratic State, to introduce a Bill of this kind. But with the experience of the last 12 months before our minds, it is necessary that we should take stock of the position. It is necessary that we should observe the tendency of certain political developments in this country It is necessary that we should preserve the rights of democratic Government in this country and that we should check any tendency to indulge in the militarisation of political parties here.
During the past twelve months there has been an evident growth of a military spirit in political matters. There have been attempts to organise large-scale demonstrations on military lines and with uniformed participants. Many who attended those demonstrations were armed with weapons which could be quite destructive in faction fights and which it is admitted led to faction fights. Once that sort of thing is pursued by one political party it will be followed by another political party. The country will just be treated to the position of one political party arranging demonstrations of a very peaceable character and other parties will inevitably be driven to the same action of organising other demonstrations in order to show to the people that they are just as strong and just as fearless, militarily, as their opponents.
The growth of that spirit has been particularly noticeable during the past 12 months. It is a growth that must inevitably lead to strife; it must inevitably lead to bitterness, and it must inevitably help to sow here the seeds of bitter faction, fighting and dissension amongst our people. I will concede at once that the position in this country is very much more peaceful than it is in other countries. In the matter of serious political crime we have a good deal to congratulate ourselves upon. The country has been relatively free from that. The reason the country has been relatively free from political crime is all the more reason why steps should be taken to retain that desirable position here.
By retaining the Blueshirts.
To-day there is an increasing element of political hatred and bitterness in our national politics. If that condition of affairs continues it can only help to embitter relations between all political parties in this country. It only requires a very little march from that state until we begin to sow the seeds of civil war in this country. If we are again to sow the seeds of civil war in this country, and if we are to have civil war again, this nation will be treated to another holocaust such as it experienced in 1922 and 1923. That is the position to which no sensible public representative in this country should in any way lend his countenance.
No sensible public man should lend his countenance to a scheme of political development which is calculated to sow in this country the seeds of another civil war, which will mean the same shedding of blood, the same shedding of tears, and which will mean the same national loss as our people endured in 1922 and 1923. Should the catastrophe of civil war ever visit this country again, then, in my opinion, it will mark the end of democratic Government in this country. It will mean a bitter struggle on both sides with murders following. The inevitable end of that civil war will mean the establishment of a dictatorship by the strongest Party, the survivor of the war.
Deputy MacDermot struck a note in his speech which was helpful, and, possibly, the most helpful speech made by a member of any Party. He wished that agreement could be got in order to secure here normal political methods in dealing with our different political quarrels. I would heartily re-echo these sentiments which were uttered by the Deputy. I would wish it were possible by agreement between the Parties to get back to the normal methods of Parliamentary Government in this country, and to get back to the position when political Parties in this country would be organised on normal political lines instead of being organised by Parties on military lines, the leaders issuing them with uniform and equipping them with weapons of offence, and generally inculcating in our people a spirit of military aggression which in the long run can only be used to the destruction of our own people and possibly to the injury of the social fabric of the State.
If that position cannot be brought about by agreement between the different political parties, those of us who believe in Irish democratic methods instead of the disgraceful tyranny that has characterised the the Parliamentary Government in Germany, Italy, and lately in Austria, must ask ourselves where we stand in the position which confronts us to-day. So far as this Party is concerned, it has always been the Party of peace. It has always stood for the settlement of our difficulties in a peaceful way. So far as the politics of this State are concerned, our attitude is an endeavour to create here a period of peaceful Government by peaceful Parliamentary Opposition and peaceful Parliamentary discussion, believing that along such lines of peaceful Parliamentary methods and peaceful Parliamentary discussion reside the best hopes of this nation in bringing about social and economic regeneration. We have to ask ourselves, in the situation with which we are confronted to-day, whether we stand for permitting political developments to continue on the lines on which we have seen them proceed in this country during the past 12 months. We have to ask ourselves whether we stand for a kind of political life, which enables political Parties in the State to organise their members in a quasi-military body, dressed in uniform, armed with missiles, responding to military commands, and bearing military titles; or whether we want to see our political life ordered on the basis of civilian political Parties, pursuing civilian methods of discussion, free altogether from those detestable forms of militarism which, in the past 12 months especially, have taken deep root in our country.
We have only to look around us in Europe to see what has happened where political parties took on a military orientation. We have only to examine what the position was in Germany during the growth of the Brownshirt Nazi Storm Troop movement there.
At that time, of course, there was a democratic Republican Government in existence in Germany. I talked to many members of that Government, and at that period they never dreamt that the Nazi Storm Troop movement could possibly assume the dimensions it has assumed to-day. They did not see any need then to proscribe the wearing of uniform or to curb the military tactics of the Nazi Storm Troopers. They are wiser now. Many, from internment camps to-day, can regret the day they failed to check the growth of that military movement. Everybody knows that the Brownshirt movement in Germany started in just the same way as the Blueshirt movement is starting in the Free State, ostensibly peaceful at first, but showing every week in a more naked fashion the mailed fist beneath the velvet glove. Everyone who knows anything of the growth of the Brownshirt movement in Germany knows perfectly well that it started in precisely the same way as the Blueshirt movement here.
I wish to question that, and to give the Deputy a chance of answering. I question very much the statement that he has just made, because when the Brownshirt movement started in Germany there was a Government in office which preserved order, and which had no semi-military organisation connected with it; nor was it ever suggested, as far as I recall, by anybody connected with the Brownshirt movement that the movement was started because they were not able to get free speech and individual freedom throughout the country.
The Brownshirt movement in Germany, as the Deputy well knows, was started, not so much to get free speech, but in order to exterminate free speech.
Exactly.
The Blueshirt movement here, to-day, led by a man who says that the Parliamentary system here is un-Irish and must be replaced, inevitably means the end of freedom of speech in this country.
He does not say it.
The Deputy was talking of the beginning of the movement.
If the Deputy will be patient, I shall develop the point. It is not denied, however, that the leader of the Blueshirt movement in this country to-day is a gentleman who said the Parliamentary system here is un-Irish. It is not denied that he said that the Parliamentary system must be replaced. That is not denied.
It is not accepted.
That was a very useful admission from Deputy MacDermot.
What admission?
I have no doubt that it will appear on the next agenda at the Party meeting.
He will be fired out.
What I meant is that I do not accept the accuracy of Deputy Norton's quotation.
I agree that since that gentleman's speeches have been sub-edited lately there is evidence of greater sanity, a little more sanity in the political utterances coming from him, and for that, of course, the nation and the Party opposite will have every reason to thank themselves. But the plain fact remains that the Blueshirt movement in this country to-day is being led by a man who says that the Parliamentary system is un-Irish and must be replaced. I defy anybody on the Opposition Benches to say that that speech has in any way been withdrawn by the gentleman who made it.
Explained.
He is the Director-General of the movement from whom the lesser fry in the Party must take their instructions.
I say this, that in the heads of the U.I.P. policy, which was adopted at the recent convention of the Party, it is plainly set forth that we stand, all of us, for Parliamentary Government and democracy.
Is not the General supreme?
Deputy MacDermot's interruption reminds me of the story of the small man who married a very big woman.
You told us that before.
Realising that he was no match for this lady of considerable physical proportions, and wanting to keep on good terms with the lady, when he came out of the church he said to her: "Now, Mary, you and I are one.""Yes," said Mary, "but I am the one." Deputy MacDermot is just in the same position. They are all one, but the Director-General, the man who discovered that the Parliamentary system in this country is un-Irish and must be replaced, is the one. If anybody has any doubts about it, even the Deputy's own Party organ makes it perfectly clear. That gentleman goes out to the country leaving behind him manuscripts of speeches. He gets the streamer headings in the newspapers and the leaded type. Deputy Cosgrave, who led the Cumann na nGaedheal Party for the last ten years, gets two or three lines, and Deputy MacDermot is sometimes lucky if he even gets that.
He was not allowed to make a speech in Swinford.
Is it not perfectly clear then who is the one? There is not the slightest doubt in anybody's mind, and I wonder Deputy MacDermot questions it. The real leader of the Party is the gentleman who has stated that the Parliamentary system in this country is un-Irish and must be replaced. I defy any of the Deputies opposite to get the gentleman to repudiate that statement which he then made.
Are you going to prove that the system is a Gaelic one?
Judging by the Orange, Freemason, and pro-British people that it commends itself to, it apparently is not.
That is not an answer.
What about the British trade unions?
Deputy MacDermot agreed with the statement that the object of the Brownshirt movement in Germany was to exterminate free speech. I was making the point then that the same object is at the roots and the foundations of the Blueshirt movement in this country and must inevitably be at the bottom of any other movement started in this country by any other Party where the object is to militarise our political life, because the inevitable end of that, no matter what the object is, is to set up here a military group, a military junta, to dictate to the people, not in the way the people desire dictation, but to ensure that the people by the support of a military force will be compelled to accept the viewpoint of the dominant military Party in the State. It is the Blueshirt movement to-day; it may be the Brownshirt, or any other kind of movement, another day. The inevitable result is to attempt to militarise our political life; to secure domination over the people in one form or another, with the same particular object.
We have had the growth of the Fascist movement in Italy attired in black shirts. Everyone knows perfectly well what that movement has meant in Italy. It has meant the stifling of individual liberty, and the stifling of democratic liberty. It has meant the trampling under foot of the democratic institutions of that country. Of course, some of our people go to Rome and they imagine that Rome is Italy. I wonder, if they took a look at some of the provincial towns and cities in Italy, whether there is anything in the Italian system of Government, or in Italian economic and social life, that our people have any reason to envy. When visiting provincial towns in Italy one sees clearly the difference between the standard of life of our people and the standard of life enjoyed by the ordinary Italian worker. The Italian worker pays unemployment insurance contributions and, when unemployed, receives 3/- or 6/- or 9/- per week. Does anybody want to establish here a system of unemployment insurance benefit which will give these rates to our people, even though the Italians pay higher premiums than our people are paying? We have seen recently the growth of another uniformed force in Austria, and we see the kind of tyranny that has been the outcome of the establishment of that uniformed force. I put this question to Deputy MacDermot and to Opposition Deputies: Do they want to see established here the system of Parliamentary parties that has been established in Germany, in Italy and in Austria; and whether they want to see these Parliamentary parties end, as they must inevitably end, with the same tyranny that has disgraced Germany, disgraced Italy and disgraced Austria in later years? We had lately, especially from the speeches of the Opposition Party, admiration expressed for Fascism. We were told that the real remedy for this country is to copy the Parliamentary methods of Italy, to copy the economic and other methods of Italy. Although they are afraid to say it, what is really meant is that they are very anxious that we should copy the political methods of Italy, which means a uniformed political party, armed with missiles and more dangerous weapons, organised on military lines, subject to military control and to military organisation, leading inevitably to the suppression of free speech and to the destruction of democratic government. Do the Blueshirt people of to-day want that to be the end of their endeavours?
Does the Blueshirt movement to-day, or any other movement of that sort, no matter what label is around its neck, want to establish here a system of government similar to that of Italy, of Germany and of Austria? If they do, I suppose they will endeavour to secure the establishment of that system. At all events, I am going, so far as my power in this legislature is concerned, to frustrate the growth of a military political party, having for its object—as such parties have in every country where they are established— the destruction of free speech, the destruction of democratic institutions and the establishment of a dictatorship. Once the position is achieved, in which it is the privilege of the plain people to render homage to the dictatorship, they have to endure that tyranny.
Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney worked himself up into quite a fury last night about the moral force of the Blueshirt movement. The Deputy told us that the movement rested purely on moral force. I wonder if Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney was supplied with a return of the implements that were taken to the Blueshirt demonstration in Kildare on Sunday last. I wonder if the Deputy knows that some of the people who were attired in blue shirts in Kildare on Sunday last were equipped with metal bars, knuckle-dusters and rubber truncheons, and that they used them. The local doctors will testify to the fact that people were assaulted with these instruments.
Can the police testify to it?
If the Deputy will put down a question the Minister for Justice may get that information.
He may.
If the Deputy has any doubt about it I will give the names of the doctors who treated the people.
You want the police on the job.
What are the names of the doctors?
The dispensary medical officer in Kildare and the doctor who attends Kildare Infirmary. These are easily identified. Is it not a rather curious position, that the moral force which Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney says is the main foundation of the Blueshirt organisation, is the kind of moral force that equips itself with knuckle-dusters, metal bars and rubber truncheons?
The kicking cow.
If that is Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney's conception of moral force, one shudders to think what the use of military equipment would be in the Deputy's mind. Everyone knows that the growth on a large scale movement of a military character cannot be confined to methods of peaceful persuasion. The inevitable result of throwing together large sections of uniformed men in a military form, with the officials bearing military titles, is to drive that movement towards the use of arms, whether they take the form of firearms, or the form of almost equally destructive weapons. The inevitable effect is militarism, to import a military complexion into our political development, and to drive parties towards the use of arms either in the form of firearms or other dangerous weapons. It is quite impossible to expect that any party, once they become a militarist organisation, can possibly prevent that movement from having recourse to weapons, or to violence in some shape or form. I look upon this Bill, not as a Bill to enable one party to triumph over another party. I do not look upon this Bill as in any sense conferring a party victory on one party over another party. While I will vote for the Bill, I would not like to see it regarded as a victory for one party over another party, nor would I like to see this Bill, when it becomes an Act, implemented in any party fashion.
You will see no more democracy when this Bill becomes an Act.
We did not see much of it during the time the Deputy's Party was in office.
It is time the Deputy read the Bill to see what it means.
I read it before the Deputy was privileged to be here.
Then you did not understand the English language.
Now that we have got that advice from the fountain head of all knowledge of the English language, I will do my best in future.
Nothing you do will be an improvement on what you have done.
I hope when I have mastered it as fluently as the Deputy that I will be able to explain the farmers' grievances in less than six hours.
The one issue took six and a half hours.
Deputy Davin said nothing, though he got the reports.
I am not voting for the Bill in any sense with a desire to see one party triumph over the other. I am not voting for it so that I may be used by one political party against political opponents. I want to see this Bill used as an effort to put down definitely, deliberately and systematically any attempt to organise political parties here on a military basis. No matter what labels they may have attached to them, no matter what their complexions may be politically, no matter what their objects may be, and no matter what uniforms they wear militarily, I want to see put down any attempt to rear up political parties on a military basis, because the inevitable result of the growth of such political parties would be domination and tyranny over the people.
As this Bill purports to do.
Complaint was made in this House during the discussion on this Bill that it is difficult for one political party in the State to secure freedom of speech at public meetings. I am voting for the Bill definitely in the hope that once it is passed we can resume in this country ordinary civilian political development: in the hope, too, that a vigorous effort will be made by the Government to ensure that every political party in this State will be entitled to all the freedom of speech at public meetings which they desire. The right of freedom of speech at public meetings is an essential condition of freedom and of democratic government. I put this to the Government: that with the passage of this Bill, they must take steps, vigorous steps and ruthless steps, if necessary, to ensure that every political party shall have the right to plead its case before the electorate. If that attitude is adopted by the Government vigorously and, if necessary, ruthlessly, then there can be no possible excuse for organising mobs of people in uniform, equipped with knuckle dusters and metal bars on the plea, the specious plea, in my opinion, of keeping peace at political meetings.
I have never stood for organised rowdyism or organised hooliganism at meetings. So far as this Party is concerned it will back any measure introduced here, or support any measure under Government auspices outside this House, the object of which is to put down the hooligan and the rowdy at political meetings held here. I think it should be made perfectly clear by the Minister for Justice to the Guards that, in their efforts to stop interruptions at public meetings, to curb attacks on people at political meetings, when they are attempting to put their views constitutionally before the electorate, they will have the fullest support of the Government. Certainly, so far as this Party is concerned, any attempt to put down hooliganism at political meetings will have our warmest support.
I hope that the Minister for Justice, when replying, will make it clear that more and still more force, if necessary, will be used to ensure freedom of speech at public meetings. If you once allow the mob to dictate as to who is to be permitted to address public meetings in this country, then you have given over completely the right to function as a Government. If you once allow the mob to dictate as to who is to speak and who is not to speak at a public meeting, or to set itself up as a body to censor the speeches delivered at public meetings, then you have abdicated completely your right to govern in this country. The right of freedom of public speech is such a necessary condition of freedom that it is absolutely imperative that the full resources of the State should be used in the effort to ensure it for every political Party. So far as this Party is concerned we stand for it. The Party that would allow the mob to dictate and to rule in that matter is simply sowing a wind and will inevitably reap the whirlwind.
In the speeches that were made from the Opposition Benches yesterday, it appeared to be claimed by them, although it was not definitely stated, that they had a perfect right to organise a political party equipped with uniforms, with lethal weapons, organised on a military basis with the officers of the party holding military titles. Is that the claim the Party is making?
What is a lethal weapon?
Here we have a Deputy, who occupied the office of Minister for Defence for over five years, asking what is a lethal weapon.
I am asking for the Labour Party definition of it.
Nobody could give a better definition of it than the Deputy himself.
If I wanted a definition of it I think the first I would go to would be the Deputy. I ask: Is that the claim of the Party opposite, that they have the right to organise a political party on a military basis, equipped with lethal weapons, with the officers bearing military titles, and the right to march in military formation in uniform? Is that the claim of the Party opposite?
No.
Why the protest then against the prohibition of the use of weapons and uniforms in this Bill?
We will tell you.
I submit that it is the clear claim of the Party opposite, notwithstanding the half-hearted attempt that is now being made to repudiate it. Is not every other political party equally entitled to do the same kind of thing if it is possible for the Fine Gael party to organise on a military basis? If it is possible for the Fine Gael Party to do that, then of course, the same right must be accorded to the independent group.
Why not, if they keep within the law?
Will it not be possible for the independent group to do the same thing, and for Deputy Kent to make sure that he will be reinforced outside this House by a party similarly equipped?
The people I represent here have nothing that would enable them to buy shirts.
Will it not be possible for the Labour Party to organise a movement in the same way?
If you did, it would show the smallness of your numbers.
People in my part of the country were given five shillings to enable them to buy a blue shirt— wherever the money came from.
If the Fine Gael people claim that they have the right to organise their Party on a military basis, the basis on which they are organising the Party to-day, then every other party within the State, in this House and outside this House, has a perfect right to do the same thing. If they have a perfect right to do the same thing as the Opposition Party in this House are doing, are not we going to be presented here with the position that every party in the State that is represented in the House, or that is represented outside the House, can organise their supporters on a military basis, with uniforms and carrying firearms?
Yes, if the Government will not take up the firearms that are not under Government control.
Did the Deputy read the proceedings of the Military Tribunal yesterday?
I read the Bill, which is more than the Deputy has done.
I am sorry that the Bill had to undergo the tyranny of the Deputy's reading of it, if that is all the Deputy drew from it.
You have not come to the Bill yet.
I will not take six and a half hours to come to it, in any case.
Deputy Norton is entitled to make his speech without interruptions. Deputy Belton has been warned, not alone on this occasion, but on many other occasions not connected with this Bill, that he will have to cease interrupting unless on a point of order.
Might I remind the Leas-Cheann Comhairle that Deputy Belton has not been warned to-day?
I said that the Deputy was warned on several occasions not connected with this Bill.
I hope that statement does not damage the Deputy's character in the Press.
The Deputy must withdraw that now.
I withdraw it, but the Leas-Cheann Comhairle has made use of that language on previous occasions.
The Leas-Cheann Comhairle makes use of the expressions he considers necessary to maintain the rules and order of this House, and he will continue to do so. Deputy Belton has been continuously interrupting for the past six or seven minutes.
The Attorney-General
On a point of order, Sir, should not the Deputy withdraw the statement that you have said something to blacken his character?
The Deputy has done so.
If every other Party in this State were to organise their supporters on the basis on which the Fine Gael Party are organising their supporters to-day, it would not be very many months until this country would be an armed camp, with the supporters of the different political Parties equipped with firearms and with other weapons for the destruction of human life. It does not require much imagination to see how long or how short a period it would take until that armed military camp would lead to a conflagration in this country which would inevitably mean strife, civil war and faction fighting. In the general melée I believe that democratic government in this country would be pulled down, and pulled down, perhaps, forever. It is because I do not want to see Party politics develop along military lines that I support this Bill, and I hope that it will be passed and that it will be used to put down any attempt to create here political movements of the military character which have stifled freedom of speech and liberty in other countries in Europe to-day.
To get back to Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney's moral force: I wonder what kind of moral force was exhibited by the Deputy's supporters in Kildare on Sunday last. It was perfectly clear to all the people who attended the meeting that it was moral force accompanied by knuckle dusters, metal bars and rubber truncheons. That was the display of moral force in Kildare on Sunday last, and any Government that does not attempt to put down that kind of thing, whether practised by Blueshirts or any other kind of shirts, is unfit to be a Government. I hope this Government will put down any further attempts by the Blueshirts to organise in that way, and also to put down the attempts of any other Parties either to organise hooliganism at political meetings or to organise their followers on the same basis as the Fine Gael Party is doing to-day.
Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney, after bringing us back to the days of Henry VIII and so on, might explain what kind of moral force is being practised to-day by many of the employers who are supporting his Party. In many places in Kildare, workmen are being urged by their employers to join the Blueshirt movement and to wear blue shirts at political meetings. The only purpose of that kind of persuasion by employers is to use the weapon or economic necessity against their workmen in order to get them to embrace the economic and the political policies of their masters. A definite attempt is being made to-day in the County Kildare by employers to compel their workmen to wear blue shirts; and the price of refusing to do so is the loss of their employment. There is even more than that. Have we not had an example recently where a resolution was passed by supporters of the Party opposite—I think, indeed, by the Party opposite—urging Blueshirt employers only to employ those who support the Blueshirt movement?
Where was that resolution passed?
In Midleton, in County Cork.
Is Deputy Fitzgerald suffering from mental aberration? If he reads his own Party organ he will see it.
He should read his own articles.
Deputy McGilligan will get it up in the next bundle of statistics for him. It can take the place of some of the other quotations that he quotes here from time to time. Everybody knows that there is a definite movement on foot to compel workmen to wear the blue shirts of a Party they hate and that they have no use for. Everybody knows that every effort is being made by those Blueshirt employers to dismiss people who will not embrace their politics and to employ people who do. If that position is permitted to continue, it means that there is no such thing as freedom of speech or freedom of the ballot. If the employer is to be allowed to use his position as an employer to coerce his workmen in that way, there is no such thing as freedom of speech or freedom of the ballot. It simply means that the employees must, as a condition of working for their employer, not merely render service to him but, willy-nilly, swallow his politics as well. Does Deputy Belton suggest that that is a desirable situation to create in this country? If this Bill did nothing else than to save workmen from the indignity of being compelled to wear a particular type of shirt simply because it is prescribed for them by their employers, then this Bill would be justified by that alone.
Yes, if the assertion were true, which it is not.
The Deputy has his head in the sand again. He knows perfectly well that it is true.
Where? Of what place is it true?
In Kildare, and everywhere else.
Can the Deputy mention one single instance or one single name in Kildare?
Deputy Esmonde makes an annual speech about a lady friend of his out in the front lawn.
On a point of order, Sir, I have two men in my employment who canvassed against me at the last two elections. They are still in their employment, but if the Deputy persists in this they will leave it.
What has this got to do with a point of order?
It is for the benefit of the Press.
You will not employ much, anyway.
Nobody suggested that Deputy Belton would stoop to these disgraceful methods to which I have referred.
No, nor would I be with the Party that would support such methods.
Well, if so, I am afraid the Deputy will have to write out his resignation from his present Party soon. There is only one other Party left now that the Deputy can join, and that is closed to him.
I would not join it—not with such leadership, anyway.
It is the only Party in which the Deputy has not been, and he will not get into it even if he resigns from his present Party.
I would not be in a one-hundred-acre field with the Deputy or his Party.
He would not be allowed in even if it was in the Atlantic Ocean.
We are going into the Atlantic Ocean now.
I started by saying that I was in favour of this Bill because I hoped it would put an end to the growth of political Parties on a military basis. I hope it will be used to put an end to military-political movements, to ensure that we shall have civilian politics and that every Party in the State will be assured of freedom from molestation from any other group, whether at election or any other times. It is very bad manners and very bad taste that any section of the people should attempt to dictate to another section to what extent they should address the public or what kind of statements they should make to the public. We are supporting this Bill in the belief that it will end the militarisation of our political life. I hope it will be used with that object in mind. I hope it will be used impartially and without hesitation so as to ensure for all political Parties in the State freedom of speech not merely at election times but at all other times.
I am supporting this Bill for something more than that. The growth of the Blueshirt movement and movements of that kind, no matter what their political objective may be, means inevitably the coercion of the people into the acceptance of the viewpoint of the strongest military Party in the State. The result of that conception of Parliamentary life is to get rid of democratic government and democratic institutions, to establish a political dictatorship, and to maintain that dictatorship by murders, jailings, concentration camps and the bludgeoning of political adversaries. The right to elect and reject a Government is the most precious right the plain people of the country possess. It must be preserved for them at any cost. All the power the State has at its disposal should be and must be used—it will have the warmhearted support of this Party—to secure that the right of the people to elect and reject Governments, without fear of economic or physical violence, will be preserved for the plain people. In that spirit, I am supporting this Bill. I hope that, once the Government are armed with the powers contained in this Bill, not only will they be enabled to stamp out the growth of political movements on a military basis but that, in addition, they will use the full force of the State to ensure fair play and a fair crack of the whip, equal opportunities and equal responsibilities for all political Parties. I have said that I did not regard this Bill as the triumph of one political party over another. I would not vote for this Bill if it were merely an attempt to squelch political opponents. I am voting for it as an effort to put down the organisation of political parties on a military basis. I hope it will be used with that object, and, at the same time, to ensure that the right of the people to elect and reject Governments, without molestation and without reprisal by political Parties or employers, will be preserved.
Were it not for the remarks of Deputy Norton regarding the number of surplus blue shirts in Kildare I should not intervene at all. I should like to know from Deputy Norton whether I could be supplied at a cheap rate with some of these surplus blue shirts. The colour is a matter of indifference to me. With them I should be able to clothe—and comfortably clothe—the shirtless people and the unfortunate unemployed in East Cork. It seems an extraordinary thing to me that at this stage of our political career it should be necessary to bring in a Bill of this character. There must be something extraordinarily wrong in the country when the Government introduce a measure such as this which, if enacted, will be a complete failure, just as all the other Coercion Bills introduced by the old ascendancy gang during the Balfour régime were a failure. I always opposed coercion Bills, and I shall do so as long as I am a member of this House.
I think that there should be some other means of bringing together the two Parties which have torn this country into shreds by abusive criticism both inside this House and outside it. To my mind, the country to-day is in a sad and deplorable state. What is at the bottom of all this trouble? One Party trying to supersede the other. We must remember—every member of this House should remember—that the present Government got a mandate from the Irish people by a large majority. We must recognise them as the Government of the country. It is the duty of every citizen to support constitutionally that Government and to obey the laws which they administer. The abuse and the mud-slinging indulged in in this House, from time to time, is most painful and regrettable. Are we to go back to the deplorable incidents of the Civil War? Is any organisation to fan the embers of the deplorable and horrible incidents which occurred during that time? We owe a greater duty than that to our people and to our country. The people are crying out for unity and for peace. We owe a duty to our illustrious dead—men who unselfishly gave their lives for Irish freedom. Their names are spoken of in this House as lightly as if they were mere passing shadows. These men who died for their country have gone before the Judgment Seat and their names should not be lightly spoken. They were the noblest and bravest sons of our land. If they could speak from out their graves to-day, what advice would they give to all parties? Would they advise hatred and bitterness? Not at all. They would advise that all parties should unite to one end—to bring about the upliftment of our country and the peace and prosperity of our people. If that is the condition that exists at the present time and if it is likely to continue for any time, I see no future for this country. It would be impossible for any country to carry on an industrial policy when we find people carrying arms outside the authority of the State, and when we find them assembled at cross-roads at night when they ought to be in bed. There should be only one army in the country, under the control of the Minister for Defence. Those new politicians and warriors, that have sprung up like mushrooms in the night, now come forward. For what purpose? Is it that they love President de Valera or General O'Duffy? Or is it that they love any political party? These people come forward, not for the love of any party but for the love of sheer devilment and for the purpose of causing trouble in the country.
There is only one way, as far as I can see, of bringing about a settlement of this deplorable controversy. I make this suggestion as one who has spent the greater part of his life in campaigning for the prosperity, freedom and welfare of this country. I make this suggestion to the leaders of the two great political parties in this House. There is one way out of the difficulty, at present, and that is to go into the peace conference which Cardinal MacRory consented to preside over. That would be a means of bringing about better understanding, and showing a united front in our demand to the English Government for the settlement of this deplorable economic war which is at the bottom of the whole trouble. I, for one, never asked the Government to go on bended knee, or hat in hand, to ask for a settlement of the dispute with Mr. Thomas. If we want to bring the economic war to a satisfactory conclusion we must get the united support of every political party in this country and show a common front in our demands to which we are justly entitled.
As regards freedom of speech it is the God-given right of every individual in this country, or any other country. Every man has a right to his own political views and to express them whether in private or in public, but no man has a right to stand on a public platform to incite people to violence or to bloodshed. A great deal has been said as regards disturbances at elections, and especially during the last election. It was said there was no freedom of speech for any candidate who held different political views from those of the Fianna Fáil Party. I have not that to say for East Cork. During the whole campaign, at that election, there was not one interruption at any meeting that I addressed. I consider it was one of the most orderly elections ever held in my memory; and when that election was over there was no animosity whatsoever shown by any political party. We forgot everything about that election when it was over. We had other and nobler ideas and views before us, and that was to do our best for the people who elected us. In God's name I make this appeal here to-night. Look not too much into the past; it comes not back again; wisely improve the present. The opportunity is there if you wish to avail of it. Let us, therefore, go forward to face the future without fear and without favour, and with manly energy let us work for the welfare and prosperity and contentment of our people.
I listened to the speeches of three Ministers and later to the speech we have just heard from the Leader of the Labour Party. I suppose one ought to be thankful to the Leader of the Labour Party when he expressed himself in such a completely hypocritical way that it gave us at least some sort of estimate of the righteousness of the position he had taken up. He explained he was going to vote for this Bill because he said that he stood for freedom of speech, for the right of political parties and all the rest of it. Deputy Norton has been living in this country for the last few years; and he knows perfectly well that that period has been a period which has seen the prostitution of Government. The Government completely rendered itself deaf to every thought of justice by using its power and authority, not in the interests of the State generally, or for the well-being of the people, but in the interests of their own political followers. Deputy Norton knows perfectly well that before the Blueshirts were ever heard of constant items of news in the newspapers were accounts of assaults upon people attending public meetings. Now he will support this Bill because he stands so strongly against coercion, and in favour of justice and democracy and the rest of it. Like the Minister, he found it hard to point to anything in the Blueshirt movement in this country which rendered it in any way undesirable, or at all calculated to produce an evil effect in this country. Like the Minister, he wandered round the issue. I was rather surprised to hear him lay particular stress upon Austria. What was done in Austria was this. Austria's equivalent to Deputy Norton's Labour Party, was called upon to surrender its arms. It refused and when the Government proceeded to collect those arms that party proceeded to use them much in the same way as the I.R.A. and such criminal organisations had been doing in this country. I was rather surprised to hear Deputy Norton laying special stress upon Austria, as if what occurred there was a kind of counterpart to creating blue shirts and was properly dealt with by the Austrian Government. Deputy Norton made a gratuitous and wanton attack upon Italy, Germany and Austria. Such attacks are a disgrace to this House. It is not our business how other people manage their affairs. The Minister for Justice told us of Belgium and Switzerland and Norway and Sweden and so on. The Minister for Justice, like Deputy Norton and the Minister for Education, misunderstands words. For instance, the Minister for Justice used the word "adequate" when he did not mean "adequate" but "considerable." He said that since the Fianna Fáil Government came into power they gave more adequate protection to meetings than we did when we were in power. I am quite ready to admit that perhaps hundreds of times the protection we gave was not altogether adequate but the Minister misunderstands the word. Deputy Norton misuses the word "democracy." I could describe myself as a democrat.
That would be a crime.
The type of democracy propounded by Deputy Norton is absolutely criminal from my point of view.
It would have been a good job if you did not describe yourself as a democrat 18 years ago. You are late in doing so now.
He is proposing a thing that has been condemned by every serious teacher of morals throughout the whole history of the world. He is proposing that somehow or other authority and power are going to be divorced. We had the analogy of other countries. I want to get the analogy with this country. The Minister for Justice misunderstands the analogy. He said that because of an external attribute—in Italy a black shirt, in Germany a brown shirt, in Ireland a blue shirt—because of that mere attribute, the situation, the conditions and the whole nature of the various organisations are identical. They may be or they may not be. You might just as well say that a certain murderer has brown eyes and that, therefore, everybody who has brown eyes is a murderer. Because, possibly, people in Germany, whose uniform is a shirt, do certain things, therefore, according to the Minister for Justice, anybody who wears a uniform in the nature of a shirt is necessarily and by nature going to do these things. It is on that kind of wrong-headed—I can hardly call it thinking, that the whole defence of the Bill is based.
What is the situation? The Minister for Industry and Commerce gave it to us, up-to-date, in tabular information. The only thing that was wrong was that it was completely contrary to the truth. The Minister for Justice had said before that that the Government might have been rightfully suspicious about the time of its formation of the circumstances of the movement that afterwards became the Blueshirt movement. He said that the members were originally ex-officers, that the Government might have suspected the peculiar time of its formation, and might have been suspicious because the movement was composed of these ex-officers. What is the history of it? I think it was the Minister for Industry and Commerce said that as soon as the civil war was over, the contending parties were ready to be friends, but the loud mouthed politicians willed it otherwise. What happened was that when certain people found it was dangerous to stand up against an organised army, they sought safety by downing arms. Then when the large army, which it was necessary to create, was no longer required, and, when in the interests of economy the Government proceeded to demobilise it, the officers, instead of living in barracks, had to go back to different parts of the country where these men who had been afraid to stand up against the army were now living. These ex-officers were often assaulted, and their lives were in considerable danger. These men, who had given such gallant service in putting down organised crime in this country, then found it necessary to organise in their own protection.
The suspicious time about which the Minister for Justice spoke was the time when the people who downed arms had again embarked on their campaign of murder. They had attempted the murder of a juryman. They had murdered a witness, murdered a police officer, murdered a labouring boy, and there were places in this country where to have served this State wrote you down as a traitor to what the other people stood for and as destined for a traitor's fate to be administered by any person who liked to think that he had such authority. Then it was quite rightly necessary that some of these ex-officers should think about organising in their own protection. They were living in isolated places all round the country. When the Public Safety Act, the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution, was brought in, these people who liked to go round when they were guaranteed safety, went effectively out of operation. When the present Government came in it released the criminals from the prisons. It allowed the criminal organisations to organise. It ordered the police to hold up traffic to permit demonstrations by organisations that existed to overthrow the State which the Government existed to defend. Then they proceeded to deny us, and the then Centre Party, the right of freedom of speech. It did happen that this organisation of ex-officers felt they had a duty as citizens and that was the duty to come along and protect those meetings. That organisation proceeded to extend itself, so that as far as the exofficer element was concerned it had ceased to be the outstanding feature of it. It became a general organisation of young men who stood against the tyranny that this Government was engaged in promoting. It stood for the rights of citizens, the natural rights they possessed. This organisation then developed in a much larger form for the purpose of protecting public meetings.
My own experience was this: that before the Blueshirts started and well before they wore blue shirts, at every meeting one attended one was constantly interrupted and stood in danger of being physically assaulted, and one was even physically assaulted. When the Blueshirts came along, these meetings could be held in peace. To speak of my own experience, there was, for instance, a meeting held in a place called Paulstown where blackguards came in and assaulted the people and injured some of them. There were no Blueshirts at that meeting. A couple of weeks afterwards I held a meeting at the same place which Blueshirts attended. They had no uniform at that time. There was not a murmur at that meeting. That peaceful state of affairs remained and I had no further interruptions at meetings until this Government decided to ban the National Guard. The very first time afterwards that I addressed a meeting there was an attempt made to get at me where I was speaking, and the police had to struggle with the men to get them away. They were not arrested. There had been no trouble as long as the National Guard or the Army Comrades' Association was in existence, no trouble until this Government stepped in to make it safe for the blackguards in this country to smash up meetings. In spite of the fact that Deputy Norton thinks it is an outrage to our country to say that it contains blackguards, we say that there are many blackguards in the country. Not alone that, but there are many murderers in the country.
A Deputy
That is true.
At any rate, that is the position. The Government is going to obey again the orders of its criminal masters. It is going again to make any effort for the people of this country——
The Deputy has made a statement that the Government is obeying the orders of its criminal masters. I suggest that he should be called upon to withdraw that statement.
With regard to the incident at Paulstown——
Is this a point of order?
The Deputy's supporters were responsible for any unpleasantness that occurred on that day. They provoked it.
On the point of order, I think the statement that the Government is obeying its criminal masters is a political statement.
Surely the implication is quite clear. Deputy Fitzgerald has made the statement that the Government must obey its criminal masters. The implication is that the Government has no moral authority and that those who disobey its enactments are quite justified in doing so.
I did not say that.
The masters of the Government are the Irish people.
It is purely a matter of construction. It is purely a matter of how a person construes the statement. The statement made by Deputy Fitzgerald was that the Government are under the control or are influenced by criminal people, outside or inside. That is a purely political statement.
I do not mind. I am ready to withdraw it. It is not whether I say it or withdraw it that matters. It is the thing that is true that matters. That is the tragedy in this country at the moment——
I would suggest——
I am ready to withdraw it.
I suggest that the Deputy might deal very carefully with his suggestion that there are organisations for the express purpose of murder, as he very nearly indicated a few moments ago. He indicated the names of such organisations, the members of which are known.
Certainly, and they should be dealt with under the law, but are not.
If the Deputy persists in that line, I shall have to ask him to cease.
I suggest that there is a law in operation in this country which says that any organisation which does any of a certain number of things is unlawful, and then it proceeds to set out as unlawful the very things that are set out by that organisation amongst its chief aims and objects. That organisation is, therefore, unlawful, and the Government is clearly failing in its duty, indeed I might say it is prostituting its authority in failing to take proper action against that organisation.
I cannot allow the Deputy to say that anybody is guilty of murder until such time as the authority set up by this State to decide on that has so decided.
The only people I recognise as having the right to take life are the legitimate Government, and if other people claim that right, then I must say that their doctrine is the doctrine of murder. However, I am prepared to go off that. What I wanted to come to was the representations, I might say the history given here by the Minister for Industry and Commerce. He knows perfectly well that there is this organised opposition to freedom of speech. My own experience is that there was no adequate police protection given until it was clear that the members of the organisation which we will call the Blueshirts were going to give that protection. As a result, the people who came to deny the ordinary rights of citizens were, instead of injuring the people who wanted to exercise those rights, more likely themselves to be injured, and then there was more police protection given.
The Minister set out several items. The first stage, he said, was the uniform. There was no uniform at all as a first stage. The procession here in Dublin was banned before there was any uniform used. The Government indicated its clear disapproval and threatened action long before the uniform came in. Time and again, these organisations were denounced, irrespective of uniform. Now we find the outstanding feature of this Bill relates to the uniform, and why? Does the wearing of a uniform automatically make a man lawless? Is there something inherent in the uniform, something in its very nature which makes it dangerous to the State? Is there something about it morally or legally wrong? Nothing of the kind. But this Government proceeds to pick particularly upon the uniform.
The next item selected by the Minister for Industry and Commerce had relation to incitements to disorder. Wearing uniforms, he said, promotes a desire to support others, whether violently or peacefully. The wearing of a uniform certainly does promote a desire to support others, and it is a very worthy desire, a very right and proper thing. I can even quote Scripture in that respect: "It is better that two should be together than one, for this is the advantage of their society. If one falls he shall be supported by the other. Woe to him that is alone for when he falleth none shall lift him up." And again: "The brother that is helped by his brother is like a strong city." And the Blueshirts are like a strong city because they support one another. That is why they have to be suppressed now. When we went about unprotected and isolated the blackguards could attack us and make free speech impossible. Then we were not dangerous. But when brother supports brother and becomes like a strong city, then the whole anger of the Government rises up, the situation is no longer tolerable, and they determine to put a stop to it.
There is something innately wrong in organisation, we are told. The fact is that the Government have put forward no reasonable case in relation to uniforms. They have not been able to point out that we do incite to disorder. The Minister's third point was that opponents decide to uniform themselves. What is the position here? The question is who is A. and who is B.? The Blueshirts began to protect the citizens against an organisation that already existed, although that organisation was not uniformed. The Ministers seem to be talking the wrong way round and one might say that the Blueshirts are the reaction against the others. As the Minister stated, if constitutional rights justify uniforms why not other parties too, and so on to civil war.
What did this Government consider justifiable before the Blueshirts came along? They considered it justifiable for an organisation existing for the purpose of overthrowing this State by force of arms to have perfect freedom to organise, to have the police hold up traffic while they went about with their processions and to use their privileged position to try to seduce the whole youth of this country into paths of crime. That was what they considered justifiable, and then the Blueshirts came along to alter that situation and, thank God, they have altered it very considerably in spite of the Government. The fourth point of the Minister for Industry and Commerce was this: He talked of Austria's critical days and said that the Nazi ultimatum has expired. His fifth point was that one private army overthrows a Government and dictates. What private army proposes to overthrow the Government of this country and dictate? It is for the private army that this Government prostitutes its authority in order to relieve it from being made amenable to the law. That is the only private army that proposes that.
We are told the Blueshirts must be prohibited and that is the order the Minister for Industry and Commerce gives. The position is really peculiar. He might have stressed all sorts of other things about the Blueshirts, but what is stressed is the uniform, and why? Because the Blueshirts are the one body who have adopted the uniform and who make it abundantly clear who and what they are. The body that the Government want to protect does not wear a uniform. The only type of uniform, if one might call it that, that the members of that body indulge in is the mask in order to conceal the images of the men, because they do not want to be known when they are out doing certain work. They do not want uniforms. All their actions have been furtive and they have always wanted to avoid the light of day. They have threatened men with death unless those men committed perjury to save them from being brought to justice. The members of that particular organisation object very strongly to the Blueshirts having uniforms. It will be no hardship to the criminal organisations if this Bill prohibits uniforms, because they do not want them. It is significant that the Minister does not ban masks. The men with the masks are the men who go out to do certain work at night time. The Blueshirts go out in broad daylight and they are not afraid to show who and what they are. Yet they are singled out to be banned by this Government.
The Minister for Industry and Commerce talks about loud mouthed politicians whose greatest crime is that they are endeavouring, according to him, to revive old bitternesses and bring about disorder. What are the catch-cries on our side that are likely to revive old bitternesses? The other day I was coming out of a cathedral with Deputy Cosgrave, and supporters of the present Government shouted: "Murderers," and "Seventy-seven murders." Of course the seventy-seven was a wrong number, but the implication there was that when the last Government, protecting the people's rights and exercising its legitimate authority, brought crime to justice, the members of that Government were, therefore, murderers. That propaganda was spread about by the members of the Front Bench opposite, and was kept alive by them, and they now come in full of pious, hypocritical unction, and say: "We are trying to ameliorate the old bitternesses that those people over there are trying to fan up."
We did not want to start any particular organisation if the people's rights could be protected without it. The position was forced upon us, absolutely forced upon us, and forced upon us by the action and inaction of the Government opposite. Now when they see—having failed to do their duty, and having prostituted their authority —that the country is reacting against them, that the Blueshirt movement is growing from day to day, and that the youth of this country is no longer led into the ranks of the Communistic I.R.A., they ban the Blueshirt movement.
Would the Deputy say who gave him authority to protect the people's rights?
Who gave me authority?
Yes. Will you read that in the Scripture?
Certainly. Every man's duty is there, and here we have a Government that is not doing its duty. There is an innate right to organise. Every man has a right to protect himself.
That is not the question I asked.
I will tell you this, that when the Government's law is contrary to right reason, then it is not binding.
Who determines that?
That is an old question.
Who decides when the Government's law is contrary to right reason?
It used to be Deputy de Valera.
I am asking Deputy Fitzgerald what his teaching on that matter is.
There are certain laws that are quite above the Government's laws, and any law produced by the Government that runs contrary to them is clearly contrary to right reason.
Who determines that?
It is clearly contrary to right reason that the Government should not make a criminal organisation in this country amenable to the law, and should make law-abiding men, merely by a declaration of the Government, amenable to the law as though they belonged to an unlawful association. That is clearly an outrage on justice and an outrageous use of Government authority; it is clearly and demonstrably—although it does not need demonstration—contrary to right reason. If I go to address my constituents, and the supporters of the people opposite come along to assault me and those people who are assembled there, then I have an absolute right, according to right reason and irrespective of what the Minister for Industry and Commerce thinks about it, to see that I exercise my right without interference, and, if necessary, to protect myself by force.
Deputies
Hear, hear!
Deputy Norton over there talked about Kildare last Sunday; it seemed to have made him very uncomfortable. He talked about truncheons and knuckle-dusters.
The Vice-President knows all about it.
He said a most remarkable thing—that he could produce doctors who would say that the wounds they had treated had treated had been actually inflicted by a truncheon or by a knuckle-duster wielded by a man wearing a blue shirt. It is the most marvellous type of diagnosis anyone ever heard of, but Deputy Norton has promised that he will get those doctors to come and swear that they examined those wounds, and that they know perfectly well it was a Blueshirt inflicted them.
It is a good argument for Grangegorman.
He was very indignant. He did not say—and I watched what he did say—that those men in blue shirts, armed with truncheons and knuckle-dusters, went out to interfere with the citizens and assault them with those weapons. He said that citizens were assaulted, and, of course, he proposed that proof which I have mentioned. If I have reason to believe that a man is going to attack me, surely I have the right to at least have a defensive weapon which is of such a nature that I can only really use it when I am being attacked. If I go out with a gun I might, perhaps, shoot a man who is 300 yards away from me, but if I have a truncheon I can only hit a man when he is practically within arms length of me. The proposal is that we are to be unprotected. The Minister for Justice said to-day that members of the I.R.A. who fired rifle shots over the grave of some man were quite law-abiding because they had permission to have the rifles and to fire them, but other men whose lives are in danger from those very people are disarmed by this Government; they are not even to have a knuckle-duster or a stick, so that things will be perfectly safe for those people who put the Government in power just to carry out this policy, and so that they will not even get a cut or a bruise when they come to deprive citizens of their rights, and possibly even to murder them. Deputy Norton in the interests of all that is holy and beautiful is supporting this very Bill.
There has been talk about a dictatorship. I think it was the Minister for Justice who said Gen. O'Duffy talked about a dictatorship and a new system. When he talked about this dictatorship and a new system the only instance that he gave in our programme was the corporative State which, he said, is something new. That astounded me, because before a great many of the Deputies in this House were born the implications of the corporative State were clearly adumbrated by Pope Leo XIII. Those people go around the country in a most scandalous way, out raging all the instructions they have from the Church, and pretending they are governing according to the Encyclicals. According to the Minister for Justice, nobody in this country ever read an Encyclical, because the corporative State is most clearly set out by the Pope. The Minister for Education goes further, and says that if you are going to form a corporative State the proper Party to do that is the Labour Party. He even tried to incite the Labour Party to resist it, and said that the Labour Party would not stand idly by and see the trade unions and the trades union officials' jobs jeopardised. We are told authoritatively about the opposition between the Labour Party and the employers: "There cannot be a question of any perfect cure except this opposition be done away with," that is the opposition between the Labour Party and the employers, "and well-ordered members of the social body come into being anew, vocational groups, namely, binding men together not according to the position they occupy in the labour market but according to the diverse functions which they exercise in society." The Pope goes much further. He definitely refers, as follows, to a specific proposal with regard to the corporative State:—
"Within recent times, as all are aware, a special syndical and corporative organisation has been inaugurated which, in view of the subject of the present Encyclical, demands of us some mention and opportune comment. The State here grants legal recognition to the syndicate or union, and thereby confers on it some of the features of a monopoly, for, in virtue of this recognition, it alone can represent respectively working men and employers, and it alone can conclude labour contracts and labour agreements. Affiliation to the syndicate is optional for everyone; but in this sense only can the syndical organisation be said to be free, since the contribution to the union and other special taxes are obligatory for all who belong to a given branch, whether working men or employers, and the labour-contracts drawn up by the legal syndicate are likewise obligatory. It is true that it has been authoritatively declared that the legal syndicate does not exclude the existence of unrecognised trade associations. The corporations are composed of representatives of the unions of working men and employers of the same trade or profession, and, as true and genuine organs and institutions of the State, they direct and co-ordinate the activities of the unions in all matters of common interest. Strikes and lockouts are forbidden. If the contending parties cannot come to an agreement, public authority intervenes. Little reflection is required to perceive the advantage of the institution thus summarily described: peaceful collaboration of the classes, repression of Socialist organisations and efforts, the moderating influence of a special ministry."
Now we are denounced as attempting to set up a dictatorship in this country on no other grounds than that we have incorporated something on those lines as part of our policy. The Minister for Justice complains that we are proposing something which was never heard of in this country before. I misunderstood one point. He talked about rapid trips on the Mediterranean giving people certain ideas as to what could be done here. It was the Minister for Industry and Commerce showed me a possible meaning. I had thought, when he was talking about those rapid trips on the Continent and about their giving people certain ideas, that he was referring to the light beer business.
You get that at Geneva.
That is not a joke at all.
It was not a joke— this business of dictating to us exactly how we are going to run things. The Government objects to what we wear as a political organisation, and Deputy Norton objects to the way in which we give out our orders to our own organisation. He objects to the fact that the Director-General of the Blueshirts, not being a member of this House, dared to give an instruction, and he considered it something undemocratic. He says that everything should be on a democratic basis. What does he mean by that? We know that what President de Valera means, when he speaks of democracy, is autocracy and merely mob rule, but what Deputy Norton means is something that has been ratified by the last congress of the Trade Union Congress or something that was codified by the Fabian Society in England and is never more to be questioned. This constant misunderstanding of words——
The Deputy need not recognise us as a Government if he does not want to.
I do; I am bound to. I recognise that the Fianna Fáil Government in this country is the authoritative Government and that I am bound to be submissive to law, not only by virtue of the civil law but by virtue of the binding nature of my own conscience. What I object so very strongly to as regards the Government is that the Government is constantly propounding sedition. I give allegiance to the State. The Minister for Education read out a passage from a speech by me, in 1931, and I agree with everything I said, and not only do I agree with it, but every right-minded man in this country would necessarily agree with it. The thing was not to be answered, but, because of some peculiar mental limitation of that unfortunate man, he thought it was something that was going immediately to condemn the man who propounded it. He quoted Deputy Cosgrave as saying that there was a duty of allegiance to the State, and then he had to twist round the words and say afterwards that by virtue of President Cosgrave, as he was at the time, talking about the duty of allegiance to the State, this Government, therefore, has the right to claim the active support and co-operation of all people. This Government has a right certainly to the active support and co-operation of all the people in producing the general well-being, but for this Government to claim that, when it is doing all that is humanly possible to injure the people of this country and to corrupt the people of this country, we are bound by some new moral law invented by themselves to support and assist them and to connive with them in doing that, is a claim which, personally, I have no intention under any circumstances of ever allowing.
The whole point of view put forward by the Government is that as they have been elected as the Government, we are bound to support them, and the people of this country are bound to support them, and not to utter a word of criticism on all the appalling acts they are doing to the detriment of this country. The Minister for Education almost whined about the fact that we are sometimes critical of the Government, and the Minister for Industry and Commerce turned round on me yesterday when he said that he was speaking as a Minister and not as a member of a political Party. Everybody in this House knew perfectly well that he was speaking as a particularly —if I might use the word without offence; I cannot think of a better— unscrupulous Party politician, and I went so far as to say "Question," suggesting that I did not necessarily accept fully his statement in assuring the House, against all apparent truth, that he was speaking as a Minister and not as a Party politician. He turned round and said that that was the sort of sedition that had to be put down in this country. Note that this Bill gives the decision on all these points into the hands of an Executive Council who think that it is compatible with freedom that we are to be forced to think or to pretend to think that every futile thing they are doing is the acme of human wisdom.
Just a week or so ago there came up in this House the question of the censorship of United Ireland. The Attorney-General, having seen it, proposed that certain things be excised. Otherwise, it was all right, and everything else that he saw in it was not seditious, according to him, but the President got up and denounced the Attorney-General in this House and said that, by Jove, if he had been doing the job—knowing much more about law than the Attorney-General—he would have excised this other bit and would not have stood for it. The Minister for Industry and Commerce yesterday said that merely to question his statement, when he chose to say that he was speaking as a great national statesman and not as a party politician, is sedition—and into those people's hands the Labour Party proposes to place all this enormous power, and just note how enormous the power is. The Minister for Justice said yesterday in, as one might say, mitigation of what he was doing in this Bill, that it is not as severe as the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution. This is in addition to the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution. It is being brought in because they found that there were not sufficient coercive powers given to the Government under the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution, and yet they are the Party which got up and got blue in the face—and Deputy Hogan yesterday said that he believed they were sincere; I do not know how anybody like Deputy Hogan could be taken in by such humbug—and fulminated against that Bill as an outrage against freedom. They now agree that it does not give sufficient coercive power, and they must take further powers to be used by them, in a prostituted way, for the crushing and elimination of their political opponents in this country.
I must say that when people get up here and state, without, as one might say, putting a tooth in it, that they stand for a certain thing and are not ashamed of it, I have some respect for them, but the utter contemptousness of the Deputy Norton business here to-day is something which is really degrading to human nature.
To democracy—that you stand for.
I stand certainly for a form of democracy, but I do not stand for what Deputy Davin stands for, and I think that there is, therefore, a prima facie case for saying that I stand for something fairly good. Then we have this business of talking about private armies with regard to the Blueshirts. An army, I presume, is called an army because it has arms. The Blueshirt organisation does not propose to arm its members. I am not going to say that you might not find an odd Blueshirt who possessed an arm, but I will say that I am quite satisfied that there are not as many illegal arms held by members of the Blueshirt organisation as there are by members of President de Valera's organisation. I am quite satisfied that they have many more but, as he said himself, he does not propose to go out after the arms so far as these people who put him into power are concerned, but he is determined to take any coercive power that is required to put down an unarmed organisation like the Blueshirts.
Deputy Norton thought that he had a great thing when it was stated that the Parliamentary system is not Irish. Just on a matter of fact, is the Parliamentary system Irish? I think it is a very creditable thing for the English that they are really the arch propounders and inventors and promulgators of the Parliamentary system, but it does not follow that because a thing was made in England it is necessarily bad and should be replaced. I, personally, think that it is abundantly clear that it should be changed and reformed. It has been pointed out often, by more authoritative people than I am, that it is clear that Governments have taken on more business than they can attend to, and have taken on so much business, which is not properly theirs, that they do not look after their proper business properly, and it is certainly desirable that there should be an intermediate state between the naked individual and the Government in the form of corporations. It does seem to me that, until it is proved to the contrary, it is desirable that those corporations should be given certain statutory powers which they will use much more effectively and with greater justice than can possibly be done by such an assembly as a Parliament. I, for one, speaking for myself, certainly entirely agree that the present Parliamentary form has proved itself inadequate and is calculated to prove itself harmful and that there should be a change.
Deputy Norton talked on this Bill and told us he was voting for it because he hopes one thing and he believes the other. Everybody knows there have been illegal organisations here before this Government came into power, but up to the time this Government came into power they were not functioning. When this Government came into power these illegal organisations were given a new lease of life. They were given freedom and encouragement to go round and recruit into their ranks young men who were asked to accept doctrines contrary to the morality preached by the Hierarchy in this country. These organisations have consistently, during the last two years, endeavoured to deny the Opposition their constitutional rights. The Government has Amendment 17 to the Constitution in operation and this enables them to deal adequately with these illegal organisations.
We had Deputy Lemass saying: "If you have one organisation wearing uniforms the one danger in that is that it may produce others." I will admit that it was the situation created by the unlawful action of the Fianna Fáil supporters and the I.R.A. in this country which made it necessary to start the Blueshirts. If the Government were honestly concerned about that situation in the country what would have been a clear demonstration of their honesty of purpose? It would have been this: that having seen that the Blueshirt organisation was made necessary by the action of certain unlawful organisation to which I have referred, they would proceed to put those unlawful and illegal organisations out of operation. Then they could turn round to the Blueshirts and say to them: "You see that these illegal organisations who are interfering with you are now done away with, and that those evils which made it necessary for the Blueshirts to be created have ceased. Therefore, you have no longer any reason for continuing the Blueshirt organisation." That would be a fair argument to use towards a simple minded person like Deputy Norton.
Has the Government done anything in that direction? Nothing at all. When there was a riot and an attempted murder in Tralee the President of the Executive Council went down there to apologise to the people of Tralee for having to put some of the rioters into prison. It was reported, and not contradicted, that Mrs. MacBride, speaking at a meeting protesting against certain conditions in Arbour Hill Military Barracks made the statement that when in Arbour Hill she met the Minister for Defence and that he had turned to her and said, when she was complaining about the cells in Arbour Hill, "Would it not be a terrible thing if the place were made more comfortable for the Blueshirts?" I do not know whether that is true or not, but it was not contradicted. If it is true what does it mean? That this Government which has outraged justice is not motived by a desire to promote justice but by a desire of vindictiveness—to make certain people suffer so that they may be empowered to inflict greater injustice and punishment upon others who have broken no law.
Within the last fortnight there was a riot in Dundalk and some days afterwards there was apparently a meeting called to protest against the presence of Blueshirts. Only one man turned up at that meeting to protest against the Blueshirts. That man was the sole solitary survivor of what must have been a big thing. The others must have been called off by Mr. Aiken, Minister for Defence. If the Minister were to tell the truth it means this: that a member of the Government was associated with men who did what he wanted them to do, to make a protest against the existence of Blueshirts in Drogheda so as to give this Government an opportunity of saying: "there is strong indignation everywhere around the country against the existence of the Blueshirts.""Strong indignation" is a humbug and it is a humbug that is being worked by members of the Front Bench opposite.
Suppose what the Government says was true that these riots at our meetings only come about by reason of the fact of men being there in blue shirts— which is clearly untrue because my own experience is that it was impossible to have a meeting anywhere in the country before we had the Blueshirts and we have got good meetings now. But supposing it were true, what does it amount to, what does it mean in effect? It means that if you want to deprive citizens of their rights, you have only to create disorderly conditions in the country. The Government will not punish you for having created these disorderly conditions but it will punish the people whom you have attacked. That is a doctrine which will lead to an outrageous state of things in the country. If I am exercising my rights and somebody comes along and attacks me in the exercise of my rights am I the person who is to be punished or blamed by the Government or is it the actual law-breaker who has attacked me? The argument put forward by the Government is an argument calculated to create conditions in this country which will make law impossible.
Because the I.R.A and the Fianna Fáil people go around and attack meetings held by the Opposition it is held by the Government that it is wrong on the part of the Opposition to hold those meetings. If it were unlawful for us to hold those meetings there would be something in that argument but the law gives us the right to hold meetings, and we are to be banned because the followers of Fianna Fáil are acting unlawfully and criminally. Another suggestion put forward by the Minister for Industry and Commerce or possibly it was by the Minister for Education, was this: The United Ireland Party hold a meeting and people come along from Fianna Fáil and I.R.A. to beat the people who were at that meeting; but in their attempt to break up that meeting and inflict suffering on the people attending it, these attackers find that instead of succeeding they themselves actually get beaten away and they suffer. Then we are told that that is a situation that must be stopped because it will promote reprisals.
The Minister justifies reprisals against people who dare to defend themselves against the bullies who dare to deprive them of their rights. That is the point of view put forward here by the Government—that uniform at meetings creates disorder in this country. But these disorders were here and were permitted by the Government before these uniforms were worn. The Blueshirts is an entirely different type of organisation from that type of organisation which goes around at night armed with guns breaking into houses. The Minister complains that the organisation puts a strain on the authorities. Is it the fact of our holding meetings that puts a strain on the authorities, or is the strain put on the authorities by the action of their supporters who go to break up our meetings? And if our meetings are broken up, are not these attackers the people against whom the law should be put in force, and not the people exercising their rights?
We are supposed to be rational human beings. But according to the Ministers on the Front Benches their followers seem to be like bulls who become excited when they see red. The supporters of the Government become excited when they see blue, and the Ministers tell us that it creates bitterness and the Blueshirt organisation is to be banned because the supporters of the Minister cannot control themselves when they see blue! Yesterday the Minister for Finance came along and began accusing people outside of murder and shouting "murder" here. He is the type of man who is capable of creating bitterness, because he is incapable of thinking along any other lines or in any other terms than in terms of bitterness. I am prepared personally to forget everything about the President's past, but certainly when he gets up here and misrepresents things I feel it my duty to get up here and correct him, but that does not matter a great deal. Even with his past it is possible for him to be quite a decent man in the future. I would like to see some signs of that. We have been told that the uniform is copied from other countries. All sorts of things have been copied from other countries.
Trousers.
I would like to point out that the Minister for Justice yesterday was telling us about all these things done in other countries. I just noted that he said the thing was put in operation by the king in a certain country. Now the king is above all Parties and above all politicians, and I presume he is not moved by Party spirit or Party vindictiveness. To show that there is not a complete analogy between the situation in this country and others, it is those Ministers over there, who during the last two years were in office, are to be given these abnormal powers under which they have broken the law themselves. They also told the police to break the law under the Seventeenth Amendment. They are now going to take these additional powers and say, in taking them, that it is all right as in other countries the king operates them. The Minister implied all the time that there was a direct identity, more than an analogy, between us and other countries. He spoke about Switzerland. The situation there was something that I knew about. In Switzerland about one-quarter of the population are Italian in race and language, and were the last people to be incorporated into the Federation. You can step across the street and walk from Switzerland into Italy. In Italy there was a Fascist organisation, the Blackshirts. In Switzerland there was also a Black-shirt organisation which the Government felt was really controlled from Italy and was being operated in Italian interests. They were, therefore, very nervous of the Fascisti. There was no relationship to that position here.
The Minister said that because they were wearing certain types of shirts in other countries, and doing certain types of things, therefore we were doing them. I want to debate the matter on the exact position. I believe it was a good thing in the interests of law that our organisation here should be put into uniform in the form of blue shirts. When you go to a meeting, it is certainly well to be able to see who are your supporters and who are not. I often go to meetings and the people come into the front, and you do not know whether they are supporters or not. You have a position of disorder such as Deputy Norton and I had in 1927 when, at a meeting in Rathmines Town Hall, there was an absolute riot. As was typical of him, he allowed himself to be cowed and would not stand up to them, but I certainly made my speech. There was a riot there. It was impossible for any stewarding to prevent a riot there. The people all came in and took up their position there, and certain strong supporters of the Government opposite—I happen to recognise some of them—were right in the front. If our supporters at meetings are in uniform, they can take up their position, and we know where they are, and it makes stewarding very much easier. This law is to prevent that.
This law, it must be remembered, is in addition to the Seventeenth Amendment of the Constitution. The Government, even though they have broken the law and outraged the law of the Seventeenth Amendment, still found that it has not completely fulfilled their purpose, because their purpose is clearly a dictatorship. They object to the fact that the people of the country should belong to any other organisation than the organisation which they control. Deputy Norton talked about freedom. If I remember rightly, it was only a couple of days ago that there was a query from the Labour Party indicating that unless a man belonged to a trades union, to be completely bossed by the members of the Labour Party, he was to be deprived of the ordinary right to have something to eat and to live. That is the type of freedom apparently that Deputy Norton wants. The Government object to anybody who is not shouting "Up de Valera," and "What a splendid economic policy." We are not to be allowed to think in this country. Their only way of preventing us thinking is to take enormous coercive powers, and to use them as dictators, to see that they are going to be not merely kept in power, but not made uncomfortable by having the truth occasionally stated about them and their policy.
That is the purpose of the Bill. That is what the Labour Party is voting for. They are voting to indicate that they consider the coercive measures which they denounced in 1931 were not sufficiently coercive, and that this Government, which has proved itself the enemy of justice, that has been deaf and blind to justice, that has no regard whatever for impartiality, that has used its power to corrupt the people, should have full dictatorial powers and be completely masters of the unfortunate people.
Then Deputy Norton, when it is in the very act of doing that, turns round and does the patriot, and protests against Deputy Hogan having suggested yesterday that the action of some people in this country justified what was stated in relation to themselves, and what was stated about the whole of us, that they are unfit for self-government. If there was ever any proof of some of the Irish people being clearly not fit for self-government, it was the contemptible line taken to-day by Deputy Norton.
The Deputy who has just spoken is, in my opinion, the last Deputy in this House who, from his own language, is likely to forget the dirty, bloody history of the civil war period. On every conceivable occasion, when given the opportunity, in this House under cover of a political measure, he came here for the last ten or 11 years and made the same speech and the same charges against the present Government when in opposition that he has made here to-day when they are here as a Government. I am one of the people who have a sincere hope that the time is not far away when the political parties in this country will be able to come together in some conference-room and compose their differences on some of the major issues now in dispute, and particularly the dispute with another country. But, when it comes, I hope Deputy Fitzgerald will not be one of the people who will represent the Party opposite at such a conference. If he does, it is almost certain that such a conference will be a failure, because he will go there for the sole purpose of making it a failure.
This Government justly and rightly claims the right to have a mandate to do many things. They were returned at the last election by a majority vote of the people. If they got a mandate for anything they got a mandate to preserve peace and to administer the laws passed in this Parliament in a fair, firm and impartial manner. Can the Government, or anybody who speaks for this Government, say that they have carried out that primary duty? If not why have they failed to do so? The Government, in my opinion, certainly have not preserved peace in this country, because they have failed, within the last three or four months especially, to provide the right of free speech for their political opponents. If they have not done that, the Opposition have some responsibility for the Government's failure in this respect. The Bill now before the House is the very best proof that can be given that the Government have failed to carry out their essential duty in regard to the preservation of peace and order in this State. I believe myself that the supporters, or a section of the supporters, of this Government were originally responsible for the creation of the Blueshirt movement. I may say, at the outset, that I am definitely and conscientiously opposed to any political party in this country having at its disposal, or as part of its organisation, a body of men or women, or boys and girls, who will parade in semi-military uniform, and if this measure was introduced by any other Government, under the circumstances which we know to exist in this country to-day, I would be as much in favour of it, for the very same reasons.
I am not so concerned whether they wear badges or not, because most of the people who meet them in the streets, or on country roads, would not know what these badges represented, except they made a close examination of them. Of course, we are told by the Opposition that it is absolutely essential for their preservation that they should have men and women, and even boys and girls, parading in uniform for the purpose of maintaining that political Party in existence. Does anyone with common sense suggest that it is necessary to have women parading in blue blouses in order to maintain a political party, or, as has happened during the past few days, to encourage boys and young girls to do so? I do not know if they were encouraged to attend convent schools in a blue uniform.
The statement is incorrect with regard to boys or girls.
I have not much respect for the intelligence of fathers or mothers who allow young children to attend schools wearing the uniform of Blueshirts or other organisations.
Do not be hedging.
It happened in the Deputy's constituency.
It is a lie, and the Deputy knows it.
The Deputy is aware that he cannot accuse another member of stating a lie.
May I say that the Deputy's statement is absolutely untrue, and the Deputy knows it to be?
General O'Duffy, the supreme leader and dictator, of the party with which Deputy Morrissey is associated, has issued an order to-day——
It is not Parliamentary to say: "The Deputy's statement is untrue, and the Deputy knows it." It is a euphemism for lying.
The statement made by the Deputy was made by the Minister for Industry and Commerce last night, and it is absolutely untrue. Deputy Davin knows that it is untrue.
I point to the statement made by General O'Duffy in the Press that speaks his mind in this country, as the best proof that what I have said is true.
Not at all. The Deputy is talking through his hat.
That statement is not correct, Deputy.
Perhaps if Deputy Morrissey had his Chief Whip beside him he would not make the statement he has made.
I was Chief Whip of the Party that the Deputy is now in.
I would like to know from the Minister for Justice, or from whoever replies on behalf of the Government, what is the exact nature of the latest orders given by the Ministry for the preservation of peace at public meetings. The House is the proper place to give that information. Let us have the information so that we can judge for ourselves if proper and effective steps were really taken, at any time, to preserve the right of free speech for the leaders, or spokesmen, of political parties. I think Deputy Hogan was quite correct in his description of what happened at most of the meetings that were held, in regard to affording protection to the spokesmen of the Blueshirt organisation, or the U.I. Party. The Guards attend in large numbers, and at considerable expense to the State, but they simply divide the mob that comes there for the purpose of interrupting, or breaking up the meetings, from the sympathisers and others who are, perhaps, neutral in their attendance. I suggest to the Minister for Justice that that method has proved to be a failure, and that if the police forces are to get proper instructions to prevent intimidation, and to prevent mobs from breaking up public meetings in future, they should be told to clear the mob element away, and to deal with them in a more effective way, by arresting or charging the leaders of those who go to these meetings for the purpose of preventing politicians and public men from putting their views before those who want to listen to them. I am entitled to ask for definite information as to what specific instructions have been given by the Minister for Justice, or by the Cabinet, to the police, in connection with these very important matters.
I also am entitled to know what instructions will be given to the Guards if and when this measure comes into operation, so far as using their discretion to seize uniforms and badges. The Minister for Justice said that the terms of the Bill give the Guards discretion to seize uniforms and badges, and that the police have ample powers in that respect. Am I to understand that the instructions to the police will be to seize only badges now worn, or that may be worn in the future, by the Blueshirt organisation, and that no other organisations, whether green, black or other colour, are to be interfered with? We know that the I.R.A. at present represents a very large number of individuals in this State. Are we to understand that while the Blueshirts are to be deprived of their uniform, other organisations, such as the I.R.A. are to be allowed to go round wearing some particular form of uniform or some form of badge? Let us be clear about this, because if I am to vote for this measure it is for the purpose of having it fairly and impartially applied towards every section of men, women and children who may infringe its terms.
All badges.
The Deputy will have an opportunity of making his speech. I am sorry that his inspiration, Deputy Anthony, is not there to help him.
I prefer to have Deputy Anthony's inspiration to the Deputy's.
I realise, and otherwise I would not say it, that we are living in a civil war atmosphere. I say that deliberately. Anyone who knows anything about conditions prevailing in certain parts of the country to-day should say it, if he believes it, and should try to help in his own way to avert it, or having to pay for the luxury of a second civil war, inside ten or 11 years. If I thought that by giving the powers contained in this Bill the Government would administer the measure in a partisan spirit, or administer in such a way as to deprive political opponents of their constitutional rights, I would, if I had the power, put the Government to the country, and would even wipe out the Labour Party, before giving any such powers. A civil war can be brought about by people on the opposite side not acknowledging the law, by challenging the law and operating, as they have been operating in semi-military or military uniform, and organising people for the sole purpose of smashing up the power of this Parliament which was established by a free vote of the Irish people. That is undoubtedly the object of the General at the head of the Blueshirts. He said that was the policy.
He never said that.
Having some knowledge of conditions in the country I believe that a section of the supporters of the present Government have a very grave responsibility for the creation of the Blueshirt organisation. We are told, and I believe we are entitled to believe, that the Blueshirt organisation was founded originally to help the leaders of the political Party in opposition to get a fair hearing. Had these people received the hearing which they were entitled to receive from the very large section of the people who believed in real freedom I believe there would be no Blueshirt organisation in existence to-day. I also believe that many of the blunders made by this Government, the blunder of bringing General O'Duffy into court, and giving him a free advertisement at the expense of the taxpayers, has also helped to bring a considerable number of recruits into the Blueshirt organisation. I firmly believe that. There are people on those benches who believe it. General O'Duffy is that type of vain man who likes to see his photograph in the newspapers every other day, or his name mentioned somewhere in them. Nobody has done a greater service to advertise him freely, at the expense of the taxpayers in some instances, than the present Government by bringing him into court on frivolous charges in some cases; at any rate, frivolous in the sense that they have not brought it home to him that he has committed any particular crime against any law.
Judgment has not been given yet.
I do not want to say anything about cases in which judgment has been reserved. If this measure is going to be impartially administered it is absolutely essential that the State forces entrusted with that serious responsibility will not be interfered with by politicians or instructed to carry out any particular political decisions. We have plenty of evidence that even Deputies of this House, and I regret to say Deputies on the Government benches, have publicly interfered with the Guards. They have publicly condemned the Guards for doing what they believed to be their duty. We had a case in Limerick some time ago of a public meeting that was attended by three or four Deputies who sit on the Government benches. They publicly condemned the Guards without, I presume, having heard the Guards' answer; without having investigated the charges made in the proper governmental way. They demanded the removal of certain high officers in the Guards in that particular area. Recently, we had the case of the Chairman of the Government Party organisation, Deputy Maguire, making similar charges, and publicly condemning the Guards—calling for the removal of responsible officers from the area which he represents in this House. I say that is uncalled for.
I think it is very questionable conduct on the part of Government Party Deputies to be interfering in the political sense with the Guards in the discharge of their duties. The Minister for Justice is responsible to this House so far as the Guards are concerned, and the Commissioner is responsible to the Minister. If officers of the Guards do not perform their duties faithfully, then it is the Minister's duty to remove them or to deal with them in a disciplinary way. I think it is very unfair on the part of Government Deputies to go out publicly and condemn the Guards on charges made before any inquiry or investigation has been held. I think that is a very wrong thing to do. I am aware that in my own area the conduct of officers of the Guards, sergeants and even ordinary guards, has been discussed at local Fianna Fáil club meetings, and that resolutions from those meetings have been sent to the Minister for Justice. The Minister can contradict me if he can, but I take the liberty of saying that during the last couple of months a large number of such resolutions have reached his office. If that kind of thing were to be allowed to go on I would have very grave fears about giving the powers contained in this Bill to the Government. If this measure is to be impartially administered, that must be done under cover of instructions publicly made known through this House to the people of the country and to the Guards. I think Deputies should leave the Guards to do their duty in accordance with the instructions given.
The Minister for Justice rather surprised me when endeavouring to make a case for the Second Reading of this Bill. He actually quoted particulars of legislation passed in other Parliaments to deal with what he said was the same kind of menace which had sprung up in continental countries during the past year. Surely no one in this country will say that either the position here or the outlook of the people here is in any way comparable to the outlook and condition of the people in the continental countries which the Minister mentioned. The principal leaders of the two political parties in this country are exposing themselves daily, weekly and monthly at home and abroad as the leading Catholic political leaders of the whole world. They paraded themselves on certain occasions before the Pope in Rome and got certain decorations. But what do they do when they come back here, great Catholics and great Christians as they are? When they come back from Rome, after making a general confession there, they are so Irish that they will not speak to one another.
And charge Deputy Mulcahy with being in Glasgow.
I do not know——
Deputy Norton——
If Deputy Mulcahy wants to speak I will give way.
Deputy Norton joined up with the President in declaring that I attempted to be a military dictator.
Deputy Norton never suggested what Deputy Morrissey has just suggested: that he joined with the President in charging you with having been to the British Minister for War.
I did not say that.
It is the same as if Deputy Norton sat alongside the President and supported him singing "The Bonnie Banks of Loch Lomond," the President taking the high notes and Deputy Norton taking the low notes.
As far as I know Deputy Norton's views—it is his business to speak for himself—if he had his way the man who persuaded the President to make such an unfounded allegation would not be in the service of this State.
He is not in the service of this State.
And would have no place in the public life of this State.
Is he a servant of this State?
Order.
It has been contended that the Blueshirts have not been acting in a provocative manner. I believe that they have, and I want to say this to Deputy O'Higgins. There are many men wearing blue shirts in the county that the Deputy comes from and in the constituency that both of us represent that he would not be seen dead with during the pre-Truce period.
I would rather be seen alive with them.
There are many men in that county and in other constituencies supplying funds to these people to parade at Blueshirt meetings to-day who certainly would not supply funds to the Sinn Féin movement in pre-Truce times.
We are out for unity, for bringing all together. We want the bitterness of that period forgotten.
Some of them in that area that I know are a curious collection.
Must they always be ostracised?
I believe that persons in blue shirts at public meetings, especially when they parade before the public meeting takes place, are acting in a provocative way. For the same reason I believe that people wearing other types of uniform, associated with other political Parties, are helping to create further provocation: to build up an organisation on the other side. The Blueshirt organisation in this country, so far as my information goes, has helped in some areas in the country to increase, and increase considerably, the number of men who are now members of the I.R.A. That is the service that it is rendering to the country. It is helping to build up and to make stronger the I.R.A., which would not be anything like what it is were it not for the provocation given in certain parts of the country by the activities of the Blueshirts, their parading and so on.
I disagree with many things which this Government has done since it came into office. I admit that the Government was put into office by the free vote of the Irish people in February, 1932, at an election which was as free as any election held in any country in the world. The minority in this House, and in the country, have no right to build up behind them an organisation of a semi-military character which is set up for the sole purpose of bringing down the Government elected by the free will of the people. I was glad— and I am a member of this House since it was set up —I was delighted on the first day I saw the Fianna Fáil Deputies march into this House, because, when I saw them come in here, I said that constitutional government had been made safe for a considerable period by their coming in here. I was much more delighted when I got the opportunity myself of helping to put that Party into office by my vote, because I did so for the purpose of enabling the people of this country to have an opportunity of an alternative Government and to enable them to see, as they are now seeing, and as they will see more in the future, that the promises the Government made when they were in opposition are in many cases impossible to fulfil. I did that deliberately, and, by so doing, I considered that I was doing a good work for constitutional government in this country.
Mention some of the cases of unfulfilled promises.
The next year or two will tell, and the people will be wiser as the years go by.
What about your own promises?
In reply to Deputy Donnelly, I may tell him that I never promised a beet factory to every town in my constituency, and I never told my constituents that I would buy a private residence and reside on the outskirts of every town in my constituency. Consequently, I will not have to face the people in the future with the crime on my conscience of having broken such foolish promises. I am voting, without any reservation, for the passage of this measure, for the purpose, as I believe, of preventing further civil war in this country. I have every hope that the Minister for Justice and his colleagues in the Cabinet, backed by the Party elected by the people of this country, will administer that measure in such a way as to prevent such an occurrence happening in the lifetime of the youngest member in this House. One civil war in the lifetime of any Deputy in this House is enough. One civil war is enough in a generation. The civil war had to be paid for by the money and by the blood of the innocent majority of this country. It is the innocent majority who always have to pay for the follies of the leaders who help to create the conditions that bring about a civil war. I would say to the Opposition that they have the opportunity now of accepting a majority decision of this House on that matter, and I say to General O'Duffy, who is not a Deputy of this House, that he has a far greater chance of leading a majority back into this House in the future by carrying on a constitutional political organisation, free from militarism, than he has by following his present tactics. The majority of the people of this country do not want any armies, private or otherwise.
What about the 15,000 you voted for last year?
If I had my way I would disband the National Army. If I had my way I would take every gun away from the National Army and from the private armies, and would bring them out in the Lord Mayor's yacht and dump them in the sea, if the Lord Mayor is willing to lend his yacht for that very desirable purpose. The majority of the people want to live in peace and harmony with each other and not to be interfered with by Greenshirts or Blueshirts. As far as I can understand their mentality, they do not want to hear anything about the creation of armies or semi-military bodies of that character behind the political Parties in this State. I hope and trust that this measure will be administered in a fair and impartial manner. If it is administered in a fair and impartial manner, as it is the duty of the Government to administer it and not to use it in a vindictive way, the future will tell that the passage of this measure will have done good work for the future peace and progress of this country.
Were it not for the second last sentence of Deputy Davin's speech, I should be completely puzzled as to what his attitude was with regard to this Bill. He performed a rather difficult accomplishment, and he performed it rather with the skill of an experienced expert. He whistled two tunes at the same time; but I will say that, at any rate this time, he decided to give a vote. He is coming on, and I hope he will keep on in that direction, and that, even though it is against my view, he will stand up according to the convictions he has, and follow that statement with a vote.
Certainly.
There were one or two things he mentioned in the course of his statement, and I do not think he would have mentioned them unless he was misinformed. One statement was grossly unfair to General O'Duffy and his whole organisation. That statement was that the General issued instructions to school children going to school to wear the badge of the organisation or the uniform.
I did not make that statement. I think if the Deputy gets the shorthand notes he will find that I did not make that statement.
A Deputy's statement as to what he said or did not say must be accepted in this House.
If the Deputy asserts that he did not say it, I accept his statement, of course; but perhaps I might put it that he conveyed to this House that it was by the direction of General O'Duffy that these political badges or the uniform of the organisation were brought into the school life and that, as a result, bitterness and disagreement had arisen in school life.
Would Deputy O'Higgins accept this—that if General O'Duffy did not say it, some of his supporters in Cork said it and advocated it?
Deputy O'Higgins is in possession and has not given way.
I am dealing now with General O'Duffy and the views of the organisation. No member of the executive of an organisation can be held responsible for every individual utterance by every individual member of that organisation down through the country. I want to point out that even from the early days of the Army Comrades Association some 18 months ago, I myself gave specific instructions to many colleges and schools that, during the school term or while attending school or college, the badge of the organisation should not be worn. That policy has been consistently carried on inside the successive organisations that succeeded that Association; and it is not fair to the executive or to the head of the organisation even to suggest by implication that any disagreement or bitterness that crept into any school was due to any act of, or even due to any connivance from, the head of the organisation. That is clear enough, and if it is not sufficiently clear, I will make it clearer.
That is one statement I was anxious to contradict, and there is another statement on which I should like more information. When the Deputy was speaking, and when Deputy Morrissey interrupted him, he referred to the fact that, at all events, his Party had wiped out Deputy Morrissey. I expect that in his reference to wiping out he really meant that he and his Party had expelled Deputy Morrissey from the Labour Party. I asked why, and I was not answered.
I did not hear the Deputy.
I was not answered, and I did not expect an answer, when the Deputy was speaking on his feet, defending the very measure which Deputy Morrissey was expelled from the Party for supporting under other conditions, and more dangerous and more difficult conditions, than those prevailing at the moment.
Other conditions. Now you are at it.
There is just one other thing I would like to mention and I will finish with my colleague. He referred to the fact, further, that General O'Duffy had declared his intention to smash the Parliament of this country. Now, that is not correct.
He said it was un-Irish.
Wait now! This particular shoe might be un-Irish and you can call it un-Irish. Would it be fair to say, because you called it un-Irish, that you were out to smash the shoe? Deputies should be careful in talking about public men and about men who figure prominently in the public life of the country. It would be a very serious thing if any man, even an obscure man, but even though obscure, with some influence in the country, got up and declared his intention to smash the Parliament of this country; but it would be a hellish thing if a man in a prominent position in public life and with great influence in the country should do so. It is, therefore, very, very serious for a Front Bench Deputy, for a man who can put the 'phone to his ear at any time and ascertain the accuracy or inaccuracy of his statements—it is a very serious thing for a Deputy in that position to come to this House and play recklessly and freely and falsely with the statements of any public figure in the life of this country. I admit that things are just as dangerous in this country, that there is a little bit of electricity in the atmosphere— more than is healthy and more than is safe. If there is anything calculated to send a spark along that electricity, it is the kind of reckless statements and speeches made by Deputy Davin.
It was not reckless; it was quite deliberate.
It is a reckless thing to make a statement of which you are not quite sure about a public man when you can ascertain whether it is true or not by going to the next room and taking up the telephone. That is all I have to say on that point. I hope that when Deputy Davin stands up in future he will be more careful in his references both to parties and individuals and that he will be particularly careful when referring to an individual who does not happen to be a member of this House.
What about the Press? His speech was reported in the Press.
The same applies to the Press. The Press has an influence in this country second only to that of the Deputy. The Press has got to be very careful of the statements it makes and it has got to be very careful—I have spoken on this matter before— with regard to the accuracy of its reports. I listened to the discussion on this Bill—a Bill admittedly designed to pull the shirts off the political opponents of the present Government, a Bill which, according to the Minister, is designed for the purpose of de-shirting his political opponents. As I listened to the discussion, I thought that there was surely enough crime in this country and surely enough undetected criminals without the whole lot of us sitting down deliberately to manufacture a new crime, and, if possible, to manufacture a new set of criminals. If we had reached the point in the life of this country at which we could say "crime has practically disappeared or, if crime has not disappeared, at least, we are getting after and grabbing by the neck all the criminals and there is no undetected crime in the country"— if we had reached that point, there might be some excuse for our sitting down to manufacture new crimes and taking the risk, at least, of manufacturing 100,000 new criminals. Remember, when we are dealing with this kind of thing, we are, as I said before, dealing with young blood. Young blood is hot blood and there is a point beyond which you cannot safely provoke young blood. If this Bill ever becomes law, I am very much inclined to think we shall have reached the point beyond which we cannot get those individuals to submit any further. They have submitted to humiliation. They have submitted to what cheap minds would call "degradation." They have bowed their knee before Power, even though they opposed bitterly that Power. They have bent their neck and walked under the yoke in a humble manner time and again in the last six months. Inside that organisation, time after time, it took lengthy argument, courage, determination, supplication to get that organisation to bow to the law of the land and to submit to what they call harsh and unjust laws particularly aimed at themselves. Be it remembered to the credit of those young men, irrespective of political hatreds and political divisions, that, after all, they were Irish and, after all, they were democrats and that hating, as most of them did, the political outlook of the Fianna Fáil Government, in the end, they accepted the fact that the Fianna Fáil Government was put there by the votes of the Irish people and should be obeyed the same as a Cumann na nGaedheal Government. I appealed before not to make that job harder. Have those men not humbled themselves sufficiently? Is there any point in driving the whole organisation under the surface? Has not this country suffered enough from the curse of secret societies, from the curse of organisations going under-ground, from the curse of young men plotting against those in power, from the curse of young men being driven to appeal to the gun in their pocket rather than parade with their grouses or their grievances or with their policy in the broad light of God's own sunshine?
I appeal to you, even at this eleventh hour, not to drive further than natural forbearance the members of that organisation. If your desire is to humiliate them, have you not done that sufficiently? If your desire is to show your power, have you not done that sufficiently? If your desire is the clean desire of demonstrating that you are the Government of the country, have you not done that and have not we accepted that? Did we not call off our parade in honour of heroes that were our leaders and are now dead? Did we not accept your first, second and third ban? Did we not change our name and constitution merely because you declared our name and constitution to be illegal? Have we not done all that should be expected of any group of citizens in a free country? Must we go further? Must we pull the very shirts off our backs? Must we go back and say: "That which was no sin yesterday, that which was all right yesterday and that which was allowed to our people under our free constitution yesterday, will not be allowed tomorrow? You must go back on all that.""Why?" they will ask. "Because the Government wants further to humiliate you, because the Government wants further to provoke you." To take Deputy Davin's line, suppose we argue that this applies to all, and they reply, "Will you show me any other organisation that has its shirt, will you show me whom this is aimed at but ourselves?" I must be silent and everybody here would have to be silent in face of such a question. Nobody over there would defend that measure on any other ground than the honest ground put forward by the Minister for Justice in introducing it, when he stated openly and honestly that it is aimed at one organisation and at the clothes worn by that organisation. In view of that utterance by the Minister in charge of the Bill, is there any point in his allies coming along and saying that it is an all-round Bill, that it applies to all? In a noisy manner, the cat got out of the bag at the beginning of the debate and not all the Deputy Davins and all the Labour Parties can put that cat back into that particular bag.
Quote what he said immediately afterwards.
On what ground was this Bill defended? Time and time again I have appealed to the Government in connection with many measures, whether these measures were good or bad or just or unjust, for goodness sake to stand upon their own legs and defend them by conditions prevailing in this country. I have constantly objected to Bills being introduced and being defended by the Government because the Cumann na nGaedheal Government had done the same thing. I have asked them time and time again, as I said, to stand upon their own legs.
We always did that.
I asked them whether their measures were right or wrong to stand over them when they introduced them. We did not shelter, in our time, behind other countries, or other Governments. In connection with this measure, which is a Bill really to victimise the Government's political opponents, there was scarcely a word said about the conditions in Ireland to justify its being brought forward. We were brought by the Minister for Justice on a tour all round Europe, and we heard the names of countries that I, for one, was unfamiliar with. The Minister for Justice, because he is a weak linguist just as I am, was not able to make a speech out of many of these foreign languages in favour of this measure. His speech was mainly the speech of the Belgian Minister for Justice, when he introduced a somewhat similar measure in Belgium, and it was supported, to my amazement, by an extract from another speech made by Sir John Simon, the British Foreign Secretary.
I point out that this particular Bill is in addition to Amendment 17, Article 2a, of the Constitution. It is in addition to the powers and penalties of the Public Safety Act. Deputies opposite will remember the time when that Act was introduced. I will not weary the House by quoting what was said by Deputies opposite, some of them who are now Ministers, with regard to this Bill when it was introduced, yet now we have them seeking these powers in addition to Article 2a of the Constitution. In addition to the A.C.A., there is also banned in Ireland the association of the League of Youth. Now I want this to sink in. We have organisations in this country proclaiming their policy to the world. One is the League of Youth. Now, for the moment I waive the question whether its aims and objects as published are its real aims and objects, but I say that its published aims and objects vouched for and printed, are as follows:—"(1) To promote the voluntary reunion of the Irish nation; (2) To educate and interest the youth of Ireland in the responsibilities of citizenship; (3) To develop in the minds of young people an understanding and appreciation of democratic rights and responsibilities; (4) To promote social order; (5) To encourage voluntary public service; (6) To oppose Communism by upholding Christian principles." These are its published aims and objects.
There is another organisation, and it has public aims and objects, and these are published. It says it shall endeavour to achieve its objects by:—"(1) Force of arms; (2) Organising, training and equipping the manhood of Ireland as an efficient military force; (3) Assisting as directed by the army authority all organisations working for the same objects." There is the position. You have two organisations at least in this country. One stands for the aims and objects I have read out. The other definitely and noisily proclaims that it stands for the use of force for organising and training the youth of the country in the knowledge of arms, and for achieving their aims by force. And an Irish Government, posing as a constitutional Government, acting under the Constitution of the Free State, bans with all the ruthlessness of the Constitution (Amendment No. 17) Act—which of these organisations? Which of the two? The one that stands for the objects I have read out first. Is there a man or lady on the benches opposite who is not ashamed of that discrimination? What is the case made here for such discrimination? The only case made as justifying the suspension of that organisation was that it might resort to arms. The other organisation declares openly that they have resorted to arms and intend to do so. May I give one illustration further?
We hear a lot about Catholicity in this country. This first organisation pledges itself in bold print as opposed to Communism. The other pledges itself in equally bold print to associate itself with any other organisation that stands for the same purpose and objects as itself—the overthrow of the State as it exists.
This latter organisation has been condemned by the Hierarchy of the Catholic Church in Ireland. The other organisation suffers from no such ban, and all the vindictiveness we complain so much about is applied not to the organisation banned by the Hierarchy of this country but to the other organisation. Is it the organisation that declares itself determined to ally itself with Communism or anything else that is banned? No. The ban applies to the organisation that was not banned by the Hierarchy, and that openly, and even noisily declared its intention to oppose Communism. Yet in the light of that knowledge Deputy Davin tells us he will vote for the Bill in the hope that it will be fairly and equally administered.
What do you want the uniforms for?
I wish we would all develop Deputy Davin's degree of optimism. He is about the most optimistic man that ever walked into any assembly if he hopes that there is to be an impartial administration of this Bill when it becomes an Act, especially after what we have seen of the administration of its predecessor on the statute book. The Deputy asks why do we want uniform.
What about the blouses for the women?
I shall tell the Deputy all about the uniforms. He does not seem to like them at all. We heard a lot about the uniforms of the Blueshirts provoking attacks upon meetings. The Front Bench opposite for once whistles the same tune, and it was to the effect that attacks on meetings were really provoked because of the attendance of men in blue shirts.
And girls in blue blouses.
The contention was that it was the attendance of men in blue shirts and girls in blue blouses that led to attacks on meetings. I am not going to act the ghoul like the Minister for Finance and go back to 1922 and 1923. I could ask about things recent in memory, about the seven bloodhounds of Castlereagh. That was all years ago in the spring and summer of 1922. Fair-minded Deputies will agree with this. There was a Government in power and a political Opposition here in 1932. We were the political Opposition. Like a political Opposition we had a perfect right to hold meetings throughout the country, to rally our defeated supporters. It is particularly necessary after a defeat to be politically active, and during that spring and summer we attempted to hold meetings. Every single meeting we held up and down this country was either attacked and partially broken up or completely broken up. Take any of the posters of the organ of the Government, if you like, any Monday morning during the spring and summer of 1932. There were big screaming headlines on the posters every Monday morning—"Cumann na nGaedheal meeting broken up. Mr. Blythe shouted down. Mr. Cosgrave not heard in Cork." Every Monday morning you had the same dismal, disgraceful reports in the Irish papers.
Ask Deputy Mulcahy about 1923.
Deputies must not interrupt. If they continue to do so, they must take the consequences.
The point I am making is that right during that period there was not a blue shirt or a blue blouse in the whole of the Irish Free State, at least that we were aware of. That state of affairs continued right up to August. Then six or seven individuals—and I am giving a little bit of true history now—met together and their tone was that the game was up and that with the mob unloosed and with no protection from the State authorities, normal political opposition and normal political constitutional activity in this country were finished. They saw the growth and the alarmingly increased strength of other organisations standing against the State, standing as much against a Fianna Fáil Government as against a Cumann na nGaedheal Government. One man said: "Surely something can be done." Another said: "If young men can be recruited into organisations to defy their own Parliament and tear down their own State, then, by heavens, young men can be got into an organisation to defend their own Parliament and stand by it."
Tell us who the man is.
The man, and I am not saying this for Party purposes——
You are.
I am not.
Order.
The man who said that was Ned Cronin. Out of that, with that inspiration, with that motive, with that intention, never since departed from, the A.C.A. came into being, out of that the National Guard, out of that Young Ireland, and out of that the League of Youth. The aim, object, motive and inspiration of all were that common constitutional democratic inspiration——
From that man?
He sounded the note and 100,000 have taken it up since. I am asked about the uniform. Right through the early days of the A.C.A. men went round to meetings. There was rowdyism at the meetings and rowdyism in the towns in which the meetings had been held and reports came to me, for one, that certain members of the A.C.A. were behaving in a riotous, disorderly manner in towns after meetings. The reports I got were that the rioters or the rowdies were not all members of the A.C.A. Reports of that nature came in and we had a discussion about them. I was not prepared to say that everyone who criticised the A.C.A. was necessarily untruthful and that everyone inside the A.C.A. was necessarily truthful. We had a discussion about it and we said: "We will put down all that. We will see that there is cleanliness, decency and discipline inside this organisation. We will see that the man who misbehaves himself is made so very conspicuous that he can be taken by the back of the neck when he misconducts himself"——
Did that apply to the women?
Wait now. One thing at a time. With that aim in view, and only with that aim, we adopted the blue shirt.
And the blue blouse.
If the Deputy will sit quietly I will answer him, but if the Deputy wants to make me rough I can be every bit as rough as the Deputy. With that object in view we adopted the blue shirt. Certainly, all complaints as to indiscipline, as to riotous behaviour and rowdyism then disappeared. It might have been the fact that a man felt that all eyes were on him. It might be the fact that people stuck better together when they were dressed in a common shirt. Not only that, but from that week the strength of the organisation kept doubling itself. Then it was that the political mind saw the importance politically of a shirt and blouse. We adopted the shirt when the merger came along and when Fine Gael was established. We adopted the shirt as the shirt of the organisation, if you like, because it was such a potent recruiting factor for the organisation. In order to further our political strength and our political success, we got blue blouses also and got ladies to wear them. That is the case, and the people over there know that. They know it has been the most successful political card that was ever thrown on the table of this country, and because they know that we have the present Bill. They talk about continental dictatorship — Latvia, Sweden, Belgium, Switzerland—but the only thing that is worrying the people opposite is the Irish Free State, and the increasing and rapidly growing strength of the Opposition in the Irish Free State. They know that the great rapidity of the increase in strength is attributable to the influence of the blue shirt and the blue blouse, and this Bill is brought in, not to promote peace, but, as far as possible, to paralyse the political Opposition in the country. But the effects of this Bill may go a lot further than the people opposite think. We have this wobbly defence on European grounds, no attempt at defence on Irish grounds. We have the optimistic Deputy opposite hoping that it will be impartially administered. You have me here telling you this, that it is with difficulty, with extreme difficulty, we got the members of previous organisations to accept your laws, to bow their necks, to bend their knees——
You had to.
Now less of that. That is the kind of thing——
The majority of the people of Ireland made you.
That is the kind of thing that does harm.
The Deputy who has just interrupted has been previously cautioned in regard to his interruptions. He has persisted in interrupting and he will now retire for the remainder of the sitting.
Mr. Donnelly then retired.
I have merely one more word to say, and I address this directly to the Government. Before you proceed any further along this line of testing and provoking beyond endurance practically all the young men who are opposed to you in this country—I am not going to say a majority, and I am not going to say a minority—but practically all the young men who are politically opposed to you, I would ask you to weigh the matter carefully in your minds. As regards this Bill, coming as it does like a sledge hammer stroke after your calling off of parades, after your bans, after your suppressions, and with the knowledge you have of the difficulties experienced in getting acceptance of the calling off of those parades and the acceptance of those bans, if you do not want to make a dangerous situation a lot more dangerous and a lot more difficult than it is at the moment, either for you people over there or for the people who sit here, I would ask you even at the eleventh hour to withdraw it, because it is purely a vindictive political measure, and because the only effect of it will be to provoke a difficult state of tension and danger in this country.
If some of us had not heard Deputy O'Higgins before, had not heard him with the same pretended sincerity making somewhat similar appeals here and adopting afterwards a very embittered and nasty attitude outside, we would have taken more interest in his statements and tried to convince ourselves that he was honest. He preaches here in the interests of peace and unity, but elsewhere he adopts a different attitude. If he spoke to the men for whom he talks here with the same pretended sincerity all along the line, there never would have been a need for the introduction of this measure. Deputy O'Higgins appears to think that we are convinced that when his Government was in office they took every possible opportunity of seeing that fair play all round was administered, and he appears to think that our supporters should have no grouse whatever against the ruling power of that time. He talks about the difficulty of getting his supporters to accept this Government's rule. It is truly remarkable when one realises that he and the men associated with him were saying for ten years that we were the people who would not recognise anyone's rule, while he and his supporters were always prepared to accept the rule of the majority. Now he tells us that he went to the utmost limits of his power to get his associates to accept the authority of this Government, which was returned to power by the majority vote of the people.
Why has he kept that up his sleeve? Why did he not acquaint us that the people who were behind him would not, unless under extreme pressure, accept the rule of any Government other than a Cumann na nGaedheal Government? He talks about bitterness and about this Government driving men too far. Deputy O'Higgins and his associates should be the very last to talk of driving men too far. They, in their time, drove men to their graves, drove men out of the country. The man who is over there and who was head of their Government batoned men out of public positions, men who were prepared to accept their authority peacefully but who were not prepared to be worried, who were anxious to be allowed, if you like, to hold mental reservations. But the Government of the time would not tolerate that; they drove them out. Now, because that very Party are in Opposition we are told that no Government should drive young men too far. This Government, we are told, should not drive ex-officers of the Free State Army, men who were disciplined for ten years, four years, or three years, men who learned what it was to serve under their Government and to accept majority rule—we should not, we are told, drive them too far, although we have a mandate from the people to rule and to carry out a certain programme. Surely Deputy O'Higgins knows very well that he is not sincere when he makes those statements and that nobody can accept as being sincere a single word he said in that strain.
Following the last two elections, when we won with sweeping majorities, I remember that at the victory meetings we attended the strongest appeal that went out from our platforms was for toleration and friendship amongst the people, the burying of the old enmities that divided us. I remember also that at practically every meeting addressed by our opponents they reminded the people that we were a Party in whom nobody could have confidence, that we were unfit to rule, that we were blackguards, and they did all in their power to raise again the old bitternesses, the old enmities and the bad feelings that were just on the point of dying out. In spite of the fact that we did win a sweeping victory at the last two elections, there were no outrages committed against our opponents at the time. Our people stood the test very well and I will remind Deputy O'Higgins that it was just as difficult for our people to accept him and his Party as ordinary politicians who were entitled to be heard as it was for his supporters to accept our people as a Government. Surely Deputies opposite will concede that our people had just as much reason to be angry and embittered against them. Surely there will be a little give and take. He will, I am sure, admit that his difficulty was no greater than ours in getting our people to accept them as politicians with an absolute right to make their views clear before an audience in any part of the country.
With all the statements over the past two or three days one would think there was no disturbance at all during the ten years of Cumann na nGaedheal rule and that every crime that was committed was detected and the perpetrators were sentenced. I know that crimes were committed during the rule of our predecessors for which nobody was apprehended and I venture to say that more interest was paid by the leaders of Cumann na nGaedheal at the time to making political capital out of those crimes than towards apprehending the people who committed them. I think it will be accepted as true that a larger percentage of criminals went unapprehended under the rule of our predecessors than has been the case under this Government over the same period of years. There must be a little give and take and they must realise that when we were in opposition here there were certain parts of the country where we could not address a public meeting. We were driven out of certain parts of our own constituencies by supporters of the Party opposite. The Guards who were there could not raise a voice and did not raise a voice. We were driven out, bottles were thrown at us at meetings which we tried to address. All that happened under the Cumann na nGaedheal regime.
Deputies have spoken about this Government being responsible for disorders at meetings. They themselves were responsible during their term of office for disorders at public meetings and in certain parts of the country we could not address the people. The people over there should be aware of their own record. Possibly their memories are very short. They may have forgotten those incidents but I think it is more likely that they have not. I will not say they tried to encourage disorder—they declare that we have encouraged disorder, but that is false—but they certainly never tried to curb their followers or to prevent, when in office, obstructions at meetings in certain parts of the country which we tried to address. After the by-elections, while they were in office —there are Deputies sitting opposite who know this—the houses of supporters of our people were attacked in different towns. Their walls were tarred; their doors were smashed in. In one town in my constituency a particular supporter of theirs handed out shotguns to their own supporters to go and attack the people whom they had defeated in the election, and there never was a word about it. They pretend now that while they were in power nothing that was wrong ever happened; we were given absolute protection. Even though those things did happen, if we—because we wanted protection, because we were being attacked with shotguns and attacked in every way, our houses, our people, and our friends—wanted during that time to organise the young people of our organisation into uniforms, to put weapons into their hands, to go around and bully and bludgeon the people, I may tell you that Deputy O'Higgins would make a very different speech to the one he has just made. Deputy Cosgrave would take a very different view on a measure of that kind if it was a matter of our putting our people into uniforms and putting weapons in their hands when we were in Opposition.
It has been stated here that there is no reason to doubt the intentions of this organisation, but why blame members of the Government for doubting the intention of General O'Duffy as far as attacking the institutions of the State is concerned when Deputy MacDermot, the Vice-President of the organisation, has doubted them? He himself has stated that they caused him great "perturbation"—I think that was the word he used—that he was seriously troubled because of statements of certain lines mentioned in General O'Duffy's policy. Deputy MacDermot, who is Vice-President of the organisation, was seriously troubled because of those things. He told us, I think it was on last Sunday week in Castlerea, that before he ever agreed to a merger of his Party with that of General O'Duffy he got an undertaking from General O'Duffy about several things. Is this private undertaking given to Deputy MacDermot to be accepted by everybody? What was the undertaking? What did it recant? What was he not going to do that he had previously stated he would do, and that was troubling Deputy MacDermot? When Deputy MacDermot is troubled about the matter, can you blame members of the Government for being troubled? Deputy MacDermot has told us that he has an international reputation as a politician. He told us he studied politics in more countries than one. We know he did. He studied form in France; he studied in England, and in the North of Ireland; now he has come here; he studied in the United States and in Canada. If a man with an international reputation in politics feels there is something dangerous in the policy as outlined by General O'Duffy, until he gets a private undertaking, surely the Government are absolutely entitled, in the interests of peace in this country, to take the view that he has given of General O'Duffy at its face value. He has not given any private undertaking to the Government yet. When he does, the Government might be disposed to take a different view as to his statements on certain matters.
It has been stated that the Blueshirts brought absolute peace to this country, but the Deputies who spoke opposite, and who knew the reverse was the case, did not mention certain facts of which they were aware. Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney spoke very early in the debate, and he made it his business to be absent from the House as much as possible from that out. That is unusual for Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney. At a meeting in Castlebar a few weeks ago, Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney told a delegate meeting of Blueshirts there of a meeting he had held on the same Sunday morning in a place called Killawalla. He told them that there was opposition present at the meeting, and he told them of the great job which the Blueshirts did in hammering the opposition that was there. He told them that after the hammering there was a perfectly peaceful meeting. What I should like to question Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney on is this point: He said that after that it was quiet; he said that after that it was quite possible to hold an orderly meeting, more orderly than if the Guards had been there. That is from the ex-Minister for Justice. What respect are the people to have for the Guards when Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney creates the impression at a delegate meeting of Blueshirts that wherever the Guards are there is bound to be trouble; that they could have a more peaceful meeting at a place where the Guards are not present. Is not that nice respect for the law by the ex-Minister for Justice?
On the night after the release of General O'Duffy the Blueshirts throughout the country were evidently instructed to demonstrate their joy, as they were entitled to do. They met in Swinford, having been brought in from places surrounding the town of Swinford. A young man walking along the footpath shouted "Up Fianna Fáil." The Blueshirts attacked him, knocked him out with a blow of an iron bar, and he had to be carried away by a detective member of the Gárda Síochána and two or three civilians. That is the type of peace that the Blueshirts have brought wherever they have gone. On the day of the meeting addressed by Deputy Cosgrave in Swinford town, and by General O'Duffy and others, the Blueshirts were advised by the speakers, I must admit, to go home early; that is, as far as the public statements were concerned, they were advised to go home early. Blueshirts from the surrounding districts were driving through the town of Kilkelly on their way home in two lorries belonging to Deputy Dillon. There were four people standing outside a shop in Kilkelly. Not one of the four was over 21 years of age. They shouted "Up de Valera," or "Up Fianna Fáil," I do not know which, three or four times. They kept shouting, possibly, the whole time as the Blueshirts were coming down the street. The Blueshirts got off the lorries and beat two of those fellows with iron bars that they had in their possession. A man who takes absolutely no part in politics, and who happened to be standing at his shop door, rushed out, and tried to pull one of the young lads away. He was hit on the head with an iron bar by one of the Blueshirts, and the window of his shop was broken. They smashed the window of his shop, and four of them attempted to pull down a petrol tank which was at the door. There was absolute riot in the place for at least half an hour, created by the Blueshirts. There was no disturbance until they came there; there would have been no disturbance if they had continued on their way. Deputies opposite may smile at that, and think that after all that is only my side of it, but I have here a statement written by a member of the organisation and published in the Western People. This incident was reported in the Mayo News, and I have a letter here from a Blueshirt in Kilkelly, who writes to explain it away. He says this: “An article appeared in last week's Mayo News headed ‘Blueshirts' blackguardism in Kilkelly,’ and went on to say that Blueshirts returning from Swinford meeting attacked people and broke their windows. It is true a window was broken, but not a plateglass window, as stated. What really caused the trouble was this: as those young men were proceeding home, quietly and orderly, a gang of hooligans, aided and abetted by some people here who should have known better, commenced to jeer and shout at them, and even before they reached the square they were shouted at by some very nice young ladies, and a few more ancient ones who should be shouting at their own sons. In the rush which the Blueshirts made on the mob a window got broken, which a sum of about 5/- would repair. That was the only harm done, as the heroic mob ran too fast for the Blueshirts.” What harm would be done if the heroic mob did not run too fast? Are the Blueshirts entitled, as they appear to feel they are, to jump off lorries on every occasion on which people shout “Up Fianna Fáil,” or anything else, and smash those people's heads with iron bars? Is that the type of thing to which any Government could close its eyes? We have also a statement signed by a Blueshirt in the Western People of the week before last, which criticised a statement published in the local paper about certain blackguardly acts by Blueshirts. It sets out:—
"On behalf of the young men whom I had the pleasure to travel with, I wish to return thanks for the protection given us, even though we were quite capable of protecting ourselves and would have proved it if the occasion had arisen for doing so."
Hear, hear!
That is the attitude, and we get "hear, hear," from Deputy McGuire, who, by the way, has not worn a blue shirt yet.
I have worn a blue shirt.
You may have tried it on before the mirror and looked at it, but not in public. To that attitude, there comes "hear, hear," from Deputy McGuire. Are organisations throughout the country to dress up in military kit of that kind and to go trailing their coats all over the country before everybody who opposes them politically or otherwise? Are they to be allowed to say: "If you hit me, I will hit you"? Is that the method the people over there would adopt to give us peace?
Of course.
Very well, we will take you at your own word. We had General O'Duffy stating at a meeting of Blueshirts in the South of Ireland, a few weeks ago, that for every blow they got they would give back nine.
Hear, hear!
That is the type of thing the Government is up against. That is the type of thing that hot-headed young men about whom Deputy Dr. O'Higgins appears to be greatly concerned are to hear every day in the year, but, mind you, Deputy McGuire would never say that in public.
Is this not public?
It is quite all right——
One blow of a broken bottle deserves nine with the fist.
Deputy McGuire should not excite himself. He is the last man who should.
Why?
Because there was a time when more than broken bottles were being thrown and when the Party opposite were in much greater danger than they are in now and Deputy McGuire did not even throw a bottle.
I was about 14 years of age at the time.
Deputy McGuire did not even throw a bottle, nor did anybody belonging to him.
This House is not concerned with the personal history of Deputy McGuire.
It is so short that it is over now.
As Deputy Dr. O'Higgins says, no one minds what that rat says.
The Deputy must withdraw the term "rat" as applied to another Deputy.
I will suggest the word "eavesdropper" and withdraw the word "rat."
Deputy McGuire is very precise. I would advise him——
I would advise the Deputy to get on to the motion before the House and to get away from personalities.
Might I refer to the fact that Deputy Cleary used the phrase "dirty rat" to a Deputy last night and he was not called to order for it?
I do not know whether the Deputy intends to criticise the rulings of the Chair or the conduct of any other occupant of it, both of which would be disorderly.
What I want to know from the Opposition is if their methods in Opposition are to be taken as those in statements issued by members of their organisation? Are their methods to be those of Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney who impresses on the Blueshirts wherever they come together that they can have more peaceful meetings anywhere they go without the help of the Guards? Are they to go trailing their coats and declaring from the house tops that for every blow they get, they are going to give back nine? Is there simply to be mob law in that way and that the strongest party is to win—that the party that gives the most blows back is the party that must rule? What about the Government forces? Have the Government no responsibility? Are they to be left out of it? I would ask the Opposition whether, when they were a Government, if any responsible Deputy or man in public life made a statement urging on his supporters to go in for mob law and nothing else, they would quietly sit down and give their benediction to such pronouncements? That is the serious point about it. I do assert that long before there was anything in the nature of serious disturbance in this country, Senator Blythe used these words, without any provocation whatever, in Clifden: "The A.C.A."—as it was then—"would knock smithereens out of the I.R.A." I assert that when a man like Senator Blythe was put in a very inferior position, was cast out of public life by the people as the people were entitled to do, he became so embittered, as did the men over there, that their only care was to smash the Government in office and prevent any rule by Government here. He started out in Clifden and members of his organisation have carried the ramp on ever since, that the A.C.A. or whatever they might call it, were there to smash to smithereens anybody who opposed them, in the hope that ordered conditions would be made absolutely impossible here.
So well was the ramp carried on and with such enthusiasm—and I must admit that it must have taken a lot of enthusiasm—that pacifist Deputy Dillon down in Cork said, with his chest out: "We do not want to fight but, by Jingo, if we do——." Every place they went they trailed their coats, and in every village into which they went they irritated the minds of the people so much that a nasty, bitter atmosphere was left behind, an atmosphere even more bitter than the dying atmosphere of the civil war. Those of the Deputies in Opposition who, not like Deputy Dillon or Deputy McGuire, are long enough in public life to appreciate these things, should realise that that is one of the things that should not be encouraged in public life, and I venture to say that even Deputy Doctor O'Higgins, in his best moments, does not agree with his Party going around trailing their coats in that way and irritating the minds of the people.
We have talk about the I.R.A. having arms and I should like to speak pretty frankly about this matter. This Government has been in office for about two years. Are they to be blamed because they have not done in two years what Deputy Cosgrave did not do in ten? Is that the case made by the Opposition? Are we supposed to be so superior to them that we should have done in two years what they should have done in ten? Is that the charge they are going to make? Deputy Dillon will probably say—it is like what he would say— that the I.R.A. have arms. Why not have the question of those arms directed towards Deputy Cosgrave, and why not ask him what efforts he made during his ten years to collect arms from unauthorised people in this State or what efforts he made to detect crime during his ten years of office? The whole thing amounts to this, that this Government is being blamed for not doing, in less than two years, what the previous Government did not do in ten and what I am convinced, from their attitude in opposition, they deliberately refused to do, because they knew that the only hope they have in this country is to have a bitter atmosphere, a nasty public feeling. It is in those circumstances that they and the element behind them, who always thrive in that atmosphere, will probably get to the top. They talk about the blue shirts being worn in schools. The one charge they have not made against us is that the Government are not responsible for that. But they have denied absolutely that General O'Duffy is responsible. Who is responsible for the wearing of the blue shirts? Who has asked the people to go out and wear nothing else but blue shirts?
A Deputy
Oh, oh!
I did not mean that exactly. I apologise. Who encouraged the people not to associate with anybody except those who had the blue shirts on? Deputies opposite all know, because they are now reaping the first part of the whirlwind. They ran away from their campaign. They are apologising now because the school children have been made by their parents to wear the blue shirts. They took Deputy Dillon at his word. The parents thought it was the right thing to do and they got the blue shirts. Now they are apologising. They got the blue shirts because Deputy Dillon and the like of him went on with that kind of campaign without considering what its effect would be. The campaign was "Speak only with Blueshirts; deal only with Blueshirts; dance only with Blueshirts," and so on. If this campaign were applied more fully, as Deputy Dillon would like it to be, he would have to reckon in other respects. I have here a verbatim report of a speech made by Deputy Dillon in Swinford a few weeks ago. It is very illuminating to quote passages from Deputy Dillon: "Blueshirt girls when at a dance will not dance with anyone who is not a member of a Blueshirt organisation; Blueshirts will dance with Blueshirts and not with Fianna Fáil. If there is any lady with a blue blouse and she is not called out, do not forget to call her out."
That is statesmanship.
There is statesmanship by Deputy Dillon. That, of course, is very interesting, and it is all right to laugh at. In the future, anybody who heretofore has been a wallflower at a dance can buy a blue blouse and everything will go on swimmingly. She will be called out immediately on the instructions of Deputy Dillon. It is quite a nice thing to see, a week after that statement was made in Swinford, a certain Senator, a member of the Oireachtas, stating in the South of Ireland that she was convinced that the Blueshirt was the armour of honesty. If statements by men who pose as being responsible men in public have that effect upon the public mind, what are you to expect from members of the Blueshirt organisation? It is all right to laugh at it. But what if it is carried out to its full extent? What if Blueshirts only dance with members of their organisation, what if Blueshirt children only go to schools where there is a Blueshirt teacher, what if Blueshirt Catholics only go to chapels where there are Blueshirt clergymen? Deputy Dillon should not like to have that carried out to its full extent in Swinford. Deputy Dillon is laughing, but it is not a laughing matter. We cannot bring it out. He knows what I mean and he will not question me on it.
I could not describe the Deputy within the Orders of the House.
What if Blueshirts refuse to deal only with Blueshirt houses? What if every member of the public who deals in Deputy Dillon's shop and who is not a Blueshirt refused to go in? What if the division is going to be so clear? What would be the effect of that division in the schools, the dance halls, the business houses, the churches and other places? What will Deputy Dillon do when that comes about? What if other organisations go out and put on their uniforms too, as they would be entitled to, and which they absolutely would if it were not for this measure? If that other organisation said "Do not dance but with Greenshirts; do not associate with members of any other organisation divided from them," you would have a very nice state of affairs here. You would then have no association with anybody except those with whom you are in political agreement.
These people carried weapons like iron bars that are now being carried by members of the organisation. Unfortunately when they met there was a knocking on the heads, there was a row, there was a brawl, but when the brawl would be taking place I am sure Deputy Dillon would be as far away as he has ever remained from what he calls a brawl. It is all right for Deputy Dillon to encourage that sort of thing. We do not want to fight, but if a fight takes place, I believe Deputy Dillon will go back behind his counter and leave his mugs to thrash it out, and if they win he will then go out and do the peacock's walk, and he will tell the people they are great people because they won. That is the type of people the Government are up against, unthinking individuals who do not think of one thing except to prevent Fianna Fáil from carrying out its policy and their endeavour to destroy the Government and destroy respect for the State. That is their only idea and their only intention. They are succeeding well as far as many of their own followers are concerned. But there are other forces behind them in their organisation who see otherwise. I think that if ever they got back into power they would have to face a situation of this kind. They would reap the whirlwind that they have sown themselves.
We had Senator Blythe stating a short time ago that if they did get back into power, these Blueshirts would not be done with, that they would be part of the State forces. This will make them become more enthusiastic, and they will do things which they would not do if left to themselves and their ordinary judgment. This sort of talk will make them do certain things that are not good. I suggest that the best thing for the Opposition Party is to have a measure of this kind passed into law, and see that it is administered with absolute impartiality in the State, and see that no petty politicians are allowed to militarise or to arm their members and dress them with uniforms. Parties apart from that can go out and address public meetings. They can insist on getting ample protection, the protection which they are absolutely entitled to get, and to develop this State just as they wish on political lines. The Government would be failing in its duty if it did anything else but bring in a measure of this kind. The Government would be failing in its duty if, when this Bill is passed into law, it does not put it ruthlessly into force against anybody and any organisation that tries to break that law.
We have not broken the law yet.
Some of you will never break it. The Government must insist on absolutely peaceful conditions here, and insist on the law being obeyed. It is only under those circumstances that the Government policy can be put into operation, and it is only under those circumstances that the Government and the country can continue to prosper and to go ahead.
So much has been said on this Bill as to the danger of civil war and so forth, that I think it would be as well if, perhaps, a few questions were asked so far as the provisions of this Bill are concerned. In the first place, I should like to ask the Minister if, in the event of the members of the Blueshirt organisation being ordered to wear, say, blue dungarees, the Civic Guards if they met a number of men wearing blue dungarees would compel them to take them off? It might so happen that many of these men might have nothing under the blue dungarees and, accordingly, they would appear naked. In that case, would they be liable to be arrested for indecent exposure? While speaking about dungarees, I should like to know from the Leader of the Labour Party, in view of the fact that, perhaps, 99 per cent. of the dockers, who work along the docks in Dublin, Cork, Waterford, Dundalk and Drogheda, as well as the workers in the building trade and, in fact, workers in general, wear dungarees, whether he would agree that it would be unlawful and illegal for these men to wear blue dungarees. That is an aspect of the situation that I should also like to have explained by the Minister for Justice. It might so happen, if the Government Party went out of office, in the event of the Opposition wearing blue dungarees, that President de Valera, who would then be ex-President, might be compelled to take off the blue dungarees. I am sure he would look a fine spectacle without any trousers, and the people passing might call him such nicknames as Daddy Long Legs, etc. All these things can be done under this Bill, and it is, therefore, only right that we should have some explanation from the Minister for Justice.
Dealing with the provisions of this Bill, the Leader of the Labour Party asserted that were it not for the wearing of blue shirts there would be no interruptions at public meetings. The Leader of the Labour Party speaks in this House as if he represented the honest workers of this State. He does not, because with the possible exception of Deputy Corish, not a member of the Labour Party owes his election to this House to the votes of the honest members of trades unions. That is evidenced by the fact that the Labour Party has not got a single representative in the capital city of the Free State. So much for Deputy Norton's contention that he speaks on behalf of official labour. What I should like to ask Deputy Norton and the members of the Labour Party is this: is it not a strange thing that it was only when the Blueshirts came into being they thought fit to object to the wearing of any uniform that would give people the impression it was a military organisation? It is extraordinary, yet it is a fact, that whilst the members of that Party have not the least hesitation in mentioning by name the Blueshirt organisation, Deputy Norton or any member of the Labour Party, and for that matter any member of the Government Party, never mention the I.R.A. as an illegal organisation. The only explanation I can find for their silence in that respect is that, in the main, a very large percentage of the members, especially on the back benches of Fianna Fáil, owe their election to this House to the votes of members of that organisation. That is the reason why that organisation has never been specifically mentioned as being an illegal organisation. It is only when they come to deal with the Blueshirt organisation that they are clear and emphatic as regards their opinion of that organisation.
I want to state here and now that I have never been identified with anything savouring of militarism. That is not to say that if the occasion arose I would not have the courage to enter a fight and defend myself. I am not, however, one of those who look for trouble, but I can meet trouble when it comes. As far as the personnel of the Blueshirt organisation in the county I represent is concerned, I can say that it is composed of decent, honourable and law-abiding citizens. The manner in which the Blueshirts conducted themselves on their first appearance in public at a meeting recently held in Dundalk, excited the admiration of the people of Dundalk in general, and no more peaceful and more law-abiding men ever attended a meeting in Dundalk for the past 50 years. Now we are coolly told that the members of that organisation are out to undermine the institutions of this State. In support of that contention Deputy Norton referred to what had taken place and is taking place in other European countries, especially Germany, Italy and Austria. But, as was rightly pointed out by Deputy Fitzgerald, the strong measures taken by Dr. Dollfuss in Austria were taken to save that country from the attacks of the Socialist Party. As a worker, and as a member of a trade union, I say: "Heaven save Ireland from ever being under the domination of a Socialist Government." That is the explanation of the strong measures that were taken by Dr. Dollfuss in Austria, and by Mussolini in Italy.
There are different forms of what is called democracy. The democracy I have been accustomed to is that kind of democracy that instils into the minds of the people respect for law, and, in so far as workers and employers are concerned, respect for the individual rights of employers as well as employees. When Deputy Norton speaks of dictatorships in European countries, he forgets that, on at least half a dozen occasions in this House, he openly declared that capitalism must go; that there must be a state of affairs, as I pointed out previously, symbolic of the state of affairs which exists in Soviet Russia.
As far as the Blueshirt organisation is concerned, I believe it was started mainly for the purpose of having free speech at public meetings. Nobody can deny that over the Twenty-Six Counties there had been a deliberate attempt to prevent people who disagreed with the policy of the present Government from freely expressing their opinion. That is a well-known fact and cannot be contradicted. There was the insidious propaganda—I would almost go the length of calling it a diabolical propaganda—by which our young men in the Twenty-Six Counties were urged—by people who had not the courage to come out in the open and do it themselves—deliberately to upset public meetings held under the auspices of the United Ireland Party. There is no use in attempting to draw a red-herring across the trail by stating that were it not that the supporters of the United Ireland Party wore blue shirts, there would not be any opposition at their meetings. If the Blueshirt organisation never existed, or if it were confined exclusively to what is known as the United Ireland Party, these organised attacks on the liberties and on the members of that organisation would continue. I am sorry to say, from inquiries I made, that, as far as County Louth is concerned, the chief offenders in that respect are prominent supporters of Fianna Fáil.
I have gone the length of saying that, as far as my personal opinion goes, President de Valera, who is in the House at present, has absolutely no sympathy with the policy pursued by many of his supporters in the constituency I represent. I will give a case in point. I have here a pamphlet which was issued, to my own knowledge, by men who, at the last election, stood on platforms in support of Fianna Fáil. This pamphlet is headed "O'Duffy Murder Gang." The names of respectable citizens of Dundalk are given in the pamphlet, because they subscribed to the funds of the United Ireland Party. That is evidenced by the fact—and it must be within the knowledge of the President, and members of the Executive Council —that the collector was recently arrested at the point of the revolver. I am here to state that 99 per cent. of the moneys collected on that occasion came mainly from people who were supporters of mine at five previous general elections. It is a lie and a slander of the worst description to so dub decent men, who subscribed to that fund in exercise of the liberty that should be enjoyed by every citizen, irrespective of what particular Party he belongs to. As a result we know what followed. I am not going to go into these horrible details. I stated before in public that I would rather draw a veil over them. I do not and never did blame the President. I have always held that he was out for fair play for everyone in this State. If he suffers from the criticism levelled at him in this House, and outside it, I can tell him honestly, and without fear of contradiction, that the men chiefly responsible for such criticism are his own followers. Therefore, I say, let Deputy Cleary not get up in this House and impute dishonest motives to people who are members of the United Ireland Party. As far as County Louth is concerned, he will find that we have done our best to put the policy of the Government into operation, in so far as that policy tends to improve the position of the people of that county. I want to assure the President, as far as I am concerned, that he will have no better supporter in having that policy put into operation. At the same time I am entitled to disagree politically in certain respects with the policy pursued by the present Government. I have the right to differ. But that is no reason why supporters of Fianna Fáil in County Louth should endeavour to prevent the supporters of the United Ireland Party from freely giving vent to their feelings when, how and where they please.
I should much prefer that this Bill was never introduced. As far as County Louth is concerned, conditions there are all that could be desired. There is peace, and there is goodwill, more or less, amongst the different sections of the people. But, I am afraid that happy state of affairs will not continue if this Bill is passed and put into operation. I heartily join with many Deputies on this side of the House and with many Deputies who spoke from the Labour Benches in asking the Government to hasten slowly in so far as the operation of this Act is concerned, because there are many men who, at the present time, are members of the Blueshirt organisation who are of a very quiet disposition. But it so happens that quiet men can be very determined if and when the occasion arises, and I am one of them. I am one of those who never look for trouble but I never shirk it. It might be well to remind some Deputies in the Fianna Fáil Party that so far as I am personally concerned the history of Ireland—in so far as patriotism is concerned—did not start in 1916 or in 1922: that there were Irishmen before 1916 and after it, patriotic Irishmen who worked for the good of the country according to their lights. They will continue to do so. It is because we are imbued with that spirit that we want peace and prosperity in the country. I am convinced that the differences that exist at the moment between the two Parties can be adjusted; that when they are adjusted it will only be a matter of time until the major differences that exist between this country and Great Britain will be adjusted to the mutual advantage of the peoples of both countries.
It is an experience to listen to a lecture on the introduction of militarisation into politics and the disadvantages attaching to blue shirts from members of a political party which was founded on a dumping arms order, and forced into existence by the futility of a military mission sent by them into Russia, and by the incredulity with which their supporters in America received their grand ideas as to what could be done with an army here and the job that was waiting for it. But the propaganda must go on. The Party that has propagandised itself into power, that has kept itself in power by nothing but propaganda, that is unable to deal with the social and the economic difficulties and troubles that the country lies under, must continue its propaganda. The House passed a vote the other day for the setting up of a Bureau of Information, but that is not sufficient. We have this Bill brought in here for the purpose of blinding people's minds by propaganda, on the one hand, and giving the Government, on the other, a chance of running away from the responsibilities that attach to their office.
The various Deputies who have spoken have all taken up some particular bogey to hang in front of the people. The Minister for Justice, who, in the beginning of his speech, let, as Deputy O'Higgins said, the cat out of the bag, stated that this Bill "is frankly directed against the Blueshirts, and that is the problem at the moment." But another cat came out of the bag when he was finishing, when he charged this Party here with stirring up disorder in the country in order that, being unable to get back into power by any other way, they might get back into power on disorder. The Minister for Industry and Commerce held up before the people of the country the civil war that was facing them, and the challenge by some armed group in the country to take over by force the government of this country. He explained the simple process by which all that comes about. First, the party adopts a uniform; secondly, that uniform irritates others in the country. The third stage is reached when other parties in the country adopt another uniform and they prepare for civil war, and for the fourth stage the Minister turned to yesterday evening's newspaper and said: "See the Nazi threat to a government in power." The Minister for Finance has discovered a murder in the ranks of the organisation that they want to proscribe, and the Leader of the Labour Party finds a military dictator. He helps the President out of the position that he was not able to get into, and he brands myself, for one, as being a person who, long, long ago, wanted to be a military dictator, and clearly finds that there are ex-soldiers in the organisation. All these are terrors that are going to frighten the people of this country, they think, from looking around them and seeing what are the facts of the situation, and of organising to deal with the problems that require to be dealt with here. The problem of the Fianna Fáil Party may be the problem of the Blueshirts, but the problem for the people of this country is to get ordered conditions here, ordered Government, an impartial Administration, a chance to use their own intelligence in an ordered way, to get rid of the economic difficulties that they labour under and to go about doing their own Irish business.
People are asked to look at conditions in Europe and to look at conditions here and to give the Government permission to go ahead in this particular way. The Minister for Justice told us that because of the terrible conditions that exist throughout Europe all the Governments have acted in this way by bringing in a Bill to ban shirts. He told us about Belgium, Holland and other places. They do not tell us anything about the Bills that were brought in to banish military uniforms and badges. They do not tell us that when the Minister for Justice introduces his Bill he treats us to a translation of a speech made on a similar occasion by a Minister in Belgium. He did not recall that about September of last year English school boys, travelling into Belgium from Germany, because they wore the Swastika were arrested, deprived of their passports and imprisoned under a law that exists there, a law that prevents people wearing Nazi badges or uniforms entering Belgium. He tried to hide for us that what the Belgian Government is protecting itself for is a development in Belgium of an organisation associated with the people who trampled their country under foot in 1914.
When he tells us that the Dutch Government have introduced a law against the wearing of political uniforms, he does not tell us that the Government that introduced that law in Holland was a Government drawn from all parties, with the exception of one, a Government that had decided that it would put aside all party questions and all questions dealing with religion; that it would concentrate on matters that concerned agriculture and industry, the economic conditions of the country, and the balancing of their Budget; that it would take every step possible to resist terrorism and disorder in the country; and that the uniform law was introduced against a political party in the country that was collaborating with Communism that was disloyal to the throne, and that was out against the Constitution of the State. That is the picture that is with-held from us here when the Minister comes in here and, unable to make a case for his Bill himself, gives us the speech of a European Minister. The beginning—the first step—says the Minister for Industry and Commerce, is that a Party adopts a uniform. A lot went before the adoption of the uniform, and before the law dealing with the adoption of the uniform, that the Ministers on the far side did not tell us about. We are not particularly interested with what went before either the adoption of the uniform or the passing of the law in any European country. We are concerned with conditions here, and part of the problem that is associated with the Blueshirt problem in the Government's mind is that the eyes of the people in this country are being a little bit opened and that they are able to look at such problems without these problems being obscured in any way by the European situation. The first step is the adoption of a uniform by a political Party. Let us look at the situation here with that axiom of the Minister's in our minds. Deputy Cleary has just been telling us that from the time they got into power the first word that was on their lips from every platform in this country was "toleration." A Deputy from Mayo tells us that; a Deputy from the constituency that the Minister for Justice represents, who, the very first month he was in office, went to Deputy Cleary's constituency and his own, and said: "Get the accursed crowd out of our way." That was his litany. Ministers on the far side—the Minister for Finance—went through the country asking the people to spit on the name of Cosgrave as they would on that of Leonard McNally, Castlereagh, or any traitor the Irish people ever had to them. Ministers held up Deputy Cosgrave, his associates and his Party, as people who were not only applauding England in a certain attitude towards this country, but dictating to England what kind of action she should take. That was the toleration, and that was the type of things that Ministers in this country were saying in the spring and summer of 1932. It was no wonder that meetings were broken up and free speech interfered with in the way Deputy O'Higgins described it then. Then, he said, the Army Comrades' Association came, and it has been suggested by Ministers in this debate that the Army Comrades' Association was formed first when it was seen that the Cosgrave administration was going to go out of office, and that the purpose of the Association was to use force to throw the Fianna Fáil Government out of office.
It would prolong this debate to go into many matters in connection with it. The Minister for Justice, on one particular occasion here, has informed the House that the police authorities did me the honour of mentioning me as a person who was most active of the ex-Ministers in working up the Army Comrades' Association in 1932. The date of that police report was September, 1932. I had one connection with that organisation, if it could have been called a connection, before the date of these reports, and it was that I addressed a meeting at Beal-na-Bláth in the end of August. The line I took at that meeting was that circumstances had prevented Michael Collins being seen in his true light; that the fact that he appeared on the horizon of Irish politics in the bedraggled ranks of Pearse's army in 1916, and that he died in the uniform of a Commander-in-Chief of an Irish army, had tended to make people, particularly the young men in the country, look on him particularly as a soldier, and had tended to obscure all the magnificent work he did as an administrator, all the work he did as Minister for Finance and as the most prominent member, perhaps, of the Dáil Eireann Cabinet in the old days—all the work he did as Chairman of the Provisional Government and all the work he did in England when he went to argue the Irish cause—work not as spectacular as that of a soldier, but work that was far more important. I asked them not to be led away by the picture of Collins merely as a soldier, but to take these other pictures into their minds so that in the responsibilities of the work that would fall on them in these days they should model themselves on the worker who said: "Make anything you like of me— your Commander-in-Chief, your Minister for Finance or your Minister to London—make anything you want to make of me, and I will work in one just as I will work in the other." I pointed out that the work that had been done in the past had brought newer and different and more important responsibilities on the youth of this country than the responsibilities of a soldier. That was my association with the organisation up to the time the police reported about the magnificent work I was doing for it. If I was able to address men in that particular way, it was a compliment to the men themselves, because I was simply expressing their spirit.
A month after that, I went down to County Limerick with two other members of this House to speak on the political affairs of the time to the electorate of County Limerick. It is true that I went to tell them that the whole economic situation of Limerick county as well as that of other counties was being destroyed by the actions of a number of people, among whom were three or four they had elected in County Limerick; and that the destruction of the country could not go on without the direct vote and assistance of these men. Were we allowed to hold our meeting there? We held it; but not because the spirit of toleration that Deputy Cleary speaks about had been disseminated through the land, not because the Government was standing for the impartial administration of the law but because there were stout hearts in this country representative of the true instincts and true spirit of the people. They decided that what was fought for and won in the past was not going to be lost or sacrificed for want of a few courageous hearts to stand up for it on a day of difficulty. The Minister for Justice suggested, in response to an intervention by Deputy Fitzgerald, that he had not particulars of Kilmallock. I am going to weary the House slightly by reading some extracts from the Cork Examiner of 10th October about Kilmallock, because we had better see things in their true light.
The paper says:—
"A pitched battle was waged in the streets of Kilmallock yesterday, when an organised opposition sought to break up a Cumann na nGaedheal meeting at which General Mulcahy and Professor Hayes were the principal speakers."
Deputy George Bennett and ex-Deputy Dick O'Connell were also speakers.
"It was the first time since their formation that members of the Army Comrades Association were called into active service. Fifty of them augmented a small force of Civic Guards to the extent of rendering futile the efforts of the would-be meeting wreckers. Yet, it was no bloodless conflict in which the Association registered its initial success in assuring freedom of speech. Far from it. The results of the clash of yesterday were seen in quite a number of casualties on either side. ... That trouble was brewing was apparent some time early in the day, when large numbers of known Fianna Fáil adherents assembled in the town. General Mulcahy's meeting was timed for 2.30 in the afternoon, and just before that hour a number of young men collected at the Castle Arch, in Emmet Street, bearing two streamers, each supported on two long poles. These had the respective inscriptions: ‘Kilmallock stands for de Valera,' and ‘Remember the 77 executed; their executioner is here to-day.' Marching four deep and with these streamers held aloft in front, these processionists proceeded down Lord Edward Street, past the hotel in which the speakers were awaiting their meeting. At the end of Lord Edward Street, the opposition element sang the ‘Soldier's Song,' and here, apparently, their numbers were substantially augmented, for they retraced their steps through Lord Edward Street, again in processional order, some 200 strong. Into Sarsfield Street they marched, and gibed at Limerick Army Comrades' Pipers' Band, which waited on the street to play the speakers to the platform. The march was continued to the end of Sarsfield Street, where a halt was called. Meantime, the Pipers' Band was about forming another procession to march up Sarsfield Street, when Superintendent Holland, in command of the Civic Guards, suggested that they do not do so. The band immediately acquiesced, as did also those who had fallen in behind it. The speakers and their supporters moved to the platform ... Mr. Bennett was speaking some few minutes when the opposition crowd, now estimated at some 300, came in view, shouting as they marched towards the meeting. A dozen Civic Guards—Superintendent Holland, two sergeants and ten Guards, to be exact—moved in a line across the roadway to meet them. There was a short parley, and it was then seen that the crowd was getting out of hand and that the police cordon would be broken by sheer weight of numbers. It was at this point that 50 members of the A.C.A. under Commandant Cronin, of Charleville, intervened. The banner-bearers, egged on by the crowd behind them, persisted in breaking through. The police drew their batons and, in a moment, there was turmoil. Superintendent Holland, wielding his walking-stick, led the baton charge, while others took hold of the poles to which the streamers were attached, wrested them from the hands that held them, tore the streamers to shreds and used the broken poles as weapons of defence. Sticks, hurleys and batons clashed. Guards and civilians went down in the muddy roadway and a regular pitched battle that had alarming possibilities ensued. Then two shots rang out in quick succession, and these had the immediate effect of causing many of those on the street to run for shelter. Apparently, too, they had their effect on the opponents of the meeting, for their ranks broke and they fled back along the street. Mr. Bennett, during all this disturbance never once faltered in his speech."
Who was the Commissioner of Police at that time?
I shall tell the Deputy anything he likes at the end of my speech. The report goes on:—
"The opposition element returned. There was another scuffle, in which many were badly handled, and there were crashes of glass as shop windows went in. Stones began to fly in all directions, and there were many narrow escapes from these. They struck against the shuttered windows of other shops and, were it not that Kilmallock business people still favour to a large degree the old-time timber shutters, the results in glass breakages would have been numerous. Comparative quiet was again restored, with the opposition group at one end of the street, the cordon of Guards—their mud spattered uniforms testifying to their zeal in the prevention of disorder— situated a few yards away, the body of Army Comrades stationed about half way between the latter and the meeting."
After attempting to attack the meeting in that way, after keeping up sustained attacks from the outside and after going to the back of the houses and throwing stones at the speakers, they realised that they could not prevent the people of Limerick being spoken to by the representatives of this Party. They went, then, a few yards away and started to hold a meeting. The paper reports:—
"The rival meeting was presided over by Mr. Michael Hayes, Chairman of the East Limerick Executive of Fianna Fáil, and the speakers thereat included Messrs. Patrick Carroll, Kilfinane; Michael Walsh, local Joint Treasurer of the Fianna Fáil Club; Seán Hayes and Seán Hogan. The latter, in the course of his address, intimated that he would send a telegram to the Minister for Justice, Mr. J. Geoghegan, informing him of the occurrence there that day and asking for an inquiry into the alleged shooting. As the result of yesterday's hostilities, seven persons were admitted to hospital in Limerick."
There were cases before the courts as a result of that. Who were the people sentenced by the courts and punished by the courts? A man who assisted the Civic Guard to stop that mob of 300 from assaulting members of the crowd and breaking up that political meeting was fined £10 because he had a revolver for which he had not a licence, the licence having expired a short time before.
The Attorney-General
Is this an attack on the District Justice?
It is an attack on anyone who is responsible. Two persons were punished by the court. One was fined £10, which was reduced to 5/-, on appeal to the Circuit Court. Those who were part of the mob were up before the District Justice. He held up dealing with them or punishing them——
The Deputy is contrasting, so far as I can see, the District Justice's way of dealing with one set of circumstances as against another. That is, surely, imputing prejudice to the District Justice.
I do not intend to impute prejudice to the District Justice but, so far as the impartial administration of the law goes, as well as the interest of free public speech, I want to point out that of the people who were charged——
The Deputy cannot discuss the decision of a District Justice in this House.
I am not discussing it. I am stating the fact.
The Deputy is suggesting, by the way in which he is dealing with the matter, that the District Justice dealt in a particular fashion with certain people and that he did not apply the law impartially.
I am not suggesting anything, good, bad or indifferent, as regards the District Justice. I am telling what happened.
What is the contrast?
It is this—that, because there was peace in the district, a case that had been held up for eight months was dropped. I only want to lead up to the type of people in the crowd—people who were not punished. Prominent in the crowd were men of the name of Fraher. They got no punishment for what they did in Kilmallock that day.
Were they before the court?
They were before the court.
Surely, the Deputy is criticising the decision of the justice. If the justice did not punish these people, clearly there was no evidence on which he could give a decision against them. We cannot discuss here the decision of a court.
I am only stating the fact.
By contrast, the Deputy is implying that the District Justice did not deal out justice impartially.
I want to say distinctly that I wish to make no contrast, good, bad or indifferent. I want to talk of what happens in carrying on ordinary political business here. Deputies will go down the country and attempt to address a meeting. A mob of 300 will attempt to stop them. A group of young men will assist the Guards in protecting the meeting. Two of the persons who assist the Guards will be punished by the court and, so far as the others are concerned, no punishment at all will be dealt out.
They were brought before the court?
Yes.
What is that but criticising the court?
That is what happened.
I cannot allow the Deputy to proceed on those lines. If two sets of persons are brought before a judge, and one set, with certain political convictions, are dealt with in what the Deputy considers a harsh fashion, and the other set is not dealt with in the same fashion, the Deputy, when he comments on that, is criticising the application of justice by the judge.
Very good. We will leave it at that. In the mob that attempted to stop that meeting there were people of the name of Fraher, and I want to show the kind of people that that mob was made up of. The Irish Press on the 18th February published a statement about sentences inflicted upon certain people in Limerick. It stated that:
"Judge McElligott sentenced Thomas Fraher and Patrick Fraher (junior) to 18 months each with hard labour, and John Carroll to 12 months with hard labour for breaking into the house of John Ryan, Kilmallock, on the night of December 15 last, and taking £6 10s. and goods. Carroll and Fraher (junior) pleaded guilty, and Thomas Fraher was found guilty by a jury. Evidence was that the house of Ryan, who lived with his two sisters, was entered by masked men, and that while the raiders were in the house the mask fell off Fraher (junior). Fraher (junior) gave evidence implicating Thos. Fraher."
So that the only people that were punished in that disgraceful scene at Kilmallock were two men who stood out for the rights, and stood out successfully for the rights of the Constitution that our people here possess. Nothing happened to the rest, and when they had got free of their misdeeds because of the position in the district then——
I do not know the case the Deputy is referring to, but he appears to be referring to a judgment and a decision of a court. Of course, the decisions of courts are not subject to revision here, this House having no judicial functions.
I am recalling the fact that a number of persons attempted to break up a Kilmallock meeting in 1932, and that they have since been declared by a court to be of a type that put on black masks on their faces and went into a person's house at night and robbed him, and we have the satisfaction of knowing that they are putting in a period of imprisonment. That was at the end of 1932. Deputy Cosgrave went to Limerick in September, 1933. What was the situation there then? Again the Cork Examiner of 25th September records:—
"Limerick experienced one of the wildest occasions in its political history on Saturday night, when the first meeting of the United Ireland Party was held at the Crescent. Numerous baton charges by the Gárda Síochána took place previous to, during, and following the meeting. Wild scuffles for the possession of flags occurred in the streets. Bleeding bandsmen played the National Anthem as a beginning to the meeting, and were so badly injured as to be unable to play it at the end."
They were attacked, broken bottles being thrown at them as they emerged with Deputy Cosgrave from the hotel to go to the place of meeting. They were wounded in a horrible fashion and they simply staggered on, doing their duty until they reached the platform. A party escorted Deputy Cosgrave and the other speakers from the hotel to the platform. Some of that party wore blue shirts; the band was in blue shirts, and thus, owing to the assistance given to the police in Limerick 12 months after Kilmallock, it was possible to hold the meeting which it would not be possible to hold otherwise, although 27 people had to be taken to hospital as a result of the blackguardly attacks. The following day the Cork Examiner says in its leading article:—
"The country will be interested to hear President de Valera's explanation of the conduct of the unruly elements professing to support him who banded themselves to prevent the leaders of the United Ireland Party holding a public meeting at Limerick on Saturday night."
That was 12 months after the meeting at Kilmallock. The country was able to see what President de Valera had to say upon that matter. In his organ the next day he said:—
"The one thing that could defeat the people now is disorder, and we ourselves are convinced that the gentlemen who have made a profession of parading in blue shirts are determined to create that disorder."
The men who prevented the meeting being broken up in Kilmallock, and who had become more disciplined and organised as Deputy O'Higgins said, and who put on uniforms to discipline themselves and to distinguish themselves from the mob—these were the people that the President contends were responsible for the attempt to break up the meeting in Kilmallock 12 months before. Is it any wonder that the Ministry in this country, in these circumstances, find themselves up against the realities in a matter of law and order? How did they attempt to get out of the difficulty? You have the extremes to which the President was driven in August last to make a case for an attack on that organisation. He had to get up here in this House and tell the people that there was a case for getting these extraordinary powers because an ex-Minister had gone over to Glasgow, and in collusion with the British Minister had got British armed assistance to help the organisation here and to put himself and his Ministers out of office. He was driven to that extremity in August last.
He brought in his Constitution (Amendment) Act, and put it in force with that excuse. He told us the Military Courts have been operating since. With what result? Eighty plus 12 cases had come up before the Military Court under that Act and 12 of these cases dealt with the Party here for which it was specially instituted. By introducing that measure the President by the general circumstances that led up to its introduction, and the condition to which the country was reduced then, and which has continued since, was forced because he had the weapon in his hand and because he brought it in for that purpose, to use it. But the difficulty he is up against is the material that he has to work on because it is material he does not want to work on. Now the Executive sets out to create a new series of crimes and a new series of criminals. And the new series of criminals are those people who had put on blue shirts in order that they might more effectively and more orderly carry out the special duties which attach to citizenship here in our present circumstances.
The Minister for Justice is interested in files. I shall ask the Minister for Justice to look back over some past files — particular files — immediately before the passing into law of the Constitution (Amendment) Act, and to look at the position in Tipperary then. Superintendent Curtain had been killed; Ryan was assassinated. If he looks at these files he will find that there was in Tipperary a meeting attended by Seán Russell, a short time before the members of the present Ministry sent to Russia that military mission that proved to be such a futility. Russell attended a meeting of certain people in South Tipperary, and he told them to keep quiet for a while; that if they did not, the Constitution Bill would be passed, and President Cosgrave as he then was, would get powers to deal with them; he told them to wait until after Christmas. He reviewed the Army position and found that they were in possession of one Lewis gun, one Thompson gun, 67 rifles; 20 revolvers; 5,000 rounds of rifle ammunition and 100 rounds of revolver ammunition. Yet all the Minister does is to go to South Tipperary, to Ballyneale, to find a member of the Fine Gael organisation with an old revolver that has no trigger, that cannot be fired unless you push an improvised trigger with your thumb. He has to find him and send him before the Military Tribunal. That is the kind of administration that we are getting under the Constitution Amendment Bill.
Will the Deputy say when the revolvers, the Lewis guns and the Thompson guns were in South West Tipperary?
They were in South West Tipperary in September, 1931.
Will the Deputy tell us why his Government did not collect them?
Because they had not the close knowledge or association with the people who had them as the Minister.
A Deputy
Why?
Remember what the position was. They were inspected and reviewed by, as I say, Seán Russell, who, the Minister for Industry and Commerce two years before had said, was the best man that could go to Russia on the military mission that was going. I have not the close association, or the members of the Executive at that time had not the same close association, with the people who knew of these arms and who were capable of dealing with them and disposing of them.
You do not know where the arms are?
Order!
So that the Minister has to go to Ballyneale. We have heard of impartiality of administration here. We have heard talk of the tolerance that is spoken of by Ministers from one end of the country to the other. Ministers, by the talk in which they have indulged, by the charges they have made and by the propaganda in which they have engaged, have created a problem for themselves. They are running away from that problem. They are running away from the problem that they have been forced up against, of dealing, under their own machinery, with 80 cases of their own friends, as against 12 of our followers, in spite of the partial administration. Therefore this Bill has to be introduced. It will also help them to hide and obscure from the minds of the people generally the condition to which they have brought them. The Minister for Education tells his constituents of events in Germany and in Austria to prevent their hearing what he says to them in other sentences—that the Executive Council cannot provide all the money for public works, that the ratepayers will have to provide some of it or they will not have any works, to blind them to what the Minister for Defence has said in regard to taking land from people who will not use it, and to make them deaf to what the Minister for Industry and Commerce has said about the slaughter of cattle. All these problems are pressing on the people and so the Government invent the problem of the blue shirt. Propaganda is not going to solve these problems. It is evident on one side that the Blueshirt Bill is propaganda. On the other hand, there is an attempt at dictatorship if Ministers on the far side had guts enough to be dictators, but in the hands of people, in whose hands the Constitution Amendment Act is crumbling because they have not the moral courage to use it, the Blueshirt Bill, when they get it through as an Act, must and will crumble also. Meanwhile just as the material emancipation of the people has gone on, their political emancipation, the emancipation of the mind, is going on even faster, and that is the problem that is really before the Fianna Fáil Government.
It is extraordinary how Deputies on the opposite benches have not got sense enough to see that they cannot have it both ways. We cannot be in a perfectly peaceful position with ex-Ministers in this State creating a scare and Deputies such as Deputy Mulcahy getting up to tell us how serious the position is. Now, we are in a serious position. There are Deputies on that Front Bench, as there are Ministers on this, who have seen civil war generated in this country and who know that the bitterness which is being created to-day is going, if it is not stopped, to bring about exactly the same situation. I lived through 1922 and I know how, step by step, the very same thing that made civil war inevitable in that period is going on to-day, and Deputies on the opposite benches ought to co-operate with us here, who have lived through the miserable period since, in seeing that it does not eventuate from it. This country is either blessed or cursed with the fact that there are such people on these two benches. It will be blessed with it if their knowledge and experience will save the country from such another civil war.
Hear, hear.
It will be cursed with it if the bitterness which was engendered at that time is going to continue now to create another civil war. Yes, we are up against it. This Government was elected into power on a programme which should have appealed to every Irishman, no matter what side he took in the civil war. We tried to get our people to work on the motto of Tone, to put aside the memory of the dissensions of the past and to try to come together, if we were all Irishmen, in a country that was worth saving, a nation that was a grand nation, that we should, as we were, ready to die for it, be all ready to live for it and forget the past bitternesses which, God knows, were imposed from outside. Now, what is the position we are in? When we came into office we knew that there were problems against which coercive methods had been used and which they did not solve. We came in here and we said: "We believe that our people are a noble people, that they are a sensible people, that they will recognise fair play, one to another, and that if the Executive takes time, has patience, the good sense of our people, old and young, will finally triumph."
For a year we were in office. In that year we were getting more and more peace until there was not, as can be seen if you look up the records, a period since 1922 in which there was greater peace in the land. We were attacked here in the House and blamed because we were not taking certain measures which those on the opposite benches would have taken if they were in office. They might have been necessary if they were in office. That is a fact; they might have been necessary. We were getting reports, and we knew what the situation in the country was. We knew that with the removal of the Oath and the passage of time, the peace for which we were looking, and wanted to see, would be established. The Oath was removed. There was available then to every section of the Irish people an opportunity of going before the electorate and putting their programme, Republican or anything else. They could have their representatives freely elected, owing no allegiance to anybody, to no Power under Heaven except the Irish people. And with that there before them it was quite clear that it was only a matter of time until the motives which banded the I.R.A. together would cease to operate and when, instead of having a military organisation with arms at its disposal, arms which were intended originally to fight for the freedom of this country against foreign countries and which never should be used against the people here, these guns would either get rusty or would finally, when the Republican Government was elected and a Republic declared, be surrendered to the representatives of the people.
Patience was all that was required, but human beings approach problems in different ways. Our attitude of patience was nothing but cowardice in the eyes of those who were using force. I believe in patience. I do not believe in combat, which was put as the motto of the National Guard. I believe in persuading the people to do what is right, if you can. I always knew that, if we were forced to it, the Executive had behind it all the resources of the country and, if it had to do it and was forced to do it, it could mobilise all the sensible people in the country to see that order would be kept. But that policy did not recommend itself to the people on the opposite side and we were attacked here for cowardice and weakness and every possible effort was made to force us to adopt a policy which had proved unsuccessful in the hands of our predecessors.
I have no doubt they are very happy to see us in this position, but I can tell them that I foresaw this position when Fianna Fáil was founded, and I did not shirk the responsibility of coming into this position and I am not going to shirk it now. I am not a fool in politics. I have as good experience as anybody on the opposite benches, and I believe I know the Irish people as thoroughly as anybody on the opposite benches. I knew what I was doing. I knew the difficulties that were in front of our Party unless commonsense were rapidly going to be supreme, and the gentlemen on the opposite benches, if it is any satisfaction to them to know that we are in this position, they can have that satisfaction. But I do want them to know that we have not simply stumbled into it. Let them have their satisfaction, and it is a poor satisfaction for any Irishman.
Deputy Mulcahy has told you how at Kilmallock and at Limerick freedom of speech was denied to him. I have, through my whole life, at every meeting that there was occasion to do it, asked the people of Ireland not to be tyrannical one towards the other, to give fair-play one to another. When meetings at which I was were occasionally disturbed by interrupters, and when some of the people in the crowd wanted to pitch them out, I have frequently said: "No; let us hear that man's question; let us answer his question," and in 99 cases out of 100 the answering of that question was helpful and not harmful. I do not stand for disorder. I do not stand for interfering with the rights of others, and I make an offer to those on the opposite benches now. If they quit this tomfoolery of blue-shirting, which is provocative here as it was in Belgium and in Holland, and all those other countries on the Continent, and if we cannot get by the ordinary forces of the law, the existing forces of the law, fair-play at political meetings, freedom of speech at political meetings, we will get a joint composite force, a national force, and we will preserve order.
The greatest enemies of this country, whether in 1922 or now, are the people who create disorder, because disorder, where there are guns available, is going to stop, not at fisticuffs, not at blows of knuckle-dusters, or cudgels, but ultimately it is going to lead to more serious bloodshed. Not very long ago I read a dispatch which Mr. Lloyd George sent over here in the summer of 1922, and I read the reply which the Executive of that day made, having Irish interests at heart as I will admit on seeing it. Trying to put off a conflict, they were temporising, when a spark out there in the streets set fire to the powder magazine and we had a civil war in which we were on both sides involved. Do we want that again? Are we going with our eyes open back into a situation like that? I appeal to every decent Irishman, to every Deputy here, to everyone through the country not to play the game of the enemies of our country by allowing that to happen.
We have come in here with responsibilities. We hate, I hate, everything that tastes of coercion; I hate it from the bottom of my heart. We brought into operation the Seventeenth Amendmend. We did it because I did not want to see bloodshed in the streets of Dublin, and I gave that as the principal reason, as it was. That was the immediate reason for bringing down that Act and, having it down and seeing the situation as it was, and sincerely wishing to put it aside, we have been unable to do so because of the fact that we are only seven or eight years removed from that civil war and the bitterness of that period is still in the hearts of many, and it does not require much to set fire to the powder magazine again.
We are bringing in this Bill with reluctance. We want, as a first step in securing order, to prevent the provocation of disorder. We were accused here the other day of establishing a Party propaganda bureau. We were accused of doing that by the very Deputy who himself made an excellent speech at the time he, on a previous occasion, brought a similar proposal forward. We were accused by him although he knew what we were doing has been done in practically every country in the world. We are accused of bringing in this Bill as an attack on political opponents; we are accused by people who know full well that the problem we have to deal with here is not confined to our country. The difference is that here it would be much more dangerous and terrible and menacing if it got under way than it would be in any of these countries to which reference was made by the Minister for Justice. Deputy Mulcahy would have you believe that in Belgium the reason for the introduction of the law was to prevent a foreign organisation coming into Belgium. Nothing of the kind. It was brought into Belgium to prevent a conflict between the Greenshirts and the Blueshirts. The Blueshirts were a Socialist organisation. They had been peacefully in existence for a long time but the advent of the Greenshirts and the danger of clashes between the two made it necessary for the Government of Belgium to bring in a Bill to ban all uniforms. This Bill is not merely to ban the uniform of the Blueshirts, as those on the opposite benches would have you believe. It is to ban the wearing of uniforms as a political distinctive mark by any political party.
Deputies
Hear, hear!
I know that Deputies profess to have nothing but the most peaceful intentions with regard to that uniform, but we cannot afford to take the peaceful expressions or the peaceful intentions as expressed by Deputies as a sufficient safeguard for this country. Deputy Cosgrave appeals to his record, and asks would he be associated with any movement that might tend to overthrow political institutions or to establish a dictatorship here. I might say something which I do not want to say if I suggested that Deputy Cosgrave's assurances would not be enough to save such a situation. I think I saw somewhere that Deputy MacDermot said a dictatorship would be established in this country only over his dead body. Again I say we do not want to see Deputy MacDermot's dead body, nor do we think his dead body would be a sufficient safeguard against the establishment of a dictatorship. I tell both of those gentlemen that if this explosion which is possible should take place, or, if I were to use a similar simile, if that storm should arise, they would be only corks on an angry sea. We are not going, with our responsibility, simply to desist because we get assurances of this kind. The fact is that those assurances are not believed by a large section of the people. The fact is that statements such as those made here by the ex-Attorney-General, Deputy Costello, are not believed by the people. What they believe is that just as the wearing of shirts was but the preliminary in other countries to the establishment of a dictatorship, so here the wearing of shirts helps the banding together of people who could measure their strength, as the Belgian Minister put it, and see what are their chances of success by violence when the time arises. The headline and example of what happened in those countries is before our people's eyes, and it does not matter how you may say that that movement has no sinister purpose, it is not going to be believed by the people. Just as Deputy MacDermot said that a dictatorship would be established here only over his dead body, so there are in this country a large number of people, much larger, perhaps, than Deputy MacDermot imagines, who would say too of themselves that it is only over their dead bodies a dictatorship would be established, and who, therefore, would be tempted to attack by force those whom they suspected, rightly or wrongly, of having the intention of establishing such a dictatorship. Now I believe in liberty. I believe in liberty for the individual. I believe in democratic liberty. I believe that as human beings we are not to be dedicated to some idol of the State, but that the State should be organised for the benefit of the individual.
Deputies
Hear, hear!
Those are the principles of liberty which are very dear to the hearts of Irishmen. There are Irishmen in this country—and I am one of them—who will die as readily as Deputy MacDermot would rather than see without resistance something established here which is going to deprive us of every right that we thought valuable. You are complaining on the opposite benches because we are introducing something here that is going to limit your liberty. What liberty would there be if there was established here that type of Fascism which it is suspected you intend to establish here? Do you think you would stop at simply preventing the wearing of badges of political organisations that might give rise to trouble on the streets? You would not. Countries where uniforms are forbidden have been mentioned. I will repeat some of them. You have Switzerland, the country, perhaps, of all others which has the most democratic organisation; you have Holland; you have Sweden; you have Norway; you have new countries like Latvia and you have Roumania; but you have also, I would point out to you, Italy and Germany. Those who are opposing the bringing in of this measure know in their hearts that if that which is feared, and which a large section of the people are opposed to, took place in this country, you would have none of that liberty which you are claiming for yourselves, and which you say we are denying you by measures of this kind. You would not then be allowed to write in your papers and speak of a gangster Government, nor would you be allowed to speak of the head of the Government as being responsible for having bombers in Dundalk. You can now say those things, although there are many of the Irish people outraged that you can say them. You can oppose the efforts of the Government elected by the majority of the Irish people to carry out its programme. You can oppose it now, but I should like to see the person who would try to oppose any programme that was going to be put forward by the substitute that you want, or at least that you are suspected of wanting.
Very different.
I agree it is very different, but it is not very different when we have nothing to prove that we can accept the assurances of Deputy MacDermot or Deputy Cosgrave. Deputy Cosgrave is moved aside by General O'Duffy. I have listened to expressions from the opposite benches which make it quite clear to me that they would have none of the irresponsibilities which General O'Duffy has been guilty of on platforms, but they are not able to restrain him. You think when he has organised his League of Youth and when he has regimented them that you will be able to restrain him. Well, we have a solemn duty to our people to see that he will not get by force into a position to deny our people the liberties which are their right. He can go before the Irish people. If he has a programme he can get from the Irish people recognition and approval for that programme, and if he becomes a Government he can come over here. I can promise that if he does there will be far less liberty in this country than the liberty which it is enjoying to-day. He has that way of doing it, and because he has that way of doing it— as it was done in the past, as Cumann na nGaedheal were doing it—he has no reason to complain. He should not have to be dependent upon the glamour of blue shirts or the Roman salute in order to get him the support that would be necessary for him. I do not want to be misunderstood. I have no fault to find with the colour blue, none whatever. As a matter of fact, I like the colour blue and the Minister for Defence and myself showed our liking for it by choosing it as the colour for the dress uniform of the cavalry section of the Army at the time of the Eucharistic Congress. We have no objection to blue. It has, as Deputy Cosgrave said, roots in the traditional past and we have no fault whatever to find with it. I should like, however, at this stage, to say just one little word about it. A few days ago, I saw an account of a meeting down in Limerick at which Lord Muskerry was speaking. Speaking, as I remember, to the labourers of Limerick, he appealed to them in these terms:
"We have to choose to-day whether you will join our Party and endeavour to follow in the footsteps of St. Patrick or whether you will go over to Fianna Fáil and become an advocate of their thinly-disguised policy of Communism, class hatred and destruction which they are preaching in a camouflaged form."
He went very near it.
Comrade Muskerry!
He went very near it. Is there anybody here in this country who can accuse me of preaching class hatred? When Deputies on the opposite benches were indulging in it, I was not. I have never preached class hatred in this country. The reason I quote this is with reference to St. Patrick. If there is anything more contemptible than another, more disgusting than another, it is for people in any political Party in this country to try to drag in religion to help them.
Hear, hear!
The majority of us here in this country are of the same religion, and if any of us love that religion and love that Church, we will not seek to drag it into Party politics here.
It is about time you said it.
I am saying it. I have always held it and have always said it and I have never attempted to do what is being done from the benches opposite. Every Irishman and every Catholic knows full well that it would be a bad day for the Church and a bad day for religion that it identified itself with political Parties. It has a mission, it has a duty, far above politics. Politicians are up to-day and they are down to-morrow. The dictator of to-day is the exile of to-morrow, and those who love religion and love the Church and want it always to be in a position in which it will be able to be above politics and able to deal with and speak to all its children with an authority that will be unsullied because it is known and appreciated to be non-partisan will deprecate the attempt that is being made here by Lord Muskerry, following others, to associate the Blueshirts with St. Patrick.
We are accused of Communism, and Deputy Mulcahy says that it is near the mark. He is far more of a Communist than I am and he knows it. I have never stood for Communism in any form. I loathe and detest it as leading to the same sort of thing that I loathe and detest in the type of State that General O'Duffy would set up, because they are both destructive of human liberty. Communism is antagonistic, as everybody who understands it feels, to that individuality of soul which every one of us was given by the Creator. I am not in favour of Communism. I do not believe in it either as a social policy or an economic policy, or any other, and I defy anybody in this country to show that at any time I have supported, or in any way trafficked in it. The Deputies yonder, in the same type of despicable work they are at to-day, when they try to associate us with it, went out on a campaign through the country and they went to the religious authorities and told them the danger that was threatening of Communism. They did that at a time when their own private reports from their police officers let them know that there was no immediate danger or menace of Communism. I asked for reports about Communism when I came into office and I got them from the former Commissioner of Police, General O'Duffy, who talks so much about it now, and he knows it is false. I have that report here. It was, I think, he said himself, a report of fifty pages. It was a lengthy report, anyhow, and I got it summarised.
On a point of order, I suppose this report will be made available to Members of this House?
I am going to give a summary—a statement with regard to counties—and the report, if necessary, can be put on the Table of the House.
For Comrade Fitzgerald and Comrade Muskerry.
Class hatred as usual.
I have got here reports which, as I have said, are a summary of that report which was got at my request from all the superintendents of the Guards throughout the country. Here is what the report reveals. Cork is a city of some industries where you might have expected if there was much Communism about to find some traces of it. And this is an extract from the report put here in the summary prepared for me:—
"There does not appear to be any definite effort to bring Communistic influence to bear on the unemployed as at present organised, for there is no distinct organisation of unemployed under Communistic auspices."
There is no Communism then in Cork and this was the position as at November 10th, 1932—no organised Communism in Cork.
In Carlow-Kildare, similarly, there is no organised Communism. The Carlow report says:—"There are no Communistic organisations in this county." The same statement is made with regard to Kildare.
In Monaghan-Cavan the report is similarly "no."
In Clare the report states:—"About 20 members of the Kilrush branch of the Irish Transport and General Workers' Union belong to the I.R.A.; about 50 more support that organisation, and their outlook could be said to be more Communistic than national." Reference is made to "a Communistic cell recently formed in Kilrush by Mr. T.J. Ryan, local organiser and Commandant of the West Clare Battalion I.R.A." That is Clare. "In Kilrush there are about 20 members of the Kilrush branch of the Irish Transport and General Workers' Union belonging to the I.R.A. and about 50 supporters of that organisation." I do not know what the position in Clare is to-day. I know that there was at that time a labour dispute and that there were difficulties in Kilrush, but I take it for what it is worth.
In Donegal two men are mentioned, one whose activities have been referred to in previous confidential reports. He gave out Russian periodicals weekly, distributing them to the local people. It is believed that he advocated Communism, but so far his activities have been confined to the locality in which he resides. In August this man was visited by a Russian lady and a few days later left. That is the position as given by the report from Donegal.
In Galway, the report does not disclose the existence of any Communistic organisation, and Galway was going to be the centre of a great Communistic Convention and I will tell you how beautifully this educator of youth is able to turn it on at a United Ireland Party Convention. In Galway there is no Communism.
In Kerry it is stated "no Socialistic or Communistic agents have so far existed or become active in the division." In Leix-Offaly there is nothing to show that any Communistic organisation exists though the report refers to attempts from Communists outside the division to bring some of the unemployed into their ranks. "Generally speaking," the report says, "Communism has got little or no hold in this division."
In Limerick, it is stated, that there was a failure to form a branch of the Workers' Union of Ireland and the report states "the president of the City Workers' Union is stated to be of a Communistic mind." But he appears to be the only Communist agent they discovered in Limerick. Now I am reading this for the House because I want the people of this country to realise how they are being humbugged.
The President will publish the full report?
The full report will be laid on the Table of the House for Deputies to read. We next come to Louth-Meath. There is no evidence of any Communistic organisation in this division or the association of anyone here with such an organisation elsewhere. That is for Deputy Coburn. There is no report of Communism in his constituency.
He is your best friend there, if you only knew it.
"In Longford-Westmeath there is nothing to report to indicate the existence of any Communistic organisation. A meeting was held in Longford in October, 1932, at which a certain person was expected to speak. He did not turn up. Scarcely anybody attended the meeting." In Mayo there is no sign of Communist tendencies. Roscommon: "There is no reason to believe that the unemployed of this county are allied to an organisation with a Communistic outlook." Sligo-Leitrim, two persons are referred to.
We have rather a long extract here about these two persons. One of them has been deported since. Tipperary; no evidence is given of the existence of any Communistic organisation. Several individuals are mentioned in the report who are said to have Communistic views. In some instances leaders of the branches of the Able-bodied Unemployed Men's Organisation are described as Communists, but it is not stated that they are engaged in open propaganda. Some of them were involved in the seizure of Cleeves' Creameries in 1922.
In Waterford-Kilkenny the report states that a certain person, one of the leaders of the Able-bodied Unemployed Men's Organisation, is in touch with the leaders of Communism in Dublin but that he has not disclosed his Communistic doctrine to the rank and file of the Able-bodied Unemployed Men's Organisation. That is Waterford-Kilkenny. There is, however, a further portion of the report, and it says that a certain person is stated to have visited Russia two years ago and to have brought back a quantity of Soviet literature. The Irish Mines and Quarries Union at Castlecomer is stated to be controlled by this man. There are no further particulars given of this organisation. It may be presumed that this refers to the branch at Castlecomer. Wexford: "Several persons are named as holding Communistic views, but it is not suggested that there is any Communistic organisation in the county." Dublin-Wicklow, not including Dublin: "Communistic agitators have not made their appearance." In Dunlavin the non-existence of Communistic activities is reported. But a number of men locally unattached to any organisation may, it is stated, have tendencies in a Communistic direction. "The Finglas Branch of the Able-bodied Unemployed Men's Organisation apparently savours of Communistic ideas, but they have given no trouble so far." Dublin City. Now perhaps I had better read just this: "The Workers' Revolutionary Party and the Communistic Organisation has its headquarters in Dublin. It is stated that approximately there are 400 members in the Dublin district, several of the moving spirits of the Association are Englishmen and Scotsmen. Another Communistic organisation is the Union of the Dublin Unemployed Workers Movement which at the date of the report had rooms in North Great George's Street." The Workers' College is then described. I think there was talk some time ago about this Workers' College. It was closed in June last for want of students, and it was the only Communist College that existed in Dublin.
I have gone over the reports made by the officer in charge giving information to the Government of Communist activities throughout the country. We have got those reports and watched them day by day and under our eyes, whatever tendency to Communism was there, was fading away. It was fading away because the one thing that might give it life was anything which could be regarded as an attack upon the freedom of the workers. This country is not a natural breeding ground for Communism and everybody knows it. It is opposed to our religion; it is opposed to our individualistic tendencies; it is opposed to our whole scheme of life. If there is one country in the world more than another which is unsuitable soil for Communism it is this. It was raised as a bogey by the gentlemen on the opposite benches in order to give them an excuse at one time for the Bills which they introduced and they are continuing to use it to-day as an excuse for their Blueshirts. An excuse must be given for them. One excuse is that they have to preserve order. It is extraordinary how this community of ideas travels across the water. In Belgium protection was also given as an excuse. The proper people to protect the rights of the citizens are the organised servants of the State and the State will have to procure sufficient to keep order. As I have said already, if Deputies on the opposite benches want to work for order they will find us more than willing to supply all the means that may be necessary, and if the ordinary forces of the State are not sufficient to secure order, I say our two organisations together can secure it; but they must be controlled and directed by the proper responsible authorities. There must be no usurpation whatever of police functions by unauthorised persons or by people who want to use that as an excuse for building up a political army.
I have dealt with two of the excuses. One of the excuses is the keeping of order. As a matter of fact, they know that it provokes disorder. They have complained that their people suffer. We have got complaints that our people suffer. If somebody loses a coin in the street and starts to look for it a large number of people will immediately collect around him through pure curiosity. When political meetings are held people go to them. Unfortunately opponents go as well as supporters and it is a very difficult task indeed to get opponents of a political policy to keep quiet when they hear things that are distasteful and hurtful to them. We have had scenes provoked here in this House where at least we ought to be able to control ourselves somewhat. We have had scenes provoked in this House by references one to another and to things that we do not agree upon. Something hurtful is said. The person saying it may believe it to be true, but there is an immediate response from those who do not agree. We all have commonsense enough to know that with the limited human intelligence we have, unable to see truth as a whole, each one of us only able to see a narrow facet of it, we are not able to agree about certain things and we will not view these things in the same way. The trouble about it all is that very often the more sincere we are and the more certain we are that we have got the whole truth the more intolerant we become, and the more desperate sometimes we become, if our conception of the truth is assailed. If Deputies in an Assembly like this, used to each other's remarks—our skins by this time ought to have been very well tanned— become excited when there is some perversion of what they regard as the truth, is it not obvious, that when people who have not our experience, who have not got the training we should have got in self-control, go to meetings as opponents and hear things said which they believe are——
The kind of interruption we complain of is not at all what the President is suggesting. The interrupters who come to our meetings start interfering before we begin to speak at all.
I am quite willing to concede to the Deputy that, unfortunately, that sort of thing does happen. Deputies know that on more than one occasion I have had to face people who did not agree with me.
A Deputy
Ballinamore.
I have had to put up with interruptions. I know that that is exasperating, that it offends every conception of fair play. But we are living in a world of human beings, unfortunately, and not in a world of angels.
It is not done at your meetings.
Let us take that fact into account and try, so far as we possibly can, to approximate to the ideal which we think is right. We are willing to do that. As I said at the beginning, I detest it from my heart. I think it is tyrannical and unfair. It offends every feeling of mine to see any interruptions of this kind. When I say interruptions, I mean the kind of interruptions that Deputy MacDermot has been speaking about, those deliberate interruptions, as if there is anything good or right in a policy you are going to kill it by shouting it down. If the policy is right, it is going to triumph in spite of you, and if it is wrong, you give it a sort of artificial life which it would not have otherwise. There is nothing more stupid, or more insane, than the attempt to combat political opinions and political policies by interruptions. If I had my way, and if my will could do it, I would urge people going to public meetings, if they thought there were opinions going to be expressed that would be disagreeable, to make up their minds, as I have often to do here, to stay away. Very often I find the task rather a difficult one.
We all do.
We all do, I admit, but, in the long run is there not some work that will be of some good to us? If people go to political meetings and want to hear what their opponents say, at the start they should make up their minds that they will hear things which will rile them and exasperate them. If they think they have not sufficient control of themselves, so as to keep quiet, then they should keep away.
The Minister for Justice tells them to go there. What does he mean by saying "keep the accursed crowd out of the Government's way"?
I sincerely say now, as I have said before, that I have often wondered whether this country would not be better off if the whole lot of us, on the benches on both sides, were taken out and put into some foreign island, and made to live together. I have often thought that seriously, when I see what is happening. I am quite willing to go with the Deputies opposite.
Surely the Minister for Justice is not going so far.
Order!
Deputy Mulcahy is not above reproach either.
Probably not.
Not by any means, and was not above reproach when sitting on Ministerial benches.
I never asked anyone to "keep the accursed crowd out of the way."
If I thought for one moment that it was going to mean an advantage to this country, and if I could prove that to myself, I would do it willingly.
Will you take General O'Duffy with you?
If I thought it would save the country, or save it from the kind of craziness which I see he is bringing upon it, I would go.
A Deputy
Deputy MacDermot would be delighted.
Even though Deputy MacDermot might have the satisfaction, and I might have the misery, I would be prepared to do it. That is a fact. Remember that the feelings we have here and the passions we exhibit at times, are right through the country. A couple of days ago I met two deputations. One represented the Army Pensioners' Defence Association. There was a man on one deputation who formerly held high rank as a soldier. A few days later I met another deputation, and a brother of this man was on it. They had taken opposite sides. We must remember that the division at the time of the civil war has gone down, and has divided families, putting brothers on opposite sides.
Who did it?
I am as prepared to face judgment upon that as the Deputy.
You will all be judged by the same God, anyway.
I am not asking the House to judge who was right or who was wrong. I am asking the House to take facts into account and to remember that there is right through this country that desperate division of opinion and fierce passions which are ready to be kindled at any moment. Deputies should bear that in mind when they start a dangerous course, such as I can see to be the course that those on the opposite benches are engaged in at present. When I was in the United States I travelled through the Southern States, some 60 years after a civil war had been fought in that country. The position there was not quite the same as here. There were certain territorial divisions which kept them apart. I was entertained to a banquet at a certain city in one of the Southern States. The chairman of the reception committee was a Federal Judge and although 60 years had passed there was the same bitterness in his heart against the "Yankees" as he called them as was in the heart of his father, and in the hearts of those who were active participants in that war. If that can be so where people are separated territorially, how much more is it so in our country? Do we not know that we cannot take risks here that could be taken in other countries? Do we not know that there is a situation here far more dangerous, if it got ahead, than such a situation would be in Belgium, in Holland or in Switzerland? These countries have had no recent civil war. The leaders on opposite sides in these other countries are not relatively young men which, again, is either to the good fortune or eternal misery of this country. We are relatively young. Every member on the opposite benches and on these benches could, if driven to it, be an active participant in a physical conflict to-day. I ask Deputies on the opposite benches not to persist in trying to do this thing.
It has been said that we are a partisan Government. I say that is not true. We came into office in most extraordinary circumstances. I believe you can search the pages of history in vain to get a parallel. We were the defeated side in the Civil War of a few years ago. Then we went to the Irish people with our programme and we were elected by a majority. We came here to take over the State organisation and the State machinery, every single part of which was built up by and composed of persons very largely who regarded us as deadly enemies until a few years ago. To the eternal credit of our country I say that, and certainly as a justification I am going to admit it, because I think it is right to admit it, as a justification and proof of the professions of those on these benches now, who were formerly on the opposite benches, that these servants of the State took their orders from us. The members of the Army who were opposed to us, and who fought us physically, took their orders from us as the elected Government of the Irish people. The civil servants, many of whom served against us and used their brains and their intelligence to defeat us, being human beings could not help having their bias and their sympathies, but I can say honestly and sincerely, speaking for the Departments with which I am connected, that I have got as good service from these men as I could expect from anybody under any circumstances.
Deputies
Hear, hear.
There is a police force which like the Army was largely recruited from former comrades of the I.R.A.—those who took one side when it divided. They had difficult work to do through the country. They were sent out unarmed and often amongst a hostile people. We can only confess, as far as we are able to know, that these officers have loyally served us. We came into office and we got service. We came in and we got that service because these men realised that we are not a partisan Government. It is said that we have been vindictive. It has been said by supporters of Deputies on the opposite side that we have acted vindictively. I ask Deputies to show me a single example of vindictive action on our side. I move the Adjournment.