I am sorry for delaying the House. I did not intend to speak at this stage. It was merely to facilitate matters that I proposed the adjournment of the debate a short time ago. The Chair desired that somebody should move the adjournment, and I did so as a formality. I do not know what the rules of the House on the matter are.
Offences Against the state Bill, 1939—Second Stage (Resumed).
Does the Taoiseach want to speak?
I did not intend to speak at the present time.
Afterwards?
I want to hear a few further speeches from the Opposition.
I understand that the strict rule is that, if a speaker intervenes, he is precluded from taking any further part in the debate. I have no doubt, however, that if the Taoiseach wishes to speak later, the House will be prepared to accommodate him.
As there was a misunderstanding, and the Taoiseach moved the adjournment of the debate merely for the purpose of having the Housing Bill taken, I think he would be entitled to intervene later.
I am sure the House understands that I simply moved the adjournment in order to facilitate the Chair at the time.
I must, at the outset of my remarks, congratulate the Minister for Justice on the magnificent volte-face he has made with regard to this Bill. I heard from the Minister sentiments with which I entirely agree. As far as his general propositions were concerned, I entirely agreed with them. When he said that it was the duty of the State to preserve order; when he said that, since it was open to persons to vote, and by their votes elect their representatives if they were strong enough, they had no moral right or legal justification in making an appeal to arms, I agreed with him. I was very glad to hear that. It is perfectly sound, because what is it but a paraphrase of speeches I myself made again and again from the bench in which the Minister is seated? I am glad he has been converted. I am glad he has come completely round to my point of view. I am glad that those principles which when enunciated by me, he and all the members of his Party thundered against, are now accepted as right, sound political doctrine by our converts.
It is an interesting thing to cast, even for a moment or two, one's mind back a few years. It is an interesting thing to consider how, when we introduced it in this House, Article 2A was received. It is an interesting thing to remember how the Minister for Finance, who is not now in his place, wanted to know who was wearing "the mask of Castlereagh." The Minister for Finance—Deputy MacEntee, as he then was—talked of the "baying of the bloodhounds." He was quoting Shelley and I am merely paraphrasing. If the Minister for Finance was then right, who is now wearing the "mask of Castlereagh?" Has the Minister for Finance, if he was then right, been driven out of this House by the baying of what he politely called the bloodhounds, his colleagues in the Executive Council? To-night I heard Deputy Norton read extract after extract from the speeches of an Taoiseach, and from the speeches of the Minister and from the speeches of other members of the Executive Council. If what they said were then true, it would be true to-day. They say it is not true. They say to-day that what they said in 1931 is not true, and they have their very words cast in their teeth by Deputy Norton. Evenhanded justice commends the ingredients of their poisoned chalice to their own lips. All the vitriol that they then poured upon us, all the bitter attacks that they made against us, were perfectly unjustified, perfectly wrong, but not one single one of them has had the moral courage to get up in this House and state that simple obvious fact.
It is indeed true that this Bill is not quite the same as Article 2A, but in many ways this Bill is more severe than was Article 2A of the Constitution. There is a good deal in this Bill which was taken out of Article 2A of the Constitution and put into the ordinary normal law—things which never should be there. I want to make clear to the House again, as I made clear several times years ago, what our attitude towards Article 2A was. We never loved Article 2A. We never thought it was a desirable thing. We always thought that the jury system was the right way to try every prisoner, and we clung on to that jury system as long as ever we could cling on to it. It was not until we were spurred along by the force of necessity that we deserted the jury system. Indeed it would be more correct to say that it was not we, it was not this House, it was not any legislation in fact that took away the right to trial by jury from a certain class of persons in this country. Those persons themselves took away the right to trial by jury. They themselves took away the right to trial by jury when they made the exercise of the right to trial by jury impossible. They took away the right to trial by jury when they murdered jurymen, and when they intimidated other jurymen. It was they and not we who were the real and true authors of the taking away of the right to trial by jury in certain classes of cases. We never liked to do it. We said so again and again, but we had to do it or fail in the duty which was imposed upon us by every principle of civil and moral law when we took up the reins of office and assumed the Government of this State.
It was rather interesting when the Minister for Defence intervened with an interruption in the course of this debate. When Deputy O'Sullivan pointed out the great defects in this Bill, the Minister said: "Oh, but it is in Article 2A." What is the view of the Minister for Defence now? That Article 2A is the consummation of all wisdom, and that nobody can ever criticise any single thing which is in Article 2A. I will deal with his interruption, because be made a statement which is entirely inaccurate in fact. I will deal with that a little later on. Let us take this Bill as it stands. Will the Minister inform us what is the reason for putting in abnormal with normal legislation? I want to know that. What is the reason and what is the excuse for bringing in things out of Article 2A and putting them into the normal everyday law of this State? The Minister made a most astonishing statement. He said something like this, that the first four parts, as in the Treasonable. Offences Act of 1925, made provision by ordinary legislation for the preservation of the liberty of the people, and that those were precautions taken by every State to preserve itself. Does the Minister stand over that? When I consider what is in the first four parts of this Bill, and when I hear the Minister state that they contain nothing except the precautions taken by every civilised State to preserve the liberty of its people, I wonder very much if the Minister has been consulted in the drawing up of this Bill. I wonder very much if the Minister has even read this Bill, because nobody who has read this Bill could possibly say that there is nothing in the first four parts of it which is not to be found in the ordinary legislation of every civilised State. I consider that for practical purposes Great Britain is a civilised country. I consider that they, by their common-sense, have worked out a system of Party Government and set an example of Party Government to every State in the world, but I do think the finest achievement of British common-sense has been the evolving of British common law, altered on occasions by Statute. I want to know and I ask the Minister to point out, as a parallel for those provisions, any single thing in British law, or any single thing that is in the common law of this country, or anything except Article 2A, now repealed, that is the law to-day in this country.
I will take a few of those extraordinary provisions in the first part of this Bill. I will take Section 8, sub-section (1), certainly the most extraordinary provision I have ever seen in any Statute, and certainly a provision which you will find neither in the common law nor in any Statute which was passed by Great Britain, if that is, according to the Minister, a civilised country. It certainly never was the law here, and I do not believe that there is any country in the world, except Nazi Germany, in which sub-section (1) of Section 8 can find its parallel. I will read it to the House:
Every person who shall commit any act of violence—
I pause there, Sir, to say it is "any act of violence", it is not "any act of unlawful violence." It is any act of violence of any kind—
against or of interference with a member of a lawfully established military or police force (whether such member is or is not on duty) or shall take away, injure, or otherwise interfere with the arms or equipment, or any part of the arms or equipment of any such member shall be guilty of a misdemeanour and shall be liable on conviction thereof to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years.
Now, what is the plain meaning of that section? It allows any policeman who likes, whether in uniform or not in uniform, it allows any soldier who likes, whether in uniform or not in uniform, let me say to strike a civilian, but if the civilian strikes back in self-defence he is liable to two years' imprisonment.
There is nothing about political motives. If you interfere with a soldier or with one of the Volunteers, or if a neighbour has a row with them on a farm, and that it has nothing to do with politics, the penalty is two years. There is no answer, no law, no defence. If a person uses violences or interferes in the smallest way with a soldier or a policeman, even if it is not connected with the discharge of their duties, that person is liable to a sentence of two years. Why is the word "lawful" left out? Why has the Minister deliberately left that word out? It appears in every Statute. Why is it left out of this particular section? It is not even a mistake in drafting. Any interference with a soldier, justifiable or unjustifiable, whether done in pursuance of any right, or not done in pursuance of a right by any person, is liable to punishment by imprisonment for two years. Will the Minister tell the House in what State a precaution of that nature is taken to preserve itself, except in this State?
We now come to the powers which are given in Section 27. Remember this is normal law. This section allows the stoppage of a person by a Guard on suspicion. It allows that person to be removed to a police station, and to be kept there for 48 hours, and then, under certain circumstances, to be remanded for 48 hours, although there is not a scintilla of evidence against him. Words equivalent to that were in Article 2A and they were abused. The power was abused. The Minister knows that. I protested again and again in this House against the abuse of this power by Guards. It is very nice to say:—
Whenever a person is arrested under this section, the following provisions shall have effect, that is to say:—
(a) Such person shall be removed to a convenient station of the Gárda Síochána:
(b) such person may be detained for a period of 48 hours in the Gárda Síochána station to which he is so removed.
How did that work out in practice. A man is arrested on suspicion because he was suspected of "having committed or being about to commit or being or having been concerned in the commission of an offence under any section or sub-section of this Act or an offence which is for the time being a scheduled offence for the purposes of Part V of this Act..." What happened in fact? A man was arrested, was kept in for 48 hours, and then released. He had not walked five yards from the barrack gate until he was rearrested and kept in for 48 hours. In one instance which I brought before the House, and which I condemned as strongly as I could, a man was kept a whole month in custody, being released for five minutes, and then a new period of 48 hours started. That is what happened to the knowledge of the Minister, because I denounced it in the House, and yet exactly the same thing is reproduced here, and not reproduced as a matter of emergency legislation, but as a matter of ordinary every-day legislation. The Minister knew about the abuses. I drew his attention to them. They are not abuses that, I believe, he would venture to stand over, yet he re-enacts a section of wider application than under Article 2A, knowing it has been abused in the past, and therefore knowing for a certainty that it will be so abused in the future. If that is not his wish, why is it not stated that no man shall be arrested more than once a month on suspicion by a Guard? What I think would be much fairer would be to say that a man shall not be arrested more than once a year, and detained for 48 hours or for 8 days, as the case may be, on mere suspicion by a Guard. Putting in 48 hours has, in fact, proved in practice perfectly nugatory, and yet the Minister is deliberately silent about it. In what countries in the world does a similar provision exist? Take Section 24, a very interesting section, which deals with the holding of public meetings. It says:—
It shall not be lawful to hold a public meeting which disturbs public order or causes or leads to a breach of the peace.
It is not that the object of the holders of the meeting was to create a breach of the peace, it is that the meeting has, in fact, created a breach of the peace. That takes away from the ordinary political parties the right of freedom of speech. Let me give the House an example of what I mean. I was present at a meeting in Ballina. I addressed that meeting and Deputy Dillon and other Deputies also addressed it. That meeting was one at which there was a very grave breach of the peace. At that meeting the police drew a cordon and behind the cordon there was collected a very large number of stone-throwers and, under police protection, those stone-throwers proceeded to disturb the peace, injuring several persons in the crowd. It was only by luck that the speakers or some other persons on the platform were not injured, as some of the stones lighted on the platform. What do I find under this Bill? I held a meeting which led to a breach of the peace. I did so, because I was not to be intimidated, as I think no member of this House could allow himself to be intimidated from holding a meeting. I held a meeting and it led to a breach of the peace. Suppose this Act were in force, what position would I create? Under Section 24, sub-section (5), every person who organises or holds or attempts to organise or hold a public meeting the holding of which is a contravention of this section, or who takes part or is concerned in the organising or the holding of any such meeting shall be guilty of an offence under this section and shall be liable on summary conviction thereof to a fine not exceeding £50 or, at the discretion of the court, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months or to both such fine and such imprisonment. I held a meeting which was in contravention of this section because, not ten, but I suppose 200 or 300 fellows were flinging stones at the meeting and most certainly disturbing the peace and, therefore, I, by holding that meeting, was liable, if this Bill were law, to a fine of £50 and three months in jail because I refused to give up my common law right and constitutional right of addressing the people of this country or the people of my own constituency. Where, might I ask, does the Minister find any section like that in the legislation of any country?
I am glad to see the Minister for Defence enter the House. The Minister for Defence made an interruption on this and said this is only Article 2A again, Article 2A being the sum of all wisdom, according to the Minister for Defence, and as soon as something is found in Article 2A the last thing in its favour has been said, according to the Minister for Defence. But let us see if this is in Article 2A. Take Article 2A The section dealing with the holding of public meetings provides: "Whenever it appears to the Executive Council that the holding of public meetings in or in the vicinity of any particular building or any particular road or street is likely to lead to a breach of the peace or to be prejudicial to the maintenance of law and order, the Executive Council may issue a proclamation prohibiting the holding in or within a specified area (including such building, road, or street and not extending more than one mile therefrom) during a specified period (not exceeding three month)."
It is very interesting, because, of course, under Section 24 of this Bill, sub-section (3), it is whenever an officer of the Gárda Síochána, not below the rank of chief superintendent, wishes to proclaim a meeting, he can proclaim a meeting off his own bat. So, whether the Government or a superintendent of the Gárda Síochána are given the same powers, the Minister for Defence would say it is exactly the same thing. In other words, the wisdom and the discretion of, let me say, the least able chief superintendent of the Gárda Síochána is, according to the argument put forward by the Minister for Defence, just as good a judgment and just as good an exercise of ability as the exercise of the judgment and ability of the whole Government. There is no difference, in the mind of the Minister, whether power is given to a chief superintendent or given to the Government or any member of the Government. And, besides, that particular section deals with the preventing of a meeting being held in a specified place and within a mile of a specified place. It does not prevent the holding of a meeting anywhere, and, above all things, it does not make that meeting subsequently illegal by the holders thereof and by the people who addressed it by the action of persons over whom they have no control, persons who are there deliberately to break them up.
Where in God's earth, in any State, civilised or uncivilised, or any section of any statute on any Statute Book the world wide over, can one man or body of men make another man a criminal without the knowledge and against the wishes of the man himself? And where on earth can a body of enemies of an individual make that individual liable to a fine of a very large amount and liable to a term of substantial imprisonment though he himself has done nothing wrong? There are many other things, Sir, in this Bill which satisfy me, at any rate, that the Minister ought to take out every single one of what I will call the "executive" sections in the earlier part of this measure—the first four parts. Let him, if he wishes, put them all into the latter two parts. Let them not come into force unless there was proclamation. I do not really care, as far as I personally am concerned, what he makes offences, but I object to these powers he gives to the Guards. For instance, a Guard goes into a witness box and says: "I believe so and so," and that is evidence, though he knows nothing about it, and a man can be convicted on a statement of that nature, under this statute, unless he gets into the witness box—which he is not by law bound to do—and proceeds to deny it.
Where is that to be found anywhere? The proper and only correct course, I am satisfied, for the Minister to take is to separate the normal legislation from the abnormal legislation. Do not confuse and do not run in together your normal and your abnormal legislation. It is a wrong thing to do. Do not run them in together. Keep your normal legislation by itself. Put your abnormal legislation, which the disturbed times require, by itself and hope that the day will sometime come when, finally, the supremacy of the law will be established in this country and there will be no need for abnormal legislation. As long as there is need for abnormal legislation, and certainly, as far as I am concerned, when a Minister in this House states, on behalf of the Government, that he cannot guarantee the supremacy of the law and the security of the lives and property of the people who live within this State, when he states that on his authority as a member of the Government and with the knowledge which he must have from various sources, especially from the Guards and from the Secret Service, I, certainly, will not be one to withhold from him those necessary powers; but let him keep his necessary abnormal powers in a groove by themselves. What on earth is the reason for running the two together? Why put them in the same Statute? Why make them things of the same nature? Why hand down to future generations the idea that Article 2A and this Bill, which is the successor of Article 2A, are things to be considered as quite ordinary? Let the Minister tear out of this Bill everything except what he is satisfied can only be brought in by proclamation when the Government are satisfied that a state of emergency is required. Why bring in all these things from abnormal law into normal law? We are willing to support the Minister. He knows that we must hate things like this. Why will be not meet us and take them out? Why did he ever put them in? He must have known that our objection to things of this nature must be there.
I have said that I will accept what I understand to be the definite statement from the Minister, that these abnormal laws are required now because there are indications that the present peaceful condition of the country will not continue, unless there are abnormal powers, and I am willing to give him those abnormal powers, in so far as my vote is concerned; but I should like to know from the Minister, who tells us that there are armed bodies who are training, organising and getting funds from outside, how he has dealt with these persons up to the present. Has there been any effort, when men were found drilling, to prosecute them for drilling? They need not be brought before a jury. They can be tried before a District Justice, and they have been.
Has there been any effort made to search for the arms? Has there been any finding of arms? I should very much like to know if there has been any genuine search for arms, any genuine endeavour to discover where the dumps are? I think it is a matter we most certainly should be told. I should gladly hear from the Minister that reports which have been widely circulated that arms were missing from military barracks are not true, and I should like a further confirmation of that from the Minister for Defence. I should be glad if he would tell me if the arms in the barracks from which it is said that arms have been stolen, or are missing, have been checked and found right, because it would allay a good deal of uneasy feeling in the country.
The Minister for Justice has already answered that question.
I accept the statement of the Minister for Justice, but I want to know if the arms have been checked and found correct.
The Minister for Justice answered the question.
And the Minister for Defence will not? Well, I am sorry. I must draw my own conclusion from that refusal to answer. I am very sorry to have to draw the conclusion which I am driven to draw. I can draw only one conclusion—that they have been taken and that the Minister for Justice or the Guards have not been told. That is a conclusion I do not want to draw, and it is a conclusion which I do not want the country to draw, and I wish the Minister for Defence would definitely deny it.
I stand completely and entirely behind this Bill, so far as it asserts the principle that abnormal legislation is necessary for abnormal times, so far as it asserts the principle that the State must be supreme, that the State must protect itself and must protect its citizens, and that it would be wanting in its duty if it did not follow that course. We, on these benches, ever since this State was established, have stood for law, for the supremacy of the law and for the crushing down of lawlessness, no matter what form it took. The doctrine was announced, and always faithfully adhered to, that we would have no peace with crime, and we never have, and, please God, we never will have. If the ordinary law is not sufficient to keep down crime, then, I agree that abnormal legislation is required, and, as I said, I am willing to accept the statement of the Minister that the Government cannot carry on without legislation of this kind, but I do press as strongly as I can upon the House that, if abnormal legislation is necessary at present, and I will assume that it is, this is not the time, nor ever could there be a time, when the bringing in of abnormal legislation should be made the excuse to prostitute normal criminal procedure.
It is for that reason that, though I approve of the Bill in so far as it gives the State power to deal with crime with which it could not otherwise deal, I am thoroughly opposed to what it contains, in so far as it gives abnormal power in normal times to Guard or to soldier, or gives the right to suppress public meeting to police officers. Surely the two can be segregated? Surely you can put in one Bill your abnormal legislation and let us have it. If you want it, take it. You say that you are afraid of what will come, if you do not get it. So far as I am concerned, take it, but do not mix it up with the normal law. Do not make the present necessities an excuse for prostituting the normal law and giving powers which should not be given in normal times. It is a simple thing to do. Why not do it? I think it would be far wiser— far, far wiser—that the Government did so, but if you claim to be allowed to give abnormal powers to Guards— powers of suppressing meeting, interfering with the Press and with publications of various kinds—if you give all those powers in normal times, then you have brought in a Bill that ought not to have been brought in, and a Bill that, in my humble opinion, could not be justified, and I would ask you to think it over.
After all, as our leader said, the liberty of the subject is a great and precious thing. There are not very many States in the world now in which the ordinary individual has got his complete freedom as he used to have a few years ago. There are very few States indeed in the world at the present moment in which a man has got the right, without interference, to follow out his own good in his own way, which was the normal definition of liberty. We have that right in this State here, and let us regard it and recognise what a precious thing it is. Let us keep it in mind. If, under stress of abnormal circumstances, we have, as we have had to do in the past and as we have to do to-day, to fall away from that great ideal, let us not keep away from it all the time, and let us not, just because there may be a case to-day for falling away from that ideal, make a stalking-horse of it behind which you can filch away the ordinary liberty in ordinary times of the ordinary citizen of this State.
I wish to give some of the reasons that I have for opposing this Bill. I claim to have a good knowledge of the conditions prevailing in Cork City and for a good distance outside the city, and I must admit that I never remember Cork City and its suburbs to have been more peaceful than has been the case in the last couple of years. I have been reading the clauses of this Bill, and it appears to me that the powers sought in some of these clauses are very far-reaching. I fear that if this Bill will do anything, when passed, it will enkindle all the old bitternesses that existed in the city and country eight or ten years ago. I am quite satisfied that the Guards and the military to-day are accepted by the people with the best of goodwill. I find people amusing themselves at all hours in the evenings and coming home late in the mornings, and yet we have had hardly a single report of any irregularities taking place in the city. I have also talked to men who have made sacrifices for this country, and they have expressed themselves as being very definitely opposed to these Bills, and particularly to the one under discussion now.
I am quite satisfied that the conditions existing to-day bear no comparison at all to the conditions that prevailed in 1925 or 1931. I have a certain amount of experience of meeting members of the old I.R.A., and even of knowing some of the few youths who are rather impetuous at the moment, and I want to say to the Minister for Justice that, as far as the people of Cork are concerned—and I think I am interpreting their minds correctly— they do not take these proclamations, to which the Minister has referred, seriously, and if there are other reasons, of which we have not been informed, behind the introduction of these Bills, I think we have a right to be told these reasons. I have good reason to know also that during the period in which those other measures were in operation we found that the presence of the Guard or of the secret service men at meetings was rather more of a disturbing element than otherwise. Their presence was more of a disturbing element than an influence for good, and, as one who has had some knowledge of dealing with men in groups and at public meetings, I may say that we often had to speak to officers of the Guards and people who were responsible for order, and tell them that we would guarantee that their absence from a meeting would be much more helpful than their presence at the meeting. That was due to the fact that a good many of the law-abiding citizens did resent being treated in that manner.
Another objection that I have to the introduction of this measure is that the Government in Northern Ireland have stated that they see no reason for any change in the law as it is at present administered in the North, and that they consider that the measures they have at present for the preservation of law and order are quite sufficient. Then, across the water, where undoubtedly there is some reason for the authorities to be somewhat alarmed, we find that they are quite satisfied that the law they have there at the moment is quite sufficient to meet the abnormal situation there. I am quite satisfied— and I say this as a man with responsibility—that the present law of this Government is quite sufficient to deal with any disturbing elements in this country. For that reason, I am very definitely opposed to the introduction of this Bill.
I am satisfied that there is no need at all for this panicky Bill. From what the Minister has said, I believe he made a very weak case. If this Bill shows anything, it shows up the policy of the Taoiseach in the past when he was going around this country, from 1928 to 1932, and holding his big rallies in College Green, when his cry was: "Give us power and we will remove the Oath and remove the King, and then perfect peace will prevail in this country." When the Taoiseach got his power he removed the Oath and he put the King under cover, and now to-day he tells us that he has not secured peace or ordered Government and that there is danger from within. Well, it is like many of his false promises, and we see him to-day in the light in which the people, perhaps, should have seen him ten years ago. We see him in the light of a false prophet, and perhaps the people will realise that he has been a false prophet all along.
I believe, myself, that this false and panicky legislation is being brought in because a few bombs were let off in England. We are all sorry that bombs should be let off in England or in any other country to disturb the peace, but the British Government are able to deal with any disturbances that take place in their country, without bringing in panicky legislation, and I hold that we should let England alone to look after her own affairs just in the same way as we have called upon her to let us alone to look after our affairs. Of course, the point will be made that the Cosgrave Government, in their day, brought in a Coercion Bill.
I quite agree that they did bring in a strong Bill, but I also assert that at the time the Cosgrave Administration brought in their Coercion Bill they had to deal with murder, assassination, gun bullies and armed robbers of all sorts. We were then dealing with a situation in which the present Government—then called the Opposition—were out on the hills, and when they would not recognise this Parliament of ours. That was the kind of situation we had to deal with. In 1923 or 1924, the Taoiseach, when he was beaten in the civil war, said to his forces: "Dump your arms, but keep your powder dry". There was a great difference between his action then, when he was defeated in the civil war, and the action of Padraig Pearse in 1916, who, when he found he was defeated and that unconditional surrender was the order of the day, surrendered unconditionally. He did not tell his followers to dump their arms and keep their powder dry. But the present Taoiseach——
I would ask the Deputy not to fight the civil war over again.
If the present Taoiseach had told his followers at that period to hand up their arms—that they were beaten in the field and that they should try to win from within what they could not win from without—there would be no need for Coercion Acts at all and the ordinary law would be the law of the day and would be quite sufficient for the carrying on of lawful Government. When the present Government came into power in 1932, however, they did one of the most foolish acts that any Government ever did. They shouted aloud that they would open the prison gates to all and sundry, and then, when they got into power, the present Minister for Defence took his bunch of keys and marched up to all the jails and opened their gates wide to all types of people. We were told that these people were patriots, but the Government knew that behind these people they had armed bullies, murderers and assassins, and men whose hands were stained with blood, and I say that it was the duty of the Taoiseach to keep these people in until they gave a definite declaration that they would not be a menace to the people of this country and that the lives of the plain people of this country would not be in danger from any of these people.
But no, they got their unconditional release. Not alone that, but they were feasted and pampered and boosted all over the City of Dublin and made great patriots. These are the patriots who to-day are turning on the Taoiseach and his Party, and who are disturbing this country; some of them pink, and some of them pretty red, ripe and ready to do whatever they can, if they can get away with it. If this Government had enforced law and order in those years we would not have so much trouble to-day. But, if an unfortunate Civic Guard, or a Superintendent, or any man appointed to maintain the peace did his duty fearlessly, what was the result? If he was stationed in the Midlands he was removed to Limbo or to Connaught, or to somewhere else. If he happened to have a few stripes on his arm, they were immediately removed. The Taoiseach must take responsibility for every action of these people to-day. He, and he alone, is responsible for the position that has been created. He must take that responsibility, and the country must place that responsibility on him.
We are told, of course, that this Bill must be brought in, that there is immediate danger. I travel all over the country, as other Deputies do, and I have met no Deputy yet who said there is danger, or even a semblance of danger. I mix with all types of the old Republican Army, and have attended their conventions week after week, all over the country. I know every one of these men, and they belong to various Parties. There is not one of them who in his heart stands for the overthrow of the State by force of arms. They are the people from whom we should take a lead. They are the people who established law and order here, and who gave us this Parliament. They say they are not out for destroying this Parliament by force of arms. They may have a more advanced national outlook than this House has. I do not agree that they should not have that outlook. I believe that the national outlook they have is the correct one. If we in this House kept before us more a clean, healthy, Irish national outlook we would not be where we are to-day—looked down upon by the masses of the people.
We were sent here to do something worth doing for the people—to give them peace, prosperity, and national reunion. Have we given them any of these things? We have not. We are told that we have not peace to-day. We know that the people have not prosperity. We know that the people who sent us here are down in the mud, and this House is putting them down in the mud. We know that we have not national reunion, and there is not any Party in this House making a genuine attempt to bring us national reunion. We know why it is not taking place.
If the Taoiseach was the national leader we are told he is, it would be his duty to look to the three Parties in this House, bring together the Leaders of these Parties, and say to them: "If we are going to have national unity in our lifetime, it must come from a united nation". But he does not want to do that, and he will not do it. He sends a few of his puppets around this country. Not alone is he doing that here, but he is sending them over to England during the week-ends for dirty, mean, Party propaganda; propaganda which will keep our country asunder for a hundred years.
That has nothing to do with this Bill.
These are the things which are causing panic in the country to-day. The Taoiseach should stop this, because it is an eyesore, especially to the old Republican Army, to find Party politics being carried on in the Six Counties, the Twenty-Six Counties and in England. If you want to make a genuine effort to unite the old forces why do you not do it in a clean way by standing up in this House and asking us to co-operate in the one way that will bring about unity, and that is, united action? Let us put up from this House a clean, healthy programme and stand by the word and letter of it. If we do, we will make a national advance, appeasing our people, and keep them out of the hands of those who, perhaps, are bullies and low-down traitors—those who want to seize power by force. We have handed over to these people the privilege and the right which should have been the privilege and right of this House—to lead the national advance. We are stepping into the rear and allowing them to step to the front. It is time for us to step to the front and shove those people out of the way and give a clean, healthy, national lead. If you do that, this House will have behind it a united, prosperous people. At present our people are down, and their spirits are down. The national outlook is very black. That is because of the want of a lead. If a lead is given by the Taoiseach or a strong man in this country the people will harken to that lead and forget all the prejudices and differences of the past, and we will begin to step forward like manly men for the raising up of our people and the reuniting of our country.
I believe that if this Bill is passed it will not achieve the object which the Taoiseach has in mind. He told us himself that the Coercion Act passed by Deputy Cosgrave would fling him out of power. Perhaps it was more or less that which flung him out of power. Of course, if the present Coercion Bill was lucky enough to fling the present Government out of power it would be worth having. Because I have a more or less advanced national outlook, I feel that I could not vote for this Bill. Although I am one of those who made sacrifices in the past, and who is prepared to make sacrifices in the future, I do not want to be one of the type that is going to create more disunion in the country. If we had the firm, honest, and fearless Government which we should have, if our laws were enforced, if our police forces could feel that they had authority to deal with any people whom they thought should be dealt with, the country would be a model for the world. But to-day it seems to be the seed bed for revolutions, not alone in this country but across the sea. It is sad to think that an Irish Government allowed these things to go on and that our Army and police force had to stand by while such things were taking place. A few years ago there was open drilling all over the country. If you met a superintendent or sergeant in the Civic Guard he would tell you on the quiet that he knew these things were going on, that men were carrying arms all over the country, that there were plots everywhere, but if he did his duty he knew he would lose his job. Therefore, he thought it better to do nothing. That is the type of government we had and that we have to-day.
I believe that the real idea of this Bill is to stop the national re-union which has been taking place during the last six months. There are strong forces in this country thinking and working for the re-union of the people and who are prepared to make a clean, national advance. The Taoiseach knows that. I know he is a proud, vain man who does not want the lead taken out of his hands. He would rather bring the country down than take second place to another man. Whether he likes it or not, he will take second place, because he has been in power for seven years and he has broken and ruined the country.
The Deputy must deal with the Bill.
He has our police force paralysed.
The Deputy must deal with the Bill before the House.
I am quite satisfied that what I have said is quite enough, and that it has shown my attitude towards this Bill. My attitude on this Bill is the attitude of one who believes that it is not needed; it is nothing but obeying the dictates of, and doing what, England has commanded the Taoiseach to do.
Mr. Morrissey
The reluctance of the Front Bench or the Back Benches to intervene in this debate is understandable. One would have imagined that the Taoiseach had by now heard enough speeches——
Ah, sure, I should wait for yours.
Mr. Morrissey
The Taoiseach certainly should. If there is one speech on the Public Safety Bill in this House to which the Taoiseach should listen, and for which he should wait, it is mine. But, unlike the Taoiseach, when he was in opposition, I am not going to run away from my responsibilities. I have no love for this Bill. I had no love for the Public Safety Bill introduced in 1931. But I am taking the attitude to-day that I took then, and that is that if a responsible Minister of the Government, freely elected by the people of this country, comes in here and tells the national Parliament, and tells me, that he requires those particular powers to preserve law and order and uphold the institutions of the State, then I am going to vote for that Bill. The difference between the Taoiseach and myself is that I have not changed. The wheel has not turned. Let me remind the House, and the Front Bench opposite, as they have already been reminded, that there was a much greater cause and a much more urgent necessity for the Bill of 1931 than there is for the Bill now before the House. I have listened to many speeches here to-day. I followed very closely every word uttered by the Minister for Justice, speaking on behalf of the Government of the country. He stated to this House that there were certain forces in this country engaged in work which, if not checked—and which could not be checked in the absence of the powers for which he now asks—would lead to chaos and anarchy in the country. No responsible Deputy of this House should refuse those powers in the face of that statement.
That is my position. I have heard Deputy Norton saying here that there was not a shred of justification for this Bill. If the responsible Minister tells us that in the considered opinion of the Government this measure is necessary and essential in order to preserve the institutions of the State, and to preserve law and order, surely that is enough. Deputy Norton said he wanted to see the citizen in the enjoyment of his full rights and liberties. So do I. The Deputy said the situation was so peaceful that there was no necessity for the Bill. Deputy Hickey, the Lord Mayor of Cork, said there was no comparison to-day with the conditions that existed in 1931. I am very glad that conditions to-day are not as bad as they were in 1931. But bad and all as the conditions were in 1931, there is no change in the attitude of the Labour Party to-day as compared with their attitude in 1931.
If there is a difference between the Labour Party and the Government of to-day it is that even after 17 years the Government apparently have learned some sense of responsibility whilst my late colleagues have not learned it even yet. I want to put this frankly and I put it on a former occasion—I put this question to Deputy Norton and the Labour Party—if they were sitting on the Government Benches to-morrow charged with the Government of this country and if they were faced with a situation which called for extraordinary powers to deal with and safeguard the rights of the people, and to safeguard law and order and the institutions of the State, would they not take whatever steps were necessary however drastic those steps may be? That is the position. The Taoiseach might remember that I would be very glad to spend a good deal of my time in rubbing the noses of the gentlemen opposite for the many things they said in the last ten years. I could do that if I liked but for many reasons I do not want to do it. I do not think this is the time for it. I think this is too serious a matter to be treated from any side of the House in that way.
Every Deputy should weigh well every word he utters on this Bill. It is a matter of life or death not only in connection with the people against whom this Bill is aimed but to the ordinary decent citizens of the country. When we talk about the constitutional rights of the people of this country, when we talk about the people being allowed to enjoy their full liberty we ought to remember that that cuts every way. We ought to remember that the people who pursue their ordinary avocations, the people summoned as jurors to do national work and to stand up to their responsibilities as citizens are equally entitled to their full rights and liberties. I have no intention whatever of making a long speech on this Bill. I regret there is a necessity to introduce it. If I wanted to I could say a great deal as to what has led up to the state of affairs that has rendered this Bill necessary; how that condition of things could be stopped and why it should never have arisen. But all that is going to do no good. I certainly say I could not take the responsibility of voting against this measure in view of the statement of the Minister for Justice that these powers are necessary to prevent a state of chaos and anarchy being brought about in this country. That is a statement coming from a responsible Minister who is in a position to have information that is not at my disposal or at the disposal of the ordinary member of this House or of the public. It is on his statement that my decision was made and it is because of that statement that I am going to vote for this Bill.
Deputy Norton has fairly fully outlined the reasons and the attitude of the Labour Party in opposing this Bill. Anything said by Deputy Morrissey has not the least effect in changing the attitude of the Labour Party. I rather admire his childlike simplicity in accepting without any hesitation from the Ministerial Benches their arguments and their justification for introducing this Bill. He told us that that statement coming from the Minister for Justice was reason enough why the House and country must accept it. This is a Bill which we were told did not reach unanimity even in the Executive Council——
That is not so.
It is not so, and that correction was accepted by Deputy Norton.
Two points of view were held, we were told, in the Executive Council about this Bill——
That is not so.
Order, order. Sit down. Let Deputy Keyes speak.
When a matter of that kind is brought up again after correction——
On a point of order, the Prime Minister has no right to jump to his feet and interrupt a Deputy when speaking. He does it, and I submit that he ought to be made sit down.
Deputy Dillon might put a point of order without making a speech which is not relevant thereto. The Deputy seems inclined to interrupt the Chair.
I hope not.
If a Minister or Deputy is represented as having said something which he did not say, he certainly is entitled to protest. Otherwise debate would be impossible. If a statement would be ascribed to a Minister or Deputy, a statement he did not make, and discussion were based on such statement, a debate in such circumstances would be futile and absurd.
A certain suggestion was made by Deputy Keyes as to what the Minister for Justice said. The Taoiseach was not involved in that.
There was a statement made about a difference of view in the Government. As head of the Government I wanted categorically to deny that.
I can assure the Taoiseach and the House that I had no intention or desire to misrepresent any statement made. A remark was made by Deputy Norton earlier, and this was corrected by the Minister for Justice. The correction was to the effect that there was no serious division, but that there were two points of view.
The word "serious" was not mentioned. There was no question of opinions within the Executive Council. I said that there could be two points of view as to whether this Bill was brought in at a certain time or not. I pointed out what these two points of view might be: that it might be brought in in a time of calm when it could be discussed calmly. Another point of view could be that we should wait until some incident occurred. I said that this was felt to be a compromise between two such views—a purely hypothetical argument.
It is, of course, the right of the Government to have the evidence which actuated them in introducing this measure. They are the Government, but we as Deputies who are living in the country can claim to be completely conversant with the condition of affairs obtaining. We fail to see any evidence. At all events, no evidence has been placed before the House that would warrant or justify the introduction of this measure at this time. We feel that its introduction at this juncture cannot be expected to act, so to speak, as oil on troubled waters. On the contrary, we think the effect of it will be to act as an irritant on peaceful waters. The peaceful conditions that prevail in the country at this time cannot be challenged. They are such that every citizen can go about his business and transact it without let or hindrance.
We have had experience here in the recent and, indeed, in the distant past that the introduction of legislation of this type has tended to be irksome, and to create the very troubles that its authors thought it would tend to suppress. Members of the House outside the Government Party and the ordinary citizen can see no justification whatever for the introduction of this Bill, especially in view of the present peaceful state of the country.
When we look across the water we see that there have been some disturbances there in recent times. These did not cause the Government of that country to get into a state of fright, or stampede it into the introduction of legislation such as this. The offences committed there did not cause it to depart from the usual constitutional practice. Instead, the offences were treated under the ordinary law. In this country, where no such offences have been committed, the Government rush off in a fright to get this legislation passed into law. As I have already said, the effect of it, in my opinion, will be irksome and troublesome and will tend to create disaffection.
What is this legislation going to lead to? The passing of it through this House is one thing, but when it comes to be operated we may find that it will be utilised for much greater and deeper purposes than now appear on the surface. We on these benches are concerned to know how it will be operated in the case of those who devote themselves to the work of the upliftment of the worker, the raising of his standard of living. It is specifically mentioned in the Bill that anyone who incites or encourages any person employed in any capacity by the State to refuse, neglect or omit to perform his duty, or to be negligent or insubordinate in the performance of his duty, or who aids or abets or conspires with another person to do any such thing shall be guilty of an offence under the Act. That definitely covers people engaged in Civil Service avocations. I wonder does it cover a servant of the State working on a relief grant without any contribution from the local rates? Are people working on those schemes servants of the State? We from these benches have been advocating for the people working on such schemes a higher and a more reasonable standard of living than that which they now enjoy.
As a matter of fact we have a motion on the Order Paper asking the Government to give them better conditions. Suppose that we go out to the country districts and engage in advocacy of their claims and ask them to refrain from performing the relief work they are engaged on, is this section going to be invoked against people in the trade union movement who try to uplift the worker and secure for him better conditions than he enjoys at present? I wonder how is that section dealing with State employees to be operated? I imagine that it is a section that can be given a very wide interpretation. I do not propose to say more on it to-night because I think that it can be more usefully dealt with on the Committee Stage.
I remember away back in 1927 when a similar measure to this was being put through the Dáil that the Labour Party asked for certain guarantees and exemptions for certain societies and trade unions. Deputy Cosgrave, who was then President, told us not to worry: that while very wide powers were being taken they would not dream of using them against the societies and trades unions referred to. He refused to give the guarantees and exemptions asked. As regards this measure, why should this Government, if it does not intend to utilise this measure for any purpose other than the suppression of actual revolt and disturbance, take such wide powers as would make it impossible for those in the trade union movement to do their work of uplifting the worker, of raising the standard of living amongst the workers—those employed by the State as well as those in private employment.
Processions and public meetings are all capable of being banned under this Bill. For instance, a meeting convened in the Mansion House to talk about anti-vivisection or for any other purpose equally remote from rebellion and revolt may be banned under the section. If an officer of the Gárdaí is of opinion that such a meeting will disturb public order or lead to a breach of the peace, then ipso facto that anti-vivisection or other harmless meeting is caught by the section, and if the promoters persist in going on with it, they render themselves liable to the penalties laid down in the section. You can have that sort of thing so far as the suppression of public meetings is concerned.
We do not think that the present peaceful condition of the country warrants or justifies the Government in going ahead with this measure. We all remember how the members of the present Government denounced a measure of this kind when it was introduced by their predecessors. They said that it would only cause disturbance and lead to turmoil amongst the citizens. We have not been taken by the Government into its confidence as to what really is at the back of this measure. I agree that we are not entitled to be told all their secrets, but surely we ought to be given some indication, some intimation that it is not going to be used for oppressive purposes. We on these benches opposed measures of this kind in 1925, 1927, and in 1931, and we have not changed our minds in the meantime. We are opposing this Bill as we opposed the others. We are not as guileless as Deputy Morrissey is—that because a Minister says that he wants a coercion measure of this kind that you must hand it out to him on a plate. The Minister has given no reasons for the introduction of this Bill, and, therefore, in our opinion he should not get it. We are living in the country amongst the people. We know what the conditions there are. We are not going around with our heads buried in the sand. As no evidence has been put forward to justify its introduction, we on these benches have decided to vote against this Bill as we have voted against every coercion measure that has been introduced in this House.
Some of the previous speakers made the remark that there were no speakers on this Bill from the back benches on this side. I propose to be one, but for a rather peculiar reason. I am not a fighting man by any means. I never had anything to do with it. Any fights that I have been in I got the worst of them. That does not encourage one to get into more of them. Very probably I should be the one man on these benches to hold his tongue, because I am surrounded by a good many fighting men who gave proof of their love of their country years ago. I gave no such proof. My way was a different way. On a Sabbath Day a few weeks ago I was going along the streets and read a proclamation. I read it six times. I did so because I had to read it under difficulties, since the proclamation was torn. It was knocked about a bit, and I did not like to take out a piece of paper in the street to write down what it contained. That would cause too much public attention, and I am a man who shrinks from public attention. I do not like to be speaking here to-night. I read that proclamation. The proclamation is signed by six or seven men. These are honest men. They mean what they have written, and what they have printed. That is my opinion of them. But the worst feature in that type of honest man is this: that he will not give other honest men the right to disagree with him. That right I claim. I am going to give my reasons here in connection with that. I protest that their proclamation should not be accepted by the people. They use the name of Almighty God in it. That is an example of their seriousness. I say they have no right to use the Almighty's name in it. There are certain moral reasons given, I think, by Canon Law. I do not presume to have very much knowledge of it.
The Minister for Finance will give you all you need.
Never mind him. He showed last night that he was able to hold his own corner against the whole of you. All the Party was up against him, and he showed you what he was able to do. Please leave me alone now, because I am on a very serious subject —to me it is a very serious subject. Canon Law lays down certain reasons whereby revolutionary methods are moral and right, and one of the reasons is that the government in power is a tyrannical government. That is one of the reasons, and without that reason there can be no moral claim for any revolutionary object. Would anybody outside a lunatic asylum say that that body of men sitting there is composed of tyrants? No one would. Almost every speech to-night was a political speech directed against the Taoiseach, and all he said and did ten or 12 years ago. All speeches were of that type with the exception of that made by Deputy Morrissey. He was the only decent man who spoke to-night.
Did you always think that?
I think sometimes just as the feeling comes over me. Sitting here you have to think very desperately indeed. I heard the Lord Mayor of Cork a few moments ago speaking about the loyalty and good behaviour of the law-abiding citizens of his native city. He is very proud of them. Why should he not be? But I wonder was he merely expressing what the Cork men always were? I wonder did he ever hear of a writer named Max O'Rell? Max O'Rell was a Frenchman who wrote travel books and he visited Ireland, and he visited Cork. On his visit to Cork he got on an outside car and drove around the heights of Cork and the jarvey said to him, pointing away in the distance: "Do you see that city" or "that town""Yes," said Max O'Neill. Then the jarvey said to him: "There are ten thousand men in that town ready to die for Ireland." And Max O'Rell said: "Why do they not do it?" The jarvey answered: "The police would not let them."
Where are these Cork men now?
I expect they are law abiding still. Having made one claim, at any rate, in connection with this proclamation, there is another portion of it with which I have to deal. It said that they stood by the Republic of 1916, ratified by the First Dáil, which met, I think, on 29th January, 1919. That just put me in another vein of thinking. I was present at the ratification which the proclamation alludes to. I do not know whether any Deputy present to-night is in the same position— I cannot recall. But I did discharge a duty which was given to me that day of reading the Democratic Programme of Dáil Eireann. I have it in my pocket. I did not come here to-night to make a speech, but I always come prepared to do so if the necessity arises. The Democratic Programme of Dáil Eireann was given to me to read in English; it had already been read in Irish and, I think, in French. It is this:—
"We declare in the words of the Irish Republican Proclamation the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland, and to the unfettered control of Irish destinies to be indefeasible, and in the language of our first President, Pádraig Mac Phiarais, we declare that the Nation's sovereignty extends not only to all men and women of the Nation, but to all its material possessions, the Nation's soil and all its resources, all the wealth and all the wealth-producing process within the Nation, and with him we reaffirm that all right to private property must be subordinated to the public right and welfare.
"We declare that we desire our country to be ruled in accordance with the principles of Liberty, Equality, and Justice, for all, which alone can secure permanence of Government in the willing adhesion of the people."
We know all that.
Just a little patience I will come to the point. I want to make.
Is that in the Safety Bill?
A little patience. I know you do not like this and that is the reason I got up to speak.
The reading of the Democratic Programme of the First Dáil is not in order; neither may the Deputy reply to proclamations.
It may not be in legal order, but I assure you, Sir, I do honestly believe it is in moral order. I only wanted to make one point concerning it.
"It shall be the first duty of the Government of the Republic to make provision for the physical, mental and spiritual well-being of the children, to secure that no child shall suffer hunger, or cold from lack of food, clothing, or shelter, but that all shall be provided with the means and facilities requisite for their proper education and training as Citizens of a Free and Gaelic Ireland.
Nobody finds fault with that.
I do not think anybody can.
The Chair decidedly does, unless it is related to the Bill.
Very well, I will not proceed with the reading of it. We will leave it out, but I will speak about it. I read that and I meant every word of it. There is no lipreading with me. We have it stated there that there shall be no child suffering from hunger or cold, that there shall be work for everybody, a decent means of livelihood, and that there should be no slums. I read that; that is a long time ago. Some men over there to-day were honest about that and some were not, and those that were not prevailed. The democratic programme got no fair do for years, but I never let it out of my head because I always believed I was morally bound to do everything possible to try to bring it about and it was not until this Government got into power that any effort was made to bring that document to fruition. These men have tried their best——
And failed.
They have not failed. They have tried their best with the means and possibilities at their disposal. They have helped the poor and the infirm. They have tried by every means in their power to carry out that great democratic programme. I assert that without fear of contradiction and I decline to help in any way men or women who are now trying to upset and drive that Government out of power. That is my reason for speaking. I read that programme many years ago and I bow in honour to it. I am glad to be able to assert that to-night to let everybody know the reason why I am taking part in the not very pleasant job of supporting a Bill which imposes force on some of our citizens. I hope that God Almighty will give these men wisdom and that they will not try to bring about a state of affairs here something akin to that which we have witnessed for the last two or three years in a great old kingdom in Europe. The horrors of it are terrible to contemplate. Surely, they will cease their activities. I have given them credit for the honesty of their convictions. I believe they are good Irishmen but why should they go against the majority of Irishmen who believe in the leadership of the Taoiseach and his Ministers? For what reason should they? If these Ministers make mistakes they are only human; these mistakes will not interfere with life or property. If they do not carry out their work as these people think they should, well they are doing their best. If other people think that they can do better, there are ways and means of getting into power other than by the gun.
I do not intend to say much more. I do not suppose there is any necessity for it. I have given the reasons why I am supporting this Bill. I do not think that any other member of the Party behind me should speak. Most of the time of the House is taken up by the people opposite and if we started to get the itch for talking, we would never finish our work. I humbly suggest that one speaker from these benches is enough for the people to-night.
A Deputy
Too much.
Mr. Kelly
I submit that in all humility. The practice on the other side is to make speech after speech until it has come to this, that a learned professor, speaking the other night at the Royal Dublin Society, stated that there was a deposit of sulphur and other matters outside on Leinster Lawn to the extent of 1½ tons to the acre, which was much more, many tons, more than could be found any place else. Unfortunately, the vitriol did not go outside; the vitriol remained here. I have taken up probably more than ten or 15 minutes of the time of the House, quite long enough, but I feel that I have discharged my duty. I shall be ready to say to the people outside: "Stick to the man at the wheel; do not renage him now." I shall tell the people that, in my opinion, undoubtedly within the next few years this democratic programme of Dáil Eireann which was read out in January, 1919, will be put into practice in every way possible.
Mr. Brodrick
I am not convinced of the necessity for this Bill at present. In fact, I do not see sufficient evidence in the statement of the Minister that there is really any reason for the Bill. If there was any necessity for such a Bill, certainly I believe the Party on this side of the House would give every help, but for the past three weeks, during which it has been before the people, I think it has been proved that there is really no necessity for it. It is about three weeks ago since we heard overnight from the Press that this Bill was to be introduced. There has been no crime committed in the country during that period, not one. As one Deputy who has been in this House for a number of years, I can say that I supported a similar Bill wholeheartedly in 1931, and I would be prepared to do the same thing to-day if I were convinced that the same kind of terror, or anything even approaching it, existed to-day as existed in 1931. Why did I support the Bill in 1931? Because there was really a campaign of murder in this country. The Government in 1931 had to deal with that campaign, but when the new Government came in, in 1932, the first thing they did was to open the prison gates and let every murderer out of it. Now, they are getting their thanks for that. If there is anyone responsible for such a Bill, or if there is anybody responsible for such trouble as exists at the present day, it is the Ministers opposite who released the murderers, and I would say the murderers in 1939 are the murderers of 1931. The Government have got to face up to that; it is just as good for them.
In 1931 you thought you could buy them over but you did not buy them over. Now, you see the fruits of your policy. If you had followed in the steps of the Government before you, certainly I believe there would be no need for this Bill at the present day. If you intended to put down these crimes, you would have introduced such a Bill when Mr. Somerville was murdered in Cork and when Mr. More O'Ferrall was murdered in Longford. You had a right then to deal with the situation, but you brought cases of regular murder in this country before jurors who were afraid of their lives. The very same men for whom you opened the prison gates, and whom the Minister for Defence took in his arms, are the men who murdered Mr. Somerville and Mr. More O'Ferrall.
Is it in order——
The Deputy must know that those who were liberated on the occasion referred to can be identified. It is unfair to accuse identifiable persons of having committed murder. Persons were tried for that murder and acquitted. It is unjust, under the protection of this House, to accuse defenceless people of committing murder.
Mr. Brodrick
What I want to bring out is that there was some necessity for a Bill such as this at that time or that there was a necessity for the continuation of the Act previously in force. The murder campaign in this country was not finished. There was then a necessity for continuation of the Act and if that Act were continued, instead of liberating these prisoners, those men in the ordinary way would be tried before a military tribunal instead of before a jury. If that Act were continued, there would be no uproar at the present time in the country about this Bill. If people in this country are supposed to be connected with the crimes committed in England, I know that, as far as I am concerned, I see none of these I.R.A. activities in the West of Ireland. I do not think the few individuals who are going from this country to England at the present time have the ability to carry out such crimes.
We should like to hear more from the Minister as regards this country being connected with these crimes. If we look back to the years before 1920, when we had a good deal of trouble in this country, it would have been to our benefit if we could at that time carry the war to English ground instead of having it fought out on Irish ground. We must admit that we were not able to do that. We had the members of the I.R.A. at that time fighting England in this country. We should like to have information from the Government which is piloting this Bill through the House as to those who left this country to carry out the war in England. If there is any proof that men of I.R.A. associations have left this country to carry out the war in another country, the Minister should be prepared to give us some information about it.
While I am averse to interrupt the Deputy I must remind him that some of these cases are sub judice.
They are sub judice in another country. Does that preclude us from referring to them?
I think that it should. Reference to them would be calculated to prejudice certain people, whether our nationals or not.
I think it would be a fair thing to let the other country look after itself.
Mr. Brodrick
The point I am trying to bring out is: We had a war to fight from 1916 to 1921. We made every effort—members of the House will agree with me—to bring the war to the enemy's territory. We failed to do so. It has been carried there now, when we have no disagreement whatever with that country. That is the point I want to bring out—how we are in this particular war with England when we have no disagreement with them.
Regarding the Bill itself, I am concerned with the liberty of the ordinary citizen. I am a citizen of this State and I remember very well when the last Act was put into operation by the present Government. I happened to be a director of the Blueshirt organisation in the West. I am not a bit ashamed of it, in fact I am very proud of it, for the reason that we beat the hooligans for whom Fianna Fáil were responsible without any guns at all.
A Deputy
Where are the Blueshirts now?
Mr. Brodrick
We frightened you anyhow.
The Chair will hear no more about the Blueshirts.
Mr. Brodrick
Under that Act, I was followed high up and low down through the west of Ireland. I was searched on a few occasions and my house was searched. I got permission to carry a revolver about 12 months previously. That gun was taken from me and I was deprived of every means to defend myself as a public representative. To my own knowledge, supporters of the Party opposite were left with guns. Is that how this Bill is going to be worked? Is it proposed to deprive one section of the people of their liberty and give licence to another section that support the Government, as Fianna Fáil supported the hooliganism that went on in 1932 and 1933 when the Gárda Síochána were afraid to carry out their duties. Let the Minister tell us the trouble that is before the country. I do not know to whom the credit should be given—I suppose it is to the people themselves and not to the Government—but all the members of the Fianna Fáil Party will admit that we never had a more peaceful country than during the past two years. Jurors have not been interfered with for one and a half or two years in the exercise of their duties. The law has been carried out. Every person in the country has been able to go about his business in the ordinary way. In County Galway we had a by-election in 1935 and another in 1936, a general election in 1937 and a general election in 1938. A number of Fianna Fáil Deputies were down there and I ask them to say if they ever experienced quieter elections. I believe there is no necessity for the Bill in this country and the Government should have regard to this country and to this country alone.
The objection taken to this Bill is that there is no necessity for it; that we are living in a time of peace, and that the introduction of a Bill of this sort causes uneasiness and may lead to disturbance. References have been made during the course of the evening to what we said on other occasions, and to the conditions that obtained then. I am going simply to say this, that I held, when I was on the opposite benches, that there were barriers and obstacles to people who wanted—and rightly wanted—to see the Irish people supreme in their own land. I said: The way to get peace is to remove these obstacles; take away any barriers and any tests and make it possible for any group with political ideals to go freely before the people, put their policy to them and try to win the majority of the people to their side; when you provide that freedom, you will remove the necessity for the giving of extraordinary powers to the Executive.
I was told by people who were on these benches that I was wrong. Since we came into office, step by step we did certain things to remove certain obstacles. We were taunted and told we were wrong, and that we would find we were wrong. I did not believe it. I believed that there was in this country a proper spirit of democracy which, when given free opportunity, would be satisfied, and that it was because of the particular circumstances in which we were that people were driven to the use of force.
I have never been more satisfied or happier about the situation than I have been for the last couple of years. I felt that what I had said and what I had prophesied had come true; that the moment we had got a Constitution freely accepted by the Irish people themselves in a free plebiscite, and the moment we had got a Government elected or selected by representatives of the people who were freely chosen, all the difficulties which we had here in the past would disappear. When I come before the House and ask that the powers asked for in this Bill be given, I am sure everybody will realise that I come here with regret, with genuine regret. I have held that we could make no progress in this country without some unity of direction, that there must be some unified authority here, and that that authority must have powers to enable it to be exercised for the good of the people as a whole. I hope that the discussion which has taken place here in this House will be continued throughout the country, and that our people will set themselves to think, and ask themselves do they want to see a continuation of the situation we are in, or do they want to see that situation deteriorate. If there is discussion throughout the country as to the duties and the rights of an Assembly like this, it will be all to the good, because unfortunately at the present moment there appears to be a great deal of confused thinking.
When the Constitution was passing through this House, and being discussed here, certain powers were taken in it. When those powers were being taken, we adverted to the possibility that the hopes which I had expressed would prove vain, that they would not be realised, and that the Executive might need to have some of the powers which even this Executive, this Government, found it had to exercise during its period of office. We have been reminded here this evening that when we came into office one of our first acts was to put out of force Article 2A, that we released a number of people who had been imprisoned or detained under that Article. Just as it is with regret that we have to introduce a Bill of this kind here at the present time, so it was with regret that we, who had opposed that measure, who had believed that it was unnecessary, had ourselves, in order to maintain order, actually to use that measure. I believe, and I have said it in connection with the other Bill, that, as certainly as I am standing here, if we did not have those powers there would have been chaos in the country after a very short time, because we had all the elements here of a fierce civil conflict which, if the Government was not able to control it, was going to get out of hand, and the Government was going to be pushed aside. One thing was inevitable then, and that was that either of those two sides would establish its supremacy by force, and would have been compelled to maintain it by force, and the liberties that we desire to have here would have been affected for many a long day. We have come through a civil war. It has taken hard work to try and get out of the atmosphere of that war. We have, thank God, largely got out of it, and we are asking here for the powers which we think may be necessary—I hope they will not—in order to preserve that condition.
I want you to look at the Bill. Just as I said in the case of the Treason Bill, that was necessary in a new set of circumstances. We want completely to dissociate treason as it was known in this country in the past from what treason will be in the future. We want to associate any idea of treason in the future in this country not with acts against a foreign government or a foreign power, but with acts against the people of this country, because it is the people of this part—I must be accurate—of the country at the present time who are sovereign here, and none other. We have functioned here by the power which we have been nominated by them to exercise. Now, we had to bring in that Bill at the same time. It was on the stocks, so to speak, from the time at which the Constitution was passed. It was under consideration. It was brought in as a separate measure here, separated from the other, to be made as simple as possible, and to deal only with treason as defined in the Constitution. So much for the Treason Bill.
Now, on the passage of the Constitution, the powers of defending the State depended on other Acts which also had their roots in a past situation. There is a difference of opinion about that situation. We, on both sides of the House, have fought bitterly about the situation. It is well that in future we should not use those Acts as they stood with their roots in a past situation, and therefore, again from the time that the Constitution was put into operation, it became necessary to reconsider the whole position of the law by which the forces that preserve the State and order could operate. There had, therefore, to be a consideration of those past Acts. What were the powers that were necessary?
What were the powers that were necessary, not merely in the past but at any time? What powers were necessary for the future? The present Bill was intended, in a certain sense, to be a consolidation of any powers which were available for the forces that maintained the State, and to be available for them in the future. If you look at the Bill you will see that it is composed, I might say, of two main parts. One part is a consolidation of what might be called ordinary legislation, such as would be available in any country under normal and peaceful conditions for the protection of the State. It has been urged by the Opposition that a number of provisions in that part of the Bill are dangerous to the liberty of the individual. We have an open mind. There is no hurry. We can debate this Bill quietly, with a view to having the best possible set of laws which, on the one hand, will give the greatest amount of rightful liberty to the individual and, on the other hand, will not deprive the responsible authority of the power of dealing with abuses of liberty. That is our problem. We can discuss every line of it on the Committee Stage, and I would hope, in the discussion of this Bill, for the same sort of attitude which I had hoped for when discussing the Constitution. I suggested at that time that if those who are on the Government Benches would only imagine themselves in Opposition, and if those on the Opposition Benches would, for the time being, imagine themselves a Government, we would, probably, have the best sort of attitude with regard to the Constitution. I say now, in regard to this Bill, that those who are in office naturally feel their responsibilities. Perhaps they feel them too much. They may be more anxious about them than the situation warrants, but those in office, who have responsibilities, are inclined to try to get powers to preserve the authority which they feel is necessary for peaceful conditions.
On the other hand, those who are in Opposition are thinking of those who are in office for the time being, as people likely to abuse the powers which they get, and as people who must be checked. I am not saying that it is not right that that point of view should be taken by the Opposition, but I ask the Opposition, and Deputies on our benches too, to look at the problem as calmly and as coldly as they can, so that when we are finished with that part of the Bill we can say: "Now we have a measure which is the result of our combined work, and represents the maximum amount of liberty that can safely be given without danger of abuse, and if there is abuse there are powers to deal with it." I say that that part of the Bill would have been necessary in any case, if we wanted to uproot our law from the past, and to set its roots in what, I think, the House will agree is likely to prove the foundation on which we can get the greatest amount of agreement in this House and in the country. I agree with the Opposition that, in regard to a Bill of this kind, it is of tremendous importance that the people of the country should be convinced that it is right, and that the Executive are in no way acting in a panicky or foolish fashion, but are acting calmly and deliberately, with a full knowledge of the whole situation, and that the measures they are taking are measures which commend themselves to the ordinary person who loves his country, and who also claims that he has the right to live his life in his own way, if he is a good citizen. That is the attitude I ask the House to adopt towards this part of the Bill. I say in advance that any amendments put down by the Opposition, from the point of view of trying to secure greater liberty for the individual, or to prevent any attacks on that liberty by forces of the State, provided they do not deprive the Executive of powers which may be necessary to it in order that peace may be maintained, will be considered.
With regard to the other part of the Bill, I think I should deal with some suggestion that there has been a difference of opinion in the Government with regard to it. There has been no such difference. There seems to have been some misunderstanding of a phrase used by the Minister when introducing the Bill. What the Minister clearly conveyed to me was this, that when the Constitution was being passed we adverted to the possibility of special courts being required to meet conditions in which the ordinary courts could not properly function. There was a suggestion here as to whether it was fair to jurors to put them on cases when, perhaps, if they acted in accordance with their conscience and the evidence, their lives might be in danger, or they would otherwise suffer severely. Shortly after the Constitution was enacted it became obvious that we might, at short notice, at any time, have to bring in a measure of this kind, giving powers to the Executive, and just as the Departments were told to consider the question of the law with regard to treason; and the law with regard to treasonable offences, and their relation to the new situation created by the Constitution, so also were they asked to consider, if an emergency should arise that would need special courts, what sort of legislation should be introduced to the Dáil to deal with it. That also was, so to speak, on the stocks, and under consideration.
Obviously, as the Minister stated, if you think that there might be need for such a measure you have to ask yourself this question: "When should you introduce it? Should you introduce it and leave it there as a power to be availed of whenever the need should arise, and have it calmly dealt with as a provisional power, or should you wait until the public was fully and completely convinced that a measure of that sort was necessary?" In other words, are you to act in advance of a situation, or are you to wait until the people, by having crimes committed, are convinced that such legislation is necessary? Is the dog to have his first bite? That was the situation, and in it you have to decide when exactly will you introduce a measure of this sort.
If you had hope that you would not have to introduce it at all, of course, you would be in a happy position and it could go on the long finger. The natural tendency is to put off and postpone bringing in a measure of this sort. But, it is a very serious responsibility for a Government to find that all the powers which it needs to preserve order are not available for it, and we, because of these proclamations and the situation that everybody knows is being developed, came to the conclusion that we could not afford to wait and that it was our duty to get the powers now for the Government so that, if swift action was necessary, the Government could act swiftly. What you are asked in this Bill is to give power to the Government, on proclamation, to bring these special courts into operation. They do not come into operation automatically by the passing of this Bill. The responsibility for bringing the special court into operation rests with the Government, and the Government, of course, is responsible to this House. If the Government should bring the courts into operation when the majority of the members of this House think that they should not be brought into operation, they can deal with the Government. So that, the question that the Dáil is asked to decide is this: Are you going to give the Government this power to be able to bring in these special courts when they who, more than any other members of the House, are responsible for the country and for the preservation of order, think they are necessary? Are you going to give them the power of bringing in these courts when, in their opinion, they are necessary, and when they give due notice of it by proclamation, and when it is possible for the Dáil to sit in judgment upon them and to reserve their action if a majority think it is desirable or that that action has been unjustly or unwisely taken?
Members of the Dáil will have to ask themselves whether the Government, sitting here, elected by the people, responsible to the people, under the control of the majority of the elected representative here, as we are, are to be depended upon in this matter or whether some group or other, who take different views of things from those which we take, are to be depended upon. That is what it comes to— whether you are going to depend upon us, who are anxious to keep the peace, or whether you are to depend upon people who admit no responsibility to the majority of the Irish people, who have not been recently elected by them, and who have no responsibility to them at all.
In other words, are you going to depend, in a matter of this sort, on a responsible authority, or are you not? To me, at any rate, that is the point you will have to decide, with regard to the second part of the Bill, the part dealing with the special courts. Dealing with that part, you will naturally criticise it from the point of view of the powers which it gives. If you can think of any amendments which would check the possibility of abuse of these powers by the Government, by all means, put them down. As far as we are concerned, our attitude must be the attitude I have already indicated. Our attitude must be this: If we are to have the responsibility of preserving order here, and of trying to make progress by the principle that national policy has to be decided by the majority here, and if you are denying us the powers which will enable us to fulfil that responsibility, we will have to say to you, quite definitely, that we will not accept the position. In other words, you will have to give us, and we will have to demand—and we will have to ask every member of this House to support us in that demand— the powers which we think are necessary.
The next portion deals with a power which is not in the ordinary law, and which is, therefore, an extraordinary power, the power of internment. The Minister has explained why that power is necessary. There may be a moral certainty, for example, that certain people are doing certain things, and it may be quite impossible to get evidence of this which would satisfy a court. What have you to do? Is the Government, knowing, believing, satisfied, that these things are being done by certain people, and that they are being done to the detriment of the community as a whole, simply to sit back and say: "Oh, well, we cannot get evidence. They will have to be allowed to continue to do these things, although they are to the detriment of the community," or under circumstances of that kind, is the Government, in order to maintain peace and to prevent damage to the community, to be given the powers to enable them to detain the individuals who, they are satisfied, are responsible for these activities? Again, you have to choose. You know the facts. You know that what we say is true, that it can happen, and that it does happen, and you have to ask yourselves are you going to trust the Government that you have here, that you can call to account for their actions, or are you going to allow the damage to be done?
It seems to me that those are the questions every Deputy will have to decide for himself. As I say, this is not a bad time at all for us to discuss this Bill. There is a sufficient reality of threat for everybody to understand that we are not making provision against an altogether unthinkable contingency; that we are making provision against a contingency which may very well arise, and we believe that the chances of its arising will be very much less if we have the powers, in case they are needed, than they would be if they did not have these powers at all.
You can discuss this Bill in Committee; take whatever is the reasonable time that you require to discuss it for amendments. You can discuss it calmly. If we had to come in here when crimes had been committed which demanded immediate action, you would have to give us these powers or else we would have to get out of office, or we would have to allow some other body to rule the State or to control the community. We would have to come in here and ask you at very short notice to give us these powers. It is better—is it not clearly better—that you should now consider this matter, under circumstances like the present, which, as I say, indicate the threat, sufficiently closely anyhow, to enable us to take a realistic view of the situation we have to deal with? I hold, therefore, that it is far better, from the point of view of democracy, from the point of view of the rights of the individual members here in the House, to come in here at a time like this and get this matter fully discussed than to come in here in a hurry and have to ask you to pass it through all its Stages in a few hours, and to have to go to the Seanad House and ask them to do the same.
As I have said at the start, I regret that it is necessary to come with the second part of this Bill. The first part, I believe, is necessary. You may find fault with certain clauses of it, but the first part of this Bill, as well as the Treason Bill, would be necessary as part of the ordinary law. It corresponds to the law that every organised State has to protect itself and, particularly, democratic States require it. It is, therefore, as I say, with great regret that I had to come here to ask you to pass the second part of this Bill. We have here in this part of the country secured a position in which the Government, elected by the Irish people here in this part of Ireland, are, in every single aspect of their activities, sovereign.
The Legislature here is a sovereign representative assembly and can do anything that any such assembly in the world can do. You can have any form of Government you want from the legal point of view, from the constitutional point of view, that is, if it is desired to change the Constitution to another form, that can be done. If there are any Acts, dealing with internal or external matters, that you want to repeal, you can repeal them. You are truly sovereign in every respect and the Irish people have full, complete and absolute liberty in regard to their affairs. Every square inch of the territory of this part of Ireland is under the control of the Irish people. There are no commitments, notwithstanding all the suggestions to the contrary, that bind this Government, or would prevent any other Government that might come in here to replace us from having any policy they choose to have, either from the point of view of internal or external affairs. There is no justification for the use of force in this part of the country.
With regard to the completion of the national objective, perhaps I may say a word or two, as it has a bearing on the situation in which we find ourselves here. There can be no progress unless there is some way of determining national policy. If we try to work half a dozen different schemes or policies at one time, we will be only in each other's way and the result will be national frustration. If there is to be force used in future, that force can only be used effectively by the Government which is responsible to this Parliament. No other body can use force effectively, or can be allowed to use it, in the name of the Government, so long as a Government here exists. The two things are incompatible, impossible and cannot remain together. That is not a new doctrine for me to enunciate. On an occasion on which what I tried to say was misrepresented, or misunderstood, on 17th March, 1922, I tried to speak to people who were being advised to accept the Treaty, as it was at that time. It had come to my notice that they had been told that the State which it was then proposed to establish——
Mr. Morrissey
For goodness' sake, do not bring us back to that.
I am anxious to point out a very important matter.
Trying to save your face.
Give us the quotation.
I only want to refer to a fundamental fact which I tried then to point out. As I said, it was either misrepresented or misunderstood. Let us say it was misunderstood. It is as important to-day as it was then.
Give us the quotation now.
And it can be discussed in this debate hereafter.
That is the trouble. If that matter is opened by the Taoiseach now, I am afraid it will be open to debate.
If the Taoiseach wishes to place his words at that time on the records of the House, we have no objection.
I will put it in quite a different way. There was a time in this country, when there was no government here, when it was possible to work side by side—with a certain amount of interference one with the other, it is true—two types of policy. One was what was called the constitutional method and the other the physical force method. They were both aimed at the one Government, and that Government was affected by both. The moment that a Government was set up here in this country by the Irish people, responsible to the Irish people and having duties to the Irish people, that double line could not be continued, and if force, after that, had to be used, it had to be used by the Government elected by the Irish people, and by none other. That is a fact and a truth that nobody can gainsay.
But it was continued.
I have said that I will not go back. There was, if we want to go into it, a conflict between two groups here with regard to the State, but that is not the type of conflict I am talking about. It is the prosecution of the further effort that must be made in order to get the whole of the national territory under the control of the Irish people. We cannot have it two ways. There is a lot of strange thinking, I know, amongst the people of the country at present, and I want them to try to think of the problem as it is to-day. The problem to-day is this, that if there is to be a further advance by the Irish people in getting possession of their own, and I hope there will be, that advance must be led by whatever Government is here, and any section of the people who think that other methods than the methods we use should be employed will have to get here by the method of the ballot. There is no other way out of it, and those who think that there can be merely a puppet Government here are living in a fool's paradise. There cannot. Whatever Government is elected here will have to maintain the authority which it possesses, and will have to live up to the responsibilities which it assumes when it takes office.
We want the people of the country to realise that and we want the members of the Labour Party to realise it. As they were told, if they were put on these benches and were responsible for the maintenance of the conditions which we have to-day, the ordinary individual having the right to live his own life in his own way, according to the law, and if they wanted to maintain this position, they would, if there was a threat such as the threat which is abroad and the challenge contained in these documents that were read out by the Minister, have to act exactly as we are acting, and they know that they would have to act as we are acting. When we brought down Article 2A, I think the Labour Party supported us.
They had fortnightly conferences then.
I think they did support us. My recollection is that we were supported, and, I think, rightly supported, by the Labour Party at that time, but what I want to point out to the Labour Party is that they ought not, in dealing with these matters, keep the Party aspect, the political aspect of this question in mind. They ought to consider the wider aspect of it, and, as members of this House, they ought to try to support its authority. Whatever might have been said on former occasions, everybody knows now that the Constitution was a Constitution freely adopted by the Irish people, that it is the Irish peoples' Constitution that it is a free and open Constitution and that if they, or any other Party, get a majority, they can come into these benches. I have said that the Labour Party ought very carefully to consider their attitude on this matter.
So we are.
The only reason the Labour Party have given to us, that I have heard, as to why they will not support the Bill is that the country is peaceful. So it is. It has been peaceful, in my opinion, because of the pursuit of a certain policy, in taking away obstacles; and at a certain time we had to use these extraordinary powers or else, in my opinion, we would not have had these peaceful conditions. Are we to come now to face a possible situation in which we would be deprived of all the powers which enabled us to keep order on that occasion?
Are they not still in existence?
No. They are not. The Constitution swept all these things away and left us practically bereft of powers to deal with such a situation as being threatened by armed force. You have no power, at the present time at any rate, to deal with such a situation.
Did the Constitution repeal the Acts which were referred to in Section 30?
It repealed Article 2A.
Did it repeal the Acts referred to in Section 30?
It repealed Article 2A—the powers which we had to use here at one time in order to deal with a situation of grave disorder, and in the use of which we were supported at that time by the Labour Party. Suppose that to-morrow some other such situation should develop, unless these Bills are passed we would not have those powers to deal with such a condition of disorder. We would not be in the position in which we were then, of being able to sit down as a Government and think over the general situation and come to the conclusion that the way to deal with that situation would be to use the powers that we had. We have no such powers to-day, and what we are trying to get here is, in view of the threat and the challenge that exist, to have powers which will be available if, unfortunately, the situation should go from one of mere verbal challenge to something else, and it has already gone beyond mere verbal challenge because, as you have been told, citizens of this State were blown up, and you were told also by the Minister that cases containing time-fuse bombs were handed in form our territory into another territory. If this situation is going to develop, are we going to be here on sufferance, simply dependent on the good will of the people who ignore authority and who attack in every way the institutions here? Are we to be here merely on the sufferance of such people and dependent absolutely on whether they think it well to attack us or not? I think that it would be altogether wrong and that it would be an impossible situation, and I believe that a Government that would come here and not seek for the powers that would enable it to deal with a situation like that would be wanting in its duty to the Irish people, and would be worse than that.
We have got here at the present moment a situation which, I think I can say, was beyond the hopes of many of us a few years ago. We have got to that situation and we believe that the rest of the road can be travelled and that, in our generation, we will be able to see the completion of that work, provided that there is proper direction, and that the people as a whole have an opportunity of deciding what is to be the policy to be adopted. If the Government here, in face of a threat and a challenge of that sort, were not to come in here and ask for the necessary powers to deal with that position, I think that Government would be faithless to the things that a number of us here have been working for over at least a decade or two. That is why we have come in here and asked you for these powers. We are in no hurry. We believe that, if anything should suddenly develop, we could come here to you and ask you to give us the necessary powers swiftly, but we prefer by far that this situation should be dealt with calmly. We prefer that the people of the country, no matter to what Parties they may belong, should calmly consider this situation and ask themselves whether the time has now come when everybody should stand for the principle that, as there is free, open access to the national Parliament, and free open access to the council which decides national policy, the question of force should be abandoned and that, if force is to be used for the prosecution of the national purpose at any time in the future, it must be directed by those who have been elected to control by the Irish people.
I do not believe that the Taoiseach could have imagined that his introduction of that speech of his in March of 1922 has either aided this debate or illuminated the House.
The Taoiseach went away from it.
Yes, and I am touching on it to the lightest possible extent. As far as I was able to understand him, however, it is possible to take certain action against a Constitutional Government in 26 countries, but it is wrong when you want to act similarly in the remaining six countries.
That is not what I said.
Well, that is how I understood it, and that is what it comes to at any rate. So far as Parts V and VI of this measure are concerned, they have been decided long ago so far as this House is concerned. The Minister for Justice has the police records in his hands, and once he comes into this House here, with a sense of responsibility, and says that this country is going towards a condition where there may be a catastrophe, and that the situation is rapidly deteriorating, and that he wants exceptional powers, under those circumstances we can only say: "Well, take your exceptional circumstances and the exceptional powers you want, and operate them as swiftly and as ruthlessly as you can." All we can say now, however, is that you appear to have run the full cycle of revolutionary movements as we know of them in history. Long ago, the various stages of revolutions were described, as when, in the time of the French Revolution, it was pointed out that after passing through one or two stages of a revolution, a third stage is reached when certain people who had used the guillotine were being brought to the guillotine themselves because others had become successful in the meantime, and the revolution was then described as having reached the stage where the crocodile was swallowing its young. Well, the Party opposite have reached the stage of revolutionary progress where the crocodile is swallowing its young. Very well; make a good meal of it—make a grill of it—but remember that we, in our time, helped to grill these people for you. We grilled a lot of these people, and we would have grilled some of you also if you had not changed your tune in the meantime.
That is the situation, and that is the stage that you have reached, and are you going to be bold about it? It may be that you will temper justice with a little mercy when you remember that some of these people have been misled by yourselves. I think that the phrase that was used about these people in 1931 was that they were brave people, but misguided. If they were misguided, who was it that led them wrong? Was the situation as clear to the Taoiseach then as it is to-day—that a physical force movement might be right for certain things, but not for other things? If the situation has deteriorated, we have not been told how it has been allowed to go to that stage, nor have we been told of the seriousness of the situation. We were told by the Minister for Justice that three people had succeeded in blowing themselves up, but now the Taoiseach, in his speech, puts a different construction on that, and says that some people blew up others. At any rate, so far as we can gather, three people lost their lives and two proclamations were issued, and for that reason Sections 5 and 6 of the Bill are required. Very well, if they are required, take them and operate them, and come back here afterwards and say that you have done your duty, and even if we temper our regard for you by saying that it is time you did your duty, you will have done it anyway.
But also remember to be bold and face up to what you are doing. You are now trying to direct by forceful means into the paths of rectitude people whom you assisted to stray from these paths. It is meet and proper that you should do it; but we will not go bad on you the way you would have gone bad on us. From our experience of government we know what these things mean. We had our experience of the way it would be discussed if those people there were here —talking about meeting murder on the way, have a face like Castlereagh— does the Minister for Finance remember the quotation—and the bloodhounds of the Executive Council. We knew that men were going to be put up to do an ugly task; we relied upon them to do it correctly and they did it; and they will do the same for you.
Let there be no quarrelling about Parts V and VI of this Bill. So far as they are concerned, if the Taoiseach came here to-morrow and said that he required these Parts, separated from the rest, and made a case for urgency, we would assist the passage of these Parts through the House and you could have them. We know what attempts to undermine the State mean. We know what they can go to. We know the lengths people can go to when not held up and what length they can go to when they are favoured. We will help you to stop it. But I do think the House deserves a little bit more in the way of information than the Minister gave this morning. Proclamations alone do not matter. There were many proclamations in our time that we took no notice of. Proclamations themselves might have been let go. I assume that there is in the background some information which either the Minister for Justice or the Minister for Defence has with regard to arms, what arms there are in the country not under proper authority, whether they are reported to be numerous, whether people are on the move and against whom, whether there are any schemes or plans and against whom? I am sure all that information must be in somebody's possession and I think the House deserves a little bit more consideration and should get a little bit more information.
As regards Parts I to IV, including the first thirty sections, this Bill has been discussed as if it was divided rigidly into two compartments. It is not. There are a number of phrases in Part IV that relate to offences that do not become offences until Parts V and VI are put into operation. Parts I to IV are amazing. Will the Taoiseach take either of these two tests? Parts I to IV, according to him, are the sort of legislation that any ordinary country should have in the most peaceful times. It is a pity the Minister for Finance did not delay the visit that he made to Belfast in the autumn of last year. I should like to see him colloguing with Sir Dawson Bates over Part IV of this legislation, in order to find out whether Sir Dawson Bates would recognise this as legislation which he and his Ministers should introduce in the North as ordinary legislation for peaceful times. Would the Minister tell us the fruits of that conversation with that Minister on that matter? That is a test which I think the Government should face up to. Is that the sort of legislation that we, having certain feelings for certain people in the Six Counties, would like to see operated by the present Government there in peaceful, ordinary times? If so, it will pass with full marks here. Does anybody think it would stand that test? I will give one other. This is a filling out of the reservation in the Constitution on the ordinary fundamental rights. During the last couple of days we have struck a new postage stamp commemorating the 150th anniversary of the institution of the American Constitution. Will we put one of these stamps on this Bill and send it over to the Americans and say that that is our idea of how fundamental rights and liberties ought to be preserved in peaceful conditions? I suggest that no comparison with the American Constitution would lead anybody to that course of conduct.
The Taoiseach said that amendments may be moved. Do not the whole of the four first sections pivot on the point of unlawful association? I suggest they do. I take one quotation from Section 15. An organisation is declared to be unlawful in paragraph (2) if it "engages in, promotes, encourages, or advocates the attainment of any particular object, lawful or unlawful, by violent, criminal, or other unlawful means". Let me strip that of certain words. An association is thereby declared to be unlawful if it promotes the attainment of a lawful object by unlawful means other than violence or force of arms. The moment an organisation is so declared unlawful, every right guaranteed in the Constitution, with the exception of freedom of conscience, goes.
You can have arrest and detention, you can have the visits of people, you can have the questioning of folk by members of the Gárda Síochána, you can have their property seized and confiscated. There is a certain county where a certain policy was once favoured by a man who is now a member of the Government. It is a matter of law at the moment that children should be vaccinated and the County Wexford is notoriously strong against that. There is an organisation which decides to oppose vaccination, possibly an unlawful organisation—it certainly is under this measure. Is there to be the impact of this immense machinery upon any organisation of that sort, and is that for the most peaceful ordinary times under the Constitution?
There is one further point. A document is described as an incriminating document, whether it bears a date or not, if it is issued by, or emanates from, or appears to be so issued or emanating from an unlawful association. If you are caught with such a document there is the whole question of domiciliary visits, arrest, cross-examination, detention, and the possible forfeiture of property. Is that intended? It may be that the phrase with regard to an incriminating document has gone too far, but the pivot on which the first four parts of the Bill turn is an unlawful association, and an unlawful association is an organisation which seeks the attainment of any object, whether lawful or unlawful, as long as it is by any type of unlawful means.
We are told that the Government have not the powers at their command which they require. They have certainly at this moment the Treasonable Offences Act of 1925 and the Public Safety (Emergency Powers) Act, 1926. They are obviously law. They are obviously not against the constitution, because they are being repealed by the Bill. They are law at the moment. What more is required than is in the Act of 1926 and the Treasonable Offences Act, 1925? I do not understand what necessity there is for anything further than these Acts. The Taoiseach told us that Article 2A was replaced by the Constitution? Why? Is it because it was repugnant to the Constitution? It was not declared by the Constitution to be unconstitutional. Is it because it was repugnant?
Because it was part of the former Constitution.
Only for that reason? I am glad to have acceptance of that. Article 2A could be reintroduced into this House and be within the Constitution.
It could.
Article 2A was nothing more than an enlargement of the Act of 1926—and that Act is still law—and the Treasonable Offences Act. I can understand an emergency which requires Parts V and VI of this Bill. We admit that; we will take that for granted, and grant these parts. Why do we throw in all these other sections which deal with the fundamental liberties and so definitely limit them in circumstances, as described, of most ordinary peaceful conditions? I have referred to the American Constitution. It has stood the test for 150 years. One of their Articles is this:—
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof or abridging the freedom of speech, of the press or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
That has stood for 150 years. A great people, a mixture of people gathered in from all Europe, have that as their Constitution and for 150 years they have retained it. The Taoiseach never compared that with what he has put into this Bill here. We have a series of Articles in our Constitution which state fundamental principles and rights. It has stated them with so many reservations that the rights and liberties have almost disappeared. The law may change, and if it does change the fundamental rights under the Constitution are gone. I ask the President to make a comparison.
Would the Deputy refer to the Taoiseach not to the President.
Yes, the President has not been guilty yet but he may have to sign the Bill. Now would the Taoiseach compare these documents? I take it for granted that there is acceptance in this House of certain fundamental rights that the people ought to have guaranteed to them, liberty under certain heads. Matters affecting conscience are not dealt with at all. There are four others. That one ought to be secured against arrest; that the house one occupies ought not be broken into; that one should have freedom of association and that there should be freedom of the Press, and freedom to speak one's thoughts. Does the Taoiseach recognise that these four rights are definitely broken by this Bill? Has he not powers under this Constitution without further law? Let him read the Articles in the Constitution and let him still consider that the Public Safety Act of 1926 is still law. The Treasonable Offences Act of 1925 is a matter for adjudication by the courts. The Act of 1926 could only act if brought into operation by proclamation.
Does the Taoiseach think that this Bill dealing with the ordinary law should be brought in without any case being made for it? Does he think it proper to bring it in here and forget that he has two other pieces of legislation ready to his hand? I recognise one difficulty. He has almost indicated the reason why this Bill is brought in here. He said it is possible to have a situation in which you may not have evidence which would satisfy a court. What does that mean? The desire is to remove all this infraction of public rights from the courts and to put it into the hands of the Executive. Is that proper? I can imagine that it would be proper under certain circumstances. I do not suppose there is a constitution of any length which has in it so many terms and phrases repeated through its pages, such phrases as "time of war" or "of armed rebellion", as ours has. There is abundant power in the Constitution itself with regard to those matters. There is, further, Article 28 in the Constitution, which permits the abrogation of the entire Constitution in certain periods. And in between those the attempt is now made to sandwich this legislation by practically abolishing the Articles from No. 40 onwards. There are to be domiciliary visits hereafter. These are to take place when certain members of the Gárdaí "are of opinion and suspect" that there will be documents belonging to an unlawful association in such premises. If a member of the Gárda of the rank of Chief Superintendent certifies that, then that house may be visited with everything obnoxious that can follow from that. If there are people found in that house they may be questioned, and if they do not answer in certain ways they may be arrested and detained or even may be already detained; this is definitely in conflict with the ordinary habeas corpus code. All that can be done on the certificate of a Gárda not below the rank of Chief Superintendent. Is the right to have one's dwelling preserved from entry, a right which is regarded as being of any substance? Is that a right that should be lightly taken away? Is it one that we should in ordinary peaceful times establish? Is it one that should be broken because the Chief Superintendent of the Gárdaí believes that a document, say of an anti-vaccination type, is to be found in the house? That is what we are asked here to accept as ordinary law. Amongst the rights that have been fought for in every country is the right of political association and freedom of speech, and opinion, and especially opinion contrary to the Government of the day.
Section 24 deals with the prohibition of public meetings. Section 24 says: "It shall not be lawful to hold a public meeting which disturbs public order or causes or leads to a breach of the peace." There is an amount of case law with regard to a breach of the peace. What is the meaning of these words "disturbance of public order"? Is it meant to be something less than a breach of the peace? Is there some point which would not come within the ambit of the ordinary case of a breach of the peace? If so, this is an innovation. It will not be lawful to hold a meeting, if a breach of the peace may be brought about by disturbers.
If that occurs the meeting will be unlawful and people can be dealt with under the criminal law for holding it. Further, sub-section (3) of this Section 24 lays it down that
Whenever an officer of the Gárdai Síochána not below the rank of chief superintendent is of opinion that the holding of a particular public meeting about to be or supposed to be held would disturb public order or cause or lead to a breach of the peace...it shall be lawful for such officer by notice given to a person concerned in the holding or organisation of such meeting...to prohibit the holding of such meeting and ... such meeting shall become and be unlawful.
Let us be distinct on one matter in that connection. There was a tragic occurrence in Cork which was the subject of a hearing in the courts; the judge of the High Court having found against certain members of the Gárdaí, asked to have the papers sent to the Attorney-General to have these people prosecuted for manslaughter. That case was brought to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court upheld the High Court judge but in the course of that case it emerged that one, if not two, of the men in that fracas had been promoted after that shooting and I understand they are still in the Gárda.
One of them is not.
Are not both of them in the Guards?
I would want notice of that question.
Is not the case of a man of that type so notorious that the Minister would know all about it? If a member of that force, rapidly promoted for his activities in that direction, is still in the Gárdai he may climb to the rank of chief superintendent. If a type of Guard like that is going to have it in his power to prohibit the holding of a public meeting, where are the rights and liberties of the citizens?
In any event, that is what we are faced with with regard to the prohibition of public meetings. Has it not been clear throughout this country from about 1932, and for about four years afterwards, that most of the meetings held by members of the Party that I belong to were, in fact, accompanied by breaches of the peace, not promoted by ourselves? Are these meetings to be prohibited? If a man attends and speaks at any of these meetings does he commit an offence? Is it to be in the power of some person, like those to whom I have referred, to say that a meeting is likely to lead to a breach of the peace or to disturb public order? Are they to be given power to control the activities of one political Party in a State, and is the sort of legislation that we have introduced here required in the most orderly and peaceful times? These members of the Guards also have the power to get search warrants. If there is an offence committed under this Act, it may be that search warrants will be procured in the peculiar ways it is possible under this, and if they are visits may be made by night to people's houses.
Cannot the Taoiseach accept the invitation that I put to him, to put himself in the shoes of some of the people who were about Marsh's yard, and belonged to a certain political organisation? Would he like to have his house entered with a search warrant that was procured by some of the people who were around Marsh's yard on that day? Remember, the Government of the time showed their attitude towards those men by retaining them in the Force. If one man has gone since I would like the Minister to tell us whether he went for anything connected with that episode, or simply in the ordinary way. But at any rate the Government retained those men in the Force. That was their attitude towards a certain political Party at that time. That was how they indicated it. The Guards generally can be trusted, but the records of certain special people brought into the Guards for a special purpose, and retained after they had, in fact, been criticised as being guilty of manslaughter cannot lead to confidence in any suppression of a public meeting, or in any entry of persons to private residences by members of such a force.
I want to ask the Government, when they are replying on this Bill, to state whether the course that is outlined in Sections 16, 17 and 18 is intentional. As far as I understand the run of the measure, an organisation becomes illegal if it falls within the definition in Section 15. Thereafter, the Government may, or may not, take a certain step to declare an organisation to be unlawful. Apparently, if they do declare an organisation to be unlawful, the declaration must be accompanied by what is called a suppression order. If a suppression order is made there is the right of appeal, with regard to the other illegality, to the courts. Supposing a suppression order is not made, what happens? Is there any recourse to the judges, or must the matter wait until the Guards have made up their minds that documents belonging to certain organisations, described in the definitions as being unlawful, are in a certain house, and have raided it? Is there any way of appeal to the courts by an organisation so threatened, although not declared to be unlawful, so that it may get the courts to prevent any of these visits by night by members of the Civic Guards?
Section 17 of the Bill has to be adverted to. As far as the ordinary criminal law in this country goes, the scales are weighted in favour of the alleged criminal to the extent if he gets the court to declare he is not guilty the prosecution by the State closes. In the case of an organisation declared to be unlawful and in respect of which a suppression order is made, if it goes to the court you may have this: the High Court finds that the organisation is not illegal and gives a declaration of legality, but that can be stopped on application to the same High Court until the Supreme Court has decided in the matter. Why break the ordinary run of the criminal law in that respect? Why not stop at the point where the organisation has gone before one of the independent judges of the country and got from him a declaration of legality? Why is it decided, contrary to all the run of the criminal law, to keep the thing in reserve—the organisation has got a declaration of legality from a judge though it has a previous declaration of illegality hanging over its head —until the Supreme Court has given a final decision? That procedure is quite contrary to the ordinary run of the criminal law in this country, and no reason is shown why it should be in this position. These, however, are details.
The general situation here is that the Taoiseach prides himself on having passed through this country a Constitution. I feel that I can suggest at this moment that if this debate had occurred before the Constitution had been put to the people it would not have secured so many votes. I doubt if the Taoiseach made it known to the people at that time what, inside the framework of the Constitution, he could do by way of ordinary legislation. Most people, I think, had the impression that the ordinary rights had been reserved. They were written down, and people do not look to see about reservations. That has to be said by way of contrast to the older situation, as far back as 1922, that legislation of this type was definitely legislation to amend the Constitution. This legislation is not. This legislation is inside the Constitution. It can be held out as a bait possibly to those in the Six Counties: that this piece of legislation in any event will have no contrary effect upon them. If they were to come inside the swing of this Constitution they could still retain power in the Six Counties for the preservation of peace and order. Inside this Constitution, which they would adopt, they could bring in exactly this piece of legislation.
Now, let us consider the impact of this upon the ordinary lives of the people, because we are being asked to discuss this from the angle of peaceful and orderly times. That is a matter that we can deal with in greater detail on the Committee Stage. At this moment this has to be said, that of the five ordinary rights supposed to be guaranteed in any written Constitution to the people, there is only one here preserved without any great reservation. As far as freedom from arrest is concerned this makes considerable gaps in the ordinary right. As far as the right of peaceful association is concerned, this is a considerable breach of what has been regarded as the ordinary constitutional privilege in this matter. As far as the freedom of one's dwelling-house is concerned, that is completely in the dust because one is at the mercy of a superintendent of the Civic Guard with regard to documents which he believes to belong to an organisation which he thinks unlawful. That is so far as the ordinary rights that have been guaranteed to peoples in other countries and which the people in this country thought they had got in the fullest. With regard to those four rights that I had mentioned, they are definitely and entirely dissipated by the appearance of this measure. To say that does not condemn the Constitution which allows it and does not necessarily condemn the legislation that brings about that strange situation. It ought, however, to be realised that, apparently we are at this stage in this country that because of the previous old-time education which some had thought finished in 1921, or it may be because of the continuance of that education in a distorted fashion up to 1931, but at any rate, because of something, the Government of this country find themselves in this position, that they cannot grant, freely and simply as the Americans did 150 years ago, the right of freedom of speech, freedom of free expression of opinion, and freedom from arrest. But they feel that this represents the normal circumstances of the country. Read the two together, the Constitution, with all its reservations, and this, which is the filling up of all the exceptions that are made to the rights, and you get, I suggest, the picture that is in An Taoiseach's mind of the education of this country as a constitutional body, that the members of it cannot be allowed freely to associate, that men cannot be allowed freely to speak their opinions, that they cannot be allowed to hold public meetings and will not be protected, if they hold public meetings, against breaches of the peace; and men are not preserved, either, from visits to their households or from arrest and detention; and all that will depend upon this, that the ordinary law, apparently, is not competent to deal with people who are attempting to do unlawful things, to achieve unlawful ends, or to do something unlawful or lawful by unlawful means.
There is law in this country, and there are cases founded upon that law dealing with conspiracy, with incitement, and with attempts to do unlawful things. There are laws which the British are themselves operating at this moment with regard to people found with explosives. There are all sorts and conditions of law to deal with ordinary conditions where people are going to break the law, but apparently that is not satisfactory for An Taoiseach at this hour of the day; he must have this measure with its first 30 clauses to meet the ordinary circumstances. If that is the situation we are in, it reveals, with regard to this country that we used to rate in our own estimation so highly, that we have sunk to a particular depth, as far as people likely to live in constitutional relations one with the other are concerned. But if we are at that depth, and if we have to recognise it and to take on a fitting sense of humility after the revelation is made, if we are at the bottom of the ladder and are climbing steadily upwards, let the case be made, let someone say, why the Treason Act of 1925 is not sufficient; why the Emergency Act of 1926, still on the Statue Book, is not sufficient; why the ordinary law with regard to conspiracy, incitement and attempt—all that aimed at unlawful objectives—is not sufficient; why even the Explosives Substances Act and such Acts are not sufficient to control the people of this country. Why is it not that all that machinery, which in any other country would be regarded as an unconstitutional type, but which is allowed in here because the Constitution is so much a pro-State document, is not sufficient to control existing conditions? There should at least be some explanation in that connection when making a case for the introduction of this measure.
Deputy McGilligan has stated that the Government Party have completed one cycle—I think that is what he said—of revolutionary movement. They have yet to complete another cycle before we can be assured that respect for the law in this State will be based on a proper and firm foundation. We find ourselves, in this Party to-night, in the position of being asked to make up our minds as to whether we would vote for a Bill which is, practically verbatim, copied from the Treasonable Offences Act and Public Safety Acts that found their way into the Statute Book from 1922 to 1932, and Article 2A of the original Constitution of this State. Faced with that responsibility, as a responsible Opposition in this State, disliking this Bill more than the Prime Minister himself can possibly dislike it, we, through the mouthpiece of the Leader of our Party, through the Leader of the Opposition here, have announced that, subject to certain very well-defined conditions, we propose to support the Bill.
The Government, in the year 1931, when Article 2A was introduced, denounced the Bill in terms to which it is not necessary now to advert. The temptation is very strong to go back and quote the words of the present Ministers and their followers at that time, but so far as we are concerned here, at least so far as I am concerned, I do not propose to revert to one single sentence uttered at that time. I have not even read the debates since the time of the discussion on Article 2A, but I am sure the character of those debates is still fresh in the public mind. The cycle has moved on and we find that the people who, at the time of the introduction of Article 2A. denounced the people who introduced it and the provisions of the Bill in such unmeasured terms, are themselves introducing into the same Parliament a Bill in almost identical terms. We who, as the Government at that time, introduced Article 2A, are now in opposition.
The cycle that the present Government Party have yet to complete is to find themselves once again in opposition here, facing a Government formed from any other Party in the House, whether it is this or the Labour Party or any other Party, and, in circumstances similar to the circumstances existing at the present moment, giving their consent, as an Opposition, to a Bill introduced in the terms in which this Bill is introduced and in circumstances similar to those in which this is introduced to-day. When that cycle is completed and the Government Party have gone through that particular phase, if they fulfil that test, then we will have some hope for stable government in this country. The Prime Minister said he introduced this Bill with tears in his eyes and sorrow in his heart. I wonder was this Bill so framed for the sole purpose of putting this Party into a difficulty? When I read it my first instincts were of violent objection to the Bill from start to finish. I still have the most violent objection to Parts II, III, and IV.
I am prepared, as the Leader of this Party was prepared to-day, to say that when the responsible Minister for Justice of the Government gets up and says, as he said to-day, that this country has reached a position which, if it is allowed to develop, would deteriorate to such a point that the country would be heading for a catastrophe—when a responsible Minister of the Government of this country makes such a statement, and when the Government of the country, with their political past, are forced to introduce a Bill of this character, then we on this side of the House are forced to the conclusion that there must be very grave reason indeed for the introduction of such a Bill and very grave necessity for the provisions contained in the Bill. Consequently, we are forced to give a measure of conditional support to the Bill. But that support is conditional, so far as I am personally concerned, on practically the entire of Parts II, III and IV being eradicated from the Bill.
Deputy McGilligan has made our position perfectly clear, that if the Government say there is a necessity for Parts V and VI of the Bill, with the information before them, and stating that they cannot govern this country without the provisions of Parts V and VI, then they can have them, however reluctant we are to give them these powers, and however much we might fear that these powers may be abused, as they were abused in the past. The Prime Minister stated that he was open to a generous measure of amendment of Parts II, III and IV of the Bill. I recalled, when the Prime Minister was making that statement, an appeal that he made to the Deputies here on the occasion of the consideration of the Draft Constitution in the months of May and June of 1938. He stated that he wished that Draft Constitution to be amended in every possible way that would improve it, and that he would like the Deputies, on this side of the House particularly, to give him every possible assistance. I cannot recall one single amendment that was put down on this side of the House that was accepted by the Prime Minister when the Constitution was going through, and it is no satisfaction to me, and I take no pride in it, when I say that many of the things that we pointed out were inherent in the Constitution and that are now in the fundamental law of this State—many of the evils inherent in that have been proved to be evils, and our words at that time have been proved to be absolutely correct by subsequent experience.
What are they?
I take no pride in that. I will later advocate a case in Committee in reference to Parts II, III and IV of this Bill, but I want to say now, so that the Prime Minister may not say subsequently that we took advantage of him or did not point it out to him that in my opinion Section 24 of this Bill is unconstitutional. I move the adjournment of the debate.
Debate accordingly adjourned.
The Dáil rose at 10.30 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Friday, 3rd March.