I take it that the motion and the amendment may be taken together.
Censorship and Constitutional Rights—Motion.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
I move:
That, in the opinion of the Seanad:
(1) Fundamental constitutional rights ought not to be abrogated more than is necessary for national safety even during war or the threat of war;
(2) In particular, the right to express opinion on Government policy and to persuade one's fellow-citizens ought not to be so abrogated as to give excuse for unconstitutional action;
(3) Consequently, the Press censorship ought not to exclude matter from publication except upon one or more of the following grounds:
(a) disclosure of military secrets;
(b) treason, sedition, or incitement to disobey the law;
(c) violence and intemperance of language tending to excite civil commotion or provoke external attack;
(d) dissemination of unfounded rumours, likely to produce disaffection or panic.
The following amendment appeared on the Order Paper in the name of Peadar Mac Fhionnlaoich:—
Na focail seo leanas do chur i ndeireadh na tairgseanna:—
(e) léir-fhaisnéis ar leith ceachdar de na comhchogaidbthibh;
(f) léir-fhaisnéis in aghaidh neodracht na hEireann;
(g) bréag-fhaisnéis in aghaidh teanga náisiúnta na hEireann.
At the end of the motion to add the following words:—
(e) propaganda in favour of either belligerent;
(f) propaganda against the neutrality of Ireland;
(g) lying propaganda against the national language of Ireland.
On the last occasion that this question of censorship was under discussion, on a motion introduced by Senator Sir John Keane, there were one or two Senators who seemed to think that anybody who criticised the censorship at all was showing a selfish lack of interest in the safety of the country. I should like to say at once that I am quite sure there is nobody here who is more concerned with the welfare and security of the country than Senator Professor Alton and myself.
When we come forward with a motion on the subject of the censorship, it is not because we are forgetful for a single minute of the paramount claims of national security in time of war; but national security is not always obtained by a display of timidity, and is not always obtained by resigning the use of one's own thinking faculties, leaving everything to the Government, and taking for granted that everything they do is right. National security is not even necessarily identical with neutrality. A departure from neutrality may sometimes be a way to national security and not a way from it; but, aside from that, it is by no means certain that the strictest censorship is also the sort of censorship that is working in favour of national security. As a matter of fact, the record of censorship in this war—censorship in general in this war—from the point of view of national security is an extraordinarily poor one. Its performances have been negative or actually worse than negative in the various countries on the Continent that have been overrun. I remember, about a year ago, when the Minister for Finance was addressing a dinner of the Institute of Journalists in this country, he took a rise out of his audience by reading aloud a list of censorship rules that were so stringent that his audience gasped for breath, and then it turned out that they were not the censorship rules obtaining in this country, but the rules that prevailed in Holland. Well, did they save Holland? The question answers itself. Accordingly, I would ask Senators not to be too prejudiced in their minds when some of us come forward, inspired, I assure you, Sir, with a genuine sense of duty, and not from a love of filibustering, to raise a question that seems to us of great importance.
Only a few days ago the Minister for Supplies expressed the view that there were numbers of people in this country who talked and acted as if the war were taking place on another planet. I am afraid that is true. In spite of all the recruiting and of the splendid work that is being done for national defence in various fields, I am afraid it is true that there is a tremendous lack of realism, on all sorts of vital questions connected with the war, quite prevalent in this country, and I feel that, for that, the Minister for Supplies may, in large measure, thank his colleague, the Minister for Co-Ordination of Defensive Measures, whose appetite for the suppression of news and opinions seems to grow every day.
I believe it was an Irish orator, John Philpot Curran, who said—what has become a platitude—that eternal vigilance was the price of liberty. That duty of vigilance in the cause of liberty does not cease even in war time, even though I fully admit that the liberties of the individual in war time must yield to the paramount necessity of securing the honour and the interests of the State. Now, it is that vigilance in the cause of liberty that I invite the Seanad to display when this question is discussed.
There is a great deal of argument in our days for and against democracy. That is an issue that does not very much appeal to me, when put quite in that form, as a subject for discussion, but what does appeal to me is to distinguish clearly in our minds between the sort of government and constitution that are worthy of free men and the sort that are not, and if I were to lay my finger on one thing more than another that distinguishes the sort of government and constitution that are worthy of free men, it is that citizens should be governed by the rule of law and not by arbitrary power. Now, nothing was ever more arbitrary than is the censorship in this country at the present time—nothing more arbitrary, nothing more secret. Those who fall under the lash of the censor are unable to disclose their wrongs to the general public, if they are wrongs. They are unable to disclose them. Secrecy is imposed upon them, secrecy is the condition in which the censorship works, and, as I said on the last time that we discussed one aspect of this subject, I do not believe that the general public at all realises how widespread and severe are the Minister's activities.
In this motion we have attempted, perhaps, a rather ambitious thing. We have attempted to lay down a code of principles that should direct the operations of the censorship. Now, we claim no infallibility or perfection for the particular rules we have suggested. I had had some faint hope—I admit only a faint hope—that the Government might propose a constructive amendment that would have made such alterations as they thought necessary, but they have not done so, and they have not done so, I am afraid, because any sort of restraints in this matter are unpalatable to the Minister for Co-ordination of Defensive Measures.
Nobody stopped the Senator from putting them down if he could have thought of them.
No. I put down the best that I could and, as I say, they are open to improvement from other quarters. I make no claim to infallibility. In the debate of the 4th December last year—Senator Sir John Keane's motion—the Minister said: "There is no person in this world who has an unlimited right to do whatever he himself thinks." On which I asked: "Not even a censor?" To which the Minister replied: "Not even a censor. The censor is governed by law and by commonsense." Now, there is not much meaning in saying that the censor is governed by law, because the law, in fact, has given him a free hand, and whether he is governed by commonsense is a question of fact upon which we differ. I think the Minister is in a considerable minority in this country, among those who are brought into touch with the operations of the censorship, in holding that the censor's decisions are, in fact, governed by commonsense.
Again, in that debate, he drew a picture of the relations between his Department and the newspapers, which was rather idyllic and rather misleading. I myself said that, as regards courtesy and intelligence, there was everything good to be said about his staff. It is the rules and regulations and policy at the top of which I complain, but when the Minister said, as he did say: "The censorship staff and the newspapers get on very well indeed, and we have found that on the whole the newspapers are co-operating with the censorship staff to see that nothing gets into the papers that is either going to create internal trouble or trouble between ourselves and other countries," he was giving a rather misleading picture of the situation. Actually, I believe that every editor in the country of every sort of paper, with the exception of the Irish Press, which is a Government organ and has never uttered a whisper of dissent from anything the Government has ever done since it came into power and never will dissent from anything that the Government ever does if it stays in power for a hundred years—with that exception I think that the editors and staffs of newspapers in this country are reduced to a state of blasphemous irritation whenever the subject of censorship is discussed. There are four daily papers. We have mentioned the Irish Press, but the other three, the Cork Examiner, the Irish Times, and the Irish Independent, are all, unless I am much mistaken, extremely dissatisfied with the censorship.
The Irish Times published a leading article attacking the censorship the day Senator Sir John Keane's motion came on for discussion. The Irish Independent attempted to publish an article on the censorship one day last week, when it was expected to come up for discussion here. They did not succeed, but the article has fallen into my hands, not, I may say, direct from the Irish Independent itself. Perhaps it would be interesting to everybody to hear what they had to say. I do not propose to read the whole of the article but I will read extracts.
"We accepted the censorship on the outbreak of the war; we were, and always have been, extremely desirous of co-operating with the Government in exercising the censorship towards the end—the only end and object which has been, or could be, justified—that this State might preserve its neutrality."
I may say, in parenthesis, that I do not agree with them in that account of its object. If the paper stated that it was to safeguard national security I would agree.
"We assumed, as we had a right to assume, that the censorship would be reasonable, intelligent, competent and impartial.
"The censorship has shown none of these qualities. Its powers have on many occasions been exercised in a manner which could not be defended on any reasonable basis; decisions have frequently been made which, in our view, were devoid of any intelligent explanation. The censorship has shown its incompetence by a lack of the most elementary knowledge of the workings of newspapers, by disregard for the convenience of newspapers and their readers, and by the issuing of contradictory orders. The censorship has failed to be impartial in that it has on several occasions prohibited the Irish Independent from publishing news which other Dublin newspapers were permitted to publish. The censorship has exceeded its powers by issuing orders which it had, and has, no authority to issue.
"These are, in general outline, our complaints against the censorship as we have experienced it for more than 16 months. We are prepared to support by specific instances every charge which we have briefly summarised above. We are prepared to place that evidence before any impartial tribunal appointed to inquire into this subject. What has been the experience of other newspapers we cannot tell. We are concerned here only with what we know ourselves. We suggest that those members of the Seanad who are jealous to preserve fundamental public rights and to curb the arrogance and incompetence of bureaucracy should demand an immediate inquiry. If the Government refuses to grant it the public will know the reason."
The feeling of the Cork Examiner was, I think, expressed on Senator Sir John Keane's motion by Senator Crosbie in person, so I do not need to read anything from that newspaper.
On the last occasion when talking about the censorship I expressed the view that there ought to be a parliamentary committee set up, which would periodically review the operations of the censorship. It would not have executive powers, but the Minister would be to some degree controlled in what he did by the knowledge that he might have to explain it to a parliamentary committee. I have not by any means abandoned my belief in the value of that proposal since then; it fits in with what is suggested in the leading article I read in the Irish Independent. I think even if the principles for guidance of the censor proposed in the motion were adopted, he would need the addition of the committee I propose, to review from time to time his operations, to see whether he was, in fact, consciously or unconsciously straying from the principles laid down by Parliament. Even if it were decided that no principles could be provided at all and that the power must be left to him without anything to guide him but common sense, then I think the committee would be of value in order to ensure that common sense played the part that it ought to play in his decisions. In framing this motion we did not want to cover too wide a field or to embark on a very broad and confused discussion, and so we limited ourselves to an attempt to lay down principles for the guidance of the Minister, and possibly the House may have the happiness on some future occasion of discussing the question of the committee.
The Minister says that really there has been no change, that newspapers have always been subjected to censorship: the only thing is that instead of being censored by their editors they are now censored by him, and that that is more satisfactory, as he is responsible to the Irish people while the editors are not. There are two answers to that. One is that the editors have considerably more experience than the Minister in this particular matter. The other is that if there were only one newspaper existing in the country it might be unsatisfactory to have it edited by a private person, but that that argument does not apply when there are a number of newspapers, holding different views. If the editor of one paper was tempted to shut out items of news that did not coincide with what he liked, he would soon find that those items were appearing elsewhere, and when the public found by degrees that they were being defrauded in their news, they would abandon his newspaper for others that presented the news more fully and more impartially.
What are the Minister's special qualifications to undertake the editing of the newspapers of the country? I have never been a harsh critic of the Minister. I have never had any virulent differences with him either in this House or in the other House but I must candidly say that I think a great many people in both Houses have shown more detachment, moderation, tact and other qualifications that are desirable than he has. He made one remark the other day for which he has been so much belaboured that I do not really wish to belabour him any more. In the Dáil, when talking about supplies, he made a remark to the effect that even if every damn ship was sunk, we had the means so that we could improve our standard of living enormously in the course of two years.
That was correct.
It is a matter of opinion whether it was correct but at any rate the word "damn" would have been better omitted.
That is a matter of taste.
It is a matter of more than taste. I dare say it was just a slip.
If it was only a slip, this is wasting the time of the House.
It is not wasting time. A man in charge of the newspapers of the country should not be capable of such slips.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
Senator MacDermot should be allowed to continue his speech.
I do not want to take up the time of the House with the enormous number of instances that I have, but I am obliged to mention some of them. I may be accused of trifling with the subject if I do not mention some, so I will go over a few. An obvious one is the one mentioned on Senator Sir John Keane's motion, concerning the attempted publication by the Irish Times of a picture of a public meeting outside the Bank of Ireland and the suppression of that picture because there was visible on it a pediment with the lion and the unicorn. The Minister made a most unconvincing defence of that, and nobody who looked at the picture reproduced the following day, with the lion and the unicorn wiped out, could doubt that it was taken at an obviously natural angle and there was not the slightest indication of any malice prepense in having the lion and the unicorn included.
This morning Mr. Willkie was censored. Mr. Willkie was so full of what, I suppose, the Minister calls "flap-doodle and propaganda" that he made some comments on the bombing of St. Paul's in London; but I understand the Irish newspapers were forbidden to reproduce those remarks.
Cardinal Hinsley is, of course, a constant subject for censorship. Of his broadcast of about a week ago, which I dare say many of us heard, no Irish newspaper was allowed to print a word. Again, I suppose, "propaganda and flapdoodle".
These are the Senator's words. I suppose they are in good taste.
They are my words now, but they were the words of the Minister.
Do not put them on to me.
They are the words the Minister used in the last debate as being the sort of thing that he suppressed. I do not exactly know what the word "flapdoodle" means, but if he has not suppressed Cardinal Hinsley on the score of being a propagandist, I cannot imagine what score he has suppressed him on.
Mr. MacEntee, Minister for Finance, was so propagandist as to suggest some months ago that there was a danger, the way things were going, that we might find ourselves at the end of the war without any friends. That remark of his the newspapers were forbidden to publish.
A short time ago somebody attempted to put an advertisement in our newspapers for a particular medical product. The advertisement included the sentence: "War-time strain tells on even the healthiest chest and lungs." That would seem to be a rather harmless thing to say, but, apparently, it was thought to be dangerous to put in an Irish newspaper, as suggesting, I suppose, that we were or might be at war. But, in view of the fact that we are constantly being told to consider ourselves in as much of a crisis as if we were actually at war, one would have thought that medicine would be allowed to be advertised in those terms.
Here is another remark which the Irish newspapers were forbidden to publish: "Either Graziani is a very bad general, or he must have been pushed into an unwise action by the Fascist Party." Can anyone tell me why that should not be published?
There was a letter in the Daily Telegraph yesterday morning, arriving in Ireland this morning, from Sir Hubert Gough, Mr. Maurice Healy, and Mr. Henry Harrison. Mr. Henry Harrison has been for years a sort of white-headed boy with the Government. He has defended all their policies, including the economic war policy, and he has been a most ardent advocate of Irish unity and has put the case in various books and articles as blackly against the British Government as anyone has ever put it. In spite of the fact that he was one of the signatories of the letter, no Irish newspaper was permitted to publish it. Here it is:
"We believe that virtually all Irishmen and Anglo-Irishmen resident in this country most earnestly desire that Ireland should be ranged actively on the side of the Commonwealth, and that this should be brought about whilst she is still in a position to render extremely valuable aid to the common cause. We also believe that this desire is founded on the conviction that Ireland's relinquishment of her neutrality could be made to be not less for her own advantage and safety than for those of Britain and of the Commonwealth, and that Ireland's past and present idealisms must necessarily predispose her towards collaboration with those who are fighting in defence of Christian ethics.
"We, from our several standpoints are entirely at one with these views, but it is idle to ignore the difficulties—or the fact that there are difficulties of which the general public are quite insufficiently informed. Such obstacles as exist will only yield to skilled and tactful treatment. Mere exhortation or censure addressed to Dublin by the uninstructed are more likely to hinder than to help the solution of the deadlock.
"The principal remaining hope, as it appears to us, is that Dominion statesmanship—by no means for the first time in this generation—may make its good offices available for a supreme effort to effect an accommodation. The situation has been changing from half-year to half-year, and the occasion is now fully ripe for the aid of a judicious intermediary. One factor of notable weight is the existence of very large Irish and Anglo-Irish populations resident in Britain, in the Commonwealth, in America and elsewhere which look to Dublin as their metropolis and which will not be content that their views and interests should be excluded from all influence on the final decision. We are confident that skilled handling may prove successful, but the initiative must necessarily lie with the British Government here."
I invite the Minister to say why that was not allowed to be published.
A week or ten days ago the Cork Committee of Agriculture passed a resolution, or issued a statement, to the effect that they proposed to ask for a subsidy of £2 per acre for ploughing grass lands, and that the price of wheat should be increased to 50/- per barrel. I say nothing about the soundness of those views of the Cork Committee of Agriculture, but I should like to know by what right, or for what reason of national interest, the Minister refused to allow that to appear in the newspapers.
I attended about a week ago a cinema performance in which there was a news reel of the bombs in the South Circular Road. The commentary started by saying that the bomb or bombs had been dropped from an unidentified aircraft. The damage done was shown, and the commentary as originally written had gone on to say, what the Government had officially stated before that, that the fragments of the bombs on examination had shown that the bombs were of German origin. The commentator in the cinema was not allowed to mention that fact. Can anyone tell me where is the common sense in that?
Was the plane identified?
The plane was not identified. It was correctly stated that the plane itself was unidentified.
Another case that occurs to my mind is that of the Lord Mayor of Dublin. The Lord Mayor of Dublin, on the day when Messrs. McGrath and Hart were executed for the murder of police detectives, thought fit to hang the city flag at half mast. I personally think that is a fact which the public ought to be allowed to know. After all, the Lord Mayor has to go up for election again—I am not sure that she has not actually gone up for election since that. But it seems to me that that is an attitude taken by the head of the municipal government of Dublin towards the action of the Government, which is quite intolerable, and of which some official notice should have been taken. But the fact was that nobody was allowed to mention it. Mrs. Clarke has since distinguished herself by saying such tactful things as that, if the Red Cross is going to be of any use to the English, or words to that effect, she, of course, would not touch it with a barge pole. I do not believe that truth should be smothered unless the case for smothering it is quite overwhelming, because I think the nation that is forced to run with blinkers over its eyes is in a very vulnerable position. It certainly has the right to know the doings of the people whom it has put in public positions.
Again, there was the play mentioned in the last discussion on censorship, "Roly-Poly", which was suppressed at the Gate Theatre. I did not see it, and it is quite possible that it was right to suppress it, but, when we come to consider the question of consistency and of fair play all round, I wonder whether there was not just as much propagandist atmosphere about another play which has recently been running at the Abbey Theatre called, I think, "Trial at Green Street Courthouse". I wonder whether the British authorities would not have had just as much reason for objecting to that in these critical times as the French and German authorities had for objecting to the other play?
I have found similar inconsistencies in other directions. Take, for example, the treatment of contributors to a paper called The Standard. A distinguished writer on The Standard was forbidden to quote words from the Bishop of Waterford's pastoral some little time ago condemning the deeds of illegal organisations in strong terms, but that same newspaper was allowed—or at any rate it was not in any way punished or interfered with— to display all over Dublin a poster some months ago which to the casual reader—in fact, to every reader— strongly implied that Irish Catholic girls were being conscripted for immoral purposes by the British Army. But when you bought the newspaper and read that particular item, you found that that was a grossly misleading description of what they were writing about. What they were writing about was the economic necessity of Catholic girls in Northern Ireland having to go to look for work in England. They sometimes had to take positions that were of assistance to the British war effort, but there was no suggestion of immorality about it at all. Yet you had a poster saying: “Irish Catholic Girls Forced to Follow the British Army.” Similarly, there is—this is not a matter of offending any external Power: it is a matter of internal peace and good feeling—an advertisement which I have seen appear every week for a considerable time in the same paper, The Standard, referring to an appeal for funds for organisations to prevent the proselytising of Catholics by Protestants. Now, it is no doubt a very proper thing for a Catholic to contribute to, but is it necessary, in appealing for such a purpose, to allege what I believe to be false, what I believe to be a libel, that Irish Protestants are carrying on a vile traffic? That, as I say, has been appearing in that paper. If we are going to give the censor every sort of power to keep down the temperature and to prevent offensive things being said, then I think that sort of thing ought not to be allowed to be said, especially when a writer in the same newspaper is prohibited from quoting from a pastoral from the Bishop of Waterford which says something which apparently was considered unduly harsh about members of unlawful organisations.
Now, I do not think it is necessary for me to extend the list beyond that. The Minister has even censored himself. I knew he would censor himself. Otherwise I would not have put the paragraph in. I may say that in an article I did a week ago, I began by putting the paragraph in the most prominent position so that it could not escape the eye of the censor or slip through unnoticed. Otherwise I would not have bothered to put it there. I did not want to get it published at all, but simply to have the amusement of catching the Minister out. I quoted him absolutely verbatim from the Parliamentary Report. I said that the concluding stage of the debate on supplies in the other House had been enlivened by the following remark by the Minister in charge of censorship. I quoted it verbatim from the Parliamentary Report, and merely added that "the tact and economic soundness of his observation had been the subject of general comment." I need hardly say that the paragraph was not allowed to go, and the actual reason given to me as to why it was not allowed to go was that I had misquoted him. I did not misquote him. It was a word for word quotation from the Parliamentary Report.
So much then for illustrations, which could be multiplied indefinitely, of the commonsense and fairness with which these decisions are made in the case of newspapers. The Minister has put down no amendment to this motion, but one amendment has been put down in the name of Senator MacFhionnlaoich. One part of the Senator's amendment is particularly remarkable for this: that it proposes to prohibit "lying propaganda" against the Irish language. Heaven knows if we had some infallible authority—I am afraid I should not regard the Minister as being an infallible authority—but if we had some infallible authority who could always distinguish between what was lying and what was not, I would be ready to cut out everything that was lying on every subject. I would also go further than Senator Mac Fhionnlaoich. If one is going to cut out lying propaganda against the Irish language and knows how to do it, I should not stop short of cutting out lying propaganda in favour of the Irish language, but it is possible that he considers all propaganda against the Irish language is, by definition, lying, and all propaganda in its favour is of necessity true. Sometimes, I cannot help wondering whether this "for and against" business is not rather deceptive anyhow. I am not at all sure, could we imagine the Irish language personified in a sort of Cathleen Ní Houlihán walking into this Assembly, whether her smiles would fall on Senator Mac Fhionnlaoich and those who think like him, or whether they might not unexpectedly be bestowed in some other direction.
On the Senator, for example.
Even on me, perhaps. She might consider, possibly, that some of those who pretend to be her greatest friends and champions were doing everything to degrade and, ultimately, to destroy her. However, that is by the way. The Irish language amendment is interesting and significant, because it can hardly be supposed, I think, that Senator Mac Fhionnlaoich wishes to limit its effect to war time. There is no special appropriateness in defending the Irish language against propaganda in war time. I imagine that the Senator has been so seduced from the principles of democracy—possibly by the spectacle of the arbitrary proceedings of the Minister for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures, or, possibly, it comes natural to him—that he would gladly see everybody in this country prohibited for all time from questioning the wisdom of the measures he thinks proper to make Irish the universal spoken language of the country. But the amendment has other parts. He also proposes——
Leas-Chathaoirleach
I do not like to interrupt the Senator, but I doubt if he ought to discuss the amendment until it is moved, because the amendment cannot even be discussed formally until it is seconded.
I thought it was announced from the Chair that we were discussing the motion and the amendment together? I respectfully suggest that we cannot have it both ways. If we are not taking the two together, it means that, as soon as the amendment is moved, we shall have another set of speeches all over again.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
It is a doubtful point.
If you object to it, Sir, I need not refer at all to the specific amendment because I have to deal, in any case, with the issues which the amendment raises. The Minister himself had a great deal to say on the last occasion on the subject of propaganda. Now, what does all this talk of propaganda come to? Propaganda has apparently become a term of abuse which we apply to the arguments of our opponents, but not to our own arguments.
I know no way of making a distinction between what is propaganda and what is argument—they are one and the same thing—except that perhaps arguments become propaganda if they are sufficiently long and earnestly pursued, if they develop into a sort of missionary effort. That is what the original word "propaganda" meant. It came from the Roman College for the Propagation of the Faith. It was there that the word "propaganda" originated, and there is nothing in the word that is, in itself, abusive. It has only become abusive because people have got into the habit in recent years of referring to propaganda in terms of horror and contempt, but actually Senator McGinley, for example, has been a propagandist all his life, and it is nothing against him. Perhaps many of us have been propagandists for all sorts of things and there is no reason, because we are capable of being called propagandists, why we should be denied freedom of speech or denied the privilege of being reported in the newspapers. Of course, if it were a question of some organisation financed from abroad for the purpose of distributing particular doctrines or news items in this country, I can understand that the Government might be justified in taking action against such organisations, but that does not arise in this case.
The question is: is there any reason why the individual private citizen in this country should not express— always keeping within the terms of reasonable moderation which we agreed on when we were last speaking of this matter in the Seanad and which are provided for in this motion—moral judgments about one or other of the belligerents? The Minister talks about the private citizen having no right to embroil the country in war. He is not going to do so. The private citizen has no power to embroil the country in war. After all, the Dáil which has the right to declare war is elected by private citizens, and if private citizens in electing them, or in instructing them after their election, are to be prohibited from expressing their opinions on a subject of vital importance on the ground that to do so in war time is to run the risk of embroiling the country, it makes the actions of the Dáil a farce, artificial and representative of nothing. I maintain that we should be free, within reason, to express moral judgments upon the participants in the present European war or any other European war.
In point of fact, such judgments are now suppressed. About the last of them was, I think, that made in a moment of what was regarded, I suppose, by the Minister for the Co-Ordination of Defensive Measures as great indiscretion by the Taoiseach, last May, when Holland and Belgium were overrun, and he said great injustice had been done by that invasion. But nothing of the sort has occurred since, and we are reduced by the censorship to a state of moral nihilism about international issues in this country to which I do not think we ought to be reduced and which I think is profoundly harmful to both the material and spiritual wellbeing of the people.
Again, I see no reason why we should be debarred from expressing opinions as to the desirability or otherwise of Irish neutrality. Senator McGinley thinks that we ought to be free to propagand as much as we like in favour of Irish neutrality, and, in fact, we are so free, and propaganda is going on every day in favour of Irish neutrality. Articles are written; speeches are made; and hundreds of people are praising Irish neutrality; but nobody is allowed to utter a single word of criticism of it, or a single word of doubt about it, and then we boast of the national unity on the subject which is obtained by means so artificial as that. The unity would be impressive if those who were inclined to criticise neutrality were allowed to speak their minds, but when they are not allowed to speak their minds, the unity is very far from being impressive.
Compare what happens across the Irish Sea. Quite a short time ago there was a debate in the British House of Commons as to whether or not steps should be taken to give up the struggle and to procure an immediate peace, and I have here before me a copy of a leading article on the subject which appeared, not in an English paper, but in the New York Times. I propose to read a part of it. It reads:
"Democracy gave a truly thrilling exhibition in the British House of Commons yesterday. In the very heart of an Empire that is battling for its survival, in a country whose leaders and people have vowed that they would die rather than surrender, three pacifist Members of Parliament brought forward a motion calling for immediate peace in a spirit of compromise. They were not beheaded for high treason. They were not flung into a concentration camp.... They were able to argue their case freely and their speeches were reported in the newspapers, because they were simply exercising their rights as the elected representatives of free men. The Deputy Prime Minister, Mr. Attlee, replied to them, and the House then voted by 341 to 4 against the motion. That was all. The four who wanted peace will be back in the House to-morrow, taking part in debates on the conduct of the war.
"What now becomes of the fatuous idea that British democracy is dead or dying? Can any free country do better than this to prove that its freedom still lives? The British Parliament, it is true, has entrusted the Government with immense wartime powers affecting the life and property of every British subject. Yet the immemorial liberties still remain."
In the same way Mr. Willkie commented—and the comment, I think, was allowed to appear in the Irish newspapers—on the fact that Parliament was free to debate the subject of the suppression of the Daily Worker and had so debated it in his presence. Now, when that is possible in a country at war, in a country where it is so essential that the efforts of all the citizens should be kept at high tension in order to win that war, do we really have to go to the extremes to which we are going and, in doing so, is it a question of our being merely overcautious? Are not we actually running into dangers that we need not run into? It is really very irritating when we know that some of us do believe that neutrality is not a safe policy, but a dangerous policy, and that we would be securer against invasion if we were not neutral it is very irritating to us, who do really keep quieter than we might. to have a Deputy, such as Deputy Mullen, the other day, telling his constituents that every single Deputy in the Dáil and every single Senator in the Seanad believed that neutrality was the right policy.
I do not believe for a minute that Deputy Mullen told a deliberate lie. He said that because the operation of the censorship has been so effective that it is generally believed. The people at large are taught to think that there is no reason for them to exercise their minds on the subject, that there is such complete unanimity it would be absurd for any of them to be so officious and so audacious as to think within himself whether neutrality had been the right policy at the beginning, whether it had continued to be the right policy ever since and whether it must necessarily continue to be the right policy to the very end.
We never had any formal debates on neutrality either in this House or in the other. Even if we had had, and even if the decision of neutrality had been reached by a formal vote, no policy of that sort is eternal. Things may happen to change your views; things may happen that change the interests of the country; and I think it is highly unhealthy that, no matter what happens, everybody should be debarred from expressing his views in any effective way, from expressing his views, so as they will get into print and be read by a considerable number of his fellow-citizens, on the subject of what Irish interests demand in the tremendous crisis through which the world is going.
The other day the Minister for Supplies talked about the terrific dangers that face us, and it was very plain indeed from what he said and from his allusions to last September what he thought the greatest danger was. He thought the greatest danger was that if there was a German attempt to invade Great Britain we should not be omitted and that a German force would try to land here, too, whether merely by way of a diversion of British effort or, perhaps, in case of failure in the attack on England, that some lodgment might be obtained in this country which would give the Germans something to show their people as having been accomplished. The question is whether by keeping up, as we have done, the traditional attitude of aloofness, verging upon hostility, to Great Britain we have not so conducted ourselves as to make the necessary co-operation that we should be then driven to, far more difficult to accomplish smoothly, and to reconcile our own people to than need have been the case.
We have carried to extraordinary extremes this business of suggesting that there is no moral difference between the belligerents. It is not merely that we are not allowed to make speeches saying one is more wicked or more virtuous than the other, but we do allow speeches to be made and speeches are made and appear in the newspapers which strongly suggest that there is no moral difference between them. Some of these speeches here come from ecclesiastical quarters, to my deep regret, and others have come from politicians and, although it is some time ago, I think it should be mentioned that the Taoiseach himself made what I regarded as an extraordinarily unfortunate statement, back in May, to the effect that either participant in the European war would attack us without a moment's hesitation if it suited his own interests to do so. Now, when this agitation, this unfortunate agitation, about the ports started in Great Britain, we were forced to appeal, and we have appealed—the Taoiseach himself has appealed eloquently—to the very moral considerations which he had already informed the world at large the British, no more than the Germans, had any use for or paid any attention to. It seems to me a great mistake that our own people should be misled in that way. Even the Minister for Supplies, who speaks more realistically about this war than most of his colleagues and most people in this country, talks about Ireland being blockaded in a way that seems to imply that she is equally blockaded by all the belligerents. What are the facts? The facts are that it is by the goodwill of the British Government, by the bravery of the British mercantile marine, by the protection the British convoys have been able to give, that we have been getting all our overseas supplies practically since this war started. It is by the goodwill of the British that we have been arming ourselves, so far as we have armed ourselves. Even in buying arms in America we have had the assistance of the British Ambassador there. We have been taught to believe that it is quite as likely that the British would commit an act of aggression against us as anybody else.
Do they not occupy portion of our country?
But for the British we would have no arms to speak of with which to resist that act of aggression if it were committed. Surely the thing does not make sense. I suppose anything may happen in war. By some extraordinary piece of folly or desperation, it may occur some day—I hope to heavens it does not—that the British may attack our ports—I think it is in the highest degree unlikely—but I do know this, that whatever resistance we are able to put up to that or any other act of aggression, we will be able to put up that resistance because the British have allowed the arms to come in. That is a thing the people of the country do not realise and that I think they ought to know.
It is not merely our physical neutrality that I personally disapprove of—and this motion is not about neutrality so much as about the right to talk about neutrality—but what the censorship has produced in particular that I resent is this sort of moral neutrality. We talk of our own unity, which, as I have said, is, to a large degree, artificial, but in obtaining that we have cut ourselves off from the entire Irish world elsewhere. The Irish in Australia, the Irish in Canada, even the Irish in America, feel very different about this whole question from ourselves and they do not feel that the belligerents are all on the same plane. In some of the speeches that we deliver about this war and the issues at stake they find a note that they are quite unaccustomed to find in Irish speeches, and that we have been much more accustomed to find in English speeches in the past, and that is a certain pharisaical note. We are too much inclined to attribute it to some moral superiority of our own that we are not involved in this war, and we walk along turning our eyes away— like the pharisee turned his eyes away from the other side of the road—from the iniquities that have been committed in various parts of Europe. I think it is a great mistake to insist that all note of criticism or condemnation of manifestly unjust and cruel oppression should be absent from our speeches and should be absent from our newspapers. I think it is doing us a great wrong throughout the whole of the civilised world and the whole of the free world.
The only sort of Irish unity that is worth having is that founded not on artificiality but on truth, and that does not lead us widely afield not only from our own material interests but from the ideals which we have always asserted to be dear to us. It seems to me that, even on the material side, our people should have been brought to realise much more than they have the extent to which our prosperity is bound up with the prosperity of Great Britain, and the appalling poverty that is likely to result here if Great Britain is defeated in this war. I say that, not as an argument that this country should enter the war, but as an argument that the people of this country should hold a far more sympathetic attitude than they hold at present towards Great Britain and Greece and the countries of the British Commonwealth.
I formally second the motion and am reserving the right to speak later on.
Níl mórán sa rún seo nach n-aontuím leis. Ach measaim nach bhfuil ann ach "tuairim chráibhteach", mar adeirtear, agus gur beag an tairbhe is féidir a bhaint as. Ach má glactar leis tá roinnt pointí ar mhaith liom cur leis; agus tá tuairim agam go bhfuil pointí eile is féidir agus is ceart a chur leis. Mar cuirtear rómhainn é tá sé ró-chumhang agus chuirfeadh sé ceangal na gcúig gcaol ar an lucht cáinte.
Tá dhá dhream ins an tír seo atá bagarthach, baoghalach do shaoirse agus neamhspleachas an Stáit, agus gur ceart srian do chur ortha le linn práinne an chogaidh, sé sin, an dream a mheasann go mbudh cheart dúinn taobhú le Sasain agus a bheith sa chogadh ar thaoibh na hImpireachta. Tá siad lán dáiríribh agus ní fheiceann siad gur contabhairt don Stát iad. Is iad iarsma na gclannadóirí iad a tháinig anall ón Bhreatain ó am go ham agus nár ghabh ariamh le náisiúntacht na hÉireann. An fhaid is bhí cumhacht Shasana i bhfeidhm sa tír bhí an dream seo in árdréim; agus goilleann sé ortha gan an cás a bheith amhlaidh fós. Diomaoidhte díobh seo tá fuighleach beag de sheoiníní fágtha gur nár doíbh aithris do dhéanamh ar na clannadóiribh agus ar na Gaill. Níl siad sin chomh fairsing is bhí siad ach tá cuid aca fágtha fós.
Ar an dtaoibh eile den scéal, tá dream beag daoine againn gur fuath nimhneach leo gach a bhaineann le Sasain. Chuirfidís fáilte roimh an diabhal féin dá raibh an diabhal in achrann le Sasain. Tá siad seo go mór dáiríribh fósda, agus dar leo go bhfuil siad ag saothrú ar son saoirse na tíre. Ach is dóigh liom nach bhfuil siad ró-líonmhar sa tír, agus gur ógánaigh óga iad an chuid is mó aca; agus gan chiall aca don chontabhairt ina gcuireann siad an tír.
Tá furmhór muintir na tíre in aghaidh an dá dhream atá luidhte agam; agus ní mór don fhurmhór sin a dtuairim féin do chur i bhfeidhm, agus gan leigint d'aon dream uathaidh iad do chur ó bhóthar na neodrachta atá ceaptha amach aca don Stát. Sin an fáth go bhfuil cáinte againn: le cosg do chur ar fhaisnéis a bheadh baoghalach dar neodracht agus is ceart dúinn bheith cúramach gan geimhleach no laingcís do chur ar an cháinte nach leigfeadh dó a obair a dhéanamh.
Má cuirtear an rún seo i bhféidhm ina iomlán caidé an tairbhe thiocfas as? Cé bhéas mar bhreitheamh ar an cháinte? Cé bhéaras breith ar an gceist, an bhfuil na nuachtáin, nó an craolachán nó na cineamaí ag dul thar teorainn le faisnéis no le bréag-fhaisnéis? Cé eile ach an cáinte, agus an tAire ar a chúl agus an Riaghaltas ar a chúl súd? Caithfidh siad san a bheith freagarach, go díreach mar atá siad freagarthach an fhaid is tá siad i gceannas ins an tír.
Agus ó tá an saoghal corrach, agus ag athrú ó lá go lá ní féidir riaghlacha beachta, seasta do cheapadh dóibh. B'fhéidir nár mhisde comhairle do mholadh dóibh ó am go h-am; ach sin a thig a déanamh. Tá níos mó eolais aca ar an scéal ná tá againne agus tá mise sásta nach rachaidh siad ró-fhada le cosg do chur ar ár saoirse, mura bhfuil géar-ghábhadh leis. Mar sin is cuma liom nach mór, ciaca glacfar leis an rún seo, nó nach nglacfar. Ach má glactar leis budh mhaith liom an moladh do leathnú agus na pointí atá luaidhte agam ins an fhuagra do chur leis. Tá contabhairt dár saoirse agus dár neodracht má leigtear do dhaoine léir-fháisnéis do dhéanamh ar aon taobh ins an chogadh mhór; agus tá baoghal ann dár náisiuntacht iomlán má leantar leis an bhréag-fhaisnéis in aghaidh na teangan náisiúnta.
Sin é an méid a bhíos ar tí do rá ar na gceist seo, ach déanfa mé tagairt ghairid do roinnt de na poinnte a chualamar ón Seanadóir Mac Diarmada. Ní racha mé thairis an óráid fhada a thug sé dúinn. Dubhairt sé nach raibh na páipéirí sásta leis an gcáinte. Tuigim sin, ach níl morán truaighe agam do na páipéirí sa tír seo. Is beag ceann acu atá iontaoibh maidir le náisiúntacht na tíre. Tá cuid acu in aghaidh náisiúntacht na tíre agus tá cuid acu ar nós cuma liom. Má thuigeann siad gur fearr bheith ar an taobh amháin, beidh siad ar an dtaobh amháin agus má thuigeann siad gur fearr bheith ar an taobh eile beidh siad ar an dtaobh sin.
Anois, tá ceist ar bhréag-fhaisnéis in aghaidh na teangan. Cadé fán bhréag-fhaisnéis a deantar gach lá ina haghaidh? Is minic chualamuid go bhfuil an Ghaedhilg marbh agus níl sí marbh. Annsin, moltar dúinn sompla Shasain, an rud a deantar i Sasain do chur annseo mar dheaghshompla agus ghlacfadh an Seanadóir Mac Diarmada leis sin. Ní raibh mé ró-shásta riamh agus ní bheidh mé chóiche glacadh le somplaí a gheibhmíd ó Shasana. Deir sé gur ceart dúinn cead bheith againn ceist neodrachta na tíre do scannsáil ós árd. Ní dóigh liom gur ceart.
Sé an neodracht an plean atá ceapaithe ag an Riaghaltas agus ag an tír seo leis an tír do choinneáil amach as an gcogadh agus ní dóigh liom gur ceart leigint do dhaoinibh cur ina aghaidh sin. Cur i gcás i Sasana féin nuair a ceaptar polasaí—polasaí troda in aghaidh na Gearmáine—níl cead ag na páipéirí cur in aghaidh an pholasaí sin. Chonaic mé sompla de pháipéar do rinne cur in aghaidh mar sin agus do briseadh é. Ní raibh siad sásta agus bhris siad an páipéar ar fad. Tá an oiread cirt againn annseo seasamh ar an neodracht agus atá ag Sasana agus ag an Ghearmán seasamh ar an gcogadh in a bhfuil siad.
Dubhairt sé rud eile agus ba mhaith liom do rá nach gcreidim é go bhfuil na Gaedhil thar lear i leith Shasana ins an troid. Ní chreidim é sin. Bhí mé ag cainnt le roinnt Ghaedheal atá na gcomhnaí i Sasana agus ní raibh siad i leith Shasana agus bhí siad ar leith neodracht Eireann. Tá mé lánchinnte go bhfuil go leor Gaedheal in Ameiriceá nach bhfuil i leith Shasana ach, creidim, in aghaidh Shasana. Níl mise ag moladh ná ag cáineadh na dtuairmí sin, ach ní chreidim na tuairmí go bhfuil siad go léir i leith Shasana.
Senator MacDermot serves one very useful purpose in the country: he is a monument to the past. He shows us what we have got away from in this country, politically and in every other way. Senator MacDermot first jumped into Irish political life, so far as I remember, when he entered the Dáil, and his first sentence, almost, was a sentence of contempt for all the rest of us. He said: "Do not let us behave like gutter-snipes."
That was not his first sentence.
Then it was his second, if it was not his first—it was very near his first.
It was the third time I spoke, actually.
So far as I remember, it was the first. The Senator—a Deputy then—was so sure of himself that he was the first man on his feet in the House after the Ceann Comhairle had opened the proceedings. The Senator will now have to get away from the idea that all the rest of the people in this country are gutter-snipes, and that he is the man to teach us all how to behave. He blew in here from some part of the world, not having studied or known anything about Irish history in more recent years, and it is very unwise of him to project himself into certain aspects of Irish life without having some more intimate or personal knowledge of what happened here in the recent past. Senator Mac Fhionnlaoich, in very restrained language, replied and showed what would be the reaction to some of the proposals that Senator MacDermot thinks would be received and debated peacefully throughout the country.
We in this State decided at the beginning of the war that the Government should have the power of censorship. That was made the law of the land in the Emergency Powers Act of 1939. It does not matter what they do in England, in Germany, in Italy, in Greece or in America. The fact of the matter is that the Dáil and Seanad unanimously passed the Emergency Powers Act and in that Act they gave powers to the Government to impose a censorship. They did that because in their wisdom and to the best of their judgment they considered it was necessary, in the war that was then upon Europe, that our Government should have those powers for use in time of neutrality or in time of war. To emphasise the fact that it was the deliberate judgment of the Dáil and Seanad that these powers should be operated in a time of neutrality, I have only to point to the fact that the Consitution was changed in order to make sure that no narrow legalistic mind would interpret "in time of war" in the Constitution as not also being a time of neutrality in a war in which certain countries in Europe were engaged and in which we were neutral. Therefore, the power of censorship was deliberately given to the Government.
The censor acts here under the law of the land and it does not matter what they do in other countries. They look after their own interests. We here have to decide our method of approach to the existing situation and to decide what is best for ourselves and we are not going to be guided by what they do in other countries. Senator MacDermot opened up with a statement which, if followed, would lead to a prolonged and bitter debate, not only here but throughout the country. That statement was that national security is not identical with neutrality and that nobody was more concerned with the safety and security of the country than he. Senator MacDermot told us his attitude here to-night, that he quite bluntly was in favour of this State going into the war. Well, he is practically alone in that attitude.
Is the Minister quite sure that nobody in his own Party is in favour of it?
Is the Senator's imagination running riot?
Is the Minister not aware that a speech of a member of the Defence Conference was suppressed because he attacked neutrality?
The fact of the matter is that the three major Parties in this country agreed to neutrality and supported it and the leaders have on various occasions gone to the people and appealed for neutrality, and I do not care what any particular member slips into occasionally. The opinion of the vast majority of the people is that this country should be neutral and should remain neutral, and Senator MacDermot even admitted that when he was corresponding with the Sunday Times.
I admitted it to-night.
And that he is practically alone in his view.
No.
Is this country to be sacrificed to Senator MacDermot's ideas? Is the country to be governed in this most grave of all positions by his will? Is that democracy? Neutrality nowadays is not a state of blissful, idyllic peace, as the Senator should know.
Of course it is not.
If one were really to define neutrality under modern conditions it would be wrong to define it as a state of peace. It is somewhere rather near a state of belligerency with both parties, while having friendly relations with the Governments. Neutrals everywhere have to resist the pressure on the part of both belligerents, pressure which is exerted in order to force the neutrals to take up arms on one side or the other. We are a sovereign, independent State and we have a right to be neutral. We have declared our neutrality with the full force and consent of all the constitutional authorities in this country. Propaganda nowadays is regarded by belligerents as one of the most important weapons, one of the most important arms of the fighting services. As I pointed out here the last day, there are belligerents in this war who are spending a vast amount of brains and energy on propaganda, just as much as they are on some of their fighting services. They examine very carefully every word that is printed in neutral papers and they make the best use of it they can. One has only to listen to the wireless any night and note some of the propaganda of the belligerents. Half of it is taken up with statements taken, or alleged to be taken, from neutral sources.
We do not want to be too much in that picture. If the Dáil decides that we should be in that picture, that we should declare war, then let the Dáil do so, but until that happens, it is the Government's duty to maintain neutrality, and neither to do anything itself nor to allow anyone else to do anything which will endanger our neutrality. As propaganda is a vital weapon at the moment, we must do nothing here, even in the line of talking or in the line of writing, that would give offence to the belligerents. Senator MacDermot wants to go to war. He wants the country to go to war, and that is the reason he wants to abolish the censorship. Having that in view, it is up to him as best he can to try to undermine the censorship as much as he can.
I hope the Minister is not taking it that I accept what he has just said as a fair representation of what I stated.
Well, other Senators heard the Senator as well as I did, and I think it is a pretty fair representation of his mind and of what he said here to-night—that he wants us to fight for Christian ethics and all the rest of it.
Mar eadh.
If that were to be debated, there would be a lot of things said on both sides. All the people in the country are not like Senator MacDermot. If we were all Senator MacDermots, with whom one word would only borrow another, it would be all right, but words borrow blows here. We do not want trouble with outsiders nor do we want internal trouble, particularly on a question on which the vast majority of the people are united. In the general statement which I made at the beginning of this speech, I have answered many of the minor points which Senator MacDermot made. However, I shall try to deal with the specific instances that he has given where, in his opinion, the censorship has acted unfairly. He said that we should be governed by the rule of law, and not by arbitrary power. I have pointed out that the censorship is acting under the rule of law.
Senator MacDermot said that the editors of newspapers in the country have been reduced to a state of blasphemous irritation. I have every sympathy with editors who have been accustomed to working on their own without any authority over them and without having to submit to rules and regulations, but it has been decided by the Dáil that it should be so during this period of emergency and, whether they like it or not, it is up to them to try to co-operate in the best way they can. The Senator alluded to an editorial from the Independent which was stopped. If the Senator had been here, at a certain stage in Irish history, he would remember another leading article which the Irish people would have been glad to see stopped in 1916.
Is the Minister punishing the Independent for that leading article now?
No.
Mr. Hayes
That is very interesting. It sounds as if he were.
I hope the Senator is not patting the Independent on the back for that article.
Mr. Hayes
The Minister knows very well what my views were about that article, but to bring up in 1941 what a newspaper wrote in 1916 as a justification for the Minister's action, is to show the Minister's complete unfitness for the responsibilities he has undertaken.
I mentioned the matter in reply to statements of Senator MacDermot.
Mr. Hayes
It was not mentioned by Senator MacDermot.
We have plenty of time to discuss it. Senator Hayes, in order to make a political gibe at me, wanted to know—although he knew perfectly well that there was no connection between the two things—if I had suppressed the Independent leading article in 1941 because of something which it had written in 1916. He knew perfectly well that there was no truth in that, and if he gets a reply in kind——
Mr. Hayes
I asked the Minister a question. He mentioned a leading article of 1916 which I thought was perfectly damnable and the Minister knows that. He mentioned it in connection with action which he took in 1941. Surely it is in order, quite proper and even courteous for me to ask, is he punishing the Independent in 1941 for something which was written in 1916? If so, it is an abominable form of government.
That is not true.
Mr. Hayes
I think the Minister is quite capable of it.
That is uncalled for.
The Minister was answering a point made by Senator MacDermot about a certain leading article on a matter of national importance, which was suppressed by the Minister's authority in the Independent. Surely we ought to deal with that, take that leading article and decide whether or not it was such that the national interest required that it should be suppressed. To talk about something written in 1916, as the Minister did in reply to Senator MacDermot, is hitting at a newspaper which the Minister has it in his power to prevent dealing with him. I think the Minister's remarks have been most unfair and irrelevant. I have no doubt that the Minister can make a good case for the suppression of the leading article referred to but the way in which he referred to an article of 25 years ago indicated that he is not able to justify his action and that he is seeking to justify himself by something that occurred 25 years ago.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
The Minister might be allowed to proceed with his speech.
I mentioned it in order to tell Senator MacDermot something he did not know.
Oh! I have heard it about 100 times.
We should get back to the leading article of 1941. This particular leading article alleged unfair discrimination against the censorship— a completely unjustifiable statement. If we are to have censorship in the country, we cannot allow editors to say things in their leading articles which would lead people to believe that the censorship was acting unfairly. As the Minister responsible for censorship, I am responsible to the Dáil and to this House for the operation of the censorship. I am prepared to answer any question affecting censorship and to justify any action if it can be justified. We are not claiming infallibility in the censorship department but if anybody has a legitimate grievance against censorship in the country, he has a right to approach his representative in the Dáil or to approach a Senator and to have the matter raised in debate.
Is the Minister serious in that? Does he really think we could have a separate debate in either the Dáil or the Seanad on every one of these grievances?
There is no necessity to have a debate on them. As the Senator well knows, all the censorship staff and myself are open to approach at any time of the day or night in regard to matters affecting censorship.
He could have cut out the one phrase about discrimination.
We have taken a deliberate policy in regard to leading articles in the newspapers on censorship. We allowed the papers a certain amount of freedom on that one occassion, but we are not going to have, day in and day out, leading articles on censorship. Censorship has been decided by the Dáil and, as in the case of neutrality, if the newspapers want it abolished it will have to be abolished by the Oireachtas, and until then the newspapers, just the same as everybody else in the country, will have to obey the law. I deny, without fear of contradiction— and I am satisfied that I would be able to prove my case to any reasonable man—that there has been any unfair discrimination against the Irish Independent or any other newspaper in this country, and if any half dozen Senators here want to come along, or if any one Senator wants to come along, I can prove to him that the Irish Press not only has a grievance against the censorship but that it has the biggest grievance of any newspaper against the censorship, simply because it is impossible, with the rapidity with which the work is done there in the small hours of the morning, for the censorship to be infallible.
Every newspaper, no doubt, can make a case and show 100 instances where something has happened which is to its disadvantage, but they are all in the same boat, and, generally speaking, the cases that they have to put forward are not worth talking about— not really legitimate grievances at all— and a couple of the biggest grievances, where a newspaper was deprived of a news item that was allowed in other papers, were by the editorial staff of the Irish Press.
The Senator alleged that no word of Cardinal Hinsley was allowed to appear in the Irish newspapers. Some of his Eminence's material was sent over here, for publication "in Ireland only". Certainly, the Cardinal is a very patriotic Englishman, and, as such, he makes his propaganda in favour of his own country, but if we were to allow some of his statements to appear in our daily papers, we could not cut out similar vigorous statements on the other side, and the result would be that we would have a very bitter controversy arising here, which we decided not to have. Senator MacDermot also said that a statement was cut out relating to some demand for 50/- per barrel for wheat down in County Cork, or that it was cut out of the Cork Examiner. I do not doubt that the Senator's statement is correct.
I do not think I mentioned the Cork Examiner. It was a Dublin newspaper.
Well, some newspaper, at any rate. Generally speaking, however, I think Senators are aware that the farmers' demand for increased prices has been published. That news item may have been associated with something else which necessitated its being censored. If a demand for increased prices was coupled with a threat of strike, for instance, it would be censored.
There was nothing of the sort.
Well, I do not know why it was, but as a general policy there has been no censorship of price requests. Senator MacDermot has gone back to past history over the play in the Abbey and the play in the Gate Theatre. The play in the Gate Theatre had the date of 1941 on the programme, I think.
It must have been prophetic, then.
No, 1940 was the date on the programme of the play at the Gate, and the date on the programme in the Abbey had relation to something in 1870.
I think that if the other play had been 1870, it would have been suppressed just the same.
No, I do not think so. At any rate, from one point of view, it would not have been suppressed. The Senator talked about the Henry Harrison-Sir Hubert Gough letter, which was not allowed to appear in our papers here. That letter, generally, was advancing the same argument as Senator MacDermot, and if we allow those arguments in on one side we have to allow them in on the other. Senator MacDermot criticised things we cut out, and then proceeded to suggest a lot of things which he would cut out if he were censor.
I did not say that, but I did say that if you were going to be arbitrary at all you should cut out impartially.
Anyway, there were some things that appeared which he complained about. One was in regard to a poster, I think, which we had no power to stop at that particular time. I think we had not power to stop posters at that time, but we did take that power afterwards.
I think the Minister will agree that it should have been stopped, if it could have been stopped.
It would have been stopped if it had been submitted, whether voluntarily or under compulsion: that is, if it was worded as the Senator described it to-night. He talked also about some advertisements that the Irish Independent was prevented from publishing. I do not know whether it was that particular advertisement, but we had a protest from the advertising manager of the Irish Independent, in which he complained about the censor stopping a particular advertisement which contained the words: “Gott strafe Hitler”.
No. This advertisement was not for the Irish Independent at all.
I thought that was the one the Senator was referring to. That is the sort of thing we will not allow into news columns, advertisements or editorials. I want to go back now to the question of our attitude on the war, and to deny that we are pharisaical in refusing to go into it. We have the right to be neutral in this war.
I did not say that we were pharisaical for not going.
The Senator said something about being pharisaical.
Yes.
A pharisee usually strikes a pharisaical note.
I did not say that we were pharisaical for not going into the war.
It was a case that we were not doing too badly.
I will leave the Senator there, but I say that the people of this country, through the institutions which they themselves freely established, have taken a decision as to their attitude in this war, and as Minister in charge of censorship, I have to do my best to see that the neutrality they proclaimed through their institutions will be kept until it is changed in a constitutional manner.
Hear, hear!
That is all I have to say.
Mr. Fitzgerald rose.
I thought the debate had concluded.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
I think that was only the Senator's own conclusion. It was not mine.
And that no one in the House was to get up to speak on it now.
It is not the Minister's function to conclude in a matter of this sort. I cannot say that I enjoyed any portion of Senator MacDermot's speech that I listened to. In fact, I thought it was a speech which contained a great deal that I regard as nationally harmful. I must say that I thought a bit the same about the Minister's statement. He made a statement—I do not know that there is any solid foundation for it—that every neutral is undergoing a form of pressure from both belligerents, trying to force each individual neutral to participate in the war as a belligerent. If our Government has been submitted to pressure from one or other, or from both of the belligerents, trying to force us to participate in the war, I have not heard of it. I do not think it is justifiable. Everyone knows that Ministers necessarily have information that is not available to the man in the street. I do not think the Minister should make a statement like that unless he is prepared to go further, and to give some information as to the form in which this pressure, which he have suffered from both sides in the war, is going to be made known to the people.
I said that the belligerents, not belligerent Governments, and if the Senator only reads the newspapers or listens to broadcasts from the wireless stations of the two belligerents, he would know that they would be highly delighted if we allied ourselves with one or the other.
I would be highly delighted if some one would give me £5,000,000 to-morrow, but it would make me indignant if there was an attempt to blackmail me to give £5,000,000. Naturally, any people would be delighted to have any support in moments of grave national crisis, when they are fighting for their lives, but to say that they would be delighted or that they are imposing pressure on other people, is a matter that is almost —if not a misrepresentation of facts— certainly not a clear statement. I think the Minister misunderstands the legal position. Our Government has a right to impose taxation on the people. The Minister said that, by law, the Government has a right to censor, and his argument, to use his exact words, was that the matter had been settled by the Dáil. The Dáil has settled the constitutional matter of taxation, and the Government has the right to tax. Does that mean that the whole people have to sit down when the Government imposes taxation that is unjust, inequitable or exorbitant, that they are not to say anything about it? The law gives the Government power to tax, but the people are not to question the justice of that tax or the particular form it takes?
The Minister's argument that we gave the Government power to censor is quite right. I believe in censorship, and I agree that the only proper authority to control that censorship is the Government. When there is that power they can use it wisely or unwisely; they can use it severely or ineptly, but it does not follow, because the Government is the proper authority that the last word has been said on it. The Minister said that we were not going to have any day in and day out leading articles on the censorship; that the matter had been settled by the Dáil. That type of argument annoys me. I did not hear the earlier part of Senator MacDermot's speech. Apparently he referred to a leading article in a newspaper which was the subject of censorship. Now the Minister turns round and says that we are not going to have day in and day out leading articles on the censorship. I do not say so offensively, but to my mind that conveys something which is not true. Implicit in the Minister's statement was this, that it is only by the constant intervention of the censorship that we are not getting articles daily denouncing censorship. If that is based on the fact that there was an individual article which the Minister suppressed, it must be taken on its merits. To say that if he relaxes his grip, we were going to be annoyed and harassed with continued articles about the censorship is, I think, a misrepresentation of the case.
The Dáil has not settled once and for all whether or not we should criticise concrete acts of the censorship. It does not follow that the Minister's mind works in a series of non sequitur. That is not proved at all. That is rather dangerous. The Minister is responsible for censorship, but somehow, in his words to-day, I think he did himself less than justice in suggesting, in thinking because he is the authority in charge of censorship, that he is the absolute arbiter in the matter, that everything he does must necessarily be proclaimed as good or else we must keep our mouths shut.
Does the Senator agree that newspapers should flout the decisions of the Dáil in order to support their own personal interests?
I do not see how that question arises. The decision of the Dáil is that the national interest requires that there be a certain control in the form of censorship. The ordinary institutions of the State indicate that there should be a Minister responsible for that. Where does the question of flouting the decisions of the Dáil come in? As a matter of fact, even though we pass an Act, I as a free person, able to form a judgment according to my reason, have a perfect right, if my judgment indicates that, to decide that that Act was iniquitous and that that Act was shameful nationally. It is not flouting the decision of the Dáil to say that we think the Act is of such a nature that it should be rescinded. That is not so at all. That is not flouting. If I say, "That is the law of the land and we are right in defeating and disobeying the law," I would call that flouting the decision of the Dáil.
I am entirely in favour of censorship and in agreement that it must be in the hands of the Minister. But there are certain cases put up which make me rather worried. For instance, on the last occasion here the Minister did the heroic business by saying, "Attack me; do not attack the unfortunate civil servant." If one says that one thinks certain higher officials in charge of the censorship are unsuitable for it, that is not necessarily a criticism of them. There is nothing which says that, unless a civil servant makes a most perfect censor, he is unsuitable to be a civil servant.
I have no doubt that we have civil servants who are supremely expert both in knowledge and in wide experience of the application of the law relating to local government. If you take a civil servant who is supremely efficient, competent, widely experienced, and wise in judgment, in the Local Government Department and, say, put him in charge of censorship, am I attacking him if I say that he is not a good man for the job? I am not attacking him in that case; I am attacking the Minister, because the Minister's business, when work has to be done, is to look out and find—it is also required of him that his judgment should be good—a competent and suitable person for that work.
I am not going to be very critical of the censorship, because one can only do that with concrete cases, and my knowledge of concrete cases is limited. I am, however, a bit suspicious, because I know that the Minister and his colleagues long before the emergency came on had the feeling that any criticism of the Government was itself a form of sedition. I can remember about eight years ago, when the Taoiseach was President, there was a feeling in the country that freedom of expression was being suppressed, as it was, by brute force. The President at the time when the use of brute force was suffering a bit from reaction which was equal and opposite, got up and said that he entirely disapproved of any attempt to suppress freedom of speech. Just that day I had been informed that a journalist of a paper outside this country had received a notice, described to me as from a quarter very near to the President, which was of so minatory a nature that the journalist said he would not like to receive another notice of the same kind. Just when the President was proclaiming his heartfelt adherence to the policy of freedom of speech, I made reference to this in a veiled way so that the President, if he was aware of what had taken place, would follow it. I thought I was then going to get from him a statement that anybody who purported to speak in the name of the Government and who sought to control what was written in newspapers in another country was misrepresenting his position and acting without authority. On the contrary, he began talking about sedition; that what was published in a newspaper on the other side of the Atlantic might very well be sedition, and the Government's power would be used for punishing it. That attitude of mind makes me a bit nervous.
The Minister rather gave his case away, because he said that amongst the daily papers on suffered grievance to a greater extent than others. If that is a fact, then the censorship is working badly. He said that one paper, the Irish Press, suffered a greater grievance than any of the others. If that is so, then his Department is condemned. This is not a scientific thing. There is no way of exactly weighing up and saying “that may be published” and “that may not”. It comes down to a human judgment in the light of the concrete circumstances of the moment for which no general law can be made. If the Minister says that one newspaper has suffered a disadvantage to its own detriment, which hardship has not been imposed on others, then he has implied that his Department is guilty of injustice. It seems to me that there have been certain ineptitudes. In the Sunday Times last Sunday there was a statement by Cardinal Hinsley published in full, a most impressive and beautiful statement. I gathered from what the Minister said here to-day that that was suppressed in the Irish Papers.
I did not say that.
That was the implication. The Minister spoke about Cardinal Hinsley as a very patriotic Englishman. Cardinal Hinsley is rather more than a patriotic Englishman. He is one of the highest spiritual authorities in the Catholic Church. The Minister then said that, if that were allowed to be published, then similar statements on the other side should be published.
I was not referring to the statement the Senator has been talking about, because I have not seen it.
After all, that statement was published in an English newspaper which was on sale here on Sunday.
I was not referring to that statement.
The Minister was talking about what Cardinal Hinsley said. What is in my mind is that most impressive and convincing statement which spoke, to my mind, very directly to the Christian conscience. The Minister said that a similar statement on the other side would have to be published.
What I had in mind was this. On one occasion his Eminence Cardinal Hinsley said that in this war the forces of his home country were on the side of the angels in the struggle against Lucifer. A night or two after that there was a broadcast from another belligerent country containing a reply to that, which said it was strange that 3,000,000 Catholics in England were on the side of the angels, while 40,000,000 in Germany and Italy were on the side of Lucifer. We did not want that controversy to appear here. The rest of the speech was allowed to go, but that particular statement was cut out, simply because we knew other replies would be coming and we did not want to publish them.
There is a slang phrase in which one speaks about one's opposite number. I am not sure who is my opposite number. Cardinal Hinsley is a prince of the Catholic Church and an Englishman. When the Minister says "If you allow what he said to be published freely, you will have to do the same with the other side," I am entirely in agreement. If a German Cardinal makes an important statement, I do not see why it should be suppressed here. One will read what he states as written by a Prince of the Church with some sense of his responsibility. One will also read what he states knowing that the natural pietas to his own country must have some influence. If, say, Cardinal Hinsley is writing on one side and some propagandist or newspaper writer is writing on the other side, and you try to balance these two together, I say there is no parity there.
I myself necessarily form judgments with regard to this war. That is why I always try to avoid the use of the word "neutral", because there may be subjects on which I am not quite neutral. I cannot say what they are, because they are questions that I have never heard of. It is practically impossible for me, in relation to anything that I know anything about, to remain so objective that it means a sort of complete blankness of mind. There is no good in my saying that I view the war with an absolute independence of mind, because the facts of the world situation are necessarily ordered in my mind according to certain values, and I necessarily judge in relation to those values.
The Minister said, and I thought he stressed the thing badly, that the Irish Press newspaper had suffered an injustice from his Department. If the Irish Press, or any other newspaper, has suffered an injustice, then his Department is doing its job badly. I admit that what was behind his mind was that he and his Party are personally closely interested in the Irish Press, and that what he meant to convey was “how wonderful and self-denying we are in imposing greater suffering on ourselves than on anybody else.” The Irish Press is a commercial property just as the other newspapers are, and there should be absolute equality between them. The Minister, I think, made a bad case on that.
The Minister, again, was misleading with regard to Cardinal Hinsley's statement. The Minister says: "If we publish what Cardinal Hinsley says, then we must also publish what comes from the other side." I do not agree. I agree that if you publish freely all that Cardinal Hinsley says, you must, if the claim is made, give equal prominence to what is said by Cardinals who are Germans in order to put both sides on a parity. But there is no parity at all between the publication of what is said by Cardinal Hinsley and what is said by a paid propagandist over the wireless. That is what makes me gravely concerned about censorship. I am not going to found any argument on anything I have heard in newspaper circles about certain things which were not allowed to be published. However, what I did hear seemed to me to indicate ineptitude rather than wise judgment on the part of the censor. I have seen things published which, I think, I should not allow to be published. I have in front of me some copies of an Irish provincial newspaper in which certain comments appear, not under a news heading, but in what are called pithy paragraphs. These comments are, to my mind, marked by complete dishonesty. If someone gets up and says that, having weighed up all the rights and wrongs of the war, he is whole-heartedly on the side of one belligerent or the other, and is prepared to make a reasoned case based upon fact for that, then I think one would hesitate to interfere, but here you have things that are markedly tendentious: that, in fact, are definitely untrue as far as we can understand from the Government. You have here in this local newspaper what I consider to be most dishonest anti-British propaganda. You have in it this, for instance:
"Now I think it must be clear in the minds of everyone where the real imminent danger lies. The recent demands made by the English Premier for the handing over of Éire's ports and air bases to the English Government and the vile propaganda used by English Ministers...."
and so on. The writer there refers to the recent demand made by the British Government for certain ports in our hands. That appeared in the issue of that newspaper, dated 28th December last. That was after the Taoiseach's broadcast in which, I think, he said that no such demands had been made. The censor, presumably, allowed that to go.
May I again interrupt the Senator to say that I think the paper he is referring to is The Nationalist and Leinster Times? It received a very severe rap over the knuckles for that, and the editor was told that if he did not behave himself, and submit articles like that in future, he would be compelled to submit the whole paper every week.
At any rate, that kind of thing went on for some time. I have been a censor myself, and I do say that you can have no hard and fast rules. You must judge according to human judgment, but why in the world was not such a thing as that suppressed? I think we have carried censorship a bit too far in some directions, and have been rather slack in others. I can point to that case in this weekly paper which, as I have said, contained this most tendentious statement. The thing was cleverly done and was calculated to suggest that anyone whose conscience urges him to see the good predominate on one side rather than on the other was only moved by the most venal motives. There was the dishonest reassurance that his pecuniary position was not going to be incommoded if the war went the way they were afraid it might go. Anyhow, about neutrality in this war I do not pretend to be neutral. I am not pretending to be impeccable. It seems to me that one's human judgment, when not blinded by this historic prejudice, necessarily directs one to hope, in the name of all the marvellous heritage of civilisation and culture and moral order that has come down to us through 2,000 years of European history, that the balance will tend to one side rather than to the other. That is my view, but I am not trying to push it over on anybody else.
It seems to me that the censor's conception of neutrality is not quite mine. I agree that human prudence must come in, and there is no good in trying to be too independent or too truculent about things. On the other hand. I find it rather hard to believe that we have always to watch our step and be careful of what we do lest someone should take umbrage. According to my judgment, censorship very often tends to work in a rather harmful way in this country. I think that, as far as danger to this country is concerned, it is all from one side, and practically not at all from the other. That, as I say, is only a personal judgment. I personally feel that occasionally certain official statements from the Government, and certain action by the Government, might tend to mislead the public as to the more likely source of danger, and in that way might, quite unintentionally, do a very considerable amount of harm. I agree with the Minister and with the Government that the well-being of this country requires that we remain non-belligerent, and that we should do all we can to remain in that not very happy condition and avoid a possibly more unhappy condition.
I think that, as regards the censorship, we must expect a certain amount of ineptitude from it. The Minister appointed a man in charge who, as far as I know—I do not know that he had any peculiar gifts—had no particular qualifications for his work. That indicated bad judgment on the part of the Minister. We had the Minister's own attitude towards censorship revealed in his speech. He seems to think that if somebody as distinguished as Cardinal Hinsley makes a statement, that statement should be suppressed if there is the danger that some writer to a newspaper, calling himself “Pro Bono Publico”, or some paid propagandist, might come along and try to argue with the Cardinal. I say there is a lack of parity there. The Minister would be quite right in suppressing the paid propagandist, “Pro Bono Publico” or whoever he might be, and in letting the Cardinal speak.
From certain cases I know, it seems that the Minister and his Department have used their powers to suppress things which were not nationally detrimental, but which were rather critical of his own Party. I entirely agree that at the present time, when we are all likely to hang singly, it would be wiser for us to hang together, and, in speaking here, I am very much handicapped because there are all sorts of things I want to say, and not fear of the Minister or his censorship gag, but my own feeling that I must do nothing which might conceivably, by any stretch of the imagination, be injurious to my own country makes it rather difficult for me to say what is at the back of my mind; but I do think that the Minister's Department have suppressed things which were going to do no national harm, but which were critical of the policy of his Government. There, I think, they should have been very careful. What we have to avoid is anything which will be injurious to this country, such as making public military information which would be useful. Senator MacDermot gives a list of things to which he thinks censorship should be limited, but, to my mind, that motion is just silly. If the Minister's operations are to be limited to those headings (a), (b), (c) and (d), if I wanted to injure this country, if I wanted to write things which I think should be allowed to be published, I could find a dozen ways of doing so and still keep within the law.
As to Senator McGinley's amendment, the censorship powers possessed by the Minister are what we call emergency powers, and I want the Minister to understand that I entirely agree with censorship. I entirely agree that censorship power should be in the Minister's hands, and I fully recognise that if the wisest Minister ever made were put in charge of censorship suddenly, there might easily be grounds for criticism afterwards. We do not expect to have a sort of infused wisdom with regard to censorship, but this censorship relates to a crisis in which we are all involved. I judge from Senator McGinley's amendment that he considers the Irish language, and everything relating to it, as being in a permanent condition of emergency. It is an emergency which is with us, always was with us and is always going to be with us, and, consequently, the censorship is to be a permanent institution so long as the Irish language remains known to anybody. It is perfectly ridiculous to say that we are not to have propaganda in favour of either belligerent. The word "propaganda" is vague and indeterminate, and I am not going to say that I must be absolutely mum and pretend that I see no difference between one belligerent and another, but if I use my judgment and express my views, it does not make me a propagandist. There is a certain other significance attaching to the word.
Senator McGinley's amendment would apply the censorship to propagands against the neutrality of Ireland and to lying propaganda against the national language of Ireland. I am against any lying propaganda at all, but it seems to me that a great number of Senator McGinley's colleagues are wrongly informed about the Irish language—I referred to one case last week in which they are historically wrongly informed; I hear them going around talking highfaultin' patriotism about the Irish language, but their facts are just wrong—and I am afraid the people who would suffer under clause (g) of the amendment are these people. I am wrong in that argument. I thought the phrase was "Lying propaganda about the national language of Ireland," but it is "Lying propaganda against the national language of Ireland," and I must withdraw what I said. I see that Senator McGinley is going to leave the field perfectly free for any lying propaganda in favour of the Irish language.
As I say, I would much prefer if a great deal of that portion of Senator MacDermot's speech which I heard had never been delivered. I feel that it might easily be construed in a way harmful to our country. I disapprove of the Minister's speech not so much in respect to what he said as to the point of view which seemed to me to underlie it—the point of view which suggests that nobody is to criticise his Department in relation to censorship. That is a happy condition in which every Minister and every Department would like to be, but so far as the law of this country is concerned, the Minister is under a misapprehension. There is no law of this country which says that a Government responsible to the Dáil is to be absolutely immune from any criticism as to the way it administers the work it has undertaken. That is a misapprehension, and as long as that misapprehension remains in the Minister's mind, he is likely to be a bad guide to the censorship officials.
I disagree with a great number of other arguments he put forward, but we have to have censorship, and we have to have it in charge of the Minister. That being so, as we want to interfere as little as possible with the well-being of our people and to have it as wisely administered as possible, it is right that it should come up here, and in the Dáil, for review and criticism. That is something I want the Minister to accept, because, if he does not accept that, there is only going to be a feeling in the country that the Minister is using arbitrary powers to put across to the people what he wants to put across to them, and to conceal from them what he wants to conceal.
Perhaps the Senator would be so good as to develop what he means when he says I made statements harmful to the country?
I do not want to go into that. I did not hear the first part of the Senator's speech, but I think that he opposed in various ways what we will call our non-belligerent position. I think that so far as my prayers with regard to the outcome of the war are concerned, they would be identical with those of Senator MacDermot, but at the same time, if he claims the right to make the speech he did make, it is quite possible that somebody, not what I might call the paid propagandist as against the Cardinal Hinsley—not that other number arrangement, but another Senator—might make a statement which, I think, would be very harmful.
I do not think I said a bit more than the Senator said himself.
I think the Senator said it in a very different way. I did not make notes of his speech, but I must say that I was very uncomfortable when he was making it. I disagree with his motion. As I say, if the operation of the Government were limited, formally and legally, to those heads, I could get up and say all sorts of disastrous things and prove that I was acting within the law.
The Minister's reply to Senator MacDermot was in the nature of a personal attack on the Senator and that seemed to me to be an entirely wrong way of approaching this matter. Apparently Senator MacDermot referred to a leading article in the Irish Independent which was suppressed. The Minister may have had, and I am quite prepared to accept that there were, ample grounds for suppressing that article, but when a man begins to talk about something that was in the Irish Independent in 1916 that, to my mind, is a most dishonest red herring. If the article he suppressed should have been suppressed, it is within his competence to show why he suppressed it, or to prove that he was right in doing so; but when he quotes an article written 25 years ago by a man who has long since gone to his Maker and brings that up in evidence, to me it is something which I can only describe as beneath contempt.
The Minister possibly did not realise what he was doing, but it is the sort of thing that a person, if he wanted to try to cover up a very bad case, might drag in as a very bad red herring. At the same time it does make one rather anxious as to how censorship is being run. One is afraid that there may be a lack of justice in the treatment if the Minister feels that way. When we talk about what The Times said in 1845 the idea to be conveyed is that some human being in 1845 wrote a certain article in The Times. Presumably the person who wrote that is dead. When somebody quotes what the Independent said in 1916, to my mind it is a dishonest argument altogether. The Minister is not censoring what was published in 1916. He is censoring what is to be published in the year 1941. If he can make a good case for it we are ready to listen to him and we are ready to judge everything and to weigh everything in his favour and in the favour of his Department, but if he goes dragging in these other things, I think we will have to be suspicious and feel there is something to be concealed.
May I now move the adjournment of the debated? It seems to me the debated may go on late to-night.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
The adjournment until when?
Until to-morrow.
We should sit on until 11 o'clock.
May I point out that Senator Hogan desires his motion to come on to-morrow in order that it may be satisfactorily discussed? We must adjourn until to-morrow and if that is so we might as well adjourn now instead of later.
I formally move the adjournment of the House until to-morrow.
I think it would be well to reach some general understanding as to the hour at which this House should normally adjourn unless it is agreed at the beginning. Personally, I think it should be 10 o'clock.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
It used to be 9 o'clock.
I think it would be a very good thing if there could be an understanding once and for all. We would know how long the House would sit.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
I have here an extract from the minutes of the Committee on Procedure and Privileges of the 7th February, 1939, which I will read:—
"It was the view of the Committe that an hour not later than 9 p.m. should, by general understanding, be adopted for sittings of the House when business warranted sittings to that hour."
That is the general agreement reached at the Committee.
If we were not sitting again until next week there would be a case for going on later to-night, but as we are sitting to-morrow anyway, and the programme is by no means overloaded, I think we should adjourn now.
On a point of order, is it in order to debate the motion for the adjournment?
Leas-Chathaoirleach
Yes. Senator Alton has moved the adjournment of the debate.
It used to be the ruling of legislative assemblies that it should not be debated. I submit, in all respect, that that is the ruling here.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
The motion is open for debate.
The motion standing in my name is a matter in regard to which time is a very important factor. I adjourned it last week at the express wish of the Minister and if it is not discussed this week I think its discussion will not be nearly as valuable. That is the reason why I asked the House to decide to meet to-morrow.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
In order to get a decision, I will put the motion that the debate be now adjourned until to-morrow.
As it will not be possible for the Minister to attend here early to-morrow, I suggest that the first business on the Order Paper to-morrow should be Senator Hogan's motion.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
That would be quite simple to arrange.
Will the Minister say at what time he will come so that we can fix the time?
Minister for the Co-ordination of Defensive Measures (Mr. Aiken)
Half-past four.
I do not think my motion will take very long. The arguments are so clear it will not take very long for me to make them.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
Is it generally agreed that Senator Hogan's motion will be first on the Order Paper?
I do not think it is agreed and I do not think it should be agreed. If we could adjourn this debate until some time convenient to the Minister we could then take Senator Hogan's motion and adjourn if it was not finished.
I am one of those people who have 150 miles to travel to attend this House. After four or five hours' debate it is decided to adjourn until the next day and perhaps the next day it will be decided to adjourn again. There are many country members in the House and in fairness to them I think this House should sit at least until 11 o'clock when it does meet. That is ordinary fair play to the country members. I am quite satisfied that his debate will finish by 11 o'clock to-night if we continue to sit.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
That cannot be raised now.
May I suggest that if a debate is adjourned in the presence of the Minister the Minister is within his rights in saying that he cannot attend at 3 o'clock and the proposal to attend at half-past four is a reasonable one. I think, in the circumstances, we ought to meet at 3 o'clock and take Senator Hogan's motion. It may be concluded by half-past four but, whether it is or not, at half-past four we could resume this motion.
Leas-Chathaoirleach
The motion is agreed, I take it, to adjourn the debate until to-morrow.
I dissent.
Debate accordingly adjourned until Thursday, 30th January.
The House adjourned at 9.30 p.m. until 3 o'clock on Thursday, 30th January.