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Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 24 Feb 1937

Vol. 65 No. 6

Spanish Civil War (Non-Intervention) Bill, 1937. - Allocation of Time—Motion.

I move:

That in the case of the Spanish Civil War (Non-Intervention) Bill, 1937:—

(i) The Committee Stage of the Bill shall be proceeded with immediately upon the passing of this motion on Wednesday, February 24th, 1937, and the proceedings on that stage, if not previously concluded, shall be brought to a conclusion at 8 p.m. on the said day, by putting from the Chair forthwith and successively any Questions necessary to bring the proceedings to a conclusion; provided that after the said hour on the said day no Question shall be put from the Chair upon any amendment save an amendment set down by the Government, and the Question on such amendment shall be in the form, That the amendment be made; and after the appointed time the Question to be put from the Chair to bring the proceedings in Committee on the Bill forthwith to a conclusion shall be (as the case may require), That the section, the sections, stand part of, and that the Title be the Title to the Bill;

(ii) the Fourth Stage of the Bill shall be proceeded with immediately upon the conclusion of the Committee Stage on Wednesday, February 24th, 1937, and the proceedings on that stage, if not previously concluded, shall be brought to a conclusion at 9 p.m. on that day, by putting from the Chair forthwith the Questions necessary to bring the proceedings to a conclusion; and after the appointed time no Question shall be put from the Chair upon any amendment save an amendment set down by the Government, and the Question on such an amendment shall be in the form, That the amendment be made;

(iii) the Fifth Stage of the Bill shall be proceeded with immediately upon the conclusion of the Fourth Stage on Wednesday, February 24th, 1937, and the proceedings on that stage, if not previously concluded, shall be brought to a conclusion at 10 p.m. on that day by putting from the Chair forthwith the Question necessary to bring the proceedings to a conclusion.

With your permission, Sir, I should first like to pay a tribute to those brave men of our race who lost their lives in the sacred cause of fighting militant Communism. Their readiness to sacrifice everything in that cause will ensure them an abiding place in their country's memory. But a higher reward is theirs and it is the best consolation we can offer to their families.

We refuse, Sir, to accept the Government's plea of urgency in this matter. We cannot consent to their attempt to steamroll this Bill through the Dáil until they have satisfied the very reasonable demand that we have put to them. That demand, Sir, was reasonable and moderate. It is the very least that the people of Ireland have a right to expect of any Government here, and until that demand has been granted, we must oppose the policy of the Government in this particular matter. I admit there are things in international affairs that require urgent consideration, but there are things that require urgent consideration more even than this Bill, more even than getting this Bill through the House to-day, and one is the matter of the clarification of the attitude of the Government on certain vital issues, a clarification that, on every occasion and on every opportunity that was offered to them, they have refused to give up to the present. I suggest to the President, who is Leader of the House and head of the Government in this State, that he should realise that Parliament is not the place, and now is not the time, to indulge in the trivialities and in the dialectics of which we had such a striking example to-day. We had the Minister for External Affairs, the President, juggling in his usual fashion to-day with important matters. Does he know, and, if not, has he not been informed, that a Minister or an Ambassador is accredited personally to the head of a State? He is not accredited to a nation; he is not accredited to an impersonal thing called Spain, he is accredited to the head of the Government that this Government recognises and he is accredited to nobody else. We saw a discreditable attempt to-day to get out of that plain issue, and yet the Government that trifled with such important issues have come down to this House to plead urgency for a measure of this kind. There are things that are urgent but we are convinced that if the fair name of this country is to be saved, if the aspirations of the people of Ireland in this matter are to be satisfied, the thing that is really urgent is the withdrawal of the credentials to the Caballero Government in Spain.

This Bill proposes non-intervention in the Spanish Civil War. On Friday last, two reasoned amendments were submitted to the motion for the Second Stage. There did seem to be doubts about the relevancy of these amendments but the Chair admitted them. They were disposed of by a vote of this House, hence the question of recognition or non-recognition of either Government in Spain does not now arise.

Of course, I shall follow your ruling, Sir. I was merely giving the reasons why we are opposed to this motion. I was not asking the House or the Government to reverse the decision previously come to. I was merely giving the reason why we cannot consent to this motion and why, though we still believe in the policy of non-intervention, we feel it necessary to oppose the Bill at this stage. I want to make that clear, and I had hoped that I was in order in doing so. I am not asking the Government now, though I hope an opportunity will arise when that will be possible, to deal with the matter of the withdrawal of our Minister. I am giving the reasons why I, for one, cannot accept this motion before us now. The Minister, speaking on the first occasion on which he addressed himself to this particular matter, said that he did not wish to use his majority. What do we see here to-day? We now see the fulfilment of that promise by the President in a typical manner. He is using his majority, which he had practically pledged himself not to use. He will not use that steamroller, if he gets approval for what he wants from every part of the House but otherwise he is going to use it; otherwise he has no reluctance or no hesitancy in using it. The guillotine has seldom, if ever, been used by the present Government to secure the liberty or the advantage or safeguard the honour of the Irish people. It is not being so used to-day. We shall admit that he has this majority. We shall admit that all those ranged on the opposite benches can carry this guillotine motion through. Of course they can; but it is an outrage on the feelings of the Irish people that they should attempt to do it. It is an outrage when we consider the depth of feeling of large masses of the Irish people on this particular matter.

Our attitude on this has been clear from the start. We made it clear last November that we considered that if a policy of non-intervention could be carried through, in the interests of the Franco Government itself, and in the interests of the peace of Europe, that was the sounder policy. I pointed out that there were other nations capable of intervening more effectively than we. Taking this Bill in the circumstances that prevail here to-day the circumstances for which the President, by his inaction, the majority here by their vote, the Ministers by their speeches, are responsible, there is no other possible course open to us except the stand that we are now taking. Nobody can say that we have been unduly pressing the Minister for External Affairs or his Department in so far as giving information to this House is concerned. There again the President has obstinately refused to give us any information.

I cannot, owing to the ruling of the Chair, touch on certain matters. All I can say is that we tried last November to lift this whole Spanish question out of the realm of Irish party politics and it was immediately pulled down into the political arena by the President and it has been kept there by the members of the President's Party, by his Ministers and by his Press. That is the atmosphere prevailing in Ireland, or at least in a certain portion of Ireland, amongst a certain portion of the population of Ireland, and that confronts us when we are faced with this resolution. Attempts have been made to drag this question down to the level of party politics, and those attempts reached, not their zenith, but the lowest point possible, a point beyond which they could not go, in a speech made last Sunday.

I think that, in regard to this matter, this country, with its traditions, with its beliefs, should take up a certain attitude. I cannot accept what was, practically speaking, the burden of the speech of the Minister for Education about our powerlessness and our insignificance. I admit he did not use the word "insignificance," but that is what it came to. I refuse to think that in any international conference this country should be reduced to the position of a back-bencher of the Fianna Fáil Party, a mere yes-man, merely giving assent to anything put forward there. That was the burden of the speech of the Minister for Education last week. How is it reasonable, when we hear statements of that kind, when we see such disrespect paid our country, to expect a Party like this to accept this proposal or consider this Bill divorced from all the surrounding circumstances that give it its real significance for the people of the country?

On one occasion—you may remember it—down in Cork the President spoke of how this little nation might lead the world—"This little nation will lead them." Here he had an opportunity and all that he can do, all that his Ministers can do, is to reduce this nation that could give such a lead, to a position of following, without discussion or consideration, behind the tail of the other nations, reduced to the position of a mere yes-man in a general assembly, without a word raised, without any attempt made, so far as we know, to consider the circumstances or the issues that were at stake. It is because we strongly believe that, owing to the attitude of the Government, owing to the statements of Ministers, owing to the campaign conducted by the Irish Press, which, remember, is one of the circumstances I must take into account because of the atmosphere created in the country——

No Minister is responsible to this House for any newspaper.

Quite; I never suggested they were, and that is the reason I phrased my statement in the way I did. What I have to take into account is the atmosphere that is created. I am not saying that the Ministers are responsible to this House for the Irish Press, and apparently the Irish Press is not responsible to Parliamentary Secretaries. I am not saying that, but there is a certain atmosphere created and that is an atmosphere that we must take into account in discussing whether there is reason for urgency and whether this request on the part of the Government should be granted—whether their plea of urgency should be heard. As a result of these things that I mention, we feel that the real interests of this country, the highest interests of this country and the honour of the country, are being sacrificed.

We are being asked by the leader of the House, the President, to accept a guillotine motion on an important measure of this kind. It is impossible to do it. No self-respecting Irishman should vote for such a motion. We ought to have led. It might have made a tremendous difference in the whole aligning of forces if we showed at least there was one "democratic" country that held certain views. We had our opportunity and we threw it away, and by throwing it away we gave our support, so far as this House is concerned, to the lie that this is a struggle between Fascism and democracy. We have helped in that direction as much as we could by what we have done. Ireland's place at the conference should have been very different from what it has been. In the international conferences that took place under our régime very different was the position occupied by this country.

I cannot pick and choose between the different statements of the President and his Ministers. I have no doubt that if careful search were made, it great energy were spent in the search, statements could be got from the President when, on some remote occasion, he did condemn Communism. Several years past he did something of the kind—we have it on his own authority that he did, and we accept that. But before this House passes this motion it is entitled to something more definite than we have been able to extract from the President.

The question of Communism does not arise on this motion, which is to decide whether the Committee and other stages will be taken at certain times. Our social problems are not relevant.

I am not discussing the value or the extent of Communism, but the extent of Communism elsewhere and the danger of it here constitute one reason for our opposition to this motion, which, on the plea of urgency, asks us to allow this Bill to be steam-rolled through in a day, to allow all the concluding stages to be taken. Because of the situation created generally by Ministers, because of the evidence we have that that situation is largely accepted by the Government's followers—not by all of them, but by many of them, and I merely adduce, as evidence of that position, the campaign of the Irish Press—it is necessary for us to explain our attitude. I will admit that they are not responsible as Ministers—I made that quite clear—but that this House can hurriedly discuss a Bill of such import as this, that it should be asked to give freedom to the President to dispose of all remaining stages in a single day— that we could intelligently discuss that without any reference to the wishes of the country on the matter and the campaign in the country, I find it diffcult to understand.

I can only attach one significance and one meaning to the attitude taken up by the Government—that, despite everything that has been said, despite, as I believe, the feeling prevalent in their own Party, in the country, amongst many of their followers, and important followers at that, they are determined not to give way; having taken the wrong course, they are determined to continue on the wrong course. There is no explanation otherwise of a motion of this kind being tabled to-day.

We have been accused of misrepresentation. If there was any misrepresentation, it was not ours. If anybody misrepresented the President, it was himself in his attempt to explain away what he said. That was the real misrepresentation. If there has been any doubt as to his attitude on the questions raised by this Bill and by this motion, there is only the one person to blame, and that is the man who refuses to give a straight answer to a straight question. I am not going into the question of misrepresentation. I, amongst others, have been accused of misrepresenting the President. I leave it to anybody who reads the report of the proceedings of this House to determine which of us gave the truer interpretation of his meaning. A man who can give a harmless inter pretation to a statement attributed to the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance which that Parliamentary Secretary never made, and which he denies is true, but which the President shows is quite harmless— that man can do anything in the way of explanation, and he has done it.

How can we give to the Government what they want in this particular matter? How can we trust the Government? What right have we, even if we wanted, to give powers to the Government to pass in a single day a Bill of this kind when one of the principal Ministers of the Government, the Minister for Finance, speaking last Sunday, said:

"This land required the service and sacrifice of every son of Ireland and had no blood, no zeal, and no enthusiasm to spend in any other cause or in any other country"?

After that statement by the Minister for Finance last Sunday, we are accused of misrepresentation and we are asked by that same Government of which he is such a prominent Minister to give these facilities to-day. I think it would be degrading if for a moment we considered anything of the kind. There are certain aspects of the Minister for Finance's speech last Sunday into which I do not intend to go. Events have occurred quite recently that make me avoid some particular parts of that speech and I shall not deal with them. But from that speech alone you know, Sir, and the House knows the views of the Government, who are asking us to do this to-day.

What must be the atmosphere in which these Ministers move if the Minister for Finance was able to make a statement of that kind? Why talk of misrepresentations about "isms" when the Minister for Finance states: "This land required the service and sacrifice of every son of Ireland, and they had no blood, no zeal and no enthusiasm to spend in any other cause or in any other country"? We all love this land of ours and are proud of it. We are proud of this land, of her traditions, of her history, and of her steadfastness to ideals. I hope everybody here, each in his own particular way, tries to serve that land and these ideals. But despite the Minister for Finance, and despite some other Deputies, such as Deputy MacDermot, I suggest that there is a higher cause even than the particular ones mentioned by the Minister for Finance. I think it is a shocking thing that a Minister for this State should make a statement of that kind. High as we rate and deeply as we respect the interests of this country, there is an even higher cause than these. And yet a Government of which that man is a Minister come down here to-day and ask this House to display their confidence in that Government by passing this guillotine resolution. The same enlightened Minister said: "There was a civil war being waged in Spain, and why should Irishmen fight on one side or the other?" Let me point out that it was not whether, as part and parcel of an international agreement, this Bill should be forced through, but that it was the merits of the case that were being argued.

By whom was the statement made?

By the Minister for Finance.

If Ministers make speeches outside this House, Deputies are entitled to question them here on the relevant and proper occasion. If the Minister for Finance dealt with matters not relevant to the Bill they may not be raised now.

I suggest that reference to the civil war in Spain, and therefore relevant to the Bill and the motion we are now discussing, is the only portion of the speech I am referring to. I am not referring to the statement about the national teachers. I am not referring to various other statements and misstatements he made. I am not referring merely to this particular matter, and even so far as this matter is concerned, reasons of delicacy prevent me going into some of the things he said. I think you will approve that I should follow that particular line. I think you will recognise from what you saw of that speech in your private capacity——

I can assure the Deputy that I have not read it. I do not read speeches.

I can assure the Ceann Comhairle that if I were anxious to make merely personal points or nasty points about the Minister, there are other statements in this speech to which I could refer, but I shall not do it. What I want to ask is: How can a Government of which he is a member pretend that it was any misrepresentation to say that for them it was a battle between rival "isms"? Why that statement about "isms" did not go half the length to which the Minister for Finance went last Sunday. He absolutely crossed every "t" and dotted every "i" in the statement of the President. But he was only expressing what was the policy of the President, a thing the President might let slip in an unguarded moment—he is much too clever to do it often—an indiscreet member of the Government could fully reveal to an astonished public.

The Chair is still not clear in this matter. Two reasoned amendments were disposed of by a vote of the House. The matter before the House now is, whether we should proceed to consider all the remaining stages of the Bill to-day. It seems to me the Deputy is reopening last Friday's debate.

I made it quite clear that I was quoting the remarks of the Minister for Finance. Since you first called me to order I have not made a single reference to the representation in Spain or to the two amendments discussed the last day.

Is not the Deputy replying to a speech made by the Minister on Friday?

Oh, no; not in the slightest. This speech was made last Sunday.

I meant the Minister for External Affairs.

I was showing how the speech made last Sunday knit with the general attitude of the Government.

That is precisely what I was driving home, and if I may credit myself with one thing it is that it is always my desire to be completely relevant in any discussions that take place in the House. On more than one occasion you, Sir, paid a tribute to my efforts in that respect.

I hope I shall be justified in doing so on this occasion.

We can only read this Bill in the light of the Governmental statements, and we can only discuss this motion in the light of such statements. As it was put yesterday by one of the Dublin newspapers, "the cat is out of the bag," and I suggest that the President will have great difficulty in getting the cat back again. He has tried to get several cats back, but I have very grave doubts if he will get this cat back. How can we consent to the policy the Government has outlined in the motion? How can we consent to their request when a Minister said that the people of Ireland have no interest in this matter? In order to show that they have, and that, therefore, this motion should be refused, may I give a quotation? This is a statement made by the Minister for Education to the Caballero Government to the Russian anti-God Central Council of Moscow. I have not seen the original statement, but I quote from The Universe of last week:

"Your struggle against religion is also ours. It is our duty to make Spain a land of militant atheists. The struggle will be difficult, as there are still a great many reactionaries in the country who oppose the absorption of Soviet culture. All schools will be branches of Communist schools."

To suggest that the people of this country have no interest in that struggle between two foreign sects is to show a complete misunderstanding of the whole position. I could hardly believe it to be otherwise than a deliberate failure to recognise the vital issues at stake. Yet men guilty of that failure go on and ask us in a single day to pass a Bill of this kind. You cannot divorce this Bill from all the surrounding circumstances—at least I am not capable of doing so. My mind is not subtle enough for that. Before this Bill becomes law— apparently that will be to-night—I should like to give Ministers an opportunity of sleeping over it, to see if they could not meet our wishes in this particular matter. I oppose this motion. I should like a plain, definite and clear statement of the Ministerial attitude on the vital issues involved. They have neglected opportunity after opportunity. Let us give them another opportunity, by postponing the final decision on the matter, at least, until to-morrow. How can we believe that Ministers responsible for this Bill and this motion really know what the whole struggle is about? Can any reasonable man who has followed this struggle, and who has tried to see what was involved in it, believe that the President really knows what it is all about? I am taking the most charitable interpretation of his conduct. If he does realise it and grasps what is at stake, then, Sir, his guilt is heavy indeed. Let him, before this Bill passes, before giving this gesture of solidarity with European nations, make another gesture, a gesture of solidarity with the traditions and the ideals of his own people. He has that opportunity. If he wants time to think it over, let this Bill proceed in the normal way and let us have it again to-morrow or next week. The President likes a policy, I understand, of "keeping them guessing." The issue involved in this Bill is too vital for that. That is not a time to keep the people of Ireland guessing, and this House, no matter to whatever Party Deputies belong, should not pass this motion until we have a clear and unequivocal statement from the Minister for External Affairs as to what his attitude is. I venture to say that this is one of the most vital questions this or any other country in the world can face at the moment. For my part, considering the nature of the issue at stake, I fail to see how this question could be discussed without reference to religious and moral principles. If there are vest-pocket Machiavellis in this House who think that it is possible to discuss this issue and leave such vital considerations out, I profoundly disagree with them. I say you cannot do it. I do not mind the sneers thrown at us for that, because we undertook to do what is our duty— sometimes a painful duty. Our duty we consider clear, and that duty we have followed. I think we did accomplish a little in dragging a quarter of a statement from the President. You could hardly call it a clarification, but it was, at least, a dawn of clarification.

Did the Deputy not hear what the President said on Friday?

Was not that clear enough?

That is not his fault.

It is his skill. It was not his fault. It would be a fault in an ordinary man—very much a fault. If we could, between now and the final passing of the Bill, persuade him to be quite definite, I feel something would be achieved. If we could induce him to give a lead to the country, to his followers in the country, and to his Ministers when they speak in the country, which would show beyond yea or nay where he stood, and where the people of Ireland stood, I think we should have done a good day's work for this country. I will admit it might be some advantage to his Party, and that is, perhaps, a heavy price to pay, but it would be worth even that price. I say again that before the House is asked to pass this resolution, he ought to seize the opportunity of at least making an effort to assuage the uneasiness that prevails in the breasts of very important members of his own Party, who have been to a certain extent horrified by the line he has adopted, representing a certain campaign that has gone on in this country, suggesting that this is a struggle between two "isms." To a man who could take that view—or to a man who could emphasise it like the Minister for Finance emphasised it last Sunday—we cannot give those facilities for which he asks to-day, in so far as we can withhold them. He has had an opportunity, and he should have clarified the position. He has had various ways of doing it; he has done it in none.

We had from Deputy Donnelly a statement that when the time came there is no doubt a remedy would be found. If churches were to be burned, he would be the first to defend them. I will accept that. We do not want to let it come to that. That is where we differ. The country ought to be reassured on this important matter. The House ought to be reassured before it passes this particular motion. As I say, if there is anything urgent in connection with this whole matter, it is a clarification of the Government's attitude, and we have not got that. I have no doubt that an isolated passage or sentence may be taken here or there out of a statement of the President, or one of his Ministers— possibly even of his Press—to show what is the attitude of the Party. You can always do that with isolated statements. But we have to take the prevailing tendency of their remarks. That prevailing tendency, Sir, is such as to cause us grave disquiet, and to cause grave disquiet to everybody who has the good name and the interests of this country at heart. That is the really urgent matter. It is much more urgent, I suggest, than the motion which we are now discussing. Let him allay that profound uneasiness which has sprung up in many quarters, even amongst many of his own followers, in the last four or five months—uneasiness to which he and his Ministers have contributed; uneasiness which they have done their part to build up.

I have tried—I admit I was not able, owing to your ruling, Sir—to traverse quite the ground I had at first intended, to make it clear to this House what the attitude of this Party is, and what the attitude of the House, in my opinion, ought to be. From the start, owing to the greater facilities possessed by other countries, I was definitely of the opinion that a policy of non-intervention was the soundest policy, first of all on the grounds that, if intervention happened, people at Spain's border would be able to utilise the opportunity much better than we could, owing to their propinquity and their size; and secondly, because of the dangers of a European conflict. But from consideration of the wisdom of that policy, we cannot divorce the attitude of the Government on this whole matter. I think, Sir, that the attitude of the House, if they have the interests of this country and its honour at heart, ought to be clear on this particular motion. I oppose the motion, Sir.

I shall vote for this motion for the paradoxical reason that I believe that those who support non-intervention in principle should also support it in practice by their votes. Deputy O'Sullivan has exercised remarkable agility in trying to show that there has been no inconsistency in the attitude of the Opposition; in trying to show that it was quite reasonable of them to declare themselves in favour of non-intervention last November, and to oppose the necessary steps for making non-intervention effective to-day. Once again, instead of discussing the merits of the actual Bill before us and the merits of the motion, we have been treated to a discourse about speeches made by Ministers, and statements made by them have, in my opinion, been tortured and twisted out of their true sense. But were that not so, and had the utterance, for example of the Minister for Finance carried all the implications that Deputy O'Sullivan says it carried, I would still have considered that there is very little reason why we should bother our heads about the statements that Ministers have made. What we ought to bother our heads about is whether measures of non-intervention are good or bad, and whether they should be expedited or not. Those matters with regard to a diplomatic representative and with regard to the alleged Red or semi-Red tendencies of the Fianna Fáil Party, even if the Opposition statements were well-founded—which they are not—would, in my opinion, be irrelevant to what we have to decide.

Deputy O'Sullivan has taken the opportunity once again to suggest that only on the Opposition Benches is the true nobility recognised of the cause for which General Franco is fighting. I absolutely deny that. I do not think anyone has painted that cause in more glowing terms than I myself did in this House a day or two ago, but the merits of the two causes in Spain are not what we have to decide. You would hardly realise, you would hardly believe, listening to the sort of things the Opposition Deputies have been saying that if you scanned the columns of the newspapers and looked to see what has been going on in the Parliaments of all the other countries concerned in this matter, you would not find one Government that is being attacked on the same lines that our Government here is being attacked for doing no more and no less than what the other Governments are doing. Why should that be so?

We all agree, or practically everybody in the House agrees, in having warm sympathy with the cause of General Franco, but we recognise that the considerations which count here, are, first of all, the importance of maintaining European peace, the terrible danger that a general war will throw the whole of Europe into misery and Communism if intervention is allowed to go on. There is also the consideration to which the President drew attention that, in the long run, the fate of Spain must be settled by the Spaniards; and there is the further consideration that, according to what we can judge from what we read of the position in Spain, and, according to statements that have been made to-day in Italy and Germany, the effect of these measures being brought into operation for non-intervention at this particular moment will be not to hinder General Franco but to help him. The Franco cause is secure if no new factors are introduced into the situation, and measures of non-intervention ensure that no new factors will be introduced into the situation.

The Opposition declare that the Government and their supporters have dragged Party politics into this matter. How have the Government and their supporters dragged Party politics into this matter? What advantage from the Party point of view had the Fianna Fáil Party to gain from the policy of non-intervention? What Party advantage had they to gain from maintaining diplomatic representation with the Caballero Government? Obviously they had no Party advantage to gain. By doing that, they were doing something that every nation in Europe has done except Germany, Italy, and Albania. It was stated here the other day that Portugal had acted along with Germany and Italy in withdrawing recognition from the Caballero Government, but that is not so.

That is so.

The Consul for Portugal in the Irish Free State, who ought to know, informed me yesterday that it was not so, and that Portugal still recognise that Government.

I was in Salamanca the evening it happened.

There is a conflict of authority then!

We do not accept your authority for it.

At any rate one thing is quite certain and that is, that except for Fascist countries and states under the control of Fascist countries, nobody has acted in the way the Opposition suggest our Government ought to have acted, and, therefore, there is not the smallest prima-facie evidence that our Government, for the sake of some Party advantage, have taken a course which they would not otherwise have taken. Until the Opposition forced it on them by the line they were taking, there was no attempt by the Fianna Fáil Party, and there could be no attempt by the Fianna Fáil Party, to make any hostile reflections on the Fine Gael Party in reference to Spain. The whole impetus to the Party battle arose from the Opposition and the Opposition only, and I say that was discreditable. I say that the course of action the Opposition are taking here is unparalleled in Europe at the present moment, and I say what I said the other day, in spite of the excitement it aroused in the breast of Deputy Dillon, that they are exploiting, or trying to exploit, the religious sentiments of our people for Party advantage. That is an accusation that has often been made and truly made by many politicians in this country, including, I am pretty certain, Deputy Dillon himself against the Orange leaders in the North, of trying to exploit religious feeling for political purposes. There is nothing novel in the thing, unfortunately, and there is nothing novel in the accusation, and to suggest that it is an unparalleled sort of personal vituperation is simply to fly in the face of the facts.

Deputy O'Sullivan professes great concern for the fair name of this country. The fair name of this country is in no danger whatever from the policy of the Government. How could it be, associated as we are with so many other Catholic States in this matter? It is the fair fame of the Party to which they belong that the Opposition ought to be taking heed of rather than the fair fame of the country, which is perfectly safe in this matter in the hands of the President.

This is all relevant, Sir, I presume? It is much wider ground than was travelled by Deputy O'Sullivan.

The main point about this Bill is that it is a Bill not favouring Communism but against Communism, and every vote on it and on the measures necessary to expedite its passage into law should be given with that consideration in mind. We are told that the country needs to be reassured. It does need to be reassured, but why does it need to be reassured? Simply and solely because of the propaganda of the Opposition. The country could hardly have been thrown into a fever on this subject, in so far as it has been, if politicians had not confused the public mind and disguised from it the fact that in this we are acting normally and acting as other countries do. I have not the smallest hesitation in supporting this motion, and I only wish that, even at the eleventh hour, now that these amendments with regard to diplomatic representation have been defeated, that pretext could be laid aside and regarded as disposed of, and that the Opposition would carry out the policy which they themselves praised a few months ago of making non-intervention in Spain effective. They say one moment that they are, in principle, in favour of non-intervention, and the next moment, when they think they can score points by doing so, they make speeches which suggest that it is wicked to prevent our young people from engaging in the struggle and that it is wicked to suggest that it is unwise of them to do so. Nobody, I am sure, in any Party wants to depreciate the courage of young men who have gone out, and no one wants to suggest that their motives are other than the highest, but we ought all to be agreed, if we are in favour of non-intervention, that it is desirable that they shall not go. I wish the Opposition would show a little more logic, a little more courage, and a little less love of Party advantage, and co-operate with the Government in the cause of peace.

I want to intervene just for a moment. It has been suggested by Deputy O'Sullivan that the Government are steamrolling this Bill through the House. There is no attempt being made by the Government to steamroll this Bill through the House. When this Bill was introduced last week, two amendments were submitted, one by the Opposition and one by Deputy Belton. These amendments were debated here, and we find the Bill to-day clipped of these trimmings and clipped of these amendments, and we have to deal simply and solely with the Bill as one for non-intervention. I have been trying to follow the arguments put forward by Deputy O'Sullivan, and I confess I have not been successful. On the issue of non-intervention, we have, as was quoted here by the President on the last day, the statement made in the House by Deputy Cosgrave last November which leaves no doubt in anybody's mind where he stood and where his Party stood on this question of non-intervention, which is the matter at issue here to-day. He said:

"Of that policy we on this side of the House approve. I believe that the intervention of outside Powers would, as far as our human intelligence can judge, almost certainly lead to a general conflagration, a conflagration that might bring upon us at once the disastrous consequences that would follow inevitably but at a slower pace on the victory of the Red forces in Spain."

Even one would gather from Deputy Belton's speeches in 1936 that he did not approve of people going to Spain and taking part in the fight there.

That I accepted no responsibility for them.

The Deputy said that while he admired them, he certainly did not approve of them. So far as I can follow Deputy O'Sullivan's remarks, his objection now to this Bill going through is that he wants first to have a definite statement from us as to our attitude towards Communism or something like that. Now that statement was made by the President here on the last day on which this Bill was debated. That statement was made as clearly as any Deputy who wishes to see and read it, could expect. The statement is not wanted for the people here but it is wanted for the people outside, so that certain people can be able to twist it for propagandist purposes.

I can quote statements from the other side and I ask them now what they meant by them. I quote here a statement made by Deputy Mulcahy on the 5th December, 1936, as reported in the Western People. The statement is headed “WHY THEY WENT” and reads:—

"There was a time not so long ago," continued the speaker, "when the young men of this country established democratic rule here—a rule which will stand for all time, if we are only watchful. Some of these men are amongst those who have left to fight for Spain and the reason they are gone there is that in spite of their work for this country (Ireland) the country is not able to offer them an honourable living so they have gone to fight for our religion in another country. Who sent them there? The forces that sent these young men to Spain are the forces that sent a hundred times as many men from here into the British Army during the last few years. There is not a single person in Ireland who is blind to that fact."

The same forces that have compelled these men to go to Spain are the same forces as have driven men into the British Army during the past few years. I do not want to go on on those lines except just to say this—the people who are so anxious to distort simple statements for propagandist purposes can have the honesty of these statements tested by their own attitude in the past—by the statements they have made themselves. So far as the present stage of this Bill is concerned, we can say that the Bill has been very fully discussed by this House already and discussed before we came on to the Committee Stage at all. Very few points were raised on the Second Reading that would be relative to the Committee Stage.

The measure is closured on the Committee Stage, the Report Stage and the Final Stage and it was closured on the Second Reading.

The point that I have been making is that this is a Bill dealing with non-intervention, a principle which the people on the opposite benches have agreed is desirable for this country. Now if we have decided that this is a desirable Bill for this country, we have got the principle of that Bill through the House already. Then what is the point now being made by Deputies that we are closuring discussion?——

The point is that you are closuring down on Parliament here—that you are closuring the Dáil from discussing the situation in another country in respect to which we are passing a law here.

We are passing this law because other countries with whom we have entered into this non-recognition pact, have agreed with us to take certain steps that are desirable in the interests of Europe and desirable in the interests of peace throughout the world.

Why cannot we pass legislation here to assist an unfortunate country or to help an unfortunate situation in Europe without trampling under foot the Parliament that we have set up here? It is sought to have this Bill passed without discussion and forced through this House while it is open to the Government to take the most reasonable line possible.

When this Bill was introduced and when the President asked for a First Reading for it that was given; that showed that the passage of this Bill was going to be facilitated by the Opposition.

And now the Minister not only wants it facilitated but passed even without discussion.

Not without discussion, and the Deputy knows it. For two days last week we discussed and debated this Bill. One Deputy spoke for almost three hours on the Bill, and it is not with regard to the merits of the Bill that we have doubts. It is clear that the aim of the Opposition is to twist and distort and misrepresent the Bill in some way or other, simply and solely for propagandist purposes and for nothing else. We have a charge made to-day, and that charge has been made despite the statement made by the President on last Friday. That statement of the President left no doubt or uncertainty as to the sentiments, feelings and sympathies of the people on this side of the House in the present conflict in Spain. Deputies on the opposite benches know that, and it is unfair, unjust and beneath the dignity of any political party to try, by stooping to such miserable methods as these, to fool the people and get Party and political credit for their actions. These statements of the President are there to be looked at and read by anybody who wants to read them. So far as the stage that is reached now is concerned, we want to get that stage and the other stages through because we have entered into this non-intervention pact with other nations. As has been pointed out by Deputy MacDermot, we see no such discussion attempted to be raised in other Parliaments abroad that have to deal with this question. It is only here, since this Bill was introduced, that such attempts have been tried. We want this Bill with the least possible delay to be put into effect, so that we can do what we undertook to do in the non-intervention pact. We should have got this Bill in the ordinary way by midnight on Saturday, but, seeing that the Opposition were not prepared to give us the further stages then, we put the Bill back until this week. If anybody had any complaint to make in connection with this Bill, it would not be with regard to the details of the Bill, because no details were referred to on the Second Stage.

It would not have been in order to do so.

Deputy MacDermot returns to the charge to-day. I said in public all I intend to say about Deputy MacDermot, and I do not now intend to return to that subject. It is extremely distasteful to me. The representation as to urgency that has been made by the Government is the essence of the case for getting the Bill through to-day. But it is not an hour ago since the President told us that seven States who are parties to this non-intervention agreement have done nothing at all in the matter of introducing legislation, and that 11 States are still discussing the legislation they introduced. We are told that if this non-intervention pact is not to be held back this Bill must be guillotined through this House to-day. Deputy Thrift on the Second Stage spoke without accuracy when he said that he had a feeling that if we did not give the President all the stages of this Bill on Saturday last, the non-intervention pact might collapse, because the failure of one State to pass the Bill might imperil that pact. But from the President we learned to-day that seven of the States have not yet introduced legislation.

Nevertheless, what I said as to the conflict is true.

I am not charging the Deputy with an untruth.

Only with inaccuracy.

And I suggest that the inaccuracy arises from the want of information given to the House by this Government.

I think not. If the Ceann Comhairle will permit me, I should like to explain——

And if the Deputy will permit you.

And if the Deputy will permit me. I think that an arrangement had been come to and that all parties agreed that, before the present date, non-intervention would be adopted by the signatories to that agreement.

As I understood the representations from the Government last Friday, they were that it was vital to get this Bill through; that, otherwise, our action would imperil the entire non-intervention pact. That was the representation made to us. We were held up to public odium that, in an irresponsible moment, we did not care and were prepared to postpone the whole matter. Now, we understand that 11 States are still legislating and that six have not started to legislate yet. We are told that our Government requires our Parliament to stampede the whole business through, ours being virtually the only unicameral system of Government in Europe. Practically every other State in Europe has two Chambers. Ours is virtually the only system having one Chamber and it is the one State in which it is a vital duty to guillotine the whole business through. When you ask why, echo answers why. The only answer I heard, so far, is that Great Britain wants it, that France wants it and that the Great Powers want it.

I believe in the British Commonwealth of Nations. I believe in co-operation with members of the Commonwealth of Nations. I have always believed that and I was not afraid to say so on public platforms when some of the recent converts to that doctrine were shouting "West Briton" at me. While I am prepared to bend my mind to understanding the instinctive reactions of the peoples of the other States-members, while I am prepared to co-operate, in so far as it is possible to co-operate, with the British people, I was not aware until to-day that the time had yet come in this country when we must not only act with Britain but think and feel with the British people, at the same time. So far as I am concerned and so far as most of the Deputies on these benches are concerned, we are prepared to bend our minds to the task of understanding things we do not instinctively feel when they manifest themselves amongst the peoples who are now our fellow-members in the Commonwealth but we never can instinctively feel as the British people feel and we never can instinctively think as the British people think. It is a task for us to adjust our minds to theirs. It is a task we should gladly undertake because we believe it would be in the best interests of our country to do so. But there is no use in quoting what England or France did. We are prepared to co-operate with them but we are not prepared to deliver ourselves body and soul into their hands. I do not feel as Great Britain feels about this matter of non-intervention and I do not feel as France feels. I want non-intervention because I believe it will bring victory to the Burgos Government. If I believed that non-intervention meant that the Burgos Government would be defeated, I should be against non-intervention. Let us be clear on that.

I freely admit that there is a difference between ourselves and the members of the Irish Brigade but it is a difference of method and not of sentiment. We do not take the view —because we do not take the view, we cannot consent to the despatch the President asked for—that this is a cause other than our own. I do not know whether, on reflection, the Minister for Finance would take that view. Let me at once repudiate the suggestion that we are trying to fix on members of the Government Party responsibility for words which may have been spoken in haste. I know the reputation of the Minister for Finance as a public speaker. I know that, on public platforms, he sometimes unwittingly betrays himself into indiscretions which he subsequently bitterly regrets. He described the issue joined in Spain as "a cause other than our cause." We do not accept that. As I understood the President he said that he recognised that this was a battle between God and no God, a battle between Theism and Atheism. Granting him all credit for boldly saying that——

I read his speech and there is not a word about that in it.

The Deputy must not interrupt.

In the light of that statement, does the Minister for Finance mean that this is a cause other than our cause? I do not believe he meant to say that.

What the Deputy says the President stated is not on the records, and he did not make the statement.

I do not believe that the Minister for Finance meant that. So far as he stated it, I believe he let his tongue run away with him. They let their tongues run away with them and say this kind of thing in public, and then blame their neighbours for saying that it is evidence of the atmosphere in which they are allowing themselves to live. It is because I see that the attitude adopted by the new Liberals of this country is leading the country into paths of considerable peril that I am anxious that, at this juncture, we should meet this situation boldly, resolutely and unequivocally. The Minister for Justice gets up and thinks he confounds us by quoting a speech made by Deputy Cosgrave last November. Every word, syllable and sentence of that speech I adopt. He stood for non-intervention, as we stand for non-intervention. Our case is that this Bill, coupled with the return of Mr. Kerney to the Red Government in Valencia, is not non-intervention but intervention—moral intervention.

On a point of order, is not this more or less another dose of a Second Reading speech?

They did not raise that point of order when Deputy MacDermot was speaking, or the Minister for Justice.

Do not bring me into it. I was merely making a case why the Bill should be taken to-day.

If Deputy Donnelly would restrain himself he would find that I would not delay the House very long. Our assistance, in substance, to the Spanish Government at Burgos or to the Communist Government at Valencia is not going to make very much difference one way or another. Our resources do not extend to giving formidable help to either side. But our moral assistance can be immense. I believe it is in the interests of Spain and in the interest of the cause being fought out in Spain that there should not be intervention. But I believe that it is in the interests of the cause being fought out in Spain, in the interests of Spain, in the interests of this country and of the world that our moral influence should be felt perfectly clearly. To pass this Bill with despatch, to let it out to the public that the Irish Government is forcing this Bill through the House before many of the other signatories have put their hand to the work, coupled with the despatch of our ambassador to the Red Government in Madrid, must lead, as the slowest Deputy must perceive, to a certain interpretation of our attitude.

In view of the answer given by the President to a question relating to the position of Mr. Kerney, is it in order for the Deputy to make these repeated misrepresentations and misstatements?

The Chair is not concerned with the alleged misrepresentations but with the fact that these matters were decided by vote by the House on Friday. They should be taken as decided.

I am taking them as fully decided.

The Deputy should not re-open them to-day.

Surely I am entitled to assign my reasons for opposing the guillotine motion.

Again, I ask if it is in order that the Deputy should repeat the statement that the Government have appointed a representative to the Red Government in Madrid when the President denied that here to-day.

He did not deny it.

He did no such thing.

The Deputy wants to go further than the President.

To what Government is he appointed?

I have spoken for about ten minutes and I shall not delay the House much longer. I ask Deputy Davin to let me say my say. Deputy Davin can say his say afterwards.

It would be nearly time.

The President has dealt with the question raised by Deputy Davin and he is too astute a politician to say what Deputy Davin states. Our representative is accredited to the President of the Spanish Republic and that is Largo Caballero. These are the facts.

The question as to the Government to which our representative is accredited or the person to whom he is accredited is not now relevant.

I did not raise it. It was thrust upon me by the Deputy sitting on my right hand. There is no doubt about that question of representation. We are told that it is a matter of dismay that we should ask our Government to do something that no other Government is doing in this matter. Are we always to trot along in the wake of every pink Liberal Government in Europe? Are we never to lead? Would it be presumption on the part of this nation to strike out a course of its own? May we not say that we believe in non-intervention, but that if it is to be non-intervention it should be real non-intervention, not non-intervention in the sense that France or England understands that phrase, but non-intervention which will make it manifest to the world that if we put up anything which any person can interpret as a block between ourselves and Franco that we will raise a wall 10,000 times as high between ourselves and Caballero. That is the kind of non-intervention that we are asking for.

I spoke of the legitimate construction that could be put on the words of the Minister for Finance. I ask him to withdraw those words. Perhaps more zealous partisans of the cause which I am proud to support would think me wrong in opening a way of escape for him from the printed words he spoke. I do not think any useful purpose can be served by driving any man in this country into the arms of the pinks or the reds, and I know, or I believe I know, that this Minister of State has no desire to find refuge in such company. I would welcome from him, now that he is here in the House, a clear statement that when he said that this cause was a cause other than our own, it was merely a turn of speech, the exact meaning of which he subsequently realised and desired to withdraw. But, if he chooses to stand upon that statement, then the issue is joined between us, because if his position and that of his Party is that this is a cause other than his own cause, for us, at least, this is a cause which is identical with ours.

There are some people who profess, I well believe with an assumed innocence, to find it impossible to understand our position. Lest people be misled by that kind of feigned detachment and painful honesty which we sometimes observe in this House, let me state in words of as near one syllable as I can find what the position of this Party is. We believe in the policy of non-intervention because we believe that policy will help the Burgos Government. We believe that our moral contribution to the issues joined in Spain can be far more effective than any material contribution our people can make. We believe that before the world the guillotining of this Bill through this House coincidentally with the return of the Irish ambassador to the Communist Government in Spain, is bound gravely to misrepresent the moral position of our people, and to suggest to the whole world that here in a Catholic democratic country there is grave doubt as to whether Franco or Caballero is in the right: that there is not much to choose between them. We believe that that would immensely mitigate the moral force which we can, and ought to, throw into the scale on the side of Burgos and Salamanca.

We are charged with seeking to parade the members of the Fianna Fáil Party as Communists. That is not so, but we do say this, that if the mentality capable of declaring that the cause in Spain is other than our cause prevails and continues, we are travelling the road when there will be aligned in this country a group and Party in defence of radical views which may, before history is finished, be dominated by forces quite other than those contemplated by the leaders of the Fianna Fáil Party at the present time.

I do not want that. I want on this issue a united front. I want a united front amongst all Parties in this country on the thesis that that cause is our cause: that the Irish nation as a whole has no two minds about it, and that we are all prepared to co-operate in what we believe to be the most effective way in helping General Franco and the Government of Salamanca. Be careful lest the attitude on the other side is not hardening into the view where we are to take up the position of united neutrality as between the two, because, remember, if that is the position into which the members of the Fianna Fáil Party are being dragged, unwittingly perhaps, it is the first step to the establishment in this country of what in France is the Front Populaire and what in Spain is the Frente Populaire. I want to tell the Fianna Fáil Party now——

I do not believe that you are doing it consciously. I do not want to make any charge or to misrepresent you through the country as potential Communists. I do not believe you will ever be that, but I do say this, that you may be dragged into the same kind of thing that the decent democrats in Spain were dragged into, that the decent democrats in the Basque country were dragged into, and that the decent democrats in France were dragged into. The fate and end of them all has been that they have been swallowed up by their own Left Wing. I am ready and willing to co-operate on these fundamental facts in making a united front on the things we want, but be careful of the paths that you are travelling along, leading to the Popular Front. I warn you of this, that while we are ready and willing to make on these fundamental questions a united front with every Party in this country, if we have got to choose between splitting this country and joining the Popular Front in the vain hope of dominating it in the end, we will make our choice of splitting this country from top to bottom before we will unite with anyone under the banner of the Popular Front.

That is a fitting speech from the son of the man who split this country in the interests of the British Liberal Party.

(Interruption)

I move: That the question be now put.

I accept that motion.

You thought it was getting too hot.

I hope the Deputy did not intend by his remarks to cast any reflection on the Chair.

I would be very sorry indeed to do any such thing.

Question put: "That the question be now put."
The Dáil divided: Tá, 77; Níl, 41.

  • Aiken, Frank.
  • Allen, Denis.
  • Bartley, Gerald.
  • Beegan, Patrick.
  • Boland, Gerald.
  • Boland, Patrick.
  • Bourke, Daniel.
  • Brady, Seán.
  • Breathnach, Cormac.
  • Briscoe, Robert.
  • Carty, Frank.
  • Concannon, Helena.
  • Corbett, Edmond.
  • Corish, Richard.
  • Corkery, Daniel.
  • Corry, Martin John.
  • Crowley, Timothy.
  • Davin, William.
  • Derrig, Thomas.
  • De Valera, Eamon.
  • Doherty, Hugh.
  • Donnelly, Eamon.
  • Dowdall, Thomas P.
  • Everett, James.
  • Flinn, Hugo. V.
  • Flynn, John.
  • Flynn, Stephen.
  • Fogarty, Andrew.
  • Gibbons, Seán.
  • Good, John.
  • Goulding, John.
  • Hales, Thomas.
  • Hayes, Seán.
  • Hogan, Patrick (Clare).
  • Houlihan, Patrick.
  • Jordan, Stephen.
  • Keely, Séamus P.
  • Kehoe, Patrick.
  • Kelly, James Patrick.
  • Kelly, Thomas.
  • Kennedy, Michael Joseph.
  • Keyes, Michael.
  • Killilea, Mark.
  • Kilroy, Michael.
  • Kissane, Eamonn.
  • Lemass, Seán F.
  • Little, Patrick John.
  • Lynch, James B.
  • MacDermot, Frank.
  • MacEntee, Seán.
  • Maguire, Ben.
  • Moane, Edward.
  • Moore, Séamus.
  • Moylan, Seán.
  • Murphy, Patrick Stephen.
  • Murphy, Timothy Joseph.
  • Neilan, Martin.
  • O'Briain, Donnchadh.
  • O'Dowd, Patrick.
  • O'Grady, Seán.
  • O Ceallaigh, Seán T.
  • O'Reilly, Matthew.
  • Pattison, James P.
  • Pearse, Margaret Mary.
  • Rice, Edward.
  • Rowlette, Robert James.
  • Ruttledge, Patrick Joseph.
  • Ryan, James.
  • Ryan, Martin.
  • Ryan, Robert.
  • Sheridan, Michael.
  • Smith, Patrick.
  • Thrift, William Edward.
  • Traynor, Oscar.
  • Victory, James.
  • Walsh, Richard.
  • Ward, Francis C.

Níl

  • Beckett, James Walter.
  • Belton, Patrick.
  • Bennett, George Cecil.
  • Brennan, Michael.
  • Broderick, William Joseph.
  • Burke, Patrick.
  • Coburn, James.
  • Costello, John Aloysius.
  • Curran, Richard.
  • Daly, Patrick.
  • Davis, Michael.
  • Dillon, James M.
  • Dolan, James Nicholas.
  • Doyle, Peadar S.
  • Fagan, Charles.
  • Finlay, John.
  • Fitzgerald, Desmond.
  • Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
  • Holohan, Richard.
  • Keating, John.
  • Lavery, Cecil.
  • MacEoin, Seán.
  • McGilligan, Patrick.
  • McMenamin, Daniel.
  • Minch, Sydney B.
  • Morrisroe, James.
  • Morrissey, Daniel.
  • Mulcahy, Richard.
  • Nally, Martin.
  • O'Donovan, Timothy Joseph.
  • O'Leary, Daniel.
  • O'Mahony, The.
  • O'Neill, Eamonn.
  • O'Reilly, John Joseph.
  • O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
  • Redmond, Bridget Mary.
  • Reidy, James.
  • Rice, Vincent.
  • Roddy, Martin.
  • Rogers, Patrick James.
  • Wall, Nicholas.
Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Little and Smith; Níl: Deputies Doyle and Bennett.
Question declared carried.
Main Question put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 77; Níl, 42.

  • Aiken, Frank.
  • Allen, Denis.
  • Bartley, Gerald.
  • Beegan, Patrick.
  • Boland, Gerald.
  • Boland, Patrick.
  • Bourke, Daniel.
  • Brady, Seán.
  • Breathnach, Cormac.
  • Briscoe, Robert.
  • Carty, Frank.
  • Concannon, Helena.
  • Corbett, Edmond.
  • Corish, Richard.
  • Corkery, Daniel.
  • Corry, Martin John.
  • Crowley, Timothy.
  • Davin, William.
  • Derrig, Thomas.
  • De Valera, Eamon.
  • Doherty, Hugh.
  • Donnelly, Eamon.
  • Dowdall, Thomas P.
  • Everett, James.
  • Flinn, Hugo V.
  • Flynn, John.
  • Flynn, Stephen.
  • Fogarty, Andrew.
  • Gibbons, Seán.
  • Good, John.
  • Goulding, John.
  • Hales, Thomas.
  • Hayes, Seán.
  • Hogan, Patrick (Clare).
  • Houlihan, Patrick.
  • Jordan, Stephen.
  • Keely, Séamus P.
  • Kehoe, Patrick.
  • Kelly, James Patrick.
  • Kelly, Thomas.
  • Kennedy, Michael Joseph.
  • Keyes, Michael.
  • Killilea, Mark.
  • Kilroy, Michael.
  • Kissane, Eamonn.
  • Lemass, Seán F.
  • Little, Patrick John.
  • Lynch, James B.
  • MacDermot, Frank.
  • MacEntee, Seán.
  • Maguire, Ben.
  • Moane, Edward.
  • Moore, Séamus.
  • Moylan, Seán.
  • Murphy, Patrick Stephen.
  • Murphy, Timothy Joseph.
  • Neilan, Martin.
  • O'Briain, Donnchadh.
  • O Ceallaigh, Seán T.
  • O'Dowd, Patrick.
  • O'Grady, Seán.
  • O'Reilly, Matthew.
  • Pattison, James P.
  • Pearse, Margaret Mary.
  • Rice, Edward.
  • Rowlette, Robert James.
  • Ruttledge, Patrick Joseph.
  • Ryan, James.
  • Ryan, Martin.
  • Ryan, Robert.
  • Sheridan, Michael.
  • Smith, Patrick.
  • Thrift, William Edward.
  • Traynor, Oscar.
  • Victory, James.
  • Walsh, Richard.
  • Ward, Francis C.

Níl

  • Beckett, James Walter.
  • Belton, Patrick.
  • Bennett, George Cecil.
  • Brennan, Michael.
  • Broderick, William Joseph.
  • Burke, Patrick.
  • Coburn, James.
  • Costello, John Aloysius.
  • Curran, Richard.
  • Daly, Patrick.
  • Davis, Michael.
  • Dillon, James M.
  • Dolan, James Nicholas.
  • Doyle, Peadar S.
  • Fagan, Charles.
  • Finlay, John.
  • Fitzgerald, Desmond.
  • Fitzgerald-Kenney, James.
  • Holohan, Richard.
  • Keating, John.
  • Lavery, Cecil.
  • MacEoin, Seán.
  • McGilligan, Patrick.
  • McMenamin, Daniel.
  • Minch, Sydney B.
  • Morrisroe, James.
  • Morrissey, Daniel.
  • Mulcahy, Richard.
  • Nally, Martin.
  • O'Donovan, Timothy Joseph.
  • O'Leary, Daniel.
  • O'Mahony, The.
  • O'Neill, Eamonn.
  • O'Reilly, John Joseph.
  • O'Sullivan, Gearóid.
  • O'Sullivan, John Marcus.
  • Redmond, Bridget Mary.
  • Reidy, James.
  • Rice, Vincent.
  • Roddy, Martin.
  • Rogers, Patrick James.
  • Wall, Nicholas.
Tellers:—Tá: Deputies Little and Smith: Níl: Deputies Doyle and Bennett.
Motion declared carried.
Barr
Roinn