For quite a considerable time I have taken an interest in trial by jury. In the year 1920, when the political development of that time caused some people to move that jurors should not attend the courts, I came to Dublin and saw Mr. Arthur Griffith. I induced him to give me a letter, which I still have, authorising the jurors in Cork to attend the assizes. A meeting of the jurors of the city was held. As to the letter that I possessed, I could not very well read it. I could only hint at it at the meeting, but I was one of two in a minority out of about sixty jurors who attended the meeting who were in favour of carrying on the courts and attending in them as jurors. Notwithstanding what the President said yesterday, I still believe that this Bill is a necessity that arose out of the election in North Dublin, where if it was not an election stunt, at least it was a very prominent election feature—the murder of Mr. Armstrong and the shooting of Mr. White. The President said yesterday that that was not so, and quoted two extracts from statements made in the Dáil by members of the Fianna Fáil Party. I submit to this House that the place to answer those statements was in the Dáil. The President said that he went to a higher authority—to the people. In the Dáil he could speak to the representatives not of one constituency but to the elected representatives of the people in every constituency in the Free State, to those elected under his own Constitution. The result of that election has been referred to and I may as well refer to it. The President said that the people at that election gave him the answer that he asked for. I have looked up the figures for that election after the poll had been declared, and the figures proportionately were: three electors voted for the Government, three electors voted for the Fianna Fáil candidate, while four electors did not consider it worth their while to go out and vote for either party. The number of electors on the register in North Dublin who abstained from voting was larger than the number of electors that voted for either candidate.
Notwithstanding this election feature—if there was any measure of truth in it it was a very important matter, though I do not think an election platform was the right place to deal with it—the people were either so unconvinced by the President's statement or by his policy that four out of every ten of them did not go across the road to vote for his candidate. As I have said, three voted for Fianna Fáil and three for the Government candidate. I think that if we were to work it out in figures of three that it would be in the third decimal place you would get the Government majority.
The President seemed to be suffering from great indignation, but I think it was anger rather than indignation. I notice that in hot weather the President is very irritable, particularly when his case is a bad one. If we dare to express a view contrary to the view he has expressed we are suffering from the slave mind and are bad citizens and disloyal to the Free State and its Constitution, and a whole host of other charges are made. What was said here was more often than not misrepresented by the President when he came to reply. I thought the President would have been in good humour yesterday. His old friend and colleague. Lord Mayor O'Neill, was elected a member of the Seanad, and I thought that would put him in good humour, but it did not. I remember a letter written by the President on the occasion of the last Imperial Conference in response to an invitation to attend a ceremony at Westminster Abbey, and anything so servile from a responsible man I never read in my life. I just thought that if any English Cabinet Minister got that from Parnell he would throw it into his waste paper basket as a clumsy and stupid forgery.
The Minister for Justice gave a long and exhaustive series of reasons to justify this Bill, and I propose to deal with them. In justification of the Bill. I think, he gave as the first concrete case the murder of the unfortunate Civic Guard in Clare. I join with him in my most sincere denunciation of that infamous and diabolical murder, but the Bill was introduced before that most unfortunate murder took place. As the Minister has referred to the matter I think I may refer to it. A Deputy in the Dáil, not a Fianna Fáil member, but a very much respected Labour representative from Clare—Mr. Hogan— who at one time, I believe, was elected unanimously by the Dáil to the Vice-Chair of the House, drew the attention of the Minister for Justice on 7th March this year to the alleged misconduct of the Civic Guards in that area. One answer the Minister made to the Deputy was: "If the Deputy listened to my answer he would have heard that there was no assult committed." Mr. Hogan made further representations and the Minister said: "I am quite weary of these groundless charges against the Gárda." Mr. Hogan, T.D., was sent an affidavit by two men. It sets out in this affidavit, a certified copy of which I hold in my hand, that on the 15th February Michael Cahill visited a certain house. I will not read the whole of the affidavit. I believe it is in the official reports of the Dáil.
The following are extracts:—
Some minutes after 11 o'clock one of the police approached me and said: "Come on out here, Cahill." I got up from my seat by the fire and I went outside. I was brought by So-and-So and another policeman to the end of MacDermott's house. So-and-So then proceeded to interrogate me. I refused to answer any questions. So-and-So then said: "You will have to answer." I did not answer the questions, saying: "I would not." So-and-So further insisted that I would have to answer his questions, but I again refused. So-and-So then said: "Come on up here to the field." I was taken to the centre of the field at the rear of the house. So-and-So again insisted that I should answer his questions, but again I refused. His queries were accompanied by suggestive clickings of his revolver. After a few minutes and without any provocation on my part I was seized by the hair of the head by So-and-So and struck backwards to the ground. After getting up I was taken towards MacDermott's house by So-and-So and another policeman. When I arrived at MacDermott's house So-and-So ordered me saying: "Go and put your back to that wall." I stood up by the wall and the police went towards the door.
Some minutes afterwards I saw John Hassett being taken out by the police. I saw them bringing him to the field at the rear of the house. I was then approached by a C.I.D. man, who said: "Come on this way," pointing to the haggard at the front of the house. I walked towards the haggard accompanied by So-and-So, who was followed by two others of the police party. While going through the haggard, and without any words of warning, I was set upon by So-and-So and savagely kicked on the back and legs. I was practically kicked out of the haggard into the adjoining field. Here I received numberless kicks and blows, which showered down upon me like rain. I was felled to the ground several times with blows and kicks. After some time I was asked by So-and-So: "What rank do you hold in the Army?" I made no reply, whereupon I received another rain of savage blows and kicks. After this I saw others of the police party approaching. They gathered around me, and So-and-So now asked me: "Are you going to put this in the paper?" He asked me this question several times. I was again assaulted by So-and-So and others. I was knocked up against the fence, where I received a further series of merciless blows and kicks all over the body. At the time I heard one of the police say: "We will give him the full charge." I was pulled from the fence and, while standing, one of the police delivered a calculated and deliberate blow on my stomach."
The continuation of the affidavit is similar to what I have read. It concludes:—
I was then allowed to return towards home. It was now about 12 o'clock midnight. I returned home covered with blood, bruises, cuts, marks and swellings, sore, and suffered in every part of my body. Subsequently John Hassett and myself were medically treated by Dr. McAuliffe.
The alleged assault took place on the 15th February and this affidavit was sworn on the 25th February. Notwithstanding that, the Minister says "I am weary of these groundless charges." Deputy de Valera, who is a representative of Clare, raised the question on the 18th April, and the Minister said that these men could go into the ordinary courts. He proceeded to say: "If these gentlemen wish a public inquiry they have the public courts. They have waited for two months." Ten or eleven days after the assault that affidavit was sworn. The matter was also raised on the Adjournment, and it evidently attracted a good deal of attention locally, because the county council and the urban district council called on the Government to institute an inquiry, but the Minister for Justice turned it down, and Mr. Hogan, Labour Deputy for Clare, who raised the question, said:
Speaking as a local representative in Co. Clare—I mean as a representative on the County Council—I repudiate emphatically the statement that Clare County Council would be either frightened or obliged by action of any kind, or by coercion of any kind, to pass a resolution, as it did unanimously, to create an atmosphere for any party or for any criminally-minded people in any county. I repudiate that very emphatically. As Vice-Chairman of the county council I repudiate it, and I tell the Minister that Clare County Council has never been badgered and never been forced to pass a resolution of that kind by criminally-minded people.
Unfortunately, we know what happened. I deplore it and condemn it as sincerely and thoroughly as I possibly can, but I believe that that diabolical outrage was the outcome of revenge and that the Minister cannot divorce himself from responsibility in connection with it. I wish to say that of the Civic Guard I have the very highest opinion. I meet them everywhere, and I have always seen them conduct themselves well and have never seen anything reprehensible in their conduct. I hope that no party will try to make the Civic Guard a political force or political agents. For a certain section, generally known as the Criminal Investigation Department, I have, however, no such feeling. I do not like this seavenging of the political dustbin, but when the Minister quoted a lot of anonymous stuff which might have been written by anybody. I think that somebody should rebut it. I shall rebut it, not by anonymous statements, but by authenticated statements. I refer to the evidence given before the special tribunal set up to investigate the Coughlan shooting affair. It was not disputed that a member of the C.I.D., named Harling, shot Coughlan. I am not disagreeing with the findings of that tribunal. I presume that the members of the tribunal had before them the facts and the evidence, as well as the demeanour of the witnesses, and that they were in a position to form conclusions which outsiders could not form. In the cross-examination of Harling, Mr. O'Connor, one of the counsel, said:—
Do you suggest that you got a typewriter from the Fianna Fáil offices?—No, sir.
In the Fianna Fáil offices in Drury Street?—I did not suggest it. It was suggested at a meeting.
Mr. O'Connor: Did you go there, break open the premises and steal a typewriter?—Yes.
Was that in 1927?—Yes.
Were you then in the Detective Department?
Mr. Bewley: I object.
Mr. O'Friel, Secretary to the Ministry of Justice, came to this Tribunal and said that it was not in the public interest that that question should be answered and it was disallowed.
Mr. O'Connor: You told me already that in 1927 you took part in burgling the Fianna Fáil premises and in stealing a typewriter?—Yes.
This was to establish a new national organisation as neither of the national organisations in existence was sufficiently good for this super-patriot who stole a typewriter from the rival organisation and who was employed then, or soon afterwards, by the Ministry of Justice. What is all this leading up to? It is leading up to the fact that there are, unfortunately, employed in the C.I.D. men whose actions up and down the country provoke and incite, as Mr. Harling apparently attempted to incite, foolish young fellows into illegal and criminal pursuits. This Bill is to deal with those people whose numbers the Minister for Justice told us yesterday are relatively very small but very pugnacious. If there are many more Mr. Harlings in his employment the numbers of those people are likely to increase. Take the election, if I must refer to it again, where the Government made a feature, I will not say a stunt, of the shooting of the unfortunate Mr. Armstrong and the wounding of the foreman of the jury. Who tried to get political capital out of it? Was it Fianna Fáil? No. Though Fianna Fáil were not on their trial the Government tried to make them suspect, and outrages of that sort are very damning to a political party if the other party think that they can in any way saddle suspicion or responsibility on them. The Minister laughs. Of course he was always on the side of law and order. I have no doubt that he was on the side of law and order during the Black-and-Tan régime. I would tell him that he is the cuckoo in the nest because a great many of his colleagues on the Executive Council were not on the side of law and order in the Black and Tan time.
What is denounced high and low now was then regarded as patriotism. Let the Minister consult some of his colleagues and see what their actions were during the Black and Tan régime. I am not condemning this new order of affairs. I accept the Free State as a step to liberty, but I do not regard it as the ultimate end of Irish freedom. This country is divided and is not free. I make no pretence that there has been a great step forward politically. That is due to the actions, often illegal, of the colleagues of the Minister, even though he does laugh now. What Senator Moore said yesterday was perfectly true. Repression and coercion will not successfully cope with political acts of violence in this country. I very much regret that there should be political acts of violence, but repression will not stop them. The Minister for Justice came into some political prominence by a speech which I heard him make on the Bill which was introduced after the murder of Mr. Kevin O'Higgins —the Public Safety Bill. The Minister for Justice, in this House, had to admit to me that no successful prosecution was ever taken under that Act. No sucessful charge was made before a civil tribunal in this country under that Act. The one prosecution which I remember was brought was scouted out of court, and the Civic Guards who brought it were severely commented on by the presiding District Justice. This Bill will certainly not secure convictions or increase the number of convictions by trial by jury. The Minister for Justice undoubtedly addressed a large number of jurors in his time, but I think that I know the atmosphere of the jury room as well as the Minister or any member of the Executive Council. Men who are almost blindfolded, with masks upon them, and who are addressed by numbers do not constitute an atmosphere in which convictions will be secured.
No precaution taken under this Act will conceal the identity of jurors in cases in which public condemnation arises out of a verdict against the accused for the sufficiently good reason that the majority verdict will secure that at least one, two or three of the jurors who are known to be there will say that they did not agree to the verdict. The Minister for Justice knows that as well as any Senator here. He referred to the case of Healy who was convicted as a criminal. I never met Healy in my life. I never saw him to my knowledge, but I was approached fully two years ago by a person who said that this man was harried from post to pillar and was anxious to go back, do his work, and live the life of an ordinary citizen. Whether that is true or not I do not know, but I was certainly told so eighteen months or two years ago. This man Healy was known as the "one-eyed gunner." I believe he was a pretty good shot. One phrase used in the evidence against that man was that he fired point-blank at a detective and he replied: "If I fired point-blank at you, you would not be here now." I know nothing of the circumstances of the case. I take the verdict of the jury, and I am not attempting to justify anything of which Healy may have been found guilty, but I am convinced that Healy is not ordinarily a man of criminal instincts, from what I have heard of him.
Another case tried a week or two ago was that of McBride. McBride questioned the C.I.D. man who was giving evidence against him and he said to him, having elicited certain things which were not to the credit of the witness: "Is it not you who should be standing in the dock instead of us?" The verdict supported McBride. McBride had been kept in jail for a considerable number of months, and when he was brought to trial he was released.
The President said one true thing yesterday. There is a problem and a difficult problem to be dealt with. That is, that you have those misguided persons, a small number of persons I think, usually young fellows who pursue criminal methods to try to achieve certain ideals.
I think myself they are wrong in their methods, but whether they are right or wrong I am sufficient of a democrat to say that while any Government is elected in this country by a majority of the votes of the people, it is for that Government to carry out the policy which has received the approval of the people, but the fact is that in the heart of hearts of the people there is an insatiable desire for peace at the present time. In their heart of hearts the people of this country want a free country. They want a united country, not a partitioned country such as we have. I believe myself that that unity will come in Ireland by a process of evolution. Unfortunately repression, like this Bill, is tainted with injustice, and convictions, if secured under any section of this Bill, will not receive the moral assent of the people. That is not the way to deal effectively with these people. If the Government once let it be known that their ultimate object is an absolutely free and united country, I believe myself that these criminal manifestations would die a very sudden death.
