WILLIAM O’BRIEN, ESQ., M.P.,
_House of Commons, S.W._
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MALLOW,
_June 18th, 1917_.
DEAR MR. LLOYD GEORGE--To my deep disappointment, the details of how
“The Irish Convention” is to be composed confirm the apprehensions
which I endeavoured to express in the House of Commons. The rejoicing
excited by the courageous Amnesty for the Insurrection of last year
cannot be allowed to blind the country to the danger.
1. While the Government have nominally adopted the principle of
allowing the future Constitution of Ireland to be settled by agreement
among Irishmen themselves, they have done so under conditions which
render that principle a nullity. There can be little or no hope that
a Convention constituted as the Government have directed can arrive
at any decision except some hateful bargain for the partition of the
country under a plausible disguise. To attribute the blame for such a
decision or for the failure to arrive at any better one to the Irish
people would be little short of an outrage upon Ireland, and would be a
gross imposition on the credulity of friendly nations abroad.
2. The proposed Convention would both be too large to make a prompt
and carefully-considered agreement practicable, and too small for a
National Assembly purporting to represent all the great interests
concerned. The fact that the scheme excludes from any direct
representation whatever the 400,000 Ulster Nationalists whom any
Partition proposal hitherto contemplated would cut off from their
country; the agricultural and urban labourers, comprising one-third
of the Irish population; the great farming interest in the area of
the Rural District Councils, and the Universities and other teaching
professions--must surely make it unnecessary to emphasise the latter
point.
3. While the politicians’ organizations are in appearance restricted
to a delegation of five apiece, the pretence is, to the knowledge of
everybody in Ireland, a misleading one. The twin organizations of
the Irish Parliamentary Party--the most powerful of the two being of
a secret and rigidly sectarian character--would command a majority
of the Convention as disciplined as if directly delegated by these
organizations, and, in the event of “a deal” with the Ulster Unionist
body of at least twenty-five delegates, would represent an overwhelming
vote for some scheme of Partition, such as the two Nationalist
organizations referred to strove hard last year to force upon the
Nationalists of Ireland, and have never since categorically pledged
themselves to renounce. Their leaders have, on the contrary, on more
than one recent occasion expressed their regret that the Partition
bargain of last year did not succeed.
I do not impugn the sincerity of those who may believe any compromise
would be better than failure to secure an agreement, but am absolutely
convinced, for my own part, that Partition under any disguise would
mean the destruction of the ideal of Ireland a Nation, and could not,
indeed, be enforced at all without bloodshed and disorder.
4. The solid majority--apart even from the aid of the direct nominees
of the Government--which the Irish Parliamentary Party would thus be
able to cast in favour of any such Partitionist compromise--would
consist principally of Mayors and Chairmen of County Councils, all of
whom were the choice of the Board of Erin wing of the Ancient Order
of Hibernians and of the United Irish League, and could not have been
elected without the imprimatur of these organisations. This fact might
not be material if the Board of Erin Hibernians and the United Irish
League could still pretend to enjoy the confidence of the country;
but their leaders have owned that the contrary is the truth, and, as
a matter of fact, have not attempted to hold a free public meeting
anywhere throughout the country for more than a year past. The local
governing bodies, like the Irish Parliamentary Party themselves, have
outstayed their mandate from the country by several years. The greater
number of those whom the Government arrangements will constitute a
majority of the Convention would quite certainly be defeated if they
were obliged to face their constituents at the polls. The will of
the people is, therefore, rendered powerless to control the secret
deliberations of the Convention, and would be forced to find other and
regrettable means of resisting any such Partitionist compromise, as
there is only too substantial reason to apprehend.
5. On the other hand, while my friends and myself would welcome the
most generous representation of the unofficial Unionist population of
Ireland, the Government scheme ensures to the official Ulster Unionist
Council a full third of the voting power of the Convention--under the
direction, moreover, of a Committee not present at the Convention, but
specially nominated by the Council to supervise its proceedings from
outside. The terms of the Resolution under which the Ulster Unionist
Council consented to enter the Convention make it clear that they have
only done so as a War measure, and, relying upon the assurances of
the Government that they need fear no Parliamentary pressure if they
should adhere to their demand for the exclusion of the six counties
as a minimum--a demand, indeed, which was conceded to them last year
by the Irish Parliamentary Party. It is consequently obvious that the
chances of any agreement by the Ulster Unionist Council other than one
based on the separation of the six counties are all but hopelessly
handicapped from the start, and the temptation dangerously increased to
those Nationalist politicians who have already committed themselves to
dismemberment.
6. As you are aware, my friends and myself have long since urged upon
the Cabinet a constructive proposal, by which alone, in our judgment,
any agreement involving a genuine settlement of the Irish difficulty
can now be obtained, viz., a small Conference of responsible Irishmen,
on the Land Conference model, to draft the headings of a project of
Self-government for Ireland such as would guarantee a future of the
fullest security and power to the Unionists of Ulster and of the South
as well in the government of our common native land; such agreement, if
arrived at, to be submitted to a vote of the people of Ireland by way
of Referendum.
Recent experience has convinced me more deeply than ever that it is to
a small Round Table Conference of thoughtful and competent Irishmen,
and not to a heterogeneous assembly, mostly composed of pre-committed
partisan politicians, we must look for the materials on which the
country might with confidence be called upon for a judgment, and that
a Referendum, giving the whole mass of the population a direct and
influential voice, would be the only means of eliciting a decision so
overpowering as to put an end to all further controversy among rational
men.
It is because I am driven to the conclusion that the Government
scheme, while making a specious appearance of adopting the Conference
method, in reality adopts it only to destroy its efficacy--because
it forbids all reasonable hope of any agreement other than one which
could only inflame and intensify Irish discontent, and because it
would most unjustly cast upon the Irish people the blame for a failure
of the Government’s own producing--that I have made up my mind, with
reluctance, and, indeed, with poignant personal sorrow, that I must
decline to undertake any responsibility in connection with a Convention
so constituted.
Yours very truly,
WILLIAM O’BRIEN.
RIGHT HON. D. LLOYD GEORGE, M.P.,
_Prime Minister_.
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Transcriber’s Note:
Punctuation has been made consistent.