Conscription by no means meant either that Labour had become Sinn Fein or
that Sinn Fein had adopted the Labour programme. In fact its relation to
Labour is a problem which Sinn Fein has been very long in solving. The
alliance between Republican Volunteers and the Citizen Army in the Rising
effected no more than a temporary and partial union. The very first number
of _Irish Opinion_ had some very open criticism of the attitude of Sinn
Fein to Irish Labour. The Sinn Fein Convention of November 1st, 1917, had
passed two Labour resolutions, one of which affirmed the right of Labour
to a "fair and reasonable" wage: the other was in favour of Irish Labour
severing its connection with British Trades Unions. On the first of these
_Irish Opinion_ remarked: "The resolution of the Sinn Fein Convention
conceding to Irish Labour the right to fair and reasonable wages was not
by any means encouraging. It was a resolution to which the assent of even
Mr. W. M. Murphy might have been secured. It did not go far enough, and it
bore upon the face of it timidity and trepidation. The Labour demand
to-day goes rather beyond fair and reasonable wages: the British
Government is prepared to offer, in fact has actually offered, some share
in direction to British Labour. This being so, there is not much to be
gained from Mr. de Valera's statement in his Mansion House speech 'that in
a free Ireland, with the social conditions that obtained in Ireland,
Labour had a far better chance than it would have in capitalist England.'
'Our Labour policy,' continued Mr. de Valera, 'is a policy of a free
country, and we ask Labour to join with us to free the country. We
recognize that we can never free it without Labour. And we say, when
Labour frees this country--helps to free it--Labour can look for its own
share of its patrimony.' We agree that 'to free the country' is an object
worthy of all the devotion that men can give to it, but at the same time
we would urge that, pending this devoutly-to-be-wished-for consummation,
men and women must live and rear the families upon which the future
Ireland depends. What Mr. de Valera asks in effect is that Labour should
wait till freedom is achieved before it claims 'its share of its
patrimony.' There are free countries, even Republics, where Labour claims
'its share in its patrimony' in vain. We can work for freedom, and we
will, but at the same time we'll claim our share of our patrimony when and
where opportunity offers." This is to put the issue squarely. Labour was
not going to commit itself blindfold to any policy of "ignoring"
indiscriminately all "English law," when by recognizing it any practical
advantage was to be gained. Labour had too keen an eye to the realities
of life to refuse a gift from the left hand because the right hand had
smitten it or picked its pocket. It was prepared to settle its account
with the owner of both hands when opportunity offered, but, for the
present, "a man must live." "Fleshpots or Freedom" might form an
attractive motto for the front page of _New Ireland_, but Labour saw no
virtue (since Freedom's back was turned anyhow) in leaving the pots
untasted on a point of honour. The resolution calling upon Irish Labour to
withdraw from association with English Labour was flatly ignored. Irish
Labour was, and intended to remain, international: it was not going to
refuse co-operation with Labour in France or Belgium--it appointed
delegates to the Stockholm Conference--and it saw no reason to refuse
co-operation with Labour in England. Besides, without the help of English
Labour it felt unable to stand alone. And Labour, while it sympathized
with the demand for Irish independence, did not wish to commit itself to
any step which would make it more difficult than it need be to win the
co-operation of the Unionist workingmen of Belfast and the North.
Curiously enough, while Sinn Fein was calling upon Irish Labour to
withdraw from membership of English Trades Unions, the Unionist leaders in
Ulster were trying to induce Belfast Labour to do the same thing: but
while Sinn Fein objected to the English Labour Party because it was
English, the Ulster politicians objected to it because it was in favour of
Home Rule. Among the Sinn Fein papers, _New Ireland_, while faithful to
the resolution of the Convention, saw most clearly the reasons which
explained the Labour attitude and, while expressing the hope that a
severance from the English Unions would eventually occur, pleaded for
toleration and for, in the meantime, a free hand for Labour.
But the Sinn Fein difficulty in regard to Labour lay deeper than any mere
question of tactics. The leaders of Irish Labour might be Republicans, but
they were also largely Socialists, and where Socialism is suspected the
Church has to be reckoned with. James Connolly, the revered leader of
Irish Labour, had been (though he died a sincere Catholic) supposed to
have come into conflict with the Church for his opinions on social
questions. His associate, James Larkin, had more than once furnished a
text for some very plain speaking in pastorals and from the altar for the
alleged subversive and immoral tendency of his teaching on Labour
questions. During the General Election of 1918 a sentence from James
Connolly's writings, which had been quoted on a Sinn Fein election poster,
was the subject of a bitter and prolonged controversy, during which Sinn
Fein was challenged by a militant Churchman either to repudiate Connolly's
political philosophy or to declare itself opposed to the authoritative
teaching of the Church. Sinn Fein, very wisely, did neither: but it was
felt very generally that while this might be wisdom for the moment, it was
not wisdom for all time: and Sinn Fein has still to formulate its social
philosophy.
The conclusion of the war made no difference in the government of Ireland
except that more troops might be expected to be available for the
maintenance of law and order. Martial law was not relaxed or revoked: the
Competent Military Authority retained unimpaired over large areas of
Ireland the power to arrest and imprison (often for long periods) persons
charged with every variety of offence which could be interpreted as
dangerous to the prestige and efficiency of that form of government which
is best administered under the sanction of a courtmartial. Men, women and
children were arrested upon charges not specified and committed to prison
for periods impossible to ascertain either from the authorities who sent
them, or the authorities who kept them, there. It was under such
circumstances that Ireland was asked to take part in the Victory Election
of 1918. The electors of Great Britain were asked to give a "mandate" to
the British representatives at the Peace Conference, and "to strengthen
their hands" in exacting from the Central Empires and their Allies the
full measure of punishment. Ireland decided to give a "mandate" which was
neither asked for nor desired and to "strengthen the hands" of the Peace
Plenipotentiaries in demanding that for which the war had ostensibly been
fought--the freedom of small nations. It was known that the Parliamentary
Party would retain only a fraction of the seats it once held and that Sinn
Fein would be in a majority. For a time it seemed as if the verdict of the
majority might be weakened by the intrusion of Labour candidates who,
though most of them were Sinn Feiners in point of fact and all of them
were bound by the Labour Party not to attend Parliament except when
ordered by the Labour Congress, would give no pledge of absolute and rigid
abstention from the English Parliament and were Labour candidates first
and Sinn Feiners afterwards. At one time it seemed as if an acute conflict
between Sinn Fein and Labour might occur. But the Labour Party,
recognizing the extreme importance of Ireland having an opportunity of
delivering an unequivocal verdict in the most important election that had
been held for a generation, finally agreed to withdraw its candidates and
to allow the electorate to decide on the political question only. The
decision was conclusive on the question. Out of 106 members returned for
Irish constituencies, 73 were Sinn Fein candidates, pledged to abstention
from the English Parliament and to the claim of Irish independence.
CONCLUSION.
The months before the European War broke out saw Nationalist Ireland
practically unanimous in its support of the Home Rule legislation of the
Liberal Government, ready to be reckoned as a part of the British Empire,
prepared to acknowledge the supremacy of the Imperial Parliament, content
with an Irish Parliament charged only with the control of a number of
matters of domestic concern. Though the policy of the Home Rule Act had
been definitely and deliberately adopted by the English electorate, it was
defeated by threats of armed resistance on the part of a minority of
Irishmen, backed by promises of support from a minority of Englishmen, and
by the refusal of the Liberal Government either to vindicate its own
constitutional authority or to appeal to the country to do so for it. The
Government put itself in the position of seeming to prefer in England the
conciliation of its enemies to the satisfaction of its friends, and in
Ireland to acknowledge the claim of a minority to veto the legitimate
expectations of the majority. Occupying this position at home, it plunged
into a war in Europe to vindicate "international morality" and "the rights
of small nations," as a protest against the doctrine that the force of
arms is superior to the force of justice and law. The month after the war
ended saw Nationalist Ireland still claiming and still denied (in
obedience to the same obstructing forces) the right of self-determination:
but the self-determination sought was no longer that in which before the
war it had been content to acquiesce. It held that the war, which it had
done something to win, had secured to the weaker nationalities (if the
public and reiterated professions of the victors were not meant
deliberately to deceive the world as to their intentions) the right to
their own national existence, independent of the claims and the interests
of the stronger nations by whom they had been subjugated. It held that
during the war the rights, the interests, the feelings and the liberty of
Ireland had been treated by the English Government with so much
indifference and disdain as to make the future subordination of Ireland to
English domination a prospect distasteful to Irishmen and a position
injurious to Irish interests. It revived the claim of Ireland to
independence, declaring that it was justified alike by history and by the
common consent of Europe and America, and as a first step in the assertion
of that claim refused for the first time since the Act of Union to send
representatives to sit in the English Parliament. The forces which
produced so serious an alteration in the attitude of Ireland have been
described in the foregoing pages.
At the end of the war the only part of Ireland whose political outlook
remained unaltered was the Unionist North-east. Upon the indurated surface
of its political conscience nothing that had happened either in Ireland or
out of it had produced the least effect. Alone in Europe the Ulster
Unionist seemed to regard the war as a detachable episode with (so far as
he was concerned) no political implications. He adopted the same
standpoint, used the same language and expected it to meet with the same
approving response from the same people. The changed attitude of other
people was attributed by him to treachery, to disloyalty, to lack of fixed
principle. By an adroit use of his opportunities during the war he managed
to secure his position: he could point to the loyalty alike of those of
his political faith who had enlisted and of those who had not enlisted:
the former had done their duty to the Empire--the latter had performed
their duty to the Government by providing it with a perpetual incentive to
the conscription of Ireland. He had collected "pledges" from all who cared
to give them that his position would be respected. To rely upon the
"pledge" of a politician as a bulwark against the advance of political
ideas may seem a somewhat imbecile proceeding: but it was not in his case
so imbecile as it looked. He was shrewd enough to see that what European
statesmen were doing was not by any means in accordance with what they
were saying, and he decided (distrusting "ideas" of all kinds) to stake
his future upon the relative permanence of things as they were rather than
upon the doubtful advent of things as they ought to be.
Sinn Fein was the opposite of all this. It appealed alike from force and
from fact to an ideal justice. Unable to win independence from a power
both strong enough to coerce it and interested for economic and military
reasons in retaining its hold upon Ireland, it refused to ask for
"pledges" which it felt sure would be broken, even if given, it refused to
plead its case before a court whose interests were engaged against it in
advance. It preferred to appeal to its rights, though there was no
tribunal before which its plea could come. It hoped that at the Peace
Conference the principle of self-determination could not be insisted upon
as against Germany, without Germany claiming that it should be
acknowledged in the case of Ireland. To its dismay and (it would seem) to
its surprise Germany was not represented at the discussions: the Peace was
dictated by a body in which none but the victors were represented and of
which the object was not so much to establish a principle as to enforce a
settlement, even at the risk of establishing a precedent. The claim of
Sinn Fein that Ireland should be represented at the Conference as an
interested party was brushed aside, contemptuously by the representatives
of England and France, shamefacedly by the representative of America. The
League of Nations which the Peace Conference set up was expressly
constructed to prevent interference with the sovereign rights of its chief
members as they existed at the time it was constructed: the right of
England to retain whatever dominion it pleases over Ireland is guaranteed
by the League of Nations in advance. Disappointed of the hopes placed in
the Peace Conference and the League of Nations, Sinn Fein has to rely
either on the interference in its favour of some Power whose friendship
England cannot disregard (an interference rendered less easy than it was
by the very League of Nations which was expected to make it easier) or on
the gradual and silent force of European opinion, or on the result of some
future war.
Sinn Fein takes its stand upon the proposition that Ireland is a nation
and upon the assertion that all nations have a just claim to independence.
The proposition cannot be controverted except by arguments which go to
prove that no such thing as a nation exists, and the assertion that all
nations have a just claim to independence is like the assertion that all
men have a right to be free: each is admitted in principle, but the
principle is subject in practice to so many modifications that to say that
a nation is free is to say what may mean as many different things as there
are nations called free. A nation may be politically free and economically
dependent, or vice versa: each of these conditions may be of various
degrees on each side: and each of these again may be combined with varying
degrees of moral, social and intellectual dependence.
Sinn Fein aims at the complete political, the complete economical and the
complete moral and intellectual independence of Ireland. It has first to
secure independence of England, and, having secured that, to avoid falling
into dependence on any other Power. Its immediate problem is the means of
securing independence of England. To induce England to acknowledge the
independence of Ireland (to force her being out of the question, unless
allies are to appear in the future) is no solution, as is abundantly
proved by the history of their relations: the independence acknowledged in
1783 was recalled in 1800 and has been denied ever since. To induce the
League of Nations, as at present constituted, to acknowledge the
independence of Ireland is out of the question: if it were reconstituted
so as to make it possible for it to do so, mere recognition of
independence would be useless, unless the League were in a position to
guarantee that it would continue to be recognized.
The means at the disposal of Sinn Fein at present hardly seem adequate to
accomplish its object. It may bring about the moral and intellectual
independence of Ireland: it may secure a certain measure of economic
independence: but to secure political independence, in face of the forces
ranged against it, seems impossible. But what it cannot do for itself may
in the future be done for it by the moral forces of which it is a
manifestation. It may in the future be recognized by the conscience of
mankind that no nation ought to exercise political domination over another
nation. But that future may still be as remote as it seemed in the days of
the Roman Empire.
Printed at The Talbot Press
89 Talbot Street, Dublin
Transcriber's Notes:
The original text includes Greek characters. For this text version these
letters have been replaced with transliterations.
The following misprints have been corrected:
"ulimate" corrected to "ultimate" (page 26)
"of of" corrected to "of" (page 207)
"adressed" corrected to "addressed" (page 237)