IRISH FREE STATE

Evening Star, Issue 21076, 13 April 1932, Page 7

IRISH FREE STATE

ABOLITION OF OATH BRITAIN'S NOTE WELCOMED (British Official Wireless.) Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright. RUGBY, April 12. (Received April 13, at noon.) Although the Free State Executive Council meets to-morrow a Dublin message says it is unlikely that Mr Thomas’s reply to Mr De Valera's despatch will be examined before Friday. According to the Dublin correspondent of ‘ The Times ’ the friendly tone of the British Government’s Note, with its freedom from any kind of threat, has been welcomed by Irish Free State citizens. Many Free State people are surprised that the oath, which Mr De Valera and his followers in the Free State Parliament themselves have taken describing it in so doing as “ an empty formula,” should be treated as an occasion to precipitate a dispute. In no quarter of the British Press is any sympathy or approval found for Mr De Valera’s action. The ‘ Star ’ (Liberal) says: “Ireland is now no longer an apanage of England, but a member of the Commonweath of Nations. Her old position, lives only in the memory of those who cannot adjust their minds to the facts. Tho only thing, in fact, which binds the commonwealth together is allegiance to the Crown. Mr Do Valera is writing to the wrong address. He thinks lie is trying to break the link with England. He is, in fact, threatening to break the bonds of Empire which bind the Irisiiman in Canada, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand to Ireland itself.” The 1 Evening News ’ refers to the already expressed concern of Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa at the possible consequences of Mr De Valera’s meditated action, and says he probably will be further reminded by them that the Free State helped to frame the Statute of Westminster in which it is laid down that the “ Crown is the symbol of the free association of the members of the British Commonwealth of Nations, and they are united by common allegiance to the Crown.”

The ‘ News ’ adds that all over the Empire the hope will be that Ireland, which has accepted the invitation to the Imperial Economic Conference at Ottawa, will not go there with the intention of tearing itself out of tho family, so becoming no longer entitled to the many and growing boons which membership of the British Commonwealth confers.

BRITISH PRESS COMMENT LONDON, April 12. The newspapers approve of the Government’s reply to Mr De Valera and its firm stand by the treaty. ‘ The Times ’ says; “ The wider questions raised by Mr De Valera’s despatch affect a larger public than the people of Great Britain and Southern Ireland. The Governments of Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa have already expressed concern over the possible consequences of the action contemplated by the Irish Free State, and their anxiety is natural enough. All the dominions, including the Free State, collaborated in framing the Statute of Westminster, in the preamble of which it is expressly declared that the Crown is the symbol of the free association of members of the British Commonwealth of Nations, and they are united by common allegiance to the Crown. It is hardly to be expected that the other members of the Commonwealth will acquiesce in the Free State’s repudiation of the political basis of membership and at the same time stimulate retention of its economic advantages. It is certain that Mr De Valera’s persistence in his present attitude would lead other members of the Commonwealth to invite the Government 1 of the Free State definitely to choose whether it will maintain its present allegiance or accept the status of a foreign Government, with all the implications of that decision. Mr De Valera cannot have it both ways.” The ‘ Daily Herald ’ urges the Empire tribunal which was envisaged at the last Imperial Conference to set to work immediately, and thus avoid a quarrel which would be harmful to both Britain and Ireland. The ‘ Daily Telegraph’s ’ lobbyist says: “Ministerialists agree that the next step in the Irish dispute must be taken by Mr De Valera. Tho firm tone of the British Note is completely approved, and it is recognised that the Government is on solid ground with reference both to the oath and the annuities. The Government is prepared to consider any further representations from Dublin, and it is unlikely that there will be a debate in the House of Commons till after the meeting of the Dail next week.” The ‘News-Chronicle’ says: “Mr Thomas's replies to Mr De Valera are sensible and temperate, the most effective passage being the reminder that the Free State participated in notable constitutional developments by which the position of the dominions as equal members with the United Kingdom of the Commonwealth of Nations has been defined to the world. Mr De Valera’s attempt to represent Ireland as a depressed, oppressed victim of British Imperialism was once true enough, but it will not bear examination now. The clock cannot thus be put back.” ‘ The Times’s ’ correspondent at Dublin expresses the opinion that the friendly tone of the British despatch is welcomed in some quarters; nevertheless, the extreme gravity of the situation is obvious. Cabinet will not consider the British despatch immediately, and may not reply to it until the removal of the oath has been accomplished.

FULL TEXTS OF NOTES

ISSUED BY MR FORBES [Per United Press Association.] WELLINGTON, April 12. The Prime Minister (Mr G. W. Forbes) to-day issued the full texts, received through the Governor-General, of communications between His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom and His Majesty’s Government in the Irish Free State. A despatch received by His Majesty s Government in the United Kingdom from His Majesty’s Government in the Irish Free State, dated April 5, contains the following;— Paragraph 3 begins; “The suggestion in your despatch that the Government of the Irish Free State contemplates acting dishonourably cannot in justice bo let pass. The pages of the history of the relations between Great Britain and Ireland are indeed stained by many broaches of faith, but I must remind you that the guilty party has not/ been Ireland.” Paragraph 4 says: “In justice also I must point out that the observance of the agreement of 1921 has involved no parity of sacrifice as between Great Britain and Ireland. Since it was signed it has cost Britain nothing, but for Ireland tho agreement has meant the consummation of the outrage of partition, and tho alienation of the _ most sacred part of our national territory, with all the cultural and material loss that this unnatural separation entails. British maintenance parties are still in occupation in some of our principal ports, even in the area of the Irish Free State. Our coastal defence is still retained in British hands, and Britain claims the right in times of war or strained relations with a foreign Power, to make demands upon tho Irish Free State, which, if granted, will make our right to neutrality a mockery. This agreement divided the people of the Irish Free State into two hostile camps—those who deemed it their duty to resist and face the consequences and those who deemed it prudent in the national interests temporarily to submit, the latter being placed in the no less cruel position of having apparently to hold the Irish Free State for England with ‘ an economy of English lives,’ to quote from the late Lord Birkenhead’s famous exposition of policy in tho House of Lords, 'To England this agreement gave, peace and added prestige; in the Irish Free State it raised a brother’s hand against brother, gave us ten years of blood and tears, and besmirched the name of the Irish Free State wherever foul propaganda has been able to misrepresent us. During these ten years there has been extracted from us, though in part only as a consequence of the agreement, a financial tribute which, relative to the population, puts a greater burden on the people of the Irish Free State than the burden of war reparation payments on the people of Germany, and, relative to the taxable capacity, a burden ten times as heavy as the burden on the people of Britain of their debt payments to the United States of America.”

Paragraph 6 says: “ With regard to land annuities my Government will be obliged if you will state what is the ‘ formal and explicit undertaking to continue to pay land annuities to the National Debt Commissioners ’ to which you make reference in your despatch. The Government of the Irish Free State is not aware of any such undertaking.”

Paragraph 7 says: “In conclusion, may 1 express my regret that in the statement conveying to the House of Commons the information given to you by our High Commissioner, that part of his message was omitted which assured your Government of the Irish Free State that the relations between the peoples of our respective countries should be friendly. These friendly relations cannot bo established on pretence, but they can be established on the solid foundation of mutual respect and common interest. They would long ago have been thus established had the forces that tend to bring us together not been interfered with by the attempt of one country to dominate the other.”

The despatch from His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom to His Majesty’s Government in the Irish Free State, dated April 9, says, in paragraph 3: “His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom could certainly not accept the sweeping statement in paragraph 3 of your but it feels that nothing is to be gained l by reviving unhappy memories of the past. His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom entered into the 1921 settlement with the single desire that it should end a long period of bitterness between the two countries, and it is its belief that the settlement has brought a measure of peace and contentment which could not have been reached by any other means. Paragraph 6 says: “With regard to laud annuities His Majesty’s Government in the United l Kingdom is at a loss to understand the statement that your Government was not aware of any such ‘ formal and explicit undertaking ’ as was referred to in my despatch of March 23.” Paragraph 7 says: “Land annuities —the formal and explicit undertakings referred to are as follows:—On February 12, 1923, a financial agreement was signed on behalf of the British Government and on behalf of the Government of the Irish Free State, which, inter alia, laid down the policy to be pursued in regard to completed and pending agreements for the purchase of land in the Irish Free State. The first two paragraphs of the agreement read as follows: ‘ (I) The Free State Government undertakes to pay at agreed intervals to an appropriate fund _ the full amount of annuities and due from time to time, making itself responsible for actual collection from the tenant purchasers; (2) security for such payments shall be primarily a Free State guarantee fund similar to that under existing legislation, and, secondly, the central fund of the Irish Free State.’ This undertaking was confirmed in the heads of the ultimate financial settlement between the British Government and the Government of the Irish Free State which was signed on behalf of the British Government and on behalf of the Government of the Irish Free State on March 19, 1926, and discussed in the Dail Eircann on December 8, 1926. The first head of this settlement reads as follows: ‘ The Government of the Irish Free State undertakes to pay to the British Government, at agreed intervals, the full amount of annuities accruing and due from time to time under the Irish Land Acts, 1891 to 1909, without any deduction whatsoever, whether on account of income tax or otherwise.’ ”

THE ANNUITIES

“ The Irish land annuities,” writes a contributor to the ‘ Sydney Morning Herald,’ “ are payments which tenants make in order to repay with interest sums lent to them to enable them to buy their lands. They are debts from one set of individuals (the Irish tenants) to another set of individuals (those who lent purchase money),. The

land annuities arc not, as is sometimes supposed, paid to the British Theasury, but to the National Debt Commissioners, who meet the service of loans. The Irish Free State Government has no _ more claim in equity to these annuities than it has to rent paid by tenants of Oxford street or Pall Mall. As regards tho arrangement between the Irish Free State and Great Britain, one fact is absolutely clear, the Irish Free State has from the beginning paid the annuities to the National Debt Commissioners, and has given most formal and explicit undertakings that it will continue to do so. . . . The formal undertaking of the Free State Government is contained in Article 11. of the Financial Agreement made in order to carry out the treaty. In the financial agreement of February 12, 1923, the Free State Government undertook to pay at agreed interval! to tho appropriate fund the full amount of annuities accruing due from time to time, making itself responsible for tho actual collection from tenant purchasers. Statutory effect to this arrangement was given in section 12 of tho Land Act, 1923 ; of the Irish Free State, which provides that the laud annuities should be paid into a special fund, ‘ and there shall from time to time be paid thereout by the Minister of Finance to the appropriate authority for the credit of the Land Purchase Account or the Irish Land Purchase Fund, as the case may be, an amount equivalent to the purchase annuities.’ IS 1920 ACT RELEVANT? " Mr De Valera, in the statement which he has published, does not put forward any argument to disprove the equity of land annuities continuing to be paid to meet service of Irish land stock, nor does he contest that His Majesty’s Government in the Irish Free State is bound by a formal undertaking. Mr De Valera bases himself on two extremely technical legal arguments. In the first place he contends that under the Government of Ireland Act, 1920, the Government of Northern Ireland had the right to retain land annuities, and that the Irish Free State on its establishment acquired the same right. It is surprising to find Mr De Valera taking the view that the Government of Ireland Act, 1920, has any relevancy to the question. This Act embodies the settlement which Southern Ireland refused to accept, and after a period of unhappy memories the attempt to force the settlement on Southern Ireland was abandoned, and the treaty of 1921 conferred upon tho Irish Free State the status of an autonomous dominion, and not the status of a Government subordinate to the United Kingdom, which the Act of 1920 contemplated. The financial settlement contemplated by tho Act of 1920 was, of course, completely different from the financial settlement which resulted from the treaty. In particular the Government of Ireland . woidd have made a contribution (fixed provisionally at £10,000,000 a year) to the Imperial Government of the United Kingdom. CONTRACTING PARTIES NOT IN DOUBT. " Mr Do Valera’s other argument is that under agreement of December 3, 1925, tho Irish Free State was released from the obligation to assume liability for a proportion of the service of the Public Debt of the United Kingdom and of the payment of war pensions. He argues that the Irish Lands Stock was part of tho Public Debt of the United Kingdom, and that therefore the Irish Free State ceased to be liable to pay over Irish land annuities. This is an attempt to argue from the letter of an agreement without any regard to the substance. It is clear beyond doubt that the parties to the 1925 agreement did not in any way intend to refer to Irish land annuities. Payment of these annuities to the National Debt Commissioners continued without interruption as before, and the undertaking to pay them over was reaffirmed later in the agreement of 1925 quoted above. Merely as a matter of literal interpretation, it is difficult to see how Irish land stock, of which interest is guaranteed by Great Britain, can properly be regarded as part of the British Public Debt. But this argument is really beside the point, since it is perfectly clear that both parties to the agreement intended that payment of Irish land annuities should continue as before, and even if the wording of the agreement had been ambiguous, the interpretation must clearly be settled in accordance with what is known to have been the intention of both parties to it.” __________