IRISH QUESTIONS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22955, 5 February 1938, Page 14

IRISH QUESTIONS

It seems probable that the outcome of discussions between British and Irish Free State Ministers will be an amicable settlement of some matters in dispute. If the forecast of results be correct, the economic war will be ended and the trouble over the Free State land annuities, the wrongful interception of which by Mr. de Valera was the cause of the economic war, will also cease. A reciprocal trade agreement, on a wider scale, is indicated as a positive achievement in this connection. So far,, the prospective is satisfactory. About other things it is not so promising. Differences on the subjects of defence and constitutional principle are not so easily removed, foe they involve the interests of the whole British Commonwealth, whereas the land annuities, the economic war and the reciprocal trade agreement displacing it ai-e matters between Britain and the Free State. If the British Government has accepted a compromise on defence, this should be subject to endorsement by other self-governing units of the Empire. That is conceivably possible. But there can be no compromise on the constitutional questions. About these, Northern Ireland is particularly concerned. They affect fealty to the Crown, a fundamental con-sidei-ation to Northern Ireland. Unless Mr. de Valera is prepared to reverse every action he has taken to sever the constitutional bond, his hope of a reunited Ireland cannot be fulfilled. Further, as his subversive policy violates also the principle •of a shared citizenship in the Empire, the change he contemplates in creating an Irish Republic, wholly self-contained and independent, is in crucial respects one to which the Dominions are bound to raise objection. They have no right, indeed, any more than has the Irish Free State, to destroy the integrity of the British Commonwealth.