John Redmond's Last Years Part 23

There was a pause of consternation. The Chairman intervened and the debate proceeded, and was carried on through the week. During its course a letter to the Chairman from the Bishop of Ross was circulated to us, most dexterous in exposition, most affecting in the tone of its conclusion. It can be read in the Report of the Convention and it cannot with justice be quoted except at full length--so admirable is the linking of argument. It need only be said here that it was an appeal "to my fellow-Nationalists who have already made great concessions" to yield, for the sake of a settlement, this further point, and that the appeal was signed "from my sick-bed, not far removed from my death-bed."

That eloquent voice and subtle brain could ill be spared from our a.s.sembly: but the letter came too late. It is plain that the writer had no inkling of what would happen till it was actually taking place.

No one can overstate the effect of this episode. Redmond's personal ascendancy in the Convention had become very great. I am certain there was not a man there but would have said, "If there is to be an Irish Parliament, Redmond must be Prime Minister, and his personality will give that Parliament its best possible chance." The Ulstermen had more than once expressed their view that if Home Rule were sure to mean Redmond's rule, their objections to it would be materially lessened.

Now, they saw Redmond thrown over, and by a combination in which the clerical influence, so much distrusted by them, was paramount.

IV

A new stage in the history of the Convention now opens. In the interval between the meeting which began by Redmond's withdrawal of his amendment and that of the following week, Sir Horace Plunkett went to London and laid the situation before the Prime Minister. Redmond had also written to Mr. Lloyd George stating that no progress could be made unless Government would declare its intentions as to legislation. The Chairman came back with the following letter in his pocket:

10 DOWNING STREET,

WHITEHALL, S.W. 1,

_January_ 21, 1918.

DEAR SIR HORACE PLUNKETT,

In our conversation on Sat.u.r.day you told me that the situation in the Convention has now reached a very critical stage. The issues are so grave that I feel the Convention should not come to a definite break without the Government having an opportunity of full consultation with the leaders of the different sections. If, and when, therefore, a point is reached at which the Convention finds that it can make no further progress towards an agreed settlement, I would ask that representatives should be sent to confer with the Cabinet. The Government are agreed and determined that a solution must be found. But they are firmly convinced that the best hope of a settlement lies within the Convention, and they are prepared to do anything in their power to a.s.sist the Convention finally to reach a basis of agreement which would enable a new Irish Const.i.tution to come into operation with the consent of all parties.

Yours sincerely,

D. LLOYD GEORGE.

Before acting on this, Sir Horace Plunkett allowed the debate to continue during two days. Since no movement towards agreement manifested itself, but only evidence of widespread and various divergence, he laid the Prime Minister's invitation before the Convention. There was considerable difference of opinion before a decision was reached for acceptance. Groups separated to select their representatives on the delegation.

It was agreed in private conference that only one view should be presented from the Nationalist side, and that the view of what was at this point clearly the majority. Redmond, in agreeing to act as a delegate, agreed to set aside his own judgment and to press the claim for full fiscal responsibility--which, like other Nationalists, he regarded as in the abstract Ireland's right. But illness prevented him from attending when at last the delegates were received by the Prime Minister on February 13th.

On the 5th he had asked a question in Parliament--the last he was to ask there. It concerned the starting of a factory for the manufacture of aircraft in Dublin--one of the things for which he was pressing in his ceaseless effort to bring Ireland some industrial advantage from the war. I saw him towards the end of that month in his room at the House, and he commented bitterly upon a raid carried out by Sinn Feiners, in which some newly erected buildings were destroyed at one of the aerodromes near Dublin which he had helped to establish. But the main thing he had to say concerned the course of the Convention. Everything, in his judgment, was wrecked; he saw nothing ahead for his country but ruin and chaos.

He spoke of his health. A bout of sickness which had prostrated him at Christmas in Dublin had left him uneasy. He was at the time, I thought, unduly alarmed about himself, and I believed that the continuance of this frame of mind was simply characteristic of a man who had very little experience of ill-health. I left him with profound compa.s.sion for his trouble of spirit, but without any serious apprehension for his state of body.

The Convention rea.s.sembled on February 26th to consider the result of the delegation, which was summed up in a letter from Mr. Lloyd George.

This well-known doc.u.ment begins with a definite pledge of action. On receiving the report of the Convention the Government would give it immediate attention and would "proceed with the least possible delay to submit legislative proposals to Parliament."--The date of this pledge was February 25, 1918.--Mr. Lloyd George pressed, however, for a settlement "in and through the Convention"; and he declared his conviction that "In view of previous attempts at settlement and of the deliberations of the Convention itself, the only hope of agreement lies in a solution which on the one side provides for the unity of Ireland by a single Legislature, with adequate safeguards for the interests of Ulster and of the Southern Unionists, and, on the other, secures the well-being of the Empire and the fundamental unity of the United Kingdom."

Ireland's strong claim to some control of indirect taxation was admitted; but it was laid down that till two years after the war the fixation and collection of customs and excise should be left to the Imperial Parliament: and that at the end of the war a Royal Commission should report on Ireland's contribution to Imperial expenditure and should submit proposals as to the fiscal relations of the two countries.

For the war period, Ireland was to contribute "an agreed proportion of the Imperial expenditure," but was to receive the full proceeds of Irish revenue from customs and excise, less the agreed contribution. The police and postal services were to be reserved also as war services.

These provisions were laid down as essentials. A suggestion was made of an Ulster Committee within the Irish Parliament, having power to modify or veto measures, whether of legislation or administration, in their application to Ulster.

Lastly, Government expressed their willingness to accept and finance the Convention's scheme for land purchase and to give a large grant for urban housing.

The question now before the Convention was whether it should or should not accept this offer, which differed from the Midleton proposals in that it withheld the control of excise as well as of customs, and that it retained control of police and Post Office for the war period. It also adumbrated an Ulster Committee, which had been an unpopular suggestion when put forward in the presentation stages. On the other hand, it offered great material inducements in the proposed expenditure for land purchase and for housing. Some of the County Councillors who had been most vehement in their opposition to the Midleton compromise were now disposed to think this too good an offer to let go, but believed it could be obtained without their taking the responsibility of voting for it. It was necessary to point out that the Irish party could not lower a standard of national demand set up by the Nationalists in the Convention, and that if they did so they would be hooted out of existence.

The main argument of those who advised against acceptance was that Ministers had pledged themselves to act in any case. Let them. We could best help by enunciating our own programme. Then they would know the real facts of the Irish situation. If a majority of the Convention accepted the proposals of the Prime Minister's letter, there was no pledge that the Bill would be on those lines. We needed to keep a bargaining margin in what we put forward. It was even suggested that the Government proposals would be more likely to attract support in Ireland if put forward as a generous offer from a largely Unionist Government than if published as a compromise to which Nationalists had condescended.

Our reply was that the essential thing was to make a beginning with self-government, and that by refusing to accept the Government's offer, on which alone we could combine with an influential Unionist section, we gravely increased the difficulties in the way of carrying Home Rule. If, as we held, the main need was to unite Ireland, the last thing on which we should insist was the concession of complete financial powers. When the lack of those powers began to prove itself injurious to Ireland's material interests, Ireland would certainly become united in a demand for the concession of them; and the history of the British Empire since the loss of America showed that every such demand had been granted to a self-governing State.

At this moment interest centred on the discussion in private councils of Nationalists. The debates in full Convention were animated, but somewhat unreal by comparison. Lord Midleton's motion had been dropped, by consent, for a series of resolutions tabled by Lord MacDonnell which were in substance an acceptance of Government's proposal.

But neither in the private councils nor in the public debates had we Redmond's presence. His illness had grown serious; an operation was necessary; it pa.s.sed over hopefully, and on Tuesday, March 5th, when the debate resumed, Mr. Clancy had a telegram saying that he was practically out of danger.

It was plain in these days that we were nearing a most critical decision, and Nationalist opinion was profoundly uneasy. Many men were drifting back to Redmond's view, and recoiled from the prospect of dividing the Convention once more into its original component parts--Nationalists on the one side, Unionists on the other. It was proposed that on the Wednesday Nationalists should meet and, if possible, concert joint action; if not, determine definitely each to go our own ways; for a painful part of the situation was that all of us had been used to act together, and none now felt himself free of some obligation. This had to be cleared up When we came down to Trinity College that morning, the news met us that Redmond was dead.

The Convention adjourned its work, although time pressed most seriously, till after the interment. Ireland is a country where a public man can always count on a good funeral. The body was brought to Kingstown, and thence by special train to Wexford, where he had expressed the wish to be laid, in the burying-place of his own people and in the town with which he had been most closely a.s.sociated. Hundreds of men came from distant parts to mark their sorrow and respect: what remained of him was carried in long and imposing procession through the streets. Over the grave Mr. Dillon, who had been chosen to succeed him in the chair of the Irish party, spoke eloquent and fitting words. Some day, no doubt, a monument to his memory will be set up in the streets of Wexford, where his great uncle's statue stands, and where will be placed the memorial to his gallant brother, subscribed for from all parts of the kingdom and from all Irish regiments in the Army.

But I say without hesitation that the first and most striking endeavour to put in lasting shape a tribute to John Redmond was made in the Convention, not by great men, but by the ordinary rank and file of Irish Nationalists, who went back from the graveside to the work which his death had interrupted.

Those who had been inclined before to accept his advice--still standing on our minutes--were now more than ever determined to follow it. That advice was not to refuse the hand of friendship which offered itself from men who by alliance with us could take away from the Home Rule demand all sectarian character: who could bring for the first time a great and representative body of Irish landlord opinion and Irish Protestant opinion into line with the opinion of Irish tenants and Irish Catholics. In order to act upon this advice men needed to face a powerful combination of forces and much threatened unpopularity: they had to encounter the hostility of an able and vindictively conducted newspaper; they had to separate themselves politically from the united voice of their own hierarchy; they had to break away from the politician who for many years now had equalled Redmond in his influence in Ireland and surpa.s.sed him in popularity. All of them were representative of const.i.tuents, all were living among those whom they represented; not a man of them but knew he would worsen his personal and political position by what he did. Yet, for that is the true way to state it, they stood to their dead leader's policy.

It needs not to follow out in any detail the steps by which we reached the end of our labours. In the upshot, the Ulster group of nineteen dissented from everything and joined in a report which renewed the demand for part.i.tion. The Primate and the Provost signed a separate note declaring that a Federal Scheme based on the Swiss or Canadian system offered the only solution which could avoid the alternative choice between the coercion of Ulster and the part.i.tion of Ireland. The remaining members, sixty-six in all, accepted one common scheme.[14]

Their number included ten Southern Unionists, five Labour representatives (three of whom were Protestant artisans from Belfast), with Lords Granard, MacDonnell and Dunraven, Sir Bertram Windle and the representatives of the Dublin and Cork Chambers of Commerce.

The scheme on which we concurred recommended the immediate establishment of self-government by an Irish Ministry responsible to a Parliament consisting of two Houses, composed on highly artificial lines. For a period of fifteen years Southern Unionists were to be represented by nominated members, while Ulster was to have extra members elected by special const.i.tuencies representing commercial and agricultural interests. The Parliament was to have full control of internal legislation, administration and direct taxation. The fixation of customs and excise was to be from Westminster, but the proceeds of these taxes to be paid into the Irish Exchequer. There was to be a contribution to the cost of Imperial defences, and representation at Westminster, but a representation of the Irish Parliament rather than of the const.i.tuencies. All of this was agreed to at our last meeting, and nothing could have been more pleasant than the atmosphere of good will which prevailed. But this was after a critical division--the most critical in which I have ever voted--in which those of us Nationalists who were for accepting the Government proposals voted with the Southern Unionists and those who were against with the Ulster group. The combination of Ulstermen and extreme Nationalists was thirty-four strong; those who adopted Redmond's policy and Lord Midleton's were thirty-eight. We had in our lobby sixteen of the Nationalist County and Urban Councillors; they had eleven.

If that vote had gone otherwise, we were told plainly that the Southern Unionists would be no parties to the rest of the compromise. They were willing to recommend self-government only if the Convention recommended the reservation of customs to the Imperial Parliament. This point had become in their minds important even more as a symbol of the close union between the two kingdoms than by reason of the economic advantages which they attributed to it.

Once the sticking-point was pa.s.sed, the divided Nationalists recombined, and we were all at one in our mutual felicitations on the harmony which prevailed at the close. But as one of our rank and file said in my ear, "If we had not given the vote we did, where would be all this talk of harmony? And mind you now, it was not easy to give it."

He was right, and within six months it cost him the chairmanship of his County Council. Others paid the same penalty, I am sure, without grudging it, for most of us were prouder of that action than of any other in our political lives. It may be well to set down the names of the local representatives and Labour men who voted as Redmond would have advised on that first crucial division.

They were: W. Broderick, Youghal Urban Council; J.J. Coen, Westmeath County Council; D. Condren, Wicklow County Council; J. Dooly, Kings County County Council; Captain Doran, Louth County Council; T. Fallon, Leitrim County Council; J. Fitzgibbon, Roscommon County Council; Captain Gwynn, Irish Party; T. Halligan, Meath County Council; W. Kavanagh, Carlow County Council; J. McCarron, Labour; M. McDonogh, Galway Urban Council; J. McDonnell, Galway County Council; C. McKay, Labour; J.

Murphy, Labour; J. O'Dowd, Sligo County Council; C.P. O'Neill, Pembroke Urban Council; Dr. O'Sullivan, Mayor of Waterford; T. Power, Waterford County Council; Sir S.B. Quin, Mayor of Limerick; D. Reilly, Cavan County Council; M. Slattery, Tipperary (S. Riding); H.T. Whitley, Labour.[15]

In so far as we were led by anyone, Mr. Clancy, fulfilling in public what he had privately spoken, was our leader and spokesman.

We were along with the Southern Unionists and our natural allies, Lords Granard and MacDonnell and Sir Bertram Windle. Archbishop Bernard and Dr. Mahaffy voted with us in that pinch, so that both the late Provost of Trinity and the present one did their part to secure an agreement.

In the other list, the Archbishop of Armagh and the Moderator were grouped with the Archbishop of Cashel and the Bishops of Raphoe and Down and Connor; the Lord Mayor of Cork and Lord Mayor of Belfast were together; Mr. Devlin was with Mr. Barrie. This list represented no unity except a common refusal to agree to any compromise. Those who voted in it followed one or other of two trains of cogent reasoning; but the reasonings led to opposite conclusions. These men were beyond doubt as honest in their convictions as those who went the other way; but they took the easier course, whether they were Nationalist or Unionist: they swam with the tide.

The troubles which Nationalists brought on themselves by supporting Lord Midleton were answered by the troubles which his group met for supporting Nationalist demands. The men who refused to make the compromise possible have the laugh of us. Neither section of us who voted for agreement achieved anything by facing the risk of unpopularity. We had followed Redmond's policy and we shared Redmond's fate. We had done our best to help the British Government and that Government itself defeated us.

By the Prime Minister's letter Government was pledged to legislate for the better government of Ireland, not upon condition of our reaching substantial agreement, but in any event. Yet the letter emphasized the "urgent importance of getting a settlement in and through the Convention." We had secured a report for a scheme in which sixty-six out of eighty-seven concurred in the broad lines; and of the twenty-one dissentients, nineteen were a group sent to the a.s.sembly with a pledge which they construed as giving them a special position, in that no legislation affecting them was to be pa.s.sed without their concurrence.

The agreement which we had reached enabled the Government, when it undertook legislation, to quote Unionist authority on the one hand and Nationalist authority on the other for many wise provisions which otherwise a Coalition Ministry might have found it most difficult to propose.

But no legislation followed. Once more an Irish issue became involved in the wheels of the English political machine.

We have ourselves in part to thank for it. We might in January have taken Redmond's advice, and Lord Midleton's declared view that legislation would follow might have proved correct. Yet, what use are might-have-beens? History is concerned with what happened, and our work in the Convention dragged itself on till the great German offensive had been launched and the Allied line pushed back to the very gates of Paris, and Government was at its wits' end for men. It is hard to blame a Ministry for what harm was done in the frantic rush to cope with perhaps the most critical instant in all history; but what was done produced infinite mischief and no good result. Immediately after the Convention's report (signed upon April 8th) had been received, Government proposed to apply conscription to Ireland.

It is said, and it is not difficult to believe, that without making this proposal they dare not have come upon the British people with so extreme demands for compulsory service as were made. But by making it Ministers tore up and scattered in fragments whatever results the Convention had to show for its labours, and by legislating for conscription in Ireland they gained not one man. The proposal, as Redmond had always told them, proved impossible to carry out.

I do not believe that if Redmond had lived this would ever have happened. His record in the war gave him an authority in Parliament which no other Irishman could possibly claim. It would have been impossible for Mr. Lloyd George to take such a step without giving him notice; and once that notice came, Redmond could have insisted upon the significance of the report of the Convention's sub-committee on questions of defence. This committee consisted of two civilians and three soldiers. Lord Desart, a Unionist, was in the chair; Mr. Powell, K.C., a Unionist (afterwards Irish Solicitor-General and now a judge), was the other civilian; the soldiers were the Duke of Abercorn, an Ulster Covenanter, with Captain Doran and myself, Nationalists from the Sixteenth Division. We found unanimously that if an Irish Parliament existed, whatever might be the claims of the Imperial authority, it would be impracticable to impose conscription without the Irish Parliament's consent. This unanimous finding was bound to influence the view of any Ministry, no matter how hard pressed. But, as debate revealed, Mr. Lloyd George had never heard of it.

I believe that Redmond could have persuaded Mr. Lloyd George to adopt in April the course on which--but after the harm was done--he fell back in June, when Lord French asked for a large, but limited, number of recruits to refill the Irish Divisions within a specified time--at the end of which time, failing the production of the volunteers, other measures must be taken. Here, however, we are back in the region of speculation. Conscription was proposed and anarchy let loose in Ireland.

Redmond's words, "Better for us never to have met than to have met and failed," stand as the final sentence on this notable episode in Irish history.

That is the Convention's epitaph as, I think, he would have written it.