The Evolution of Sinn Fein Part 6

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 att.i.tude 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 a.s.sociate, 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 circ.u.mstances 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 const.i.tuencies, 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 const.i.tutional 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 a.s.sertion 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 att.i.tude 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 att.i.tude 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 a.s.sertion 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 a.s.sertion that all nations have a just claim to independence is like the a.s.sertion 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 const.i.tuted, to acknowledge the independence of Ireland is out of the question: if it were reconst.i.tuted 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.