AFTER THE MURDER

Evening Star, Issue 19658, 10 September 1927, Page 21

AFTER THE MURDER

KEVIM C’HIGGIKS’S DEATH MENAGE OF SECRET SOCIETIES Kevin O’Higgins, in hours that ho lay dying, kept his brain perfectly dear; he dictated a will in proper legal form, and when a doctor came in who had been attending his colleague, Mr Desmond Fitzgerald, the dying man’s first word being, “ Hello, how’s , Desmond?” writes Mr Stephen Gwynn, in the ‘Ob server ’). There may have been in that some touch ol the spirit which made the - Norseman say as he looked down on the weapon that was through him,, “These broad spears are greatly in fashion,” But the strain is not the less tine toi being deliberate. ( A great funeral is nothing new in Ireland, but when Parnell died, when Griffith died, when Collius was shot, the mourners were all from the Catholic people, with those relatively few Protestants who had thrown in their lot with Catholic Ireland. This time the Provost ol Trinity College rose Irom a sick bed to attend the ceremony in Westland-row Chapel, and while the office was read, one friend ol mine noted a couple ol priests lending their office-books to the rector and curate of a Protestant church, and another helping the Chief Rabbi to follow the ritual. Among the members of the Dail who marched behind the coffin all classes in the Free State were represented; even fan Orangeman was there. When the Dail reassembled for business ou the day following there was no speechmaking; all had been said before. In reply to an ordinary question, President Cosgravo announced that Mr Blythe would be Vice-President, and that he himself would assume the va cant offices of Justice and External Affairs. There was no emphasis and no applause; in the Press-Gallery one could hardly hear what was said. But that was the President’s answer to assassins; and who asks for a bettor one ?

■ Then, at the end of questions, Mr Johnson, Leader of the Labor Party, the largest section of what may bo called Opposition, announced that, after consultation with the other group leaders, he had decided to let the whole block of Estimates pass unopposed. Ministers, in the face of this catastrophe, should not be asked to make up briefs, he said. Again there was almost a silent assent. But Ireland learnt that if there is a national crisis, the hundred members who sit in the Dail act together to meet it under Mr Cosgrave’s leadership. AN INNER GANG.

Xlie essential difference between Kevin O’Higgins and Mr De Valera, both of whom were revolutionaries, is that the one realised that secret societies were a poison and the other did not. Kevin O’Higgins stated publicly that he had been a member of the 1.R.8., but had renounced his membership directly he became a member of a self-governing Dail. Again, at the time of the mutiny, he insisted mono forcibly than anyone else that secret societies must be stamped out of the Irish Army. Mr De Valera, probably himself not a member of any secret organisation, has more than any other man maintained the mentality in Ireland which surrounds secret, societies with a halo of romantic-patriot-ism.' Yet these. latest murderers have taken the tinsel off that halo.

This crime is probably the work of some inner gang, a law to itself, just as the Invincibles- in .the time of Parnell were distinct alike from the open Land League and from the secret oathbound Fenian Society. I believe that it will bo found somehow connected with the outrage at Spike Island, when a machine-gun was turned on unarmed British troops.' It is political in the same sense that that was—a mere rabid expression of hate. Kevin O’Higgins was known to be a marked man, for he had been vehement in defence of the Free State’s record of executions. Yet if this had been a personal vendetta, the act of some f riend or‘ comrade of Rory O’Connor and his fellows, it would have not been so delayed. It comes after tho elections, at which Sinn Fein, the physical force party, suffered egregious defeat; and at which Mr Do Valera increased his following only to march them up to a blank wall and leave them marking time there. The deed was deferred in the hope that the electorate would wreck the Free State; it was carried out when that hope failed, firstly, to injure the State, as was the Spike Island outrage. In a secondary sense, no doubt it was done to have revenge of Kevin O’Higgins. No roan disputes the success of the plot to injure. The National Loan will cost more to raise; tourist traffic will suffer. The loss will probably reach hundreds of thousands—perhaps half a million. But we all know now that the man wo have lost was worth more than the money—no matter what the figure Yet on the balance I have the feeling that the Free State has been made stronger. Even in his death Kevin O’Higgins has served Ireland as no one else could.