The Sun 42 Wyndham Street, Auckland, N.Z. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 17, 1927. IRELAND IN THE MELTING-POT

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 152, 17 September 1927, Page 8

The Sun 42 Wyndham Street, Auckland, N.Z. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 17, 1927. IRELAND IN THE MELTING-POT

IRELAND to-day is in the melting-pot of politics, and not until the result of the general elections is made known will it be possible to say whether the country’s domestic distraction is to continue or Ireland is to enter upon an era of political peace. The friends qf Ireland the world over —and the Irish have no enemies, unless it be themselves—wish her most fervently a happy issue from her troubles. Since the murder of Mr. O’Higgins, who was the right-hand of the Government, there has apparently been a very decided accentuation of the movement away from Fianna Fail, the party led by Eamonn De Valera, that stormy bird who flies from rock to rock in the Irish political sea, and whose peculiarities have exhausted the patience of even erstwhile warm supporters. De Valera, though elected to the Dail, refused to take the oath, in company with the elected of his followers. Then, hoping to wreck the Government, they forsook their “fixed determination” and took their seats in Parliament in the routine way. But when they repeated the oath, they stated that they did it merely as an “empty political formula.” The New York “Evening Post,” in a biting comment on this casuistry, remarked that “a little thing like perjury” was evidently of no consequence to De Valera.

But, as the Boston “Transcript” observed, the entry of the De Valeraites into parliamentary status was a good thing, for it brought everybody out into the open. And the test was almost immediate, for there was an attempt by the combined De Valera and Labour forces to overthrow the Government. It was defeated only by the casting vote of the Speaker—too close a call to be pleasant. But the Government was quickly heartened by winning two by-elections by overwhelming majorities. Realising that public opinion—horrified by the O’Higgins murder, and disgusted by the attitude of the De Valeraites in regard to the oath of allegiance, which was condemned from many pulpits—had swung in its favour, it played a trump card by dissolving Parliament and appealing to the electors. It is for that judgment that the Cosgrave Government is now confidently waiting.

The chief cry of the De Valeraites is against the Public Safety Act. But harsh as may appear some of the provisions of this measure, it was really legislation of their own making, for they had provoked the lawlessness which threatened to turn Ireland into a shambles, and which indirectly, at least, led to the assassination of O’Higgins. Now they rail against this “exasperating act of coercion”-—and say they have become good Constitutionalists—with never a word about their former threat to “wade through Irish blood” to scrap the Treaty. But, as “The New Statesman” says, whatever may be the qualifications of De Valera as an agitator, “he is a hopelessly maladroit politician, and Fianna Fail under his control gives the impression of running blindly in circles.” The hopes of Ireland depend on this election, for she sadly needs peace for the restoration of her lost prosperity. Let it not he forgotten that after the fifth century, Ireland, formerly pagan and warlike, advanced so rapidly in learning and culture, and sent so many erudite missionaries abroad, that she became known as the “Island of Saints and Scholars,” and that civilisation owes her much. England has granted Ireland tardy justice but her future is now in her own hands. May the electors of the Free State return a stable Government, pledged to the Empire and to law and order, and there will follow a united and a happier Ireland.