THE IRISH REPUBLIC.

Taranaki Daily News, 17 December 1919, Page 8

THE IRISH REPUBLIC.

MELBOURNE CONVENTION. ; SUPPORT FOR DE VALERA. • | (Published by Arrangement.) Enthusiasm and unanimity characterised the proceedings of the "Australasian Irish Race Convention" which was recently held in Melbourne. Delegates from all parts of Australia' and from New Zealand, included sis archbishops and ten bishops, the central figure being Archbishop Mannix, by whom the convention was called. The chairman was Mr. T. J. Ryan, ex-Premier of Queensland, and, according to Dr. Mannixx, "the prospective Prime Minister of Australia." Press representatives were not admitted, reports of the principal speeches being supplied by officials of the convention. Dr. Mannix said the convention had a declared and definite purpose—to support Ireland's claim as expressed at the last general election in Ireland and to support her chosen leaden Eamon De Valera. This was no time for halting words or balanced phrases. They were with the Irish people or against them. (Cheers). They would help them openly or leave them to their fate. In pleading Ireland's cause they claimed that they were helping to Temove the blackest stain upon the Empire.

AUSTRALIA'S "DEMANDS." England wag equally bound, by every obligation of honor and of gratitude to listen when Australia and New Zealand demanded freedom for Ireland. They fought side by side with England for the Empire, they fought for the freedom of the Belgians and the Poles and the Jugoslavs; but 60,000 Australians and other thousands of New Zealanders did not give their blood and their lives that Ireland's chains might, be more firmly rivetted than ever. They were there to support the policy which the Irish people adopted deliberately, and with striding unanimity at the last general election. For them to attempt to revise that policy or to suggest an alternative would be an impertinence at any time, but especially now, when self-determination—-which was really Sinn Feinism—was on everybody's lips. (Cheers).

Dr. Mannix declared that "every generation in Ireland had its own armed uprising, in which Ireland fell back Wed and exhausted, yet not subdued or repentant, but sullen and expectant of another opportunity and a better day." \ - • "ALL GOOD SINN FEINERS."

! Archbishop Redwood, of New Zealand, moved:—"We, the delegates of the Australasian Irish race convention, assembled in Melbourne, affirm the right of the people of Ireland to choose their own form of government, and to govern their country without interference from any other nation; we endorse Ireland's appeal to the nations for international recognition; and we pledge our support to Ireland's chosen leader, .'Eamofn de Valera."

Archbishop Redwood said that though an Englishman he was on the Irish question, by convietion and sentiment, as Irish as the best Irish themselves. (Cheers). He knew the lamentable story af Ireland's wrongs and woes for many centuries at the hanc\s of the misgovernment of England. By England he meant the Government, not the English people at large. The vast majority of Englishmen had been cratyily and systematically kept in the dark regarding Ireland. They were helpless victims of a false tradition, of accumulated lies, and misrepresentations for centuries. At the , back of the misgoverning gang in England there.had been the venal and corrupt press, misleading the people, and at the same time there had been a suppression of every argument for Ireland's right of self-determination and national independence. All good Australians ought to be Sinn Feiners.

A LEAD FOR NEW ZEALAND. The Rev. Father O'Connor, who claimed to represent a very large body of New Zealanders, said, that the people of the Dotninion had looked to Australia for a lead, and it had on that day been given to them. Is this loyalty to the Empire?