March 12, 2015

Toward the Irish Treaty

C.P. Scott reported in his diary that Harold Laski had found Churchill, who had begun negotiating the eventual Irish Treaty, full of threats against Irish extremists, arguing that Britain had utterly broken rebellion in the 16th century, so “why not now with our vastly greater power?” “Yes,” replied Laski, “but the condition of Ireland today is the fruit of our policy then.”

Clementine pressed moderation upon her husband: “Do my darling use your influence now for some sort of moderation or at any rate justice in Ireland. Put yourself in the place of the Irish. If you were ever leader you would not be cowed by severity and certainly not by reprisals which fall like the rain from Heaven upon the Just and upon the Unjust.It always makes me unhappy and disappointed when I see you inclined to take for granted that the rough, iron-fisted `Hunnish’ way will prevail.”

Churchill played a key role in negotiating an acceptable treaty with the Sinn Fein delegates, Arthur Griffith and Michael Collins. Griffith warned the English that although he would sign the treaty there would be great difficulty getting it approved in Ireland. As for Griffiths’s colleague, Churchill later wrote, “Michael Collins rose looking as if he was going to shoot someone, preferably himself. In all my life, I have never seen so much passion and suffering in restraint.”

Basically, the treaty gave Ireland Dominion status similar to that of Canada, Australia and New Zealand. The more radical, led by De Valera, opposed it, demanding complete separation from Britain. The treaty also left the destiny of the six Ulster counties for future resolution. Churchill believed that eventually Ulster would join Southern Ireland but that the decision would have to be Ulster’s.

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Given the responsibility for guiding Irish legislation through the House of Commons, Churchill with his rhetoric was an important factor in winning its acceptance. Speaking of the role of the Irish in British politics and the role of the Irish nation abroad, he told the House: “It is a curious reflection to inquire why Ireland should bulk so largely in our lives. How is it that the great English parties are shaken to their foundations, and even shattered, almost every generation, by contact with Irish affairs? When did Ireland derive its power to drive Mr. Pitt from office, to drag down Mr. Gladstone in the summit of his career and to draw us who sit here almost to the verge of civil war, from which we were only rescued by the outbreak of the Great War? Whence does this mysterious power of Ireland come? It is a small, poor, sparsely populated island, lapped about by British sea power, accessible on every side, without iron or coal. How is it that she sways our councils, shakes our parties, and infects us with great bitterness, convulses our passions, and deranges our action? How is it she has forced generation after generation to stop the whole traffic of the British Empire in order to debate her domestic Affairs? “Ireland is not a daughter State. She is a parent nation. The Irish are an ancient race. `We are too,’ said their plenipotentiaries, `a far-flung nation.’ They are intermingled with the whole life of the Empire, and have interest in every part of the Empire wherever the English language is spoken, especially in these new countries with whom we have to look forward to the greatest friendship and countenance, and where the Irish canker has been at work How often have we suffered in all these generations from this continued hostility? If we can free ourselves from it, if we can to some extent reconcile the spirit of the Irish nation to the British Empire in the same way as Scotland and Wales have been reconciled, then indeed we shall have secured advantages which may well repay the trouble and uncertainties of the present time.” Such was the impact of Churchill’s speech that only about sixty Tories voted against the Irish Treaty in the Commons; but this group formed the nucleus of a potential Conservative revolt against Lloyd George’s leadership of the governing coalition.

Churchill also became Chairman of the Cabinet Committee on Ireland which met regularly throughout December. His activities give credence to the suggestion that he is the founder of the modern Irish State. Churchill left for southern France the day after Christmas, hoping to rest, play and work on his Great War memoirs. Clementine was to join him but she was held at home by the illness of all of her children, a situation which brought about her own collapse. From her bed she wrote, “I wandered in the miserable valley too tired to read much and all the sad events of last year culminating in Marigold passing and re-passing like a stage Army through my sad heart.”

Winston replied, “What changes in a year! What gaps! What a sense of fleeting shadows! But you sweet love and comradeship is a light that burns. The stronger as our brief years pass.”

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