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November 6, 2000
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ON Sunday, November 19, 1950 the Ard Fheis of Sinn Féin was held at An Ard Oifig, 9 Parnell Square, Dublin in the large front room on the first floor.
More than seventy delegates attended, An t-Éireannach Aontaithe/The United Irishman reported in its issue of December fifty years ago.
The dominant note in the assembly was one of satisfaction with the progress made during the previous twelve months and of hope and confidence in the continued development of the organisation.
Margaret Buckley stepped down as President, having served in that capacity for 13 years – since 1937. The incoming President was Pádraig Mac Lógáin of Portlaoise, a northern Republican who was among those "excluded" from the Six Counties by the new puppet administration there in 1923 following the original Partition of Ireland.
Born near Markethill in South Armagh in 1899, Pádraig joined the Irish Volunteers in 1914. He was on hunger strike in Mountjoy Jail with Thomas Ashe and Seán Treacy in 1917.
Later he was officer in charge of North Antrim and operated an active service unit in North Down. He was captured and imprisoned in Belfast Jail under the name "Patrick McLoughlin" while British forces searched for him outside as he was wanted on a capital charge.
During the Free State War he was imprisoned in Newbridge. From 1933 to 1938 he was a Republican abstentionist TD for South Armagh and was Chairman of the short-lived political wing of the IRA, Cumann Poblachta na h-Éireann 1936-37. He was interned at the Curragh 1940-41.
A more extended account of his life-long service to his death in 1964 can be read in The IRA in the Twilight Years 1923-48 pages 875-6-7.
To return to the Ard Fheis of 1950, Margaret Buckley in her address "gave a brilliant résumé of the history of the organisation from its formation in 1907 (sic), tracing its progress through the Rising of 1916 -- sometimes called the Sinn Féin Rebellion -- to its re-formation on more definite Republican lines in 1917 and arriving at its apex in the 1918 election and the formation of the Republican Parliament and Government in 1919".
Her address received wholehearted applause from the delegates and was later issued in pamphlet form under the title "Mrs Buckley’s Short History of Sinn Féin". For many years it was essential reading in the political education of Republican Sinn Féin members.
The Secretary’s report stated that many new Cumainn had been affiliated since 1949, twenty of these being in the Six Counties. An Ulster organising committee had been set up to co-ordinate and direct the activities of Cumainn in the province. With the aid of this committee it was expected that the rate of progress made would be maintained and even accelerated.
The success of the Ulster Committee encouraged the Standing Committee (later known as An Ard Chomhairle) to set up a similar one for Munster and that was gradually getting to work and had already established two new Cumainn.
It was expected that Connacht and Leinster would be co-ordinated in the same way. This method of organising was aimed at producing a strong sense of mutual support and co-operation between neighbouring Cumainn and thus promote a more active and virile organisation.
This idea also underlay one of the principal resolutions adopted by the Ard-Fheis, that dealing with the changing of the constitution of the Standing Committee.
Up to then the Standing Committee consisted of the Officer Board, Resident Standing Committee (i.e. Dublin based) and provincial representatives (who were expected to attend only quarterly meetings).
It was felt that this arrangement did not give adequate scope to the provinces to voice their opinions and cast votes on general policy.
To remedy this situation the resolution proposed to abolish both the Resident Standing Committee and provincial representatives and to substitute a Standing Committee (Ard-Chomhairle) to be chosen from all over the country.
This proposal was adopted and the incoming Officer Board elected was as follows:
President: Pádraig Mac Logáin (Portlaoise); Vice Presidents: Tomás Ó Dubhghaill agus Éamonn Ó Gargáin (Áth Cliath) ; Hon. Treasurers: Rita Mac Sweeney and Ella May Woods (Áth Cliath) ; Hon. Secretaries; Anthony Magan and Seán Kearney (Áth Cliath).
The Standing Committee elected were: Margaret Buckley (Dublin), Pat McCormack (Antrim); Joe McGurk (Belfast) ; Larry Grogan (Drogheda); Paddy McGlynn (Dublin); Gearóid Ó Broin (Áth Cliath); Caoimhín Mac Cathmhaoil (Muigheó) agus Críostóir Ó Néill (Áth Cliath) .
In addition there was a complete overhaul of the main provisions of the Constitution which had been unchanged since 1917 when Sinn Féin became a definite Republican organisation.
In particular the following passage was inserted up front: "The Organisation is based on the following fundamental principles:
These basic principles on which the Organisation would stand from 1950 onwards were (a) that all Irish people owed loyalty to the All-Ireland Republic of 1916 and (b) that the unity and sovereignty of that Republic could not be given away and were not matters for decision.
Of course the Treaty of Surrender of 1921 denied these two principles. In recent times the Stormont Agreement also did so.
Both instruments sought to have Irish people give allegiance to the 26-County State and to the Six County Statelet under British rule. They claimed to give away the unity and sovereignty of Ireland and in the case of the Stormont Agreement to put such for decision in concurrent referendums on both sides of the British-imposed Border under threat of continuing war.
In other countries such action is stigmatised as "treason" or "treachery". Under the new provisions, loyalty to the 32-County Republic and the sovereignty and unity of Ireland were absolutes. One could not deny these principles and remain a member of Sinn Féin.
Another of the resolutions on the Clár referred to the censorship of Sinn Féin or Republican information by the Dublin daily papers. Many speakers rose to support this motion and referred to the deliberate campaign carried out by the Irish Press and Irish Independent to suppress or misrepresent the views of Republicans.
This allegation was given additional point by the fact that a statement issued by the Organisation on the South Armagh by-election then current was referred to in part by the ‘Independent’ but completely ignored by the ‘Press’ although each carried an advertisement saying that the statement was being submitted for publication.
The Sinn Féin statement sought to clarify the Republican attitude to the by-election. They were debarred from the contest because candidates were required to sign a declaration that they would sit in Stormont if elected.
One of the candidates sought to sit in Stormont. The other was publicly pledged not to enter Stormont but was prepared to seek admission to Leinster House if elected.
Sinn Féin itself could not contest and it would not support either of the candidates. It was the intention of Sinn Féin to hold a series of public meetings throughout the constituency to elaborate on the stand adopted by Republicans.
Another Ard-Fheis was held Dublin about the same time -- that of the Anti-Partition Association. Stormont Senator McNally, a former Republican prisoner, condemned 26-County political parties for trying to organise north of the Border.
The organisation of nationalists should be left to the anti-partitionists in the North, he said. At the same time he said that any possible outbreak of military force must come from whatever government was in power in the 26 Counties.
An t-Éireannach Aontaithe called this an extraordinary statement since all parties in Leinster House had declared that force would not be used. Or perhaps he would like the Northern Nationalists to do the organising and the Southerners to do the fighting? If so, he is also very mistaken, it went on, for when the time comes for fighting the true Republicans in the North will be fighting hand in hand with their Southern brethren and neither Mr McNally and his anti-partitionist politicians nor the Free State Government would take part.
Joe Connellan, Stormont MP for South Down thought the solution lay in admitting Nationalist MPs to Leinster House. Apparently he was convinced, the Republican journal thought, that attendance at Westminster and Stormont was a waste of time.
"As long as Nationalist MPs have been at Westminster and Stormont, their Southern counterparts have been at Leinster House and have not advanced one step nearer to a solution".
If he would only have remembered this he might have been convinced that the solution might be found in a policy that ignored Leinster House, Stormont and Westminster.
After his election as Chairman, Mr PT O’Reilly, said he hoped the government of the 26 Counties would "take steps to have 250,000 men ready to act in the final demand for unity and freedom".
What a hope! remarked An t-Éireannach Aontaithe. He must have been listening to the wilder statements of Irish politicians in America. The meeting ended without a solution, without a policy, without a hope, concluded the Republican organ. But the reality was that since Easter 1949 many young men had joined the FCA in the hope that the 26-County government would move. They wanted to be ready for that day.
In time, some of the more sincere of them would join the Irish Republican Army and actually take part in the 1956-62 campaign.
Another Ard-Fheis held about the same time was that of Fianna Fáil, still led by Mr de Valera. There was the usual pious demand for complete sovereignty over the 32 Counties.
The resolution was passed unanimously. The delegates then went home quietly satisfied that they had done their part. The Coalition Administration was roundly condemned for allowing British and American troops to take photographs and make a general survey of the Irish Coastline.
It was also condemned for its lack of policy in the then world crisis, for its attitude to the Irish language and for all the evils it inherited from Fianna Fáil.
De Valera made it clear "that the total responsibility for national action on Partition must necessarily remain the responsibility" of the 26-County Administration.
His sole interest in joining the Mansion House Committee on Partition and in continuing on it "was to supervise the expenditure of the funds collected".
The Republican paper summed up by saying that in opposition Mr de Valera would do exactly what he did while in office – nothing. But still that bus left Enniskillen loaded with young men once a week. It picked up others in Lisnaskea and other places en route across the Border to Clones, Co. Monaghan.
There in the FCA building they put on uniforms, were issued with rifles and did their military training.
What would happen when these young men discovered at last that they were being fooled? What would they do then?
(More next month . Refs. The IRA in the Twilight Years 1923-48 by Uinseann Mac Eoin and An t-Éireannach Aontaithe/The United Irishman, December 1950.)
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Web layout by SAOIRSE -- Irish Freedom November 6, 2000 Send links, events notifications, articles, comments etc, to the editor at: saoirse@iol.ie marked "attention web-editor". |