John O'Connor Power, Charles Stewart Parnell and the Centralisation of Popular Politics in Ireland

Irish Historical Studies Publications Ltd

John O'Connor Power, Charles Stewart Parnell and the Centralisation of Popular Politics inIrelandAuthor(s): Donald JordanSource: Irish Historical Studies, Vol. 25, No. 97 (May, 1986), pp. 46-66Published by: Irish Historical Studies Publications LtdStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/30008589 .

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Irish Historical Studies, xxv, no. 97 (May 1986)

John O'Connor Power, Charles Stewart Pamell and the centralisation of popular politics

in Ireland

In historical treatment, as was the case in life, John O'Connor Power has

been overshadowed by Charles Stewart Pamell, his political nemesis who campaigned successfully to destroy Power's influence. However during the decade 1874-84, Power was the most enigmatic, controversial and divisive figure in Irish politics. His fellow parliamentarian T. P. O'Connor called him 'one of the few [Irish M.P.s] who stood out from the ruck of Irish placehunters' , whose 'profound knowledge, his temper ...his profound contempt for ignorance and, as he thought, at the same time the insanity of Pamell ... made ... him a source of division' . O'Connor described him as having 'a powerful but very ugly face, the ugliness accentuated by the marks of a severe attack in childhood of smallpox' .1 Tim Healy remembered him as 'reeking of the common clay' and remarked that 'Pamell's aristocratic sensitiveness recoiled' in Power's presence.2 In addition, Pamell was contemptuous of Power's petty jealousies and outbursts of temper, as well as his inability to resist the lure of upper-class London society. Although they worked closely together at Westminster from 1875 to 1880, their disdain for each other was never far below the surface. At their first meeting Power dismissed Pamell as a 'mediocrity'; in 1878 Pamell called Power to his face a 'damned scoundrel* , to which Power made, in Hea- ly's phrase, a 'coarse reply' .3

This personal animosity highlighted a feud between Power and Parnell that was rooted in profound political differences over the direction and control of the Irish parliamentary party and the land movement. The issues dividing Pamell and Power were fundamental ones that were to determine the direction of Irish political life. Power was politically and culturally the representative of local initiative in Irish politics. He was heir to the tradition of the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century secret societies, the local committees of the Catholic Associa- tion of the 1820s and the post-Famine farmers' associations, all of which operated independently of central direction. These associations tended to respond to short- term economic depressions or local injustices rather than out of a belief in the fundamental injustices of the economic and political system that could only

^.P. O'Connor, Memoirs of an old parliamentarian (2 vols, London, 1929), i, 82-5. 2T.M. Healy, Letters and leaders of my day (2 vols, London, [1928]), i, 65. 3Ibid.; R. B. O'Brien, The life of Charles Stewart Pamell, 1846-1891 (2 vols, Lon-

don and New York, 1898), i, 75.

46



Jordan — John O'Connor Power 47

be dealt with on a national level. The wave of national feeling during the 1870s widened the horizons of many local political activists but did not nullify their fidelity to local initiative and responsibility. Power exemplified this provincial spirit: an ardent nationalist who believed that the ills of Irish society could only be countered by a national movement, but one that was responsive to the perceptions and priorities of the localities. His political career, especially the changes of direction that were labelled traitorous by his numerous enemies, appears to have been guided by his respect for the wishes of his constituents. As understood by Power, they were interested in the possible, in pursuing concrete reform of specific grievances, even if doing so meant pushing aside the sacredly held principles of pure nationalism. Accordingly, Power was a leading figure in the 'new departure' of the 1870s through which Fenians and parliamentarians could jointly participate in a movement for land reform. He was the first M.P. to support the land agitation in 1878 and was an early supporter of an alliance between Irish home rulers and the liberal party of Gladstone. Eventually Pamell adopted all of these policies on his way to becoming the 'uncrowned king of Ireland' but he sacrificed Power along the way.

Pamell, the masterful Wicklow gentleman, was a product of a different political tradition. He was heir to the organisational principles, if not the tactics, of the United Irishmen, the Young Irelanders and the Irish Republican Brotherhood (Fenians), all organisations whose leaders had little patience for the narrow political horizons of rural Ireland. As with his predecessors, Pamell sought to impose a political programme on his fellow countrymen. But whereas the earlier nationalist leaders were often motivated by fidelity to the cause of Irish nationality, Pamell confused principle with personal power. Parnell's triumph over Power, his first major rival for leadership of the advanced wing of the Irish parliamentary party, marked a decisive step in the transformation of the party and the nationalist movement into one in which loyalty to the 'chief was the first principle.

I

John O'Connor Power was bom in 1846 at Ballinasloe, County Galway, quite likely the illegitimate son of a policeman, and most certainly in very poor circumstances.4 Part of his childhood was spent in the Ballinasloe workhouse, which may have been where he contracted smallpox, the disease of the poor, which disfigured him for life. At the age of fifteen he moved to Rochdale, Lancashire, where he lived with relatives, assisting in their house- painting trade. Like many other Irish youths in Lancashire, including his boyhood acquaintance Michael Davitt, Power joined the Irish Republican Brotherhood and was soon engaged as an organiser, travelling around England and Scotland to enrol new members. In Febmary 1867 he took part in the thwarted attempt

4Brief biographical sketches of Power appear in O'Connor, Memoirs, i, 82-5; T. W. Moody, Davitt and Irish revolution, 1846-82 (Oxford, 1981), pp 47-50; William O'Brien and Desmond Ryan (eds), Devoy's post bag, 1871-1928 (2 vols, Dublin, 1948, 1953), i, 74-6; Michael MacDonagh, The home rule movement (Dublin and London, 1920), pp 30-32. The last named book was written, it was claimed, with access to Power's personal papers, which have since disappeared.



48 Irish Historical Studies

to raid Chester Castle for arms, and seven months later was in Manchester for the daring but ill-fated rescue of Colonel Thomas J. Kelly and Captain Timothy Deasy, during which a policeman was killed. Late in 1867 he travelled to America, apparently to discuss the reorganisation of the I.R.B. with American Fenians.5 He returned in January 1868 bearing with him, according to Superintendent Daniel Ryan of the Dublin Metropolitan Police, orders to establish I.R.B. councils in each Irish province and in England.6 Power took an active role in setting up the supreme council of the I.R.B. and, after five months of imprisonment from Febmary to July 1868 under the suspension of habeas corpus, became an active and influential member of the council.

The failure of the 1867 rising and the 'monstrous brutality' of the explosion outside Clerkenweil prison in December 1867, in which twelve innocent people were killed in a Fenian escape attempt, sobered many Fenian leaders who reluc- tantly concluded that the political conditions for a successful rebellion were not at hand.7 In Power's view, this political impasse could be surmounted through qualified co-operation with a rejuvenated constitutional nationalist movement. Compelled by what he later called the 'hard necessities of Ireland's pros- trate condition' , Power led the supreme council towards an accommodation with the parliamentary nationalists, becoming, in Davitt's words, the first 'old Fenian' to do so.8

Power claimed later that during the winter of 1868-9 he approached George Henry Moore, home-rule M.P. for Mayo, with a proposal for co-operation between the insurrectional and constitutional wings of Irish nationalism.9 Dur- ing the mid-1860s Moore had established apparently close ties with the Fenian leadership and may actually have taken the oath of membership in the I.R.B.10 In 1868 this widely-respected veteran politician had been coaxed out of retire- ment by several Mayo clergymen and was returned unopposed to the house of commons. He was an ideal man to place at the head of the new departure that Power proposed, but his death in April 1870 left the path to leadership open to the more moderate Isaac Butt. Accordingly, Power threw his support to Butt and persuaded other Fenians to do likewise.11

In 1873 Power gave qualified Fenian support to Butt's Home Rule League and at the home-rule conference in November he declared himself 'anxious to avail ... of the opportunity ... to identify ... publicly with the principles of self-government for Ireland' .12 At the conference Power seconded, in a

5Moody, Davin, p. 49. 6Abstract of cases of persons arrested under the habeas corpus suspension act, 17

February 1866, iii, 29 (S.P.O., C.S.O., Irish crimes records). 7The Clerkenweil explosion was condemned in the first 'message' from the new

supreme council of the I.R.B. in April 1868 (T.W. Moody and Leon 6 Broin (eds), The I.R.B. supreme council, 1868-78' in I.H.S., xix, no. 75 (Mar. 1975), pp 301-2).

8Michael Davitt to R. B. O'Brien, 6 Dec. 1893 (T.C.D., Davitt papers, MS 9377/1063).

9MacDonagh, Home rule movement, pp 115-16. 10David Thomley, Isaac Butt and home rule (London, 1964), pp 42, 44, 55, 89-91. 11T.W. Moody, 'John O'Connor Power, 1846-1919: a forgotten Irish leader' (paper

read before the Irish Historical Society in Trinity College, Dublin, 13 Dec. 1977; typescript probably in T.C.D., Moody papers, unsorted).

freeman's Journal (hereafter F.J.), 18 Nov. 1873; Thomley, Isaac Butt, pp 160-62; William O'Brien, Recollections (New York and London, 1905), pp 139-41.




lengthy address, a resolution calling on Irish M.P.s to take counsel regularly with 'a great national conference to be called in such a manner as to represent the opinions and feelings of the Irish nation' and to 'render to their constituents an account of their stewardship' at the close of each parliamentary session. According to Power, 'Ireland has been powerless because she has not been able to watch her representatives' and keep them true to the principles of Irish nationalism.13 He assured the delegates that this experiment with constitu- tionality would fail without Irish members who would raise the 'stern voice of justice' or if that voice was 'drowned in the clamours of bigotry' of English parliamentary leaders. Should it fail, he warned, 'the Irish people will conclude — and it is the only logical conclusion — that, while nothing can be expected from England through a sense of justice, a great deal can be wrung from her fears' .14 This policy of limited support for the activities of the Home Rule League was embodied in the I.R.B. constitution of March 1873.15

In a move symbolic of the alliance of constitutional and revolutionary nationalists, Power announced in January 1874 his intention to stand for parliament for County Mayo. He declared in his election address that he was doing so 'in response to the call of the nationalists of your noble county, and in accor- dance with the expressed wishes of many of the leaders of the home rule movement' .16 Moreover, Power announced that if elected he would take the required oath of allegiance to the queen and take his seat, even though this act would violate traditional Fenian principles. This action by Power was to become the most serious test of the Fenian-home-rule connexion.

The political situation in Mayo was ripe for Power's challenge. During the 1860s and 1870s political power came to rest in the hands of those who were profiting the most from the establishment in Mayo of a market-oriented livestock economy. After the famine of 1846-50, the number of acres in Mayo devoted to livestock grazing rose along with the price of beef on the English market. The chief beneficiaries of this buoyant economy were large-scale cattle graziers and the merchants and tradesmen who supplied them with goods and services. Together they mounted a successful challenge to the political power of the landed elite and the catholic clergy.17 Moreover, the expansion into Mayo of a livestock-oriented market economy during the 1850s and 1860s gradually created an environment conducive to radical political activity centring upon demands for land reform. Western-based Fenians, especially those in counties Galway and Mayo, took the lead in bringing their radical tradition and organisational experience to the inchoate agrarian movement. Mayo's Fenians found fertile ground for recruitment among the artisans, agricultural labourers and

nF.J., 21 Nov. 1873. 14Ibid., 19 Nov. 1873. 15Moody 8l 6 Broin, 'The I.R.B. supreme council' , p. 314. 16 16F.J., 31 Jan. 1874. 17Donald Jordan, 'Merchants, "strong farmers" and Fenians: the post-Famine

political glite and the Irish land war' in T.H. Aston and C.H.E. Philpin (eds), JVa- tionalism and popular protest in Ireland (Cambridge, 1987), forthcoming; K. Theodore Hoppen, 'National politics and local realities in mid-nineteenth century Ireland' in Art Cosgrove and Donal McCartney (eds), Studies in Irish history presented to R. Dudley Edwards (Dublin, 1979), pp 190-93; J.H. Whyte, 'Landlord influence at elections in Ireland, 1760-1885' in English Historical Review, Ixxx (1965), pp 740-55.




small farmers of the county, especially those located in and on the outskirts of the rich grazing land in central Mayo, where the social disparities associated with the growth of a grazier-retailer economy were greatest.18 By the 1870s Mayo was, in the opinion of New York-based Fenian leader John Devoy, the 'best' organised county in Ireland and was believed by police authorities to contain one of the most fully armed Fenian organisations in the country.19

Power's candidacy provided the focus for the formation of a nationalist and anti-landlord coalition in the west of Ireland, composed of Fenians, farmers and townsmen, which was to remain in place through the opening year of the land war of 1879-81. The alliance was based on the shared goals of breaking the economic and political power of landlords, lessening the political influence of the catholic clergy, securing the release from prison of Fenian prisoners and winning some form of political independence for Ireland. At this early stage these goals were ill-defined, as were the means by which they were to be achieved. The fragile unity between revolutionary and constitutional nationalists forged during 1873 temporarily obscured divisive questions over goals and tactics that later dismpted the land and nationalist movements.20 In 1874 this unity enabled large farmers and townsmen, many of whom were electors, to join with the Fenian-organised small farmers, artisans and agricultural labourers in support of Power, who symbolised both the vitality and the ambiguity of the nationalist alliance.

A major centre of Fenian activity in the west of Ireland was St Jarlath's, the diocesan college of Tuam, which Power entered in 1871.21 The college's president, Ulick Canon Bourke, and its patron. Archbishop John MacHale, one of Ireland's most formidable nationalists, looked with a tolerant eye on their Fenian pupils and in 1868 mobilised them in aid of George Henry Moore's candidacy for one of the two Mayo seats in the house of commons.22 Canon Bourke may well have influenced Power's decision to stand for Mayo in the general election of 1874, since he agreed to nominate him at the meeting of the county's clergy at which candidates were to be endorsed for the two county seats.23 Prior to that meeting Power travelled to Mayo equipped with letters of support from prominent home-rule M.P.s John Martin and Mitchell Henry and claiming the endorsement of Butt.24 He addressed several meetings on the eve of the clergy's meeting and seemed assured of clerical support as a result of the influence of Bourke and MacHale. However, at the conclusion of a stormy meeting at Castlebar of the bishops and clergy on 4 February, a local catholic landlord, Thomas Tighe, was asked to stand for Mayo in alliance with the county's sitting member, George Browne.25 The nature of the clerical

18Jordan, 'Merchants, "strong farmers" and Fenians' . 19John Devoy, Recollections of an Irish rebel (New York, 1929), p. 33; Paul Bew,

Land and the national question in Ireland, 1858-82 (Dublin, 1978), pp 43-4. 2()These divisions are discussed in Donald Jordan, 'Land and politics in the west of

Ireland: County Mayo, 1846-82' (unpublished Ph.D. thesis. University of California, Davis, 1982), pp 213-352.

21Mark Ryan, Fenian memories, ed. with intro. by T.F. O'Sullivan (2nd ed., Dublin, 1946), pp 28-37; Moody, Davitt, pp 45-6, 124.

22Ryan, Fenian memories, pp 28-9, 41. 23F./., 30 Jan. 1874. 24Thomley, Isaac Butt, pp 183-4. 25F.J., 3, 4, 5, 6, 23 Feb. 1874.




meeting was revealed in a letter from the bishop of Gal way, John McEvilly, to Paul Cardinal Cullen, archbishop of Dublin: 'things took a dreadful turn in Mayo. Dr MacHale and the priests were hooted because they did not support a Mr O'Connor Power, a student of St Jarleth, the recognized head of the Fenians in this country.' McEvilly included in his letter extracts from the letter of a Mayo priest, who reported 'that the archbishop came from Tuam accom- panied by his cousin, Rev. U. Burke, to promote the candidature of madman Power, the Fenian. But thanks to the stand made by Dr Conway' — the bishop of Killala — 'and all the priests of the county here, he was obliged to set him aside. He could not conceal his humiliation by his embarrassed manner, nervous and choking voice.'26 The priest noted that Power had the support of mobs who threatened to cut off clerical dues. Yet despite this support, Power honoured his pledge to withdraw from the contest if he could not secure MacHale's and the clergy's endorsement, allowing Browne and Tighe to defeat Sir George O'Donel, a protestant landlord.

The election was invalidated on procedural grounds and a by-election was called for May 1874.27 Power resolved to stand again, explaining his decision in an address to the electors of Mayo: When I last addressed you as a parliamentary candidate, I was bound by a pledge, which made my candidature conditional on my adoption by his grace the archbishop of Tuam and the bishops and clergy of Mayo; and when their decision was against me I retired from the contest, though it appeared that my return was certain had I gone to the poll. Before, however, my committee accepted my resignation, they, in the name of the nationalists of Mayo, extracted a promise from me that I would again become a candidate for the county if, at any ensuing election, they should still be dissatisfied with the candidates then in the field. Sooner, many years sooner than I could have anticipated, I am now called upon by a numerously-signed requisition of the electors to fulfill that promise. I kept my word on the last occasion, I am determined not to break it on this; and hence I again offer myself as a candidate.28

Power assembled an election committee of Fenians, which included Matthew Harris as chairman and Mark Ryan as secretary-treasurer (both of whom were from County Galway) as well as townsmen, including twelve Castlebar merchants who signed Power's nomination papers. In an apparent reference to the Galway-based Fenians, the Ballinrobe Chronicle commented that Power's campaign was largely organised from outside Mayo, but conceded that the 'vastness of his organisation' sustained him during the campaign and played a major role in its success.29 At numerous rallies Power drew on his oratorical talent and Fenian background to appeal to the populace. The Ballina Herald summed up Power's campaign: Mr O'Connor Power is ... more prominently before the electors than perhaps either of the other candidates. He has already visited all the principal towns of the county

26John McEvilly to Paul Cullen, 11 Feb. 1874 (Dublin Diocesan Archives, Cullen papers). I am indebted to Emmet Larkin for this and the subsequent reference to letters in the Cullen papers.

17Copy of the special case and of the shorthand writer's notes of the judgement of each of the judges for the court of common pleas in Ireland in the matter of the County Mayo election petition, H.C. 1874 (165), hi, 747-51.

28F./., 7 May 1874. 29Ballinrobe Chronicle and Mayo Advertiser, 23, 30 May 1874.




and has delivered stirring addresses in each. He is without doubt the 'popular' man — the favourite with the populace. His eloquence and his advanced political opinions have secured him this honour.30

The reporter went on to assure his readers that Power's appeal was to the impoverished, while the more prosperous electors 'ignored' him.

Archbishop MacHale supported Power's candidacy but was anxious not to suffer another defeat on the matter at the hands of the Mayo bishops and clergy. According to Emmet Larkin, MacHale apparently chose not to convene a pre- election meeting of the Mayo clergy to avoid a repeat of the meeting of 4 February. Writing again to Cullen prior to the election, McEvilly described the Mayo contest as 'a bad business, O'C. P. is a Fenian and swore in as Fenians some alumni of the college he was in, among them a brother of a P.P. in the diocese of T [uam]. It would be most humiliating if he were returned.' Hugh Conway and Francis MacCormack (bishop of Killala and coadjutor bishop of Achonry respectively) were, the letter continued, 'dead against him. I hope they will succeed.'31 The clerical campaign against Power, apparently orchestrated by Bishops Conway and MacCormack, was supported from an unlikely quarter. Patrick Lavelle, parish priest of Cong, County Mayo, and one of the most famous nationalist priests in Ireland, apparently detested Power on personal rather than political grounds. He defamed Power in a letter written to Butt in March 1874:

you may have often heard the question put — 'who is this Mr O'Connor Power?' I often did but never could get an answer. I am, however, now in a position to tell you that he is the bastard son of a policeman named Fleming from Co. Cavan, and a house painter by trade who has managed to live on his wits and the gullibility of others and myself for years!!!32 The Times reported that the catholic clergy were leaving 'no means ... untried to influence popular feeling, and if the accounts received from some parts of the county be correct, the power of the mobs was not left in abeyance' .33 The nationalist newspaper, Irishman, reported that Power faced a 'desperate strug- gle against the combined influence of the whole priesthood of the county' and assured its readers that the clerical denunciations had been so 'fierce' as almost to guarantee that, should Power lose, the election would be voided on grounds of clerical intimidation.34 In a letter to a home-rule M.P., Mitchell Henry, one Mayo priest expressed confidence that Power could not win the county. As you see by the papers, Mr O'Connor Power has created great excitment in the places he visited, but you will find that it will cool down before the day of polling

30Quoted in ibid., 16 May 1874. 31John McEvilly to Paul Cullen, 25 May 1874 (Dublin Diocesan Archives, Cullen

papers). Archbishop MacHale's role in Mayo politics and in the 1874 election will be analysed by Emmet Larkin in his forthcoming book, The Roman Catholic church and the emergence of the modem Irish political system, part one, 1870-1874.

32Patrick Lavelle to Isaac Butt, 12 Mar. 1874 (N.L.I., Butt papers), quoted in Thomley, Isaac Butt, p. 184. On Lavelle's career, see Tomas 6 Fiaich, ̂ he patriot priest of Partry: Patrick Lavelle, 1825-1886' in Galway Arch. Soc. Jn.y xxxv (1976), pp 129-48.

^The Times, 1 June 1874. ^Quoted in ibid.




...I fear very much that he does not know Mayo well. 1 was there for the last ten years and as far as I can give an opinion there is no county in Ireland so much in the hands of the priests as Mayo ... It is hard to place implicit confidence in a man they [electors] know nothing about unless that man is strongly backed by priests. One word from the altar next Sunday, or even a word privately to the electors before the polling day, will set the electors at ease and turn the scales for the selected one*5

Allegedly with the aid of the votes of conservative electors trying to damage the political power of the clergy, Power overcame clerical opposition to be returned second in the poll and thus elected Mayo's junior M.P. Power polled 1,319 votes, 11 less than the incumbent senior member, George Browne, but 40 more than Thomas Tighe.36

Power's election was not the great victory for fenianism that some of his supporters expected. He quickly identified himself in parliament as a supporter of die moderate home-rule platform of Butt. Butt's programme called for a federal union between Great Britain and Ireland with 'one sovereign, ...a common executive and a common national council, ... while each of them should have its own domestic parliament for its internal affairs' .37 In a deferential letter to Butt written in October 1873, Power expressed his support for federalism, a stand he reiterated in his parliamentary debut on 2 July 1874. In his first speech in the house of commons Power demonstrated the degree of his fidelity to this moderate form of home rule when he said that he 'regarded federalism as the most logical base on which a perfect union between Great Britain and Ireland could be secured' .38 With its provision for continued Irish allegiance to the British crown, Butt's programme could hardly be expected to attract orthodox Fenians, but Power had ceased to be one.

The reasons for Power's rapid conversion to pariiamentarianism and federalism are impossible to document. Possibly, his student days at St Jarlath's tempered his views. His many detractors within the Fenian movement proclaimed loudly that Power's commitment to insurrection was never firm, accusing him of cowar- dice and opportunism both before and after he entered parliament. Many of Power's former Fenian associates claimed later that he used both them and the movement callously to forward his personal and political ambitions. There is no way to corroborate these accusations, but it is difficult to escape the conclusion that the repulsion many Fenian supporters felt for Power was rooted in more than his betrayal of the principles of revolutionary nationalism when he entered parliament.

35Pat Ryan, P.P., to Mitchell Henry, 18 May 1874 (N.L.I., Butt papers, MS 8706). 36Brian M. Walker, Parliamentary election results in Ireland, 1801-1922 (Dublin,

1978), p. 120. 37Isaac Butt, Home government for Ireland: Irish federalism, its meaning, its objects

and its hopes, quoted in Thomley, Isaac Butt, p. 98. 38John O'Connor Power to Isaac Butt, 28 Oct. 1873 (N.L.I., Butt papers, MS

10415/4); Hansard 3, ccxx, 941 (2 July 1874). Power remained an advocate of federalism throughout his political career. During the 1886 debate on home rule, Power wrote a series of articles to the Manchester Guardian restating the case for a federal union of Britain and Ireland (John O'Connor Power, The Anglo-Irish quarrel: a plea for peace: a reprint of recent articles in the Manchester Guardian, revised by the author (2nd ed., London, 1886).




n

Despite their moderate programme for hortie rule. Butt and his supporters were committed to pressing the government for the release of Fenian prisoners, and early in 1875 placed responsibility for this campaign in Power's hands. In his election address of the previous May, Power had written: 'having been a sharer in the sufferings of the political prisoners, I am not likely to grow lukewarm in my efforts to procure their release' .39 In parliament he introduced resolutions for their release during the sessions of 1875, 1876 and 1877, collected the signatures of 138 M.P.s for a memorial on the subject, and regularly harried the government on the prisoners' condition and on what he alleged to be the unjustness of their continued capitivity.40

These efforts were successful in December 1877 with the release of four prisoners, including Davitt, but did little to placate the growing hostility to Power on the part of hard-line Fenians. A segment of Fenian activitists had never been happy with Power's efforts to reconcile the extreme and constitutional wings of die nationalist movement. His election to parliament aroused the fierce antipathy of the irreconcilables within the I.R.B., who imputed base and selfish motives to Power's decision to sit in the house of commons. This mistrust of Power is expressed in a letter from John O'Leary, an early Fenian activist (who later was to influence profoundly the romantic nationalism of Yeats) to John Devoy in New York:

I'd as soon entrust my purse in the hands of a pick-pocket as my life or liberty (much less the lives or liberties of others) in the hands of such a man. Human nature is a queer thing, and this fellow, however unprincipled he must necessarily be, may be incapable of the worst infamy of all; but I deliberately say that no man of sense should act otherwise than on the supposition that such a man is capable of any baseness.41

Hostility to Power surfaced in August 1876 when the supreme council of the I.R.B. formally withdrew its limited support from the home-rule movement and requested that 'all members of the organisation who may have any connec- tion with the home rule movement will definitely withdraw from it their active co-operation within six months' . As a result of his unwillingness to comply with this request, Power and three others were removed from the supreme council.42

Power's constitutionalism was particularly obnoxious to the American Fenian activists. During a five-month tour of America in 1875 as an envoy of the supreme council. Power alienated many hard-line Fenians, who viewed his decision to stand for parliament as opportunistic and a violation of Fenian principles.43 At the conclusion of the tour, John Devoy bitterly attacked Power in the columns of the Irishman, while Dr William Carroll, president of the

39F.y., 7 May 1874. ^Hansard 3, ccxxii, 1759-64 (12 Mar. 1875); ccxxv, 258-9 (21 June 1875); ccxxix,

1040-52 (22 May 1876); ccxxxi, 285-9 (1 Aug. 1876); ccxxxiv, 1309-15 (5 June 1877); ccxxxv, 1587-91 (20 July 1877); ccxxxvii, 126-9 (17 Jan. 1878).

4iO'Brien *fc Ryan, Devoy's post bag, i, 121. 6

yypg 42Moody Sl 6 Broin, The I.R.B. supreme council' , pp 294-5. 43Ibid., pp 319, 329; John Devoy, 'Davitt's career, pt VII' in Gaelic American, 21

July 1906.




executive of Clan na Gael, the American Fenian organisation, spoke of a campaign against 'Powerism' .44 By March 1878, when Dr Carroll met Pamell, initiating discussions that led to the 'new departure' , animosity towards Power within Fenian circles was intense. At the meeting the two principles sat silently while John O'Leary and James J. Kelly, two Fenians activists, quarrelled vehemently about Power.45 It was evident that Power's association with the advanced parliamentarians led by Pamell would be a formidable obstacle to a rapprochement between Pamell and the Fenians.

Power aligned himself with Pamell in parliament during 1876, telling a Castlebar audience in September that he retained his personal loyalty to Butt, the home-rule leader, but could no longer support his 'timid' tactics.46 Short- ly afterwards, Power and Pamell set sail together for America as delegates from a hastily-called home-rule assembly in Dublin presided over by advanced home rulers from Britain. They were sent to present an address from the Irish people to President Grant.47 While they eventually had to settle for presenting the address to the House of Representatives, the well-publicised trip propelled both men into national prominence and identified them together in the national cause.

When parliament reconvened early in 1877, Power joined with Pamell and Joseph Biggar, a Belfast provisions merchant and member for County Cavan, in obstmcting parliamentary business as a protest against governmental inaction on Irish grievances. This tactic grieved Butt, who publicly criticised the obstruc- tionists in a vain attempt to restore his control over the home-rule members. Power responded with two strident letters to Butt, which strengthend his iden- tification with Pamell and parliamentary obstruction.48 According to Mitchell Henry, Power was 'the most statesman like' of the obstmctionists, who during the course of 1877 and 1878 sessions joined the subtle Parnell and the gross Biggar in disrupting parliamentary business.49

Yet the obstmctionists' alliance was never a secure one. Power, a proud and independent man, told his constituents in Castlebar that he did 'not endorse every act and every word of Mr Parnell and Mr Biggar' and was 'no more prepared to follow Mr Pamell blindfolded than I was to follow Mr Butt blindfolded three years ago' .50 On their side, Pamell and Biggar regularly com- plained that Power did not adequately support them in parliamentary obstruction.51 However, there was more at issue in the growing tension between Pamell and Power than questions of personal loyality and fidelity to obstruc-

uIrishman, 11, 25 Mar. 1876; O'Brien 8l Ryan, Devoy's post bag, i, 152-3. 45Devoy, Recollections, p. 283; Devoy, 'Davitt's career, pt X' in Gaelic American,

11 Aug. 1906. F.S.L. Lyons doubted the truthfulness of Devoy's account of the meeting. See his Charles Stewart Pamell (London, 1977), pp 74-5. Other accounts of the meeting appear in O'Brien, Pamell, i, 159-60, and F. Hugh O'Donneil, A history of the Irish parliamentary party (2 vols, London and New York, 1910), i, 271-5.

^Connaught Telegraph (hereafter C.T.), 23 Sept. 1876; Thomley, Isaac Butt, p. 287. 47Lyons, Charles Stewart Pamell, pp 35-7. 48F.y., 16 Apr., 2 June 1877. 49Mitchell Henry to W.J. O'Neill Daunt, 23 Apr. 1878 (N.L.I., Michael MacDonagh

papers, MS 11446). 50C.r., 26 Oct. 1878. 51Healy, Letters and leaders, i, 85.




tion. Pamell was contemplating the development of an understanding between the obstmctionists and the physical force nationalists that could be hampered, if not prevented, by his parliamentary association with Power.

Pamell received an opportunity to distance himself from Power and identify with Power's Fenian opponents in September 1877. Opposition to Power was led by John Daly, a Limerick Fenian and former friend of Power's who, as an ardent foe of parliamentary action, wanted to ensure that the 1873 agreement between the Fenians and the home-rule movement be limited to three years.52 Angered by Power's decision to stand for parliament, Daly harassed him at public meetings and attempted to organise opposition to him in Mayo. In September 1877 Daly organised a band of Glasgow Fenian supporters to disrupt meetings at Dumbarton and Hamilton, where Power was a scheduled speaker. At Dumbarton Power was to share the platform with Pamell, but unbeknown to Daly, Power had cancelled his appearance several weeks before. Daly and his troop stormed the meeting in pursuit of Power while Pamell was speaking. Pamell adroitly turned the confrontation to his advantage by welcoming Daly as 'an old associate in the task of putting down West Britonism in Ireland' and stated his wish that 'Ireland had many men like him' . He pointed out the inequity of attacking Power behind his back and, after the departure of the Fenians, told the original audience that Power had been unjustly accused, but nonetheless sat benignly by while Daly vilified Power as 'no nationalist' but 'a renegede to the principles he once practiced, ...a traitor [who] should receive condign punishment' . Daly pledged that Power 'would be pursued with all the unrelenting vengence of which Irishmen could be capable, and hunted from every platform in the land' . Pamell, he said, deserved Fenian respect 'because he was faithful to the opinions he always professed' .53 Parnell's association with Daly went back to 1873 when he consulted the Limerick Fe- nian about the possibility of Fenian support if he stood as a parliamentary candidate.54 Although Daly rebuffed Pamell on that occasion, Parnell's first reported overture to the militant nationalists, it was appropriate that his renewed gesture towards them should be made to Daly at the expense of Power, who both men detested.55

UI

By the winter of 1878-9, as the discussions on the new departure between Davitt and the I.R.B. leadership proceeded, it appeared as though Fenian wil- lingness to co-operate with the parliamentary nationalists would be conditional

52MacDonagh, Home rule movement, pp 117-25. 53Flag of Ireland, 20 Sept. 1877, quoted in ibid.; F.J., 21 Sept. 1877. ^Lyons, Charles Stewart Pamell, p. 48. 55In October Power wrote a scathing letter, published in the Freeman's Journal, con-

demning Daly as a 'foul-mouthed liar' , a 'fraud and a humbug' , a 'renegade and a traitor' , whom he accused of attempting to 'destroy that unbroken union and magnificent discipline which have for the last ten years prevailed in the national ranks [that] 1 proudly claim at least one man's share in the building up of. Power's attack provoked several spirited defences of Daly by his friends and a lengthy letter from Daly (F.J,, 12, 16, 18, 20 Oct. 1877).




upon Pamell breaking with Power. This point was driven home in January 1879, when Devoy and Davitt met in Paris with the supreme council of the I.R.B. to press for its approval of the new departure. According to Devoy's account of the meeting, the discussion of the 'new departure' was opened in an irregular way by a litde passage of arms between Davitt and a couple of those present over the merits of O'Connor Power and his probable attitude towards the proposed new movement. ... During most of the discussion in Paris it was O'Connor Power, rather than the 'new departure' , that occupied the attention of those present.56

Shortly after the Paris meeting broke up without the supreme council endors- ing the 'new departure' , Davitt met Pamell to arrange a meeting with Devoy.57 It seems safe to assume that Davitt gave Pamell a full account of the Paris meeting, including the dismptive discussion of Power. Certainly, Pamell had Power on his mind in Boulogne on 7 March 1879 when he and Biggar met Devoy and John O'Leary. He greeted O'Leary jocularly, reminding him that when they had last met, in March 1878 at Pamell's meeting with Carroll, O'Leary 'started a hare in the person of John O'Connor Power, and we were so busy chasing that hare during the whole evening that we had no time for anything else' .58

If Pamell contemplated a public break with Power at this time, he was thwarted by the land agitation, which burst upon the scene a month after the Boulogne meeting. Power's early participation in the agitation during the winter and spring of 1878-9, combined with his popularity in Mayo, shielded him from public criticism as long as the agitation was confined to the west of Ireland. As the only politician of national stature at the Irishtown meeting in April 1879, tradi- tionally seen as the first meeting of the land war. Power appeared in an ideal position to profit politically from the nascent agitation. However, lacking Pamell's superb tactical sense, Power returned to London after the Irishtown meeting, and despite numerous invitations to speak at subsequent meetings, did not return to Mayo until September. By staying away from Mayo during the summer of 1879, when the land agitation was in its most exhilarating phase and was confined largely to Mayo, Power lost the advantage in his duel with Parnell. Anxious to counteract Power's influence in the land movement, Pamell moved quickly to seize the initiative.59 Power's mistake in abandoning Mayo was readily apparent when he returned on his annual September tour to find 'a system of the most damnable lying has been set up against me' by, as he alleged, Parnell.60

Animosity towards Power in Mayo was building up during his absence. Many local political figures simply did not like the often abrasive Power, while others, such as John J. Louden, a Westport barrister, coveted Power's seat in parliament. More significantly, some of Power's Fenian supporters who had never

56Devoy, 'Davitfs career, pt VIF. 57John Devoy, 'Davitt's career, pt IX' in Gaelic American, 4 Aug. 1906. 58 p58Devoy, 'Michael Davitt's career, pt X' . 59 p59Joseph Lee, The modernisation of Irish society, 1848-1918 (Dublin, 1973), p. 74;

Healy, Letters and leaders, i, 75. ^John O'Connor Power to Fr John O'Malley, 26 Sept. 1879 (N.L.L, J.F.X. O'Brien

papers, MS 13457).




felt easy with constitutionalism were turning against him, most importantly P. W. Nally, head centre of the I.R.B. in Mayo and a man of considerable influence in the county.61 Furthermore, Power's long-time friend, Davitt, whose release from Dartmoor Prison had been a product of the M.P.'s tireless campaign for Fenian prisoners, began to doubt Power's utility to the land movement. In a letter to Matthew Harris, Davitt stated his concern that Power's association with the National Land League of Mayo, formed in August 1879, 'would meet with opposition in America' . Concerned that slighting Power would affect adversely the adherence of Mayo's small farmers to the newly formed league, Davitt concluded that it would be impossible at the time to dispense with Power's association.62

Power's popularity with the small farmers of Mayo was in part the consequence of his early and uncompromising commitment to peasant ownership of land. In his speech at the Irishtown meeting Power endorsed peasant proprietorship as the ultimate solution to the land question, something Parnell was not yet prepared to do. Power reminded his audience that peasant ownership of the land must be achieved constitutionally and would take time to accomplish. In the meantime, he recommended short-term remedies that would alleviate Irish distress without intermpting the drive for a permanent settlement of the land question.63 He expanded his ideas in an article that appeared in Nine- teenth Century in December 1879. In it he acknowledged that achieving peasant proprietorship in Ireland would be 'a vast undertaking' that 'should be carried out gradually' rather than in 'one sweeping measure' . He proclaimed, as he was to do many times from the floor of the house of commons, that a beneficent piece of legislation for the government to enact would involve a government- funded scheme for the reclamation of wasteland that could then be settled on by farmers from the over-populated regions of Ireland. This and other pieces of remedial legislation, he maintained, would satisfy the immediate needs of the Irish people while a large plan for peasant ownership could be prepared. He assured his readers that Irish farmers, as owners of the soil, would become 'the best friends of social order' .64

In this article, Power emphasised the moderate features of the programme for land reform adopted at the founding conference of the Irish National Land League in October 1879. Yet this did not immunise him from attack by the leaders of the newly-formed league. As early as September 1879, Power became convinced that the animosity towards him in Mayo, was merely a prelude to a Pamell and Land League-directed campaign to unseat him at the forthcoming general election.65

Pamell viewed the election, called for April 1880, as an opportunity to increase his supporters in the house of commons and to strengthen the alliance

61Moody, Davitt, p. 312. 62Michael Davitt to Matthew Harris, n.d., probably late Aug. or early Sept. 1879

(N.L.L, W.G. Fallon papers, MS 22704). 63C.r., 21 Apr. 1879. ^John O'Connor Power, 'The Irish land agitation' in Nineteenth Century, vi, no.

34 (Dec. 1879), pp 956-63. 65Power to O'Malley, 26 Sept. 1879.




between the land agitation and radical parliamentarians.66 At first it appeared that Mayo figured litde in Pamell's election strategy. Its senior member, George Browne, was an ineffectual and frequently-absent parliamentarian; he could be classified as a home ruler, albeit a meek one, while the county's junior member, Power, was still viewed as a popular associate of Parnell's. However, following a year of intense political activity, many people in Mayo were unwilling to accept the candidature of Browne, a landlord owning 2,809 acres in the county and a man unwilling to support either Pamell or the land movement. Following a flurry of political manoeuvring during which several potential candidates either declined to stand or proved too unpopular to challenge Browne, Davitt persuaded Pamell to stand for the county.

Parnell's last-minute decision to stand for Mayo, despite already having been returned for Cork City and being assured of re-election in County Meath, generated considerable bitterness. To many activists, most prominent among them James Daly, the influential editor of the Connaught Telegraph, Pamell's decision appeared as an attempt by the central executive of the National Land League to dictate to the local movement. Matters were complicated by the fact that the supporters of a Pamell candidacy, led by John J. Louden who was acting as lawyer for the National Land League, were antagonists of Power's and were allegedly trying to embarrass him financially by forcing him into a costly canvass.67

As soon as Parnell's candidacy was announced rumours flew that Pamell's real motive in standing for Mayo was to oust Power. Tim Healy, Parnell's campaign manager in Cork, later wrote that Pamell stood for Mayo 'nominally against George Browne, but in reality against O'Connor Power, on whom he wished to be revenged' .68 Davitt, who was acting as Pamell's election agent in Mayo, recorded in his diary that 'Power's conduct [is] miserably selfish. [He] would rather see [the] principle [of the] land movement and everything else go be damned than that he should be put to the expense of a contest.' Davitt later noted that some of 'Power's friends' dismpted the election out of anger against Pamell's decision to stand but he (Davitt) 'put it down afterwards' .69 However, for the most part animosity between Pamell and Power was kept muted, with Pamell assuring the electors of Mayo that his goal was to defeat Browne in alliance with Power and that in the event of Power being unseated, he (Parnell) would step down in Power's favour. Somewhat to Pamell's chagrin, Power topped the poll with 1,645 votes to 1,565 for Pamell and only 628 to Browne.70

The campaign against Power on the part of the Land League leadership began publicly and in earnest in June 1880, appropriately in America where hostility towards Power was extensive and where he could be attacked with a minimum

^The importance of the general election for Pamell is discussed in Conor Cruise O'Brien, Pamell and his party, 1880-90 (corrected ed., Oxford, 1964), pp 11-35, and in Lyons, Charles Stewart Pamell, pp 116-29. The election in Mayo is discussed in Jordan, 'Land and politics in the west of Ireland' , pp 252-63.

67 pp67Jordan, 'Land and politics in the west of Ireland' , pp 254-7. 68 68Healy, Letters and leaders, i, 92. 69Davitt's diary, 5, 12 Apr. 1880 (T.C.D., Davitt papers, MS 9531). ™ p™C.T., 10 Apr. 1880; Walker, Parliamentary election results, p. 120.




of reverberation in the west of Ireland. In an interview with the New York newspaper the Irish World, Davitt, who was touring America, accused Power of always having been 'a brand of discord in the national ranks' who had become 'one of the most dangerous opponents of the National Land League' .71 The immediate cause of Davitt's attack was the introduction in the house of commons by Power of a bill to amend the land act of 1870 in order to allow tenants evicted for non-payment of rent to collect compensation for disturbance from their landlords. The object of the bill was to reduce the number of evictions in Ireland by making them expensive for landlords, but Davitt and other radicals objected that the measure fell far short of the league's demand for a bill to suspend evictions altogether.72 Davitt was correct in his assessment of the measure as a retreat from the radical stance taken by the league at its April conference, but he was either unaware or sought to conceal from his American audience that the responsibility for the introduction of the measure rested with Pamell. It had been adopted for introduction in the house at a meeting of the. Irish party on a motion by Pamell, who, after Davitt's interview, wrote to the league defending the bill as capable of fulfilling the objec- tives of the league.73 Conor Cruise O'Brien has suggested that Power was chosen by the party to introduce the measure 'because of his neutral position, isolated from both factions of the party';74 but it is equally possible that Pamell, knowing that the measure would be unpopular with the advanced men, set up Power to bear the brunt of their anger.

Pamell and Power first exchanged barbs publicly in a debate on the compensation for disturbance bill introduced by the government as a substitute for that proposed by Power. From the beginning of the new session, Power had made it clear that, after six years of dealing with a tory administration from which no improvements for Ireland could be expected, he was willing to give the new liberal government a chance, though not the uncritical one that some of his Irish colleagues were prone to. In his response to the queen's speech, Power stated; 'there is no more sincere liberal in or out of parliament than I am' . He went on to praise Gladstone as standing 'on a pinnacle so exalted as to be far from the reach of any eulogy' and proclaimed his joy 'at the triumph which [Gladstone] had won at the late election over Lord Beaconsfield' . Given this liberal victory, he suggested to his Irish colleagues that they leave obstruction to the conservatives: 'the duty of the Irish party here will be to supply that impartial criticism which may allay the bitterness of English party warfare' .75 However, Pamell, the leader of the Irish party, had no intention of accepting the role of an 'impartial' critic of the new liberal government. He remained poised to capture political advantage at the expense of the government and, in consequence declared his unwillingness to support the compensation bill. Power, although himself highly critical of the bill, accused Parnell

71C.7:, 7 July 1880. 72Bew, Land and the national question, p. 110; O'Brien, Pamell ti his party, pp

47-8; Michael Davitt, The fall of feudalism in Ireland (London and New York, 1904), pp 260-61; Hansard 3, cclii, 740-41 (28 May 1880).

73C.r., 26 June 1880. 740'Brien, Pamell d his party, p. 48. 75Hansard 3, cclii, 127-32 (20 May 1880).




of allowing 'himself to be made a tories' cat's paw' . Pamell rose quickly to his feet in order to remind 'the hon. member for Mayo that in time past Irish members had done even worse things than helping the tories — namely, they had helped the whigs' . He went on to assert, though with little foundation, that 'Irish constituencies looked ... with greater suspicion upon those hon. members who helped the whigs nowadays than upon those who helped the tories' .76

A full-scale rift between Power and Pamell was postponed by the arrest on 2 November 1880 of Parnell and six others for allegedly conspiring to prevent the payment of rent in Ireland. At the opening of the new session in January, Power joined with the Pamellite M.P.s in prolonging the debate on the queen's speech by ruthlessly pointing out the illiberality of the liberals' actions in Ireland.77 A week later he participated in a savage obstmction of the government's coercion bill, and was one of the thirty-six Pamellite members to be ejected from the house on 3 Febmary for creating 'indescribable confusion' after the home secretary's announcement of the arrest of Davitt.78

This emergency alliance between Power and the Pamellites lasted only three months, ending in an outbreak of invective over Power's decision to vote with the liberals on the second reading of the government's Irish land bill. The land bill, introduced by Gladstone on 7 April, went a long way towards satisfy- ing the immediate needs of Irish tenant farmers by creating a machinery for the judicial review of rents. However, the bill angered many agrarian radicals by its failure to meet the Land League's demand for peasant proprietorship. In addition, they were fearful that by granting a concession that would satisfy many tenant farmers the bill could undermine the strength of the league.79 Parnell hestitated to pronounce on the bill until he had tested the political waters in Ireland, but once he became convinced that the radicals' opposition to the bill was not shared by the majority of Irish farmers or their supporters in parliament he sided with the moderates. At a league convention held in late April, Parnell pushed through a resolution calling on Irish M.P.s to press for amend- ments to the bill in committee, but not to reject it out of hand. Irish members were left to vote or not to vote for the second reading as they saw fit.

However, before the vote on the second reading of the bill could take place, the arrest of John Dillon, member for Tipperary and a prominent radical, altered the political environment. His arrest resulted in renewed pressure on Parnell from his left wing to lead the Irish party out of the house of commons and proclaim a strike against rent in Ireland. In order to avoid such steps, but still maintain the confidence of the left, Parnell resolved on what Lyons called a 'dramatic and innocuous' gesture. At a meeting of his parliamentary supporters on 5 May, he called upon them to register their disapproval of Dillon's arrest by abstaining from the vote on the second reading of the land bill. This action, again to quote Lyons, 'looked fierce, but would not hamper the pro-

76Ibid., ccliv, 100-1 (9 July 1880). 77 y77Ibid., cclvii, 218-30 (7 Jan. 1881). 78Ibid., cols 1922-3 (31 Jan.-l Feb. 1881); O'Brien, Pamell 6 his party, pp 57-9. 79 pypp790n the Irish political context in which the land bill was introduced, see O'Brien,

Pamell cfe his party, pp 65-72; Lyons, Charles Stewart Pamell, pp 157-62; Bew, Land and the national question, pp 161-5.




gress of the bill in the slightest' . This motion was approved at the meeting by a vote of 18 to 11 after Pamell threatened to resign if it was defeated.80

Power voted against Pamell's motion at the party meeting and that evening proclaimed in the house his determination to vote in favour of the bill on its second reading. He would do so, he said, because he has been instmcted by his consitutents, although he believed the bill had numerous defects which needed to be remedied before it could 'possibly constitute a solution to the Irish land question' . He explained to the house that 'shortly after the introduction of the bill, he attended a county meeting in May ... called for the purpose of consider- ing its provisions. The meeting was held under circumstances where admission was feasible to all.' He then read to the house the resolution passed at the meeting: that while we reaffirm our convictions that the only final solution of the land question is to be found in legislation enabling the cultivators to become the owners of their own farms, we recommend our parliamentary representatives to support the second reading of the land bill and to make strenuous efforts, after its getting into committee, so to improve its provisions that in its passage through parliament it may become a measure of real protection to the tenant farmers of Ireland.81

The meeting at which this resolution was passed took place on Easter Mon- day at a time of growing disarray within and disillusion with the land movement in Mayo. The year between the general election of April 1880 and the introduction of the land bill in April 1881 witnessed the dissolution of the nationalist and anti-landlord coalition that had come together during Power's 1874 campaign for parliament. The issues that destroyed the coalition are complex ones that are obscured by intense personal antagonisms among the leaders of the land and nationalist movement. Yet, from the welter of acrimony that charac- terised the agitation in Mayo during 1880-81, two issues emerge that were particularly divisive. The first was the degree to which the ultimate goals of the abolition of landlordism and Irish independence should be compromised to allow for the immediate, if only temporary and partial, relief of the plight of Irish tenant farmers. The second was the question of how much control the Dublin-based central committee of the Land League should have over the local agitation.82 The debate over the land bill brought both issues to a head, completing the collapse of the land agitation in Mayo.

The bill guaranteed to Irish tenant farmers the 'three Fs': fixity of tenure so long as the rent was paid and the landlord-tenant covenants were observed; free sale of the tenant's interest in the holding; fair rent fixed by an independent land court for fifteen years. Although the bill fell far short of meeting the principal demand of the land movement for the abolition of landlordism, it did recognise the principle of dual ownership of the soil, shared in unequal proportions by the landlord and the tenant.83 Voicing the views of Mayo's moderates, Power told the house of commons that in addition to failing to meet the principle demand of the agitation, the bill's provision for free sale

^Lyons, Charles Stewart Pamell, p. 159; O'Brien, Pamell Sl his party, p. 67. 81 Hansard 3, cclx, 1883 (5 May 1881); C.T., 23 Apr. 1881. 82For a full discussion of these issues as they appeared in Mayo, see Jordan, 'Land

and politics in the west of Ireland' , pp 264-310. 83Barbara L. Solow discusses the land bill at length in The land question and the

Irish economy, 1870-1903 (Cambridge, Mass., 1971), pp 147-67.




of interest 'was hampered by vexatious restrictions' and fixity of tenure was limited to fifteen years and then was 'conditional on the ground that the tenants should not sub-divide or sub-let without the consent of the landlord' . Moreover, he considered that the members of the land courts should include men with 'some knowledge of agriculture and some knowledge of the districts with which they would have to deal' .84

The case for criticising the bill was strengthened by the stipulation that only tenants whose rents were paid up could take advantage of the provisions of the bill. In Mayo, this meant that possibly as many as two-thirds of the county's small farmers would be denied access to the land courts that were to arbitrate rent disputes and fix fair rents.85 Despite these arguments against the bill, it won widespread, if qualified, support among the lay and clerical leaders of the county. In an editorial in the Connaught Telegraph, James Daly wrote that the bill was 'a step in the right direction and no more' .86 The parish priest of Claremorris, Canon Bourke, the former president of St Jarlath's College and Power's mentor, told a land meeting that the bill was the 'seed sown in the soil' of Mayo by the land movement.87

Two factors lay behind this support for the land bill. The first was the deteriorating economic situation of Mayo's small farmers and the second was the perception that the Land League executive was growing increasingly indif- ferent to the plight of the small farmers. The autumn 1880 potato harvest had been better than that of the previous year: up from 1.4 to 2.4 tons per acre, though well below the 5.1 tons per acre harvested in 1876, the last year before the onset of the economic crisis that precipitated the land agitation.88 Yet, while the overall harvest was improved, it was poor for the fourth year in many of the outlying areas where small farmers clustered on uneconomic holdings.89 One consequence of the deteriorating economic condition was a sharp increase in the number of evictions. The number of Mayo families evicted in 1881 was 244, up from 106 in 1880 and 77 in 1879, and the highest number since 1855.90 For many people in Mayo the rise in the number of evictions was not seen only as a product of the continuing economic crisis but of the neglect of the small fanners by the Land League executive.

^Hansard 3, cclx, 1884-6 (5 May 1881). 85Lee, Modernisation of Irish society, p. 86. 86C.r., 9 Apr. 1881. 87Ibid., 7 May 1881. ^Preliminary report of the returns of agricultural produce in Ireland in 1879; with

tables, p. 37 [C 2495], H.C. 1880, Ixxvi, 893; The agricultural statistics of Ireland for the year 1880, p. 71, [C 2932], H.C. 1881, xciii, 685.

89Jordan, 'Land and politics in the west of Ireland' , pp 314-16. ^Return by provinces and counties (compiled from returns made to the inspector

general. Royal Irish Constabulary) of cases of evictions which have come to the knowledge of the constabulary in each of the years from 1849-1880 inclusive, pp 8-13, H.C. 1881 (185), Ixxvii, 732-7; Return (compiled from returns to the inspector general, Royal Irish Constabulary) of cases of evictions which have come to the knowledge of the constabulary in each quarter of the year ended 31st day of December 1881, showing the number of families evicted in each county in Ireland during each quarter, the number readmitted as tenants and the number readmitted as caretakers, pp 2-5, H.C. 1882 (9), Iv, 229-33.




The question of the league executive's commitment to the small farmers was particularly heated during 1880-81 as a result of a change in league policy away from the defensive strategy of thwarting the eviction of small farmers to a new offensive strategy that directed tenants to refuse to pay unjust rents, thus precipitating a duel between landlord and tenant for the farm. This policy, known as 'rent at the point of the bayonet' , favoured large farmers who had the resources required for a prolonged skirmish with their landlords and who were ready to pay their rents if necessary to preserve their farms. As a result, in the province of Munster, where there were large numbers of substantial farmers, the number of evictions declined during 1881, while they were rising by 130 per cent in Mayo.91 The resulting alienation of the western farmers from the league executive was expressed by James Daly in August 1881: 'here we are, not alone in Castlebar but in every town in the west of Ireland, sur- rounded by those who have been evicted calling for assistance from the league without avail' .92 Daly also alleged that Land League officials were profiting from league funds at a time when evicted small farmers were left on the road- side with the odd contribution from Dublin.

The most potent voices of Mayo's disenchantment with the Land League were those of Daly, Power and Fenian leader P.W. Nally. Fenian opposition to the Land League developed simultaneously with that of Daly and Power. Whereas Daly and Power were anxious over what they perceived to be the erratic, fatuous and self-serving militancy of the league executive, the Fenians were angered that the league was not militant enough. Despite this difference, shared fears that the interests of the small farmers of the west would be compromised by league officials brought the Fenians together with the more moderate nationalists to encourage Mayo farmers to support the bill. Nally, in a letter dated 12 October 1881, criticised the league executive for squandering the 'principal part' of the league's funds and advised the tenants to 'avail themselves of the land act' and not be 'such fools as to trust themselves to the mercy of landlords or Land Leaguers. Resolutions should be passed expressing confidence in J. Daly and O'C. Power, and calling on Parnell to purge the executive of ... greedy vultures.'93

It was against this backdrop of growing antagonism to the Land League on the part of those who professed to put the interests of the small farmers above political expediency that Power chose to break with Parnell and the league by supporting the second reading of the land bill. This decision put Power at odds with Pamell and members of the league's central executive, who were committed to the primacy of central direction in Irish political life. In May 1881 Pamell exhibited his disregard for the advice of the Irish electorate in a letter to the archbishop of Cashel, Thomas Croke, who had publicly criticised the decision of the Pamellite M.P.s to abstain from voting on die second reading of the land bill. Pamell wrote:

91Bew, Land and the national question, pp 121-6, 188-9. ^ ^CT., 20 Aug. 1881. 93This letter, signed P. O'Dowd, was introduced at Nally's trial in the Crossmolina

conspiracy case as being in Nally's handwriting; it was reintroduced as Nally's before the special commission investigating the 'Parnell and crime' case (The Special Commis- sion Act, 1888: report of the proceedings before the commissioners appointed by the act reprinted from The Times (4 vols, London, 1890), ii, 486-7).




union was never more necessary than it is at present. The decision of the convention, the magnitude of the interests at stake, the importance of preserving the independence and integrity of the Irish party — all combine to teach us that individual convictions, or even the directions of particular constituencies, should give place to the opinion of the representatives of die majority.94 From this perspective, Power's decision to accept the will of his constitutents over that of the majority of the Pamellite M.P.s was tantamount to treason against Ireland and, in what amounted to the same thing, disloyalty to Pamell himself.

It was in this spirit that Power was attacked in a vicious letter published in the Freeman fs Journal by Patrick Egan, treasurer of the Land League. Writing from Paris, Egan accused Power and two other M.P.s of abandoning the interests of the tenant farmers out of 'a desire to help the present cowardly, hypocritical, priest-hunting, buckshot-distributing whig government, now as ever, base, bloody and brutal' .95 Power defended himself in a letter to the Freeman's Journal in which he declared that 'the rule of arrogant dictation must cease' (within the land movement) and warned his 'countrymen that if they allow themselves to be goaded into unarmed insurrection by the screaming of hired demagogues ... they will be abandoned and betrayed in their hour of trial' .96 In a heated debate in the house of commons, Pamell declared that he had no foreknowledge of the letter, but refused to disclaim it. Rather, he attacked Power for 'appealing to the protection of Englishmen against his brother Irishmen' .97

IV

This debate marked Power's final break with Pamell, the Irish party and the Land League. It had nothing to do with differing opinions on the land bill itself. Once the bill passed its second reading and went into committee, Pamellite and non-Pamellite Irish members settled down to amend it in the fashion recommended by the league's April convention and by Power in his 5 May speech on the bill in the house of commons. The split between Power and the Pamellites was over the question of power: power of the political leadership grouped around Pamell to override the recommendations of the Irish constituencies and the power of Pamell to direct the parliamentary action of the Irish M.P.s. Power stood in Parnell's way on both issues. He placed the will of his consitutents above that of the Irish party and he was unwilling to jeopar- dise the passage of aid for Ireland, such as the land bill of 1881, in order to enhance the political strength of Pamell. In an acrimonious debate in the house of commons in 1884, Power accused Pamell and his followers of having blocked since 1881 all useful legislation for Ireland. He claimed that their only accomplishment during those years had been to guarantee to Ireland 'an addi-

^Quoted in Lyons, Charles Stewart Pamell, p. 160. The emphasis is mine. 95 95F./., 26 May 1881. ^Ibid., 28 May 1881. 91Hansard 3, cclxi, 1667-95 (30 May 1881).




tional three years of the most stringent and hateful coercion rule that was ever imposed upon any people' .98

In 1885 Power gave up his Mayo seat rather than challenge the (by this time) highly-efficient, centrally-directed Parnellite machine. Despite several at- tempts to secure an English or Irish seat, Power never again re-entered active political life. His battle with Parnell, ostensibly for leadership of the advanced wing of the Irish parliamentary party and of the popular movement in Ireland, exposed the increasing centralisation of Irish political life. Not only were local issues downplayed in the interests of national ones, but the independence of the local political leadership was undermined. By the mid 1880s, local politi- cians were expected to be no more than agents of the parliamentary party, led by Parnell. This meant that Power and other political activists, such as James Daly of the Connaught Telegraph, who had come to prominence during the 1870s and had guided the land movement during its early stages bitterly broke with the Land League and the Parnellite party, to be replaced by men willing to give prominence to the policies of the national party, as determined by Parnell and his associates.99

Donald Jordan Program in Values, Technology, Science and Society, Stanford University

98Ibid., cclxxxiv, 1465-78 (20 Feb. 1884). "An earlier version of this paper was presented to the 1985 annual meeting of the

American Committee for Irish Studies at Tacoma, Washington. I wish to thank Paul Bew, Emmet Larkin, W. J. Lowe and W. E. Vaughan for reading and commenting on earlier drafts of this paper, and the American Council of Learned Societies and the Trustees of the Mabelle McLeod Lewis Memorial Fund for funding the research.



John O'Connor Power, Charles Stewart Parnell and the Centralisation of Popular Politics in Ireland

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