TO BE OR NOT TO BE A DOMINION

1. Intellectual (political and cultural) ideas to remember about hyphenation:

A. Colonial history renders more acute the economic, class or cultural divisions (the latter including the divisions between generational mentalities) within a society; colonial history multiplies polarities, creates new, occasional clusters of interests and adds new divisions [HYPHENATED IDENTITY]. Before Chapter 8, which deals with the history of the two new Irish states in the twentieth century until the Troubles, see Maire and Connor Cruise OBriens statement in Chapter 7 [The old were suspected of betrayal and judged for their passivity by the young. Cultural nationalism was exalted and Romantic. Yeatss 1902 play, Cathleen ni Houlihan (1902) became almost a sacrament to the young nationalists at the time.]

B. (inner divisions) Political divisions of Irish nationalism on the eve of decolonization.

Irish nationalism was divided into constitutional (political) and republican (military, secret) nationalism. Constitutional nationalism was in crisis after Parnells fall. John Redmonds Irish Party was weakened as the Liberal grass-roots support and left room for political alternatives. Arthur Griffiths self-reliance movement and the Sinn Fein party set up by him sought to accomodate Ireland within the British constitution after the Austro-Hungarian model, as a dual monarchy (not a dominion, as the Home Rule movement and party anticipated).

C. (complication/suspension of class divisions) Military and Political Alliances and Cross-Class Alliances before the Anglo-Irish War

The Irish Volunteers (John Redmonds CONSTITUTIONAL militia), founded in 1913, were appropriated by military nationalism [REPUBLICANISM] and the IRB appeared. See the Irish Volunteers participation in the Easter 1916 Rising, in the Atlas of Irish History (military developments) and the account of Eamonn De Valeras life

D. (historically unreconcillable divisions) The opposition of Ulsterism to political Home Rule nationalism (before the First World War see the Ulster Covenant and Ulster Volunteers materials from the Internet) which ended up with the internationally recognized Partition [and the significance of this is that the British power worked its own will on Irish nationalism]. This opposition of an Irish Protestant minority to the political and generally national Catholic majority exploited the divisions between the political parties of Britain: the Irish Protestants led by the lawyer Edward Carson put pressure on the British government and on King George V and they modified the third Home Rule Bill to enable the Ulster counties to opt out of the Irish dominion for six years. The Better Government of Ireland Act of 1920 and the Anglo-Irish Treaty stipulated the same. The Boundary Commission was dissolved after deciding the same in 1924.

E. The distinction between Ulsterism (a form of sectarian Ultra-Protestantism in Northern Ireland) and Unionism becomes the twentieth century version of the distinction between terrorist and constitutional decolonization or between covert, military and overt, politically legal action/organizations at the turn of the nineteenth century. These distinctions can be followed in the denominantions of political parties and other organizations in NI: the ones containing the word Ulster were extremist, paramilitary/terrorist groups, while the Unionist label denoted the legal/natural Northern Irish Protestants allegiance to Britain. SEE THE ULSTER COVENANT, with the violence keyword Ulster in it.

F. Hyphenation explains the constitutive rifts within the local versions of Irish political identity (see the rift between legal and illegal Protestant group that explain NI political and military history in the twentieth century in connection with the Troubles) and the rift explained by the following excerpt from Devs life (see endnote i)As part of the Anglo-Irish Treaty which ended the War of Independence all members of the Oireachtas were obliged to take an oath of allegiance (swear loyalty) to the King of Great Britain. Towards the end of 1925, de Valera and the I.R.A. found that they were on opposite sides on this issue and Sinn Fein was split in two. De Valera had made remarks which suggested that if the oath were removed, he would sit in Dail Eireann. In March 1926, he resigned as President of Sinn Fein over this issue and decided to launch a new party.

G. Throughout the Troubles in NI caused by the sectarian/civil war going on in the last decades of the twentieth century, there existed numerous peace-loving discourses, actions and people seeking to assert hyphenated identity justly and cautiously. An example of a nationalist discourse which sought peace was Seamus Heaneys Nobel Prize discourse of December 1995 (see below: the attitude of late twentieth century nationalists who only still exist in NI!)H. The problem with Partition is that it will be most likely impossible to abolish it democratically (because in any NI referendum the Protestants, with their siege mentality, will never say yes to the ending of partition and will not cooperate with Britain as Irish Protestants traditionally did), while the Provos terrorist actions meant to prove to Britain and the world that a separate NI state will never exist peacefully will not change the status quo either. The decommissioning of weapons by the IRA and the ultra-Protestant loyalist paramilitary groups has been a long-term process, as visible in the endnote on the NI peace process from the internet site CAIN http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/events/peace/decommission.htm , which begins with the following brief note on decommissioning: Decommissioning in the context of the Irish Peace Process refered to the hand-over, or verified disposal, of weapons by paramilitary groups. The issue proved to be a stumbling block during the whole process of trying to find a solution to the conflict in Northern Ireland.

I. The nationalists perspective in the last third of the twentieth century (cultural hyphenation is like a wound that secretes great poetry in the Belfast Poets generation). (in Northern Ireland, where it still mattered whether one was a nationalist or a unionist the opinion of a peace-making poet like Seamus Heaney - his Nobel Prize acceptance speech excerpt

2. Historical dates to remember:

1921 PARTITION (the Anglo-Irish Act)

1921-25 : 1922-23 The Civil War; 1925 the Boundary Commission Report (see the poem by Paul Muldoon (1980) : You remember that village where the border ranDown the middle of the street,With the butcher and baker in different states?Today he remarked how a shower of rain

Had stopped so cleanly across Golightlys lane

It might have been a wall of glass

That had toppled over. He stood there, for ages,

To wonder which side, if any, he should be on.

THE SEPARATE TWENTIETH C. HISTORY OF THE NORTH AND THE SOUTHSee Northern Ireland history, as part of the United Kingdom: it included a 45 year period of Home Rule, immediately after 1921 and until the (military, terrorist) Troubles in the wake of the 1968 international civil rights movement, and a 25 year period after (and with!) the Troubles when it became a mere province of Britain, with no right to sign international treaties; this is why all the Anglo-Irish agreements of the last twenty-five years of the twentieth c. were agreements between the independent Irish state and Britain resented by the Northern Irish (Protestant) leaders.

A. See the history of the Irish Free State (for the leaders and party splits see Devs life endnote i, infra) and the creation of the Republic:

the self-proclaimed Irish Republic (January 21st 1919) the Free State written Constitution of 1922

1925 the recognition of the existing border between the Free State and Northern Ireland

1926 Devs Soldiers of Destiny, the Fianna Fail, party was set up to break with the oath of allegiance to the British kingdom [SEE THE WIND THAT SHAKES] 1932 Devs Fianna Fail party won the elections (It was a notable example perhaps unique in a newly independent state of the victors in a civil war peacefully [IZ, CONSTITUTIONALLY] relinquishing office to representative figures among the losers in that war. CONCISE HISTORY, 155) 1937 a plebiscite/referendum to replace the Constitution imposed by Britain in 1922

1938 on the eve of the Second World War the De Valera and Neville Chamberlain negotiation about the end of the economic war with Britain [which] abrogated the defence provisos of the Treaty giving Ireland full control over its own ports the basis for Irelands neutrality during WW II, which represented a change of tactic from the historical rule expressed by the words Britains difficulty, Irelands opportunity

1948 the young mens ultra-Republican left party Clann na Poblachta led by Sean MacBride led to the fall of Fianna Fil and a coalition government was formed by John A. Costello. It remained in power until 1951. The first of two three-year period when Devs party was not in power until the 1970s. 1949 the proclamation of the Republic of Ireland a republic outside the Commonwealth 1959 De Valera elected to the symbolic office of President of the Republic

Paradoxically for a state led by republicans who have no respect for religion, until 1965 the Republic was an ultra-Catholic state exerting cultural censorship

1970 the dismissal of a member of the Fianna Fil government led by Sean Lemass because of the events in April 1969 in Ireland (see the anti-Catholic slogan in NI: No Mass/No Lemass!)

1973 the Republic joined the European Union; it had a word to say at the United Nations Organization in favour of the reduction of cold-war tensions.

Ulster 1912byHYPERLINK "http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Author:Rudyard_Kipling" \o "Author:Rudyard Kipling"Rudyard Kipling

First published inThe Morning Post, April 9, 1912."Their webs shall not become garments,neither shall they cover themselves with their works:their works are works of inquityand the act of violence is in their hands."Isaiah lix. 6.The dark eleventh hourDraws on and sees us soldTo every evil powerWe fought against of old -Rebellion, rapine, hate,Oppression, wrong and greedAre loosed to rule our fateBy England's art and deed.The faith in which we stand,The laws we made and guard,Our honour, lives, and landAre given for rewardTo murder done by nightTo treason taught by day,To folly, sloth, and spite,And we are thrust away.The blood our fathers spilt,Our love, our toils, our painsAre counted us for guiltAnd only bind our chains -Before an Empire's eyesThe traitor claims his price.What need of further lies?We are the sacrifice.We know the war preparedOn ever peaceful homeWe know the hells preparedFor such as serve not RomeThe terror, threats, and breadIn market, hearth, and field -We know, when all is said,We perish if we yield.Believe we dare not boast,Believe we dare not fear:We stand to pay the costIn all that men hold dear.What answer from the North?One Law, One Land, One Throne!If England drives us forthWe shall not fall alone.

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