The Irish Revolution, 1916-1923 (13 page)

FOREIGN POLICY

The Declaration of Independence and the Message to the Free Nations indicated that foreign recognition of the republic was one of the Dáil's highest priorities. Both of these documents also highlighted the significance that the Dáil attached to making Ireland's case for independence to the post-war Paris Peace Conference. Early in February Seán T. O’Kelly arrived in Paris to begin the campaign for recognition. O’Kelly was accompanied by his wife and a Dáil civil servant, Michael MacWhite, all of whom spoke French. On 22 February O’Kelly wrote to the French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau, who was hosting the conference, stating that he was the accredited representative of the Provisional Government of the Irish Republic and requesting a seat for Ireland. The result of the 1918 general election was cited as the democratic mandate underpinning these demands (Mitchell, 1995: 26–7).

When no reply was forthcoming from the French Prime Minister, O’Kelly switched the focus of his lobbying to US President Woodrow Wilson. With his Ulster-Scot's family background and admiration for British politics, Wilson was not personally inclined to support the Irish claims. Furthermore, he was anxious to secure British support for his Fourteen Points and the League of Nations. Nevertheless, he was coming under pressure from Irish- American elements within his own Democratic Party to be seen to make some representations about Ireland. This resulted in him sending a close adviser, George Creel, to Ireland in February 1919 to meet with Dáil leaders, including Collins and Boland. Creel offered them little hope of American support in public, pointing out that the main aim of the Paris Peace Conference was to impose peace terms on the defeated powers and highlighting the way in which Wilson's League of Nations could become a forum for Ireland to pursue its claim for independence. In private, however, he reported to Wilson that Britain should grant
dominion status
immediately in order to avoid republican sentiment hardening (Mitchell, 1995: 28–9; Carroll, 1978: 124; Whelan, 2006: 203–4).

Dominion status
: The sovereignty granted to the Irish Free State under the Anglo-Irish Treaty, under which the King remained as head of state, similarly to Australia, New Zealand, Canada and South Africa.

Support for Ireland was growing elsewhere in the USA. On 4 March the House of Representatives passed the Gallagher Resolution calling on the peace conference to recognise Ireland's right to self-determination. The wording
was a watered-down version of the original which sought support for Irish ‘freedom’ and ‘independence’ as well. It was not considered by the Senate, and most historians agree that it was little more than a gesture (Carroll, 1978: 125–6). Similar resolutions were passed at state and municipal level and by the powerful trade union the American Federation of Labor, to equally insignificant effect (Mitchell, 1995: 28).

The most prominent American support for Ireland came in April 1919, when the American Commission on Irish Independence, comprising three influential Irish-American politicians, was formed to travel to Ireland and Paris to press Ireland's case with the President. The chairman, Frank P. Walsh, was a labour lawyer from Kansas City; Michael J. Ryan had been President of the United Irish League of America until his pro-German views during the war led John Redmond and the IPP to distance themselves from him; and Edward F. Dunne was a former Mayor of Chicago and Governor of Illinois.

At a meeting with Wilson in Paris in April they received assurances that he would raise the Irish situation with Lloyd George and were hopeful that a Sinn Féin delegation consisting of de Valera, Griffith and Count Plunkett would be granted passports to travel to Paris, although not address the peace conference. The commission proceeded to Ireland for a 10-day visit, during which they addressed a meeting of the Dáil. Outside Dublin they met nationalist leaders, visited prisons and received the freedom of Limerick City. Their close association with the republican movement and criticism of both British and American policy towards Ireland annoyed both the British and American Governments and destroyed any chance of the Sinn Féin delegation being received in Paris. The London
Times
adjudged them to ‘have done more political harm in one week than British statesmanship can expect to undo in many months’.

The commission's partisan behaviour had clearly resulted in the failure of its aim to secure passage to Paris for the Irish delegation, and its members, Walsh in particular, were accused of undertaking the mission to further their own political careers. However, certain aspects of their trip were successful. It generated useful publicity for the Irish cause. On returning to the USA, they appeared before the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee and in June the Senate passed a resolution of ‘sympathy with the aspirations of the Irish people for a government of its own choice’ (Carroll, 1978: 131–9; Carroll, 1985: 116–18; Whelan, 2006: 204–17).

The Dáil enjoyed some success in achieving recognition from international socialist organisations. In addition to the American Federation of Labor, noted above, the Irish labour representatives attending the post-war international socialist conference in Berne in February 1919 were treated as the representatives of a distinct nation. Furthermore, the conference passed resolutions supporting Irish self-determination and the right to have Ireland's case heard
at the Paris Peace Conference. These were minor victories and fell well below the level of recognition the Dáil was aiming at, yet this was the first body to recognise the claims of the Dáil to be the legitimate government of an independent Irish Republic and the credit for this success belongs to the Irish Labour Party's representatives at the conference, Thomas Johnson and Cathal O’Shannon (Mitchell, 1995: 25–6).

There were also signs that another revolutionary government – the Soviet Union – was willing to recognise Irish independence. In June 1920 the Dáil decided to send a mission to Moscow to make a formal request for recognition. However, timing was a crucial factor; they were reluctant to receive such recognition from the USSR prior to making formal requests from other countries, lest Soviet recognition be considered a disadvantage as many countries were still unwilling to recognise the Bolshevik revolution. This decision to delay the request was fatal. By the time Dr Patrick McCartan arrived in the USSR in February 1921 the situation had changed. The Soviet Union was beginning to build cordial relations with Britain, resulting in the signing of a trade agreement in March 1921. The Soviet Government's representative, Maxim Litvinoff, made it clear to McCartan that the Irish had left it too late (Mitchell, 1995: 192).

Despite the conclusion of the Paris Peace Conference and the Dáil's failure to secure a hearing at it, the campaign for recognition in Europe continued. In addition to the Paris delegation, there were representatives in London, Switzerland, Genoa and Rome. The latter was significant from an Irish point of view as the location of the Vatican. In 1920 the British Foreign Secretary, Lord Curzon, sought to convince the Vatican to condemn the actions of Irish nationalists. The work of influential Rome-based Irish clerics, such as the Rector of the Irish College Father John Hagan and the Superior-General of the Carmelite order Peter Magennis, helped to head off any interference by the Vatican in Irish affairs on this occasion (Keogh, 1986: 40–4).

By 1921 Irish diplomatic representation had spread outside Europe to Commonwealth countries including Australia, New Zealand and Canada as well as South American countries with notable Irish links, such as Chile and Argentina. One of the more important missions was that to South Africa where Colonel Maurice Moore and P. J. Little were sent in 1921 to enlist support from Prime Minister Smuts to pressure the British Government into making concessions to Ireland. Although not prepared to go as far as supporting a republic, Smuts relayed his opposition to British policy in Ireland directly to Lloyd George at a Commonwealth conference in May 1921 and tried to convince all sides of the benefits of dominion status (Mitchell, 1995: 256–9, 296–7). Thus, by the time of the truce a nascent Irish diplomatic service had been established, marking another important achievement of the First Dáil's foreign policy.

After the failure of efforts to gain a hearing in Paris, the focus of the Dáil’s foreign policy shifted to the USA, where it was hoped that the popularity of Ireland's cause would lead the US Government to giving some support to Irish self-determination. By concentrating on the USA it was also hoped to achieve another aim of the Dáil's foreign policy – raising sufficient funds to bankroll the revolutionary government at home and its various foreign missions. The most important aspect of the American campaign was the prolonged visit of de Valera to the land of his birth between June 1919 and December 1920.

De Valera's trip was a massive logistical effort for the infant Department of Foreign Affairs. Soon after his arrival he addressed an enthusiastic crowd of more than 50,000 in Boston's Fenway Park baseball ground. From his base at New York's Waldorf-Astoria Hotel he spent much of 1919 visiting cities with important Irish connections including Washington DC, Chicago, San Francisco, Detroit, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Butte (Montana), and Newport (Rhode Island), in addition to states that were less well-known for their Irish connections including Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, Wisconsin (where he was made a chief of the Chippewa Indians), Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado and Washington (Hannigan, 2008).

1920 was a presidential election year in the USA and one of the principal aims of the Dáil's mission was to have one of the main parties adopt a resolution supporting Irish independence at their selection conventions. Diplomatic representation was extended with the posting of personnel to Chicago, New Orleans, San Francisco and Boston, to bolster de Valera's New York-based mission. The work of the Dáil mission in the USA in 1920 also expanded considerably with the launch of the first bond drive, headed by James O’Mara, to raise funds for the revolutionary Irish Government. Supported enthusiastically by Irish expatriates and the descendants of Irish immigrants, it raised US$5.5 million in its first year (Mitchell, 1995: 194).

Apart from this success in raising money, the rest of de Valera's ambitious plan for 1920 was a failure. Neither the Republican nor Democratic Parties supported Ireland's cause at their conventions. The latter chose to bolster support for Woodrow Wilson at a time when he was facing fierce domestic opposition to the League of Nations that would result in the USA rejecting the Treaty of Versailles, refusing to join the league and electing a Republican President in November 1920. In March 1920 the US Senate voted to include a reservation supporting Irish self-determination in the Treaty of Versailles, but this was nullified by the Senate's eventual rejection of the overall treaty (Mitchell, 1995: 192–7).

The mission was hampered by divisions within the Irish-American political groups that were exacerbated by de Valera's arrival. The most important body agitating for Irish independence in the USA was Clan na Gael, the American
wing of the IRB, which supported military action and had provided finance and weapons for the Rising. Like its fraternal organisation in Ireland, Clan na Gael was a secret oath-bound society. In 1916 an off-shoot of the Clan, the
Friends of Irish Freedom (FOIF)
was formed, which was more open than the Clan and stated its intention to support ‘any movement that will tend to bring about the National Independence of Ireland’ (Carroll, 1978: 52).

Friends of Irish Freedom (FOIF)
: Irish-American organisation led by John Devoy and Daniel Cohalan that supported Irish independence and split with de Valera's American Association for the Recognition of the Irish Republic (AARIR) in October 1920.

By the middle of 1920 two distinct warring factions existed within the Clan and the FOIF. On one side was the head of the FOIF, Daniel F. Cohalan, the son of Irish immigrants who was a judge of the New York state Supreme Court and a prominent figure in the Democratic Party. By the time of de Valera's arrival in the USA in 1919 Cohalan was the most influential Irish-American politician and was supported by the veteran Fenian John Devoy and Diarmuid Lynch, a Cork TD. The rival group, based in Philadelphia, was led by the Tyrone-born Joseph McGarrity and supported by the Dáil's special envoy Dr Patrick McCartan.

Personality clashes and power struggles were some of the reasons for the discord between both groups. However, there were also significant differences of opinion about the best strategy to adopt in seeking American recognition of Irish independence. McGarrity's faction was solely concerned with the Irish cause, whereas Cohalan also had an eye on his own political advancement in the USA. Cohalan believed that lobbying American politicians and using diplomatic pressure was the method most likely to achieve success, whereas McGarrity and McCartan were proponents of more direct action such as raising funds and acquiring arms to support the revolution underway in Ireland. Specific events, such as O’Mara's bond drive, which Cohalan opposed, deepened the divisions between both sides. Soon after de Valera's arrival in 1919, Harry Boland sought unsuccessfully to heal the divisions and it was inevitable that de Valera would have to choose between the two sides.

In February 1920 in an interview with the
Westminster Gazette
de Valera controversially asserted that an independent Ireland would accept a version of America's Monroe Doctrine (which prohibited European interference in the American hemisphere) as a reassurance to Britain that Ireland would not be used as a base from which to attack it. This controversial ‘Cuban analogy’ was widely criticised in the USA and at home. McCartan was forced to return to Ireland to explain de Valera's position even though he did not agree with it. Cohalan objected to it and it led to the eventual sundering of relations between him and de Valera. De Valera and Boland sided with McGarrity and formed the American Association for the Recognition of the Irish Republic (AARIR) as a breakaway from the FOIF (Mitchell, 1995: 194–5; Carroll, 1978: 159–60).