Was Sinn Féin Dying? a Quantitative Post-Mortem of the Party's
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Was Sinn Féin Dying? A Quantitative Post-Mortem of the Party's Decline and the Emergence of Fianna Fáili Donnacha Ó Beacháin [email protected] Dr. Donnacha Ó Beacháin is Lecturer and Marie Curie Fellow at the School of Law and Government, Dublin City University ABSTRACT: This article calls for a reappraisal of the consensus surrounding the split within Sinn Féin in 1926 that led to the foundation of Fianna Fáil. It demonstrates that quantitative factors cited to demonstrate Sinn Féin’s “terminal” decline – finances, cumann numbers, and election results – and to explain de Valera’s decision to leave Sinn Féin and establish a rival republican organisation, Fianna Fáil, do not provide sufficient objective grounds to explain the republican leader’s actions. This article demonstrates that Sinn Féin’s election results during the period in question (1923-1926) were encouraging and the decline in finances and cumann numbers can be explained by the fact that the base year used to compare progress was 1923, an election year. Moreover, this article compares the performance of Sinn Féin to the first five years of Fianna Fáil (1926-1931) to show that what has been interpreted as terminal decline can also be attributed to normal inter-election lulls in party activity. Correspondingly, subjective factors – e.g. personal rivalries, differences in ideology, organisational style and levels of patience in terms of achieving political power – were most likely the determining factors rather than organisational decline. 1 Introduction A consensus has emerged in recent years regarding the series of events, and the underlying circumstances, which led to the Sinn Féin split and the resultant establishment of Fianna Fáil. Though never the subject of much academic study, the verdict commonly expressed is that the Republican Party was dying, and that de Valera jumped from the Sinn Féin Titanic before it hit the iceberg of another electoral test. So common is this belief - bolstered sometimes by reference to articles and letters composed by those who were to become the Fianna Fáil political elite - that few have attempted to produce any quantitative data to substantiate it. An isolated though influential attempt to do just that has been provided by two lengthy articles written by Peter Pyne published forty years ago in the Economic and Social Review (Pyne 1969: 29-50, Pyne 1970: 229-257). Pyne's analysis, which remains a seminal and ground-breaking study, has provided the basis for many subsequent assumptions regarding the vicissitudes of the Sinn Féin Party from the end of the Civil War to the founding of Fianna Fáil. R.K. Carty, for example, writes that Sinn Féin's 'early successes in establishing an organisation proved to be ephemeral, and by 1924 their party was disintegrating' but his sole source for this definitive judgement is Pyne's study. (Carty, 1981: 101). In his major work on Fianna Fáil Richard Dunphy cites Pyne as his source to relate the familiar story of falling cumainn numbers, a worsening financial position combined with ‘extremely disappointing’ election results including the by-election ‘defeat’ of March 1925. This leads Dunphy to state unequivocally that ‘Sinn Féin had gone into a state of steady decline by 1924’. (Dunphy, 1995: 65) Similarly, in his book “Explaining Irish Democracy”, Bill Kissane cites Pyne to argue that Sinn Féin’s ‘poor showing in a by-election in 1925 2 apparently convinced de Valera finally of the need to abandon the abstentionist policy. Given that a decline in the party’s fortunes was apparent from almost every indicator, it was not surprising that “various elements within the republican movement began to question the party’s performance and the efficacy of its policies”. Mounting pressure for a reassessment of Sinn Fein’s political strategy led to a division within the republican movement’. (Kissane, 2002: 171, see also Kissane: 2001: 3) The parameters of Pyne's investigation are the years 1923-1926, and an attempt is made to document what is perceived to be the inexorable decline of the “Third Sinn Féin Party”. Taking that as his starting point, Pyne attempts to elucidate the 'factors contributing to [the party's] collapse'. (Pyne, 1970: 229). Three criteria are employed as barometers to gauge the organisational health of Sinn Féin - the financial position of the party; the number of party branches; and the support received in the various elections contested by the organisation. In this brief review, I hope to demonstrate that while Pyne’s facts are accurate, they are insufficiently contextualised. More particularly, a glance at the performance of Fianna Fáil in these three crucial areas during its formative years suggests that Pyne’s main conclusion – that the Sinn Féin party experienced terminal decline between 1923 and 1926 – is worthy of interrogation. Party finances Pyne notes that Sinn Féin's income for the year 1923-1924 was £26,000, which included a contribution of £20,000 from American supporters to contribute towards the cost of contesting the 1923 election. During the following year (1924-1925), 3 income dropped by a third to £17,000, the bulk of which consisted of American donations.ii Between 1925 and 1926, Pyne notes, party finances 'plunged' to £3,800, and two thirds of this was subscribed in the United States. In assessing these statistics Pyne points that out that by 1926 Sinn Féin's income was but 15% of what it had been two years previously. In addition, it is suggested that the reliance on American financial support is indicative of poor organisation and dwindling domestic support. Taking cognisance of these statistics, Pyne (not unnaturally) concludes that 'the financial position of the party was, therefore, one of rapid decline from 1924 onwards'. (Pyne, 1969: 41) 4 Sinn Fein Fianna Fail 35000 30000 25000 20000 15000 10000 5000 0 Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Year 5 1923-24, 1926-27 1924-25, 1927-28 1925-26, 1928-29 1929-30 1930-31 Figure 1 Amount raised (in pounds) raised by Sinn Féin and Fianna Fáil for party organization. Sources: For Sinn Féin funds Pyne 1969, 1970; for Fianna Fáil funds Honorary Treasurers and Honorary Secretaries Reports (Fianna Fáil Archives now housed at UCDA) However, the position of Sinn Féin appears less unfavourable when compared with the experience of Fianna Fáil during its first three years of existence as an organisation.iii The Honorary Treasurers report submitted to the 1927 ard fheis reported that party income for the previous eighteen months was £30,402 of which an incredible £29,782 had been subscribed from abroad, mainly the United States and 5 iv Australia (Report of the Honorary Treasurers, 1927 ard fheis). This figure compares favourably with that of Sinn Féin in the year after the Civil War. Indeed it can be argued that the Sinn Féin figure of £26,000 is more impressive as it covered a 12 month period as opposed to an 18 month one, and the money was raised to contest one election while Fianna Fáil had contested two within four months and thus sought and received further foreign donations. Had there been only one election in 1927 the v figure would have been considerably lower. The report also recalled that at the party's first ard fheis the previous year it had been agreed that £4,370 would be budgeted for a 'normal year', that is a year in which an election did not occur. Moreover, a figure of £7,000 was projected as the amount needed to fund party activities for the coming year. Receipts received for the year 1927-28, however, revealed that the Fianna Fáil could only muster £3,702 in the course of the twelve month period (Honorary Treasurers’ Report, 1928 ard fheis and The Nation, 17 November 1928 p. 2). Total income for 1928-29 increased to £6,792 - though this was £607 short of expenditure - before falling again in 1929-1930 to £5,156 (Honorary Treasurers Report, 1929 and 1930 ard fheiseanna). In 1931, the amount raised declined further to £4,252 before rising on the party's assumption of power the vi following year (Honorary Treasurers Report, 1931 and 1932 ard fheiseanna,). If we were to employ Pyne's logic to these statistics we might see a faltering party heading for terminal decline - an organisation whose immediate disposable income declined to 12% of its 1927 figure within a year. Such an interpretation would, however, be misleading. What these statistics indicate is the artificiality of the figures for 1923 and 1927, both of which were election years. There is invariably an inter-election lull, and the political organisation always finds it difficult to keep the party machine oiled and members motivated. 6 Local organisation The second criterion used by Pyne to demonstrate the decline of Sinn Féin - cumann numbers - produces an equally inconclusive result. Pyne argues that after an initial post Civil War boom in membership, and a corresponding mushrooming of cumainn, this had levelled off by mid-1924, before going into irreversible decline thereafter. Between June and November 1923, 700 cumainn were established and party membership continued to expand into 1924. But, as Pyne notes, only 700 of the party's 1,025 branches were able to raise the affiliation fee for the 1924 ard fheis held at the end of the year. This number had declined to little over 350 by July 1925. Pyne concludes by quoting the 1925 Sinn Féin Honorary Secretaries Report, which attributed the figures to poor organisation and argued that it was obvious that the party was not adequately representing the republican population. This leads Pyne to conclude that 'there can be little doubt that the Third Sinn Féin party was declining internally' (Pyne, 1969: 42).