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DE/2/304/1/69

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“aA representative ofthe Northem Cabinet; Shue ster's disigtlination to enter an J said the reasons were because the ifs of Dail Eireann were not business men cap; of giving the country a good business ation; and because Sinn etaining power and the Sin eight pledge. 8 to have my views on it. I this point over the week-end?’

Re Now to go on to your memorandum, which so good + I wonder if you could, follow that short memorandum sketching the development of the Colonies and extending the idea of entire freedom?

3. I wonder if you could develop more fully that idea of mine about the Irish Constitution being the Supreme Body with an elected representative recognising as a symbol the central figure in the Commonwealth? The idea of Irelani as a mother country with interests to protect. For instance, if America comes into the League Ireland would have a great responsibility for her Nationals in thet country. What I mean in this is the furthest strength Ireland's association would give to such a League.

5. Points of difference between the Colonies and Englmd - points which indicate that the Colonies are evolving to full freedom - the necessity of altering the position to meet the changing conditions. Another point developing a bit more fully the real League of Free Nations idea. 6.

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18th Hovenber, 1921. (2)

6. The final point, that Lloyd George's invitation must mean thet they themselves have a responsibility for defining the new association to emphasise the departure from the old position. There are no precedents for this present sitvation, but this will be & precedent for perhaps meny a new situation.

DE#2/304/1/69(003) 9] SE | HOPES j

"Jee. the idea..... about the Irish Constitution 1 being the Supreme Body, with an elected representative recognising, as a symbol, the central figure in the Commonwealth."

It is inappropriate for individual representatives of a people, in their capacity as such representatives, to give allegiance to anything except to their own State as represented by the Government of the day. That government has its authority from the whole people, and any oath of ellegiance is in fact one of allegiance to the people.

In England the Crow has been preserved as the expression of government. (It is no more. The King's speech is the speech of his ministers, and he acts only through his ministers. ) |

While it is appropriate, therefore, for British representatives to give an oath of allegiance | to their King as the Symbol of their State, it is not appropriate for the representatives of the other - nations to express allegiance to the King of England | as regards their own national government, which is } independent) of England.

But in the relation of the nations of the Commonwealth to each other, the British Crow can fulfil another part.

It can ect ss the symbol of the free union of the different countries composing the Commonwealth.

But to that symbol it is the chief representative of each nation, who hes been chosen by his people tobe their spokesman, who should express such ellegiénee in the name of the nation for which he speaks.

The present oeth of allegiance es used by the is a confusion of two things. It is used to express allegiance to their om government, and it implies a relationship between their country and the government of . That relation hes been in the past one of subordination, and the oath retains the expression of that subordination. But there is now no subordinstion. The governments are completely independent of each other, and the oath in its present form no longer fits the facts. It is unsuitable for expressing allegiance to their own State, end it implies & relationship which does not exist.

But the Dominions are willing to be related to Great Britain and to each other in some form of 2 association, and that association could be expressed by @ suitable declaration of allegiance. NOTES ON

4. "....the idea of Ireland as a mother country with interests to protect ..... if America comes in to the League Ireland would have a great responsibility for her nationals in that country secceceee the further strength Ireland's association would give to such e League."

If Ireland gets such @ freedom as will satisfy her people in Ireland and in the Dominions and in America, the Commonwealth will be strengthened - and Englend's vitally necessary friendship with America will materialise.

And Ireland's inclusion as a free member of the League would consolidate the League, and would operate as a powerful influence upon America to join in such, a\League, Ireland being herself a Mother Country to whom-her nationals in the Dominions and Americe look for association and protection.

Those nationals would influence the countries in which they live to remain loyel to or to enter into (in the case of America) such a League, if their mother country were a free constitutional member of it.

In this matter the extent to which Ireland is : a mother netion is of-enormous importance.

In) such a League Ireland would find something to join for her own sake, in the further link she would get with /her children, and would be not merely acquiescing out of deference to British susceptibilities. 4 England's fear of Ireland as a possibly hostile nation, or a.hostile base, would be gone, with the possibility of war between England and America ended, if England, Ireland and America were associated in such a way.

Anglo-d4merican friendship would be secured. Doubly assured, the British in America joined to the British in England, the Irish in America joined to the Irish in Ireland.

It would be the wish and the effort of the Irish people in every country of such a League to preserve the union by means of which they were allied to each other and were united to their mother country.

DE#2/304/1/69(005) ae i nine NOTES ON and 6. "Development of the Colonies to complete 2,5 freedom: matters to be adjusted between Great Britain and the Dominions; the form of association which might become a real League of Nations: Mr. Lloyd George's invitation to Ireland to join such an association."

DEVELOPMENT OF THE COLONIES T0 COMPLETE FREEDOM:

In the eighteenth century the colonies were regarded as "foreign plantetions" developed by the Mother Country for the purpose of supplying her with rew materials, and of providing markets for her manufacturers. A paper in the Regord Office dated 1726 seys:- "All advantageous projects or commercial gain in any colony which are truly prejudicial to, and inconsistent with, the interests of the Miother’Coumtry, must be understood to be illegal.and the-prectice of them unwarranteable; because they contradict the end for which the colonies had a being.”

Assemblies grew up in the) colonies, but, according to the English view, they were subordinate to the English King and Parliament. England cleimed the right to tax the colonies, end the Stamp Act of 1765 resulted in the American Decleration of Independence.

With regard to the remaining colonies, the development towards independence has been gradual end is still teking place. Their distance from England enabled them tomeintain e virtual independence es to their internal concerns,

In this distance wes their advantage. In regard to Ireland, her proximity has enabled England to assert, and, up to the present, to keep her supremacy. 4nd in Ireland there was and elways had been e complete nationhood which England hed either to recognise or to trample out of ell recognition.

A gradual development of independence was not possible, in the same way, in Ireland, but it suited the case of the colonies. Their nationhood wes but beginning, it was incomplete, and England, at their distance, was unable to prevent its development, and wes obliged to allow it to find such expression as was suitable to it.

Accordingly, the theory of "Responsible Government" grew up, by which local matters were given over to the Colonial legisletures, Imperiel concerns being retained absolutely in the hands of the British Government.

The various schemes of Home Rule for Ireland were attempts to force this procedure on a country to which it never did, and never could, suit the fects. Anda

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2.

And as the colonies developed it was evident that this system, convenient as it mey have been for a transition, was in itself unstable. The powers first conceded to the colonies were bound to be developed, and the colonies, as they grew in importance and in national consciousness, claimed to exercise all such powers as were essential to their growing national existence. :

This was the case in regard to such matters as Public Lands, and the control of trade, both foreign and inter-Imperial. The colonies knew that to allow Englend to dictate their commercial policy would be to permit her to dictate the lines of their social life.

The matter was settled by the declaration of the Canadien Ministry in 1859 of their constitutional independence in the matter of fiscal policy. "Self-government" they wrote "would be utterly annihilated if the views of the Imperial Government were to be preferred to those of the people of Canada." The freedom of the colonies.-to control their own fiscal policies was:never egain, seriously challenged by England.

Nor has the idea of holding the colonies by armed force against their will ever been practically entertained since the American colonies fought for and won their independence,

During the ten years, 1860 to 1870, the British Government greduelly withdrew ell British troops from self-governing colonies.

While the colonies developed their independence, England was considering the possible ways by which they might be kept)in some form of voluntary union. Far-seeing people realised that independence was becoming inevitable and in "The Colonies of England" published in 1849, J. 4. Roebuck hed argued that by encouraging national development in the colonies, England would make herself the centre of a closely allied and iImtimete group of nations.

But the idea of Imperial unity wes not ebandoned and during the seventies and eighties there was a movement for "Imperial Federation." This broke down in the nineties, as the colonies refused to surrender themselves to a fedefation - a sort of super-State - and desired something more in the nature of an alliance. It became no longer a question of the "national unity" of the , but of the international relations of the States forming the group.

The movement for Imperial Federation had been largely based on the need for Imperial defence, and the hope that such e powerful Federation might be able to impose peace on the world. But in 1891 Professor Goldwin Smith wrote: "Surely the appearance of a world- wide power, grasping ell the waterways and all the points of meritime vantage, instead of propagating peace, would, like an alarm gun, call the nations to battle."

Federation

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Federation through a super-State was as little acceptable to the colonies as domination by Englend, and was equally misconceived from the point of view of world peace. But the desire remained to preserve some link between the kindred nations and to eneble them to co-operate for purposes of genuine defence and world policy. It became clear that the method must be one which left free statehood to each of the nations, but provided for co-operation in their common concerns.

At the time of the Boer Wer, especially, the question of common defence came under consideration. The English Government, pressed by the colonies to ‘ give them @ voice in the common policy, bargeined for some shere of the burden of defence being taken over by the colonies. The British Admiralty wished for a subsidy from the colonies towards the British Nevy,and got offers of contributions from some of the colonies. But the Canadian Ministers objected on the ground that "the acceptance of-the proposals would entail an important departure from the principle of Colonial self-government," ‘and in Austrelie national feeling expressed itself against the anti-national principle of subsidy. -

As regards-military defence, the colonies took the same line. At the Conference of 1902, Canada and Australie protested that "to-establish a special force, set apart for general Imperis] service, and practically under the ebsolute control /of\the Imperial government, was objectionsble in principle, as derogeting from the powers of self-government enjoyed by them."

They egreed to the pringdiple thet each should organise its own /‘forees along common lines, with & view to the possibility of co-operation in the future, but insisted that.it should be left "to the colony, when the need arose, todetermine how and to what extent it should render assistance."

Between 1902 and 1907 the struggle continued between the British Admiralty's ideal of a centralised British Navy, contributed to in cash or in kind by the Dominions, end the rising nationel feeling in the greater Dominions ageinst "hired defence" and in favour of Dominion navies. In March 1909, the Canadian House of Commons declared in favour of "the speedy organisation of a Cenedian navel service in co-operation with, and in close relation to, the Imperial nevy," and the government of Australie proposed the encouregement of naval development for the two-fold purpose of providing for locel defence, and of assisting in Imperial defence by acting in concert with the other sea-forces of the Empire. The naval agreement drawn up in 1911 between Canede, Australie and the , began by stating "The naval services and forces of the Dominions of Canada and Australia will be exclusively under the control of their respect Governments."

The

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The principles which should gbvern the development of machinery for the co-operation required by the British Commonwealth were leid down in the Constitutionel Resolution of the Conference of 1917.

It stated that the constitutional relations of Great Britain and the Dominions should be based on a recognition of the yee of equality of nationhood in foreign effeirs (as in ali other matters) and declared thet there should be a readjustment providing "effective errangements for continuous consultation in all importent matters of common Imperial concern, end for such necessary concerted action, founded on consultation, es the special governments may determine." The details of the methods for such consultation and concerted action, and the progress madé in arriving at a workeble scheme of co-operation are given in the reports of the proceedings of the Colonial Conferences (afterwards called Imperial Conferences) in 1887, 1897, 1902, 1907, 19114-1927 end.2918.

As the scheme, for-cosoperation became more definite and effective, and the relations between the Dominions and the United Kingdom became more cordial, a corres- ponding progress was made in the claim by the Dominions for equel and independent, statehood, and the recognition of thet claim in theory end prectice. The speeches of General Smuts and Sir R. Borden at the Imperial War Conference in 1917 and during the Treaty Debates iin their respective Parliaments in Sept. 1919, show the progress made by the Dominions towards absolute.\equelity with the United Kingdom and towards constitutional independence. In 1914 the\Dominions were - in a sense - nations, put they were definitely subordinate to nations. In 1917, General Smuts/said "The status of the Dominions es equal nations of the Empire will have to be recognised to a very large extent," and Sir R. Borden said "I look forward to a development in the future along the line of an increasingly equel status between the Dominions and the Mother Country."

In 1919 the uncertainty and diffidence of these phrases had vanished. The Dominions repeatedly and successfully demanded recognition of their ebsolute equality of netionhood. "We have received e position of absolute equality and freedom not only among the other States of the Empire but among the other netions of the world." (Genl. Smuts’, Sept. 1919. "The indomitable spirit" of Canada made her "incapable of accepting et the Peace Conference, in the League of Nations, or elsewhere, a status inferior to nations less advenced in their development, less emply endowed in weealth,resources, and population, no more complete in their sovereignty." (Sir R. Borden, Sept. 1919.)

These

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These statements reflect a state of facts which is practically recognised; but which is inconsistent with the 01d legal phraseology surviving from the earlier days of colonial development.

The two needs of the moment are to cleer up the true relations between the associated States as regards the complete independence of each Government, and the forms of allegiance which the people of each country owe to their own Governments, and to the symbol of their association with one another.

And to work out,in a practical way, the arrangements for co-operation between such free and equal States in matters of common concern such es foreign relations, defence, trade and communication.

The matter is no longer that of defining limited local autonomy, but of finding formulas for the recognition of the complete statehood of all the countries, and of arranging for e new form of international cooperation.

These are indeed the—very same problems which sare raised by Mr. Lloyd George's invitation to the Irish delegates, and which should form ithe subject of the Irish Conference.

The only association which) it will be satisfectory to Ireland anaé to Great Britain and to the Dominions for Ireland to enter will be/one based, not on the present technical legal status of the Dominions, but on the real position which they claim and have in fact secured.

In the interest of all \the associated States, in the interest abovyeoell of England herself, it is essential that thé present de facto position should be recognised | de jure, and that all its implications as regards sovereignty, allegiance, constitutional independence of the governments, should be acknowledged.

This will have to be done, anyhow, if the consolida- tion of the Commonwealth is to be assured.

The Irish Conference makes it necessary thet it should be done at once.

The question of the machinery of ¢o-operation coulda then be proceeded with, which should be on such lines, as would enable America, and eventually other netions, to join in a world-wide League.

DE#2/304/1/69(010) a s Sink eet a a