Irish Republic
This article is about the historical Irish Republic
. For the modern state, see Republic of Ireland[In order to avoid the implication that the Republic of Ireland extends to the whole island of Ireland, some journalists and politicians refer to the modern Republic of Ireland as the "Irish Republic". Others simply use the term as a colloquial shorthand. However, as a title for the modern state, ]Irish Republic
is incorrect. The "Ireland Act 1949" (a UK Act of Parliament) provides for the use of "Republic of Ireland" as a substitute for "Éire" in United Kingdom for official purposes. The term "Irish Republic" has no international legal status today. Irish embassies will accept credentials addressed to "The Embassy of Ireland" or "The Embassy of the Republic of Ireland", but not "The Embassy of the Irish Republic". Continued use of the term also suggests acceptance of the Sinn Féin position that Anglo-Irish Treaty was invalid and that the revolutionary republic still exists. for other uses of Ireland
, see Ireland (disambiguation). For the history book with the same name by Dorothy Macardle, see The Irish Republic (book).
The
Irish Republic (
Irish:
Poblacht na hÉireann or
Saorstát Éireann) was a
unilaterally declared independent state of Ireland proclaimed in the
Easter Rising in 1916 and established in 1919 by
Dáil Éireann. Its existence coincided with the
Irish War of Independence of
1919-
1922 between the
Irish Republican Army and the forces of the
United Kingdom.
It formally ceased to exist in 1922 with the ratification of the
Anglo-Irish Treaty that ended the war, when 26 of the country's 32 counties became the
Irish Free State and the remaining 6 continued within the United Kingdom as
Northern Ireland.
In
English, the revolutionary state was to be known as the 'Irish Republic' or, occasionally, the 'Republic of Ireland'. Two different
Irish language titles were used:
Poblacht na hÉireann and
Saorstát Éireann, based on two competing Irish translations of the word
republic:
Poblacht and
Saorstát.
Poblacht was a derivation of
pobail (people) and of the Latin
Res Publica.
Saorstát, on the other hand, was a compound word based on two already existing Irish words:
saor (meaning "free") and
stát (a foreign loan word derived from the English "state"). Its direct, literal translation was "
free state". A slight variant of the title,
Saorstát na hÉireann, was also sometimes used in later days as was the
Latin Respublica Hibernica.
The term
Poblacht na hÉireann is the one used in the
Easter Proclamation of
1916. However the
Declaration of Independence and other documents adopted in 1919 eschew this title in favour of
Saorstát Éireann.
When the
Irish Free State was established at the end of the
Anglo-Irish War,
Saorstát Éireann was adopted as its official Irish title. However this Free State was not a republic but a form of
constitutional monarchy within the
British Empire. For this reason, since that time, the word
saorstát has fallen out of use as a translation of
republic. When the Irish state became the
Republic of Ireland in
1949, for example, its official Irish description became
Poblacht na hÉireann.
In
1916 nationalist rebels participating in the
Easter Rising issued the
Proclamation of the Republic. By this declaration they claimed to establish an independent state called the "Irish Republic" and proclaimed that the leaders of the rebellion would serve as the "
Provisional Government of the Irish Republic" until it became possible to elect a national parliament. The Easter Rising was short-lived, largely limited to
Dublin and, at the time it occurred, enjoyed little support from the Irish general public.
The leaders of the Easter Rising had proclaimed a republic.
Arthur Griffith's Sinn Féin organisation, which favoured the establishment of a form of dual monarchy between Ireland and Britain, had not taken part in the Rising. In 1917, Griffith's Sinn Féin and republicans under
Éamon de Valera, came together to form the new Sinn Féin Party. A compromise was reached at the
1917 Ard Fheis (party conference), where it was agreed that the party would pursue the establishment of an independent republic in the short-term, until the Irish people could be given the opportunity to decide on the form of government they preferred. This agreement was subject to the condition that if the people chose monarchy, no member of the British royal family would be invited to serve as monarch.
In the
UK general election of 1918 candidates of the radical
Sinn Féin party, including many who had participated in the 1916 rebellion, stood on a manifesto that committed the party to boycott the
British Parliament and instead unilaterally establish a new Irish assembly in
Dublin. Sinn Féin candidates won a large majority of seats, many uncontested, and in January 1919 gathered in the
Mansion House in Dublin for the first meeting of
Dáil Éireann. At this meeting the Dáil adopted the
Irish Declaration of Independence. Because of the Easter Proclamation already adopted in 1916, the Dáil retrospectively ratified the establishment of the Irish Republic.
 |
The First Dáil
meeting in the Round Room of the Mansion House in January 1919. |
On the same day as the Declaration of Independence was issued two members of the
Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) escorting a cartload of
gelignite were killed at
Soloheadbeg, in
Tipperary, by members of the
Irish Volunteers. This incident had not been ordered by the Dáil but the course of events soon drove the Dáil to recognise the Volunteers as the army of the Irish Republic, and so the Soloheadbeg incident became the opening incident of the
Anglo-Irish War between the Irish Republic and Great Britain.
The decision to establish a republic in 1919, rather than any other form of government, was significant because it amounted to a complete repudiation of all constitutional ties with Great Britain, and set the party against any compromise that might involve initial self-government under the
Home Rule Act 1914 or continued membership of the
British Empire. The volatile question of the Unionists of the northeast having long indicated that they would never participate in any form of a republic was left unresolved, the six northeastern counties remaining part of the
United Kingdom under the
Government of Ireland Act, 1920, and later the
Anglo-Irish Treaty.
Dáil Éireann
The central institution of the republic was Dáil Éireann, which convened as a unicameral parliament. The
First Dáil consisted of members elected in the 1918 Westminster election. Two further general elections conducted by the British government in Ireland were also treated by nationalists as elections to the Dáil. The
Second Dáil comprised members returned in the
1921 elections for the Parliaments of
Northern Ireland and
Southern Ireland; the
Third Dáil was elected in
1922 as the "
provisional parliament" of "
Southern Ireland", as provided for by the
Anglo-Irish Treaty.
At its first meeting the Dáil adopted a brief, provisional constitution known as the
Dáil Constitution.
Aireacht
The Dáil Constitution vested
executive authority in a
cabinet called the "
Aireacht" or "Ministry". The Aireacht was answerable to the Dáil which elected its head, known initially as the "PrÃomh Aire". He in turn appointed the ministers. According to the constitution, there were to be four ministers:
1. Minister of Finance (Aire Airgid),
2. Minister of Home Affairs (Aire Gnóthaà Duthchais),
3. Minister of Foreign Affairs (Aire Gnóthaà CoigcrÃoch)
4. Minister of Defence (Aire Cosanta).
The Aireacht met as often as secrecy and safety allowed.
Head of State / Head of Government
Initially, partly because of the division between republicans and monarchists, the Irish Republic had no explicit
head of state. The Republic's leader was known initially as the "PrÃomh Aire", literally "prime minister" but referred to in the
English version of the constitutionas "President of the Ministry". Later the
English title
President of Dáil Éireann also came to be used for the same post, especially during President de Valera's tour of the
United States. In August 1921, de Valera, standing for re-election as President of Dáil Éireann, had the Dáil rename the post to "
President of the Republic", so that he would be regarded as the head of state. After de Valera's resignation in January 1922, his successors Griffith and Cosgrave called themselves "President of Dáil Éireann".
Military
The military branch of the Irish Republic were the
Irish Volunteers who, in the course of the War of Independence, came to be known as the "
Irish Republican Army" to reflect their status as the national army of the declared republic. Despite being theoretically under the command of the Dáil's Ministry, in practice individual IRA columns enjoyed a high level of autonomy.
Judiciary and police
The judicial arm of the Irish Republic consisted of a network of
Dáil Courts administered by IRA officers, which at first operated in parallel with the British judicial system, and gradually came to supersede it as public opinion swung against the British. These were first established in June 1919.
The enforcement of law and the decrees of the Dáil Courts was vested in the
Irish Republican Police.
In many respects, the declared state had the function of an independent country, albeit one with unresolved issues. The influence of the Dáil did extend to most of Ireland. County councils, where Sinn Féin also held majorities, gave their allegiance to the government of the Republic. As the RIC lost the support of the populace, especially after the arrival of the
Black and Tans, personal disputes were increasingly referred to the Republican Police and the Dáil Courts. The cabinet met frequently, though necessarily in secret, and dealt with everyday matters as well as the conduct of the war.
Support for the Republic was strongest in the south of the country. On the other hand, the north-east was heavily Unionist and the Unionists did not recognise its authority.
Efforts by President de Valera in the United States, and the republic's "ambassador" at the
Versailles Peace Conference,
Sean T. O'Kelly, to win international recognition failed. O'Kelly had already established the Republic's "embassy" in
Paris in April of 1919, and Dr.
Patrick MacCartan set one up in
Washington D.C. at the same time. Despite heavy lobbying from prominent
Irish-Americans,
President Woodrow Wilson refused to raise the Irish case at the conference. The only foreign recognition won for the Irish Republic occurred when the
Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic, under
Vladimir Lenin, borrowed money from
Michael Collins' Ministry of Finance and paid it back in the
Tsarist
crown jewels. This was a short-lived boost to the more socialist side of the republican movement.
The Irish Republic was not recognised by the
British government. In 1921 in accordance with
Ulster unionist demands the British government passed an Act partitioning Ireland into two regions, called '
Southern Ireland' and
Northern Ireland (the
Government of Ireland Act, 1920), with their own parliaments which convened in June.
Nationalists refused to recognise the authority of the British to do this.
When, in December 1921, the republic sent representatives to negotiate a truce with the government of
David Lloyd George the Dáil commissioned them as "envoys plenipotentiary", acting under the authority of the President of the Republic. However Lloyd George refused to consider the negotiations as talks between two sovereign states, rather that the delegates were representing the Irish people. Furthermore, when the
Anglo-Irish Treaty was concluded the British government insisted that it be submitted to the
House of Commons of Southern Ireland for Irish ratification, rather than the Dáil (although in practice the membership of the two bodies was almost identical and it did so only on conclusion of the Dáil debate and vote). Although this was partly a face-saving measure, it was also due to the fact that it would not be recognised in UK law unless it was ratified by a British-recognised institution.
Finally, in the transitional period leading to the establishment of the
Irish Free State, the British government transferred governance over Southern Ireland to an organ called the '
Provisional Government', rather than the Ministry of the Irish Republic. Again, this was designed to save British face and made no practical difference, as the bodies were one and the same.
By approving the
Anglo-Irish Treaty in December 1921 and the
Constitution of the Irish Free State in October 1922 the Dáil temporarily agreed to the dissolution of the Irish Republic and its replacement with the system of constitutional monarchy of the Irish Free State.
In 1922 the Provisional Government came into being but the Irish Republic was not dismantled, rather its institutions continued to operate in parallel with those of the provisional authority. Thus, for a time, the interim state had (nominally) two heads of government. Michael Collins was designated as
Chairman of the Provisional Government, in theory answerable to the
House of Commons of Southern Ireland and appointed by the
Lord Lieutenant[Collins met Lord Fitzalan in Dublin Castle. In Irish constitutional theory it was to accept the "surrender" of Dublin Castle. In British constitutional theory it was for Collins to Kiss Hands (i.e., be formally appointed) and take over the British departments in the Castle.]. In contrast the Republic's Aireacht continued with Arthur Griffith as President of the Republic following de Valera's resignation.
[Griffith chose to call himself "President of Dáil Eireann" but he was officially de Valera's successor as President of the Republic.] However the two administrations were progressively merged until in August, following the deaths of both Griffith and Collins,
William T. Cosgrave assumed both leadership positions simultaneously and so the two most important offices effectively became one, producing a unique constitutional hybrid; a crown-appointed prime minister
and a president of a republic. Both parliaments, the Second Dáil and the House of Commons, were replaced by a joint parliament known variously as the
Third Dáil or the
Provisional Parliament which as a
constituent assembly enacted a new constitution with the passage of the
Irish Free State Constitution Act.
On the
6 December 1922 the Constitution of the Irish Free State came into effect and the institutions of both the Irish Republic and the Provisional Government ceased to be.
The goal of those who established the Irish Republic was to create a
de facto independent republic comprising the whole island of Ireland. They failed in this goal, but the Irish Republic paved the way for the creation of the Irish Free State, a
British Commonwealth dominion with self-government, and a territory that extended to the 26 counties originally foreseen in the
1914 Home Rule Act. By 1949 the Free State became a fully independent republic, the '
Republic of Ireland'.
Speaking in the Dáil on 29th April,
1997 Bertie Ahern, the leader of the
Fianna Fáil party, which is the successor of the anti-treaty Sinn Féin, and the then
Taoiseach (head of government)
John Bruton, leader of the
Fine Gael party, which is the successor of the pro-Treaty Sinn Féin, agreed that as a basis for inclusive commemoration, the date from which Irish independence should be measured was not the formation of the Irish Republic in 1919, but the 1922 establishment of the Irish Free State, the first modern Irish state to achieve
de facto independence and international recognition.
Since the
Civil War of
1922-
1923 the Irish Republic has been an important symbol for radical republicans. The Civil War began in June 1922 when both Sinn Féin and the IRA split between those pragmatists, who supported the Treaty, and those hardline republicans who opposed the compromises it contained. In particular the anti-Treaty faction objected to the continued role in the Irish constitution that would be granted to the British monarch under the Irish Free State. When the Dáil ratified the Treaty its opponents of the agreement walked out, arguing that the Dáil was attempting to 'destroy' the Irish Republic, and that its members had no right to do so. After the Irish electorate voted in a majority of pro-Treaty candidates to the Dáil, Éamon de Valera declared that "the people have no right to do wrong."
Opponents of the Treaty refused to recognise either the Provisional Government or, when it was established, the Irish Free State, insisting that the Irish Republic continued to exist as a
de jure entity. The anti-treaty faction also refused to recognise the Third Dáil, as the Second Dáil had never met to dissolve itself. These Republicans therefore considered the Third Dáil, and all future institutions arising from it, as illegal. (See
Second Dáil).
The anti-Treaty side was defeated in the Civil War. Most militant opposition to the Free State came to an end on
May 24 1923 when
Frank Aiken, chief-of-staff of the IRA issued the order to "dump arms" and Eamon de Valera issued his address "Legion of the Rearguard". Éamon de Valera continued as president of the
Sinn Féin political party. In March 1926, Éamon de Valera, along with most anti-Treaty politicians, founded a new party called '
Fianna Fáil' and ended their boycott of the institutions of the Free State.
Nonetheless a small hard-line minority continued to reject the legitimacy of the Free State and its successor, the
Republic of Ireland. Most importantly, the
Provisional IRA (PIRA), which conducted a campaign of bombings and shootings in Northern Ireland from the late 1960s until 1998, and its political wing, the modern Sinn Féin party, used to insist that the Irish Republic was still legally in existence, with the IRA as its national army, and the
IRA Army Council Ireland's sole legitimate government. These views are also held by other radical groups such as the
Continuity IRA and the
Real IRA.
As of 2006, the Provisional IRA continue to use the title
Oglaigh na hÉireann (lit. Volunteers of Ireland), the official
Irish title for the
Republic of Ireland's
armed forces.
Latterly Gerry Adams, president of Sinn Féin, has recast the doctrine to state that there is no legitimate government in Ireland, but his party has both recognised the legal fact of partition by signing the
Good Friday Agreement and accepted the legitimacy of the government of the Republic of Ireland by openly speculating on taking up posts in a coalition government.
*
Tim Pat Coogan,
Michael Collins (Hutchinson, 1990) ISBN 0091741068
*Tim Pat Coogan,
Eamon de Valera (Hutchinson, 1993) ISBN 009175030X
*
R.F. Foster,
Modern Ireland 1600–1972*Joseph Lee,
The Modernisation of Irish Society*
F.S.L. Lyons,
Ireland Since the Famine*
Lord Longford,
Peace by Ordeal*
Dorothy Macardle,
The Irish Republic*Earl of Middleton,
Ireland: Dupe or Heroine?*Arthur Mitchell & Pádraig Ã" Snodaigh,
Irish Political Documents 1916–1949*John A. Murphy,
Ireland in the Twentieth Century*
History of Ireland (1801-1922)*
History of the Republic of Ireland*
Names of the Irish state
