Gaels and their Organ

An tAthair Padraig O Murchada, M.S.S., Inis Chórtaigh, puts our case in the following letter :— "When any new movement is started one of the first things that its promoters take in hands is the establishment of an organ to direct its policy. Thus we have in our country as many daily and weekly newspapers, reviews, and magazines as there are movements, leagues, and associations. These official organs devote the greater portion of their columns to expressing the views and publishing the speeches of their leaders and to giving reports of branches and meetings of their own organisation.

Sometimes they may advocate the claims of some other movement, but only in a half-hearted manner. They are not to be blamed for that, as their existence depends on the strength of their own particular movement and it is their business and duty to push their own cause for all it is worth. I have often heard Gaelic Leaguers saying 'Why don't the daily papers give us more news about the Gaelic League? Why don't they give us more matter in Irish? Why don't they join in with us in our struggle against the foreign boards of education' and so on.

My answer has always been : 'That is not their business exactly; they are political organs of some shape or form; they must cater for their own followers first and the rest of us afterwards. Have we not got an official organ of our own?', 'Yes, but it is so small that it has not space enough to publish all we want.' AN CLAIDHEAMH SOLUIS, the official organ of the Gaelic League, is small; we must all admit that. Whose fault is it but our own?

The Gaelic League has been in existence over a dozen of years: it has a large and powerful organisation at its back. It has thousands, tens of thousands of followers over the length and breadth of Ireland and across the seas, but the fact that it is not able to support a larger newspaper is little less than a disgrace to the Gaelic League and to its followers. I say again it is our own fault. We hear a great deal nowadays about Sinn Fein. Well, I believe that the Gaelic Leaguers who talk most about Sinn Fein are the very last to practise it as far as the support of the official organ is concerned. My idea of a true Gaelic Leaguer is that no matter what his political opinions may be he should be a Gaelic Leaguer first of all, and consequently he should support the official organ of the League.

I receive every week by the same post the four weekly newspapers or reviews that are closely identified with the language movement. I first turn towards the official organ of the Gaelic League, to which 1 look for inspiration and guidance; then I read the other papers. Every Gaelic Leaguer may not find it convenient to buy three or four weekly papers, but I do believe that it is the duty of every Gaelic Leaguer to buy the official organ in preference to any other.

If every Gaelic Leaguer did that we would soon have an official organ that would have the largest circulation and be the largest weekly published in Ireland; and a large weekly CLAIDHEAMH SOLUIS under the present Editor's wise control would wield enormous influence in the country. The followers of the Gaelic League are at present marshalled under several captains who give different orders every week, so that there is no unity of action amongst us.

Let us all go under the one general, let us all support the official organ, let us all carry out the orders given every week by that organ and I believe that we shall have such a united organisation and such determined followers that there will be no power in the land able to resist the demands of the Gaelic League."