Politics and the League

The Gaelic League has three policies to choose from at will, the Parliamentarian or deputation-cum-negotiation method; the Sinn Féin or self-reliance method; the physical force method. At present certain people want to restrict us to the use of the first or Parliamentarian method. The attempt must be resisted at all costs.

The policy of ‘sanity and commonsense’ which is Dr. Hyde’s way of describing the Parliamentarian method; is that most likely to succeed when dealing with our own people. It is the business, as it has been the policy, of the League to cajole and entice and persuade our own people to learn the Irish language and make it part of the National life.

When dealing with institutions such as the National University, established by the British Government, but not directly under its control, the Sinn Féin policy of helping the lazy ones on with a stick has proved entirely effective. No amount of blarney or sweet reasonableness would have Irishised such an institution as quickly as the big stick wielded by the County Councils—the possible boycott and the threatened stoppage of funds. Shall we throw away this big stick at the dictation of any section within or without the League?

If the advocates of the exclusive use of peace methods believe they are going to capture the educational citadel fortified by the British Government, controlling all the primary schools, entrenched behind a network of red tape, and effect that capture by showers of pious resolutions, they have forgotten the history of the National Board.

‘It is not the business of the Gaelic League to fight the police,’ say the peace-makers. It is the business of the League to fight every force in Ireland which sets itself in opposition to the language. If peaceful methods fail, then let there be war. We of the Gaelic League are not to allow consideration of John Dillon’s services to any class in Ireland to stand in the way of the League’s advance. The League knows no politics and must respect no politician who publicly opposes or privately pulls the strings against the League’s advance. To do otherwise would be to ignore the constitution of the League.

‘We can do nothing with the National Board until we get Home Rule,’ says Pádraig O’Daly, General Secretary of the Gaelic League at Aughrim Feis, with John Redmond by his side. And forthwith Pádraig proceeds to do nothing. Here is a clear and definite example of the League trimming its sails to the political wind. Away with the policy of self-reliance, cease firing against the British Government Boards of Education until Home Rule is achieved, that is the cry of the peace-makers.

There can be no peace with the English enemy in Ireland, even when disguised as Education Boards. Their duty is to England not to Ireland. John MacHale would have none of them. The Presbyterians of the North burned down their schools. The peacemakers hope to persuade them into better ways.

One National school boycotted or levelled to the ground, one inspector ejected, one Leaguer imprisoned for ignoring the English-run Insurance Act, would effect more in a month than a cairn of resolutions—particularly if passed unanimously to-day and run away from six months hence.

Every Leaguer’s duty is to see that no wire-puller or body of wire-pullers shall set at naught the policy of the Ard-Fheis, whether that policy happens to be a policy of peace or war. We cannot afford to throw away a single weapon, whether it be branded Sinn Féin, Physical Force, or Parliamentarianism. It is open to the League to use all three or any one of them how and when it pleases without reference to any body but the members who compose and control the organisations.

ÉAMONN CEANNT.

Originally published in Sinn Féin.