and to smash the Republic by terrorism. Cathal Brugha, as Minister for Defence, supported by Michael Collins and Richard Mulcahy, waged war with such courage, tenacity and skill that all the King’s horsemen and the King’s men could not restore administration in our island. In America, Eamon de Valera sought the recognition of the Irish Republic not with complete success, but with such a large measure of support that England’s difficulty in repression was intensified. He returned to Ireland as the hunted President of a State that the people recognised as stubbornly as the English refused its recognition. The Black and Tans burnt down Cork. In Brixton jail MacSwiney died, the hero of all who love liberty throughout the earth. Erskine Childers wielded the weapon of propaganda with such remarkable skill that British consulates everywhere found their work embarrassed, impeded, often frustrated; and the Empire was brought into difficulties such as it never had known.
In the midst, therefore, of the glorious Summer of 1921, the British premier, Lloyd George, ate his words about “taking the last gun from the last gunman,” and sought a truce. President de Valera came out of hiding, and the Dáil met in the open for the first time since the meeting at which it was established.
When the Truce was signed by General Macready, the Republican army retaining its arms, England tacitly recognised our belligerent rights, but a battle of diplomacy followed in which it was Lloyd George’s aim to subvert our people’s faith in themselves and our leaders’ courage and unity.
This battle began with an offer of limited Dominion Home Rule. The offer was made to President de Valera in the normal way of negotiation, but General Smuts published it to the world, rushing into an affair that was not the concern of any African. The Dáil met, and the President announced the Irish Government’s answer. “We reject the terms,” he said, and he went on to explain to the vast audience that packed the Round Room, and to the world beyond it, that Ireland had not fought in order to become a Dominion of the British King. It was then that he uttered his famous phrase—it rings in our ears still— “We are not doctrinaire Republicans.” He meant that Ireland had not declared the Republic for the sake of the Republican form of government, but because allegiance to the Crown of England meant subjection to the English parliament. The Crown is simply the symbol of British power, and that is what Ireland cannot allow within her shores if she is to escape the interference which has been her bane ever since Henry II sought to incorporate this island in the dominions of the English monarchy.
In the tense exchange of messages that followed, Lloyd George tried to force our Government from its claim to sovereignty, while the President insisted that negotiations should be unfettered. At length, an unconditional conference was agreed upon; to consider how Irish national aspirations could be met together with an association with the States that now is called the British Commonwealth. Irish delegates were sent to London with clear instructions to this end. Their credentials instructed them “to negotiate … a Treaty of association and accommodation between Ireland and the Community of Nations known as the British Commonwealth.”
It is important to grasp exactly what the Government of the Republic, by the Dáil and the nation, contemplated. Some form of association with Britain was to be accepted. The reason for this, as the President told Lloyd George and several times stated to the world, was that a minority in Ireland is attached by reasons of sentiment and interest to the British Commonwealth, and the nation as a whole would concede association in order to reconcile these persons. To put the thing more bluntly, the Unionist element, with its fortress of a Six-County Parliament in the North-East, would be conciliated by an arrangement which would permit them, in a free Ireland, to retain relations with Britain for which the older stock, for historical reasons, feels no enthusiasm. As Mr. de 