Sinn Fein and the EU Elections        [1984]

[Sinn Fein did not contest the first direct election to what became the European Parliament, which were held in 1979. Its decision to contest the next such election in 1984 occasioned this article by Desmond Greaves. In it he contrasts Sinn Fein’s then unwillingness to take seats in the British or Irish Parliaments with its willingness to sit in the Strasbourg body. Greaves regarded recognising the legitimacy of the EEC/EU as recognising the validity of the boundaries of its Member States, which meant implicitly recognising Partition.  Greaves regarded this as a move by the Republicans to moderate their opposition to the then EEC and accommodate themselves to supranational federalism – a process that was to culminate thirty years later in Sinn Fein’s advocacy of the Six Counties remaining in the European Union in the 2016 UK Brexit referendum, when it backed the“Remain”side.  What is now known as the “European Parliament” was titled an “Assembly” in the 1957 Treaty of Rome that established the European Economic Community (EEC). Its members decided to call themselves a “Parliament” from the early 1960s onward without any legal entitlement to do this. This reflected their political aspiration to establish the institutions of a federal superstate, with appropriate names for its envisaged institutions. It was only in 1987, in the treaty known as the Single European Act, that the term “Assembly” was replaced by “Parliament”,  which gave the name  a  legal basis in EU law. Greaves’s original article was titled  “The Euro-election dilemma” and was carried in the June 1984 issue of the “Irish Democrat”.]

Proclamations have been posted throughout Britain and Ireland and other countries. Look at them. They announce elections for the European Assembly. Look at them again and confirm it. The elections are for a European Assembly. 

Why then does every single organ of the imperialist press talk constantly about the “European Parliament”?

There must be a reason. And it must be a reason arising from some centralised directive. Partly it is because people assume a Parliament is worth voting for and an assembly is not. The higher the vote for the Assembly the more people are taking seriously the EEC, which is of course the political arm of the transnational corporations.

If the Establishment wants a high vote in the “European elections” it can’t be too good for you and me. For my part wild horses wouldn’t drag me out to participate in this farce, not even if the Archangel Gabriel was going up. But everybody doesn’t think this, and everybody is not necessarily a fool.

The Communist Party of Ireland has found a neat way of getting the publicity without sending up the candidates. They have Mr Eoin Ó Murchú contesting the Laois-Offaly by-election as an anti-EEC candidate.

He says bluntly that the EEC has failed the Irish people, and the object of the “sham election” is to weaken Irish democracy.

The CPI says the Euro-election should be boycotted and the electors should abstain or spoil their ballot papers. They say the future of the Irish working class is outside the EEC.

This seems a simple logical position. But others think there are other issues as well as the logical.

Take Sinn Fein for instance. They would say that whereas  a CPI candidate would not have a strong chance of being elected, one of theirs would. They are locked in political combat with the strongly pro-Common Market SDLP. If John Hume were elected it might strengthen the influence of his party, whereas if Danny Morrison were elected it would be one more step in the struggle for hegemony in the nationalist community.

In effect the EEC election would be taken as a plebiscite in internal Irish affairs. There is a sort of precedent in the 1921 British election which was “deemed” to be an election to the Second Dial. Of course some have argued that the decision to dissolve the First Dail on a British initiative was the first fatal blunder that led to the “Treaty” and the Civil War.

But at any rate the Second Dail was still abstentionist. There was no intention of going to Westminster. Sinn Fein however will participate  in the European Assembly if elected. The argument is put that to fail to do so would be give advantage to John Hume. A candidate who goes up on an abstentionist platform cannot so readily bring people out to vote.

But this faces Sinn Fein  with another dilemma. If it is right to go to Europe in order to do what little is possible there, why is it  wrong to go to Leinster  House where honest  politicians are no more numerous than in other national  parliaments? The EEC is a ha’porth  more legitimate than Leinster House? One might go the whole hog and ask why not go to Westminster? A determined, honest, educated Republican could do quite a lot there.

There are those in Sinn Fein who would go into Leinster House. Perhaps they regard going to Europe as a precedent. But others will see the move as the beginning of the slippery slope which converted Sinn Fein into Sinn Fein the Workers’ Party and then dropped the Sinn Fein altogether [This had been the political progression of “Official” Sinn Fein, which split from “Provisiona”l Sinn Fein in 1970].   Others will say that going to Europe is not a matter of principle whereas entering Leinster House is. But perhaps keeping out of European toils is a matter of principle and participating in an Irish Parliament elected by Irish people in Ireland is a matter of tactics?

Well, every dog is allowed one bite. After that there may be some thinking to be done.

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