An Exchange With N.I. Premier Terence O’Neill [1966]
[Editor’s Note: On 26 October 1966 the Connolly Association wrote a letter to Stormont Prime Minister Captain Terence O’Neill, taking issue with him regarding points he had made in a speech he gave in Ballycastle on 19 October. In this speech the Northern Premier called on the 26 Counties to alter the provision of its Constitution which claimed rightful jurisdiction over the North at the time. The Connolly Association letter, which was drafted by Desmond Greaves and signed by CA General Secretary Sean Redmond, was carried in the November 1966 issue of the “Irish Democrat” and is given below. Prime Minister O’Neill’s reply to it was carried in the December 1966 issue of that paper, as well as the Connolly Association’s reply to that in turn. The exchange shows how aware the Unionist Government was of the Association’s solidarity campaign in Britain in those years and how concerned it was about it.]
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Letter from the Connolly Association to Captain Terence O’Neill, Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, 26 October 1966:
The report in the London “Times” of your speech to the North Antrim Unionist Association in Ballycastle prompts us to challenge you to state clearly whether you refuse to entertain establishing a democratic regime in Northern Ireland unless the Nationalist minority in that area, together with the Nationalist majority in Ireland as a whole, withdraw their opposition to partition.
May we respectfully suggest to you that linking up the plain issue of democracy with political and constitutional questions, may not necessarily conduce to your comfort. For you endeavour to give the British State in Northern Ireland a legal foundation which it does not possess. May we elaborate this?
You state that under the 1949 Act “there can be no change in the constitutional position of Northern Ireland without the consent of Stormont.” But this is not what the Act says. It says that Northern Ireland “shall not cease to be part of His Majesty’s Dominions” without the consent of the Northern Ireland Government. Apart from this restriction the constitutional position of Northern Ireland can be altered by the Westminster Parliament at any time.
Thus, if the Republic were, wisely or unwisely, to rejoin the Commonwealth, the first part of the Ireland Act 1949 would read repealing. But the second, even if it remained, would afford you no protection; a united Ireland would then be a part of Her Majesty’s dominions, and thus your consent would be unnecessary. Many Irish people thought the object of the second part of the Ireland Act was a bait offered to attract some future government of the Republic to rejoin the Commonwealth.
But the British Parliament can now, if it so decides in its wisdom, merge the six-county territory with the rest of the United Kingdom and abolish your Government altogether. The 1949 Act offers you no protection whatever, even if the Government of the Republic “accepts the definition of your status” in accordance with your exposition of it.
And likewise the Westminster Parliament, as was made clear by the Deputy Speaker in a recent debate, can by legislation at any time introduce the elementary measures of democracy into Northern Ireland that your Government refuses to consider.
Thus in your speech you talk of the “constitutional position”, but you have no constitution. Your Government is a subordinate government. The Red Book which purports to set forth your constitution is simply a statement of the Government of Ireland Act of 1920, as amended by numerous subsequent acts of the Westminster Parliament. Your subordinate Parliament cannot change one word of it.
The “constitutional position” is never the same two years running, and there is nothing to prevent the Westminster Parliament repealing the 1949 Act at any time and then proceeding to vote you into the Republic if Dublin is prepared to accept you. No parliament can bind its successors. And you cannot bind any parliament which may replace you at Stormont. You should think of that when you speak of making your status “final”.
Similar delusions of grandeur inform your references to a supposed instrument accepted by the “legally constituted Governments of the United Kingdom, and of Northern and Southern Ireland” in the year 1925 (We quote from the “Irish Press”). You claim this is “not open to repudiation” by any party.
Without doing more than comment on the irrepressible optimism of this statement when practically every colonial settlement in operation in 1925 has been blown away by the wind of change, we remark that again your facts are wrong, your law is bad.
By 1925 there was no government of “Southern Ireland”, the territory allocated to “Southern Ireland” in the 1920 Act having been transferred to the Irish Free State which from the very start was conceived as covering all Ireland, though the six-county area opted out (as was believed) temporarily. It thereby remained part of the United Kingdom.
There were thus not three high contracting parties but only two. The status of one of them, the Irish Free State, was varied in 1937 and again in 1948, and this variation was accepted by the other. If Britain could not or would not prevent the revision of the status of the Free State, why should she regard that of the six-county area as inviolable? There is no more “finality” in this than in anything else.
As for the legality of the subordinate Government which existed in Northern Ireland in 1925, there are differences of opinion. It has been contended that by its abolition of Proportional Representation and consequent imposition of indirect discrimination against Catholics, it violated Section Four of the Government of Ireland Act and was thus illegally constituted.
You claim the suffrages of the people of the area today, yet you have never once tried an election based on “one man one vote” and have maintained the system of gerrymandering, discrimination and police repression. Is it really so strange that there should be among the minority people who have no faith in a constitutional position which deprives them of elementary human rights, and seek as an alternative to the constitution that is admittedly “made in England”, one that is made by themselves in Ireland?
You describe this minority as a “Trojan horse”. At a classical scholar you will recall that the Trojans themselves carried the Greek horse into the city. Had they left it outside, the Greeks would never have got in. You should reflect on this in connection with Fermanagh and Tyrone.
These, and others elsewhere, whom your predecessors encouraged Westminster to drag into a state whose existence they never desired nor accepted, you now lecture on responsibilities. Responsibilities to whom, for what? And until they do this you urge your own “self-styled liberals” to ignore the responsibilities of the majority.
You are prepared to give equal opportunities to the opposition only on condition that they cease to oppose on the crucial point which is their reason for existence as an opposition, and in addition you want their friends across the border to betray them. Then, with no opposition, you will feel Northern Ireland is safe for democracy.
You exclude the constitutional position from “legitimate political argument”. This position was taken up two centuries ago in what is now the United States, and more recently in India. But what happened? As recently as October 9th the Irish ambassador in London, Mr Molloy, called for its reconsideration.
Why should it be “an abuse of the machinery of Government” for residents of Northern Ireland to work for the same objective? Yet as abuse you regard it, or you would give them equal electoral rights and opportunities.
Yet suppose, in spite of the massive obstacles the Unionist Party places in their way, your Government is replaced by a coalition of Nationalists Republicans and Labour men, and these proceed to promote constitutional changes, what will you do?
Will your lofty claims for the Stormont Government still stand? Or will you cry Church and Queen, and call for British military intervention? Or if this is not forthcoming smuggle in arms from Germany as your party did in 1912-14 and solemnly commemorated in 1962-64?
It is clear from the above that it is in vain to try to buy compliance in your policies by offering the opposition what is theirs of natural right. You would be far better engaged in reforming the entire structure of government in your area in accordance with the demands made by all sections of the opposition, Nationalist, Republican, Liberal and Labour, for the simple democratic rights which are a commonplace in most civilised countries.
Failing that you cannot expect the British Labour movement, already seriously concerned at your proceedings, to forget that under the 1920 Act, Westminster is ultimately responsible.
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Reply by Stormont Prime Minister Captain Terence O’Neill to the Connolly Association’s letter, and that body’s further reply – both items carried in the December 1966 issue of the “Irish Democrat”
Stormont Castle,
Belfast 4
8th November 1966
Dear Mr Redmond,
Thank you for your letter of 26 October about my recent speech at Ballycastle. I fear, however, that you have not – possibly because of the abbreviated nature of Press reports – appreciated the point which I was trying to make.
In asking me to “state clearly whether you refuse to entertain establishing a democratic regime in Northern Ireland”, you are, if I may say so, begging the question in a way which I could not possibly accept for a moment. It is very easy to make generalised allegations of gerrymandering, discrimination and police repression without offering one shred of evidence for them.
When, for instance, we appointed an eminent QC to undertake a most expensive, lengthy and searching inquiry into allegations against the police mounted by an opposition Member of Parliament, they were found to be almost wholly without foundation. No doubt your organisation, in carrying out its self-appointed task of informing the British public about Irish affairs, will wish to take this fact into account.
As you say, we do indeed “claim the suffrages of the people of the area today”, and we feel we can do so with complete justification since at the last democratic test – the United Kingdom general election – 11 out of 12 Unionist candidates were elected, under electoral laws and conditions identical with those prevailing elsewhere in the United Kingdom.
You ignore also the fact that in the case of elections to the Northern Ireland Parliament the Unionist majority today is not markedly different from what it was when such elections took place on the basis of proportional representation which was an operation up to 1929 in constituencies laid down by the Government of Ireland Act.
I was entertained to read your complex and ingenious version of our constitutional status. It completely fails to take account of the fact that constitutional questions within the British Commonwealth have a conventional as well as a legislative basis. The theoretical power of Parliament is, of course, unlimited, but the conventions of the constitution are founded on common sense, and they include a very long-standing convention about the position of subordinate legislatures.
I am frankly unable to follow your complicated argument about the events of 1925. The facts seem to me to be quite simple. There were three parties to an Agreement at that time. Each was the lawfully constituted Government within its own territory. These parties came to a settlement, knowing full well what they were doing. You may regard such Agreements as mere scraps of paper which can be dishonoured at will. That is not my concept of public morality, and I will never accept it.
Finally, you say that I have urged people “to ignore the responsibilities of the majority.” Where, may I ask, have I said this? What I have done is to declare that the minority have responsibilities too, under what I described at Ballycastle as “the unwritten compactor or understanding which should exist between the State and its citizens.” I pointed out that there is all the difference in the world between legitimate political arguments as to how the State should conduct its affairs, and unceasing attempts by every means from propaganda to outright violence to subvert the constitution and destroy the fabric of that State.
Between your outlook and mine there is evidently an unbridgeable gulf, but I do not believe that there is such a gulf between my views and those of many of that “minority” in Northern Ireland for whom you presume to speak.
Yours sincerely
Terence O’Neill
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Reply to Captain Terence O’Neill’s letter, drafted by C. Desmond Greaves and signed by Sean Redmond on behalf of the Standing Committee of the Connolly Association, sent in December1966
Dear Captain O’Neill,
I placed your letter of November 8th before my committee, and they asked me to thank you for it, to express appreciation of your courtesy in replying at such length, and to make the following reply:-
We gather that you decline to answer our question as to whether you make the establishment of a democratic regime in Northern Ireland conditional on the Nationalists’ withdrawing their opposition to partition, on the grounds that the regime as at present conducted is less than fully democratic, and you assert that we have not produced a “shred of evidence” to support “generalised allegations” of “gerrymandering, discrimination and police repression.”
We could of course have provided ample evidence, but we judged this unnecessary. In the House of Commons at Westminster on November 15th, Mr Harold Wilson showed that he too was under this impression when he said: “I am sure that Captain O’Neill is well aware of the facts brought out from time to time by my Hon. Friend (Mr Gerard Fitt).” Mr Fitt had just concluded references to the “vicious gerrymandering” of Derry City and it is noteworthy that the Prime Minister used the word “fact”.
Indeed we are unaware that any Unionist spokesman has ever denied that in Derry City two-thirds of the electorate are Nationalists, and that thanks to the way in which the electoral boundaries have been drawn they are represented by a Council two-thirds of whose members are Unionists. Regarding the enquiry into police methods we presume you refer to the McBrien case, which we do not judge to have political significance but where, rightly or wrongly, the enquiry had the result which you state.
We would have found your disclaimer more convincing if a similar inquiry had been instituted into allegations of police torture in the highly-political Mallon and Talbot case. We cannot forget that the Special Powers Acts on the Statute Book of Northern Ireland contravene approximately two-thirds of the provisions of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and we note from your penultimate paragraph that you yourself can regard “propaganda” as destructive of the “fabric of the State”.
On the subject of discrimination, we imagined you would be following closely the attempt being made in Dungannon to bring the whole question to a test in the courts. This attempt was suggested by the late British Prime Minister, Sir Alec Douglas Home. It is alleged that the Dungannon Urban District Council has contravened one of the provisions of the Government of Ireland Act (1920) by offering housing accommodation to Protestants not on their list in preference to a Catholic, Mr Patrick McHugh, who has been waiting for some years.
We cannot pre-judge the issue, but draw your attention to the fact that Mr McHugh has been deterred from pursuing his case, which is the nature of a test case arising from the challenge of a British Prime Minister, on account of the refusal of the authorities to provide him with legal aid. Perhaps you will use your good offices to alter this situation, now that the facts have been drawn to your attention.
You state that Westminster elections are conducted in Northern Ireland “under electoral laws and conditions identical with those prevailing elsewhere in the United Kingdom.” We agree about the laws, but dispute the identity of the conditions. On August 8th, 1966, Mr Gerard Fitt MP asked the Minister of State: “Why has the returning officer … deliberately sited polling stations in my constituency in favour of the Unionist candidates?” There was no denial except that the Home Secretary was responsible.
Clearly there is a prima facie case that gerrymandering, discrimination and police repression exist in Northern Ireland, and we cannot understand why, believing as you appear to do that this case is easily answered, you do not urge H.M. Government to set up an impartial enquiry into the whole situation.
Such an enquiry has been specifically requested by every opposition party of importance in Northern Ireland, and yet for some reason the Unionist Party seems to lack confidence in the probable result. If as you state in your last paragraph you hope to narrow the gulf which divides you from many of the “minority”, we can conceive of no better initial step than the reference of their long-standing complaints to an impartial external tribunal where all the facts can be fearlessly probed and remedies recommended.
Such a step on your part would be practical confirmation of your belief in an “unwritten compact or understanding which should exist between the State and its citizens”. We are encouraged to hope that perhaps you may drop your opposition to such an enquiry by your welcome denial that you have urged the majority to ignore its responsibilities.
On the constitutional position it continues to surprise us that you believe that the 1925 agreement is sacrosanct, whereas the third “Home Rule Act” was not. It is hard to escape the conclusion that this agreement provided an unusually good bargain for the Unionist Party. But the bargain was struck by Britain. The ratification clause of the agreement makes no reference to the Parliament of Northern Ireland. Only two of the parties were sovereign and ratification from Stormont was therefore unnecessary. The agreement was in breach of previous undertakings by the Government of the United Kingdom and of the Irish Free State and was repudiated by important sections of the electorate. Moreover its negotiation was rendered necessary primarily by the failure of the Government of Northern Ireland to co-operate in the working of the Government of Ireland Act, for example in relation to the Boundary Commission. We do not accept that it was a fair agreement freely arrived at.
Reference to Commonwealth convention is of course irrelevant since Northern Ireland is an integral part of the United Kingdom. As for “conventions” within the United Kingdom, a prominent expert in constitutional law, the Senior Lecturer in Law at Queen’s University, Belfast, has only recently pointed out that the doctrine that Westminster is limited in its power over Northern Ireland through a supposed convention is founded on a fallacy.
The conclusion is thus that the Northern Ireland Government is responsible to the Westminster Parliament in all respects and must justify itself to that assembly. We do not need to inform you that there is widespread disquiet over the allegations of undemocratic practises in Northern Ireland, not only in Parliament but among the entire British public.
As you say, there seems an unbridgeable gulf between your views and ours. We can only hope therefore that the course of experience will convince you that the interests of the people of Northern Ireland, both Protestant and Catholic, are best served by the most thorough-going measures to achieve complete democracy, including the right to combine or federate with their countrymen south of the border. We venture to suggest to you that such measures correspond equally to the interests of the British people.
Very sincerely yours,
Sean Redmond
For the Standing Committee of the Conolly Association
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