Shillelagh Buried

"Further outlook for the British Isles: Fair over Ireland and England." Instead of a matter-of-fact report on the weather, the statement might well have been the prognostication of a political commentator for that afternoon at No. 10 Downing Street British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and Eire's Prime Minister Eamon de Valera had put their signatures to a far-reaching accord and buried the bloody shillelagh which for seven centuries the two nations have been hurling back & forth across the rough Irish Sea.

The three main sections of the pact provide: 1) Britain is to transfer to Eire without reservation or compensation the three deep-water naval stations of Lough Swilly, Bere Haven and Cobh (Queenstown) which since 1921 have been maintained on Irish soil. 2) The six-year-old dispute over land annuities (guaranteed absentee Irish landlords by Britain after their estates were expropriated) is to be settled by the lump payment to Britain of $50,000,000. 3) The two nations agree to raze their retaliatory tariff walls built up since the land annuities squabble began in 1932. The pact will go into effect as soon as it is ratified by both Parliaments, will run for three years.

"Up Devi," "Good old Dev, you've done a fine piece of work," rang out from thousands of Irish throats as the Prime Minister next day sailed up Dublin Bay. Political observers were agreed that "Dev" had come out on the long end of his three months' negotiations with the British. The only Irish demand not granted concerned the union of Eire and the six counties of Protestant Northern Ireland. This was temporarily shelved by de Valera in order 'to gain the other concessions, but it is deemed likely now that, with Anglo-Irish relations on a "good-neighbor" basis, Britain at the least will take firmer measures to improve the position of the Catholic minority in the north.

The naval agreement was a symbolic victory for "Dev." In securing the removal of the last British sailors and marines on Irish soil he won a concession that Britain refused to yield to Michael Collins and Arthur Griffith, Irish negotiators in 1921. Downing Street has long been anxious over the prospect of an unfriendly Eire at England's back in time of war. Last week's accord gained for Britain Irish goodwill, assured her of easy access to vital supplies from agricultural Eire in wartime. While the treaty made no commitments regarding Irish defenses, it is expected that Britain will assist Eire in developing her army, strengthening her coast defenses and constructing a small navy.

Most surprising feature of the accord was the settlement of the land annuities. Since 1932 "Dev" has stoutly insisted that Eire would never pay a single penny and the back payments meanwhile accumulated at the rate of some $20,000,000 a year. In settling for a lump $50,000,000 "Dev" drove the British to a hard bargain--the annuities were due to run until 1990, would have reached a total of $750,000,000.

To the bulk of Eire's farming population the most important provision was the tearing down of tariff walls. When the retaliatory tariffs were instituted in 1932, Irish farmers lost their English markets, Anglo-Irish trade tumbled from $400,000,000 a year to only $210,000,000 in 1937. Last week's treaty practically brings Eire into the British Empire's Ottawa tariff group, provides that all Irish goods enter Britain duty-free while only certain British goods have the same privilege in Eire. The only ones who had no reason to acclaim this re-establishment of virtual free trade with Britain were the owners of scores of new factories which shot up in Ireland behind the tariff walls. Eventually, most of them will probably be forced into bankruptcy.

De Valera lost no time in putting his achievements before the Dail Eireann (lower house). Four days after the pact was signed, the Opposition Fine Gael of William Cosgrave, who has now lost his chief difference with de Valera's party, joined with the Prime Minister's Fianna Fail supporters to vote approval. One diehard, James Larkin, Dublin Laborite, spoiled a unanimous vote. "The payment of $50,000,000 to Britain is a compromise," groused Laborite Larkin. In London, Prime Minister Chamberlain, busy last week with another neighbor, France (see p. 15), is expected this week to set in motion his machinery for parliamentary approval of the accord.

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