‘Hamlet without the prince’

Constrained by censorship from Dublin Castle, the response of the Irish press to the first Dáil was generally muted, with most newspapers expressing hostility towards Sinn Féin

IAN KENNEALLY

IN JANUARY 1919, the Irish press was working under a strict censorship regime operating from Dublin Castle. Lord Decies, who acted as Dublin Castle’s censor through the Defence of the Realm Act, had a remit designed to keep Sinn Féin and republicans out of the country’s newspapers. The Irish press was severely constrained in what it could print and neither the Declaration of Independence nor the Dáil’s Democratic Programme appeared in the following day’s newspaper reports.

The Freeman’s Journal, then a leading national newspaper, succinctly explained the effect this had on the coverage of that first parliamentary session: “The report of the gathering which is published today reads like Hamlet with the part of the prince carefully excised.”

As such, the press response to the first Dáil was generally muted.

Another reason for this may have been the nature of the day’s events, which all the newspapers agreed were “businesslike” and disappointingly devoid of any histrionics.

The special correspondent of the Times noted: “I may say here, once and for all, that the proceedings throughout were orderly and dignified, not a word being uttered that could provoke discord or ill-feeling.”

Many newspaper owners were antagonistic towards Sinn Féin and this hostility manifested itself in the editorial pages. The Freeman’s Journal praised the patriotism of the Dáil’s members but argued if they did not reconsider giving effect to the measures they proposed, such as the creation of an Irish Republic, they would “humiliate” the Irish nation. Conversely, if they were serious, then “we are on the eve of one of the most tragic chapters in the history of Ireland”.

This was also the line carried by the Irish Independent, which feared the Dáil would cause international embarrassment to Ireland if it drafted measures it could not enforce.

The Irish Times gave extensive coverage to the Dáil but it carried the most critical editorial of any Irish paper. The parliament was described as “a grave warning” to the country. “These men are today the elected representatives of three-fourths of the Irish people, and the more quickly Ireland becomes convinced of the folly that elected them the sooner her sanity will return.”

Like many commentators, The Irish Times discerned a deep division within Sinn Féin between moderates and extremists. On one side there was “a body of idealists who nurture themselves quite honestly on visions of an independent, but peaceful and pious Ireland”. On the other, there were those who planned “to apply the principles of Lenin and Trotsky to Irish affairs. It is working for the disintegration of society and the confiscation of all property, public and private”.

The Irish Times was one of the few papers to make such a strong link between the Dáil and international socialism. It announced there were only “two safeguards” for Ireland’s future: “A firm and fearless enforcement of the law, and the existence of a public opinion which will be equally intolerant of political lunacy and of crime and outrage.”

Much of the regional press was also hostile towards Sinn Féin but one paper was supportive of the Dáil: the Cork Examiner.

It described the opening of the new institution as an “event of the first importance as it connotes the breaking away from the methods that secured the full adherence of some of the greatest Irishmen of the past half-century”. This, the editorial argued, was an inevitable result “of the methods several British governments have employed in their dealings with this country”.

The Munster paper was hopeful for the Dáil: “The Irish historian of the future will no doubt regard January 21st, 1919, as a date that marked a turning point in the political history of this country – a new departure that influenced Ireland’s future and helped to mould her fate.”

English newspapers were free of the censorship that so hampered their Irish counterparts. They reported widely on the event but there was little editorial comment. The special correspondent in the Times gave an entertaining, if superficial, account of the proceedings. The reporter observed the Mansion House had held a luncheon for the Royal Dublin Fusiliers that morning, before being opened up to the Dáil.

“It was thoroughly loyal in the morning and exceeding disloyal in the afternoon,” he wrote.

Amidst the sombre atmosphere of the parliament there was one moment of levity: “A ripple of laughter went around the room when the name of Sir Edward Carson was solemnly called as one of the members for Belfast.”

Under the banner headline “Irish Assembly Proclaims the Irish Republic” the New York Times, through an Associated Press correspondent, gave a detailed report on the events in the “dingy meeting place” that was the Mansion House. The correspondent offered little analysis of what he had witnessed, which was probably just as well. Surveying the future course of Irish events, he advised: “Ireland is a country of the unexpected but no one predicts any trouble or disorder.”

Ian Kenneally is author of the The Paper Wall – newspapers and propaganda in Ireland 1919-21, published by Collins Press