MARCH 3rd, 1951:Three years in office in spring 1951, the inter-party government of Fine Gael, Clann na Poblachta and Labour was suffering severe strains which were about to break it apart over the so-called Mother and Child scheme. It was clear beforehand that all was not well within the coalition, but the details which were to lead to its collapse were as yet unknown, as this editorial from The Irish Timesindicates.
ALL SORTs of rumours have been in circulation recently concerning the future of Clann na Poblachta. For some time past there had been talk about alleged dissensions within the party ranks; and, when Mr Noel Hartnett, one of its founders, announced his resignation, it was generally assumed that all was far from well with the party. We do not know what, if any, importance to attach to these stories. We do know that, whatever may be the condition of its domestic affairs, Clann na Poblachta has played, and is continuing to play, an important, if not almost a decisive, part in the framing of national policy. In fact, it is the only party in the Government that has contrived to impose its own ideas on the others. The chief plank in Clann na Poblachta’s platform, when it went to the country at the last general election, was the declaration of an independent Republic, and secession from the Commonwealth. The electorate gave a very definite verdict against this policy, and when the inter-party Government was formed, Mr Sean MacBride, who was appointed Minister for External Affairs by the Taoiseach , admitted frankly in the Dáil that his party had failed to secure a mandate for that Republic. He and his colleagues, therefore, had decided to leave the issue “in abeyance”; yet within an almost incredibly short space of time Mr Costello, whose party had been identified closely with the Commonwealth, announced in Canada that it had been decided to repeal the External Relations Act, and to set up an independent Republic for the Twenty-six Counties. [. . .] Has the Clann tail being wagging the Government dog for the past three years? The most recent development in the Dáil suggests that its influence is still fairly strong. In its election program three years ago Clann na Poblachta proposed that all members of the Northern Parliament who felt so inclined – in other words, the Nationalists – should have the right of admission, and of audience, to both Dáil and Senate. At the time, when Clann na Poblachta’s chances of an electoral victory seemed to be remote, there were few who took this proposal really seriously. When the new Government was formed, the principle involved in the Clann’s idea was recognised to some extent by the appointment of Mr Denis Ireland, a Belfast Protestant-nationalist, to the Dublin Senate; but the Clann very wisely decided also to leave its major plan ‘‘in abeyance’’. Its more thoughtful members realised that constitutional difficulties would be bound to arise, that the proposal might be interesting window dressing, but that, in the long run, the game would not be worth the candle. Now the whole thing has been revived in an acute form. The Northern Nationalists . . . have begun to put pressure on the Republican Government to admit their Parliamentary representatives to Leinster House [. . .] The Taoiseach surprised most people on Thursday, when he stated in the Dáil that the Government would give time for a debate on the matter as soon as possible after Easter, and that the issue would be left to a free vote of the House. This concession represents a definite score for the allegedly moribund Clann.
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