IRISH FREE STATE: Civil Tariff War

That President Eamon De Valera has sufficient backing to override the refractory Free State Senate he proved last week when Senators rejected the bill empowering his Cabinet to impose retaliatory tariffs against the Mother Country (TIME, July 25).

The Dail, having passed this bill, had adjourned. Mr. De Valera called the Dail back into session. It promptly repassed the bill, thus squelching the Senate’s opposition.

For good measure the Dail voted numerous extraordinary powers to the Government before finally adjourning. “I will guarantee that these powers will not be abused,” promised Mr. De Valera. “We are not anxious to extend the area of friction and this friction was not caused by us!”

It was caused by the Free State’s withholding payment of the so-called “land annuities,” which caused the Mother Country to enact tariffs against Free State goods.

In Ottawa last week Vice President Sean O’Kelly of the Free State set forth his Government’s view informally thus: “It must be remembered that the land of Ireland, almost all of it, was at one time or another taken by force (stolen, one could truthfully say) from the rightful owners, the Irish people, by English invaders. . . . After a long struggle the English consented to let the Irish buy back their own lands at a high price [by paying the ‘land annuities’]. “We have now refused,” summed up Mr. O’Kelly, “to continue to pay to Britain an annual tribute which is more, much more, in proportion to population than what Germany was obliged to pay under the Young Plan. . . . The Irish people have always aspired to complete independence. . . . They accepted the Free State [equivalent to ‘dominion status’] as an alternative to the renewal of war.” In Dublin just as Finance Minister Sean Macentee was about to promulgate the tariffs authorized by the Dail last week “he collapsed in his home from strain and was ordered to bed for several days by his doctor” while his undersecretaries did the promulgating.