'Confidential report on situation in nationalist constituencies in the
Six Counties in relation to the next Westminster election'
by Conor Cruise O'Brien

On February 10 and 11, 1955, in accordance with the Minister’s instructions, I paid an exploratory visit to certain centres in the Six Counties.

I had talks with Senator Patrick McGill (Secretary of the Anti-Partition League and Editor of the ‘Ulster Herald’); Mr. Roderick O’Connor,¹ MP (Solicitor and Proprietor of the ‘Ulster Herald’ group of newspapers) and a group of Tyrone Nationalists, invited to lunch with me by Mr. O’Connor — this group included Councillor Hackett,² the chief Nationalist Registration Agent for County Tyrone. These contacts were all made in Omagh, County Tyrone.

In Derry, I talked to Mr. Eddie McAteer, Chairman of the Anti-Partition League and Alderman Frank McCarroll,³ Editor of the ‘Derry Journal’.

In Belfast I talked with Mr. J. W. Boyle,⁴ a secondary school teacher, who has been active in the Irish Labour Party in Belfast and with Dr. Pearse O’Malley, Consultant Psychiatrist to the Mater Hospital, Belfast, whose wife, Councillor Mary O’Malley, is a prominent member of the Irish Labour Party in Belfast. I also talked with Mr. Patrick Scott of the Irish News Agency, Belfast and formerly of the ‘Irish Press’.

In Armagh I talked to Senator J.G. Lennon,⁵ Solicitor, who is generally regarded as one of the ablest members of the Anti-Partition League and who is connected by marriage with the MacAleer family of Pomeroy, who are among the leading members of Fianna Uladh.

In general the people I sought out were, in the main, those with whom I had been on friendly terms for some considerable time and who were, therefore, likely to talk freely. I had with me on the trip — but not during confidential conversations — Mr. Brendan Malin, Editor of The Irish News Agency,⁶ who was calling on newspaper clients of INA in the centres which we visited.

The only major point on which I found absolute agreement among those with whom I discussed the situation was that in the event of a three-cornered contest between Unionist, Nationalist (or Irish Labour) and Sinn Féin (with Fianna Uladh supporting Sinn Féin) all three seats at present held by candidates with Anti-Partition principles will certainly be lost.

These seats are, of course, Mid-Ulster (Mr. Michael O’Neill, Anti-Partition League); Fermanagh (Mr. Cahir Healy, Anti-Partition League) and West Belfast (Mr. Jack Beatty, Irish Labour Party).

On the face of it it seems highly probable that these three-cornered contests will take place. Sinn Féin have declared unequivocally their intention to run candidates in all constituencies and Senator Kelly has declared that Fianna Uladh will support the Sinn Féin candidates.

It is true that members of the Anti-Partition League on their visit to Dublin indicated that perhaps official Nationalist candidates would not be nominated and that Sinn Féin would be left a clear field. Even so they said, they thought that Sinn Féin could not win.

On these points, however, I think that the group was being somewhat misleading — at least in their conversations with me.

It was clear to me in Omagh that the local Nationalist leaders have no intention of leaving a clear field to Sinn Féin, that they will use their influence in the Convention to have Mr. O’Neill re-nominated and that they are confident in their ability to have this done. At the same time it seems that if Sinn Féin were left with a clear field they would have a chance of winning.

Councillor Hackett, who as Registration Agent is the man most intimately conversant with the situation in Tyrone, told me in answer to a question I put to him at the luncheon in Omagh that if the Sinn Féin candidate was, as he put it, ‘the only Catholic candidate in a straight fight with a Protestant Unionist’ and assuming that the Catholic clergy did not come out publicly against him — which no one considers that they would be likely in such circumstances to do — the Sinn Féin candidate would get the vote of the whole Catholic electorate and would win the seat.

From the attitude of Senator McGill and Mr. O’Connor after Councillor Hackett had made this statement it was clear that they considered a cat had been let out of the bag. They did, however, agree that Councillor Hackett was the man who knew the field best.

I feel that the delegation which visited Dublin — perhaps unconsciously — tended to minimise the chance of Sinn Féin if not challenged by other Nationalists and to magnify their own hesitation about putting forward a candidate. I think they believed that to put the situation in this light would ensure the greatest degree of help from Dublin — i.e. they wanted to show the Government first that there was nothing to be lost by running an official Nationalist and second that an official Nationalist might not run at all without financial support and public encouragement from Dublin.

Ideally, they would like to get themselves into a position where they could say to the Government ‘the only reason why we are engaged in this electoral fight is that you asked us to do so and now it is up to you to give us all the backing we need.’

Of all those to whom I spoke only one — Mr. McAteer — seemed to see some hope of avoiding three-cornered contests in Mid-Ulster and Fermanagh.

Incidentally he, like all the other Anti-Partition leaders never mentions the West Belfast seat. (I somehow got the impression that they would not regard the defeat of Irish Labour there as an unmitigated loss).

Mr. McAteer is unique among the official Nationalist leaders in that he is in contact with not merely Fianna Uladh (which is in any case only a more-or-less militant off-shoot of the Anti-Partition League) but with Sinn Féin, that is to say, with the modern IRA. This contact is maintained through his brother Mr. Hugh McAteer⁷ who, though he has retired from the ‘active movement’, is still on friendly terms with many of its leaders in the North.

Mr. Eddie McAteer maintained that although Sinn Féin said that, it would not matter whether the seats were lost, the atmosphere would be very different when it really came up to election time and it became clear that if the Nationalists did not close their ranks they would let a Unionist in. In such situations in the past it had usually been possible, especially if the influence of the clergy was cast into the scales at the last moment, to induce one of the candidates to stand down. He hinted at the possibility of a deal whereby Sinn Féin (or at least an abstentionist) would be allowed to have one of the seats unopposed and the other would be held by an official Nationalist.

I asked him whether this meant that Mr. Michael O’Neill would be allowed to retain his seat and if the successor of Mr. Cahir Healy would be a Sinn Féin nominee or at least a candidate acceptable to Sinn Féin.

He was non-committal on this and said that at any rate he would shed no tears if in the event both seats were lost, as the present representatives in Westminster had been doing no good whatsoever.

I formed the impression, none the less, that he is making considerable exertions behind the scenes to ensure that the Unionists are not allowed to capture the seats. Whether he can succeed in this is doubtful. Whatever influence he may be able to exert locally — and even those who do not admire him politically agree that this influence is great — it does not seem that he can do much to affect the decisions of Sinn Féin, which seems at present to be a well-disciplined movement of which the centre is in the Twenty-Six Counties. Much, no doubt, depends on the influence and attitude of the Six-County members and particularly the Derry members on the Sinn Féin executive — a subject on which I have no information.

As regards the sitting members, Mr. Cahir Healy is generally regarded as written-off, though with respect, as a political force today. He says he will not go forward at the next election and it is probable that he will maintain this resolve. He is criticised for having succumbed to the atmosphere of Westminster and for taking an interest in British politics and losing sight of the fact that he represents an electorate which utterly rejects British rule. He is, however, personally highly regarded and one of my informants, Senator Lennon, who spoke of him in very warm terms, expressed regret — somewhat to my surprise — at the probability that Mr. Healy would not be standing again.

The case of Mr. Michael O’Neill is of more interest as it seems likely that he will run again. My informants in Omagh, who are the principal official Nationalist politicians of the district, told me they thought it almost certain that the Convention would re-nominate him. They were all agreed that he was well thought of locally; that he devoted considerable time to his constituency and in general that he was the best representative they could find. Senator McGill admitted candidly, however, that both Mr. O’Neill and himself and their other friends were themselves out of touch with the younger generation of active Nationalists.

Mr. McAteer spoke — as he had spoken to me before — very critically of Mr. O’Neill. He said that Mr. O’Neill (who is a small farmer) had admitted to him that he was ‘overawed by Westminster’. He thought that Mr. O’Neill had no idea of what he should be doing in London, that his presence there was quite futile and that its futility was noted and resented by the younger Nationalists. In his opinion no one could be concerned with British public opinion as Mr. O’Neill and Mr. Healy were without getting out of touch to some extent with the public opinion of an Irish Nationalist constituency. He also has a poor opinion of Mr. O’Neill’s ability, although like every one else he paid tribute to his personal integrity.

I formed myself the impression that with the exception of Mr. McAteer, who is exceptionally energetic and sanguine and of one or two other members who were simply cynical, the executive of the Anti-Partition League including Messrs. Healy and O’Neill are tired and bewildered by the impossibility as it seems of making any real progress towards ending Partition. They know that despite all their years of effort they have made no perceptible advance, yet they are forced, for electoral purposes, and in order not to actually lose ground, to put a more hopeful face on things before their constituents.

There is thus a strong element of pretence in their political activity and this does not escape a growing section of the electorate which feeling that Constitutionalism has been tried and failed turns to whatever seems to them to be the only alternative; the party of physical force.

The position of a Nationalist leader in the North today requires unusual resources of patience, conviction and ingenuity and the present leaders, although by no means devoid of ability or sincerity, do not quite measure up to these very exacting requirements. As a result despair and frustration and the reckless daring of a few young men have supplied the motive power for the new Sinn Féin movement.

As regards the Irish Labour Party in Belfast, the situation seems, if I can believe informants of widely different points of view, even worse than it is with the Anti-Partition League. Mr. Beatty’s victory in West Belfast in the last election (as in the previous one) was largely, I understand, the result of the energy and enthusiasm of Councillor Jack McGougan.⁸ Mr. Beatty himself is reputed to be inordinately vain, stupid and lazy and has done little or nothing so far as I know to remove this impression. Since the election the situation has sharply deteriorated; the party became torn by internal sectarian dissensions in which Mr. MacGougan and Mr. Diamond⁹ were involved; at the same time, Mr. McGougan has moved very far to the left; is described by some reliable observers as a fellow-traveller and has also been caught up in a personal scandal which has diminished both his prestige and his political activity. In the circumstances my informants thought that the Irish Labour Party would almost certainly lose the seat even if no Sinn Féin or other Nationalist candidate were put up.

CONCLUSION:
It seems that the only hope of holding any of the seats would be as a result of some such deal between Sinn Féin and the Nationalists as Mr. McAteer seems to envisage. This might result in two abstentionists being returned for Fermanagh and Mid-Ulster, one of them an official Nationalist Convention choice, but pledged to abstain, and the other a nominee of Sinn Féin.

This does not seem a very constructive result but it will probably be regarded as preferable to a Unionist conquest of the entire representation at Westminster of the Six Counties. If so, and if the Government wishes to facilitate rather than obstruct such a deal, there should, I suggest, be, at this stage at least, no specific encouragement to the Anti-Partition League as such or to the sitting candidates. A strong statement, pointing out what the effects of disunity would be and urging all concerned to reach agreement on one Nationalist candidate for each constituency, would probably be the most useful form of intervention at present. It is true that such a statement would have little or no direct effect on Sinn Féin but it would affect local public opinion in the areas concerned — which do — probably to a greater extent than we are aware of — look for a lead from Dublin, and the reaction of public opinion could not fail to affect Sinn Féin as well as the League.

What would also certainly be helpful at the present time would be some striking gesture by the Government of interest in Partition. That, I think, was what the delegation were aiming at with their suggestion, probably not a very well-considered one, for the setting up of a special Government Department to deal with Partition.

I have suggested elsewhere that the setting up of some kind of office in Belfast, mainly for political liaison purposes (though that need not be reflected in its title) would be a constructive contribution and helpful in the long term and it might also serve the more immediate purpose of a gesture of interest.

It might be felt that in view of the demonstrably disastrous consequences of a physical force policy any Sinn Féin victory which could be interpreted as an endorsement of that policy should be avoided at all costs, even at the cost of letting a Unionist in.

In that case the sort of deal which Mr. McAteer described would not be acceptable. I think, however, that on the whole no serious consequences are to be apprehended from such a deal. The election of a single abstentionist deputy would be for Sinn Féin a somewhat hollow victory which they could do little to follow up. And the preliminary negotiations to any such deal would tend to disrupt Sinn Féin by dividing its more intransigent from its more practical members.

Therefore, I suggest that the idea of a deal is worth encouraging although I am not very hopeful that it can be achieved.