Cosgrave's Concern: British Labour Impasse on the Boundary Commission 1924

Abstract

The first ever Labour government in Britain took office in February 1924. Its prime concern during its brief 10-month period in office was to stress its legitimacy and political credibility. In the Irish Free State the fledgling Cumann na nGaedheal government of W. T. Cosgrave had emerged victorious from civil war and was likewise determined to stress its legitimacy. An inordinate amount of time and energy during 1924 was spent attempting to wrestle with the final unfinished element of the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty – the permanent establishment of the boundary between north and south to be determined by a Boundary Commission set up under Article 12 of the Treaty. The Labour government, determined not allow the Irish issue to re-emerge in British politics, employed a legalistic approach, which was bedeviled by Northern Ireland's obduracy in refusing to appoint a representative to the Boundary Commission. Labour referred the matter to adjudication by the Privy Council, seeking guidance on whether the British government could appoint for Ulster, whether the Commission would be valid without a northern representative and whether decisions were required to be a majority or unanimous. When the Privy Council ruled that the Commission would not be legal without a northern representative, amending legislation had to be passed in both the House of Commons and Dáil Eireann allowing Britain to appoint for Northern Ireland, after which a majority rather than unanimity would suffice. All of this, considered by many in nationalist Ireland to demonstrate prevarication, delay and bad faith on behalf of the British Labour government, caused considerable political embarrassment to Cosgrave not only from anti-Treaty republicans but also from Irish Labour and government TDs in Dáil Eireann.