Recognition of the Irish Free State, 1924: The Diplomatic Context to the Appointment of Timothy Smiddy as the First Irish Minister to the U.S.

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A state’s foreign policy begins with the emergence of statehood and the attendant establishment of government and its institutions (some institutions will probably have been inherited). Consequently, Ireland did not have a foreign policy prior to 1922, let alone formal relations with other states. However, declarations on external relations had been enunciated prior to independence by different political groups, who also saw the need to have representatives abroad. But it was not until Sinn Fein organised itself into a constituent assembly (Dail Eireann), which met for the first time on 21 January 1919, that the foreign policy of the embryonic state began to emerge. The ‘Message to the Free Nations of the world’ in 1919 sought international recognition for the first Dail and for the national status of Ireland as a republic. So Irish foreign policy was born out of a turbulent background*the new government was involved in a war of independence and its parliament was of course in defiance of the British imperial parliament and rule from London. One of the Dail’s next acts was to provide for a foreign minister and to create a diplomatic service to argue the cause of Irish independence. The Sinn Fein diplomatic service included Harry Boland, who was the official representative of Dail Eireann in the U.S. from May 1920 to January 1922. Boland, the mission and the American Association for the Recognition of the Irish Republic established by Eamon de Valera supervised the recognition campaign in the U.S. Thus, America was at the heart of Irish nationalists’ foreign policy and these envoys hoped that U.S. presidents, politicians and the Irish-American diaspora would promote their cause.