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Today, 100 years ago, the Irish Free State signed an agreement confirming the border between Northern Ireland and the southern Free State.
On the 3rd of December 1925, W.T. Cosgrave, President of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State signed a tripartite agreement between the Free State, Northern Ireland and Britain confirming what remains to this day the border splitting this island.
In a statement to the editors of the Irish Times and Independent, Cosgrave and Minister of Justice Kevin O’Higgins declared that ‘today we have sown the seeds of peace’ and that the agreement, ‘provides the basis of a sure and lasting peace.’
It had been sparked by the leaked report of the 1924-25 Boundary Commission, a device established by the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921 to determine the border between North and South.
While Northern Ireland had been established by the British 1920 Government of Ireland act, the signatories of the Anglo-Irish Treaty had believed that the agreed upon and binding boundary commission would result in large swathes of lands being transferred to the South, effectively economically crippling Northern Ireland.
However, to the outrage of the Free State government the commission instead recommended the transfer of Free State territory. Unwilling to cede territory nor threaten the stability of the nascent Irish state with further conflict they struck a deal with their British and unionist counterparts to bury the report. In exchange for confirming the present border and withdrawing what limited authority they had, they received a significant reduction in debt owed to the British state.
The new agreement was approved by Dáil Éireann on the 10th of December.
For Cosgrave, the treaty ensured the stability of his fledgling government. It freed them from a devastating financial debt and ensured its territorial integrity. It received public support from businesses and much of the public. However, it involved not just further recognition of Northern Ireland but an acceptance that partition was unlikely to change. For Northern nationalists it was felt to be the deepest of betrayals.
The Boundary Commission:
During the Anglo-Irish treaty negotiations between the British government and Sinn Féin during the truce of the Irish War of Independence the Irish delegation led by Arthur Griffith agreed to a boundary commission in deciding the shape of the border on the island. Article 12 outlined that the commission would determine the border ‘in accordance with the wishes of the inhabitants, so far as may be compatible with economic and geographic conditions.’
A representative was nominated from both Northern Ireland and the south, with a chairman nominated by the British.
Griffith had believed that the commission would be decided by plebiscite and that the catholic majorities in Tyrone and Fermanagh would mean territory would have to be given to the free state. Similarly, Michael Collins, another signatory, believed that minority rights would work in their favour.
However, once the commission was established the British government had no interest in anything but the status quo. The ambiguous nature of the commission and its obligation to ‘economic and geographic conditions’ allowed an argument to be made that no territory should be conceded from the North to the South.
The Reaction
The agreement was not received well by all. In a speech in Dublin on the 6th of December, Eamon de Valera argued that the agreement had resulted in the ‘rights of the nation as a whole have been forgotten and the rights of the unfortunate nationalist population of the North have been forgotten.’
However, De Valera himself had spent little time campaigning for the North in his opposition to the Anglo-Irish treaty and it is unclear what alternative, if any, he could have offered.
Within the Dáil, Cosgrave saw his most ardent opposition in the form of TD William Magennis. A self-described Ulsterman, Magennis criticised the agreement for removing the Council of Ireland, an all-Ireland political body. While the council had never met it was seen by some as a method in which Northern Ireland could be influenced by the Free State up to and including potential reunification.
Magennis depicted Cosgrave’s agreement as a cold-blooded selling out of northern nationalists, saying that ‘for the sake of persuading the financial world that we are in a good position to raise a loan, we break faith, we disregard the ties of brotherhood, the whole history of the past. We are reckless as regards the stigma of dishonour on ourselves.’
For James Craig, the first Prime Minister of Northern Ireland the end of the boundary commission and the Irish Council was a major success, garnering him huge support back home.
Commemoration and the Future:
Despite so much of the past decade being consumed by commemorations, the boundary commission receives comparatively little attention.
In part this reflects the fact that in seeking myths of national pride, the commission reflects a far more complicated and disappointing national history.
While Cosgrave may have depicted the final agreement as a success, the agreement reflected the weak position his government was in and the degree to which the British government had outmaneuvered their Irish counterparts.
It may have aided the continued stability of his government in the early formation of the Irish state but it was predicated on a turning away from Northern Ireland, an act seen by those affected as an act of abandonment.
100 years on the boundary commission remains a little spoken artefact of the past. But its existence reflects how a superior British negotiating team could ensure their priorities on this Island, ultimately determining its very shape. It is a reminder that this country’s formation has since its earliest days involved as much compromise as the more celebrated acts of rebellion which remain enshrined in our commemorations and national history.