Galway in Days Gone By
Galway In Days Gone By
1919
Lady candidates
Already the shadow of dissolution is upon them. Shrewd strategists are busy delivering election addresses to the reporters, so that they may pass on to office in the new body corporate.
But they will have to pass through the sieve of Proportional Representation; and the returning officers who were instructed on the new system at the Town Hall on Wednesday to declare it to be a Chinese puzzle.
This is not a hopeful beginning. As one optimistic returning officer put it, “We shall muddle through, and elect the new boards anyhow”. It is due to those who planned P.R. to say that it is not an “anyhow” method, but one which aims at securing representation for every section of the electorate.
In Sligo that result was admirably achieved; in Sligo they had the advantage of the P.R. officials, and these gentlemen in the coming contests must perforce delegate their duties to others.
“But these duties are simplicity itself,” they say. “Wait and see,” avers to our lectured returning officers. At any rate, the coming elections will provide a much bigger test in the great experiment than did Sligo. And already P.R. has given courage to new forces who have hitherto been practically unrepresented in Irish local government.
At least four lady candidates are spoken of. Certainly no body that has to do with the health and welfare of the community could be considered complete without women. Who knows better than the mother the trials and tribulations of the poor, and the need for decent conditions in the community?
Irish question interest
The Irish-American Press is once more freely entering this country. It reveals beyond a doubt that the Irish question to-day bulks large in American politics, and that Irish nationalism, as given expression to at the last general election, possesses a powerful and unsleeping organisation in the United States.
Smug English politicians who talk about “settling Ireland,” as if the fate and fortune of a nation were a mere matter of exchange and barter, might peruse the pages of some of the champions of Irish nationality published in the States with considerable profit.
Untrammelled by D.O.R.A., fearless of suppression, their writers speak with a candour that does not mince matters. Ireland is described as “a nation bound and gagged,” and Mr. Lloyd George as a “quack” who is merely fooling Ireland.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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1923
Gloom after war
The special correspondent of the “Independent”, who has been writing of the aftermath of civil war in the West, notes that a feeling of apathy, due to the uncertainty of events, exists amongst the sorely-tried people of Connemara; that politics are referred to only with disgust and that not more than fifty per cent. of the people would vote at a general election; that poverty and unemployment are rife, and there is a growing tendency towards emigration; and that there are bitter complaints of the huge impost of rates and taxes.
It is only too true that there is enough of material for the pessimist to brood over, and that a feeling of gloom permeates country towns. But it is a poor tribute to patriotism that has survived such horrors to encourage this gloom.
It is the duty of all of us to get this pessimism out of the national body and to rid ourselves of the notion that we have not enough Christianity and moral sense left to restore our people to cheerful and ordered progress and industry.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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1923
Peace negotiations
As we go to press, An Dáil is discussing the Peace negotiations between the Government and Mr. de Valera. It was announced on Wednesday for the first time that such negotiations were begun following Mr. de Valera’s “cease fire” proclamation of April 27, and that by the 30th of the month Senators Andrew Jameson and James Douglas were asked by him to discuss proposals.
They said it was for the Government to discuss; they could only confer. Into the ensuring conferences the Government declined to enter personally, but on May 3 the senators placed before Mr. de Valera the Cabinet’s terms, which were that future issues should be decided by the majority vote of the elected representatives of the people, and that as a corollary and a preliminary to the release of prisoners, all lethal weapons should be in the custody and control of the Executive Government.
Mr. de Valera relied to this on May 7 with a document in which he agreed to majority rule and control of arms, but added that arms should be stored in a suitable building in each province under armed Republican guard until after the elections in September, that the oath should not be made a test in the councils of the nation, and that all political prisoners should be released immediately on the signing of this agreement.
“You have brought back to us,” wrote President Cosgrave, “not an acceptance of our conditions, but a long and wordy document inviting debate where none is possible”.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
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Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
1923
State of the parties
Speculation as to parties after the next Irish elections is exceedingly interesting, especially in view of the enlarged franchise.
In Dublin, the view appears to be held by a number of people that Labour will make a great bid for power.
Dublin, however, has a curiously insular habit of thought where matters that concern all Ireland and in which Ireland has a say are concerned. We hope this insularity will rapidly disappear under the new conditions.
The country as a whole is backing the Farmers’ Party, and has not the smallest doubt that it will be the strongest combination in the next Dáil, and that it will oust the purely political parties, the one because it has resorted to force, the other because it has been compelled to use force to supress force, and the Labour Party because Ireland feels that at the back of its policy lurks the danger of Communism.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
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