The First Dáil () was Dáil Éireann as it convened from 1919 to 1921. It was the first meeting of the unicameral parliament of the revolutionary Irish Republic. In the December 1918 election to the Parliament of the United Kingdom, the Irish republican party Sinn Féin won a landslide victory in Ireland. In line with their manifesto, its MPs refused to take their seats, and on 21 January 1919 they founded a separate parliament in Dublin called Dáil Éireann ("Assembly of Ireland")."Explainer: Establishing the First Dáil". Century Ireland. They declared Irish independence, ratifying the Proclamation of the Irish Republic that had been issued in the 1916 Easter Rising, and adopted a provisional constitution.
Its first meeting happened on the same day as one of the first engagements of what became the Irish War of Independence. Although the Dáil had not authorised any armed action, it became a "symbol of popular resistance and a source of legitimacy for fighting men in the guerrilla war that developed".
The Dáil was outlawed by the Dublin Castle administration in September 1919, and thereafter it met in secret. The First Dáil met 21 times, and its main business was establishing the Irish Republic. It created the beginnings of an independent Irish government and state apparatus. Following the May 1921 elections, the First Dáil was succeeded by the Second Dáil of 1921–1922.
Background In the early 20th century, Ireland was a part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and was represented in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom by 105 Members of Parliament (MPs). From 1882, most Irish MPs were members of the Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP) who strove in several Home Rule Bills to achieve self-government for Ireland within the United Kingdom. This resulted in the Government of Ireland Act 1914, but its implementation was postponed with the outbreak of World War I.
The founder of the small Sinn Féin party, Arthur Griffith, believed Irish nationalists should emulate the Hungarian nationalists who had gained legislative independence from Austria. In 1867, Hungarian representatives had boycotted the Imperial parliament in Vienna and unilaterally established their own legislature in Budapest, resulting in the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867. Griffith argued that Irish nationalists should follow this "policy of passive resistance – with occasional excursions into the domain of active resistance".
In April 1916, Irish rebels launched the Easter Uprising against British rule in Ireland, proclaiming an independent Irish Republic. After a week of heavy fighting, mostly in Dublin, the rebellion was suppressed by British forces, who took 3,500 people prisoner, 1,800 of whom were sent to internment camps or prisons in Britain; most of the rebellion's leaders were executed. The rebellion, the British response to it, and the British government's failed attempt to introduce conscription in Ireland led to greater public support for Sinn Féin and Irish independence.
In the 1918 general election, Sinn Féin won 73 out of the 105 Irish seats in the House of Commons. In 25 constituencies, Sinn Féin won the seats unopposed. Elections were held almost entirely under the 'first-past-the-post voting' system.The exception to the use of this system were the constituencies of Dublin University and Cork City. The two Unionist representatives returned for the Dublin University (Trinity College) were elected under the single transferable vote, and the two Sinn Féin candidates elected for Cork City were returned under the bloc voting system. The recent Representation of the People Act had increased the Irish electorate from around 700,000 to about two million. Unionists (including the Ulster Unionist Labour Association) won 26 seats, all but three of which were in east Ulster, and the IPP won only six (down from 84), all but one in Ulster. The Labour Party did not stand in the election, allowing the electorate to decide between home rule or a republic by having a clear choice between the two nationalist parties. The IPP won a smaller share of seats than votes due to the first-past-the-post system.Sovereignty and partition, 1912–1949 pp. 59–62, M. E. Collins, Edco Publishing (2004),
Sinn Féin's manifesto had pledged to establish an Irish Republic by founding "a constituent assembly comprising persons chosen by Irish constituencies" which could then "speak and act in the name of the Irish people". Once elected, the Sinn Féin MPs chose to follow through with their manifesto."The inaugural public meeting of Dáil Éireann". Oireachtas.
First meeting
Sinn Féin had held several meetings in early January to plan the first sitting of the Dáil. On 8 January, it publicly announced its intention to convene the assembly. On the night of 11 January, the Dublin Metropolitan Police raided Sinn Féin headquarters and seized drafts of the documents that would be issued at the assembly. As a result, the Dublin Castle administration was fully aware of what was being planned.Mitchell, Arthur. Revolutionary Government in Ireland. Gill & MacMillan, 1995. p.12
The first meeting of Dáil Éireann began at 3:30 pm on 21 January in the Round Room of the Mansion House, the residence of the Lord Mayor of Dublin.Ellis, Peter Berresford. Eyewitness to Irish History. Wiley, 2004. pp.230–231 It lasted about two hours. The packed audience in the Round Room rose in acclaim for the members of the Dáil as they walked into the room, and many waved Irish tricolour flags."Dáil Éireann meets in Mansion House". Century Ireland. A tricolour was also displayed above the lectern.Mitchell, Revolutionary Government in Ireland, p.17 Among the audience were the Lord Mayor Laurence O'Neill and Maud Gonne. Scores of Irish and international journalists were reporting on the proceedings. Outside, Dawson Street was thronged with onlookers. Irish Volunteers controlled the crowds, and police were also present. Precautions had been taken in case the assembly was raided by the police.Comerford, Maire. The First Dáil. J Clarke, 1969. pp.51–54 A reception for soldiers of the British Army's Royal Dublin Fusiliers, who had been prisoners of war in Germany, had ended shortly beforehand.
Twenty-seven Sinn Féin MPs attended. Invitations had been sent to all elected MPs in Ireland, but the Unionists and Irish Parliamentary Party MPs declined to attend. The IPP's Thomas Harbison, MP for North East Tyrone, acknowledged the invitation but wrote he should "decline for obvious reasons". He expressed sympathy with the call for Ireland to have a hearing at the Paris Peace Conference."Roll Call, Wednesday 22 January 2019". Oireachtas. Sir Robert Henry Woods was the only unionist who declined rather than ignored his invitation. Sixty-nine Sinn Féin MPs had been elected (four of whom represented more than one constituency), but thirty-four were in prison, and eight others could not attend for various reasons.Lyons, Francis. "The war of independence", in A New History of Ireland: Ireland Under the Union. Oxford University Press, 2010. pp.240–241 Those in prison were described as being "imprisoned by the foreigners" (fé ghlas ag Gallaibh). Michael Collins and Harry Boland were marked in the roll as i láthair (present), but the record was later amended to show that they were as láthair (absent). At the time, they were in England planning the escape of Éamon de Valera from Lincoln Prison, and did not wish to draw attention to their absence.
Being a first and highly symbolic meeting, the proceedings of the Dáil were held wholly in the Irish language, although translations of the documents were also read out in English and French. George Noble Plunkett opened the session and nominated Cathal Brugha as acting Ceann Comhairle (chairman or speaker), which was accepted. Both actions "immediately associated the Dáil with the 1916 Rising, during which Brugha had been seriously wounded, and after which Plunkett's son had been executed as a signatory to the famed Proclamation". Brugha then called upon Father Michael O'Flanagan to say a prayer.
Declarations and constitution
A number of short documents were then read out and adopted. These were the:
Dáil Constitution Declaration of Independence Message to the Free Nations of the World – calling for international recognition of Irish independence Democratic Programme – a declaration of social and economic policy
These documents asserted that the Dáil was the parliament of a sovereign state called the "Irish Republic". With the Declaration of Independence, the Dáil ratified the Proclamation of the Irish Republic that had been issued in the 1916 Rising, and pledged "to make this declaration effective by every means". It stated that "the elected representatives of the Irish people alone have power to make laws binding on the people of Ireland, and that the Irish Parliament is the only Parliament to which that people will give its allegiance". It also declared "foreign government in Ireland to be an invasion of our national right" and demanded the withdrawal of British forces from Irish soil.Lynch, Robert. Revolutionary Ireland, 1912–25. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2015. pp.140–142 Once the Declaration was read, Cathal Brugha said (in Irish): "Deputies, you understand from what is asserted in this Declaration that we are now done with England. Let the world know it and those who are concerned bear it in mind. For come what may now, whether it be death itself, the great deed is done".Townshend, Charles. Political Violence in Ireland: Government and Resistance Since 1848. Clarendon Press, 1983. p.328
The Message to the Free Nations called for international recognition of Irish independence and for Ireland to be allowed to make its case at the Paris Peace Conference. It stated that "the existing state of war between Ireland and England can never be ended until Ireland is definitely evacuated by the armed forces of England". Although this could have been a "rhetorical flourish", it was the nearest the Dáil came to a declaration of war.Smith, Michael. Fighting for Ireland?: The Military Strategy of the Irish Republican Movement. Routledge, 2002. p.32
The Dáil Constitution was a brief provisional constitution. It stated that the Dáil had "full powers to legislate" and would be composed of representatives "chosen by the people of Ireland from the present constituencies of the country". It established an executive government or Ministry (Aireacht) made up of a president (Príomh-Aire) chosen by the Dáil, and ministers of finance, home affairs, foreign affairs and defence. Cathal Brugha was elected as the first, temporary president. He would be succeeded, in April, by Éamon de Valera.
Reactions The first meeting of the Dáil and its declaration of independence was headline news in Ireland and abroad."Press coverage of the First Dáil". Oireachtas. However, the press censorship that began during the First World War was continued by the Dublin Castle administration after the war. The Press Censor forbade all Irish newspapers from publishing the Dáil's declarations.Carty, James. Bibliography of Irish History 1912–1921. Irish Stationery Office, 1936. p.xxiii
That evening, a unionist view of events was printed in a local newspaper. It claimed that the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, "Lord French, is today the master of Ireland. He alone... will decide upon the type of government the country is to have, and it is he rather than any member of the House of Commons, who will be the judge of political and industrial reforms". French's observer at the meeting, George Moore, was impressed by its orderliness and told him that the Dáil represented "the general feeling in the country". The Irish Times, then the voice of the Unionist status quo, called the events both farcical and dangerous.