Reporting a revolutionary parliament

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First steps

Following the general election of December 1918, and to keep a manifesto promise, Sinn Féin's elected representatives refused to take their seats in the House of Commons in Westminster. Instead they decided to form a national assembly in Ireland. The Members met in public as Dáil Éireann for the first time in the Mansion House on Tuesday, 21 January 1919, the day on which the War of Independence broke out.

The business of the day, which received extensive coverage in the press, featured a number of carefully planned set pieces designed to draw attention to the Members’ agenda of self-determination. They included a declaration of independence and a message to the free nations of the world, both of which were read in Irish, French and English, as well as the adoption of the Democratic Programme, which was a declaration of economic and social principles, and a resolution to send three Members to the Versailles Peace Conference.

Copy of the three texts adopted by Dáil Éireann at its first public sitting / Courtesy of Whytes.com

Official Gazette

Although real-time official reports of proceedings of the First Dáil did not become the norm during its lifetime, its Members and officials were keenly aware of the importance of publicising its work and of emphasising its legitimacy at home and abroad. In this context, Members undoubtedly were familiar with the practice in Westminster of producing an official report, better known as Hansard, and as early as the second session of the Dáil, which ran from 1 to 11 April 1919, it is clear they were thinking about how something similar might be done. For instance, in the private session of 1 April 1919, Desmond FitzGerald asked whether there were “any means of finding out what transpired at former meetings of Dáil”. Later that day, Dáil Éireann passed a motion authorising the publication of an “Official Gazette”, at 2/6 per copy, recording the proceedings of its first public session.

On the same day, the Dáil entrusted Laurence Ginnell, who had sat as a Member of the House of Commons in Westminster, with publication of the proceedings of the next public session, which was to be held on 10 and 11 April. His understanding of what should form the official report was that “Official reports of proceedings of Dáil Éireann shall be full and unabridged, comprising the entire text of every draft of law, motion, resolution, question, and other document introduced, whether adopted or not, as well as all legislative acts, orders and resolutions adopted”.

Suppressed by the English censor

Ginnell was arrested in May, however, which underlines an important point about the practicalities of the Dáil producing an Irish equivalent of Hansard. The tense political situation and increasing violence meant the Dáil was under constant threat of being declared illegal by the British authorities. On the day before its first sitting, The Times of London noted the “whole thing, of course, is childishly illegal, but so long as it is orderly there will be no interference from the Government.”

As the Members set about laying the foundations for an alternative Government, however, and as the Dáil’s officials went about the business of taking minutes and keeping records in the manner of a legitimate parliament, they came ever closer to acting illegally from a British perspective. Apart from arresting elected Members, the British authorities censored newspaper reports of the Dáil’s activities. For example, when the Dáil published as a pamphlet a major statement of policy made on 10 April 1919 by the Dáil’s President, Eamon de Valera, its preface noted the statement “was in its entirety suppressed by the English Censor.” Pressure from the British authorities also meant the Dáil officials were unable to keep an original copy of the minutes of the proceedings held on the following day.

Nevertheless, the Dáil had some success in getting its activities published. For instance, the proceedings of 21 January 1919 were published in full under the title Iris Dail Eireann: An Chead Tionol, 21 Ianuar, 1919, “iris” being the Irish word for “gazette”. Similarly, the proceedings of 17 to 19 June 1919 appeared in a pamphlet entitled Tuairisc Infheidhmeach, which in English translates as “Official Bulletin”.

Typescript report concerning the work of the Publicity Department, Dáil Éireann with special reference to the Irish Bulletin / Courtesy of the National Library of Ireland

Driven underground

On 10 September 1919, the escalating violence and increased challenge posed by Dáil Éireann to “the duly constituted authority” led to its being declared illegal by the crown authorities. From then on, it could meet only intermittently and in no fixed location, which had fatal implications for any ambition to produce real-time transcripts of proceedings of the kind produced by Hansard in Westminster.

It was in this political environment that the Dáil’s Department of Propaganda, which engaged in what we would now call publicity, produced a news-sheet called the Irish Bulletin. This news-sheet was published from November 1919 until December 1921 and included the first real-time reports of activities of the Dáil, albeit incomplete and intermittent. It reported some summaries of private and public Dáil sessions and occasionally recorded resolutions and speeches, with supplements recording presidential statements and Dáil decrees. It largely featured reports of insurgency and of raids and arrests by the British Government. Indeed, its own offices were raided a number of times and circulation lists, typewriters and stationery were confiscated.

Between November 1919 and July 1921, every issue of the Irish Bulletin was typed by Kathleen McKenna, who was also responsible for distribution to friendly persons at home and abroad. In an article about the news-sheet, she wrote how Arthur Griffith, Desmond FitzGerald and Robert Brennan, director of the Sinn Féin Press Bureau, stood around her as she began to work on the first issue:

“I put a stencil into my typewriter, typed the words: The Irish Bulletin, Vol. 1, No. 1. 11 November, 1919. The three men stood near me: three pairs of critical eyes were fixed upon my fingers as they danced unerringly over the keyboard … I fixed the stencil to the duplicator and rolled off the first clear copy; the men were delighted with it, and with themselves. The Irish Bulletin had been born.”

The ceasefire - a breathing space

Although the revolutionary Cabinet agreed on 25 April 1920 to publish a “Gazette of Public Sessions” of the Dáil of April and May 1919, the conditions for doing so were not favourable until after the truce was declared between the republican and crown forces on 11 July 1921. The ceasefire made it possible for the newly elected Second Dáil to sit more often and in the open and provided an opportunity to publish proceedings more fully.

The hazards of keeping records during wartime

Consequently, the second half of 1921 saw the publication of a bound volume that covered the proceedings of the First Dáil, from 21 January 1919 to 10 May 1921. The limited-edition volume was entitled Miontuairisc an Chead Dala, 1919–1921—Minutes of proceedings of the first Parliament of the Republic of Ireland 1919–1921, and was printed by Wood Printing Works in Dublin. It was put together using a variety of sources including documentary material, such as copies of the Democratic Programme; contemporary typed notes and shorthand of proceedings produced by Dáil officials; published excerpts of proceedings from publications like the Irish Bulletin; and contemporary newspaper accounts of proceedings. For example, the Official Report of 11 April 1919, the minutes of which had been “destroyed owing to enemy action”, was taken entirely from the Irish Independent report of 12 April 1919.

During the ceasefire, the Cabinet gave thought to future publication of proceedings. In November 1921, as the Anglo-Irish Treaty negotiations were under way, the Cabinet decided to make preparations for a never-published weekly gazette which, among other things, was to provide an account of public sessions of the Dáil.

The secretarial team that travelled with the Treaty negotiators to London in October 1921 included both Kathleen McKenna of the Irish Bulletin, who served as private secretary to Arthur Griffith, and journalist Michael Knightly. When the Treaty negotiations ended, the Cabinet of the Second Dáil authorised Knightly to work as the official reporter of the Treaty debates, which ran from 14 December 1921 to 7 January 1922. Thereafter, the Cabinet meeting of 27 January 1922 granted permission “to issue the official report of the Dáil debates on the Peace Treaty with Great Britain ... (Hansard fashion)”.

As it happened, publication of the volume covering the Treaty debates did not take place until 1923. A second volume that covered the rest of the Second Dáil’s proceedings, from 16 August 1921 to 8 June 1922, was not published until 1926.

Special book of joint sitting to commemorate the 90th anniversary of the first sitting of the First Dáil

Establishment of the Free State and creation of the Debates Office

In September 1922, the Provisional Government provided for the establishment of the Debates Office that exists today and Michael Knightly was appointed the first Editor of Debates. The first sitting of the Third Dáil, which was boycotted by anti-Treaty Members, took place on 9 September 1922 and its proceedings were published as Vol. 1, No. 1, of the Official Report. Finally, the aspiration to have full, unabridged and impartial transcripts of proceedings produced in real time for each day’s sitting had become a reality.

Since then, the State has seen fit to republish the three volumes containing the proceedings of the First and Second Dáileanna, covering the revolutionary era, on many occasions. This reflects both their original importance in establishing the legitimacy and authority of the new Parliament and their continuing significance as historical documents that help to tell the story of the foundation of the State.

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