My Irish People

“Centenary Scripts: “The future lies in the hand of my Irish people themselves. May this historic gathering be the prelude of the day in which the Irish people, north and south, under one parliament or two, as those parliaments may decide, shall work together in common love for Ireland upon the sure foundation of mutual justice and respect. King George V.”

After the Northern Ireland parliament was opened, the debate continued as to whether Ireland would yet have a single parliament with Dominion status. The idea that Ireland, in whole or in part, would leave the empire was unimaginable to Britain – hence “my Irish people”.

“Mutual justice and respect”, it turned out, was generally in short supply. Unionists claimed they had accepted Home Rule (for Northern Ireland) as a sacrifice, preferring to be included in the empire parliament at Westminster, though one doubts the sincerity of this claim given their stance in the subsequent negotiations, which made clear that sharing power with nationalists and republicans would be intolerable. Thus, the sentiment that the future of Ireland lay in the hands of Irish people was understood to have limits.

A united Ireland was desired by nationalists and republicans, but as the negotiations continued throughout 1921 and into 1922 we can perhaps see republicans cut their losses – i.e. Northern Ireland – and instead drive towards independence for the Irish Free State. Departure from the empire and the fixity of partition quickly (in a matter of years, though it formally took a few decades) became a reality for Southern Ireland/Irish Free State/(Republic of) Ireland.