The New York herald., 1921-12-07
GREAT RELIEF SEEN
FOR BRITISH ISLES.
Tremendous Concessions
Made by Both Sides to
Effect Peace.
FIGHTING 700 YEARS
Deep Aversion to Return to-
Old Conditions Deter
mining Factor.
LAST STRUGGLE FIERCE
Advent of Black and Tans and
Work Here Marked Last
Stages.
LAST STRUGGLE FIERCE
BY JOHN M'HUGH STUART,

London Correspondent Of THE NEW
Y!RK HERALD.
There can be little doubt but that
the terms of settlement of the seven
hundred year old Irish problem an
nounced tonight will meet with the
approval of the vast majority Of the
people of the British Isles and of
Ireland In particular. Each side has
made tremendous concessions In detail
TO the other. Yet each side can go to
lis own people and Say that the settle
ment impairs none of the essential
principles upon which the negotiators
were empowered to act.
The Irish Free State is given gen
eral powers over all Ireland. But the
interests of Ulster, with special en-
phasis on religious. educational and
economic matters, and carefully safe
guarded in detail From information
obtained but ten days ago in London
from the most influential persons in
Ulster it seems likely that in one or
other of the ways provided in the
document now published Ulster will
add her signature to the agreement
before long.
It is the best Sinr Fein opinion that
Ulster will see her wisest path lies
toward close union with southern Ire
land. There is little or no opinion in
the south in favor of coercing Ulster
either by force of arms or economic
MANY Tr1ctav hncinoac MI
bankers have admitted frankly that they
see the wisdom Of this With the spe-
cifc safeguards for listers religious
and educational syetems it is believed
in both parts Of Ireland that these
business { hen will carry the day.
Feared Reversion to War.
The determining factor in the whole
'negotiatials was the unwilingness of
either of the parties to return to the
kind OF fighting that has made Ireland
a nightmare for the last two years.
The development or that fighting may
be traced as follows from the Easter
rising of 1915 and the execution of
Padraic Pearss and his colleagues.
Though lull in Irish activism fol-
lowed the arrest. execution and impris-
cnnent Of the 1915 leaders the British
Government found 1t could not keep
captivity. When Esmon de Valera, who
had gained celebrity for his leadership
of the Irish forces against the Sherwood
Foresters in 1916, escaped from Lincoln
gaol nearly three years later, the final
phase Of the fight for Irish freedom
may be said to have commenced.
Other leaders were released at about
the Same time and the young men of
Ireland who had neither emigrated nor
enIfgfa6 In the Srttioh
war began to flock around them. There
can be no doubt of the implication of
many Of these Irish leaders in German
plots. They frankly admit this and
say that they would have made an al
lance" with any country that was fight
Ing against England at that time.
The phraseology of the Wilson four
teen points flew through Ireland. They,
with Cardinal Mercier's decla rations
that the Belgians were not in conscience
bound to respect or obey except in SO
far as they were compelled the rule of
the German invader formed the twin
bases of internal and external Irish
propaganda and the plea of the Irish
and Irish-American delegates to the
peace conference in Paris, where thew
were not heard.
self-Determination Wins.
but tne Wnole movement waS made
cohesive at the general election fer the
British Parliament in 1918. While
Lloyd George was sweeping the rest of
The British isles in this khaki election"
on platform of making Germany pay
and hanging the Kaiser. Sim Fein had
placed candidates in the field In every
Parliamentary division In ireland
pledged to self determination for Ire
land. Eighty per cent. of them were
elected.
But the movement became formally q
Republican one--and this Is important
in view of the present abandonment Of
the Republican clain-only at the first
meeting of these Irish members in 1913
They were pledged not to take their
seats at Westminster, and they met in
Dublin. They decided to demand inde-
pendence and 1t was only in quiet,
casual and almost accidental way that
the Republican form was adopted at that
meeting for the provisional government
then established, with DE Valera at it's
head. This incident explains De valeras
significant reference at the first open
meeting Of the Dali Eireann during the
truce to the effect that I'VE are not Re-
publican doctrinairies."
In 1918 and 1919, with De Valera
raising large sums of money In America
and with the organizers of the independ-
ent government in Dublin growing daily
bolder the British Government had to
take cognizance of its new Importance.
Repressive police measures were inau-
surated and the Sim Fein and Dali or
ganizations with their branches and
many forms of their patriotic and po-
litical activities were prescribed by ex-
scutive orders under the wartime powers
FOR the Defence of the Realm.
These orders were sought to be en-
forced by the old Royal Irish Constabu-
larry and that was the beginning Of the
warfare now ended. The members of the
old r. I. c. were ell Irishrnen and they
knew every man. woman and child in
Vneir districts. II was easy for them
10 identify and arrest and punish those
connected with the prescribed activities
AS 'peelers' stern In the enforcement OF
excise and police regulations the police
man has always been good naturedly de-
tested by his Irish brethren. As the
agent of political force he became not
only mortal enemy but, in Irish eyes.
traitor.
Most OF the r.. I. G. stuck to their
duty and paid for n WIN THAR ifvea for