page_title: Irish Boundary Commission
section_title: The Commission and its work
hierarchical_section_title: Irish Boundary Commission / The Commission and its work
caption_attribution_description: English: Group taken after the arrival of the members of the Boundary Commission, with Secretaries, The Mall, Armagh. - Left to right - Mr. Francis Bernard Bourdillon, C.B.E., M.A. (Secretary to Commission); Mr. J. R. Fisher (Northern Ireland), Mr. Justice Feetham (Chairman), Dr. Eoin MacNeill (Free State representative), and Mr. C. Beerstacher (private secretary to Mr. Justice Feetham). - Photo, Hogan.
context_page_description: The Irish Boundary Commission met in 1924–25 to decide on the precise delineation of the border between the Irish Free State and Northern Ireland. The 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty, which ended the Irish War of Independence, provided for such a commission if Northern Ireland chose to secede from the Irish Free State, an event that occurred as expected two days after the Free State's inception on 6 December 1922. The governments of the United Kingdom, of the Irish Free State and of Northern Ireland were to nominate one member each to the commission. When the Northern government refused to cooperate, the British government assigned a Belfast newspaper editor to represent Northern Irish interests.
  The provisional border in 1922 was that which the Government of Ireland Act 1920 made between Northern Ireland and Southern Ireland. Most Irish nationalists hoped for a considerable transfer of land to the Free State, on the basis that most border areas had nationalist majorities. However, the Commission recommended relatively small transfers, and in both directions. This was leaked to The Morning Post in 1925, causing protests from both unionists and nationalists.
context_section_description: War broke out in the Irish Free State between pro and anti-Treaty forces, causing a delay with the appointment of the Boundary Commission, which did not occur until 1924. The Northern Ireland government, which adopted a policy of refusing to cooperate with the Commission since it did not wish to lose any territory, refused to appoint a representative. To resolve this the British and Irish governments legislated to allow the UK Government to appoint a representative on Northern Ireland's behalf. The commission thus convened, it began its work on 6 November 1924, based at 6 Clement's Inn, London, consisting of:
  Justice Richard Feetham of South Africa as Chairman (appointed by, and representing, the British Government).
  Eoin MacNeill, Minister for Education (appointed by, and representing, the Free State Government).
  Joseph R. Fisher, a Unionist newspaper editor, author and barrister (appointed by the British government to represent the Northern Ireland government).
  A small team of five to assist the Commission in its work.
  The deliberations of the Commission were conducted in secret. On 28 November 1924 an advertisement was placed in the Irish Press inviting interested persons, organisations and public bodies to evidence to the Commission for its deliberation. The Commission then conducted a preliminary tour of the border area in mid-December, acquainting themselves with conditions there and holding informal meetings with various local politicians, council members and police and ecclesiastical bodies.
  The Commission met again on 29 January 1925 to consider the responses to the Irish Press advertisement, of which there were 103. A series of formal hearings were then held in Ireland from 3 March-2 July 1925 in Armagh, Rostrevor, Newcastle, Enniskillen, Derry and Omagh, with the Commission meeting directly with those peoples and bodies who had submitted representations. Hearings were also conducted with customs bodies from both sides of the border, as well as Irish Free State officials, the British and Northern Irish governments having declined invitations to attend. The Commission then returned to London, continuing with its work throughout August-September 1925.
  Despite the wishes of the Irish delegation, Justice Feetham kept the deliberations to a small area either side of the existing frontier, thereby precluding the wide-scale transfers of territory that the Free State had envisaged. The Commission's report states that it worked on the principle that it "must start its examination of the whole question on the basis of the division marked by the existing boundary, and must treat that boundary as holding good where no sufficient reason, based on considerations of which the Commission can properly take account, is shown for altering it" and that "no wholesale reconstruction of the map is contemplated... Northern Ireland must, when the boundaries have been determined, still be recognisable as the same provincial entity; the changes made must not be so drastic as to destroy its identity or make it impossible for it to continue as a separate province of the United Kingdom." With Feetham ruling out the use of plebiscites, the Commission relied heavily on data concerning religious affiliation from the 1911 Census, supplemented by the hearings held in 1925.
  A draft outline of the final boundary was decided upon on 17 October 1925. The boundary thus created was only marginally different to the existing one, being reduced from 280 miles to 219 miles, with only small transfers of land to the Free State (282 sq m) and indeed some transfers the other way (78 sq m). In total 31,319 people were to be transferred to the Irish Free State (27,843 Catholics, 3,476 Protestants) and 7,594 to Northern Ireland (2,764 Catholics and 4,830 Protestants). Only 1 in every 25 Northern Irish Catholics would have been placed under Free State rule. On 5 November the Commission agreed that its work was complete and that they were ready to pass their recommendations on to the British and Irish governments.
caption: Irish Boundary Commission's first sitting in Ireland. Irish Independent, Thursday, 11 December 1924. Second from left, Mr. J. R. Fisher; center: Mr. Justice Feetham; second from right, Dr. Eoin MacNeill.
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