How Collins proposed divisive Treaty oath

IT IS difficult to imagine now the intensity of the controversy that was stirred by the Treaty oath, or the fact that history could have ignored for so long that it was Michael Collins who essentially proposed that oath.

During the Treaty negotiations, the British were prepared to allow Ireland to withdraw from the UK, but they insisted the country remain within the British Commonwealth. In theory the dominions of the Commonwealth were subservient to the British king, but countries like Canada and the Union of South Africa claimed that they were really independent, because the British Crown was only symbolic.

“The British Dominions have been conceded to them all the rights that Irish Republicans demand,” President Éamon de Valera declared in written response to questions from the Manchester Guardian in Feb 1921. “It is obvious that if these rights were not being denied to us we would not be engaged in the present struggle.”