Irish Boundary

To London went President Cosgrave of the Irish Free State Cabinet and Home Minister Kevin O'Higgins, there to meet Premier Sir "Jimmy" Craig of Ulster and his confreres in conference on the Irish boundary dispute.

Under the Presidency of J. H. Thomas, British Secretary of State for the Colonies, the deliberations started. At 5:30 the same evening the conference "broke down," an agreement having been found to be impossible.

Said President Cosgrave: "The conference to which we were invited in London has not been productive of any results. All matters proposed were dismissed. No agreement was reached and there is no alternative to the Boundary Commission. It will, therefore, be the duty of the Executive Council to renew their request to have the machinery of the Boundary Commission set up so that its work may proceed."

Said Premier Craig: "I think both sides of the boundary conference conducted the meeting with credit, but agreement was impossible. We shall continue to maintain the same attitude on the boundary question as we have always done. There is no suggestion of a further meeting."

The bare facts of the Irish boundary dispute are as follows:

In 1920 was passed by the British

Government the Government of Ireland Act, which divided Ireland into two parts, Southern Ireland containing 26 counties and Northern Ireland containing six counties.

In 1922 the Irish Free State Agreement Act was passed, in which the terms of a treaty between the Irish malcontents and the British Government were incorporated. One of the clauses of the treaty provided in certain contingencies for the establishment of a Boundary Commission to determine "in accordance with the wishes of the inhabitants, so far as may be compatible with economic and geographic conditions," the real boundary between Northern Ireland and the Free State.

Northern Ireland now claims that the boundary was fixed by the Act of 1920 and that she was not a party to the 1922 Act. The Free State demands revision of the 1920 Act under the provisions of the 1922 Act.

The Sunday Times of London summed up the whole situation most succinctly: "The plain fact is that each party .has quite a good case. The South stands on the treaty. The North says we were never a party to the treaty which was ultra vires. Probably there would be some chance of bringing the two together if it were possible to devise a satisfactory boundary line, but Protestants and Catholics are disposed in a debatable territory that would puzzle an arch-angel."