Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 ‘The Centre of Delight of the Household’: 1904–1916
- 2 ‘Fighting the Tans at Fourteen’: 1916–1918
- 3 Seán MacBride's Irish Revolution: 1919–1921
- 4 Rising through the Ranks: 1921–1926
- 5 ‘The Driving Force of the Army’: 1926–1932
- 6 ‘The Guiding Influence of the Mass of the People should be the IRA’: 1932–1937
- 7 Becoming Legitimate? 1938–1940
- 8 ‘Standing Counsel to the Illegal Organisation’: 1940–1942
- 9 ‘One of the Most Dangerous Men in the Country’: 1942–1946
- Epilogue
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
5 - ‘The Driving Force of the Army’: 1926–1932
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 ‘The Centre of Delight of the Household’: 1904–1916
- 2 ‘Fighting the Tans at Fourteen’: 1916–1918
- 3 Seán MacBride's Irish Revolution: 1919–1921
- 4 Rising through the Ranks: 1921–1926
- 5 ‘The Driving Force of the Army’: 1926–1932
- 6 ‘The Guiding Influence of the Mass of the People should be the IRA’: 1932–1937
- 7 Becoming Legitimate? 1938–1940
- 8 ‘Standing Counsel to the Illegal Organisation’: 1940–1942
- 9 ‘One of the Most Dangerous Men in the Country’: 1942–1946
- Epilogue
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
By 1926, the consolidation of the Free State was no longer in question. Militarily, the Civil War had been well won by the Treatyite forces and the republicans resoundingly defeated. More pertinently, whereas the elections of 1923 had provided a fillip to republican morale, the rapid disintegration of Sinn Féin's electoral machinery in the years after 1924 underscored a corresponding collapse in the basis of that party's appeal to a general public that was slowly responding to the state-building efforts of the Free State government. With state institutions up and running, and daily life functioning with a large degree of normality, republican adherence to the mantras of abstentionism and armed opposition to the Free State appeared more illusory than ever, particularly in the wake of the formation of Fianna Fáil. The ability of Fianna Fáil to successfully fuse latent republican sentiment and popular discontent with an awesomely powerful political machine left both Cumann na nGaedheal and the IRA enormously unprepared for the runaway success of de Valera's new party.
Arguably, neither Cumann na nGaedheal nor the IRA ever recovered from the twin defeats visited on them by Fianna Fail in the 1930s, and in failing to adapt to the changed political context of the Free State, the republican movement essentially condemned itself to political irrelevance. MacBride was a key figure in the playing-out of that process in the years before the first Fianna Fail administration in 1932, and soon became a recognisable public figure and a frequent speaker at republican events and street meetings. It is important, however, not to dismiss all IRA initiatives and actions during the late 1920s and early 1930s as unimportant; aside from its ostensible role as the controlling armed wing of the Fianna Fail party, the republican movement also reflected wider political trends, both European and imperial. Disputes within the IRA as to the proper place of these trends in directing the organisation's activities would become a recurrent feature of the new-look IRA and form an integral part of MacBride's personal and political relationships over the subsequent decade.
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- Seán MacBrideA Republican Life, 1904–1946, pp. 77 - 99Publisher: Liverpool University PressPrint publication year: 2011