eamodonnelly

Shall Fianna Fáil evoke the spirit of it's forefathers, or forge a new path?

Now that the campaign for the FCT is in its final days, at the end of this process we will see whether the efforts of Fianna Fáil canvassers up and down the country will have resonated with the electorate, and indeed with traditional Fianna Fáil supporters. We have seen public and internal debate on our own party’s position on Europe, which was a healthy sign that the Fianna Fáil party is still very much alive and kicking in terms of policy debate and internal democracy. In the end, majority ruled, and those on the other side of the debate have done the honourable thing and accepted that decision, and are still very much an active part of Fianna Fáil. The one thing that seems to unite all sides is that keeping a tighter control on spending is a positive thing – to write it into the Constitution was an issue.

However, after this treaty, a situation may arise that may propose further European integration in return for Eurobonds, tax harmonisation or indeed federalisation of debt. This will yet again bring the debate on Europe to the fore. Fianna Fáil will have to search deep within it’s soul to find guiding principles from it’s own history and indeed forefathers to ensure that it follows the traditions of the party.

The party’s traditions are best encapsulated within the Fianna Fáil constitution. The most relevant passage of this constitution is article 7:

(vii) To maintain the status of Ireland as a sovereign State, as a full member of the European Union and the United Nations, contributing to peace, disarmament and development on the basis of Ireland’s independent foreign policy tradition.

This is where the problem arises – if maximising Ireland’s sovereignty and remaining a “full member” of the EU would indeed be contradictory if proposals for a Federal Europe were to arise. Obviously Ireland has needed to cede some small aspect of its sovereignty in order to be part of the UN and the EU, however when does the tipping point arise? Surely when economic sovereignty is compromised, or is there a new post-nationalist approach evolving across Europe? Or, will there inevitably be a 2 speed Europe, where Ireland can retain membership of the Euro but without the increased integration of Federalism?

As the Fianna Fáil constitution does not seem to give an adequate answer in this regard, we need to assess the comments of the Fianna Fáil party leaders. Fianna Fáil party founder Éamon De Valera stated the following  after a meeting in Strasbourg prior to the treaty of Rome:

“We have always realised that we are one nation and that, as far as physical resources were concerned, our resources were not great. We also realise that, small as were our physical resources, there were spiritual ones which were of great value; and we never doubted that our nation, though a small one, in the material sense, could play a very important part in international affairs. In a Council of Europe it would have been unwise for our people to enter into a political federation which would mean that you had a European parliament deciding the economic circumstances, for example, of our life.

For economic and other reasons we had refused to be satisfied with a representative of, say, one in six, as was our representative in the British parliament. Our representative in the European Assembly was, I think, something like four out of 120. That is, instead of being out-voted on matters that we would have regarded as important interests to us by five or six to one, we would have been out-voted by 30 or 40 to one.

We did not strive to get out of that domination [British] of our affairs by outside force, or we did not get out of that position to get into a worse one.”

De Valera’s comments seem to indicate he would be against the idea of a Federal Europe. The second leader of Fianna Fáil, Seán Lemass, seems a little more relaxed in relation to European Integration, but also stops short of being in favour of federalism. According to this article by Ronan Fanning, in July 1962  in an interview with The New York Times, Lemass stated that Ireland was

“prepared to go into this integrated Europe without any reservations as to how far this will take us in the field of foreign policy and defence”.

However, as Bruce Arnold points out, the only indication is that Lemass was in favour of increased integration in relation to foreign policy and defence. Indeed it would be hard to see how a man like Lemass that had fought for political and economic indepenendence from the UK could then within 50 years embrace federal economic and fiscal integration.

Fianna Fáil will certainly be engaging in some soul searching over the coming months and years in relation to this pivotal issue that faces our Nation, however we must balance the legacy of our forefathers with today’s realities. Fianna Fáil is a pragmatic party, but can we be pragmatic about such a core issue?