The Government has dissolved the Dail, without warning, or regard for the just claims of the 140,000 young voters enfranchised by the Referendum of December 7th. Why has it done so?
The answer lies in the crisis in the North, now approaching its climax, wrapped up in the White-Law Paper. It can be safely prophesied that the Paper's proposals will solve nothing; that they will merely camouflage a withdrawal of British troops from the North, after they have made the North safe for the Vanguard movement.
To achieve this situation, a strong neocolonial regime in the South will be essential. Lynch has weathered the storm very successfully so far; but he will need more seats to strengthen his position in order to withstand the opposition which he expects to the British plans for Ireland.
It is true that he has some disagreements with his master Heath - Jack is a lackey, not a mere puppet: he has some room for manoeuvre.
Heath basically does not care whether Lynch or Cosgrave is in power in the Twenty-Six Counties. On 30th November, Lynch was ready to go to the country, to get a mandate for his coercive law, the Offences against the State (Amendment) Act. Heath, however, wanted the law's immediate passage more than he wanted it to be operated by any particular government. "Persons unknown" bombed and killed Dubliners, blowing the straw men of Fine Gael away from the "Nil" lobby, where they had been going to oppose the Act. The British were off the hook; Lynch was still wriggling on it.
He had 18 months left in which to call a General Election. He knows that the effect of the White-Law Paper will prevent any existing government in Leinster House from having an easy ride in the near future: he had to ensure his prospects by holding a general election before the White-Law Paper appeared. There could be no waiting for the enfranchisement of 18 year-olds in April. The British, who so signally scuppered Jack's hopes of a Christmas election, are now helping him by acting as if they really mean to give everyone in the North a fair deal - if only by arresting Protestants as well as Catholics. The tendency among large sections of the population of the South to wish that the North would quieten down of its own accord is thus being encouraged. Eventually, people will wake up to the reality; but by then Jack and his gaffer, Ted Heath, expect that things will be too far gone for anyone to do anything about them.
BLANK CHEQUE Jack Lynch expects — a blank cheque from this election.
The Dublin government already has the strongest powers of coercion enjoyed by any government in Western Europe. In gaining them, it has been helped by the claims of so-called liberals and constitutionalists to be opposed to the "non-political" strategies of the genuine fighters for national unification. Probably they had the support of the majority of the population, which, as we have said, is ready to believe in the ability of British imperialism and its Irish client capitalism to solve equitably the question of national unity.
The Revolutionary Marxist Group makes no Lipt is an flustani on aggin as ones bee lief is an illusion, and a dangerous one. claim that at least one man has proved his agreement with us Jack Lynch. If he believed in the justice of the White-Law Paper. why did he not wait for it to appear to justify his policies? Why is he prepared to disenfranchise the very youth for whom he claimed to take such pains to get the vote. If Jack gets back, we may expect him to make disapproving noises at the mess that Britain and Vanguard will make of Northern However, when he acts, it will be against those elements who are subversive enough to do something about it. To succeed in this, he needs a "mandate".
But there are still more important reasons why the present situation is dangerous. Over the last decade, we have seen what the Government can do with the powers it has. The Trade Unions, the farmers, the homeless, R.T.E. have all suffered at its hands. Much of this occurred at a time of prosperity. Now unemployment is increasing again. At the same time inflation is rampant. Both these trends as the R.M.G. has warned before are likely to continue and accelerate, now that we are in the E.E.C. Economic discontent will increase and the government will have more powers to deal with it.
Do you want Ruari Roberts to follow Ruari Brady into jail? Irish capitalism cannot avoid this, except at the cost of many humbler trade unionists.
The only immediate alternative to Fianna Fail is little more prepossessing - the Fine Gael/Labour coalition. A Government headed by Liam Cosgrave - a man notoriously guided by the urge to live down his Daddy's image -is unlikely to be either less subservient to Britain or more agreeable to workers. But what of Labour, the partner in the coalition. Cosgrave senior also liked coalitions - of his dog and its fleas. Perhaps the Labour Party is a rather large flea, but its role is nonetheless written. It has changed its mind - usually for the worse — on so many issues, that it has credibility only for those who would vote for any hole-in-the-wall covered with a Labour poster. The only result of bringing (second-hand) brains into the Labour Party has been that these brains give better and more subtle reasons for abandoning Labour principles.
Under Billy Norton, the party at least tended to be firm on civil liberties (except of course in coalition when its own man was in the Justice Department). During the last year, however, we have seen the edifying spectacle of the Labour Party imitating the amoeba on the Prison's Bill (for non-biologists, the amoeba is an interesting creature - it can split indefinitely). Curiouser and curiouser. we saw the liberal constitutional Cruise O Brien acting on this issue notably less liberally than Deputy S. (as in Storm Trooper) Coughlan.
But the politics of the coalition would be ludicrous enough, even if its executors had any credibility. In the present crisis, the only credible policies offered by an Irish capitalist Government would be those of a political nature; on the one hand "dismantling" the repressive nature of the state; on the other, secularising it.
Instead the firm of Cosgrave and Corish is going to spend money in a big way. Where are they going to get the money? Where did Harold Wilson in Britain get the money for his social and economic reforms? Yes, you're right. That's why there weren't too many reforms.
If any Irish capitalist government (and the coalition of Liam Cosgrave and the 50 other reasons against socialism will be capitalist) is to carry out any sort of economic development, reform is out, and repression is in. The R.M.G. insists that there can be no joy for the Irish people from any government likely to come from this election. DONT PLAY THIS CARD...