ULSTER'S DECISION. T HE Ulster Cabinet maintains its refusal to appoint
a Boundary Commissioner. At the same time it declares that its " offer to Mr. Cosgrave to settle the matter by mutual agreement is still kept open." This is no bluff. It is based on a chain of circumstanec which can easily be stated. The Northern Parliament Act laid down what was to be the area over which the new Parliament should exercise its powers—powers as great as those of a Sovereign American State. Then came the so-called Treaty of Peace with Southern Ireland and Article 12, with its " gingerly " worded section in regard to the boundary. • Now, it is certain that if Northern Ireland had deter.: mined to oppose the statute based on the Treaty she could have prevailed in any matter which infringed previoui grants of territory and power accorded to her. She wa's very near explicit opposition of this nature, but she ultimately refrained from it, because it was, in effect; pointed out to her that the only clause by which her rights were infringed was a voluntary clause. Everyone who was at all behind the scenes in DeCember, 1921; knows that this was the case. In effect the spokesmen of the Coalition Government said to the Ulster leaderS, " Why are you making all this fuss 'and risking the defeat of the Treaty and the Settlement ? Provision is made TM4 a frontier line of a more efficient kind, but not for any serious _diminution of area. But even if it were, you are protected by the facf that the ComMisSiOn is not forced upon you. It is voluntary,. and if later you are Manned you can prevent its appointment, or substitute a mutual of giye and take for a formal arbitration:'6 That is why the clause as to the Commission does not contain the usual proviso, " and if 'either Southern Ireland or Northern Ireland should fail to appoint a Commissioner then it shall be the duty of the Government of Great Britain to appoint a Commissioner who shall act as if he had been a Commissioner appointed by the Northern Government." By such arguments as these the Ulstermen were induced not to oppose the Boundary Clause.
The belief in. the voluntary character 'of the Com- mission Clause was triumphantly vindicated'by the decision of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council and then came the decision of the Government to amend the Act and so the Treaty. A' new statute was to be passed giving the Imperial GoVernment power to appoint the third Commissioner should Ulster refuse so to 'do. This alteration of the terms of the Treaty, for so it is, was justified by the cool assumption that it was only through an oversight that the Commission was made volun- tary ! The change must be effected to save our honour! We must break our promises made in the Northern Province Act in order to keep our promises alleged to be implied, but certainly not expressed, in the Free State Act ! And then we wonder that Ulster is angry and suspicious ! And now what is the Government going to do ? Will it coerce Ulster ? When the Boundary Commission (new version) has reported, will the Imperial Government resort to force, i.e., to the bombing of Belfast by air and sea, and co-operation with Free State and Republican troops ? Of course, it will not do anything of the kind. But if the new Act is not to be enforced, why pass it ? In these circumstances would it not be better to tell Mr. Cosgrave he must meet Sir James Craig again and not claim to reduce the Northern Province by half under the alias of frontier rectification ? That course is far .more likely to be approved here than the bombing of Belfast.
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