Free State and British Citizenship If it were really the
case that British subjects in the Irish Free State were to be deprived of the rights of -citizens by the Citizenship Bill and the Aliens Bill now before the Dail, there would be good grounds for the protest made by Lord Danesfort in the House of Lords last Tuesday. But actually the position is not so bad as it seems. Mr. de Valera has said that as soon as the Citizenship Bill has become law the Executive will -confer, by Order, the same privileges on British citizens as are enjoyed by citizens of the Free State in Britain and other parts of the Empire. The measures before the Dail are certainly provocative in character ; they are the gestures of a Government determined to assert the separation of the Free State from Great Britain; but it is not .worth while for this country to waste time or dignity in
'protests against proceedings which are concerned with
-matters of form rather than substance, and make no real difference to anyone.
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