Collins Repudiation
of the 'Pact'
Introduction from Chronology
Speaking in Cork, Collins repudiates the 'Pact' with de Valera
(just two days before the election). He tells his audience that he
expected them to vote for the candidates they thought were best regardless of
whether they were on the panel or not.
He said that “the country [is] facing a very serious situation. If
the situation is to be met as it should be met, the country must have the
representatives it wants. You understand fully what you have to do, and I
depend on you to do it”.
Comment
Hopkinson
argues that it is unclear whether Collins meant to break the agreement as he
made a speech in Clonakilty the following day in which urged support for the
pact and he also states that historian Michael Gallagher has pointed out
that considerably less publicity was given to Collins’s speech than has often
been claimed. However, Macardle says that the Freeman’s Journal
printed headlines in large type calling the electorate’s attention to Collins’s
speech. This view is supported by Curran who says that both the Freeman’s
Journal and the Irish Independent printed Collins repudiation of the
pact on election day.
Curran
goes on to give a series of arguments as to why he believes that Collins did
mean to repudiate the pact (and puts down his endorsement of the pact the
following day in Clonakilty to Collins’s concern about reaction by the anti-Treatyites
to his speech in Cork). Hopkinson echoes one of Curran major arguments
for Collins’s repudiation of the Pact i.e. after his meeting with Churchill the
previous day, Collins realised that the publication of the Free State
constitution would end all hope of compromise along the lines of the Pact.