The first inklings of trouble came to light on 1 November 1930. In a short article in The Connaught Telegraph it was reported that, at a meeting held in Castlebar courthouse, the County Council’s library committee had rejected the recommendation of the Local Appointments Commission to appoint Miss Dunbar Harrison as Mayo county librarian, on the grounds that she did not have the requisite knowledge of Irish. The proceedings were held in private with the newspaper merely reporting the outcome in a few succinct paragraphs.1 The Local Appointments Commission was the independent body set up by the Cumann na nGaedheal government to oversee the recruitment of senior posts in the local authorities.
When the library committee’s decision was brought up before the full meeting of the council, a letter from the Department of Local Government was read aloud. It stated that the council had no choice but to appoint Miss Dunbar Harrison. The county secretary, M.J. Egan, suggested that it be referred back to the library committee without further discussion. Councillor Waldron objected, stating that he had been against the library all along due to the cost. Michael Davis, the chairman of the council, called him to order, but Councillor Waldron persisted. ‘Chuck the library and you will require no librarian,’ he proposed.2 Eventually it was agreed to accept Mr Egan’s suggestion and the matter was referred back to the library committee for further consideration.
Rev. Naughton, Bishop of Killala, presided over the next meeting of the Mayo County Council library committee, which was held in Castlebar courthouse on Monday, 30 November. The sole matter on the agenda was to consider both the recommendation of the Local Appointments Commission to appoint Miss Dunbar Harrison and the subsequent letter from the Department of Local Government calling on them to endorse the recommendation.
Due to the widespread local interest in the matter, on the proposal of Councillor Moclair the meeting was, for the first time, held in public. Councillor Moclair’s initiative also ensured that the debate was widely covered in the local and national press.
Attending the meeting were:
Rev. Dr Naughton, Bishop of Killala, chair of the meeting
Archdeacon Fallon, Castlebar
Canon Hegarty, Belmullet
Dean D’Alton, Ballinrobe
Rev. Higgins, Bohola
Brother Kelly, Westport
Rev. Prendergast, Castlebar
Rev. Jackson (Rector), Castlebar
Dr Anthony McBride
Councillor T.S. Moclair
Councillor Bernard Joyce
Councillor Pat Higgins
As is obvious from this list, the committee was very much dominated by the clergy. A head (or collar) count shows that it was made up of one bishop, five priests, one Christian Brother, one Protestant rector and four laymen. This would not have been all that unusual at the time, as men of the cloth were regarded as having an occupational interest in libraries. Book selection was something that had to be monitored carefully. If one was not careful, libraries could easily become occasions of sin.
Mayo library committee had a much larger potential attendance of thirty-eight members. However, many of these were infrequent attendees. The clergy were generally the most diligent members. It was an all-male committee, which was again not uncommon at the time. Mayo County Council was also an all-male assembly. On the other hand, many women were avid readers and a significant proportion of county librarians were female. Librarianship was seen as a genteel profession, a suitable occupation for a woman.
Mr M.J. Egan, the county secretary, and Mr A. Hamrock, acting librarian, were also in attendance in an advisory capacity. Mr Egan conducted the proceedings and read the minutes of the previous meeting, which had been forwarded to the ministry and submitted to a full meeting of the County Council. Mr Egan then read into the minutes of the meeting the letter from the Department of Local Government. The contents of this letter were to the effect that the appointment of Miss Dunbar Harrison would be insisted upon.
‘That is now the situation,’ Mr Egan concluded.
Dean Edward D’Alton, PP, Ballinrobe, rose and proposed that they simply adhere to the resolution passed on the previous occasion. ‘First of all Miss Dunbar is not fully qualified,’ he claimed, before adding, ‘They have taken very good care not to give us the names of the candidates who presented themselves or the marks given. In Ballinrobe some years ago we had a girl who taught commercial subjects, but because she could not teach through the medium of Irish she could not be sanctioned. [Yet] if she used Irish she would have no students as they couldn’t follow the instruction in Irish. For every single position it was the same – nurses, doctors, and even mid-wives had to know Irish. I believe if a carpenter looks for a job he must know it and if a farrier looks for the shoeing of horses he must know it too. It’s a wonder they do not require the horse to know it.’3
Laughter greeted his remark.
‘That is the case and now we are asked to turn around and appoint a girl who knows no Irish. The County Mayo is scheduled in the Gaeltacht, but it is ridiculous to say everyone in it speaks Irish. It is equally ridiculous that in the districts where the people speak nothing but Irish that no effort should be made to help them, so that it is obvious that the person appointed should have Irish.’
‘I would like to know,’ Dean D’Alton continued, ‘what chance a Catholic girl would have if she went to Belfast to get a position like this? The proportion of Catholics in Belfast is not as great as in this county, but I suppose quarter of the population of Belfast is Catholic. North of the Boyne, there is a Protestant ascendancy and a most aggressive, impudent ascendancy they are. We are asked to set up a Protestant ascendancy in Mayo, a hundred years after Catholic Emancipation and every vestige of the Penal Laws wiped out. We are not appointing a washerwoman or a mechanic where religion would not come in, but an educated girl who should be able to estimate the value of the books to be put into the hands of the boys and girls of Mayo.’4
Dean D’Alton then mentioned the recently concluded Lambeth Conference, a congress of the Anglican church that had debated such issues as birth control and trial marriages. It had given conditional approval for the use of contraceptives in certain cases. This was, of course, anathema to the Catholic church.
‘Is it fair,’ asked Dean D’Alton, ‘that a girl, a non-Catholic not in sympathy with Catholic views but those of the Protestant clergy, should be appointed librarian to County Mayo? The minister can enforce this appointment. It is evident he intends to force the girl on us. It would be a curious thing to do. I think he will have public opinion strongly against him. I think he will find it a pyrrhic victory, but it will be a great deal better for him to take defeat. He will have to face the electors. I will oppose the appointment in as far as I can, as I do not think her a fit and proper person to be appointed and if there is only myself here I will continue the opposition as far as I can.’5
As Dean D’Alton took his seat, Councillor Bernard Joyce and Canon Hegarty rose simultaneously. Councillor Joyce having made the first utterance, Canon Hegarty sat back down. Councillor Joyce proceeded. He said he wished to second the proposition but not for the same reasons that Dean D’Alton had outlined.
‘Personally,’ he declared, ‘I do not approve of the system of appointments now in vogue. It is not a recommendation in the strict sense of the word but rather a mandate to be obeyed. As I understand it, it is more in the line of dictation than a recommendation to the representatives of the county.’
Councillor Joyce went on to mention a disagreement that had arisen between the County Council and the Department of Local Government over the appointment of a county medical officer. ‘Now I think the council has cleared the air very much in that respect,’ he said, ‘and the people of Mayo should stand a little more together with regard to local affairs in their own county … The Dean pointed out that only the name of a non-Catholic was mentioned. He did not wish to hurt the feelings of anyone. Neither do I, but it stands to reason that it is not a recommendation but a mandate. The young lady suggested may be all right, but I do not think her appointment would mean the success of the library in Mayo and I have pleasure in seconding the proposition that she be not appointed. If appointed by us, I can assure you that she will not be accepted by the County Council.’6
Canon Hegarty then got his chance to speak. He rose to support the proposition. ‘I intend to develop the arguments put forward,’ he said. ‘Our religion was persecuted because our politics were Irish and national, and the politics of Mayo are today national and Irish and it is extraordinary that it rests with an Irish national government to select a West Briton to cater for the political, the literary, the economic, the religious and the moral interests of the people of Mayo and for the 99 per cent who are Catholic. Now it rests with an Irish national government to send us a young lady for whom I have not the slightest blame. She is looking for a position. I cannot blame her. But undoubtedly the people who have assigned her to Catholic and nationalist Mayo have made a very serious mistake. The business of government is to promote the good of the community, to fall in with the general idea of the country.
‘Cromwell came to this country and our ancestors had no option but to go “to Hell or to Connacht” to make room for a class that was not of our race or religion and now a national government has given the people the option of becoming West Britons or going into the mountains and glens again and leave knowledge aside in order to preserve what they hold most dear. A librarian is a teacher. She has to deal with books that are designed to give instruction, education and amusement. Therefore you will allow, whatever class they may be, they will leave a trace behind them.’7
Canon Hegarty went on to refer to the previous county librarian and a disagreement that she’d had with the Department of Local Government. He added that he had received letters from other potential female candidates for the position, all of whom had ample Irish. He also questioned why the age qualification had been raised from twenty-one to twenty-five years of age.8
Dr Anthony McBride, a brother of Major John McBride, who had been executed after the 1916 Rising, then spoke in favour of the appointment. ‘I propose that Miss Dunbar be appointed,’ he said. ‘There is no law in the Constitution of the Irish Free State against Protestants or graduates of Trinity College or any citizens of the state being appointed to any position in it, provided they are qualified. Trinity College turned out some of the greatest Irishmen the world has seen. It is recognised the world over as an Irish university. I cannot assume or accept that the Local Appointments Commission were not honest in making the selection. We are bound to accept their decision.’ He then pointed out that successful candidates who did not have Irish had three years in which to acquire a passable knowledge of it.
‘I think it would be an abominable thing,’ Dr McBride continued, ‘if we did not carry out the Constitution made by Irishmen for Ireland and the Irish people, and that every Irish citizen, no matter of what colour, of what class, of what creed, should have equal chance in securing the appointments in it. The committee has no discretion on the matter, the system of appointment having been accepted. This young lady was found to be the best qualified, except that she did not have a full knowledge of Irish. It would be an awful thing to take the question of religion into consideration. We had religious persecution in former days and we should not continue that on our own side now. I need say no more. I stand by the Constitution on this question.’9
Rev. Jackson seconded Dr McBride’s proposal to support the Local Appointments Commission’s recommendation. He was of the impression that the County Council had invited the LAC to do what was necessary to fill the post.
‘I think it would be a great acquisition to the county,’ he said, ‘to have a young lady who is so well qualified as a librarian … Reference was made to sending her north of the Boyne. What an effect it would have on people north of the border if it went forth to the world that Mayo library committee had appointed a Protestant and a graduate of Trinity College to this responsible position. We want to unite the North and the South and what an effect it would have for broad-mindedness and tolerance in this part of the country if we here in Mayo appointed Miss Dunbar.’10
Mr Egan, the county secretary, corrected Rev. Jackson’s explanation of the role of the Local Appointments Commission. He pointed out that the implementation of the recommendations received was not optional, but in fact compulsory. The Local Appointments Commission had been set up by the government to oversee the filling of such positions as county librarian. Rev. Jackson accepted the correction. Councillor Moclair said that he was glad that the county secretary had corrected Rev. Jackson as it saved him from doing so. He then spoke up in favour of Dean D’Alton’s motion.
‘The government are blowing hot and cold in regard to Irish,’ he said. ‘One time they are going madly for it and another time madly against it. At the mental hospital they compelled the farm steward to have a knowledge of Irish so he could talk to the vegetables better and make the cows work overtime.’11
Again laughter greeted his remark.
Brother Kelly was next to speak. In his opinion Miss Dunbar Harrison was not a fit subject to be appointed librarian in Mayo. He believed her mental outlook and constitution was the self-same outlook and mental constitution of Trinity College. He believed that this anti-Irish institution had an evil history as far as Ireland and the Irish people were concerned and there was no sign of this altering to any extent. The college had been endowed for 330 years by the government of England and, during that time, never ceased to regard itself as alien and hostile to Irish aspirations, culture and customs. He claimed that Trinity had in the past exterminated its tenants in Kerry and Donegal and battened on the life-blood of the nation.
‘I cannot believe,’ he said, ‘for it is impossible to believe, that Miss Harrison or Dunbar would serve Ireland as I would like to see Ireland served, as I believe Ireland deserves to be served. Her past has not been an Irish past and I very much doubt that her future will be an Irish future. Dr McBride has told us that Trinity College has produced some of the greatest Irishmen. True, and heaven has produced some of the greatest devils in hell. [Hear, hear.]’12
Councillor Higgins contended that the letter from the department was misleading. ‘The word “recommend”,’ he said, ‘would lead one to believe that we would have some say in the matter but in the next line they say they will compel us to appoint her.’13
The vote on Dr McBride’s amendment to support Miss Dunbar Harrison was defeated by a vote of ten against and two for. Dean D’Alton’s motion was then carried by the same margin of ten for and two against. Both votes saw Rev. Jackson and Dr McBride in the minority.
Notes
1.The Connaught Telegraph, 1 November 1930, p.4.
2.Ibid., 29 November 1930, p.3.
3.Ibid., 6 December 1930, p.8.
4.Ibid.
5.Ibid.
6.Ibid.
7.Ibid.
8.Mayo News, 6 December 1930, p.5.
9.The Connaught Telegraph, 6 December 1930, p.8.
10.Ibid.
11.Mayo News, 6 December 1930, p.5.
12.Ibid.
13.The Connaught Telegraph, 6 December 1930, p.8.