A LOOK BACK TO SEE WHERE WE ARE HEADING #6

DE VALERA DEFENDS
HONOR FOR HITLER

Says Call on Reich Envoy to
Mourn the Fuehrer Followed
‘Established Practice’

By HUGH SMITH -
By Cable to THE NEW YORK TIMES.

DUBLIN, July 19 — No act of
Prime Minister Eamon de Valera's
public life has evoked more world-
wide criticism comment than his
call upon the German Minister to
Dublin to express his condolences
upon the reported death of Adolf
Hitler. In many places it was de-
scribed as a first-class blunder.
For the first time since that call,
Mr. de Valera in the Dail Eireann
[Parliament] here tonight defend-
ed his action, for which he was
trenchantly criticized by Deputy
James Dillon.

“Deputy Dillon,” Mr. de Valera
began, ‘referred to the German
Minister here as a representative
of Nazism. I say that is not so.
It would be an intolerable situa-
"tion if by the fact of receiving a
foreign representative we should
‘appear to be favoring the policy
of his government,

“I£ must be clearly understood
that when a representative of a
foreign state comes here he comes
as a representative of his people
and his nation, and not of a partic-
ular government, That does not
imply approval or disapproval of
the policy of his state. The Ger-
man Minister here then was in the
same position as his predecessor—
a representative of the German
nation.

An “Established Practice”

“My visit to the German Min-
‘ister was taken in accordance with
procedure and practice that has
‘been established here and also is
universal,” Mr. de Valera declared.
“That act of courtesy must not be
taken ag involving any question of
approval or disapproval of the
policy pursued in the state he rep-
resented.”

“That,” continued the Prime
Minister, “was well known, but be-
cause that fact did not please the
propagandists who had been try-
ing to malign us because of our
taking up an attitude similar to
that of Switzerland and other neu-
tral countries, they tried to mis-
represent it. There was not much
publicity given the fact that I came
here to ask the Dail to adjourn on
the death of President Roosevelt.

“We do not wait until we get
official notification of the death of
the head of a state. We naturally
assume that when the death of the
head of a state is reported, it is
true. We delay sufficiently long to
make sure there is no fundamental
mistake, but we assume that when
it is reported generally that the
head of a state is dead that that
report is correct and we do the
necessary courtesies,

Cites Honor for Roosevelt

“When we adjourned the Dail as
a particular mark of respect to the
American nation,” Mr. de Valera
said, “and when the flags were at
half staff in our city from the
moment we heard of the death of
the President of the United States
until his burial, there was very lit-
tlee publicity given it,

“I want to say that I did what I
did as my duty, and I was quite
well aware when I was doing it
that is was capable of being mis-
represented,” he declared.” “To do
anything else would bring us into
absolute contempt. My doing that
does not suggest or imply judg-
ment of any kind.”

Mr. de Valera then challenged
Deputy Dillon to name the member
of his Cabinet whom he alleged
had Nazi sympathies. Mr. Dillon
promptly named Frank Aiken, now
Minister of Finance but Minister
in charge of censorship during the
European war.

Stoutly defending Mr. Aiken,
Mr, de Valera said that because
Mr. Aiken did his duty as a censor
because he was impartial in his
work and did not allow propa-
ganda from either side, to avoid
being accused of having leanings
in certain directions. The mem-
berg of his Cabinet, Prime Minister
de Valera added, were for neither
one side nor the other but were
pro-Irish.

The New York Times

Published: July 20, 1945

2023

Euronews

Elon Musk says Ireland's
Taoiseach Leo Varadkar
'hates Irish people'

The billionaire tech mogul's com-
ments came after the Taoiseach
revealed new legislation to crack
down on hate speech after violent
anti-immigrant rioting Dublin.

Tech billionaire Elon Musk says
that Ireland's Taoiseach Leo
Varadkar "hates the Irish people."

Musk made the comments on
his own social media platform X,
formerly known as Twitter.

It came in response to a post
where one user claimed the
Irish government "want all of
your freedoms," after Varadkar
announced new legislation to
combat hate speech.

Musk's comments on X were
followed by dozens of anti-
Varadkar posts, many of
which were racist in tone.

On Thursday afternoon a
stabbing incident in Dublin
saw three children and an
adult injured near a school,
which some people blamed
on the government's
immigration policy.

Police say right-wing agitators
were behind violent protests
which followed the stabbing,
bringing angry mobs onto
the streets of the city centre,
burning vehicles and smashing
windows amid a wave of
anti-immigrant sentiment.

Politicians on all sides
have condemned Thursday
night's rioting.

Published on 25/11/2023

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