The Mansion House in Dublin was packed for Éamon de Valera's first public appearance after his internment by the Free State government for 11 months in 1923/24. This is part of what he said, a year after the Civil War and two years before he founded Fianna Fáil. – JOE JOYCE
‘THE WORK that is to be done is pressing,” proceeded Mr de Valera, “and if you ask me where we are to begin, I will say you will have to begin with the moral stiffening that we had when we began in 1917. We need back the ideas of 1917; the discipline amongst ourselves that existed then.
“And, if we want to honour the dead, we must show it by our conduct, and show that we are men ourselves that deserve to be admired. Therefore, I would say that the first thing that will have to be done is to get back again to the grand moral standards of 1917.
“To achieve all you wish for, all you want is the necessary backbone.
“It is said we were robbers. We were not robbers. We did not stand for robbery, and never did. We do not stand for murder, and we never did. We stand for the individual rights of citizens; we stand for every Irishman’s home being his castle.”
Mr de Valera said that he never had arms in his hands except defending the constitution of the Irish Republic, which had not been rejected by the Irish people. Those who stood for the constitution of Ireland had been defeated militarily.
Here there was some dissent , and Mr de Valera replied: “We have been. I don’t mind using the word. We have been, and we may as well recognise it.
“There is no use blinding ourselves to facts; if we were not defeated militarily, I would not sign the proclamation.
“We have been defeated for the moment, but victory militarily is not an end in itself always. There was a military defeat, but the end has been achieved because there was a political victory. The political victory you have achieved has, by your protest, made this nation free.
“No agreements bind us to bending the knee before any foreign power. No power can make us take an oath of allegiance to the foreigner.”
“I think I could justify every view I hold,” he said, in conclusion.
“I always believed myself, and believe myself still, to be a moderate man, and I have always been ready to advocate that we use moderate means and simple means to achieve our ends, if they are achievable by those means. But, I have always stood up against excluding any means from nations struggling to be free.
“Therefore, we must be prepared to use any means if moderate means fail.
“Three months of the spirit of 1917, and we would be back again in the glorious position we were in before December, 1921.
“Three months of that spirit and Ireland would really be free, really independent and no foreign power would be able to show any claim to any part of this country.”