George Gavan Duffy (Irish: Seoirse Gabhán Ó Dubhthaigh; 21 October 1882 – 10 June 1951) was a politician, barrister and judge.
He was born in Cheshire, England, in 1882, the son of Sir Charles Gavan Duffy and his third wife, Louise (née Hall). He qualified as a solicitor and practised in London. He defended Sir Roger Casement at his trial for high treason. Although Casement executed, the trial had a huge effect on Gavan Duffy and in 1917, when he was called to the Irish Bar, he came to live in King's Inn, Dublin and became involved in Irish political life. |
Political LifeIn 1918 George Gavan Duffy was elected as a Sinn Féin MP for South County Dublin. He was sent to Paris to join Seán T. O'Kelly as an envoy of the newly declared Irish Republic. He published articles and pamphlets urging recognition of Ireland as a sovereign nation at the Paris Peace Conference. This did not please the French establishment, who believed his publications were damaging Franco-British relations.
Gavan Duffy and O'Kelly sought France's help against Britain when the treaties ending the First World War had not yet been signed but Britain had been France's main ally for most of the war, in which France had suffered enormous losses. The Allies of World War I saw the Sinn Féin movement as more or less hostile. A final letter of June 1919 demanding recognition and addressed to the French prime minister Georges Clemenceau, the chairman of the Peace Conference, received no reply. Finally, after publishing a letter he had sent to Prime Minister Clemenceau in protest against the mistreatment of Terence MacSwiney in prison in 1917, Gavan Duffy was banished from Paris. He was later declared persona non grata in December 1920. He then went to Rome and from there travelled through Europe on behalf of the Ministry of the Irish Republic, without securing its recognition. |
Anglo-Irish TreatyGavan Duffy was among those who travelled to London to negotiate the Anglo-Irish Treaty in 1921. He protested against signing the Treaty and did so reluctantly, being the last person to sign. He stated that he would recommend the Treaty reluctantly but sincerely as he saw no alternative for the desired aim of independence.
Gavan Duffy remained in office, serving as Minister for Foreign Affairs from January 1922 to July 1922. On the outbreak of the Irish Civil War he resigned when the Provisional Government refused to effect a court order for habeas corpus in favour of George Plunkett (a son of Count Plunkett), who was detained without charge with other republicans.His tenure in office was cut short by his decision to resign again when the Executive Council of the Irish Free State abolished the Republican Courts and executed his good friend Erskine Childers. He stood in the 1923 general election as an independent candidate but failed to be re-elected.
Back to LawGavan Duffy returned to the Irish Bar and built up a large practice and was engaged in some notable constitutional cases such as the Land Annuities controversy in which he claimed that the Irish Free State could not be bound either in honour or in law to hand over annuities to Britain. He was appointed Senior Counsel in 1930 and Judge of the High Court in 1936. He acted as an unofficial legal advisor to de Valera during the drafting of the 1937 Constitution of Ireland and was consulted on many issues. He was also a member of the commission to set up the second house of the Oireachtas,Seanad Éireann, in 1937.
In 1946, he was appointed President of the High Court, a position he held for the rest of his life. His most controversial judgement was in the Tilson Case heard in 1950, one year before his death, in which he applied the ne temere decree to the letter as de Valera's 1937 Irish Constitution gave the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland a "special position".[5] The Supreme Court of Ireland concurred but Gavan Duffy was criticised in some quarters for his ruling. |