Explainer: The Democratic Programme of the First Dáil

By Brian Hanley

What was it?
The Democratic Programme was one of three major documents endorsed at the meeting of the First Dáil. It committed the Dáil to the principle that the ‘ownership of Ireland’ rested with the ‘people of Ireland’ and affirmed that ‘the right to private property must be subordinated to public right and welfare.’

What influenced it?
The programme, inspired in part by Padraig Pearse’s The Sovereign People, was largely written by Labour leader Thomas Johnson in response to the desire of Sinn Féin to win the support of the labour movement and to reflect the global desire for social change in the wake of the Russian Revolution. After some opposition from the IRB, a version re-written by Seán T. O’Kelly was accepted.

What became of it?
Censorship meant that the Programme did not appear in the press and it was rarely discussed during the War of Independence. During 1922 Liam Mellows argued that it might form the basis for an anti-Treaty social policy.  Ironically, the Programme is more iconic, and widely referenced by republicans and left-wingers, today than it was during 1919.

Dr. Brian Hanley is an AHRC Research Fellow in Irish History at the University of Edinburgh, working on the story of Ireland’s global revolution, 1916-23