You will probably have received by this the official Dáil Reports of the Debate on the Estimate for External Affairs. You will see that one of the pellets with which Deputy McGilligan peppered the Taoiseach was the argument that the concluding words of Sub-Section 2 of Section 3 of the Executive Authority (External Relations) Act, 1936, meant that there was still a law of succession in force in this country and that the Act of Settlement was part of that law.

A question which has been bothering us here - and to which we are unable to find any answer in our files, which are incomplete - is how the words 'under the law of Saorstát Éireann' ever came to be included in Section 3 (2) of the Act at all. There is a manifest conflict of principle between Sub-Section (1), and Sub-Section (2) of Section 3. In Sub-Section (1), the King is something wholly external to the Irish State. It deals with a King recognised by certain States (not including Ireland) as the symbol of their co-operation and authorises the use of the King so recognised as long as Ireland is associated with the States in question. This, of course, is the conception of the King upon which our whole present policy is based. In Sub-Section (2), however, we find a suggestion of a quite different conception. It seems to assume the existence of a law of succession in this country (in spite of the amendments made the previous day in the Constitution (Amendment No. 27) Act), and that, in turn, would seem to suggest that, even though he had been deprived of every vestige of power or function, the King continued to have at least a theoretical legal existence in our internal constitutional arrangements. It is impossible to reconcile this inference from the words 'under the law of Saorstát Éireann' with the purely external conception of the Kingship so plainly indicated in Sub-Section (1).

The Taoiseach cannot remember how the words came to be adopted. His recollection is that all the discussions on Sub-Section (2) centred on the words 'and all other (if any) purposes'. The only theory available to explain the inclusion of the words is that it was a point of concern at the time to make clear that the alteration in the succession which was being made at the time was being effected, so far as this country was concerned, by Dáil Éireann, and not in consequence of the legislative action being taken in the Parliament of Great Britain or the other States of the Commonwealth.

Can you throw any light on the matter? It would be extremely valuable if, when you have a moment to spare, you would let us know what you think about the point. It could, no doubt, be argued - though the argument would involve to some degree an admission - that, whatever theory as to the legal existence of an internal King was justified by the concluding words of Section 3 (2), it is no longer tenable in view of the subsequent enactment of the Constitution; a more interesting question is, however, whether Section 3 (2) could now be cut out of the Act without invalidating anything done or enacted at the time. But this is a very hypothetical question. The Taoiseach would hardly amend the 1936 Act merely on that point. If he were to touch the Act at all, it would I imagine be to repeal it completely.