John J. O'Kelly

John Joseph O'Kelly ("Sceilg") (Irish: Seán S. Ó Ceallaigh; 1873–1957) was an Irish politician, author and publisher. He was a former president of the Gaelic League and of Sinn Féin. He was born on Valentia Island off the County Kerry coast. He joined Sinn Féin at its inaugural meeting on November 5 1905. Following the 1916 Easter Rising, O'Kelly joined the Irish National League and became Treasurer of the Irish National Aid and Volunteer's Dependant's Fund for the relief of prisoners and their families. In February 1917 he was arrested and deported to England where he was interned without trial for several months. On his release O'Kelly was elected to the Provisional Committee of the newly merged Irish National League and Sinn Féin, thereafter called Sinn Féin. In the United Kingdom general election, 1918 he was elected as a Sinn Féin MP for Louth by 255 votes in what was the closest contest in Ireland in that election. The closeness of the contest was due to the strong AOH organisation in the county that campaigned for outgoing North Galway MP Richard Hazleton of the Irish Parliamentary Party. O'Kelly took his seat in Dáil Éireann as a Sinn Féin Teachta Dála and was elected Leas (vice) Ceann Comhairle He was Secretary for Education in the Government of the 2nd Dáil. From 1919 to 1923, he was President of the Gaelic League. He opposed the Anglo-Irish Treaty and refused to accept the legitimacy of the Irish Free State. He and others maintained that the Irish Republic continued to exist and that the rump Second Dáil, composed of anti-Treaty TDs who refused to take their seats in the Free State parliament, was the only legitimate governmental authority in Ireland. He was elected to the Third Dáil but abstained from the Free State parliament. After the resignation of Éamon de Valera as president of Sinn Féin in 1926, O'Kelly was elected in his place and remained in the position until 1931. He was a prolific author on Irish language and history topics, editing Banba, The Catholic Bulletin and An Camán. He was intensely religious and a conservative Roman Catholic. Many of his speeches and writings contained anti-Semitic content. He opposed members of the IRA fighting against Franco in the Spanish Civil War. In 1938, he was one of seven remaining abstentionist Second Dáil TDs who transferred the "authority" of what they believed was the "authority" of the Government of the Irish Republic to the IRA Army Council (see Irish republican legitimatism).

Further reading

• Dr. Brian P. Murphy, The Catholic Bulletin and Republican Ireland 1898-1926: with special reference to J. J. O'Kelly (Athol Books: Belfast, 2005)