Throughout the bitterly contested deliberations of the Constitutional Convention, the British supplied the White House with the same confidential reports that were received by George V in Buckingham Palace.63 The message was clear. The hopes of American intervention were fuelling intransigence on the Nationalist side. Unless the full force of both London and Washington was put behind a compromise, Ireland faced permanent partition between a ‘majority and a minority each relying upon the doctrine of self-determination . .
