Editing Irish Free State (section)

===Oath of Allegiance===
As with all dominions, provision was made for an Oath of Allegiance. Within dominions, such oaths were taken by parliamentarians personally towards the monarch. The [[Oath of Allegiance (Ireland)|Irish Oath of Allegiance]] was fundamentally different. It had two elements; the first, an ''oath to the Free State, as by law established'', the second part a promise of ''fidelity, to His Majesty, King George V, his heirs and successors''. That second fidelity element, however, was qualified in two ways. It was to the King ''in'' Ireland, not specifically to the King of the United Kingdom. Secondly, it was to the king explicitly in his role as part of the Treaty settlement, not in terms of pre-1922 British rule. The Oath itself came from a combination of three sources, and was largely the work of Michael Collins in the Treaty negotiations. It came in part from a draft oath suggested prior to the negotiations by President de Valera. Other sections were taken by Collins directly from the Oath of the [[Irish Republican Brotherhood]] (IRB), of which he was the secret head. In its structure, it was also partially based on the form and structure used for 'Dominion status'.<ref>{{cite journal | doi=10.1080/03086534.2016.1175735 | title=The Commonwealth and the Oath of Allegiance Crisis: A Study in Inter-War Commonwealth Relations | date=2016 | last1=Coffey | first1=Donal K. | journal=The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History | volume=44 | issue=3 | pages=492–512 | doi-access=free }}</ref> 

Although 'a new departure', and notably indirect in its reference to the monarchy, it was criticised by nationalists and republicans for making any reference to the Crown, the claim being that it ''was'' a direct oath to the Crown, a fact arguably incorrect by an examination of its wording, but in 1922 Ireland and beyond, many argued that the fact remained that as a dominion the King (and therefore the British) was still Head of State and that was the practical reality that influenced public debate on the issue. The Free State was not a republic. The Oath became a key issue in the resulting [[Irish Civil War]] that divided the pro and anti-treaty sides in 1922–23.