Michael McDonnell

Born in London to an Irish Catholic family, McDonnell attended the public St Paul's School, London (he later wrote a history of the school and its illustrious alumni). He went on to read medicine and then law at St John's College, Cambridge, where he also served as president of the Cambridge Union Society.

At the Cambridge Union Society, Michael and his older brother T.F.R. McDonnell championed the Irish Home Rule cause. Both were also adamant supporters of women's suffrage and admission to Cambridge.

In May 1903, McDonnell had opposed a Union motion moved by John Maynard Keynes: "that Home Rule for Ireland is beyond the sphere of practical politics". Keynes observed that while "there is no other member who can crush an illogical or ineffective speaker with such concentrated scorn as Mr McDonnell", against himself McDonnell had not been "at his best". Keynes's carried his motion by 57 votes to 51.{{Cite web |title=The Cambridge Union and Ireland 1815-1914 - Chapter 10 - Ged Martin |url=https://www.gedmartin.net/the-cambridge-union-and-ireland-1815-1914-chapter-10 |access-date=2024-12-11 |website=www.gedmartin.net}}

Four years later he published book addressing what he perceived as the ignorance of Irish affairs in England.{{Cite book |last=McDonnell |first=Michael Sir |url=https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Ireland_and_the_Home_Rule_Movement/PufQEAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=Michael+McDonnell,+Irish+Home+Rule,+book+1907&pg=PT15&printsec=frontcover |title=Ireland and the Home Rule Movement: Exploring the Struggles and Triumphs of Irish Nationalism |date=2023-08-12 |publisher=Good Press |language=en}} A preface was supplied by the Irish Parliamentary leader, John Redmond.

After graduating from Cambridge McDonnell was called to the Bar at the Inner Temple. At that time he authored the book Ireland and the Home Rule Movement (1908), an attack on British policy in Ireland and a critique of Empire more broadly. McDonnell nevertheless went on to join the Colonial Service in 1911, serving in British West Africa for sixteen years. During his time in West Africa McDonnell served as Assistant District Commissioner in the Gold Coast, magistrate in The Gambia, and Attorney-General and Acting Chief Justice in Sierra Leone.

In 1927, McDonnell replaced Sir Thomas Haycraft as Chief Justice in the British Mandate of Palestine.Sachar, Howard A. A History of Israel from Zionism to the Present. Second Edition. (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1996) p. 125

McDonnell was forced into early retirement – historian Matthew Hughes speaks of his being dismissed from officeMatthew Hughes, Britain’s Pacification of Palestine: The British Army, the Colonial State, and the Arab Revolt, 1936–1939, Cambridge University Press 2019 p.36. – in October 1936. This was towards the end of the first wave of the Arab Revolt, and he was replaced by Harry Herbert Trusted in January 1937. McDonnell's retirement was induced by a series of clashes with Palestine's High Commissioner, Sir Arthur Wauchope, over the role of Palestine's judiciary in suppressing the "disturbances". This clash culminated in McDonnell's ruling in the El Qasir v Attorney-General (1936) 3 PLR 121 case. The decision pertained to house demolitions scheduled to take place in the old city of Jaffa. Although McDonnell ruled that the government had the authority to demolish the houses, he deemed the government's reliance on town planning justifications, rather than military necessity, an act of moral cowardice and accused it of "throwing dust" in the public's eyes.Tom Segev, One Palestine, Complete: Jews and Arabs Under the British Mandate, 2001, {{ISBN|0-8050-6587-3}}Tom Bowden, [https://www.jstor.org/stable/4282565 The Politics of the Arab Rebellion in Palestine 1936–39], Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 11, No. 2 (May 1975), pp. 147-174Binyamin Blum, [http://www.allacademic.com/meta/p_mla_apa_research_citation/3/0/4/2/0/p304208_index.html The Not Very High Standard of Credibility of Witnesses in Palestine: Perjury, Colonialism, and the Corroboration Requirement in Mandate Palestine] Paper presented at the annual meeting of The Law and Society Association, Grand Hyatt, Denver, Colorado, 25 May 2009

After retiring from the bench and returning to London, McDonnell took up advocacy on behalf of the Arab cause in Palestine: he published a number of articles in which he attacked Britain's pro-Zionist policy in Palestine and in 1939, he was an adviser to the Arab delegation concerning the 1915–1916 correspondence between Sir Henry McMahon and the Sharif Hussayn of Mecca. The delegation disputed the government's claim that McMahon's letters excluded the territory and people of Palestine from the British promise that Arab self-determination.{{Cite web |title=McMahon-Husain correspondence - Report of Arab-UK committee - UK documentation Cmd. 5974/Non-UN document (excerpts) |url=https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-199699/#:~:text=James's%20Palace%20on%20the%2015th,and%20the%20Sharif%20of%20Mecca, |access-date=2024-12-11 |website=Question of Palestine |language=en-US}}

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• {{Gutenberg author | id=5322| name=Michael McDonnell}}
• {{Internet Archive author |sname=Michael McDonnell}}

{{Chief Justices of the British Mandate of Palestine}}

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Category:1882 births

Category:1956 deaths

Category:Presidents of the Cambridge Union

Category:Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge

Category:Gold Coast (British colony) people

Category:Gambia Colony and Protectorate judges

Category:Sierra Leone Colony and Protectorate judges

Category:Attorneys-general of the Sierra Leone Colony and Protectorate

Category:Chief justices of Sierra Leone

Category:Mandatory Palestine judges

Category:People of the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine

Category:Chief justices of the British Mandate of Palestine

Category:British anti-Zionists

Category:British people of Irish descent