Irish Democrat June - July 2000

iBish Oemocn
June/July 2000 Connolly Association: campaigning for a united and independen 00 ISSN 0021-1125
•MENT
Where now for
the Good Friday
agreement?
Page 4
The British
and the
Act of Union
Page 7
"penal laws?
Page 12
ONE MORE CHANCE
PEACE
PROCESS
David Granville
IF THERE was anyone more relieved
than David Trimble himself that the
embattled Ulster Unionist Party leader
had secured the narrowest of victories at
the party's council meeting on May 27,
that person must surely have been British
Secretary of State for Northern Ireland,
Peter Mandelson.
The minister's sense of relief that he
too had survived another close call was
evident as he posed for the television
cameras to sign the ministerial order
bringing back to life the very institutions
which he, on behalf of the British
government, had unilaterally suspended
just six weeks after they had come into
operation amid a fanfare of optimism.
His gamble in shutting down
institutions to save Trimble from the
braying No-men of the UUP, nearly
turned out to be as disastrous as his
injudicious loan from Labour tycoon
Geoffrey Robinson.
He may be Blair's favoured political
son, and in line to rejoin the cabinet
following a less-than-respectable period
in purdah, but it would have been
difficult for the Prime Minister to have
repositioned Mandelson at the foot of the
throne had the entire peace process
crumbled into dust under his
stewardship.
Rarely has a minister been so
unsuited to his brief. Unreceptive to the
nuances of political life in the North,
imbued with the arrogance of the new
elite and unashamedly partisan in favour
of unionism, few in the nationaldemocratic
camp will mourn his
departure when that day eventually
comes, probably sooner now rather than
later.
Having served his sentence, the
resuscitation of the Good Friday
institutions should hasten his departure
from the NIO to lead, if we are to believe
the widely-circulated rumours, Labour's
forthcoming election campaign.
The collective sigh of relief which
will accompany his departure, involving
all but the pro-Trimble unionists, will
probably be loud enough reach the US,
enabling Bill Clinton and, no doubt,
George Mitchell a chance to join in.
But what of the future of the Good
Friday agreement in the wake of
Trimble's narrow victory and the IRA's
historic statement on putting arms
verifiably beyond use?
Few are expecting political life in the
North to get any easier or simpler.
Trimble for one will have to move
swiftly to press through proposed
changes to the makeup of the Ulster
Unionist Council (UUC) involving the
exclusion of votes for the Orange Order
and his party's increasingly antiagreement
youth wing. With only 30
signatures needed for a recall of the
UUC, it could not be long before he is
once again in the hot seat defending a
steadily declining majority in the face of
a braying pack of UUP No-men egged
on from the sidelines by Paisley's crowd
who have adopted the demeanour of a
pack of vultures waiting to descend on
the UUP corpse. Time, as they say, may
not be on his side.
However, a wily political operater
and pragmatist of the first order you can
bet that bookies in the North will not be
laying generous odds against him using
every ounce of leverage in the wake of
his narrow victory to extract even more
concessions out of British ministers.
Rooney, Teresa Jordan & Eilish McCabe
by the RUC. (Justice for victims of state violence, see page 6)
With Britain's record of rolling over
whenever Trimble's party squeals loudly
enough, the omens are not good. As a
result, it is likely that the reaction of
republicans and nationalists to the
plethora of changes in unionism's favour
over the implementation of the Patten
report recommendationsis looks set to
harden in the coming period.
This in itself could result in another
major crisis — even the Catholic
Church has come out strongly against
the watering-down of the Patten report
— as disillusionment over the British
government's committment to
implementing the equality agenda
reaches new heights.
The day after Trimble's narrow
victory on 27 May Sinn Fein's chief
negotiator, Martin McGuinness,
described the amendments as "totally
and absolutely" unacceptable and vowed
that the party would campaign
vigorously to have them dropped. The
SDLP's position is not significantly
different. Perhaps more importantly,
neither is Bill Clinton's.
Further trouble is also expected if
concessions to the Orange Order over
provocative marches are forthcoming as
rumoured.
Even so, it is unlikely that
republicans will resort to withdrawing
from the institutions which they have
fought so hard to get up and running.
Apart from anything else, their presence
at the heart of mainstream politics in the
six counties causes unionists far more
difficulties than their absence.
Sinn Fein's support for the peace
process and an increasingly
sophisticated organisation at all levels is
also paying dividends at the polls as was
evidenced by the recent Omagh byelection
where the republican vote rose
by 25 per cent, largely at the expense of
the SDLP. This trend is likely to
continue, north and south, with the result
that republicans are likely to hold an
even stronger hand the other side of the
forthcoming general elections in both
Britain and Ireland.
Unionism is also more divided than it
has ever been in its history and while
this may cause difficulties and
instability vis-a-vis the Good Friday
institutions it surely bodes well for the
future. It has been years since the it has
been accurate to talk of the Ulster
unionist monolith of the post-partition
sectarian statelet.
In some key respects it has been
downhill all the way for unionists since
the introduction of direct rule in 1972,
and certainly since the Anglo-Irish
agreement of 1985.
This is at least part of the reason why
they have fought so tenaciously to hang
on to what privileges that remain and
against any genuine power-sharing
arrangement which can only undermine
their position further. There are
increasing signs that some at least
recognise that there is nowhere else to go.
0 See also: Plea to adopt principles of
conflict resolution, page 3; Bobbie
Headey on the latest developments, page
4, and the IRA's statement in full, page 4.

IRISII O c m o o u c
Founded 1939 Volume 55, Number 3
The primacy of politics
THE IRA's statement, which has been responsible for breaking the
decommissioning deadlock, represents an unequivocal endorsement
of politics, rather than armed struggle, as the way to tackle the
underlying causes of the Irish conflict — partition and the resulting
discrimination against the nationalist population of the six counties. It
is a welcome development with major implications for the success of
the reform process initiated by the two governments and the overall
objectives of Irish national democracy.
While the IRA statement does not spell out how politics can
achieve their goal of a united Ireland — that is the task of republican
politicians — the method is implicit. Explicitly it means
achieving
equality of treatment and parity of esteem and in doing so removing
the rational basis of the unionism of most unionists — the ability to
lord it over the nationalist community, politically and economically.
Make 'top-doggery' impossible and the circumstances are created
in which today's unionists can discover that they have far more in
common with their nationalist neighbours than with their erstwhile
fellow' Brits across the water who, with few exceptions, care little for
their predicament or their wellbeing. The quicker the equality agenda
is implemented, the quicker this process will progress.
The way for democrats in Britain and internationally is to keep up
the pressure on Westminster to
implement speedily the equality
aspects of the Good Friday deal, including the full implementation of
the Patten report; dealing with the issue of provocative Orange
parades, and economic investment to tackle inequalities.
Enlightened, democratic opinion in Britain, organised to support
the majority forces of national democracy rather than the unionist
minority, has a key role to play. Within this, the Irish in Britain, the
overwhelming majority of whom continue to vote Labour, are
stategically placed to carry out a vital and unique job.
It is therefore important that the Connolly Association and other
progressive organisations within the Irish community continue to
inform, educate and campaign, increasing the number of 'friends of
Ireland' here and ensuring that their combined efforts become
significant in determining British government policy on Ireland.
Rotten to the core
BRIBERY AND corruption on a mass scale is the only way to
describe the way that Fianna Fail and Fine Gael councillors and TDs
have sold their votes to property developers over the past 30 years.
The revelation of the Rood Tribunal that nearly half the members
of Dublin County Council, some now in the Dail, were on the take re
Dublin's Quarryvale shopping centre, puts a question over much of
Ireland's body politic. There have been many other Quarryvales.
Is there not a connection between so many being willing to sell
their votes to developers and the sell-out of Irish neutrality and the
Irish punt to the EU in the same period?
Charles Haughey was Taoiseach when the Supreme Court found
the political parties to be acting unconstitutionally in seeking to ratify
the Single European Act treaty by a Datl majority. 'We must look at
this carefully' was Haughey's first reaction to the judgement. He then
went to Brussels and came back determined to ram it through by
referendum, unlawfully spending half a million pounds in the process.
We have learned since that this was the very time when Haughey's
own personal finances were being 'supplemented' by the largesse of
leading Irish businessmen. His Fianna Fail colleagues, and Fine Gael,
backed him to the hilt, as they continued to back the abolition of the
national currency by means of the Maastricht Treaty five years later.
'Thank God I had a country to sell,' said one of the bribed peers in the
College Green parliament during the 1800 Act of Union, when
someone accused him of selling out his country. He has worthy
successors in today's Ireland.
iRish Oemoctuc
Bi-monthly newspaper of the Connolly Association
Editorial Board
Gerard CurTan; David Granville (editor); Pelcr Mulligan
Production: Derek Kolz
Published by Connolly Publications Ltd. 244 Gray's Inn Road, London WC1X 8JR,
tel 020 7833 3022
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Page 10 Irish Democrat June/July 2000
News
Landmark as RUC officers Jailed
SECTARIAN POLICING
Democrat reporter
THE JAILING of two RUC officers for
their involvement in a sectarian
conspiracy against a north-Belfast
Catholic teenager has been welcomed
and described as "remarkable" by
human-rights campaigners in the North.
Darren James Neil), who was
stationed at Oldpark Rl'C station, was
sentenced to two years after being found
guilty of assaulting Bernard Griffin in
the back of an RUC Land Rover in
February 1998. RUC colleague Michael
Magowan, the driver of the police
vehicle, received a one year sentence. A
third RUC officer and a British soldier
were each fined £1,000 each for their
part in the subsequent cover up.
Following the attack, during which
his attacker threatened to have him shot
by loyalist paramilitaries, Griffin faced
police allegations that he had been the
perpetrator of an attack rather than its
victim.
Although this prosecution did not go
ahead, his home was raided by RUC
officers who planted a 'coffee-jar' bomb.
Griffin spent over three months in jail on
bomb charges before the case was
eventually dropped.
The conspiracy eventually came to
light when the third RUC officer
involved and the British soldier came
forward to confirm Griffin's version of
events.
According to the Derry-based Pat
Finucane Centre the case marks the first
time in 30 years that serving police
officers have been jailed for offences of
this nature.
However, the case represents the tip
of an iceberg, the centre insists: "For
years the Police Authority, DPP and
Independent Commission on Police
Complaints have colluded in covering up
both assaults and attempts to pervert the
course of justice on the part of RUC
officers."
Army board keeps family waiting
McBRIDE MURDER
Democrat reporter
SUPPORTERS OF the murdered Belfast
youth Peter McBride hekl a vigil outside
of the Ministry of Defence in Whitehall
in mid April and called for the two Scots
Guards convicted of the 1992 murder to
be dismissed from the Army.
In 1998 an Army board decided that
the convicted murderers, guardsmen
Mark Wright and James Fisher, could
remain in the Army despite their
convictions.
This decision was successfully
challenged by the McBride family and a
court ordered a new hearing of the
internal Ministry of Def ence disciplinary
board. Relatives are still waiting to be
notified of the date of the Army board
meeting.
Campaigners for the McBride family
have also demanded the intervention of
Prime Minister Tony Blair following
recent revelations that the guardsmen
were visited in jail by senior British
Army officers who promised that
everything was being done to get the two
soldiers released and that they could
'Dandy Pat' goes home
PAT BYRNE MEMORIAL
Democrat reporter
A ONCE-LOST monument dedicated to
the memory of 'Dandy' Pat Byrne has
been restored and returned to its rightful
place in the area of the Wexfordman's
Liverpool home.
Bom in Ferms, Co. Wexford, in
1845, Patrick Byrne sailed to Liverpool
as a boy and spent the rest of his life in
the city where he built a reputation as a
successful publican and a philanthropist.
A committed Home Ruler, he served
for several years as a local councillor for
the Irish Party where he used his
position to campaign for the interests of
tosh
working people in the city.
In 1888 Byrne was attacked and
badly beaten by opponents of Home
Rule, never fully recovering from his
injuries. He died two years later in 1890.
The original fountain, which was
erected in his memory in Scotland Place,
had been moved, vandalised and dumped
in a council depot. It was eventually
tracked down by local historians and
Irish campaigners who have had it
restored with help from a grant from the
North Liverpool Partnership.
The restored monument, which is
situated in the grounds of St Anthony's
church, Scotland Road, was unveiled by
the Lord Mayor of Liverpool, cllr Joe
Devaney, at a ceremony in mid-April.
Oemoctuc ^ f
For a united and independent Ireland
Published continuously since 1939, the Irish Democrat is the bi-monthly journal
of the Connolly Association, which campaigns for a united and independent
Ireland and the rights of the Irish in Britain
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even be promoted.
S For further information contact the
Pat Finucane Centre website:
www.serve.com/pfc/
IN
BRIEF
Equality challenge
A RECENT report published by the
Equality Commission for Northern
Ireland has revealed that unemployment
for Catholics in the six counties remains
twice as high as among Protestants. It
also confirmed that discrimination based
on religion, race, sex, and disability was
rife throughout the North.
Earlier this year, the Commission
issued new guidelines for public bodies
aimed at achieving equality of
opportunity and the promotion of
harmonious relations between people of
all backgrounds.
Hume honoured
SDLP LEADER John Hume was made a
freeman of Derry at a ceremony in the
city's Guildhall on 1 May. Among the
tributes read out at the event was one
from US President Bill Clinton and his
wife Hillary.
Donations to the Connolly Association
and the Irish Democrat
17 March — 23 May 2000
Jim Duggan £50 (now out of hospital
and thanking CA friends for their
support); A. Murray £8; A. Moynihan
£5; J. Dempsey £5; J. Mulrennan £2; A.
Wright £5; P. Evans £5; H. Bennett £20;
F. Rushe £10; S. Deans £10; R. O'
Donnell £10; A. Valentine £10; T&G
meeting (London) £25; S. O'Cearnaigh
£5; M. Sheehan £4.50; M. Kenny £2.40;
J. Williams £20; D. McDonagh £5; F.
Jennings £10; K. Matthews £15; Anon
£5;
Bankers orders (2 months) £286.00
Total £517.90
Irish Democrat June/July 2000 Page 11
Plea to adopt principles of conflict resolution
MAY DAY RALLY
Democrat reporter
THE BRITISH government and Ulster
Unionists must end their unbalanced and
contradictory approach to the Irish peace
process and to embrace fully the
principles of conflict resolution.
That was the message delivered by
Irish Democrat editor David Granville
at this year's Chesterfield May Day rally,
just days before the IRA declared its
intention to put its weapons beyond use.
British ministers and pro-agreement
unionists were equally reluctant to accept
that they were involved in a process of
conflict resolution as this would force
them to acknowledge that there had been
a conflict in the first place.
Instead they insisted on clinging to
their preferred, and unrealistic, version
of events, as a case of "criminally violent
activity" versus "the forces of law, order
and democracv", he said.
Part of the British government's
reluctance was that "this would include a
tacit acknowledgement that the British
Connolly Association members from Sheffield, London, Scunthorpe and Hull
were on hand to help out with the bookstall and march In the Chesterfield
May-Day parade, right. Left' Irish Democrat editor David Granville addresses
the main Chesterfield May Day rally.
taxpayer has had to foot the bill for the
failed policies of past governments, the
enormous cost of which is not counted in
monetary terms alone".
The end result had been an
"unbalanced and contradictory
approach" to the peace process, he said.
For anti-agreement unionists, ever
Maginnis stars
In video nasty
ROBERT
HAMILL
Democrat reporter
CAMPAIGNERS HAVE accused the
senior Ulster Unionist MP Ken Maginnis
of encouraging a 'whitewash' of the
Robert Hamill case after he was filmed
angrily dismissing the concerns at a
recent meeting at the University of North
London.
Maginnis, who threatened to walk
out of the event, became embroiled in an
argument with members of the audience
following comments by the MP that
Hamill had been rescued by the police.
The Ulster Unionist's defence
spokesperson went on to claim that
Hamill had "chatted and talked" in
hospital and had only died "because a
bone was damaged at the back of his
eye". The whole event, including
Maginnis's outburst, was recorded on
video and has been circulated to key
politicians and media outlets.
Campaigners insist that Hamill failed
to regain consciousness after the attack
while the autopsy report gives the cause
of death as "widespread damage" to the
brain believed to have been caused by
"repeated blows to the head such as by
punching or kicking".
Spokesperson for the Robert Hamill
Campaign in London, Jeremy Hardy,
condemned Mr Maginnis's remarks:
"This is a man who claims to know a lot
about the Hamill case," he said. "He is
just making this up as he goes along, he
doesn't want to know anything about it.
He wants the thing to be whitewashed."
Meanwhile, supporters of the Robert
Hamill Campaign in the north of
Mixed fortunes for
Committee author
LIBEL
ACTIONS
Democrat reporter
INDEPENDENT TELEVISION
producer Sean McPhilemy has been
forced to agree a $1 million out-of-court
settlement in the US with two prominent
loyalist businessmen named by the
author in his book, The Committee, as
being part of a conspiracy to assassinate
Catholics and republicans in the six
counties between 1989 and 1991.
The settlement with car dealers
Albert and David Prentice is to be paid
by his publisher's insurance company.
Financial difficulties resulting from the
cost of defending the case in the US have
forced Roberts Rinehait to cease trading.
Among those who had agreed to
testify in McPhilemy's defence were
historian Tim Pat Coogan, former
Channel 4 executive Michael Grade,
former RUC officer John Weir and
former British army propaganda chief
Colin Wallace.
McPhilemy agreed to settle out of
court after it became obvious that the
Prentices' legal team was planning to call
the author's main source, loyalist Jim
Sands, as a key witness.
Although forced to issue a statement
that the brothers were not involved in the
assassination conspiracy, McPhilemy is
standing by his account and has made it
clear that he is not offering an apology to
the Prentices. McPhilemy will also have
gained some solace from the fact that the
two brothers now face a legal bill of
around $2 million.
Towards the end of March,
McPhilemy won a separate libel action
against The Sunday Times in the High
Court and was awarded £145,000
damages by a jury who unanimously
agreed that his Channel 4 documentary
programme, also called The Committee,
was not a hoax as alleged by the paper in
an article in 1993.
The Sunday Times, which is
appealing against the verdict, was also
ordered to pay Mr McPhilemy's costs,
believed to be around £1 million.
Like the book which followed it, the
original programme set out to prove the
existence of elaborate conspiracy to kill
nationalists and Catholics, involving
loyalist paramilitaries, unionist
councillors, RUC officers and prominent
six-county businessmen.
Pics by Craig O'Brien
busy creating new roadblocks to reviving
the institutions suspended by British
Secretary of State Peter Mandelson, it
was clear that the overriding priority was
to prevent progress towards a genuine
power-sharing arrangement in the North.
Other obstacles also existed, he said.
An attempt earlier this year to stage a
England (pictured) were among those to
hold vigils at the end of April and the
beginning of May marking the third
anniversary of the 1997 attack on Hamill
and his death eleven days later.
The campaign, which is calling for a
independent inquiry into the events
surrounding Hamill's death, is also
raising money to enable the family to
mount a private prosecution against
RUC officers who witnessed the assault
by the loyalist gang in Portadown town
Barristers' victory
IN
BARRISTERS WILL no longer have to
declare their willingness to serve the
British monarch before they become
queen's counsel a Belfast judge ruled in
early May.
The ruling is the outcome of a
judicial review applied for by two sixcounty
barristers, Seamus Treacy and
Barry Macdonald, following a ruling by
the Lord Chancellor insisting that
barristers declare to "well and truly serve
Queen Elizabeth II" before being
allowed to practice at the Bar. The two
successfully argued that the ruling
discriminated against nationalists.
MI5 book panic
THE BRITISH security esUblisiiment
was sent into a spin in May after jt was
revealed that former MI5 boss Siclla
Rimmington is planning to publish her
already written memoirs of her time as
UK spymistress general.
It is believed that the book could shed
considerable light on the British state's
secret war against the trade unions,
particularly its efforts to undermine the
1984-85 miners dispute, and the covert
war against Irish republicans.
Meanwhile, the latest revelations of
disaffected former MI5 agent David
reconciliation gesture involving a
ceremonial joint disposal of arms by all
parties to the conflict, including the
British army, had been vetoed by senior
figures within the British military
establishment and the RUC.
People therefore needed to ask their
MPs who exactly is running the Irish
peace process. "Is it the elected
government of the country or the
combined forces of the British military
and security apparatus and unionist
leaders in the six counties?"
Now was not the time for progressive
and democratic forces in Britain to take
their eye off the ball, he said, urging
trade unionists and labour-movement
activists to give their support to
organisations such as the Connolly
Association and the Friends of the Good
Friday Agreement who remained
committed to the Good Friday
agreement.
"Given the dreadful legacy of
partition it is worth reminding ourselves
that what we are dealing with is as much
a British question as it is an Irish one," he
said.
centre but did nothing to save the young
man's life.
The campaign received a major boost
at the end of April when the Dublin
government signalled its intention to
press Tony Blair for an independent
public inquiry.
a For further information: BM Hamill
Campaign WC1N 3XX (London) or
j usticeforroberthamill @ hotmai 1 com
(north of England)
BRIEF
Shayler have confirmed that at least one
member of the 26-county police force
was on the British military intelligence
payroll and that, in 1983, they also used
a bogus holiday competition as part of
attempts to recruit Irish informers.
Shayler told the Irish Sunday Tribune
that there were three channels between
MI5 and the Gardai: official, casual, and
through officers recruited and paid for by
the British to pass on information about
possible IRA suspects.
Orange about turn
PLANS BY the Orange Order to hold its
first march in Dublin in over 60 years
were abandoned in early May amid
claims bv the organisation of an absence
of support outside the Gardai.
The march was originally welcomed
by the Lord Mayor of Dublin, Mary
Freehill. However, she distanced herself
from the proposal as opposition grew
amonp members of her qwn Fianna Fail
party and the general public.
In April, Dublin Corporation
unanimously supported a Sinn F6in
motion recognising the Order's right to
march. However, the motion also called
for a lifting of the Loyal Orders' siege of
the Garvaghy Road for negotiations
with the nationalist community in
Portadown to end the current impasse.
WORLD
COMMENT
by Politicus
'Pivotal' Euro vote
28 SEPTEMBER, the date of Denmark's
referendum on the euro, looks set to
become a pivotal date in European
history. Depending on how the Danes
vote, a new period of reaction or a
progressive phase will dawn for Europe.
If they vote Yes to joining the EU's
single currency, the Swedes are likely to
soon after. The new Labour government
in Norway will then be encouraged to
launch a third bid to change Norwegian
minds about joining the EU. With
Denmark and Sweden inside the
eurozone, fierce pressures will then
mount on Britain to join.
If the Danes vote No, Sweden's
social democrats, who decided at their
recent congress to hold a referendum on
the euro but without setting a date, will
probably forget the idea — a Danish No
would almost certainly mean a Swedish
No also. Norwegian europhiles will once
again be silenced by the eurocritics. And
everywhere people will grow more
sceptical of the EU currency.
Denmark's social democrat Prime
Minister, Paul Rasmussen, set the
referendum date for just after the
summer holidays to wrongfoot the No
campaigners. Initial polls show the tactic
may have rebounded on him. At this
stage, before the campaign begins, at
least half the Danes remain opposed.
Much depends on the referendum
question. If asked do they want to be part
of the eurozone, most people say Yes: to
people who know little about what is
involved, it seems nicer to be part of any
group than excluded from it! But if asked
2 do they want to abolish their national
| currency, most people say No. Between
now and September there will be a fierce
battle in Denmark on these issues.
It is shocking that mainstream
Labour and social democrat leaders like
Rasmussen and his Swedish
counterparts should advocate handing
over control of interest rates, credit and
the exchange rate to irresponsible —
because completely independent —
European central bankers in Frankfurt.
They thereby strike a deadly blow at
the interests of their own members and
their fellow-citizens. The reason is that
they see more brilliant and lucrative
careers for themselves as junior partners
in running the EU as a whole, than in
defending their own countries against the
schemes of transnational capital, to
which the EU is central. Mainstream
labour thereby hands the defence of
national democracy and independence to
the political right.
In the great betrayal that was WW 1,
mainstream labour throughout Europe
cheered on their respective national
capitalist classes, as they sent the
workers of Europe's nations to slaughter
one another in their employers' interests.
Big capital has since outgrown the
nation state and today mainstream labour
in most EU countries supports
transnational capital in its project of
subverting the democracy of the nation
state, the one instrument history has
produced for defending workers'
interests and imposing social controls on
capital. There are of course dissenting
voices in the Labour and Social
Democrat parties, but they are a
minority, though a growing one.
As James Connolly taught, labour
people and socialists everywhere should
be foremost in achieving national
independence and then defending their
nation state. Not out of nationalism, but
for the sake of internationalism.
Democrats and internationalists
everywhere will be wishing Denmark's
eurocritics victory on 28 September.

Page 10 Irish Democrat June/July 2000
The hard
road
ahead
Whether or not David Trimble contunies to hold on to
the leadership of the Ulster Unionist Party there will
he no quick or easy implementation of democracy in
Northern Ireland, writes Irish Democrat northern
corespondent Bobbie Heatley
GROWING NUMBERSARE
coming around to the view
that, as the six counties are
a colony, a democratic
colony is a contradiction in
terms. Whatever, getting
democracy in this place while it remains
a part of the UK state, is like extracting
teeth from a live dinosaur. The history of
what has happened to the Good Friday
agreement since its signing over two
years ago is proof of this fact.
Between them, the British
government and the Ulster Unionist
Party (UUP) have played fast and loose
with the agreement, frustrating its
implementation at every turn.
From the beginning Downing Street
saw the accord as an instrument whose
prime purpose was to pressurise the IRA
into giving up its arms in the way in
which it demanded, while paying scant
attention to what had actually been
agreed.
Trimble became Blair's main proxy
in this process. There was, of course,
another route towards paramilitary
disarmament based on implementing the
democratic reforms of the agreement
and, in that context, allowing the raison
d'etre for paramilitarism (at least in the
republican case) to phase out in
reciprocation.
Until recently, neither the UUP nor
the British government had shown much
interest in this option. Only the nearfiasco
brought about by Mandelson's
unilateral and illegal decision to suspend
the Stormont institutions has caused a rethink.
The joint statement of the London
and Dublin governments and the IRA's
positive response to it (see panel) seems
to have unlocked the logjam over
republican decommissioning, loyalist
paramilitarism not being of any great
concern to Downing Street.
The almost universal approval of the
IRA's decision to put its weaponry
completely and verifiably beyond use
caught the Northern Ireland unionists,
the UUP especially, by surprise. When
they came up adroitly with further
stalling demands, the British government
responded in its habitual way by
capitulating.
Although Trimble excoriated the
Patten report on policing as the shabbiest
piece of work he had ever seen,
Mandelson promised to implement it. In
the face of stiff UUP opposition, he is
now attempting an about-turn.
The SDLP, whose credibility over the
issue is at stake, has unearthed 44
infractions of Patten's original
recommendations in the Policing Bill
currently currently before the
Westminster parliament.
The Irish government has lamely
demurred while Sinn Fein, which
regarded the original Patten proposals as
minimum basis for reform, is unable to
recommend that nationalists enlist in the
RUC on the basis of predominantly
News/analysis
The Connolly Association is among those calling for Patten to be implemented In full
cosmetic changes. The Northern Ireland
Office has tried to excuse itself by saying
that further reform will be forthcoming.
As it stands, the Bill will not give
Northern Ireland an impartial police
service in any party-political sense and
has attracted widespread criticism far
beyond nationalist and republican
circles.
The existing Police Authority for
Northern Ireland, generally regarded as a
government-friendly outfit, has stated
that the planned new Police Board has
even fewer powers than it has now. The
Police Ombudsman, one of the few
reforms already in place, has also joined
the outcry as the powers of her office are
also being curtailed.
The Patten proposal for an impartial
Police Overseer, preferably from outside
the UK, is being taken up. However, the
name of the office holder and the extent
his or her remit remains uncertain.
THE EFFECT of the Bill as it
now stands is to put control
of RUC reform in the hands
of the Secretary of State and
the Chief Constable who
between them will determine
its pace and nature. The SDLP has
pledged to fight for amendments. So too
has the UUP, which is seeking further
concessions, including the retention of
the RUC name along with its badge and
symbols. Ultimate control over these
THE LEADERSHIP of the IRA is committed to a just and tint will completely and verifiably put IRAj
lasting peace. We have sustained that commitment despite the We will do it in such a way as to avoid risk!
abuse of the peace process by those who persist with the aim misappropriation by others and ensure 1
of defeating the IRA and Irish republicans.
confidence. We will resume contact with;
Republicans believe that the British government claim to a International Commission on Decommisa
part of Ireland, its denial of national self-determination to the into further discussions with the Commissi
people of the island of Ireland, the partition of our country and the IRA leadership's commitment to resoi
the maintenance of social and economic inequality in the six arms. j
counties are the root causes of conflict.
We lode to the two governments and espi
The maintenance of our cessation is our contribution to the government to fulfil their commitments
peace process and to the creation of a future in which the Friday agreement and the joint statements
causes of conflict are resolved by peace&d means. For our speedy and full implementation of the Goodj
part, the ERA leadership is committed to resolving the issue of and the government's measures, our arm
arms. The political responsibility for advancing the cuirent/;&||lMi^gtiri is no threat to the pcace proce
situation rests with the two governments, ^specially the In this context, the IRA leadership has
British government, and the leadership of the political parties, place, within weeks, a confluence-build
The full implementation, on a progressive and irreversible confirm that our weapons remain secure. 1
basis by the two governments, especially the British number of our aims dumps will he inspect*
government, of what they have agreed will provide a political patties, who will repot that they have
context, in an enduring political proceaksMth the poMMal to Independent International Commission on D
remove the causes of conflict, and in which Irish republicans, The dumps will be re-inspected regularly t
and unionists can, as equals pursue our respective political weapons have remained silent,
objectives peacefully.
In that context, the IRA leadership will initiate a process
, i J
^ n B B H B H H H R K H R H H H H H ^ i
matters is being passed to the Secretary
of State.
In an attempt to minimise opposition
to the British government's deviations
from Patten, Tony Blair is reported to
have twice phoned Bill Clinton in the
White House with requests for the US
President to put pressure on republicans
and nationalists.
Apparently he got a flea in his ear:
the time comes, he was told, when
negotiations have to end. There is no
evidence that this latest setback for Blair
will curtail the insatiable demands of the
supposedly pro-agreement UUP.
There is their problem with flags.
Cherry picking the Good Friday
agreement for an argument to justify
them, unionists contend that only the
Union flag ought to be allowed to fly
over publicly-owned buildings —
harking back to the days when
Stormont's Rags and Emblems Act
forbade the display of the Irish national
flag anywhere within the six counties..
Unionists simply disregard the
agreement's requirement for parity of
esteem whereas the simple solution
would be for both flags to be displayed
alongside one another — something the
UUP refuses to countenance.
The Orange Order has also not been
idle and there have been signs that
Downing Street is preparing to make
concessions over parades. Blair recently
altered the composition of the Parades
Commission, getting rid of dissidents
who disagreed with his plans for it. It
now contains no recognised
representative of the nationalist
community. A legal challenge to this
development is now being mounted.
Furthermore the legal framework
within which the Parades Commission
anives at its decisions has been, in the
opinion of the Garvaghy Road residents,
subtly altered in favour of the
Orangemen. It is suspected that a public
order insertion may be used to force
through a parade this summer. The
Orangemen have been threatening
further mayhem if this does not go
ahead.
All this is fast eroding the confidence
of nationalists and republicans in the
capacity of the agreement to introduce
democratic changes into Northern
Ireland.
The continual drip-feed of
concessions to unionism and the recently
demonstrated fact that, notwithstanding
the all-Ireland referendums, the Good
Friday agreement remains the property
of Westminster and its proxy the UUP,
Sinn Fein has been forced to remind
Downing Street that the IRA's offer to
put its arms completely and verifiably
beyond use is a revocable one.
Most people, including many on the
unionist side itself, are hoping that
matters will not be brought to such a pass
but the way in which the Northern
Ireland Office has been behaving is
testing people's patience to the limit.
Army bases to close
DEMILITARISATION
Democrat reporter
THE RECENT announcement by RUC
Chief Constable Ronnie Flanagan of the
closure of two British Army bases and
several spying posts in the North has
been welcomed by national-democratic
forces as an important first step in the
process of British demilitarisation.
The announcement, made within days
of the IRA's initiative for putting
republican weapons beyond use, was
widely seen as part of a highly
choreographed sequence of announcements
designed to remove obstacles to the
re-establishment of the Good Friday
institutions and the full implementation of
the agreement signed on 1 April in 1998.
Immediate closure plans cover
British Army bases in Cookstown, Co.
Tyrone, Fort George, Derry, and
observation posts in Cloghogue, south
Armagh, Broadway, west Belfast and
Templar House in north Belfast.
Making the announcement, Flanagan
claimed that the closures were made
possible by a security -force assessment
suggesting a reduced threat from
'paramilitaries'. Using this criterion
military installations could have begun
to be di: nantled two years ago.
How jver, while further steps are
expected within three months, including
the demolition of the sangar overlooking
the centre of Crossmaglen, the British
Army looks set to keep the rest of its
oppressive fortress in this staunchly
republican border town.
Commenting on the closures, Sinn
F6in assemblyman Gerry Kelly called
foi the demilitarisation process to be
speeded up, but stressed that it should
have begun immediately after the
signing of the Good Friday agreement.
For the SDLP, deputy leader Seamus
Mallon said that the removal of security
installations would help to convince
people in heavily fortified areas that the
Good Friday agreement could make a
difference to their lives.
Irish Democrat June/July 2000 Page 11
News feature
A window on Casement
John Garton reports on a
recent symposium
focusing on the life and
work of the humanitarian
and campaigner for Irish
freedom, Sir Roger
Casement, who was
executed for his part in the
1916 rebellion
EVEN BEFORE his
execution in 1916, the
complexities of Roger
Casement's life had become
a topic of debate in informed
and uninformed circles.
Since then colloquiums, symposiums
and seminars have occurred throughout
the world, reaching a climax in the
symposium of 5-6 May, held in the
Royal Irish Academy in response to a
call by Irish Taoiseach Bertie Ahern for a
thorough investigation of the supposed
Casement material now held in the
Public Records Office in London.
Speakers from Belgium, England,
Scotland, America and Germany
presented papers on many aspects of
Casement's work in the Congo, the
Putumayo, England and Ireland and
contributions from a well-informed
invited audience sought to throw light
upon the life and character of the man
who it was generally agreed was the
greatest humanitarian of his age.
Dr Jules Marchal said he believed
that the young Casement had been
greatly influenced by the concerns of
Edward Bannister, his uncle, and his
work for the welfare of the native
peoples of the Congo. Bannister had also
shown a remarkable appreciation for the
culture of these people and this
undoubtedly opened up a new world to
the boy, raised as a Protestant in the
ascendancy atmosphere of the
Ballymena Academy.
Dr John Hemmings, former director
of the Royal Geographical Society,
having made similar expeditions to that
of Casement up the Putumayo,
expressed the opinion that it would have
been impossible for anyone to have been
engaged in the sexual activities attributed
to Casement in the 'Black' Amazon
diaries without his companions, or the
spies of the Peruvian Don Julio Arana,
being aware of it.
The numerous alleged acts of
indecency in kiosks was also ridiculed
by Angus Mitchell who provided
photographic evidence that such places
English identity
THE RECENT piece about English
identity by Peter Berresford Ellis was
most interesting and helpful. It seems
true now that devolution to Wales and
Scotland has indeed put the subject on
the agenda. There should now be a useful
debate about it, without playing into the
hands of the ruling class and their
ideology.
I thought Peter Berresford Ellis
achieved that, by exposing the ridiculous
claim that a trail of monarchs leads us
happily back to the Middle Ages, thus
causing someone like me to be English.
The modem equivalent has been the
use of the English language by the
British ruling class (disproportionately
Scottish) to 'civilise' half the world.
I suspect that there is no single
The 1916 trial of Sir Roger Casement, as painted by Sir John Lavery, above.
were unlikely spots for clandestine
sexual encounters.
Professor Christopher Andrew and
Gill Bennett, OBE, chief historian of the
Foreign and Commonwealth Office, rose
to Whitehall's defence. However, thenarguments
that the diaries were genuine
and that the dirty tricks department of
British intelligence barely existed failed
to convince a knowledgeable audience.
Ms Bennett did, however, release a few
documents relating to Casement before
they are in the public domain. They
purport to throw light on the activities of
Adler Christiansen, among other things,
but present no proof positive of any
sexual relationship between Christiansen
and Casement.
Few, if any, were convinced by two
above speakers and later when asked
why, if the diaries were genuine, they
were not returned to the Parry family,
answer to the question of what it means
to be English, as opposed to British in
the chauvinist sense. Despite being small
geographically, England is densely
populated with strong regional
traditions. Differences between north
and south, for example, go back
hundreds of years.
But times change, and so do cultural
expressions. Rural English folk song
moved on to its industrial equivalents,
popularised by Ewan McColl and others
in the 1950's and 1960's. Capitalist
exploitation has added a crucial
dimension to Englishness, by making
f&HKl
Casement's legatees, as they should have
been under statute. Ms Bennett, while
admitting no legal expertise, implied that
there was a law which enabled Britain to
hold on to such documents. One
wonders if a European court would
support this. Perhaps the Irish
government should put it to the test.
James J. Horan of the John Jay
College of Criminal Justice, City
University of New York, gave an
impressive account of how forensic
science would approach the Casement
diaries.
He told this correspondent that he
would not have undertaken an
investigation of the relevant material
under the restraints imposed upon Dr
David Baxendale when working for the
BBC in 1993 — Baxendale, who had
been required to sign the Official Secrets
Act, was not allowed to make copies of
the pages and was allowed only one day
to study the material.
Despite these constraints, Baxendale
concluded that the few pages he had
been permitted to see were in
Casement's handwriting.
Dr Roger Sawyer repeated his
position, clearly staled in his two
Casement books, that the Black Diaries
are genuine. This position was supported
by Jeffrey Dudgeon whose Casement
biography is due later this year.
Angus Mitchell presented a
compelling argument for the diaries
being forged and, responding to a
statement from the floor, pointed out that
his full research had yet to be published.
Mitchell nailed his colours to the mast. It
is unlikely that his ship will sink.
Eoin O Maille of the Roger
Casement Foundation was permitted ten
Letters to the Editor
Write to: The Editor, Irish Democrat, c/o 244 Gray's Inn Road, London WC1X 8JR
or email at: democrat@hardgran.demon.co.uk
common cause with working people
around the world.
Identity is at least as strongly defined
by class as by anything else. By this I do
not mean constructions such as 'skilled
working class' or even 'Essex man'
bandied about by the media. Rather,
many people, in various economic
positions, see themselves as just getting
by in a harsh world, where the selfish
rich increasingly please themselves and
get richer. This is the real division in
today's society, rather than regional or
other differences.
It is probably more important to
*«>»

Page 10 Irish Democrat June/July 2000
Irish Democrat June/July 2000 Page 11 Page 7
Connolly column
In this article, published
in Forward in February
1914 in the aftermath of
the infamous Dublin
lock-out, the Irish labour
leader sets out the case
for sympathetic strike
action and argues the
need for industrial trade
unionism
A lesson from Dublin
SOME TIME ago I reprinted in Forward an extract from an article I had contributed
to the Irish Review defending and expounding the idea of the sympathetic strike.
That was at the beginning of the Dublin struggle. Now, the members of the Irish
Transport and General Workers' Union who have returned to work in Dublin have
done so after signing an agreement to handle all classes of goods, that is to say, to
renounce for the time the idea and practice of the sympathetic strike.
This, by the way, is the only agreement yet signed by members of that union. In
those firms which still insist upon the former Employers' Agreement banning the Irish
Transport and General Workers' Union the strike or lock out is still in active
operation. But the question arises: what reason is to be derived from our experience
of the sympathetic strike in Dublin? What lessons can be learned from a cool and
reasoned study of our struggle?
Let me repeat the essence of the article alluded to as an explanation of the nature
of the sympathetic strike. It pointed out that we in Dublin had realised that the
capitalist cannot be successfully fought upon the industrial field unless we recognise
that all classes of workers should recognise their common interests, that such
recognition implied that an employer engaged in a struggle with his workpeople
should be made taboo or tainted, that no other workers should co-operate in helping
to keep his business growing, that no goods coming from his works should be handled
by organised workers, and no goods going to his works should be conveyed by
organised workers.
That he should, in effect, be put outside the pale of civilisation and communication
with him should be regarded as being a deadly crime as correspondence with the
enemy in war time...
It may then be asked: how far has the Dublin experience justified or failed to
justify the practicability of this policy?
We have been forced in Dublin to abandon the policy temporarily because other
unions whose co-operation was necessary had not adopted a similar policy. It was not
Every executive
naturally aligns
itself in opposition
to the policy of the
sympathetic strike,
except when its
own union is
immediately
concerned
practicable to enforce the policy of
tainted goods in Dublin whilst the goods
so held up could be transported from
other ports and handled across channel
by other unions.
The executives of other unions,
failing to sanction the co-operation of
their members, (ensured that - ed) the
enforcement of this policy became an
impossibility.
Hence, I submit that the main
difficulty in the way of the success of this
policy is in the multiplicity of unions and
executives. Every union not immediately
engaged in the conflict is a union whose
material interests — looked at from a
narrowly selfish point of view — are
opposed to being drawn into struggle.
Therefore, every executive naturally
aligns itself in opposition to the policy of
i the sympathetic strike, except when it is
its own union that is immediately
concerned. When it is one of the principals in the fight then each union becomes as
enthusiastically in favour of the sympathetic strike as it formerly was against it...
It is no use pointing out the inconsistency of such action: it is merely a case of
following the immediate material interests of their union, instead of the broader
material and moral welfare of their class. But when recognising this ugly fact, what
lesson ought we to derive from it?
We ought, I think, to learn that the first duty of the militant worker today is to work
for industrial unionism in some form. To work for the abolition or merging of all those
unions that now divide our energies instead of concentrating them — and for the
abolition of all those executives whose measure of success is the balance sheet of their
union, instead of the power of their class...
This is, to my mind, the lesson of Dublin. Industrial unionism, the amalgamation
of all forces of labour into one union, capable of concentrating all forces upon any
one issue or in any one fight, can alone fight industrially as the present development
and organisation of capital requires that labour should fight.
This will not be accomplished in a day, nor in a year, but be should definitely
aimed at, no matter how long the period of its accomplishment.
The organisation of all workers in any one industry into a union covering that
entire industry, and the linking up of all such unions under one head is a different
thing from the mere amalgamation of certain unions. But, whilst it is not necessarily
antagonistic, it is certainly more in the line of industrial development, and more
effective in the day of conflict.
The name also helps to retrieve the workers' movement from the unnatural
alliance with mere anti-politicalism so unfortunately and unnecessarily introduced as
a fresh dividing issue at this juncture when all our minds ought to be set upon unity.
Features
State-violence victims
also require justice
Mark Thompson of
Relatives for Justice
outlines the importance of
disclosure and truth for the
victims and survivors of
state violence
IN 1994, post-cease-fires, many
relatives, indeed communities,
recognised the legacy of the
conflict on them and their
immediate families. People began
to reflect and talk — many for the
first time — about the terrible events
which had shaped their lives.
Relatives, who for years had
campaigned tirelessly for truth and
justice, saw that the unfolding political
events brought a glimmer of hope.
There was a sense that outstanding
human-rights violations might finally be
resolved in a new and emerging climate;
that those who were previously denied
recourse and redress would have
recognition, acknowledgement and
eventual disclosure by those responsible
for violations against them and their
loved ones; that the prospect of knowing
and publicly hearing truth would ease an
enormous burden and alleviate their
grief; and that a form of positive
reparation and restoration would follow
forming part of the overall process of
conflict resolution contributing towards
building for the future.
Others found a space within this
atmosphere which allowed them for the
first time the opportunity of addressing
their trauma and in doing so they too
realised a need to hear the truth.
Attempts to dampen these needs and
hopes at times became paramount for the
British government, confirms the view of
many relatives and campaigners that
issues of state and state-sponsored
violence are not to be voluntarily
included in any new resolution process
and that the campaign for inclusion will
be actively resisted.
Simultaneously, the British
government has elevated the
circumstances of others who have also
suffered through the conflict with
initiatives such as the Bloomfield Report
and the appointment of Adam Ingram as
FOUNDED IN th
Relatives for Justice
early 1990s,
to survivors and relatives of
bereaved through the conflict,
particularly those affected by state and
state sponsored violence.
RJF assists families coping with
the affects of bereavement through
violence and die resulting trauma and
stress:
# providing one-l
counselling, group
advice
contact, peer
and legal
| M| -
• engaging with legal
professionals, go'
through the
through international
# liasing with hi
and the UN
% RW also
behalf of many
campaign and
particularly in rural
# For further
RFJ, 235a Falls R<
4PE; tel. 028 90 22011
E-mail rfj@
bodies and
of cases going
' Uujliu Ij
/JJiiUiiJ UlUilJ.iJJ^J
® t.
'minister for victims'.
We recognise and acknowledge the
hurt and suffering of all and the affinity
that others may have with this forum, but
there also needs to be a understanding of
the circumstances regarding the people
who we work with. This has been flatly
ignored. In fact, many interpreted the
above report and appointment as a direct
snub.
People see through the selective
nature and exclusivity of this report and
the rank hypocrisy of appointing the
person in charge of the very forces
responsible for committing atrocities as
minister to deal with victims/survivors.
This approach has served only to
heighten awareness about the forgotten,
the disparity of treatment, and to reemphasise
the need for inclusion and
equality. More importantly it has
strengthened the resolve of relatives for
disclosure and underlined the need for
redress.
This awareness has brought about an
unprecedented determination for truth
and justice throughout Ireland in relation
to many of the forgotten incidents of the
conflict. It has created an under current,
captured a mood and is educating a
generation eager to know the truth.
THE DESIRE to know about
these incidents now goes
beyond just the relatives,
campaigners and immediate
communities as people have
recognised the value of
disclosure and truth.
Forgotten incidents, which have
claimed countless lives in dozens of
violent attacks involving the British
Army, the RUC and their agents, are
becoming the subject of increasing
debate. Forgotten simply because they
were deliberately perpetrated by those
supposedly there to protect and prevent
such atrocities.
The Dublin bombings of 1972,
Dublin/Monaghan bombings, New
Lodge massacre, Bloody Sunday in
Deny, Armagh and other shoot-to-kill
incidents, the massacres in Springhill,
the Ludlow case and Silverbridge all
represent that mood and need for redress.
There are many more.
The violence has even been extended
to human rights lawyers who champion
these causes. These are all issues that
will not fade.
What makes these incidents even
more reprehensible is that no one has
ever been held accountable or prosecuted
despite compelling evidence that these
were acts of violence carried out with
impunity; and that it was often the
bereaved relatives and survivors,
standing up for truth and justice, who
were vilified.
There is also a growing recognition
of the centrality of people and
communities addressing their trauma
and experiences as a core part of the
healing and conflict resolution process.
Truth and justice are vital components in
enabling this process to be successfully
achieved. They are inalienable rights that
continue to be denied.
Disclosure, reparation and restoration
are also basic fundamental requirements
to the both individual and community as
part of the healing process.
A real resolution cannot fully be
achieved without addressing these three
principles in relation to outstanding
human-rights abuses. Particularly those
abuses carried out by the state. It has an
onus, a special responsibility in this area
compared to illegal organisations, in this
matter. They must be accountable, they
must not be above the law.
In this new environment relatives are
entitled to have answers to the questions
which have been asked over the years
about these atrocities and to be treated
equally. Not to be dismissed and told that
their suffering is in anyway different to
that of those who acted in favour of the
status quo or who were killed by groups
other than the state.
If the conflict in Ireland is truly
drawing to a close, if it is to be properly
resolved, and if those central to the
process are sincere, then issues of state
violence must become an integral part of
that process.
Our challenge is to ensure that this is
the case and that these issues are
resolved. Our view remains that, as in
other conflict resolution processes, the
quest for truth and justice will create a
momentum of its own which will
eventually overtake those who refuse to
yield and to do what is morally right.
The struggle to accurately tell the
truth about the past has many valuable
lessons for society and future
generations. There should be no line
drawn under the past only lessons
learned — lessons which will enable us
to build a better and more just future for
all, nationalist and unionist alike.
The contribution from relatives is
very much a positive role. As relatives
their experiences need to be heard,
respected and valued. Above all else,
these experiences need to inform the
nature of change, to bring about a more
human-rights based culture.
In doing so this will allow everyone
to realise the pivotal role and vital
contribution that relatives bring to the
creation of a new emerging society. One
that is free ffom conflict and which has
as its cornerstone foundation respect for
human rights.
Features
The British and the Act of Union
In the latest in our series of articles on the background
and significance of the Act of Union, Liverpool-based
historian Ian McKeane looks at the events from the
perspective of the British government of the day
ON 1 January 1801, the
United Kingdom Act of
Union made Ireland an
integral part of the British
state. Why did the British
government bother? What
were its main reasons? Was Ireland the
government's chief concern or were
there other motives? The answers to
these questions lie in British imperial
concerns, concerns with her nearest and
strongest neighbour.
The Act of Union clearly created a
larger imperial state with a central
parliament in London. The House of
Lords was enlarged by four (Anglican)
Lords Spiritual of Ireland and 28 Lords
Temporal (elected for life). The House of
Commons expanded by 100 MPs sitting
for the counties, the Cities of Dublin and
Cork, Trinity College and 31 of the
"most considerable cities, town and
boroughs" of Ireland.
It confirmed the King of Britain as
the monarch of the new enlarged United
Kingdom and that all procedures for
parliamentary election, laws and taxes
effective in Britain would apply across
the whole kingdom. However, the
national debt was to continue to be
administered separately and for the first
20 years the contributions were to be in
the ratio of 15:2 for Britain and Ireland
respectively. A similar period was to
elapse before the harmonisation of taxes
and duties on such as beer, spirits and
sugar.
The British government's prime
motivation was consolidation of the
national territory — since, despite its
Dublin parliament, Ireland was by no
means independent. It was in effect a
colony. Integration pulled Ireland more
closely into the kingdom which was the
heart of the empire. This was made
explicit by the language used in Article
One of the Act which referred to the
imperial crown as the national symbol.
In the previous three decades the
British empire, having reached an
apogee in the annus mirabilis of 1759
with the acquisition of Canada and India
plus an array of profitable smaller places,
had taken a serious knock with the
secession of the 13 American colonies in
1776.
They had not been allowed to go
quietly. Britain had attempted to keep
The Working Class
Movement Library
them by force but bad generalship, poor
naval co-ordination and the better tactics
of the Americans and their French allies
had defeated the imperial forces.
The American success allowed
France to regain a degree of confidence
since Versailles had supported the
Americans in a curious alliance between
an absolute monarchy and a fledgling
republic at the expense of the British
empire.
That there should be a French
connection with the events leading to the
Act of Union is far from coincidental. It
is in fact central to the British
justification for union. France was seen
as the continental bogeyman at the time.
It had the largest population (over 26
million) and the greatest national
territory and was potentially the greatest
of the continental powers.
France obsessed British politicians.
British defence policy at the end of the
18th century was directed almost
exclusively towards France. The British
empire was seen as a commercial
undertaking to be run largely at the
expense of France and Britain's imperial
naval power was maintained to this
effect.
No cracks could be tolerated at the
centre of the empire and the tightening of
control over Ireland was seen as a means
towards more efficient governance and
the creation of a solid core at the heart of
the empire the better to enable its
defence against France.
So, when the French revolution broke
out in 1789 it was monitored very
closely. The British government feared
civil disorder at home. More seriously,
they feared the intellectual substance that
French ideas of the rights of man and
democratic representative government
might now give disaffection at home.
Although the British could rely on
their troops to maintain order, as had
been proved in 1780 during the Gordon
riots, there was government concern at
the democratic ideas emanating from
France. This became more acute after the
establishment of the French republic in
1792 and the subsequent attempts to
reconstruct French society.
The area of British control where
these ideas seemed to be taking root was
Ireland which had gained a measure of
self-government in 1782 during the
The Working Class Movement Library is a collection of books and other
media concerned with the activities, expression and enquiries of the
labour movement, its allies and its enemies, since the late 18th century.
In addition to around 25,000 books and 15,000 pamphlets, the
collection includes banners, badges, handouts, leaflets and ephemera;
periodicals, sound and vision, photographs, commemorative crockery,
archival material and posters.
The library's Irish collection, based around the libraries of the late
Desmond Greaves and T.A. Jackson, is undoubtedly the most
important collection of its kind outside of Ireland.
For further Information and (totalis of opening hours
(accoss oy appoimmeni oniyj coniaci.
WCML, 51 Ths Crescent, Salford, M5 4WX.
Tel: 0161 736 3601 Fax: 0161 737 4115
Web: http://www.wcml.org.uk. E-mail: enqulries@wcml.org.uk
and the 1798
American disaster.
At the time the British government
felt this move would remove an
administrative problem at time of stress.
The volunteer militias, widespread in
Ireland at the time, were seen as
providing an in-house defence force,
enabling regular troops to be released to
overcome the rebellious Americans.
AFTER ONLY a few years,
British government spies
followed the activities of
the Society of United
Irishmen (SUI) and in
particular their contacts
with the French in the early 1790s.
Ireland began to move back into the
frame of British paranoia. The leading
members of the SUI from the outset had
cultural leanings towards France and
links with radical elements in Britain.
The SUI had initially attempted to
pursue its ideals while remaining within
the constitution and the law. However,
after the outbreak of war between Britain
and France in February 1793 they shifted
towards a more revolutionary stance. By
April 1794 they had links with French
agents and in May 1794 the society was
proscribed. Leading members went
abroad or underground and began a
process of lobbying the French
government for support.
This came to fruition under the postterreur
government, the Directory. The
French put together a well-equipped
expedition of over 15,000 men to send to
Ireland under the command of General
Louis Lazare Hoche.
Unfortunately, procrastination and a
series of financial and organisational
foul-ups meant that it did not set sail
until December 1796. Hoche was
separated from his force by winter gales.
n provided Pitt, below, with an excuse
The main body of the fleet arrived in
Bantry Bay but failed to effect a landing.
The force returned to France.
When the information of the nature
and extent of the fleet became known to
the British the full realisation of the
potential of the landing sank in.
If the French troops had landed and
managed to establish a bridgehead it
would have taken the British a good deal
of effort to defeat and eject them.
Bonaparte might have been persuaded of
the potential of the Irish landing and the
whole course of the French war could
have been changed.
This attempted French landing is the
key to the Act of Union. It was followed
by a pacification campaign, in Ulster and
Leinster under General Lake, of extreme
barbarity.
Ostensibly making Ireland safe
against the French by rooting out
disaffection, Lake unleashed his militias
and yeomanry on the population in an
orgy of torture, and summary execution.
It was in reaction to this campaign
that, in April 1798, the exasperated but
well-organised Catholic peasantry of
Wexford fell on the North Cork Militia
and the 1798 rising was on. The
Presbyterians of Antrim and Down rose
in the summer and a small French task
force landed in Co. Mayo.
The British
government's
prime motivation
was consolidation
of the national
territory
After order had been re-established in
Ireland, Pitt had really no alternative but
to move to union.
We know that the notion of union had
been in the air from the correspondence
in the Casdereagh papers, articles in the
Northern Star in April 1795 and the
Belfast Newsletter in 1797. But now
there was a proven external threat from
France. The Protestant ascendancy were
clearly incapable of maintaining internal
order and therefore union with Britain
had to be the best method of
consolidating the empire.
The Irish government had failed to
0 move to union
maintain order in areas such as Armagh,
where sectarian disorder was endemic,
and to prevent open rebellion in 1798.
Ireland was clearly vulnerable to French
atta^V.
integration would lead to closer
oversight of Irish matters. As Scotland
had been successfully absorbed into the
UK so Ireland would, with good
governance, become an equally valued
and stable component of an enlarged
imperial nation. Its largely Catholic
population would be granted
emancipation with full civil rights and
the Protestant ascendancy would have
their social position maintained,
although their political power would be
diminished. The UK population (10.5
million) would be increased by 31 per
cent at a stroke and, most importantly,
Britain's Atlantic flank would be secure.
Yet, right at the outset, the union was
flawed. George III refused outright to
countenance Catholic emancipation. He
saw it as destroying "this groundwork of
our happy Constitution." Even the wily
Pitt could not change his sovereign's
mind.
Ireland's colonial status was largely
maintained with government now in
Dublin Castle — a viceroy, chief
secretary and a series of lesser officials.
1 "volved parliament had gone and there
v as nothing in its place. Ireland had its
100 Westminster MPs but they could not
redress the representational deficit
caused by the closing of the Dublin
parliament. It was 80 years before they
were to attempt this.
These flaws in the arrangement were
to gnaw away at the heart of the union
for decades. In Ireland Catholic
emancipation, home rule, and Young
Ireland were all attempts to address these
flaws.
After 1858, republicanism and
complete separation were seen by
increasing numbers as the solution. Thus
for Ireland, the union was and remained
flawed. For Britain, it was seen as an
arrangement which would only need
revision when events obliged the
government to remember Ireland.
If only General Hoche had known
what trouble his failure in Ireland was to
cause Britain, he might not have been
such a broken and disappointed man on
his death in 1797.
0 Ian McKeane is a doctoral research
student at the Institute of Irish Studies,
University of Liverpool, and teaches
Irish history

Page 10 Irish Democrat June/July 2000
Book reviews
A legacy of enforced migration
Ruairi O Domhnaill reviews The
Great Famine and Beyond:
Irish Migrants in Britain in
the19th and 20th centuries,
by DM MacRaild (Editor), Irish
Academic Press, £35 hhk
THIS IS a compilation of eleven essays
by authors of impeccable academic
qualifications. MacRaild's own essay is a
coincidence of communication skill and
his fund of pertinent material.
His performance as an editor is more
difficult to assess. It may be, as some of
his contributors affirm, the medium is
less than ideal for the topics addressed.
Notwithstanding the authors'
credentials, there are minor lapses. There
Oiary of a somebody
Rutin O 'Donnell reviews Then The
Walls Came Down: a prison
journal by Danny Morrisson, Merrier
I'ress, £9.99 pbk
FORMER Sinn Fein national publicity
director Danny Morrison is best known
for advocating that republicans should
seek power with a ballot box in one hand
and an an nalite in the other.
An activist on several fronts,
Morrison spent five years in Crumlin
Road Jail and the H-Blocks following his
conviction for imprisoning and
conspiring to kill an IRA informer in
1990. Now a novelist and writer,
Morrison's 'journal' comprises letters
sent to his partner and associates during
his time behind bars.
The candour, intimacy and often
surprising political content of the
selected letters indicates that they were
never intended for public eyes. The
resultant sense of insight more than
compensates for its unorthodox
epistolary and strictly chronological
format.
Morrison's reminiscences in his more
personal letters place the 'journal' in the
wider tradition of prison memoirs and
many former inmates would
immediately relate to his stories of
routine, tedium, visits, camaraderie and
tension.
Where the book takes on extra
IT REALLY says something about Irish
politics and society that This Great
Little Nation: the A-Z of Irish
scandals and controversies
by Gene Kerrigan and Pat Brennan (Gill
and Macmillan, £7.99 pbk ) even exists.
Writing about Irish society in 1913,
Yeats referred to "fumbling in the greasy
till" If he was describing the shenanigans
of the era since independence no doubt
he would have noticed that the fumbling
has become more commonplace and the
till greasier than ever.
The scandals and controversies
detailed here are dealt with
alphabetically, with Haughey, Charlie
occupying six-and-a-half pages in his
own right — although he's associated
with many more.
It would have been interesting if the
authors had estimated the total cost to the
taxpayer of all the scandals described.
Read it and weep.
Few places in Northern Ireland have
come to symbolise the heart of
republican struggle against British
occupation and unionist domination in
the most recent phase of the conflict than
Reviews in brief
significance as an historical text is in its
treatment of political developments as
relayed to Morrison during the advent of
the first IRA ceasefire. While the
decision to forgo explanatory footnotes
adds to narrative fluidity and reflects the
book's character as a reconstructed
journal, it also means that the full import
of such events is not fully explained.
Morrison, of course, was obliged to
submit all writings to censors and was
presumably circumspect even in the
letters selected for smuggling out. What
is clear is that he remained sufficiently
informed when imprisoned as to be in a
position to offer critical analysis to the
Sinn Fein leadership, analysis which
may yet be shown to have influenced the
party's progression towards negotiations
he had long favoured.
There are many poignant anecdotes
in this book which provide glimpses of
the gallow's humour, fluctuating morale
and legendary resilience of Irish political
prisoners. Remarkably, republican and
loyalist paramilitaries were obliged to
self-segregate in Crumlin Road during
Morrison's time there, a prison in which
one remand prisoner was held for
attempting to kill the father of another.
The improved atmosphere in the H-
Blocks after the 1981 hunger strikes
benefitted Morrison whose prison
journal is one of the most interesting
recent publications arising from the
conflict.
Ballymurphy in Belfast.
It is therefore most welcome that
there is a new, fully revised edition of
Ciaran de Baroid's account of the
conflict as it affected this staunchly
republican community.
Ballymurphy and the Irish
War (Pluto Press, £12.99 pbk) deals
with the subject in tremendous detail and
includes a new forward by Bernadette
McAliskey. Its main contribution is to
demonstrate in the starkest of terms how
the recent phase of the 800-year old
Anglo-Irish conflict "transformed a
transient working-class community with
little interest in politics into a square mile
of solid anti-state conspiracy".
A History of Settlement In
Ireland (Terry Barry ed„ Routltdge,
£40 hbk) is an impressive collection of
papers on the history of Irish settlement,
each written by a recognised expert for
each period, such as Kevin Whelan's
"Settlement and society in eighteenthcentury
Ireland". Although the papers
were presented at an academic
conference, there is plenty here for
everyone. Pity about the price.
is apparent confusion of terms like
'Ulster' and 'Irish Republic'. I took
expressions "an Ulster Catholic":
"Ulster-bom... Catholics": "An Ulster
Catholic by birth" as implying that a
Gael in Ulster is exceptional, although in
the five of its nine counties they are in a
majority — although the editor
contradicts my interpretation.
There is also an attempt to illustrate
an historical argument with events which
occurred in a different country about half
a century later. Some source material,
like the 1851 census, is less than ideal.
Some statistical descriptions are
reminiscent of psychometric test items.
Mervyn Busteed, who utilises the
"supercilious and patronizing"
Manchester Guardian and the "overtly
Surveying
the famine
Ruan O'Donnell reviews Mapping
the Great Irish Famine: a
survey of the famine decades
by Li'am Kennedy, Paul S. Ell, E.M.
Crawford and LA. Clarkson, Four
Courts Press £19.95 pbk
THIS IMPRESSIVE new reference
book on Ireland's calamitous 'Great
Famine' is the work of four academics
based in the Department of Economic
and Social History and the School of
Sociology at Queen's University,
Belfast.
Eschewing the traditional forms of
historical narrative, Kennedy, Crawford
and Clarkson contribute short, thematic
articles on a wide range of faminerelated
topics. Key issues such as
Citadels of dominion
Peter Berresford Ellis reviews Castles
in Ireland: feudal power in a
Gaelic world by Tom McNeill,
Routledge, £12.99pbk
I AM not criticising the book when I say
that the subtitle may be misleading for
many readers who are looking for some
historical and social analysis on feudal
power and the changes in Gaelic society
caused by its introduction into Ireland.
This is essentially an archaeologist's
view of physical structures and, indeed,
that is what Dr McNeill is, a senior
lecturer medieval archaeology at
Queen's University, Belfast.
A Capital man
Ruairi 6 Domhnaill reviews Karl
Marx by Francis Wheen, Fourth
Estate, £20 hbk
THIS GRUELLING chronicle is
probably an appropriate vehicle to
describe Marx's gruelling life — an
everyday tale of "bailiffs, boils and
boorishness".
In the context set, it would be
difficult not to judge Marx's private life
by anything other than the bourgeois
standards by which he lived. Like many
great men Marx was an over-bearing
genius, totally lacking in generosity
towards those with whom he disagreed.
Considering his vast intellect, one
anti-Catholic" Manchester Courier as
two of three sources, makes the key point
that academic studies largely ignore
opinions of the immigrants. His third
source is "broadsheet ballads", written in
English with "traces of Gaelic rhythmic
and linguistic devices". However, "little
was known about the purchasers". The
Irish were "pre-literate" and many spoke
Gaelic.
Notwithstanding these criticisms,
essays on immigration to Newcastle
upon Tyne, Liverpool and Manchester
are particularly informative and
challenging. Why did Gaelic wither in
Liverpool, while the Welsh language
thrived? MacRaild (1999) claimed that
the condition of the Irish in Newcastle
was better than elsewhere. Worse than
population, disease and food are well
covered along with such less typical
aspects of research as gender ratios,
work practices and housing.
The textual segments are extensively
illustrated by the cartography of Paul S.
Ell whose excellent maps translate
complex statistical d .ca into often
His study is really concerned with
castles themselves and how they reflect
on the Norman lordships and influenced
changes among the Gaelic kings and
their nobles.
This study talks of the role of castles,
is replete with line drawings,
photographs and descriptions, rather
than people and policies.
However, and interestingly, McNeill
argues that the very design of these
castles contests the traditional view of
Ireland as a land continually torn by war
and divided culturally between the
'English' and Irish. He is to be
congratulated.
It is high time that scholars are
prepared to knock down that myth that it
was the 'English' who arrived in Ireland
in 1169 and that 'English' was spoken in
wonders, like the author, what Marx
would have achieved had he not
"frittered" away his time on unworthy,
described here must have been wretched
indeed!
My disappointment with 'Secondgeneration
Irish in England' by Se&i
Campbell was partly the result of my
expectations. It was exacerbated by 25
per cent of the essay being devoted to
'popular' musicians. Being totally
ignorant of their work the essay was
largely wasted on me.
The acme of this compilation must be
Enda Delaney's account of the
involvement of the British and Irish
states in immigration 1921-45. It
incorporates a fluency of language with
thorough research of Irish and British
sources, and a display of an in-depth
understanding of the prevailing political,
legal and social ethos.
strikingly defined patterns. The book
adds 106 annotated maps of Ireland,
eighteen tables and forty-six figures to
the available canon and thereby fulfils its
brief of 'mapping' the 'Great Famine'.
Colour maps would have improved
the appearance of the book but if the
costs entailed were deemed prohibitive it
is undoubtedly better to have affordable
access to the perfectly legible black and
white alternatives.
While not the primary aim of the
authors, the current state of famine
historiography is briefly assessed and
use made of publications brought out to
mark the 150th anniversary of 1845 and
succeeding years.
The choice of themes covered in
Mapping the Great Irish Famine and its
mature overview has clearly benefited
from the recent surge of interest.
Naturally, the long term efforts of
Cormac O'Grada and other specialists
have also been surveyed.
This volume is an essential
companion to existing and future full
length narrative treatments of one of the
greatest disasters in European history.
Ireland from that time.
When Henry Vm became the first
English king to declare himself 'King of
Ireland' and sent an emissary to address
the 'Anglo-Norman' Lords in a Dublin
parliament of 1541, he found only one
such Lord had enough English to
translate the emissary's words into Irish
for his fellows to understand. They had
all been completed assimilated into the
Irish nation.
Tom McNeill presents an excellent
physical picture of these lords and their
castles. However, for a deep
understanding of the social changes, one
still has to defer to Dr Katharine Simm's
seminal study From Kings to Warlords:
The Changing Political Structure of
Gaelic Ireland in the Later Middle Ages
(Boydell Press, 1987).
trivial feuds and malicious attacks.
Marx formed few lasting friendships.
Fortunately Engels was an exception.
Marx's lifestyle was partly financed by
money scrounged from Engels, who
pilfered from his employers, and who
lived as an English gentleman in a
manage a trois with two Irish sisters.
More importantly Engels frequently
wrote material for Marx and collated
Volumes II and III of Capital from the
chaos which Marx left.
Wheen tediously discusses
allegations of Marx's fathering an
illegitimate son by his wife's maid
Whoever the father, the baby was sent
for adoption, and appeared to have led a
long and fulfilled life, unlike Marx's six
acknowledged offspring, four of whom
predeceased him. Those who survived
him both committed suicide.
Irish Democrat June/July 2000 Page 11
Book reviews
Roller-coaster ride towards 'carnival of reaction'
Sally Richardson reviews The Irish
Counter-revolution 1921-1936
by John M. Regan, Gill and Macmillan,
£19.99 hbk
WHEN REVOLUTIONS are followed
by oppression anti-revolutionaries are
apt to rejoice, regarding it as proof, if any
were needed, that revolution is
'altogether a bad thing'.
In the case of Ireland, however, the
reactionary and repressive regime that
followed the Treaty is regarded by many
a crusty old reactionary as the
consolidation of democratic rule — they
justify the execution of men like Erskine
Childers and Liam Mellows on the
grounds that these men refused to accept
the democratic decision of the Irish
people to go along with the Treaty.
John M Regan's careful study,
although it does not promote any
ideological viewpoint, points out that the
anti- and pro-treaty positions do not
correspond respectively with anti- and
pro-democratic attitudes in the way that
historians such as Tom Garvin have
asserted. In fact, there was considerable
support for the anti-treaty position —
much more than has often been allowed
for.
Besides, divisive as the Treaty was,
there was not that much ideological
difference between the anti-treatyites
and those republicans who backed it
believing it was the best deal that could
be obtained for the time being.
The real ideological divide was
between republicans and the Catholic
middle-class conservatives, epitomised
High crimes and legal misdemeanours
Ruairi 6 Domhnaill reviews Bloody
Sunday and the Rule of Law
in Northern Ireland by
Dermot PJ Walsh, Macmillan,
£15.99 pbk
THIS WORK is based on painstaking
research conducted on behalf of the
people of Derry. In 1996, Dr Walsh was
commissioned by the Bloody Sunday
Trust to investigate the events of 30th
January 1972 and that monument to
British judicial rectitude, the Widgery
Tribunal.
Dermot PJ Walsh describes
contemporary history with the sense of
intimacy of a Belfast resident. His
analysis of the Widgery Tribunal is a tour
de force. When he finds events
"strange", "bizarre", "incredible",
"perverse" and "hopelessly flawed", he
is not indulging in hyperbole.
However, his use of the term
"terrorist", almost exclusively reserved
for republicans, betokens the insidious
success of British propaganda.
The basic strategy is to critically
analyse events, adopting the
methodology of the legal professions —
Dr Walsh is a Banister at Law. Thus the
case presented implicitly accepts the
efficacy of Northern Ireland and
therefore, all of its repressive laws.
This is compounded by a related
strategy — the author concentrates on
history since 1921, "when the province
was established".
The effect is to exclude detailed
discussion of pertinent events preceding
the foundation of the statelet, which
materially influenced Northern Ireland's
constitution and laws.
These include the Tories cynical use
of the "Orange card", the home-rule
debacle, House of Lords support for
unionists, the Solemn League and
Covenant, the UVF and its arming by the
Kaiser's Germany, the Curragh Mutiny,
and after the Great War, the conduct of
the Boundary Commission.
The premise should have been that
the establishment of Northern Ireland
was founded in illegality (by unionists'
own standards) and was a negation of
democracy (by any standards).
The rule of law — protection of the
citizen from arbitrary government action
— did not suddenly evaporate in
Northern Ireland on Bloody Sunday.
British law, per se, traditionally affords
citizens "no inalienable rights".
The supremacy of parliament and the
power to legislate retrospectively, make
the mystical British constitution an ideal
tool of the ruling class, which
Making common cause
David Granville reviews Partners In
Revolt — the United Irishmen
1792-1798 (1803) and the
British reform movement by
Sedn Redmond, £3 (pamphlet)
THE SECOND pamphlet by the author
to have been published in recent months
Partners in Revolt outlines the extensive
links between the United Irishmen and
the movement for democratic reform in
England and Scotland — a connection
largely overlooked in Ireland during the
bi-centenary celebrations of the 1798
rebellion.
The pamphlet opens with a reference
to the Joseph Priestley commemoration
organised by the Connolly Association
in November 1998.
Priestly, a scientist, Unitarian
minister and supporter of both the
French revolution and Catholic
emancipation, was forced to flee to
America with his family after their home
in Birmingham was burnt to the ground
by a 'King and country' mob. Prior to his
departure an address was sent to him by
the Society of United Irishmen in
appreciation of his stand, offering a
tantalising glimpse of the contact
between Engli L radical and Irish
revolutionary currents.
An exploration of the links between
the United Irishmen and the London
Corresponding Society, the Scottish
Friends of the People, and later with the
Society of United Englishmen and the
Society of United Scotsmen, forms the
basis of the pamphlet.
In addition to Priestley, the roles
played by key figures such as the
Scottish radical Thomas Muir, John
Binns, one of those arrested attempting
to smuggle Father O Coigly to France,
and Colonel Edward Despard, a former
soldier who was arrested while planning
a revolt in Britain to coincide with
Emmet's failed rebellion in Ireland, are
also explored.
The author argues that British policy
towards Ireland in the 1790s cannot be
fully understood without an awareness
that during this period the British
establishment was fighting on three
fronts simultaneously: the war with
France; the revolt in Ireland; and the
reform movement at home.
An excellent introduction to the
subject, complementing recent work by
unencumbered by conscience, happily
tolerated — perhaps sponsored — a halfcentury
of fascism in Northern Ireland.
Such "rights" as have been
reluctantly allowed, stem from
international conventions. The
international courts of justice refused to
address the Bloody Sunday case, and as
the author points out, have been less than
munificent to the people of the six
counties.
There are elements of hope in Dr
Walsh's proposals, but the omens are not
promising. The Guardian reports that,
contrary to orders, the British Army has
destroyed vital evidence required by the
Saville Tribunal.
Geoff Hoon, H.M. Secretary for
Defence, has apologised "in a written
answer in the Commons... (he)
expressed deep regret". No doubt the
miscreants will be suitably admonished.
The people of Derry want justice, but
they are unlikely to get it from the UK,
where lawyers deal in different terms. As
Sir Louis Blom-Cooper, Q.C. has
asserted: "The law is... unconcerned
with guilt or innocence. Its concern is
conviction or acquittal".
Dr Walsh, now Professor of Law at
Limerick, might ask the older locals to
translate "cuimhm'gh ar Lumineach agus
feall na Sasanach".
Ruth Frow of the Working Class
Movement Libray and the historian Peter
Berresford Ellis, this informative and
well-written pamphlet will hopefully
stimulate further in-depth research into
this important aspect of the revolutionary
and democratic struggles on both sides
of the Irish Sea.
Partners in Revolt is available
directly from the author at 33 Lindsay
Road, Dublin 9 and from the Four
Provinces Bookshop in London.
by and led by Kevin O'Higgins, who had
expected to come into their own when
Home Rule was implemented and who
felt that they had been cheated of their
inheritance by revolutionary
republicanism. They wanted a
hierarchical Ireland where the lower
orders knew their place.
For the most part they were not
military men and had played little part in
the armed struggle. They had thus
missed out on the breaking down of
social and class barriers that had
occurred within the IRA, where merit
and ability, rather than background,
mattered.
O'Higgins's task was to neutralise
the pro-treaty republicans — ostensibly
his own supporters. After all, many protreatyites
were socially progressive and
republican. O'Higgins was neither. It is
astonishing to read the original
programme for the new Cumann na
nGaedheal party — it included an
embryonic welfare state and health
service for children and access to
secondary education for all. These
radical initiatives were nipped in the bud
very quickly. Instead, O'Higgins looked
elsewhere for political and financial
support for the Free State regime — to
old parliamentarian home-rulers and
even to unionists.
It is impossible to do justice to this
book in such a short review. Regan has
produced an accessible text on a
complex and demanding subject. His
extensive research brings to light a good
deal of new material and he has
interesting new things to say on many
matters. The book contributes greatly to
our understanding of how the forces of
reaction took control of Ireland after the
revolution and illuminates our view of
the political landscape of the country
today.
Unreliable sanctuary
Enda Finlay reviews Unsafe
Haven: the United States, the
IRA and political prisoners by
Karen McElrath, Pluto Press, £12.99
pbk
THE UNITED States has traditionally
been seen as a haven for republicans
engaged in the struggle for Irish unity
and independence. The United Irishmen,
the Fenians, and republicans active in the
20th century have occasionally sought
refuge there to escape repression at
home.
America has also been an important
source for financing and arming those
Sociology of division
Bobbie Heatley reviews
Contemporary Northern Irish
Society, an Introduction by
Colin Coulter, Pluto Press, £14.99 pbk
THIS BOOK sets out to examine and
explain the social structure and the
politician division in Northern Ireland
society, but in an original way.
The author correctly sees the above
as hand-me-downs from earlier British
capitalism which are now being
subjected to change through the
intrusion of global capital.
Hbwever, he relies too much on
ethno-religious explanations as the
source of present-day identities and, by
implication, conflicts.
Unintended humour can arise when
dealing with this topic. The author found
it difficult to choose a title. Ultimately he
took Northern Irish which tagged him.
He notes his other options: 'the North of
Ireland', the 'north-east of Ireland', the
'six-counties', the 'province', and, even,
'Ulster'.
groups engaged in the republican
movement's campaigns— De Valera
raised a mammoth £5 million in the
1920s following his escape from Lincoln
prison.
However, according to McElrath, the
influence of the 'special relationship
between Britain and the US has had a
much greater influence on American
policy in relation to political prisoners or
the overall political situation, than any
consideration for human rights or the
political situation in the North.
For this reason the US, no more than
Britain itself, can realistically claim to be
neutral in the conflict. The 'special
relationship' was evident during the
Thatcher/Reagan era with the narrowing
of the political offence exception in
extradition cases — generally seen as the
pay-back for Britain's support for the US
bombing of Libya.
McElrath also examines the conduct
and coverage of the US media, which
almost unfailingly regurgitates the
British line, and faithfully adheres to the
'hierarchy of deaths', used by their
British counterparts. McElrath's
arguments are powerful and
illuminating.
By examining the so-called nonintervention
policy of most US
administrations in relation to political
prisoners, she concludes that political
considerations, particularly relations
with Britain, have often been the
determining factor.
I can offer him two more. When the
Irish Football Association soccer team
takes the field its supporters refer to the
'national' side. In desperation some
people fall back on the 'region . Only a
colonial influence can cause this much
confusion among a largely homogenous
pet pie.
But it would be wrong to suggest that
this book, which covers five different
aspects of the scene, is either narrowly
focused or trivial.
Referring to the effect of UKcolonialism,
the author notes that, with
the imposition of Direct Rule in 1972,
the injection of British tax-payers'
money was stepped up and channelled
down to street level through traditional
state-friendly institutions and sponsored
selective groups within the communities.
Kevin Bean, a research student at
Liverpool University, among others, has
highlighted the aim: to pacify the
disaffected and attach them to the state.
One does not have to agree with the
author's 'take' on everything to derive
benefit from this interesting and largely
jargon-free book which will stimulate
both debate and controversy.

Page 10 Irish Democrat June/July 2000
Irish Democrat June/July 2000 Page 11
Reviews/culture
An unusual hybrid of criticism and journal
Frank Foley reviews A Raid into
Dark Corners and Other
Essays by Benedict Kiely: Cork
University Press. £14.95pbk
THIS IS an unusual hybrid of literary
criticism arid personal journal. The style
varies, being written over 40 years. The
essays embrace the work of writers like
"Father Prout", Frank O'Connor, Sean O
Faolain, and Brendan Behan, whose
work must have varied also under
puritanical tradition and censorship.
Kiely can place a writer's work in
perspective with historic detail and
poetic description of the landscape. His
essay on Seamus Heaney conveys the
visceral force of the best of Heaney's
work, with an interesting section on the
significance of eels, influenced by Volker
Schondorff's film of Gunter Grass's Die
Blechtmmmel (The Tin Drum).
'The reluctant novelist'. Canon
Sheehan. demonstrated a simple, ascetic,
(De Valerian), ideal for the Gaeil — "a
hardy race who lived on oatmeal, came
to mass on time and were content with
no money in their pockets," with an
"Irish youth" uncontaminated by the
"pernicious doctrines of materialistic
science".
The latter was a sentiment shared by
his contemporaries. Perhaps an idealist
tract like Plato's Republic or Thomas
Moore's Utopia, would have rewarded
him more than a novel, which he
regarded as, at best, frivolous and at
worst, profane.
Kiely suggests a mystical union of
the Gaeil and their ancestral lands. In 'A
Land Without Stars', he mourns the
demise of the Gaelic language and avers
that "the man who had once perfectly
Signs of the times
Sally Richardson reviews Symbols
in Northern Ireland edited by
Anthony D. Buckley. Institute of Irish
Studies. £8.50 pbk
THE CONTRIBUTORS to this volume
are for the most part anthropologists and
experts on popular culture and although
this is a book by academics under an
accademic imprint it is aimed at a wide
readership and is mercifully free of
jargon.
All political conflicts and struggles
throw up a variety of symbols, which
often have to be seen in a particular
context to become emotionally and
culturally charged. As Neil Jarman
points out in his essay on political
murals, the position of a mural (for
example, as a challenge to a British
V
ft*.
Psycho-ceilidh: que
est ce que e'est?
Anniversary parade
Chris Maguire selects some notable
days for June and July
June 1 John Mitchel, son of a
Presbyterian minister, Young Irelander
and founder of the United Irishman
newspaper, transported on board the
Scourge to Van Diemen's Land
(Tasmania), 1848.
June 3 Mayoman Michacl Gaughan,
IRA hunger striker, dies, 1974
June 4 Henry Grattan, Protestant
politician and supporter of Catholic
emancipation dies, 1820
June 8 Tom Paine, English radical and
military installation) is part of its power.
One way of interpreting a symbol is
to deny its political content, insisting that
it is 'normal' and value-free. This is
disingenuous, to say the least, as it
constitutes a political position in itself.
Dominic Bryan deals with a classic
instance of this in his piece on Orange
marches and their portrayal in the
Unionist and British media. 'A fun day
out — bring all the family' is the usual
message, often in a pull-out supplement,
with loyalist paramilitaries, drunkenness
and violence kept out of the picture.
Symbols used by one side can be
appropriated by another — Cuchullain,
long a republican figure, has been
pinched by loyalists.
Although republicans have
occasionally borrowed from loyalists
(the mural tradition was originally
IT'S A fair assumption that any
contemporary Irish band that describes
its music as 'psycho ceilidh' isn't going
to sound like Mary Black or the latterday
Finbar Furey.
That's certainly true of Londonbased
Neck, who recently embarked on a
short tour of the USA, which is where
the editor of this paper was fortunate
enough to run into them.
While there is no denying that the
band's considerable musical skills are
rooted in the folk tradition, their live
performances infuse it with boneshaking
doses of high-energy rock 'n'
roll and punk.
author of The Rights of Man, dies New
York, 1809
June 13 Michael Collins meets the
British politician Winston Churchill in
London, 1922
June 18 Thirteen apprentice boys of
Derry shut the city's gates against Lord
Antrim's 'Redshanks', Catholic troops
loyal to King James thus starting the
Siege of Derry, 1688
June 20 James Clarence Mangam, poet
and journalist, he wrote Dark Rosaleen
and for Gavan Duffy's Nation, dies of
malnutrition in Meath Hospital, Dublin.
1849; Wolfe Tone born, 1763
June 22 United Irishman, Kelly of
Killane, hanged for his part in the
A RAID INTO *
ANO
OTHER ESSAYS
expressed the spirit of any place, is
always alive in that place." In 'The Great
Gazebo' (surely a punning reference to F.
S\ m h n l v
IN NOH1 M{ UN IHt I AND
f q A
IT*
ST
I
loyalist/unionist) Mary Catherine
Kenney admits that: "By a creative
choice of the more successful metaphors.
The overall effect might be described
as akin to the Pogues in their wilder
moments, but far punkier — not
altogether surprising given that frontman
Leeson O'Keefe (vocals/banjo/guitar) is
a former member of Shane McGowan's
band The Popes.
For their first US visit, O'Keefe and
the rest of the band, Gavin Carroll (bass)
Marie McCormack (whistle), Barry
Hollywood (rhythm guitar), Roy Harris
(drums/bodhran) and Marion Gray
(fiddle), stormed their way through a
selection of souped-up traditional and
not-so-traditional songs and tunes.
For this reviewer, the pearl in the
band's twin set at Rocky Sullivan's bar,
Manhattan, was what must surely have
been the fastest and loudest version of
the The Fields of Athenry ever played on
earth.
Other gems included a number of the
band's own compositions such as Blood
on the Streets, about the deaths of Robert
Hamill and Rosemary Nelson, The Ferry
rebellion, 1798
June 25 Dr Bridget Rose Dugdale,
English heiress and Oxford graduate,
sentenced to nine years' imprisonment
for her part in a ! elicopter hijacking and
attack on the RUC station at Strabane,
1974
June 26 Charles Stewart Parnell, Irish
nationalist leader, marries Kitty O'Shea
in Brighton. England, 1891. He dies four
months later.
July 1 William of Orange's forces,
backed by Pope Innocent XI, defeat
James II's Jacobitc army at the Battle of
the Boyne, 1690; Oliver Plunkett,
Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of
Ireland, hung, drawn and quartered at
Scott Fitzgerald), a political
conservatism becomes apparent.
Ascendancy "dark corners" are not
exempt, including George Moore's
assertion that "Moore Hall might serve
as a token of my admiration for a
Protestantism that has given Ireland all
our great men and our Anglo-Irish
literature".
Consequently, the burning of Moore
Hall becomes a commentary on the
"twisted ways of Ireland". One of the
darkest is: "Irish manuscripts, histories
and traditions served only to nourish and
foster vacuity, idleness and habits
pernicious to industry."
Unfortunately, the absence of notes
and references, and piling literary
references on top of each other, may lead
to a loss of focus. They may add to the
impression that Kiely is acutely aware of
his own erudition.
slogans and symbolic motifs, nationalists
have come to dominate the political
discourse".
Repulicans lead; loyalists follow
rather lamely behind. Kenney gives
undue respect, however, to the potty
ideas of Ian Adamson — the concept of
Ulster protestants as the ancient Cruithin
does not stand up to scrutiny and is just
another attempt by loyalists to separate
themselves from the 'wild Irish'.
The only problem with looking at the
people of the six counties as material for
anthropological study is the tendency to
fall into the trap of regarding society in
the north as being divided between 'two
tribes' and to leave out the colonialist
framework (British occupation) that
causes the divisions, and neglect the
political ideology behind the symbols.
There is much of interest here,
though, and Linda May Ballard's essay
on motor-cycle dress was an unexpected
delight.
Fare, dedicated to another founder
member of The Popes, Mo O'Hagan,
who died recently, and Bobby Sands'
Back Home in Derry.
It's not often you'll find traditional
songs such as Spancilhill and The Foggy
Dew played with such energy or hear
The Irish Rover given the 'Star-
Spangled' (& la Jimi Hendrix) treatment.
There's even less chance that you'll
hear them played in the same set as the
Clash's ska tribute White Man at
Hammersmith Palais or the Undertones'
high-energy youth anthem Teenage
Kicks. While the more traditional music
lovers among you will no doubt be
thankful of this, for those who like to
walk a little more on the wild side check
them out, and as they say in the US,
enjoy.
Neck's EP, Psycho Ceil(dh is
available at gigs and through the band's
website at http://www.neckneck.freeserve.co.uk
David Granville
Tyburn, London, 1681
July 2 Rev. James Porter hanged for
satirising Lord Castlereagh in Samuel
Neilson's Northern Star, 1798
July 6 Clann na Poblachta founded by
S6an MacBride, 1946; Thomas More,
politician and writer, executed by Henry
VIII, 1535
July 9 Edmund Burke, politician, writer,
orator and critic of the French revolution,
dies, Beaconsfield, near London, 1797
July 10 Kevin O'Higgins, pro-treaty
politician who defended the execution of
27 republicans in 1922-23 and founded
the Garda Sfoch£na, shot dead by
unknown gunmen, 1927
July 15 Countess Constance
k w n - o m
Seamus 6
Cionnfhaola
Caoine an
mangaire
sugach
(Lament of the mangaire sugach)
ANDREW McGRATH, commonly
known as the 'mangaire sugach' or the
'jolly merchant', having been expelled
from the Catholic Church for his
licentious life, offered himself as a
convert to the doctrines of Protestantism.
However, the Protestant clergy also
refused to accept him, causing the
unfortunate mangaire to vent his feelings
in this lament.
A dhalta dhil an danaid leat mo chas
anois,
Im charta ag Eaglais gan fath ar bith,
An aicme seo ni ghlachfaidh me ach im
fhanaire
's ni ghabhaid liom im Protestant na im
Papaire!
Deir pearsa acu gur cearuch neamh
ghnSthach me,
C6 go n-admhaim gur sasanach Ai
15thair me,
Deir a n-uair scaram leis gur ag aifreann
is gnath me,
Is nach ceachtair sin m£, Protestant na
Papaire.
Dearbhim gan dearmad nach folair leis
me.
Do ceartha anois le h-eachtana do lathair
cirt,
Go racha liom chun achrainn, gan spas ar
bith.
's go gcaithfea^a bheith im Protestant
n6 im Pipaire.
An sagart deir gur fSnaire neamhadhmarach
me,
's go dtaraingin le mangaireacht na mnd
chun oilc,
Gur measa me na fgaire ata le broid,
's nach gabhaid liom an Protestant na im
P&paire.
Focloir
(vocabulary, notes and translations)
Caoine an mangaire sugach:
A dhalta dhil (beloved); an danaid leat
(do you pity); mo chas (my case); Im
charta ag eaglais gan f£th ar bith
(pursued by priest and minister in dire
disgrace); An aicme seo ni ghlachfaidh
me ach im fhanaire (the churchmen
brand the vagabond upon my brow); 's ni
ghabhaid liom im Protestant nd im
Pdpaire (they'll not take me being
Protestant or Papist ); Deir pearsa acu
gur cearuch neamh ghnathach m6, Ce go
n-admhaim gur sasanach d£ lathair me
(the parson calls me wanderer and
homeless knave, and though I boast the
Saxon creed with aspect grave); Deir a n-
uair scaram leis gur ag aifreann (my
Popish face must allow); Is nach
ceachtair sin me (although I am neither).
Markiewicz, republican, radical and the
first woman to be elected to the
Westminster parliament (she didn't take
her seat), dies 1927
July 16 Ireland's first holiday camp
Butlins, opens at Mosney, 1948
July 17 Henry Joy McCracken, United
Irish leader, hanged at Belfast markethouse,
1798
July 29 William Smith O'Brien, former
conservative politician turned Young
Irelander, leads an unsuccessful rising of
peasants against police at Ballingarry,
Co. Tipperaiy, 1848
July 30 Eugene O'Cuny, scholar and
influence on the Gaelic-language revival,
dies, Dublin, 1862
James Connolly
the Irish Rebel
This superb song appears in the book The Easter
Rising in Song and Ballad by Desmond Greaves. The
name of the songwriter is not given.
A great crowd had gathered outside of Kilmainham,
With their heads uncovered they knelt on the ground,
For inside that prison lay a brave Irish soldier,
His life for his country about to lay down.
He went to his death like a true son of Ireland,
The firing party he bravely did face,
Then the order rang out: "Present Arms, Fire,'
James Connolly fell into a ready-made grave.
The black flag they hoisted, the cruel deed was over,
Gone was the man who loved Ireland so well,
There was many a sad heart in Dublin that morning,
When they murdered James Connolly, the Irish Rebel.
God's curse on you, England, you cruel hearted
monster;
Your deeds, they would shame all the devils in Hell.
There are no flowers blooming but the Shamrock is
growing,
On the grave of James Connolly, the Irish Rebel.
The Four Courts in Dublin the English bombarded,
The spirits of freedom they tried to quell,
For above all the din rose the cry 'No Surrender',
'Twas the voice of James Connolly, the Irish Rebel
The Old Man's Lament
In an impoverished land, where pretty girls were so
often given in marriage to rich old men, the ancient
independence of women still asserted itself. This was
the explanation of this song given to collector Alan
Lomax
The other evening I chanced to go roaming,
Down by the clear river I jogged along
I met an old man making sad lamentation
About rocking the cradle and the child not his own
Chorum
Ee-i-o, my laddie, lie easy,
Perhaps your own Daddy might never be known.
I'm weeping and weary with rocking the cradle,
And nursing a baby that's none of my own.
I'm sorry, my neighbours, I married this fair one,
She favours the neighbours and none of her own,
She goes out every evening to balls and to parties,
And leaves me here rocking the cradle alone.
Gerard Curran's songs page
Chorus
Come all you young fellows men that want to get
married'
Take my advice, leave the women alone;
For it's by the Lord Harry, if ever you marry,
They'll leave you there rocking the cradle along.
The Holy Ground
This brings back memories of the great sing-songs in
the farmhouse of my sister and brother-in-law, Nora
and Mick, who will be remembered by some as the Irish
Times agriculture correspondent, and for his livestock
reports on RTE. Mick used to sing this song with great
gusto and we all joined in.
Adieu my fair young maiden, a thousand times adieu.
We must bid farewell to the Holy Ground and
the girls that we love true.
We shall sail the salt sea over, and return again for sure,
To seek the girls who wait for us in the Holy
Ground once more.
chorus
FINE GIRL YOU ARE
You're the girl that I adore
And still I live in hopes to see
The Holy Ground once more
FINE GIRL YOU ARE
Oh the night was dark and stormy, you scarce
could see the moon,
And our good old ship was tossed about, and her
her rigging was all torn:
With her seams agape and leaky, with her timbers
dozed and old,
And still I live in hopes to see the Holy Ground once
more
Chorus
Join the Connolly Association
in its campaign for unity and peace In Ireland
Membership £10 per year; £12 (joint), £6 (joint
unwaged); £5 students, unemployed and
pensioners. Membership includes a subscription
to the Irish Democrat.
For further details or a membership form contact: The Connolly
Association, 244 Gray's Inn Road, London WC1X 8JR
Four Provinces
Irish bookshop
244 Gray's Inn Road, London
WC1X 8JR
tel: 020 7833 3022
For a wide selection of Irish-interest books, history,
politics, culture, greetings cards, mugs, badges, Irish
language materials, music tape and, CDs
Open 11am-4pm, Tuesday to Saturday
Mail order and catalogue available on request
Murty Hynes
Members of the Land League showed great patience
and understanding of Murty's 'misdemeanour' and did
not make a pariah of him after he 'd admitted his error
and gave up the farm of an evicted tenant.
Come all true sons of Erin, I hope you will draw near,
A new and true narration I mean to let you hear.
T'is for your information I pen these simple lines
Consaming of the Land League, likewise of Murty
Hynes.
For when upon the roadside poor Bermigham was sent,
Because with all his striving he could not pay the rent,
And keep ould Lord Dunsandle in horses, dogs and
The monthly
newspaper of the
Labour
left
wines,
Who comes and takes the holdin' but foolish Muity Hynes.
But when the noble Lard League got word of this
disgrace,
They sent a man to Murty to raison out the case;
"I own my crime," says Murty. "but I'll wash out the
stain—,
I'll keep that farm no longer; I'll give it up again."
And then he wrote a letter and sent it to the League,
Saying, "From the cause of Ireland I never will renege,
And never more, I promise, while Heaven above shines,
Will I for land go grabbin'," says honest Murty Hynes.
Och, when the people heard it, they gathered in a crowd,
The boys brought their banners, and bate their drums
aloud.
And there was songs and speeches, and dancin light
and gay,
Around the flaming bonfires that night in old Lougrea.
Now all true sons of Erin, wherever you may be.
Come join in celebratin' this glorious victoree.
And by Colombia's rivers, and 'midst Canadian pines,
Give three cheers for the Land League and NINE for
Murty Hynes.
The Freedom Come-all-Ye
Here's a great lowland Scottish song by Hamish
Henderson. It speaks for itself— although it probably
helps if you are familiar with Lallans.
Roch the wind in the clear day's dawnin',
Blaws the cloods heelster gowdy in the bay.
But there's mair nor a roch wind blowin'
Through the great glen o' the world the day
It's a thocht that will gar oor rottens,
A' they rogues that gang gallus fresh and gay,
Tak' the road an' seek ither loanins,
For their ill ploys tae sport and play
Nae mair will the bonnie callants
Mairch tae war when oor Braggarts crousley craw.
Nor wee wains frae pit-heid an' clachan
Mourn the ships sailin' doon the Broomielaw
Broken families in lands we've herriet
Will curse Scotland the brave nae mair, nae mair;
Black an' white, ane til ither maniet
Mak' the vile barracks o' thyeir maistares bare.
O come all ye at hame wi' freedom,
Never heed whit the hoodies craok for doom;
In your hoose a' the bairns o' Adam
Can find breid, barley bree an' painted room.
When Maclean meets wi's freens in Springburn
A' the roses an' geans will turn tae bloom,
And a black boy frae yont Nyanga
Dings the fell gallows o' the burghers doon
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Sources said...
PETER MULLIGAN'S regular
trawl through the pages of
the British press
Bloody Sunday — "Christopher
Clarke QC, counsel for the inquiry, said
that members might gain some insight
into the minds of the soldiers involved
from the evidence of a 'display of
triumphalism'." — "We'll get you Paddy
Bastards tomorrow" — "Paras 13 —
Paddies 0" "Ha, ha, ha. Hee, he, he.
We've got 13 more than you — 1 Para"
(soldiers graffiti, Derry city. The Times)
The unionists — "Although their
principal demand is for
decommissioning, most of them do not
want an inclusive process with Sinn Fdin
in government. Many of them at heart
simply do not want Catholics in
government: that's not to say they don't
want peace; but they don't want this
peace process." (David McKittrick, The
Independent)
Orange marches — "That (the
troubles) effects foreign investment in
Northern Ireland. It certainly effects
tourism. And soon we will be in the
marching season again, so all the usual
negative stories will dominate CNN and
the other media." (John Stringer, Belfast
Chamber of Commerce, quoted in The
Times)
Peace conditions — "The
cumulative effect of these three grim
developments is to leave the progressive,
creative wing of Ulster Unionism
hopelessly hemmed in. ...there is not
now one Unionist veto but two. The
UUP is saying 'No guns, no
government' but also 'No RUC, no
government'. Mr. Trimble may have
been able to finesse one of those issues,
somehow wiggling through a
compromise that kept everyone on side,
but not two." (The Guardian)
Collusion — "I think it is important to
make it clear that this collusion between
Loyalists paramilitaries such as Robin
Jackson and my RUC colleagues and me
was taking place with the full knowledge
of my superiors." (Statement by former
RUC officer John Weir, 3 February 1999)
Stressed out — "Thousands of
RUC officers have been looking for
counselling and careers advice since
widespread police reforms were
announced. The Police Rehabilitation
and Retraining Trust, set up to counsel
RUC officers has been inundated with
calls. About 80 per cent of the officers
seen by psychologist Dr. Michael
Patterson are suffering from posttraumatic
stress disorder, or are showing
some of the symptoms. There is a fourweek
waiting list for clinical psychology
sessions at the centre. (BBC News
Online)
RUC pensions — "Chris Patten, the
former Governor of Hong Kong,
estimated that 'exit costs' for the RUC
would amount to £475 million in the first
three years of reform, reaching a total of
£995 million after ten years." (The Times)
LAST WORD
"We most eSimestly desire to help in
bringing about a lasting peace between
the peoples of these two islands, but see
no avenue by which it can be achieved if
you deny Ireland's essential unity and set
aside the principle of national selfdetermination."
Eamon de Valera replying to an
invitation from Lloyd George to
begin negotiations. 28 June 1921

Anonn Is Anall: The Peter Berresford Ellis Column
Imsh temocMC
How penal
were the
penal laws?
Exodus was one Irish response to the oppression of the penal laws
Peter Berresford Ellis reminds us that the introduction of the series of
penal restrictions which followed the 1691 Treaty of Limerick had an
equally devastating impact on the lives of Ireland's Catholic and
dissenting Protestant population
WHEN IT comes to Dr Samuel
Johnson (1709-1784) and the
Irish, he is generally
remembered for the quip
attributed to him by his
biographer James Boswell:
"The Irish are a fair people; they never speak well of
one another". However, a more significant
statement of Johnson's attitude was his declaration
that the Penal Laws in Ireland were "more grievous
than all the Ten Pagan persecutions of the
Christians".
I was reminded of this remark when I came
across a little neo-colonialist tract How Penal Were
the Penal Ixiws'.' which tried to make out that they
were not bad.
We have all heard about the Penal Laws which
made Irish Catholics 'non citizens'; and, I hope, that
it is finally sunk into the national psyche that same
Penal Laws and restrictions applied to all dissenting
Protestants. Only the members of the Established
Church of England were allowed civil rights in
Ireland after the victory' of William of Orange.
The Treaty of Limerick, October 3, 1691, which
ended William of Orange's conquest in Ireland,
contained some liberal terms more or less
underwriting the laws enacted by James H's Dublin
parliament which guaranteed religious freedom for
all denominations.
William himself appeared to care little or
nothing of religion and was personally a liberal
man. Matthew O'Conor (1773-1844), the historian
and lawyer, in his study Irish Catholics from the
Settlement in 1691 (1813) has stated:
"In matters of religion. King William was
liberal, enlightened and philosophic. Equally a
friend to the religious as to civil liberty, he granted
toleration to dissenters of all descriptions, regardless
of their speculative opinions. In the early part of his
reign, the Irish Catholics enjoyed the full and free
exercise of their religion. They were protected in
their persons and properties; their industry was
encouraged; and under his mild and fostering
administration, the desolation of the late war began
to disappear, and prosperity, peace and confidence
to smile once more on the country."
Perhaps this is a rather rose-coloured view as we
are talking of a period of a few months following the
agreement at Limerick.
In 16'J2 the new Lord Lieutenant Henry,
Viscount Sidney, convened the first Irish parliament
of William's reign. At that time there were no
disqualifying acts against Catholics and Dissenters
and so Catholic and dissenting Commoners and
Peers made their way to Dublin to take their seats in
the parliament. However, in 1691 the English
parliament had ordered that the Oath of Supremacy
Not until 1829 were
Catholics again allowed
to sit in parliament
without taking the Oath
of Supremacy
must be taken — that before anyone could take
office they had to acknowledge that the king of
England was head of the Church. No Catholic could
take such an oath and so the Catholic Peers and
Commons were not allowed to take their seats in the
1692 Parliament.
It would not be until 1829 that Catholics were
again allowed to sit in parliament without taking the
Oath of Supremacy. Although there had been a
relaxation of the Penal Laws prior to this, still in
1828, it was shown that out of 2,062 government
offices in Ireland, 2,023 were filled by Protestants.
The 1692 Dublin parliament began to enact the
laws to deny rights to all other religious
denominations and there was no opposition to curb
their excesses.
It has been argued by apologists for William that
he was personally appalled by the legislation and
that he only gave royal assent because he knew
which side his bread was buttered. While this may
be debatable. Viscount Sidney, the Lord Lieutenant,
certainly was agitated by the legislation. His
criticism made him unpopular among the colonials.
He was soon recalled.
The event that was of significance for Ireland
actually happened on the continent. In 1695, the
defeat of the French at Namur brought a close to the
War of Grand Alliance leading to the Treaty of
Ryswick. With William everywhere victorious, his
Irish parliament, summoned that year by his new
Lord Lieutenant, Capel, was confident to push
ahead with even more draconian legislation. Indeed,
Lord Capel. in opening the parliament, announced
that William was now intent on the settlement of
Ireland "upon a Protestant interest".
The first Act of the new series was 'An Act for
the better securing the government by disarming the
Papists' . All Catholics were to 'decommission' their
weapons by a certain date. After that arbitrary
searches would be made. If arms were found there
were various punishments — fines, imprisonment,
the pillory and public floggings.
That meant that no Catholic could even go
hunting for the occasional rabbit for the pot — the
start of the remarkable change of the staple diet of
the poor to a reliance on tubers, a crop that could be
grown on any small patch and which was essentially
hidden from voracious conquerors. It also meant
that in areas where armed Protestant militias were,
Catholics were totally defenceless. Woe to them if
they were known to have money or coveted
valuables or even an attractive wife or daughter. The
search for arms was a perfect excuse for the
excesses of the rapacious 'conquerors'.
Catholics were prohibited education. They were
already debarred from being tutors or teachers and
now could not even receive education. Many Irish
Catholics were being sent to Europe for education in
schools and universities so the parliament swiftly
enacted "that if any subjects of Ireland should, after
that session, go, or send any child or person to be
educated in any popish universities, college, or
school or etc etc." they would "forfeit all their
estates, both real and personal, during their lives".
EVEN AFTER the Williamite
confiscations, Catholics still owned 14
per cent of Irish land. So between 1704
and 1709 more Acts were passed which
stopped Catholics from purchasing
land, or taking leases for longer than 31
years, and which debilitated existing landowners.
By 1778 only 5 per cent of land was left in Catholic
hands.
So extreme and petty were the laws that in 1695
it was enacted that "no Papist shall be capable to
have, or keep in his possession, or in the possession
of any other, to his use or at his disposition, any
horse, gelding, or mare, of the value £5 or more". To
this was added the usual clause to induce Protestants
to inform on Catholics or make their own searches
for such animals. The reward was the value of the
animal itself.
From May 1, 1698, all Catholics priests,
including archbishops, bishops, monks, friars and
other religious were ordered out of Ireland. "If any
of them remain after that day, or return, the
delinquents are to be transported, and if they return
again, to be guilty of high treason and to suffer
accordingly." That meant execution.
Catholics were not allowed to print and sell
newspapers or books.
Another Act imposed a fine of two shillings or a
flogging in default of payment on 'every common
labourer, being hired, or other servant retained' who
refused to work for whatever wages a Protestant
offered them even on feast days unless appointed by
the state.
Another Act prevented Protestant and Catholics
from intermarrying. In 1697 the Irish Parliament
even enacted that an Anglican who married a
Catholic was immediately debarred from voting or
sitting in either House of Parliament. A Protestant
heiress marrying a Catholic lost her inheritance.
Catholics were now prevented not only from
holding government offices but from entering the
legal and medical professions, from holding
commissions in the army and navy, custom and
exercise and municipal service.
Over the next thirty years these laws kept being
added to in order to cover any loopholes which
emerged that were not covered in previous
legislation. In 1727 yet another Act provided that
"no Catholic shall be entitled or admitted to vote at
the election of any member to serve in Parliament,
or at the election of any magistrate for any city, or
other town,".
With the accession of Anne to the throne in
1702, came a series of laws "to prevent the further
growth of Popery". If the son of a Catholic
converted to the established Church he could take
over ownership of his father's property and throw
him out, or indeed, if any Protestant, convert or
otherwise, found he had an interest in any Catholic
estate he could claim it. To this Bill was added the
first major legislation against dissenting Protestants,
mainly concentrated in Ulster.
On March 4, 1704, the royal assent was given to
the Bill. By this Act the Penal Laws in their
expressed intent could be considered almost
complete. Dissenting Protestants, the mainly
Presbyterians of the north, were as much 'noncitizens'
as Catholics.
A Presbyterian minister was liable to three
months jail for delivering a sermon and fined £100
if caught celebrating the Lord's Supper. If couples
were discovered to have been married by a
Presbyterian minister, they were dragged into a
Church of England and accused of the crime of
fornication. Such marriages, even among
Presbyterians, were declared illegal.
By 1704, nine tenths of
the Irish were
effectually reduced to a
slave population under
control of the colonial
masters
The Act of 1704 excluded all Presbyterians from
holding office in the law, army, navy, customs and
excise or in municipal employment. In 1715 a
further Act made it an offence for Presbyterian
ministers to teach children and this was punishable
with three months in prison. Intermarriage between
dissenting Protestants and Anglicans was declared
illegal and even as late as 1772 Presbyterians were
punished for holding religious gatherings.
This was, ironically, the 'religious freedom'
which the Orange Order now so enthusiastically
celebrates.
By 1704, nine tenths of the Irish were effectually
reduced to a slave population under complete
control of the colonial masters. To be an Irish
Catholic or a dissenting Protestant was to be almost
a chattel. They could not have been brought to a
lower level except by being bought and sold at the
whim of their rulers as they have been in the
previous century. Travellers in Ireland in the mid to
late 18th century described the Irish peasantry
suffering a worse state of feudal rule than their
French cousins under the 'ancien regime' of the
autocratic Bourbons.
It may seem curious to turn to Edmund Burke
(1729-1797) for a final comment on the Penal Laws.
Curious for Burke, who became a Privy Councillor,
was the great intellectual opponent of revolution,
whose conservative Reflections on the Revolution in
France provoked Thomas Paine's magnificent
response, The Rights of Man.
Burke's Irish tracts are not well known. In his
letter To A Peer of Ireland on the Penal Laws (1782)
he compared the Penal Laws in Ireland with Louis
XIV's recall of the Edict of Nantes, which had
secured the toleration of Protestantism in France.
This was highly progressive for the Protestants of
England had been outraged and vociferous in
denouncing the debilities of the Protestants in
France brought about by this recall. Burke pointed
out that the Penal Laws were far more horrific than
the revoking of the Edit!.
Burke said the restrictions on Protestants in
France were far less than the suffering of Catholics
and dissenters in Ireland. They were not even
suffering half of what the Irish were suffering; not
even one twentieth! "... and then the penalties and
incapacities which grew from that revocation are not
so grievous in their nature nor so certain in their
execution, nor so ruinous by a great deal to the civil
prosperity of the State, as those which were
established for a perpetual law in our unhappy
country".