Irish Democrat August - September 1994

I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I • I I II I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I • I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I II I 

p3 p4 p6 

Towards Peace in Ireland labour World exclusive: Maud Gonne's letters - reviewed 

movement conference. previouly unpublished letters by Liz Curtis 

from Sean O'Casey ^—^ 

August/September 1994 • Price 40p Connolly Association: campaigning for a united and Independent Ireland 

is 25 

It is a quarter of a century 

since Britain first 

sent in troops to Belfast 

as an emergency 

measure to protect 

the people in the Catholic 

/ Nationalist areas from 

attack from the forces of 

the ruling power. 

The statelet had 

plunged into crisis as 

soon as the demand for 

equality for Catholics 

had emerged, for the 

very existence of the state 

was based on 

"supremecy" of the- 

Protestant/Unionists. 

Northern Ireland's 

failure as a workable 

state was at last manifest 

after nearly 50 years of 

existence. 

Who would have 

thought, then, as Stormont 

headed for 

collapse, that 25 years 

later, the crisis would still 

be festering, unresolved, 

the underlying problems 

left untackled? 

The distinct impression 

most observers of 

British policy have, is that 

Westminster would happily 

1/et the crisis continue 

in Northern Ireland for 

another 25 years, if they 

could get away with it. 

The initiative f

HEADLINES 

HEADLINES 

C O M M E N T 

What about 

the Ulster 

Protestants? 

Sean O' Casey on page 4 of this issue 

writes of the IRA border campaign in 

the 50s: "It is a rotten policy, and keeps 

the Ulster Protestant hard-hearted, and 

sends him deeper into his den." 

His words 36 years later have a horrible ring 

of truth. The Ulster Protestants, ( very many of 

them) have become harder and more ruthless 

after 22 years of direct rule from Britain, (no 

democracy) and 25 years of Republican/British 

warfare. The British all the while have used 

them to avoid any real attempt at solving the 

problem. And the Tories have continued to cynically 

use the Loyalist MPs to bolster up their 

own position. 

Now, with the Downing Street Declaration, 

the mat is beginning to be pulled from under 

the Loyalist feet. This is already too much for 

some. Although the unionist majority still has a 

veto on any progress, a politically united 

Ireland is now on the cards. 

Conservative MP Nicholas Budgen, writing 

in the Guardian (July 28), is on to the "disastrous 

drift in policy on Northern Ireland," but 

argues that the British should: "just say that we 

want the union to survive and that we shall 

govern Ulster in a manner designed to achieve 

that end." Which means no more discussions 

with the Dublin government or Sinn Fein, no 

more peace process. If s a logical position: either 

you go forward, or go back. But Mr Budgen is 

using the rise of Loyalist violence as the stick to 

argue a backwards direction. 

The alternative position is to go forward and 

make the demilitarisation of the situation an urgent 

priority. 

Not all Unionists want to go back to the old 

regime; some are trying to visualise some new, 

tolerant Northern Ireland. Ulster Unionist Party 

councillor in West Belfast, Chris McGimpsey, 

speaking at the Towards Peace in Ireland conference 

in London said: "What we want is a continuance 

of a thoroughgoing programme of 

reform upon which we can build a truly liberal 

and pluralistic society." He should be encouraged 

to get that message through on the 

Shankill. 

Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams has appealed 

to Unionist leaders to prepare their 

people for change. Chris McGimpsey said the 

UK was better place to live than the Republic of 

Ireland because of its cultural diversity. 

But Ireland is already a culturally diverse 

country. So why shouldn't we fight to make it 

more so, and break down intolerance in the 

south, for example, in some circles, of the Northern 

nationalists? 

Let the last word go to Sean O' Casey, writing 

in the same letter quoted above: 

"Long ago I suggested that the Irish government 

should invite the Orangemen to hold a 

Twelfth Parade in Dublin to show that the Orangeman 

was reckoned as Irish as anyone else." 

HB 

lnishOemocM 

NEWSPAPER OF THE CONNOLLY ASSOCIATION 

Founded 1939 Vol 49, no 6 

EDITORIAL BOARD: Helen Bennett (editor), Gerard 

Curran, Conor Foley, Jonathan Hardy, Martin Moriarty, 

Peter Mulligan 

TYPESET AND DESIGNED: Connolly Publications 

PUBLISHED BY: Connolly Publications Ltd, 244-246 

Gray's Inn Road, London WC1X 8JR Tel: 071-633 3022 

PRINTED BY: Ripley Printer* (TU) Ltd, Nottingham 

Road, Ripley, Derbyshire. Tel: 6773-731641 

1939-1980 and 1981-90 now available or^microfilm 

Breaking down barriers 

ACTIVITY 

London reporter 

The Labour movement 

conference Towards 

Peace in Ireland in July 

was remarkable for bringing 

together speakers from all 

sides: SDLP leader John 

Hume, Labour spokesperson 

on Northern Ireland, Kevin 

McNamara, Sinn Fein councillor 

in Derry and Six Counties 

chairman, Mitchel Mc- 

Laughlin and Ulster Unionist 

Party councillor in West Belfast, 

Chris McGimpsey. 

John Hume spoke about 

breaking down barriers. 

"As the walls fall all over 

Europe, it has been necessry to 

build 13 walls in the city of 

Belfast to separate and protect 

one section of the people from 

another. And those walls are 

an indictment of everybody involved 

in what has become the 

Irish problem. 

"The challenge is: are we all 

prepared to re-examine in 

depth out past attitudes with 

the dream of bringing down 

those walls." 

He compared the Unionist 

mind-set to the Afrikaner 

mind-set, "which says that the 

only way to protect themselves 

is to hold all the power in 

their own hands and exclude 

everyone who's not one of 

them... 

"What is required of the 

unionist people today is that 

they might take some example 

from the white South Africans 

and have the confidence to 

stand on their own feet.." 

And small conciliatory 

noises could be heard. 

Unionist Chris McGimpsey 

did admit that "the demand 

for civil rights was a wholly 

legitimate reaction to an administration 

which had become 

out of touch." But he did 

go on to say that "the peaceful 

aims of reform were usurped 

by those wielding a gun." 

Mitchel McLoughlin paid 

British Prime Minister John 

Major a compliment, saying: "I 

do recognise that John Major, 

despite his very pressing 

political problems, has 

devoted an unprecedented 

amount of his energy and attention 

to the challenge of ending 

the conflict in Ireland. 

"I also feel it is correct to 

acknowledge that under his 

premiership the British 

government position has 

shifted." 

Other speakers included 

Clive Soley MP, former Northern 

Ireland spokesperson, 

Northern Ireland Select Committee, 

Dr Brendan O'Leary of 

From Civil Rights to Human Rights 

DISCUSSION 

Jonathan Hardy 

Addressing the conflict 

in Ireland through the 

language of human 

rights has increased considerably 

in the last few years. 

There are now several organisations 

including the 

Britain and Ireland Human 

Rights Project and Britain 

and Ireland Rights Watch, 

set up specifically to 

moniter and challenge 

abuses. At the Towards 

Peace in Ireland conference, 

the value of a human rights 

approach was discussed by 

Michael Fairell of the Irish 

Council for Civil Liberties 

adn John Wadham, legal 

director of Liberty. 

Sixth Desmond Greaves 

Weekend Summer School 

Irish Labour History Museum, Beggars Bush, Dublin 

Friday August 26 

Dr Luke Gibbons • Refiguring National Identity: 

How culture becomes politics in Ireland 

Chair: Professor Brendan Bradshaw, Cambridge 

University 

Saturday August 27 

Kieran Crilly - Raymond Crotty, economist and 

economic historian: an assessment 

Chair: Anthony Coughlan, Trinity College Dublin 

Sunday August 28 

Dr Alt O'Brien - Nascent Capitalism, English 

Colonialism and the Conquest of Ireland 

Chair: Mary Cullen, Maynooth College 

Jack Bennett - Northern Ireland: two communities, 

identities, religions, nations or what? 

Catriona Ruane - Northern Ireland: perspectives of 

a human rightsand Third World activist 

Chair: Noirin Green, SIPTU 

£12 full school, £3 individual sessions. Social and 

garden party included, Bookings to • 

Cathal MacUam, Summer School Director 

24 Belgrave Rd, 

Dublin 6 (tel: 4973154) 

IRISH DEMOCRAT A u g u s t / S e p t e m b e r 1 9 94 page 2 

Michael Farrell spoke of 

the climate of opinion 

which percolated out of the 

conflict in the North in the 

70s and 80s, within which 

simply to raise civil liberties 

issues risked one being 

branded as a "provo sympathiser" 

or "fellow 

traveller." During this 

period the Irish government 

introduced a series of 

repressive measures including, 

most famously, the 

Section 31 media ban. Opposition 

became emasculated 

and the record of the 

Irish Labour party in challenging 

attacks on civil 

liberties was, he argued, 

"appalling." 

However, the situation 

is now changing. Greater 

use has been made of International 

Human Rights 

standards as a means of 

challenging abuses by the 

state and its emanations. 

There has also been increasing 

interest shown by international 

human rights 

organisations in the situation 

in Northern Ireland, 

adding further pressure on 

the two governments. 

Farrell argued that a 

Attention all members: 

The ConnoHyAssociation 

Annual General Meeting 

will be held in early 

October 

Members will be 

notified of date and 

venue within the next 

month. Contact EC 

members for further 

information. 

Special 

appeal 

the Departmentt of Government, 

London School of 

Economics, Dr Anthony 

Coughlin, lecturer in Social 

Policy in Trinity College, 

Dublin, Siohan Crozier of the 

Labour Party Irish Society and 

Ken Livingstone MP. 

There were four lively 

seminars which examined 

various aspects of campaigning 

in Britian and in Ireland 

In "The one-island 

economy" lead by Bob Rowthorne, 

co-author of Northern 

Ireland: Political Economy of 

Conflict" and Inez Mc- 

Cormack Northern Ireland 

Regional Secretary of 

UNISON, how to level out 

standards of living North and 

South was discussed. The 

emerging unity of business interests 

was examined. A 

report on the seminar on 

human rights is carried below. 

human rights approach 

could have a major role to 

play as part of the peace 

process by contributing to 

the development of a 

climate of trust and 

measures of protection for 

both communities in the 

North. The success of the 

peace process will depend, 

he argued, on rolling back 

repressive and discriminatory 

practices currently 

sanctioned under the 

law so as to instill genuine 

and widespread confidence 

in the ability of the system 

of justice to deliver. 

This could play a major 

part in rebuilding trust and 

continued on opposite page 

1994 Desmond 

Greaves Memorial 

Lecture 

Liverpool branch 

of the- 

Connolly Association 

Women in Irish 

History 

by Liz Curtis 

Author and Lecturer 

on Saturday 

September 17 

at 1.30 pm 

At Merseyside Trade 

Union Centre, 

Hardman Street, 

Liverpool 

We are very grateful to all those who responded to our 

special appeal for the Irish Democrat as well as our regular 

contributors. 

Special appeal: J Bird (NZ) £10, S O'Cearnaigh £15, C 

Knight £5.00, D Fletcher £5, R Deacon £10, PW Ludkin £5, 

Dovle £10, Anon £20, D Deighan £100, J McElhinny £10, J 

Gaster £50, BJ Murphy £10, C Will £20 P Quin £10, R Bowen 

(Italy) £36.88, A O'Keefe £5, M Bond £12.50, R Smith £5.00 

Total: £384.38 

General donations: Y Boydell £3, Sheffield CA £25, T 

Donaghy £10, Sfek Healy £3, F Jennings £15, F»o Coulton £10, 

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International Friendship League £20, Bankers Orders 

£331.90. 

Total: £598.74 

\ 

BBC exposed in the US 

CENSORSHIP 

James Mullin USA 

The US Human Rights 

Watch / Free Expression 

Project has 

severely criticised the US 

distributor of BBC World 

Service because of British 

media cesorship. 

The president of the 

Human Rights Watch, 

Gara LaMarche sent a 

scathing letter to American 

Public Radio earlier this 

year. The letter to APR's 

president, Stephen L 

Salyer, made an irrefutable 

case that the BBC is subject 

to the broadcast ban which 

amounts to "institutionaliised 

state censorship" 

and that it was an 

inappropriate news source 

for a publicly funded entity 

such as APR." 

The letter urges APR to 

use alternate news sources 

until the ban is lifted, or, 

"at a minimum, to precede 

BBC reports with disclaimers 

that explain to listeners 

the nature of the 

broadcasting ban and its effects 

on BBC productions." 

Human Rights Watch 

points out that the broadcast 

ban forbids direct 

broadcast of words by any 

person that support or 

solicit support for 

proscribed organisations, 

and prohibits the broadcast 

of any statement by a person 

"who represents or 

purports to represent" one 

of these organisations. 

"This type of politicallydefined 

censorship is a 

dangerous intrusion by the 

state into the realm of free 

expression. In this case, it 

severely restricts efforts to 

provide equitable and 

complete coverage of the 

events in Northern 

Ireland." 

APR receives funding 

from the Corporation for 

Public Broadcasting (CPB) 

which was formed by the 

Public Broadcasting Act of 

1967. According to the Act, 

Britain holds the key 

ACTIVITY 

Glasgow reporter 

The Glasgow branch of 

the Connolly Association 

held a public 

meeting on Saturday June 

25th in the City Halls 

where the speaker was the 

former Belfast correspondent 

of the Irish Democrat, 

Jack Bennett. 

The theme of the meeting 

was "How to bring 

peace to Ireland", and Jack, 

a Northern Protestant currently 

living in Dublin was 

warmly received by a 

small, but appreciative 

audience. 

Prospects for peace in 

Ireland have never been 

better during the last 25 

Human Rights 

for a recourse to armed 

struggle. 

A human rights approach 

can, Farrell said, play an important 

role in addressing 

the fears of Northern Irish 

Protestants under future 

constitutional arrangements 

involving the Dublin 

government. 

Both speakers highlighted 

the way in which "emergency" 

legislation has seeped 

into general law. John- 

Wadham of Liberty spoke 

about the impact of legislation 

introduced into Northern 

Ireland on people in 

Britain such as the PTA. 

Much contemporary legislation 

has now become effectively 

permanent. In 

particular, the PTA covers 

international terrorism as 

well as that associated with 

years, said Jack. Much of 

the credit for this had to go 

to the Irish peace initiative 

promoted by John Hume 

and Gerry Adams This has 

helped to chfinge the political 

agenda and put the 

whole question of Irish 

self-determination centrestage. 

However a great 

deal of serious work still 

has to be done both in 

Ireland and in Britain if a 

just and lasting peace is to 

be acheived. 

Since the responsibility 

for the Anglo-Irish conflict 

lay with successive British 

governments, it should be 

obvious to all fair minded 

people that the present 

British government led by 

John Major has a responsibility 

to create the necessary 

conditions for peace to 

become a realisable goal. 

Northern Ireland, and, so, 

he argued that it would be 

extremely difficult politically 

to remove PTA law 

from the statute books in 

the UK. 

HP spoke of the many inst 

inces of miscarriages of 

justice and strongly 

criticised the May inquiry 

into the Guildford Four. 

This, he said, had been no 

more than a whitewash of 

the system, falling back on 

the "rotten apple" theory of 

errant, individuals as a 

means of evading responsibility 

for fundamental 

i ailures in the criminal justice 

system which required 

urgent reform. May's approach 

was wrong in fact 

and wrong in principle. 

After this lengthy process, 

no individuals within the 

CPB must "carry out its 

purposes and functions...in 

ways that will most effectively 

assure the maximum 

freedom of the public 

telecommunications entities 

and systems from interference 

with, or control 

of, program content..." 

The Act specifically 

does not authorise control 

by any US government official 

over the content of 

public telecommunications. 

According the CPB 

itself, it is required by the 

Act to "strive for objectivity 

and balance in the 

controversial programmes 

that it funds." 

In addition, Congress 

has made it clear that "CPB 

is to emphasise maximum 

protectionfrom interference in 

programme content to allow 

the greatest freedom for the 

expression of ideas from 

diverse sources." 

The Human Rights 

Watch / Free Expression 

project letter comes to a 

logical and devastating 

It was Britain that partitioned 

Ireland against the 

wishes of the majority, and 

created the sectarian Norrther 

Ireland statelet which 

has consistently repressed 

and sytematically discriminated 

against Roman 

Catholics trapped within 

its artificial border. The 

provisional IRA was a 

response to events that occured 

within that area, and 

in a sense was produced by 

the palace of Westminster 

not the inhabitants of the 

Falls Road. 

Despite recent claims by 

the British government 

"that they have no selfish 

strategic or ecoonomic interest 

in Northern 

Ireland," Northern Ireland 

remains a British colony. 

Britain still claims 

soveriegnity over the six 

criminal justice system will 

be publicly held to account, 

while the report itself contributes, 

despite its textual 

denials, to the whispering 

campaign against the innocence 

of the Four. 

Wadham described how 

the Criminal Justice Bill 

now going through Parliament 

imports parts of the 

Emergency Powers Act (N. 

Ireland) into domestic law; 

such as provisions on 

"going equipped for terrorism." 

These measures place the 

onus of proof on the accused, 

who will have to 

prove that their equipment 

(fertiliser? clock?) or information 

(journalist's contact 

book?) will not be used in 

terrorist acts. 

conclusion for CPB and 

APR: 

"Having forbidden influence 

in US public broadcasting 

by the US 

government, there is no reason 

to suppose that Congress 

would take a different view in 

regard to influence by British 

government in US public 

broadcasting. APR's distribution 

of BBC broadcasts, then, 

appears to violate not only the 

basic precepts of free expression 

and full disclosure, but 

Congressional intent as well." 

American Public Radio, 

(soon to be called Public 

Radio International) is actively 

undermining our 

First Ammendment Rights 

by disseminating British 

government censored 

"news" in the US, and the 

Corporation for Public 

Broadcasting is aiding, 

abetting and financing a 

multitude of lies. 

James Mullin is president 

of the Irish American Unity 

Conference, South Jersey 

Chapter. 

counties via section 75 of 

the Government of Ireland 

Act, and maintains the 

constitutional guarantee 

whiclii allows the 

Unionists to block political 

progress. The power to 

move the situation on, 

therefore, is in the hands of 

the British government. 

This government must 

be compelled to use its 

power and resources to 

promote change that is 

consistent with basic 

democratic principles. 

This is where the labour 

and democratic move 

mentsin Britain can play a 

vital role. Influence on 

these movements can be 

exercised by the Irish community 

in Britain. 

Free at last. 

Congratulations to Kate 

Magee who was found innocent 

of the charge under the 

Prevention of Terrorism Act of 

"withholding information." 

The Derbyshire-based Kate 

Magee support group welcomed 

the outcome, but expressed 

anger at the decision 

of the Crown Prosecution Service 

to procede with the case in 

the first place. 

WORLD COMMENT 

BY P OLITIC U S 

A World of 500 

countries? 

That was the headline of the front page lead article 

in the Wall Street Journal of June 20 last. 

The house journal of US finance capitalism, 

whose job it is to keep rich Americans informed 

of the real world trends, seems to be 

echoing a view often suggested in this column, that 

humanity is still at a relatively early stage in the formation 

of nation states. 

"It is a paradox of global proportions," said the article, 

"The closer that trade and technology bind nations 

together, the bolder the moves to break nations 

apart. Who would have expected all this? Following 

World War 2, many predicted that a global economy 

and global communications would lead to a worldwide 

community. Nationalism, they said, would 

decline, as ever more people saw us all as passengers 

on lifeboat Earth. 

"But the growth of the global economy and of more 

powerful transnational institutions is producing the 

opposite effect. Instead of fading away, nationalism is 

flourishing, and not just in the war-ravaged Balkans. 

Now, even tiny groups of people can contemplate 

breaking away from the central state and plugging 

into the world economy on their own. Regions nursing 

ancient grievances are claiming independence, or 

at least autonomy, confident they aren't committing 

economic suicide. 

"At the same time the big corporations and institutions 

shaping the world economy seem so remote that 

many people turn to local ethnic groups and obscure 

languages for their identity, furthering the world's 

political fragmentation." 

And the new nations n«fWork at every opportunity. 

Early this year in Davos, Switzerland, the prime ministers 

of Estonia and the Czech Republic - two nation 

states that didn't exist five years ago - huddled with 

Argentina's finance minister to discuss financial 

strategy. Tamils use the Internet computer network to 

discuss politics with Quebecers and Slovenians, bypassing 

the big power centres they would once have 

had to go through. The end of the cold war has 

loosened blocks of countries once bound in tense allegiance 

to the superpowers. 

One wishes that more people in the labour movement 

knew how to take more advantage of the trend 

in the formation of new nation states, rather than 

seeing it as just a manifestation of nasty nationalism. 

The left has traditionally neglected the factors making 

for state boundaries and has often paid a costly price 

for doing so. 

The United Nations had fewer than 50 member 

states when it came into being after World War 2. 

Today it has nearly 200. In Europe, the number of 

states has risen from 34 in 1989 to 52 at the last count. 

The process of nation state formation is clearly unfinished 

even in Western Europe. Is not Scottish independence 

inevitable in time? And that of Wales and 

Catalonia, Wallonia and Flanders, and maybe others? 

And if that is the case in Western Europe, where 

governments have been quarrelling with one another 

to settle stable state boundaries for centuries, how 

much more likely is it in Eastern Europe? And what 

will be the situation in Africa, Asia and the Middle 

East in the coming century, where virtually all the 

state boundaries were drawn by the colonial powers, 

without the indigenous people being in any way consulted? 

There are over 2,000 distinct languages in the 

world, after all, and as many ethnic groups. 

So a world of 500 countries is quite likely. The Wall 

Street Journal, though, does not give the cause of the 

national and ethnic self-asseitiveness it discusses. The 

impetus to form a nation state comes from the fact that 

it is generally only on the basis of the national community 

that sufficient solidarity, mutual identification 

and mutuality of interest develop among people as to 

induce minorities freely to agree to majority rule, so 

providing a realistic basis for a stable democracy. 

We are still seeing the working out of the core impulse 

of the 1789 French Revolution, which asserted 

the right of nations to selMetennination as one of die 

Rights of Man. How far sftfrig was the Chinese 

Foreign Minister Chou En*Lai, who, when asked for 

his estimate of the French Revolution, said: It is too 

early to say!" 

IRISH DEMOCRAT A u g u s t / S e p t e m b e r 1 9 9 4 psge 3

j — — 

LIVING HISTORY 

X 

N 

BEHIND THE HEADLINES 

Sharp and heartfelt words from the past 

p 

These six letters from the 

great Irish playwright Sean 

O'Casey (1880-1964) have ~ 

never been published before. 

They will be of great 

interest to the literary and 

political historian and the 

general reader. 

Sean O'Casey was a friend of the Connolly 

Association and its monthly 

newspaper, the Irish Democrat. As is 

well known, he was a great admirer of the 

trade union leader James Larkin and wrote 

a letter to the Irish Democrat in February 1946 

boosting Larking in preference to Connolly. 

The first letter printed below, which 

refers to that, is a response to an invitation 

from the paper's then editor, Flann 

Campbell, to write an article for the 30th 

anniversary of the Easter Rising. In it O'- 

Casey again criticises Connolly. His antagonism 

to Countess Markievicz, 

evidenced in this letter, is also well known. 

O'Casey was secretary of the Irish Citizen 

Army for some months in 1914 and resigned 

from the ICA seemingly as a result of a 

quarrel involving the Countess. This resignation 

was probably the main reason he was 

not 'out' with his erstwhile comrades in the 

1916 Rising. His non-participation in that 

seminal event almost certainly coloured the 

view of the Rising that he expresses in some 

of his later plays, in particular The Plough and 

the Stars. 

Feb.15th 1946 

Totnes, Devon 

Flann Campbell Esq. 

Irish Democrat 

Dear Flann, 

I'm sorry to say, I may be unable to 

write the article around "Easter Week". 

I've just sent a message to the Communist 

Congress, Belfast, in reply to urgent calls 

by telegram, letter and phone, and a review 

of Mayakovsky's poems for Anglo-Soviet 

Magazine; and am occupied with things 

concerning rehearsals of "Red Roses for 

Me", as well as for "Oak Leaves and Lavendar" 

to be done sometime after the first 

May. I'm afraid, I can do not more at the 

moment, for I've little time to spare, even 

for the above, the way we are here, without 

help. I've been washing up and making 

beds etc. now for seven years, and it looks 

as if , like Jacob, I'll have to go another 

seven before I'm finished! However, I'll 

see, and if anything comes into my buzzing 

head, I'll let you have it 

Regarding Connolly, I was really 

charitable and under-wrote what I knew. It 

was he who took the workers' chance of a 

win, or a draw, in 1913, by calling out the 

men working for a Dock employer who 

had broken away from the Employers' Association. 

Oh, it was a stupid thing to do. 

Larkin was in jail at the time, and couldn't 

interfere. Connolly wanted "to close the 

port", though the one thing to do was to 

keep it open, if possible. Connolly 

couldn't stand up to O'Brien, who used 

him for his own ends. But Connolly was 

true to the workers and so one has to forgive 

a lot. Markievicz was just a silly, 

hysterical old bitch. 

All the best 

Yours sincerely, 

Sean 

The second letter was in response to an 

invitation from Connolly Association 

secretary Paddy Clancy to O'Casey to speak 

at a public meeting calling for the release of 

the IRA men who had been held in British 

prisons during World War 2. It shows the 

warm humanity of the man. 

Uth March 1948 

Totnes, Devon 

P.J.Clancy Esq., 

Irish Democrat 

Dear P.J.Clancy, 

I am, indeed, sorry I can't come to your 

meeting on 18th March. To "make a very 

special effort", I'd want a new heart, and I 

can't get that anywhere. All who know me, 

and almost ail who don't, know what I 

think about the continued confinement of 

our Irish comrades in Parkhurst Prison. 

The DeValeras, McBrides, Nortons, Costelloes 

and Mulcahys should be there 

themselves to see how they'd like it When 

some of them were, they had all Ireland 

howling at the British to let them go; and 

now, when as good, if not better men are 

there, they're silent themselves. Of course, 

with £600 as a Deputy, £500 as a pension, 

and £1,000 as Leader of the Opposition, de 

Valera may well think the geraniums in his 

window are more important than men, 

who are flesh of his flesh and bone of his 

bone, who tried, in their own way, to 

defend a course De Valera had sWom to, 

and then abandoned. To me, the leaving of 

these men in jail by De Valera then, and 

now by the present Government, is just 

cold, calculated political villainy. 

May the curse of every Irish saint fall 

heavy on every Irish head that refuses to 

lift itself, and say one word for these fine 

men wasting away in jail. 

Yours very sincerely, 

Sean O'Casey 

The third letter, sent a decade later in 

1956, accompanied an autographed copy of 

O'Casey's pamphlet, The History of the Irish 

Citizen Army, which had originally been 

published for one shilling in 1919. Flann 

Campbell had bought a copy second-hand 

and sent it to O'Casey to sign. 

14 April 1956 

Torquay, Devon 

Flann Campbell Esq. 

Dear Flann, 

Here's the booklet, signed as requested. 

I have been ill - two major operations; 

and am still far from being myself. However, 

I hope to get stronger slowly. 

Have been ordered to do no work - even 

writing letters. Hope you didn't pay too 

much for the booklet - 'tisn't worth a bob. 

My good wishes to your wife and to 

you. 

Sincerely, 

Sean 

The fourth, written in 1957 was a reply to 

a request from Irish Democrat editor Desmond 

Greaves, asking whether O'Casey 

would answer some questions relevant to 

his research for what became the definitive 

Life and Times of James Connolly. Here O'- 

Casey takes a swipe at the Papal social encyclicals 

that were nominally widely 

subscribed to in Ireland at the time and in 

which, he contended, all that Connolly did 

had been "safely mummified." 

17 December 1957 


Desmond Greaves Esq. 

Dear Desmond Greaves, 

Better write the questions to me and 

make them a* few as possible - my one 

good eye is pretty painful, and I have to 

limit writing and typing as much as possible. 

Hasn't Nora Connolly O'Brien gone 

to California to write the life of her father? 

You know that the execution of Connolly 

has set a halo around him. In my days it 

wasn't Connollyism that shook Ireland 

(and England too), but Larkinism. Now all 

that he did has been safely mummified in 

the wrappings of Rerum Novarum and 

Quadragesimo Anno; and you or no one 

else will ever get him out of it. 

All good wishes, 

Sean O'Casey 

The fifth letter is a reply to the questions 

Greaves sent him, relating to Connolly's 

service in the British Army as a young man 

and the attitude of the ITGWU Executive to 

the Citizen Army's tenure of Liberty Hall in 

the months leading up to the Rising. 

Here O'Casey acknowledges that Connolly 

"never liked me" and that he did not 

like Connolly, though in the first letter he 

says explicitly that "Connolly was true to 

the workers." In this letter too O'Casey, who 

tended to counterpose nationalism to 

socialism, 'Larkinism' to 'Conollyism', 

repeats his often expressed view that by 

taking part in the Rising Connolly showed 

he had "lost all interest in the Labour movement". 

Desmond Greaves demonstrates in his 

book Sean O'Casey, Politics and Art that O'- 

Casey never expressed such views while 

Connolly was alive and that they developed 

later, in the atmosphere of disillusionment 

following the Treaty and Civil War, when 

O'Casey wrote the plays that made him 

famous. It is, of course, about as sensible to 

elevate O'Casey's views as a political 

theorist as it is to judge the importance of 

Connolly by his verses. 

10 Jan. 1958 , 


Desmond Greaves, Esq. 

Dear Desmond, 

Your letter was as "damned a piece of 

crabbed penmanship as ever I saw," My 

one good eye is bad; but I made out the gist 

of it. 

1) I haven't an idea whether Connolly 

was or was not in the British Army. Connolly 

was close regarding himself to all, 

and he never liked me. However, he 

couldn't have be?n a Regular - 1st or 2nd 

Battalions - for his bowed legs would have 

had him rejected. Then one had to be 

without a blemish to be taken; one tooth 

gone would ensure rejection. If he was in 

the Army, it must have been the militia, so 

could never have gone to India They never 

went on "foreign service". Many unemployed 

joined them. It meant months of 

free housing and food, and a bounty at 

dismissal when drill was over. They were 

paid off at Linen Hall, a military headquarters 

then. I never heard any reference 

of this kind; for, not liking the man, I never 

spoke about him, even tu Jim. 

2) It may have been. The Committee 

were very much afraid of die Irish Citizen 

Army and Connolly's connection with it 

They didn't want a clash with the British 

authorities and they knew, or heard, Connolly 

was bent on one. It is like Connolly 

that he might obligingly suggest the interference 

of the "Army", a la the French 

Revolution; and the ICA may have invaded 

the Committee room. Whether they would 

have used their bayonets, I don't know; 

but, perhaps, it was a pity they didn't - on 

some of them. 

3) Don't know again. Connolly did give 

all his time to the ICA, and lost all interest 

in the Union; even, in my opinion, in the 

Labour Movement itself. 

Sony, I can't help you, 

as ever, 

Sean 

The significance of mass 

Euro-boredom 

JOHN BOYD 

argues that real 

anti-Euro-federal 

policies would 

wake people up to 

what is going on in 

Europe. 

An assessment of the 

recent Euro-elections in 

June provides an insight 

into several aspects of 

European politics. Each EC 

member state has a different 

political situation and history 

but in general there was a low 

poll across the whole 

European Community, 

despite some member states 

having compulsory voting. 

In Britain the turnout was 

low and the average was just 

above one in three voters who 

went to the polls, less than in 

1989. 

A low turnout also occurred 

in the by-elections held 

on the same day which normally 

attract significant attention. 

It is clear the Labour 

Party won by default and it 

was not the 'crushing defeat' 

for the Tory government as 

talked about by many commentators. 

For instance in the 

Labour stronghold of the 

north west of England the turnout 

was well below the national 

figure at one in four 

voters. 

Ironically the only 

'constitutional' party to mention 

EC matters was the Tory 

party. The others concentrated 

on national issues and avoided 

any attention to plans for 

European Union, monetary 

union or federalism. The Tory 

stand against federalist plans 

and the 'socialism' of Commission 

President Delors was for 

local consumption. Only one 

year has passed since the 

Treaty for European Union 

(Maastricht) was ratified in 

London despite internal Tory 

opposition. This talk was for 

the troops to shore up the 

dramatic loss of support the 

Tories have suffered and patch 

over opposition inside their 

Party. 

One factor in the low turnout 

was the scant interest 

shown in European politics, 

another the lack of understanding 

as to how the 

European Community functions. 

the electorate is 

deliberately kept ignorant so 

governments, on,behalf of 

capital, can get aw^ with the 

plans for European Union. 

However, a similar lack of 

interest was shown in the 

recent local elections. This signifies 

a disillusionment with 

formal democracy and is cause 

for grave concern. The disinterest 

leaves the door wide 

open for the extreme ultraright 

and fascists to fill the 

vacuum as has happened in 

Italy. The rise of racism across 

the EC including Britain is a 

symptom of this growing reaction. 

Across the Euro-elections 

a swing to the right has taken 

place, apart from the low polls 

in Britain. The political parties 

who occupy the centre have 

lost support. 

British Foreign Minister 

Hurd and Euro-enthusiast has 

stated we should welcome the 

neo-fascist Italian Ministers in 

London and in the European 

Council of Ministers and went 

out of his way to do just that. 

This is part of the exercise to 

get people used to neo-fascists 

and fascists strutting the 

European stage, - again. 

A refreshing and important 

element in the Euro-elections 

was the vote received by anti- 

Maastricht candidates and in 

some member states actual 

success. 

In Ireland the Green Party 

won two seats on a platform 

critical of Euro-federalism and 

supportive** neutrality 

independence in foreign 

Words and wisdom of James Connolly 

On Women 

What a history that would 

be which would tell us the 

history of the real women of 

Ireland - the women of the 

people! What a record of 

ceaseless suffering, of 

heroism, of martyrdom! What 

a recital of patient toil, of uncomplaining 

self-sacrifice, of 

unending abnegation! Aye, 

and what a brilliant tale of 

things accomplished, of 

deeds done, of miracles 

achieved! 

tions against British tyranny 

in Ireland, and as you honour 

the men who went out to confont 

the armed force of the 

oppressors, think also of the 

brave women who kissed 

them and cried over them ere 

they went, but bade them go 

for freedom's sake. 

The Harp 

September 1908 

Experience in freedom 

Sean's letters 

The sixth letter, written in June 1958, is a response to an 

appeal from Desmond Greaves for money for the work of the 

Connolly Association. O'Casey sent a donation and indicates 

in the letter his attitude to the 1950s IRA Border campaign that 

was then in full spate, and to the Protestant Unionists of the 

the Six Counties. 

13 June 1958 


Desmond Greaves Esq. 

Dear Desmond, 

Enclosed check of £2-0-0 They are going the wrong way 

about getting the Northern Protestants to come home. How 

can we expect them to come into a state governed by Bench 

of Bishops? One thing to come into a Freedom that won't let 

anyone say a word against clericalism unless the word's a 

whisper, and the whisper is completely capped with both 

hands as it comes from the mouth? Yet, these misguided 

youngsters shoot or blow up other Irishmen, Catholics and 

Protestants, and seem to glory in it 

No nation is worthy of independence 

until it is independent. 

No nation is fit to be 

free until it is free. No man 

can swim until he has entered 

the water and failed and been 

half drowned several times in 

the attempt to swim. A free 

Ireland would make dozens 

of mistakes, and every mistake 

would cost it dear, and 

strengthen it for future efforts. 

But every time, it, by 

virtue of its own strength, 

remedied a mistake it would 

take a long step forward 

towards security. For security 

can only come to a nation by a 

knowledge of some power 

policy. In Britain brand new 

political parties, opposed to 

Maastricht, received a significant 

share of the votes. In 

Denmark they won a quarter 

of the total vote and in France 

13 seats went to antifederalists. 

It is to be hoped all 

MEPs opposed to Eurofederalism 

will combine and 

prevent the so-called 

European Parliament from 

chanting support for 

European Union. 

In Britain the Tory Party 

knows it is probably unelectable 

and if this is so they may 

well make way for the extreme 

right. There will only be a 

Labour Government to carry 

on the current policies which 

entails putting European 

Union into place. A huge effort 

is required to let the electorate 

know the truth about all the 

implications and sacrifices required, 

loSS of democracy, accountability 

and sovereign 

powers entailed in the Treaty 

for European Union. 

The low Euro-poll implied 

people are not enthusiastic 

about European Union. Quite 

different policies need to be 

adopted wjjich run counter to 

Euro-federalism. The majority 

would support these and elect 

a progressive government 

which is jte cardinal action urgently 

and' entirely 

within itself, some difficulty 

overcome by a strength which 

no robber can take away. 

What is that of which no robber 

can deprive us? The 

answer is, experience. Experience 

in freedom would 

strengthen us in power to attain 

security. Security would 

strengthen us our progress 

towards greater freedom. 

The Workers'Republic 

December 181915 

It is a rotten policy, and keeps the Ulster Protestant 

hard-hearted, and sends him deeper into his den. Long ago, 

I suggested Irish Governments should invite the Orangemen 

to hold a Twelfth Parade in Dublin, to show that the 

Orangeman was reckoned as Irish as anyone else. They are; 

but we refuse to let them be Irish unless they, too, look upon 

every Bishop's word as proceeding from the mouth of God. 

The Ulstenaen are the true Irish republicans. 

All good wishes, 

yours, 

Sean O'Casey 

A.C. 

(The above letters are copyright of the estate of the late CD 

Greaves and may not be reproduced without permission.) 

yttsi 

J O H N M U R P H Y ' S 

KEYWORDS 

Equality 

The bible says: "The mighty shall be humbled and 

the humble exalted." "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" 

was the slogan of the French Revolution 

which ushered in modern political democracy. "The 

French Revolution divided the nation into two great 

parties, the Aristocrats and the Democrats", wrote 

Ireland's Wolfe Tone. 

At bottom there are still only two great parties, 

Aristocrats and Democrats, and the basic view one has 

of equality as against privilege decides still where 

people stand - with the rich or with the poor, the 

exploiters or the exploited, the landless or the lord of 

lands, with the rulers or the masses. As a political value 

one's view of equality arises from whom one identifies 

with. It was their views about equality and its opposite, 

privilege, that sent the Spartacus into his slave 

revolt against the Romans, led the Protestant 

Reformers to rise against the Papacy, the Vietcong to 

fight the Americans and the ANC to struggle for 

decades against Apartheid. Notions of equality are 

basic to all progressive movements. 

Like all political notions, the concept of equality is 

derived from society rather than nature. For by nature 

people are markedly unequal. There are a host of 

capacities rooted in our genetic and biological endowment 

that differ from person to person and make them 

naturally unequal. The politically relevant question is 

the extent to which society and social arrangements 

either add to or aggravate these existing natural inequalities 

or else seek to compensate for and overcome 

them. 

Equality as a political value is three-dimensional: it 

may refer to equality of rights, equality of opportunity 

and equality of outcome and rewards, and each has 

different implications for practical politics. In a 

democracy everyone has the same political and legal 

rights - pne person one vote, tl>e right to free speech, 

free movement etc., to freedom from arbitratry arrest, 

equal treatment before the law, as well as the right 

these days to basic social security, education and 

health services. These are the classical political and 

civil liberties, whose importance is often only realised 

when they are threatened by fascist or intolerant 

regimes. The notion of equality of rights is behind the 

struggle against imperialism, colonialism, racism, 

sexism, ageism and absolute poverty. Acceptance of 

equality of rights means that people should be treated 

the same in certain key respects, irrespective of their 

class, creed, sex, race, nationality or whatever. 

But that kind of equality - everyone being regarded 

as equal because endowed with the same rights - 

paradoxically serves to legitimate and make more acceptable 

the other manifest inequalities of society, in 

income, wealth, power and status that exist all around 

us. From that point of view, equal rights provide a 

floor of basic equality on which the structures of social 

inequality may rise. That is why policies to guarantee 

the same basic rights for everyone need to be supplemented 

by policies geared to achieving as much 

equality of opportunity as practicable. 

If everyone possesses innate value as a human 

being endowed with human rights, then a just society 

will pursue equality of opportunity policies, to overcome 

as much as possible of the effects of existing 

natural and social inequalities. That means treating 

people unequally rather than equally to bring about a 

more equal situation. It requires measures of positive 

and negative discriminaton. 

These policies do not bring about complete equality 

of opportunity of course. But they go some of the way. 

They could be supplemented by other measures. 

'Head start' programmes in schools, remedial 

teachers for backward children, etc, are steps that give 

more to some disadvantaged pupils. But equality of 

opportunity, like equality of rights, has the political 

effect also of serving to legitimate and make more 

socially acceptable the inequality of outcomes and 

rewards in society. We are left with the question of 

how much equality or inequality of rewards fits in 

with our views of justice. 

If everyone starts at die same point in the race, or 

even if the most favoured are handicapped and the less 

favoured given a head-start, does that mean that the 

results of the race are fair? We need principles with 

which to judge the justice and fairness of the system of 

rewards, and the degree of equality/inequality we 

might regard as acceptable. More on that in the next 

issue.

1 \\ 

IRISH 

BOOKS 

The most unmanageable 

revolutionary 

LIZ CURTIS 

The Gonne-Yeats Letters 

1893-1938: Always Your 

Friend. Edited by Anna 

MacBride White and 

A.Norman Jeffares. 

Pimblico, £12.50, pbk. 

This is a doorstopper of a 

book, more than 500 

hundred pages long, a 

real treat for admirers of Maud 

Gonne, and a must for students 

of the Irish cultural and 

political revival at the turn of 

the century. 

Maud Gonne, known as 

"Ireland's Joan of Arc," was 

born in 1866 and in her late 

twenties became one of the 

most charismatic figures in 

Irish political life, campaigning 

first for evicted tenants in 

Donegal, then for "treasonfelony 

prisoners" held in 

Britain's bleak Portland jail. 

She ran a political paper, L'- 

Irlande Libre, in France, and lectured 

widely on Irish affairs. 

Six foot tall, she was a 

woman of remarkable beauty 

who attached little importance 

to her looks, and had a lifelong 

instinctive concern for the 

poor and those in distress. 

Trapped in France in the First 

World War, she nursed 

wounded soldiers. She hated 

the war, and feared such work 

might encourage it, but wrote 

to Yeats, "& yet, & yet, one 

cannot remain with hands 

folded before suffering." 

The daughter of an English 

army officer of Irish descent, 

she had an independent income 

which she spent 

generously on the Irish cause, 

and which allowed her to 

employ various people to 

maintain her household. 

FOUR PROVINCES 

BOOKSHOP 

is open at: 

244 Grays Inn Road, 

London WC1X 8JR 

Tuesday to 

11am to 4pm 

Saturday 

A wide range of books, periodicals 

and pamphlets of 

Irish interest available. 

Also for sale: 

The Wolfe Tone Mug 

price £3 p&p add 80p 

Views expressed by book 

reviewers are not necessarily 

those of the editorial committee 

of the Irish Democrat. 

The letters in this book 

are almost all from Gonne to 

Yeats. His to her were, according 

to the dust-jacket, 

"destroyed by the Free Staters 

when they ransacked her 

Dublin home." 

Writing in the midst of a 

busy life, she frequently signs 

off with the words "in great 

haste." She is chatty, gentle 

and modest: she laments that 

her letters "say so little of what 

one means," while his "are always 

interesting and beautiful 

though sometimes they make 

me very sad." She talks of her 

lecture tours, of her travels, of 

her spells of ill-health, and 

often of her pride in her 

children. 

The letters are marred 

only by a trace of anti-Semitism, 

all too common in the 

period and shared by Yeats, 

stereotyping Jews as grasping 

financiers. 

Despite Gonne's 

reticence about personal matters, 

the letters reveal much 

about her relationship with 

Yeats. She appreciates his 

friendship: "such a charming 

restful thing," thanks him for 

the poems he often sends 

which are invariably "beautiful," 

and encourages his writing 

. She takes a lively delight 

in demonstrations against the 

authorities, and sees his role as 

different: "You have a higher 

work to do - With me it is different. 

I was born in the midst 

of a crowd." As time passes, 

his elitism contrasts more and 

more sharply with her 

democratic instincts. 

Gonne chats matter-offactly 

about their occult experiments: 

"1 will come & have 

tea with you & we will try and 

get some visions but I will not 

be in London more than a day 

or two as I ought to have been 

in Paris 10 days ago." The turn 

of the century was a time of 

ferment sometimes likened to 

the 1960s, and occultism was 

common among intellectuals, 

who were seeking alternatives 

to the established religions. 

Yeats and Gonne, with their 

interest in Irish nationalism, 

invoked beings from Celtic 

mythology, such as sun god 

Lug and the goddess Brighid. 

The letters also give 

glimpses of how Gonne tactfully 

tried to discourage 

Yeats's passion for her. "Your 

letter distressed me a good 

deal -1 don't want you to give 

me so much place in your life," 

she tells him in 1897. At thi: 

time she was having a secre: 

love affair with Lucien Millevoye, 

a French right-wing 

revolutionary, who was married. 

She had two children 

with him: a son, Georges, who, 

to her great distress died aged 

17 months, and a daughter, 

Iseult, whom she pretended 

was her niece. In December 

1898 Yeats and Gonne had 

simultaneous dreams that 

they had kissed one another. 

But Gonne once again told 

Yeats she could not marry him, 

and went to confess the story 

of her relationship with Millevoye. 

Millevoye left her for a 

singer, and Gonne continued 

to have difficulty - as did other 

prominent women activists of 

the time - in forming satisfactory 

domestic relationships 

with men. Perhaps the most 

distressing section of the book 

concerns her brief marriage to 

John MacBride. 

Her husband was a hero 

of the Irish Brigade that fought 

for the Boers against Britain in 

the South African War. In 

1902, aged 35, she wrote to her 

sister: "I am getting old and oh 

so tired and I have found a 

man who has a stronger will 

than myself and who at the 

same time is thoroughly 

honourable and who I trust." 

In 1903, despite warnings 

from their friends and 

families, they married, and 

Gonne's disillusionment was 

rapid. 

MacBride proved to be an 

inveterate drunkard, causing 

embarrassing public scenes, 

but worse was to come. In 

19C4 Gonne was told by 

several members of her 

household in Paris that he had 

behaved indecently towards 

them while drunk - even terrifying 

10-year-old Iseult in 

this way - and had committed 

adultery with her seventeenyear-old 

half sister. A long 

and bitter divorce case followed, 

as Gonne desperately 

tried to ensure that MacBride 

would not get access to their 

baby son Sean. It was not until 

after he was executed following 

the Easter Rising of 1916 

that she could safely return to 

Ireland. His execution partly 

redeemed him In Gonne's 

eyes: "Major MacBride by his 

death has left a name for Sean 

to be proud of," she wrote to 

Yeats. 

At the height of the Black 

and Tan terror in 1920 she told 

Yeats he should not keep his 

distance from the conflict, 

reminding him of "the unspeakable 

warfare being carried 

on by Government orders 

by the most debased riff-raff 

from English jails & wardrunk 

soldiers & officers, 

these torturings of prisoners, 

these floggings and & shootings 

of unarmed men & burning 

of homes of women & 

children." 

After the establishment 

of the Free State in 1922, 

Gonne's and Yeats's political 

paths diverged even further, 

and their letters became much 

fewer, with her reprimanding 

him for voting in the Senate 

for repressive laws. More of 

Yeats's letters from this last 

period survive, and his final 

one, written five months 

before his death in January 

1939, he invites her to tea and 

ends with the words, "I have 

wanted to see you for a long 

time, but -." 

Most of the biographical 

material came from Margaret 

Ward's book, (reviewed on 

the right.) 

Old analyses, same problems 

Alex Reid 

The Communists and the 

Irish Revolution. Part One. 

The 

Russian 

Revolutionaries on the Irish 

National Question, 

1899-1924. Edited by D.R. 

O 'Connor Lysaght. 

Litereire Publishers, Dublin. 

£7.99pbk. 

This is the first complete 

collection of source texts 

on the issue, according to 

O'Connor Lysaght. He has 

brought together essays, letters, 

newspaper articles and 

selections from all the important 

figures of the Bolshevik 

revolution including Lenin, 

Trotsky and Stalin as well as 

statements from the Communist 

International. 

Marx and Engels 

believed that social struggle in 

Ireland would directly affect 

the the advances of socialism 

in Britain. Marx wrote in an 

American newspaper: 

"The English working class 

will never accomplish anything 

until it has got rid of 

Ireland." 

Lenin, whose writings take 

up the greater part of this book, 

uses this quotation when clearing 

up the misunderstanding 

of Marx's position on the national 

question. There were 

those, Rosa Luxemburg 

among them, who argued that 

national self-determination 

was economically impossible 

and who interpreted Marx as 

saying that the national struggle 

should always be subordinated 

to the class struggle. 

Maud, Sean and Iseult Gonne. 

A long campaigning life 

Maud Gonne, A Life by 

Margaret Ward. Pbk. £8.40. 

Published by Pandora. 

Ms Ward's stated aim in a 

boqklet, was to put Irish 

women into Irish history, 

as both traditional and 

revisionist historians had ignored 

their role. 

The writer choose Maud 

Gonne rather than, say, 

Markievicz, Sheehy Skeffington 

or Despard, because Maud's active 

political life dated from 

1885 to 1953, whereas the others 

started their public activities 

later and died earlier. 

Maud's first political activities 

were at meetings in 

Mayo when the Ladies' Land 

League were building cabins to 

house evicted families This was 

when the male leaders of the 

Land League were all in jail and 

Maud was addressing large 

meetings denouncing the 

landlords and the government. 

Lenin, on the other hand, 

consistently shows the importance 

of linking the fight for 

national independence and 

the struggle for economic 

emancipation. 

Stalin debates with two 

leading social democrats who 

tell us that every national 

movement is a reactionary 

movement: "That is not true, 

Comrades. Is not the Irish 

movement against British Imperialism 

a democratic movement 

which is striking a blow 

against imperialism? 

The Bolsheviks' understanding 

of the situation in 

Ireland and of Britain's role at 

the time is quite striking. The 

Dublin Lock-out, the Easter 

Rising, rural develop nent, the 

Home Rule Bill and the British 

governments subsequent surrender 

to the Unionists are all 

given careful consideration. 

Lenin reminds us: 

"Socialists must explain to the 

masses that the English 

socialist who fails to struggle 

as part of his work, for the 

freedom to secede for Ireland . 

. . is a socialist and internationalist 

only in name, but a 

chauvinist and an annexationist 

in fact." 

Her charismatic personality ensured 

large audiences. 

Maud's politics were like 

that of ordinary working 

people, based on everyday life 

rather than theory. Her eclectic 

brand of nationalism meant she' 

was willing to make alliances 

with anyone who was actually 

doing something about poverty, 

political prisoners or Irish' 

freedom. So she worked at one 

time with Griffith and, later, 

with Connolly. 

After the treaty she supported 

the pro-treatyites until 

the death of Griffith and Collins. 

From then on she was in 

the forefront of opposition to 

the Free State. Both Charlotte 

Despard and Maude helped 

Roddy Connolly to set up the 

Workers' Party of Ireland. 

I leave readers to discover 

for themselves the details of the 

many other political campaigns 

Maud Gonne took a leading 

part in. 

G.C. 

In his introduction, the 

editor offers some criticism, 

not altogether unjustified, of 

the lack of political action undertaken 

by the Communist 

Party of Great Britain on the 

issue of Ireland. Personal experience 

illustrates that still 

today there are those in the 

communist movement in 

Britain who tend to leave the 

political work of campaigning 

for British disengagement 

from Ireland to their Irish comrades 

or to those who know 

about the issue. 

O'Connor Lysaght should 

be congratulated in bringing 

this collection together, an invaluable 

reference book and 

guide to action. 

onnolly 

IR 

raff 

James Connolly was the last of the Easter Rising leaders to 

be executed. Gravely wounded in the fighting at the GPO, 

he was taken on a stretcher to the execution yard at Kilmainham 

jail at dawn on May 12th, 1916, strapped to a chair and shot 

by a firing squad. Arthur Murnaghan and Charles Carroll, both 

of the Royal Dublin Fusileers, took care of Connolly's body after 

the execution. Mumaghan later told his sister that Connolly 

took the spindle of the chair with him, so great was his death 

struggle. They were both killed in France in 1917. 

The man was all shot through that came to-day. 

Into the barrack square; 

A soldier I -1 am not proud to say 

We killed him there; 

They brought from the prison hospital 

To see him in that chair, 

I thought his smile would far more quickly call 

A man to prayer. 

Maybe we cannot understand this thing, 

That makes these rebels die; 

And yet all things love freedom and the Spring 

Clear in the sky. 

I think I would not do this deed again, 

For all that I hold by; 

Gaze down my rifle at his breast - but then, 

A soldier I. 

They say that he was kindly - different too 

Apart from all the rest; 

A lover of the poor, and all shot through. 

His Wounds ill drest. 

He came before us, faced us like a man, 

Who knew a deeper pain 

That blows or bullets - ere the world began; 

Died he in vain? 

Ready, present. And he just smiling - God 

I felt my rifle shake. 

His wounds were Opened, out and round that chair 

Was one red lake; 

I swear his lips said Tire when all was still, 

Before my rifle spat 

That cursed lead - And I was picked to kill 

A man like that. 

Join the Connolly Association! 

The Connolly Association is the premier Irish 

organisation in Britain campaigning for civil liberties 

and fair employment in the Six Counties and for a 

repeal of the British claim to sovereignty over Northern 

Ireland. Membership costs a mere £10 a year (£12 for 

couples, £6 unwaged couples and £5 for individual 

students, unemployed and pensioners) and includes a 

free subscription to the Irish Democrat 

NAME 

(By kind permission) 

ADDRESS 

I enclose a donation of £. 

Liam MacGabhann 

Postcode 

. towards the campaign 

ffftnffrff 

Slievenamon 

Alone, all alone on the wave washed strand, 

All alone in the crowded hall, 

The hall it is gay and the waves they are grand 

But my heart is not here at all. 

It flies far away, by night and by day, 

To the time and the joys that are gone, 

And I never can forget the sweet maiden I met, 

In the valley near Slievenamon. 

It was not the grace of her queenly air, 

Nor her cheek of the roses glow, 

Nor her soft black eyes, nor her flowing hair, 

Nor was it her lily-white brow. 

Twas the soul of truth and of melting ruth, 

and the smile of summer's dawn, 

That stole my heart away, one mild summer day 

In the valley near Slievenamon 

In the festive hall, by the star-watched shore, 

My restless spirit cries: 

My love, oh my love, shall ne'er see you more. 

And my land will you e'er uprise. 

By night and by day I ever, ever pray, 

While lonely my lite flows on. 

To our flag unrolled and my true love to enfold, 

In the valley of Slievenamon. 

The Spanish Lady 

As I went down to Dublin city, 

At the hour of twelve at night, 

Who should I meet but a Spanish lady 

Washing her feet by candlelight. 

First she washed them, then she dried them 

Over a fire of amber coal 

In all my life I ne'er did see 1 

A maid so sweet about the soul 

CHORUS: 

Whack fol the toora, toora, laddy, 

Whack fol the toora loora-lay 

Repeat chorus 

As I came back through Dublin city 

At the hour of half past eight 

Who should I spy but the Spanish Lady 

Brushing her hair in the broad daylight. 

First she tossed it, then she brushed it, 

On her lap was a silver comb 

In all my life I ne'er did see 

A maid so fair since I did roam. 

CHORUS 

As I went back through Dublin City 

As the sim began to set 

Who should I spy but the Spanish lady 

Catching a moth in a golden net. 

When she saw me then she fled me 

Lifting her petticoat over her knee 


A maid so shy as the Spanish Lady. 

CHORUS 

By Charles J.Kickham 

I've wandered north and I've wandered south 

Through Stonybatter and Patricks Close 

Up and around the Gloster Diamond 

And back by Napper Tandys house. 

Old age has laid her hand on me 

Cold as a fire of ashy coals 


A maid so sweet as the Spanish Lady. 

CHORUS 

Traditional 

PETER 

PEEPSHOW 

MULLIGAN'S 

Disposable 

workers 

NORTHERN IRELAND ELECTRICITY 

Since privatisation in June last year 500 jobs have gone 

and 200 more are to be 'released' in the next year. All this 

against increased domestic tariffs up by 6.6 per cent and 

increasing profits, up 27.6 percent to £74.9m. Sir D. 

Lorimer the Chairman of NIE is pleased. 

UNEMPLOYMENT 

At the first public session of the newly appointed 

Northern Ireland select committee, the Northern Ireland 

economic minister Timothy Smith, told MPs he wanted to 

bring unemployment 'down to the level in Britain but he 

could not direct companies where to invest.' The Guardian. 

NB. Government statistics show that 13.3 per cent are 

jobless. That is 99,000 registered for work. 55 per cent of 

those have been out of work for over a year and 29 per 

cent for more than three years. Corresponding figures for 

Britain are 37 and 11 per cent. (The number of people in 

Britain with income below half the national average was 

3.3 million in 1977. It is now 11.4 million - one in five of 

the population.) 

UNEMPLOYMENT 2 

Paul McGlinchey brother of Dominic McGlinchey had 

a job selling insurance policies in Belfast for Cornhill. The 

secret service found out and told his employers who 

promptly sacked him. They then released the story to the 

press and Cornhill sponsors of the test match had to make 

some nifty excuses. The Independent. 

PROFIT V JOBS 

Albert Reynolds has attacked the Bank of Ireland 

group, accusing them of profiteering. He claimed that 

their profit was at the expense of jobs. The Bank of Ireland 

has announced an annual profit of IR280m (£274.5m) an 

increase of 125 per cent. The Independent 

LOYALISTS REACTION TO PEACE 

A Republican ceasefire is likely n to be perceived by 

loyalists as an indication that the IRA is edging towards 

a political victory, history suggests that the response 

would be sharp and bloody." The Times 

MORE COLLUSION 

Neil Irwin, 24, a private in the Royal Irish Regiment 

(part of the British Army) has been charged with killing a 

Catholic man and membership of the UVF. Independent on 

Sunday 

SOLUTION 

"In the rapidly changing conditions of to-days world 

the achievement of a united Ireland by consent would 

provide the best and most lasting solution, politically, 

economically, and culturally, which would be in the long 

term interests of the people of both traditions on this 

island." Taoiseach* Albert Reynolds. The Times 

GOING HOME 

"I can't help thinking there will be a lot of people in 

high places who will see the Mull of Kintyre crash as the 

last straw. (10 RUC Special Branch, six top MI5 officers, 9 

military intelligence experts) It is a dramatic signal that 

the time has finally come to cut our losses and get out of 

Northern Ireland for good." Richard Ingrams writing in 

the Sunday Observer 

LAST 

WORD 

Tone's Grave 

"In Bodenstown churchyard there is a green grave, 

And freely around it let winter winds rave. 

Far better they suit him - the rain and gloom - 

Till Ireland a nation, can build him a tomb." 

Thomas Osborne Davis. Irish Pot (1814-1545) 

IRISH DEMOCRAT A U Q U S T / S E P T E M B E R 1994 page 7 

IRISH DEMOCRAT AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 1994 page 6

ANONN IS ANALL: THE PETER BERRESFORD ELLIS COLUMN 

Peter makes a confesson and opens up another world in ancient Ireland 

The birth of Sister 

The month of August sees 

the publication of an historical 

"whodunit" 

featuring a 7th century AD 

detective. Sister Fidelma of 

Kildare is not simply an Irish 

religieuse but is a dalaigh, or 

advocate, of the Brehon courts 

of ancient Ireland qualified to 

the level of anruth, just one degree 

below that of ollarnh, the 

highest degree in the land. 

The "whodunit", entitled 

Absolution by Murder, is by 

Peter Tremayne and published 

by Headline Books of London. 

It is, in fact, the start of a 

new detective fiction series 

featuring Sister Fidelma. 

The time has come to make 

a confession. 

I am Peter Tremayne. 

Some readers may already 

know that for the last eighteen 

years I have pursued a second 

writing career as Tremayne. 

Absolution by Murder will be 

my 27th Tremayne book. I 

have also published over 30 

short stories. Most of 

Tremayne's books have been 

in the field of fantasy and 

detective fiction. 

Eclectic 

S i n c e 

childhood my 

interests have 

been widespread. 

While 

my first love 

has always been history, I have 

been a devotee of popular 

literature. I suppose a career as 

a journalist, for the first fifteen 

years of my working life, has 

made my interests eclectic, to 

say the least. I find it very hard 

to explain to people why the 

author of A History of the Irish 

Working Class can also be the 

author of The Curse of Loch 

Ness. I tried to explain when 

being interviewed by a 

newspaper a few years ago 

and was rewarded by the 

headline "A schizo author 

confesses." Ah, well. 

Was the poet C Day Lewis 

of Ballintubber "schizo" because 

he wrote detective fiction 

as Nicholas Blake? Or the 

novelist Evan Hunter, author 

of the sensational The Blackboard 

jungle, "schizo" because 

he wrote, as Ed Mc Bain, 87th 

Precinct detective thrillers? 

So why Tremayne? Simply 

because the hamlet of 

Tremayne on the West Penwith 

peninsula in Cornwall 

was the site of the best Italian 

restaurant in Cornwall. My 

wife and I lived in West Penwith 

for a while in the late 

1960s. 

Oddly enough, I can blame 

the birth of Peter Tremayne on 

the Catholic Herald. Richard 

Dowden who was editor in the 

mid 1970s knew of my interest 

in popular literature, especially 

as a means of forming and 

confirming our prejudices - a 

role now taken over more 

firmly by television. He asked 

me to review a new book Interview 

with a Vampire by Anne 

Rice, which has since become a 

modern "classic" of Gothic 

literature. It was felt that 

readers who knew my political 

work might not take seriously 

my reviewing such a novel. So 

a pseudonym was in order to 

give justice to the review. Mr 

Tremayne first appeared in 

print in November 12,1976. A 

year later the first Tremayne 

novel was published. 

The Chinese blessing is 

"may you live in interesting 

times." To that I would add 

"may you meet interesting 

people." In that respect I have 

been extraordinarily lucky 

and some of these have had an 

influence on the birth of Mr 

Tremayne. 

I suspect that it is not given 

to every boy or girl to meet 

their one time favourite 

authors. As a teenager I was 

profoundly influenced by the 

novels and essays of the black 

American writer James 

Baldwin (1924-1987). I 

counted myself lucky when, as 

a 22-year-old, I first met 

Baldwin and still remember 

our conversation about race 

discrimination. In 1965 he had 

an Irish friend in Paris who 

had told him how Catholics 

were discriminated against in 

the Six Counties and his outrage 

was part of my own 

development. I still have a 

copy of Another Country which 

he signed for me. 

In my early teens I began to 

read science fiction. Curiously, 

as a retrospect, I found that 

most science fiction writers 

that I really enjoyed turned out 

to be socialists. One of the most 

profound influences was the 

work of William Olaf 

Stapledon (1886-1950). 

He was born in the Wirral, 

took his Ph.D. at Liverpool in 

philosophy and psychology 

and spent most of his 

academic time teaching classes 

at the Liverpool Workers' 

Educational Association. He 

made no secret of his socialist 

attitudes. Apart from his nonfiction, 

Stapledon published 

science fiction such as Last and 

First Men, The Star Maker, Odd 

John, and Sirius as well as 

several others. His books were 

heavy intellectual fare but 

filled with fascinating social 

argument. 

I also devoured the work of 

Isaac Asimov (1920-1992). 

Asimov was born in Russia, 

near Smolensk, and migrated 

with his parents to the USA in" 

1923. His first work was published 

when he was nineteen 

years old. In the 1950s, as a 

teenager, I devoured Asimov's 

robot tales. I still have a first 

UK edition of his /, Robot (1952) 

on my shelf. I suppose I was 

much into robotic tales then. In 

fact, it was Karel Capek who 

invented the word in his play 

RUR (Rossum's Universal 

Robots). 

I had discovered a 1922 edition 

of the translation of 

Capek's play as performed at 

the Garrick Theatre, October 9, 

1922, in my father's library. I 

still have that copy. I devoured 

RUR and later other of Capek's 

novels, subsequently realising 

he was a Czech socialist and 

philosopher who warned of 

the evils of "scientific barbarism" 

in the rise of Fascism 

and Nazism. Capek died in 

mysterious circumstances in 

1938, aged only 48, shortly 

after the Germans moved into 

Czechoslovakia's Sudetenland. 

But to return to Asimov's 

robots. What held me 

enthralled was his novel The 

Caves of Steel (1954) which 

combined an effective 

"whodunit" with the anti- 

Utopian elements of population 

explosion and featuring a 

human-like robot as the assistant 

of a human detective. The 

same characters featured in 

The Naked Sun (1957) where 

they solved a mystery on one 

of the Earth's colonial world. 

Fascinating stuff. 

Asimov was not just a 

writer (though he published 

over 200 books) but he was a 

biochemist who became 

Professor of Biochemistry at 

Boston University, combining 

the writer and teaching of 

science with the production of 

science fiction works. 

Privilege 

Again it 

was my luck 

and privilege 

to meet 

Asimov in the 

mid 1970s just 

when I was 

beginning to 

contemplete extending my 

non-fiction works in the new 

dimension of writing fantasy. 

Asimov was a joy to talk to. 

Here was a man whose literary 

soul could ride spaceships 

across many universes but 

who confessed to me that he 

had a real phobia about flying 

and how he usually travelled 

by ship. 

What surprised me, and 

this was in 1975, was that 

Asimov had an excellent understanding 

of the situation in 

Ireland. We had met at a party 

which was not conducive to 

chattering about politics and, 

as Asimov was interested in 

discussing the war in the north 

of Ireland, we arranged to 

meet in an out-of-the-way 

wine bar and talk. I remember 

his final comment on the problem. 

"You know, the situation 

A younger and bearded Peter Berresford Ellis talks with scientist, sci-fi writer Isaac 

Asimov. English book critic, David Depledge looks on. 

could be resolved very rapidly, 

if the Irish government had 

guts enough to stand up at the 

United Nations andstart creating 

a fuss. Instead I get the feeling 

that the Irish government 

doesn't want Britain to get out 

of their country. The UK 

government partitioned their 

country by force: then denied 

civil rights to Catholics in the 

area they clung on to. When 

the oppressed community 

rose up against the injustice, 

the Irish government bends 

over backwards to apologise 

to the UK and exonerate them 

from any culpability." 

I think the moral of the 

story is that there are a surprising 

amount of influential 

people who are well informed 

about the realities of the Irish 

situation in many corners of 

the world whose voices ought 

to be encouraged to demand 

that the UK government 

should disengage from 

Ireland. 

But I was going to tell you 

about Sister Fidelma: the child 

of such development. 

Well, the idea originated in 

1992.1 have, as many readers 

will know, long been interested 

in the law system of ancient 

Ireland - maybe not that 

ancient, as it was only in the 

17th century that it was finally 

suppressed by the English. I 

have also been fascinated by 

"whodunits" and written a 

few myself. It occurred to me 

that the possibilities of having 

a detective whose investigations 

had to be conducted by 

the Brehon Laws would make 

a fascinating series in an area 

that no one had touched 

before. 

I was always conscious that 

detectives seemed to be a 

male-dominated clique. Even 

though women constitute 

some of the bestselling dete 

five fiction writers, for some 

reason they usually create 

male detectives - from Agatha 

Christie's Hercules Poirot to 

Ellis Peters' Brother Cadfael. I 

determined, therefore, that I 

would create a female detective. 

I chose the 7th century, a 

period of fascinating activity 

for the Irish (Celtic) Church. 

My detective would have to be 

a religieuse, because the Christian 

religious had taken over 

from the Druids as the intellectual 

class of Irish society. 

Celibacy 

And one 

has to remember 

that 

celibacy, as a 

rule, did not 

exist in the 

C e l t i c 

Church, or, in 

fact, in Rome, at this period. 

But my religieuse was a 

qualified dalaigh or advocate of 

the Brehon Court with all the 

freedoms that were accorded 

to women under the law and 

social systems. 

Be it remembered that it is 

recorded that a lady named 

Brigh was one of the most 

celebrated female Brehons or 

judges of the period. There 

was also a religieuse named 

Dari, another female Brehon, 

who, according to the Tripartitie 

Life of Patrick, was the 

author of the Cain Dari, or law 

code concerning women's 

rights. It was the perfect 

period to have a female detective. 

And so my detective had 

studied her law under the 

Brehon Morann of Tara and 

after eight years, obtained the 

degree of anruth, only one degree 

below ollamh or professor, 

the highest degree obtainable. 

I wrote a short story at first 

to test the idea. Murder in 

Repose appeared in Peter 

Haining's Great Irish Detective 

Stories in October 1993. By October 

1993, no less than four 

Sister Fidelma short stories 

were published in different 

anthologies. Others are due 

for publication later. Murder by 

Miracle which appeared in- 

Constable New Crimes 2, 

edited by Maxim Jakubowski, 

was bought by Ed D Hoch for 

his US Best Mystery and 

Suspense Stories of 1994 collection 

and Hemlock at Vespers 

was bought for another US anthology 

Murder Most Irish, 

edited by Greenberg and Gorman. 

From short, stories, Sister 

Fidelma has now made the 

transit to full-length novel. Absolution 

by Murder is set in the 

year AD 664 when Fidelma is 

sent to attend the famous 

Synod of Whitby where representatives 

of the Irish Church 

debate rival merits with 

delegates of the Roman 

Church. It was an angry, 

recriminatory debate. Just the 

right background for a murder 

mystery. 

The second Fidelma novel 

will appear next January entitled 

Shroud for the Archbishop. 

I am hoping that the good 

Sister and I are going to have 

along and happy partnership. 

Peter Berresford Ellis would 

like to thank all the readers 

who sent hint messages of 

good will. Although unable to 

reply to every postcard and 

letter, he would like Democrat 

readers to know that he sincerely 

appreciates all the expressions 

of concern and good 

wishes. 

IRISH DEMOCRAT AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 1994 page 8

Irish Democrat August - September 1994

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