Writing on the BBC website a week ago, Shane Harrison raises an issue I’ve heard repeatedly over the past year or so: “The 1916 rebels had no democratic mandate, but it could be argued that nobody had, because there was no universal suffrage not every adult had a vote”.
When I say that this point has been raised repeatedly, I’m talking about the first part of Harrison’s sentence , not the second. The notion that the Easter Rising’s lack of a democratic mandate invalidates it is so daft it’s laughable. When have revolutionaries conducted a poll or vote before deciding that a revolution should occur? Did George Washington and his chums? What about Oliver Cromwell and Co? Or Fidel Castro? Or the French Resistance? Or those who tried to assassinate Hitler? Not to mention all those countries that were once part of the British Empire.
The nature of most revolutions is that they require secrecy in planning (that the leaders of the Rising failed to achieve secrecy was just one of the reasons why they were defeated in the short term). Most people shrink from the thought of blood-shed – that of others and especially their own. If all violent movements had first required democratic endorsement, all regimes in place could have rested easy. Might would indeed have remained right.
The headline of Shane Harrison’s article is ‘Who owns legacy of Easter 1916 Rising?’ I’m not even sure I know what that means. My best guess is that it asks who benefits from the Easter Rising. If so the answer is simple: all of the Irish people, and maybe a lot of countries which took their cue from the Rising in the decades that followed. What Harrison may be hinting at is who should be allowed to commemorate the Easter Rising, and again the answer is simple: ‘All the Irish people’. What we then get into is how that commemoration will present the Rising. We know that Enda Kenny’s government started off with a video which had U2 and other inanities but no revolutionary leaders, so you may be sure they’ll present the Rising as having achieved its purpose: liberty.
Except it won’t. Apart from the uncomfortable fact that six of the thirty-two counties failed to achieve freedom from British jurisdiction following 1916, there is the other big question: is the state known as the Republic of Ireland the kind of state that Pearse and the others were seeking?Don’t make my cat laugh.
Remembering history is pointless if we don’t use it to create a better future. Pretending that the Easter Rising achieved all its objectives either for the thirty-two counties or the twenty-six is to strip off and don the Emperor’s new clothes. Let’s hope there are enough voices telling Fine Gael and Fianna Fail that in centenary terms, they’re not wearing a stitch.
Excellent and thought provoking, Jude. Fully agree. No mandate, that’s a laugh. And one of the other gems you sometimes hear from unionists is that the Rebels were traitors! What, because they rose up against their colonial subjugators? Give us a break.
I think we are back to the old west Brit chestnut, Jude. We have a Tory government in the south and they are so keen to bend the knee to unionism that they installed an orange woman as head of cultural issues in the lead up to the centenary. Whilst we should applaud this as outstanding outreach and good grace, we know that it will never be appreciated or, heavens above reciprocated in any way by same orange order. Can the southern government not see that they will ultimately be respected more for showing fulsome remembrance to the signatories rather than watering everything down at every opportunity. It’ll not come around again in anyone’s lifetime.
“other gems you sometimes hear from unionists is that the Rebels were traitors!”
Yeah, that’s one of my favourites too Freddy. Listening to Unionism you’d think the Protestant Ascendancy, the Plantations, the Penal Laws, the Sectarianism (especially the northern counties), etc was a good thing…..well, I suppose it was a good thing, for Unionism because Catholics were deliberately disadvantaged to the benefit of Unionism, hence the crisis within Unionism today due to equality being implemented (very slowly but steadily…). The British never had any right to be in Ireland and that’s a fact, whether Unionism agrees or not.
“We have a Tory government in the south and they are so keen to bend the knee to unionism that they installed an orange woman as head of cultural issues in the lead up to the centenary”
I didn’t know that! and it explains a lot of what has been going on.
“Whilst we should applaud this as outstanding outreach and good grace, we know that it will never be appreciated or, heavens above reciprocated in any way by same orange order”
Your right about that Freddy, it never will be appreciated or reciprocated, I wish it were different but it isn’t. I’ve questioned a few times on Judes blog about what exactly has Unionism (or the Orange Order) ever did to reach out to Catholics/Nationalists/Republicans and the answer is nothing. I can come to no other conclusion other than the supremacist mind set of Unionism is still alive and kicking. It was the same with that new Orange Order centre opened in Belfast (I think) where they flew the flags of all the nations in the World where the Orange Order had lodges and behold! the Irish flag wasn’t flown even though they have more lodges in the south than maybe any other country except the UK.
You know this attitude from Unionism/Orange Order can only be tolerated for so long. I’m not an extremist person but I’m of the opinion that zero tolerance to the likes of the Orange Order and political Unionism is the only thing they understand, if they don’t play fair then we shouldn’t. There’s only so long you can bang your head against a brick wall.
In fact that’s how the whole Gerry Adams episode when he said “break the bastards” came along. The frustrated crowd whom Gerry Adams was taking questions from asked whats the point in compromising and being in Government with Unionism when they don’t want to compromise and reciprocate in turn. Gerry Adams, though he worded it in a way I disagreed with, was right: equality, that’s what will break political Unionism and its supremacist mind set because like so called Irish Nationalist politicians accepting MBE’s, Equality and Supremacy is incompatible.
Expressing thoughts to a tee, or is it to a tea?
How went the week? The events of 1916 changed the course of Irish history. A few men and women stood against an empire with all its military might and resources in order to build a democratic republic to include Catholics, Protestants and Dissenters. Those who interrogate the events of 1916 with the benefit of hindsight seldom question the fact that the British had no mandate to be in Ireland. The process which started in 1916 continues with the values enshrined in the Proclamation of the Irish Republic, a President with a democratic mandate and a written constitution which reflects the will of the people and may only be changed by the people.
We seldom hear critics of the men and women of 1916 interrogate the dubious concept of an unelected monarch’s divine right to rule or the fact that people in other colonies dispensed with anachronistic forms of administration in order to establish democratic institutions of government. Lest the critics forget, tea was once a staple of colonial life. It was assumed that some colonists would rather pay the tax than deny themselves the pleasure of a cup of tea. The rest is history.
A pity Pearse and Connolly weren’t slaveholders like Washington and Jefferson, and thereby
immune to the insults of Patsy McGarry, Ruth Dudley Edwards etc.
Those who cite and criticise the lack of a “democratic mandate” of the Easter Rebels are normally those who totally oppose the manner of the Rising and what it stood for. A question that many tend to ignore – why do independence movements emerge and grow? In Ireland, In India, in Cyprus, in Rhodesia et al? They grow because of suppression, because of colonialism, due to imperialism, through brutal regimes aimed to destroy identities and cultures – are these democratic?
The idea that a rebellion against an alleged “parliamentary democracy” in a “parliamentary state” fails to take into account:
– the Act of Union, which almost forcibly brought Ireland into the UK, was contrived without a democratic mandate.
– The British presence in Ireland persisted without a democratic mandate.
By the late 19th Century and into the 20th century, the clear majority of the people of Ireland voted for the Irish Parliamentary Party whose mandate and will was based on the concept of achieving Home Rule for Ireland. The undemocratic House of Lords rejecting the legislation in the 1890’s! Regardless of what Irish Nationalism wanted, were they ever going to achieve Home Rule through the constitutional boundaries – it seemed they weren’t. The closest they came was the third Home Rule Bill that was manipulatively contrived and set in motion the events that contributed to the Easter Rising. Was the democratic mandate of the Irish people ever going to be accepted?
The 1912 Home Rule Bill with the non constitutional and non democratic campaign by the Unionists and Conservative Party in effect ended the “democratic mandate” of the Irish people. The measure of Home Rule that was rendered meaningless by the threat of an armed revolt by the Unionists, who had no electoral mandate over the jurisdiction of the island of Ireland, who did not speak for and represent the Irish people. It was Unionists who set out claims in the covenant, who threatened the taking over of Ulster with a provisional government – did they have a democratic mandate? Are Unionist responsible through this inflammatory language in creating the mindset for the leaders – well, their undemocratic mandate most certainly worked – Carson was even rewarded with a place in the 1915 coalition government!
The importation of arms and Curragh mutiny undermined democracy as much as anything else. I have argued before in article written that the Easter Rising would not have happened without the nature of Ulster Unionists resistance. It was Carson who brought the gun into Irish politics. It was the Tories and the Unionists who abandoned constitutional procedures. Bonar Law stating “things were stronger than parliamentary majorities” adds credence to the rebels claim in 1916.
Uniquely in 1919, the democratically elected First Dail Eireann, mandated by the people of Ireland was met by British state resistance that culminated I the war of independence – so this “democratic mandate” – does it have to be on the terms of which the British impose?
Two words with different spellings but similar pronunciations came to mind, Esteemed Blogmeister, on reading your daily forensic analysis, this time of the Shane Harrison piece.
‘Tame’ is how the Harrison polemic came across, that is compared to another piece on the same subject which could only be described as having been the result of a ‘taom’.
The latter piece was subtly entitled ‘Padraig Pearse’s overtly Catholic Rising was immoral and anti-democratic’ and finished up with this snorter: ‘Marking the event at Easter is to concede to the quasi-religious blasphemous stance of Pearse and his colleagues’.
The author is one Patsy McGarry who is the commissioning editor of the restrained ‘Rite and Reason’ (R.A.R.) column in the (gulp) The Unionist Times. The same queasy, oops, quasi-religious column which featured the week before, a subdued piece by a former distinguished diplomatic name of Sean O’Donnell, surprisingly enough entitled: ‘Gaelic Catholicism and corporal punishment in 1966’.
For some reason the name of Dick Van Dyke comes to mind.
Oh, yes. It may now be only slowly emerging the possible reason why Patsy McGarry, Bachelor of Arts, was the go-to hagiographer of the homogeneous hackitariat when former President Mary Poppins went looking for a ‘chim-chim-cheree chum’ in the communications community.
The surname Poppins, btw, is reckoned by distinguished genealogists to derive from an ancient Anglo-Saxon name of a sixteenth century Suffolk farrier who, having shod his quota of local Dobbins for the day, fancied ‘taking a pop at the Pope’.
Oh, did one forget to mention the word ‘taom’? It is, of all things, the leprechaun for (gasp) ‘seizure’.
Rumours (unconfirmed) abound to the effect that anyone phoning into The Unionist Times are likely to be temporarily put on hold, the better to get an earful of its new ring tone: ‘Ooh, ahh, Up the R.A.R., ooh, ahh, Up the R.A.R !’
More and more down here, E.B., the realization is beginning to dawn on the commonality as to the causes why the Government has been only taking half measures to commemorate the 100th anniversary, of the Cause of Irish Independence. When Pearse convinced his colleagues (see above) to take rather sharp exception to ‘John Bull invading the personal space of Paddy StInk and Mickey Mudd’.
The same poet and peasant Pearse who fancied he was some kind of Franz von Superior creature who felt it was a-ok for himself and his Hun-leaning henchmen to take over the GPO for the purposes of taking pot-shots rather than making overtures to the Light Cavalry even as they gaily trotted down Sackville Street. Such an unprecedented atrocity would never have been condoned in even the most crassly produced of B-movie Hollywood horse operas.
As for the governmental half-measures another rumour is gaining legs that what they are about is indeed the commemoration of an era-defining moment in martial musical history. It is half-a-century after all since recording first began on the seminal LP, ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’.
The explanation why this commemoration has not been so explicitly stated is on account of this Government’s well-known inclination to treat the electorate as ‘grown ups’ and its reluctance to ‘spoon-feed the voters’ as other lesser cabinets more prone to the taking of prescriptions for a spin-doctor might have done. Their preferred option is to allow ‘the most sophisticated electorate on Planet Earth’ to work it out for theyselves.
Although certain scatterbrained scribes might tend to read too much into this sort of fanciful speculation, Perkie’s inner balanced bubblehead is not numbered among them. Being one who knows his tenement from his townhouse, though he says so himself.
Consider, briefly, the hints, allegations and evidence which have been planted there under the noses of those who have eyes to see and choose to use them:
1. Sgt. Pepper was recorded in the renowned studios on Abbey Road.
( In the Abbey Theatre an uprising by the devil-may-cares was facilitated by the management last year when the motley-wearing crew of beautiful terrors took to the welcoming stage.
Ceist/ question: is it possible to blaspheme the Anti-Christ? For a freagra/ response, ring the R.A.R. number – see above).
2. Songs such as ‘With a little help from my friends’ and ‘Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’ feature on the track record.
(Code-deciphered these read as: ‘The Homogeneous Hackitariat’ and ‘Jim Cusack’).
3. Another crucial song is: ‘A Day in the Life’.
(See the laborious poster featuring the bearded husband G.Adams and his eye-lash flashing bride, Martina, entitled ‘A Day in the Wife’).
4. The original Sgt Pepper was to have included two tracks, ‘Penny Lane’ and ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ but these were pulled and released, significantly, as a double A-sided single).
(There is no B-side in that single entity, dual leadership of Enda and Joan, a partnership of equals. Has anyone, for example, seen a photograph of the B-side of the Yawnaiste? Ever.)
5. Staying with Miss Wet Taoishirt the penultimate clincher is the best track on the album: ‘When I’m 64’.
(This is a clincher on two counts: while the Yawnaiste is indeed, chronologically speaking, 66 – that fateful number again, but, as Perkie’s inner perfect gentleman strenuously asserts she only looks, erm, 64.).
6. Finally, the clincher aka the ultimate clincher, aka THE clincher.
Fifty years ago this year, 1966, and earlier in that year, the Beatles (who, psychedelically speaking, were a kind of pre-tribute band to the current Coalition, aka the Cockroaches) had released an album which was widely regarded by hotpress experts as the ultimate in pop experimentation.
In fact, they were incorrect to the point of being wrong. The first album was but the penultimate in p.e. What the Beatles managed to do – downsizing the importance of the first album of 1966 with the release of their second – the Cockroaches have emulated, and then some.
For, the latter have – give or take a thousand Shannon stopovers or ten – completely removed it for ever from Irish politics.
Revolver.
Looove that last word…The record, of course, not the shooting thingy…
great.stuff.jude.
I’m.with.you.jim.
“The notion that the Easter Rising’s lack of a democratic mandate invalidates it is so daft it’s laughable. When have revolutionaries conducted a poll or vote before deciding that a revolution should occur? Did George Washington and his chums? What about Oliver Cromwell and Co? Or Fidel Castro? Or the French Resistance? Or those who tried to assassinate Hitler? Not to mention all those countries that were once part of the British Empire.”
Goodness me, where to start with this facile “argument”. Cromwell’s revolution was in the 17th century, before democracy, but nevertheless had the support of Parliament such as it was at the time. Washington had the mandate of the Continental Congress. As for the French Resistance, it took place while France was illegally occupied by a dictatorship, during a war, and where there was no access to democracy. Similarly Germany itself at the time of the Hitler assassination plot. Castro’s revolution similarly took place in a dictatorship where there was no access to democracy.
The 1916 rising took place in a country with free elections, in which republicans were free to seek a mandate.
The circumstances couldn’t be any more different.
“Cromwell’s revolution was in the 17th century, before democracy,”
MT, Greeks, Spartans and Romans had democracy with elected members of their senates hundreds of years BC. The Magna Carta introduced it to England in 1215, bringing it to Ireland in 1217, though in Ireland it was very limited.
“The 1916 rising took place in a country with free elections, in which republicans were free to seek a mandate.”
Nationalists constantly won all elections and demanded home rule since the 1850s, home rule bills came and went but were never implemented until the rising in 1916 declared the Irish republic which the population democratically validated it in 1918 allowing Sinn Fein to create the first Dail which remains the only democratically elected centre of governance in Ireland.
The IRA fought the British army to a standstill to keep the republic in the war of independence but this partitioned the island in 1921 leaving 6 counties still under British occupation.
Loyalists fearing another rebellion in 1966 over demands of civil rights tried to force nationalists out in organised pogroms, leading to the rebirth of the IRA who once again fought the British army to a standstill.
The GFA offers a peaceful mechanism for ending British rule in Ireland. If unionists try to subvert it again with threats of civil war, that’s a fight I for one will be up for.
Be careful what you wish for.
As I said, Parliament supported Cromwell.
As for Ireland in 1916, there was no mandate for a republic, let alone for violent action to achieve a republic. The people had voted for home rule, which had been enacted in 1914, to be implemented after the war.
MT, “there was no mandate for a Republic” – Well, there was no genuine mandate for British Rule in Ireland, that was a precursor to the events of 1916.
By 1919 there was mandate for an Irish Republic, precipitated by the events of 1916 – the British government wasn’t too forthcoming or concerned about this mandate and as such acted against the will of the people and of the newly constituted Dail Eireann. So when you say mandate, on who’s term? In conjunction with who’s narrative?
You say the people “had voted for home rule”. I agree, they had done twice previously. But the Liberal’s under Asquith were all over the place on this – A carved up deal to get them into power, referred to by Carson and Bonar Law as a “corrupt parliamentary bargain”. Not to mention Liberal sides deals behind Redmond’s back (undemocratic), reneging of commitments, refusal to stand up to Ulster Unionist and Conservative militancy diluted any “vote” there was for for Home Rule – in essence by the war ensuring partition was the only solution to the crisis. Asquith stated “But we cannot admit … The right of … A relatively small minority … To veto the verdict of the vast body of their countrymen.” Well they did. Small minorities dictated. Did the British government really take serious the mandate of the Irish people? Did it matter? Was there a mandate for partition? It happened anyhow, regardless of any mandate. Do you genuinely believe all-Ireland Home Rule was going to be rolled out after the War?
In 1920 the Government of Ireland Act was enacted that created Northern Ireland and the Free State – too little too late! Sinn Fein, the main representatives of the Irish people, through their 1918 mandate, refused to take part, though the government forced through this unpopular legislation, partitioning the country. So a mandate, ignored!
Um, 1919 was after 1916.
Well done MT, you should be proud you recognised this! Obviously, the point made, was lost on you, but to repeat for clarity … you stated “in 1916 there was no mandate for a republic”. In 1919 (or more specially after the December 1918 General Election) there was a mandate for a Republic – what difference did this make?
The British ignored this mandate and the democratic will of the people of Ireland. Same way the flawed Third Home Rule Bill ignored the mandate and will of the people as it was sidelined in favour of a partitionist settlement. So, in comparison, the purpose of a mandate was … ??? The Easter Rebellion may not have had public support at the time, but in the aftermath, it most certainly was justified and supported, as Home Rule was dropped in favour of what the rebels stood for in 1916, National self determination!
I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make. This blog is about 1916, not 1919. A mandate for a republic in 1919 is not in dispute.
“The 1916 rising took place in a country with free elections, in which republicans were free to seek a mandate. ”
How free were they to vote? Who and how many could vote in the entire country? I advise you to answer very carefully.
As free as people were elsewhere in the UK and more free than in most other countries in the world.
“Free elections” meaning what ? Please explain. This at a time when there wasn’t even universal suffrage -hardly representative and “free” with a seizable portion of Irish society being disenfranchised!
Free meaning people were free to stand for election, as hundreds of candidates did. The franchise was the same in Ireland as elsewhere in the UK and much wider than in the vast majority of countries.
The Brits and yanks have done many bad things, worse than what happened at Easter 1916, and didn’t have the support of the people!!!!!!!
Indeed. Not sure how that’s relevant, though.
Best public riposte to those who claim the men and women of 1916 had no mandate comes from Eugene McEldowney in today’s IT . Eugene reveals where England got its mandate to rule Ireland “From the Divine Right of Kings.”!
Well, from the papacy actually.
But that was in the Middle Ages. Things had moved on by 1916.