The Bold Patriot Game: The Consistent Conscience of the Irish Republican’ by Donal Lavery

Senator Barry Goldwater once wrote an intriguing book summarising what he believed the psyche of the American conservative involved. While there are few parallels with Irish republicanism, it was reflective of the fact that our political beliefs reflect our individual morality in life. I draw no distinction between the two.

So what makes up the thought processes and ideology of the Irish republican’s conscience? Given our history, we have been heavily formed in the ideas of the Reformation. Yes, the radical Dutch-style Protestants who founded Irish republicanism recognised clearly that democratisation of the Church ought to be reflected in the democratisation of society – that is, that institutions should exist to serve people’s needs and not their own agenda or hierarchies.

Likewise, the Irish republican is cognisant of the Enlightenment. He or she carries on the ethos of the French and American Revolutions; the rights of man over the expediency of capital; that people should work in order to live and not live in order to work. That church and state must always sleep in separate beds. That a woman’s place is not at home, but where she determines it to be. And that our most treasured possession remains our young people.

Additionally, the republican believes in isolationism; that the only foreign interventions we must involve ourselves in ought to be humanitarian. Not isolated from the world but detached from tyranny; for no company is better than bad company.
Economically, any republican worthy of that name understands that the state has a moral obligation to intervene financially in industry; to provide and protect jobs for the people of this green land. To harvest the full fruits of their labour via redistribution.

Socially, he or she must keep an open mind. Our young people require the best country in the world in which to grow up; Parents require the best country on Earth in which to raise a family; And older people need the dignity and content to know they have lived a full life. To seek the correct balance between the struggles of the community and the efforts of the individual.

And on the question of what kind of government Ireland needs, the republican believes not in more government or less government, but simply in good government. That the right to decide who rules over you is the most fundamental for it determines all other rights in this life. We must always endeavour to remember that we have not fought for centuries to overthrow the divine right of Kings only to replace it with bureaucrats or corporations. That Irish people belong to a nation, where their law must always supersede Canon law, which has neither legitimacy nor place in the affairs of this country.

If truth be told, we have never had a proper Irish nation yet, made up equally of the Orange and the Green. So the most pertinent point of conscience is to realise that vision, of a land made prosperous by merit and rights enshrined in a single Irish state and under the guardianship of one constitution. While it may be some time before this transpires into reality, the motivation must always be that the jovial happiness of our children will have been worth the tears and pain of the past.