The Irish Israel
TABLE TALK
DENIS BROGAN
'History repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce.' Thus Karl Marx, and there are other sophistical or credulous characters who are already making a parallel between Mayor Daley's Chicago and Home Affairs Minister Craig's Londonderry or, as most of the inhabi- tants of the Maiden City call it, `Darry.' I must begin by declaring my interest. I do not be- lieve a word of the absurd charges made against that fine body of men, the Royal Ulster Con- stabulary (the only armed police force in the British Isles), and although Mr Craig was in Belfast when the violent and disgraceful attack on the police took place, and Captain O'Neill was in Leicester, I am sure they knew much more about what happened in Darry than people on the spot, misled by the combination of Communist and Papish propaganda. Con- sequently I am willing to believe everything I am told by Captain Orr, MP. I would even be- lieve all I may be told by Sir Knox Cunning- ham, tom. Yet I shall discuss the problems created by the outrageous conduct of the Com- munist-Papishes in Londonderry as if what the reporters, cameramen, and other Vatican- Kremlin agents have tried to sell to a credulous world were true.
We must notice that some of the easy parallels made between Northern Ireland and, say, Georgia, USA, and Mississippi are false. Reasons for its being considered desirable to keep niggers from voting in these commonwealths do not apply in Ulster: there are no niggers in Ulster. There are Papishes, of course, and they are treated not as helots but as perioeci. (I put all this Greek in to please the numerous admirers of ex-Professor Powell.) That is to say, the Papishes are given as many political rights as the Prods think are good for them. This, of course, has led to considerable misunderstand- ing. The fact that the majority of the inhabi- tants of Deny City cannot elect a majority of the city council is not an example of gerry- mandering on the Georgian or Mississippi level. The legislation which limits the municipal franchise and does disfranchise a great many inhabitants of Derry is designed to encourage Papishes to go into business and thus acquire extra business votes, as their Protestant fellow- countrymen are encouraged to do.
The ambiguity of the term 'Northern Ireland' and the term 'Ulster' explains a great deal that may seem odd or even undemocratic or dis- honest in the political structure of this semi- independent state. Mr Enoch Powell has sug- gested that the parallel drawn by some Welsh and Scottish Nationalists between their claims and the kind of government set up in Northern Ireland in 1920 is false, because the Ulstermen were simply struggling for the unity of the United Kingdom. In fact, by 1920 the Ulster- men's rulers were struggling for—and achieved —the establishment of the best of both worlds. They were not put under popish rule, i.e. Pro- testant Ulstermen were not, but they were given enough power to organise their own political life, which kept a great many Papishes under Protestant rule, which is, of course, as it should be. Had the late United Kingdom survived the ordeals of the threatened Ulster rebellion of 1912-14, the actual rebellion of 1916, the civil wars that followed—in fact, had the old Union been really preserved, the Protestants of Ulster would be much worse off than they are today. For example, at the time their government was set up the Mayor of Derry was a Papish. Although the Catholic majority of the 'Maiden City' is even greater now than it was then, there is no danger of such an outrage today. Indeed, had the old Union survived, even Dungannon might be ruled by Papishes because the majority of that famous town are Papishes. But as we all know, especially people of Ulster ancestry like myself and Mr Quintin Hogg, the Orangemen of Dungannon are especially hostile to those who betray . . . the old cause That gave us our freedom, religion, and laws.
They are able to express that hostility because they did manage to set up a special sub- nationality, although how that nationality is to be described is a serious problem.
Formally they are citizens and the Catholics are subjects of a body politic commonly called Ulster, but three counties of the historic Province of Ulster are in the Irish Republic, and two more, Fermanagh and Tyrone, would be if the majority of the inhabitants of these counties were allowed to vote on their destiny.
I have reflected on what state is most like Northern Ireland and I have decided that it is Israel. I may say that I am a strong Zionist, and I am glad that Israel was created and survived the various attacks on it. But I have never been able to swallow the official Israeli defence of the creation of the state of Israel. Israel is, in fact, a new imperial power set up among people who did not want to be invaded or, as so many of them were, expelled from their home land. What we have got in Ulster is in fact the crea- tion of a religious state based on the necessity of preserving Protestant supremacy in a part of what is an overwhelmingly Catholic island.
It is the difficulties of this situation that pro- duce some of the most interesting features of Ulster society. For example, every member of the Cabinet of Northern Ireland is a member of the Orange Order, and a basic principle of the Orange Order can be summed up in the famous Orange phrase, 'Croppies, lie down!,' I am sure that Captain O'Neill would much rather not be a member of the Orange Order, but he has to be if he wishes to stay in office. His cousin, I understand, was expelled from the Order recently for the criminal folly of going to a Catholic ceremony. This has meant, in practice, the natural preservation of certain types of privilege to which the British Labour party is officially opposed, and even the British Conservative party is opposed, with what is, perhaps, less passion.
Some of the towns in Northern Ireland, not- ably Dungannon, are very like some of the towns in the south described by the American civil rights commission. It was the publication by this commission of some very unpleasant aspects of the south that forced the hands of the Kennedy brothers into doing something about it after they had been preaching patience to the Negroes as Captain O'Neill has been preaching patience to the Papishes. What shook the white ascendancy in the south, was, of course, Selma and Birmingham. It is quite possible that the riot in Derry will have the same effect, for despite the stout denials of the Government, people do tend to believe what they see on TV and what they hear reported by nearly all organs of the British press.
There is one point which might be stressed in the latest developments. The last demonstra- tion against the defenders of law and order in Northern Ireland has been by the students of the Queen's University. Most of these are not Papishes. It is going to be increasingly difficult to produce students who admire the present set- up in Northern Ireland. I doubt if even the new University of Ulster, planted in Coleraine instead of in Derry (for reasons which it is not very hard to understand), will find it easy to recruit either students or teachers who are sound in the eyes, let us say, of Mr Craig, Minister for Home Affairs. I learn from Mr Moorhouse of the Guardian that in private Mr Craig is quite amiable although he tends to lose his cool and he has been undeniably badly briefed about some details of the Communist- Papish axis in Derry. It was a pity that he should hive denounced an IRA leader as being in Derry when he was 200 miles away.
I cannot help suspecting there is some Com- munistic trick behind this, but since Mr Moor- house has given this testimonial to Mr Craig's comparative amiability, I end up by pointing out that the American newspaper men I have been talking to recently say that by far the most good tempered, good mannered presidential candidate to interview in private is Mr George Wallace of Alabama. Good manners are not everything and it may be necessary to find a rather more versatile Minister of Home Affairs to deal with intrusive British MPS and the large number of people in the world who are rather tired of getting moral lessons from the British government and its dependent powers.
I should also be interested to see how far the the old traditional anti-popery of a great part of the Tory party can be kept under cover. It may be an expensive international luxury if, in fact, the Orange Order is allowed to battre son plein in Northern Ireland. A highly insolvent country perhaps can hardly be contemptuous of foreign opinion. It might also be remem- bered that most of the rulers of Western Europe, including the most formidable of them, are Papists themselves, and may not understand the necessity of preserving Protestant supremacy in Ulster. Even 'English Catholics in Christian clothing,' to quote from Arthur Griffith on the Reverend Bernard Vaughan, SJ, may find it hard to swallow.
By the way, I have still not received a satis- factory explanation why the Reverend Paisley, who is the head of his own church and there- fore not under any other sartorial authority, wears a Roman collar. Is he a fifth columnist?
Previous page
