A Re p l y To Se n at o r Mart i n Ma n s e r g h

On Th e Cas e Of (Pr e s i d e n t ) Mar y McAl e e s e Vs. Br e n d a n Cl i f f o r d

by Brendan Clifford Contents Introduction 3 Statement Of Claim 7 Reply 9 Commentary 18 A 19 Response To Reply 20 Swearing 22 Law In 23 Sequence Of Action 25 Judge Or Jury 28 Action Abandoned 29 Fair Employment 30 Malone Interlude 33 Protestants, North And South 34

David Trimble And Others 35

McAleese Biographies 40 Charles Brett 44 The Authorised Presidential Biography 49 Appendix 55 January 2007 ISBN 1-874157-17-0 or 9-781874-15717-5

Some earlier issues of A Belfast Magazine (since the McAleese suppression)—

Lord Downshire: A Proposal For A Union Of Ireland And Britain (1751) No.13 Orange Terror, by ‘Ultach’ (1943) No. 16 Linda Kearns: In Times Of Peril (1922) No 16a George Giffard: Orange: A Political Rhapsody (1798) No.17 Ireland by Lionel Curtis (1921) No. 20 The Casement Diary Dogmatists No. 22 Traitor-Patriots In The Great War: Casement And Masaryk. With a No.23 review of the Rise and Fall of Czechoslovakia The Politics Of Pre-War Europe. From The Catholic Bulletin, 1937-39 No. 24 Union Jackery: the pre-history of Fascism in Britain No. 25 August 1969: Ireland’s Only Appeal To The United Nations No. 26 Britain’s Great War, Pope Benedict’s Lost Peace No. 27 The Grammar Of Anarchy by J.J. Horgan No. 28 Military Aspects Of Ireland’s Of 1969-70 No. 29

All these and other Athol Books publications can be ordered securely online through the Athol Books website: http://www.atholbooks-sales.org

2 A Reply To Senator On The Case Of (President) Mary McAleese vs B. Clifford

"Em p l o y m e n t s f a l l i n t o a h i e r a r c h i c a l g r a d a t i o n o f r e p u t a b i l i t y . Th o s e w h i c h h a v e t o d o i m m e d i a t e l y w i t h o w n e r s h i p o n a l a r g e s c a l e a r e t h e m o s t r e p u t a b l e … Ne x t t o t h e s e in g o o d r e p u t e c o m e t h o s e e m p l o y m e n t s t h a t a r e i m m e d i a t e l y s u b s e r v i e n t t o o w n e r s h i p a n d f i n a n c i e r i n g —s u c h a s b a n k i n g a n d l a w . Ba n k i n g e m p l o y m e n t s a l s o c a r r y a s u g g e s t i o n o f l a r g e o w n e r s h i p … Th e p r o f e s s i o n o f t h e l a w d o e s n o t i m p l y l a r g e o w n e r s h i p ; b u t s i n c e n o t a i n t o f u s e f u l n e s s , f o r o t h e r t h a n c o m p e t i t i v e p u r p o s e , a t t a c h e s t o t h e l a w y e r 's t r a d e , it g r a d e s h i g h in t h e c o n v e n t i o n a l s c h e m e . Th e l a w y e r is e x c l u s i v e l y o c c u p i e d w i t h d e t a i l s o f p r e d a t o r y f r a u d , e i t h e r in a c h i e v i n g o r in c h e c k m a t i n g c h i c a n e , a n d s u c c e s s in t h e p r o f e s s i o n is t h e r e f o r e a c c e p t e d a s m a r k i n g a l a r g e e n d o w m e n t o f t h a t b a r b a r i a n a s t u t e n e s s w h i c h h a s a l w a y s c o m m a n d e d m e n 's r e s p e c t a n d f e a r ."

(Veblin: The Theory Of The Leisure Class).

1. Introduction . a letter to the Irish News in If that paragraph had which I replied as follows on been published, I would Senator Martin Mansergh this point: have considered the matter wrote as follows in a letter closed—unless McAleese, to the Belfast Irish News, "He gives the wrong or somebody on her behalf, which was published on 25th title to the Institute of disputed my statement of the September 2006: which Mary McAleese was facts, which would have been appointed Director, and it unlikely as the facts were "Clifford implies that he makes all the difference. easily ascertainable. While the was always strongly anti- She had no "professional" paragraph did not explain the Trimble, notwithstanding experience of legal significance of the facts stated the inspiration provided practice. The appointment in it, I would have let the matter to him by the two-nations was made in breach of rest if the bare facts which it theory. If so, it is difficult Fair Employment rules. states were published. But to explain why in a Though she had not they were not published. Belfast magazine in 1987 made the appointment, he strongly criticised she started a libel action The Editor of the Irish News, the integrity of Mary against me over it and did Noel Doran, having published McAleese's appointment not merely issue a "threat" Senator Mansergh's false to the post of director of it. I had to conduct my assertions did not publish my of the Institute of Legal own defence against her rebuttal. By failing to publish Studies at Queens, where solicitors and my reply, he associated the only other candidate for lack of funds. A week himself and his paper with the was David Trimble; before trial she settled Senator’s allegations. and why he joined and without a penny in costs supported the Unionist or damages. My criticism Senator Mansergh's hullabaloo over it. of her appointment was assertion was made in a not on the grounds that letter of about 720 words, in "How did he respond Trimble should have which many other assertions to the threat of legal got the job. I did not were made as well. I replied action by Mary McAleese know his application to what I took to be the most supported by Queen's? had been solicited. important assertions with a Clifford definitely has The appointment of letter of about 900 words. My form." either would have letter was cut down to about been in breach of Fair 430 words by the Editor of the On 28th of September I sent Employment rules." Irish News without consulting me. By far the most important

3 cut was my reply to the by publishing details of the who had an influence on me Senator's statement about the President's libel action, and by his dogged probing of the President's libel action. giving them what circulation I implications of Mansergh's can by my own resources. views—which amounted to The Editor of the Irish a re-writing of the history of News was under no obligation I cannot see how this will Fianna Fail in the Treatyite that I know of to publish the be more to the President's interest. Senator's allegation. The advantage than a paragraph Senator does not have a in a daily newspaper that When Mansergh brought controlling interest in the would have had a butterfly me into his argument with O paper. But, once the Senator's existence—here today, gone Comain I sent in a reply, and allegation was published, an tomorrow. But Senator I was surprised when it was impartial Editor would have felt Mansergh and Mr. Doran have published, and wondered if under obligation to publish the determined that it must be the leopard had changed its reply to it. so. It is not an option to allow spots. Mansergh responded oneself to be blackguarded by with further allegations, and my Doran chose to publish them. reply was published. the Senator's allegation. And then he chose not to publish I should explain the Mansergh then put in a my reply. But he published circumstances which led to third set of wild allegations, a butchered letter of mine Senator Mansergh writing beginning "I wish this letter to replying to lesser points in rambling, ill-informed letters close my side of a distasteful the Senator's letter, without against me to the Irish News. correspondence"—a any indication of Editorial correspondence that would cuts, thus giving his readers He has been in long- never have happened if he to understand that I had been term dispute in the Letters' had not provoked it—which given a right of reply and Column of the Irish News with included his allegation about that, since I had not disputed Liam O Comain, a Northern McAleese's libel action. And what the Senator said about Republican who is critical of the Irish News demonstrated, the President's libel action, the Good Friday Agreement. by censoring my reply, that it I accepted it as being in It seemed that the Senator had not changed its spots. accordance with the facts of set out to crush intellectual the matter. dissent from the Agreement In that censored reply I and somehow got the idea pointed out that Mansergh It was imprudent of Mr. that I was behind his failure used the wrong title of Doran to have raked up the to do so. I did not try to take McAleese's position. She was President's pettish libel action part in the argument. I was appointed to be Director of the against me by publishing the blackballed by the Nationalist Institute Of Professional Legal Senator's paragraphs. And it press back in 1970 because Studies. He omitted the word was stupid of him not to have of the unpopular stance I took "Professional". closed the matter by publishing then, and I accepted that my paragraph in reply. exclusion as a condition under Legal studies are conducted which I would have to function. by law lecturers, of which I learned long ago that in But I reported the Mansergh/O there is a plentiful supply. The modern times it is a waste Comain argument for the Irish meaning of "Professional" in of time and energy to try Political Review. Mansergh the title indicated that this was to make honest men out of must have inferred from this a job that should be held by a newspaper editors by force of that I was connected with O solicitor or who had reason. If I was wealthy and Comain, and eventually he made a successful career in was litigiously-inclined, I might brought me into the argument the actual practice of law in compel the Irish News, by libel and accused O Comain of the Courts. I will explain the action, to make the minimal being "inspired" by me. significance of this provision in concession to the truth of the the commentary which follows matter that I asked for, and I had no connection the documents. to pay for not having done so whatever with O Comain and, in the first instance. Since if one of us had an influence The point about the Northern I am neither, I meet its libel on the other, it was O Comain Ireland Fair Employment rules

4 (which will also be explained who attended the Institute spirited souls would respond later) is that they prohibit during that first year when to intimidation by becoming employers from soliciting job McAleese made no didactic Republicans.) applications from individuals. appearance before the budding The rules say that jobs should who were expecting That routine of life was be advertised in very specific her to transmit practical broken in 1969, when the terms, that only applications experience to them. The security apparatus of the local in response to advertisements writer was not a member of state (formal and informal) should be considered, and that the Unionist Party and was not launched a wanton attack complex procedures laid down in sympathy with the Unionist on Catholic areas of Belfast should be followed in making outlook. and , and those areas an appointment. defended themselves. This The Institute for Professional led to the formation of a new In this case, nobody with Legal Studies was a strange Republican Army during the the specified qualifications body, set up to deal with a Winter of 1969-70, and the for the job applied for it. strange situation. A Northern declaration of war on Britain in The employer (who was Ireland jurisdiction was 1970 by this Army, which was a combination of Queen's concocted in the 1920s to very much more representative University, the Government, accompany the Partition Act of the Catholic community than and the legal profession, (the Government of Ireland the old, "Official", IRA had ever including the Judges), decided Act). But been. to give the job to a law lecturer, was a relatively crime-free but they did not advertise the area. The region was locked The authorities decided to altered job specification. Law into a political antagonism—a treat this war as a massive lecturers had not applied for stalemate antagonism which outbreak of criminal activity, it when it was advertised, absorbed energy while making and to prosecute it as ordinary because they understood that movement impossible—and crime. And all of a sudden only successful practising the fierce concentration on the there was a drastic shortage of lawyers qualified for it, and static political conflict of the lawyers—and a problem about when the job specification two communities seemed to increasing the supply. was changed, they could not have the effect of marginalising apply for it because it was not crime. Lawyers were traditionally re-advertised in the altered produced by apprenticeship terms—and in fact it was not There was, of course, the rather than by University re-advertised at all, as far as I IRA, whose existence was courses. Law was a kind of could discover. criminal. But the IRA did very trade that was learned by little, other than exist, for close doing it under the supervision What Queen's and the legal on half-a-century, and its mere of an experienced master profession did was the thing existence, punctuated by a craftsman. But there were which was being made a crime few spectacular escapades, not enough master craftsmen when private employers did provided little in the way of to produce the great flock of it. They solicited applications routine business for the legal new lawyers required by the from people they thought profession. (Republicanism phenomenal expansion of would be most suitable. One was kept in check by intimate 'crime'. (Rory McShane, a was a law lecturer in another Protestant policing of the famous figure in the agitation jurisdiction (the Republic of Catholic community, rather of 1969-9 became a solicitor by Ireland), and another was a than by prosecutions at the apprenticeship system and law lecturer, not only within the law. That mode of policing immediately set up in business Northern Ireland jurisdiction but is described in an article very successfully, which would within the Institute. published in the Capuchin scarcely have been possible Annual in 1943 and reprinted later.) The lecturer from outside the as No. 16 of this magazine. jurisdiction was given the job. It was both containing and On the other hand, any But she did no lecturing in the aggravating. It restricted the number of people might be first year of her appointment. growth of Republicanism by pushed through a University The article I published was intimidation, while ensuring law course in a couple of written by a trainee solicitor that some of the more years.

5 What it was decided to do heavy legal expenses in meaningful use of language, was to attach an experienced keeping the action going for which is not something held in and successful solicitor or a year and a quarter, settled high esteem nowadays. barrister to a post-graduate without costs or damages. academic law course with a And, judging by the attitude of The terms of the settlement view to somehow transmitting her legal team, she was glad to were a tacit acknowledgment experience in the classroom get out of it on those terms. that her action was absurd and and producing lawyers on a frivolous. mass scale. McAleese employed the most expensive firm of I did not try to get the It seemed to me to be an solicitors in Belfast to represent proceedings reported in the absurd scheme—one of the her, along with two barristers Belfast press at the time, and many absurdities produced by about whose costs I know she was clearly anxious that 'the Northern Ireland state'— nothing. I could not afford to they should not be reported. and in the end it proved to be buy any legal representation And I did not subsequently put unworkable. and had to appear for myself. the incident on public record so that anybody who cared to But that is what the scheme McAleese was one of the might make use of it. I would was. And law students were chiefs of the legal profession have thought she would be entitled to expect during their in the Northern Ireland happy to let the matter lapse year at the Institute that they jurisdiction. I was, as I have into the obscurity it deserved— would be under the directorship always been, an unskilled and it appears that she was in of one of the masters of the labourer, and was on an annual the first instance. craft. But the students who income that was certainly less went there in the year following than her legal costs for the year A short time after the McAleese's appointment were 1989. action ended there was a fobbed off with a mere law passing reference in the lecturer—a lecturer in the law I told her lawyers, right at Andersonstown News to her of another jurisdiction—who did the start, that I did not want to legal triumph against me. I not even show herself to them. win against her, but that I was drafted a reply saying that I not willing to let her have her wished all such plaintiffs should The situation seemed to way just because she could enjoy such victories, but I did me to warrant the critical purchase law and I couldn't. not send it in. By breaking the article about McAleese's She could have her trial if she nationalist consensus in 1969 appointment written by one of wanted it, because the facts I had given many respectable those students, who went on to I published were true and I but politically ineffectual people become a successful solicitor. would stand by them, but I reason to hate me — the less thought what she was doing respectable people disagreed The article will be found was absurd and would damage with me but did not hate me within McAleese's Statement herself rather than me. — and I thought I would let Of Claim, reproduced below. them take what pleasure they I might have made a could from an uninformed belief The main documents in the counter-claim against her for that McAleese had gained case are McAleese's Statement bringing a frivolous libel action some kind of victory over me Of Claim and my Reply. against me. If I had nothing and done me some damage. better to do with my life, or had Respectable West Belfast was These are given below. And been litigiously inclined, or had a sad place in those days, then there is an account of how been drawn into the egoism of when it was trying to hold the case proceeded, which libel law, I might have had an out against Sinn Fein, and it tells a lot about what Northern entertaining time exploiting the needed illusions, so I let it have Ireland is. advantageous position in which this insignificant delusion. she had placed me against The action went on from her. She had placed me in a A long silence followed, that January 1989 to May 1990, position where I might do her was not broken until McAleese and involved half a dozen damage with impunity. I had went South, became President Court appearances. Then, nothing to lose but my time, of the Republic, and had about a fortnight before the which was of no commercial biographies written about her trial, McAleese, having incurred value, and my sense of the in Dublin. Her 'victory' over

6 me in the High Court in Belfast Director of the Institute of the appointment was, in began to be listed amongst Professional legal Studies any way, political? her achievements—and finally at Queen’s. A Special Senator Martin Mansergh, Correspondent takes Mary McAleese, a adviser to Taoiseachs, joined a look at her previous native of the , in. political activities. graduated from Queen’s in the mid-seventies …Observers in Dublin and chose to go to the claim that McAleese bar in Dublin. However 2. St a t e m e n t Of Cl a i m committed political suicide contemporaries of in 1987… McAleese at Queens, as Served this 10th day of well as in Dublin, suggest February 1989 by Messrs. Last September, that her experience as a L’Estrange & Brett of 7 & 9 considerable interest practising barrister seems Chichester Street, Belfast was aroused in legal to have been limited in Solicitors for the Plaintiff circles in Northern Ireland the extreme. She soon with the appointment of turned in preference to Writ Of Summons Issued Mary McAleese as the an academic career and 26th January, 1989 Director of the Institute eventually became a of Professional Legal criminal law lecturer at 1. The plaintiff herein is Studies at Queen’s Trinity College. However, a Barrister-at-Law and the University, Belfast. McAleese’s interests in Director of the Institute of Dublin were not confined Professional Legal Studies at The Institute is the merely to the study of Queen’s University, Belfast. body which attempts criminology. She was, to prepare students for and is, a passionate 2. The first named their careers in the legal supporter of what can defendant was at all times profession, and as such only be described as material to this action the Editor the Directorship is an reactionary Catholic and Publisher of “a Belfast influential position which theology, devoting herself Magazine”. also carries a substantial to the preservation of … salary. Ireland as a pure and untainted Catholic state. 4. In August and Controversy arose September 1988 the over McAleese’s She regularly defendants and each of appointment because contributes articles and them falsely and maliciously it emerged that the book reviews on various wrote, printed, distributed and Professors’s experience aspects of the Church published, or caused to be of the Northern Ireland to religious publications written, printed, distributed and legal system was almost as well as to the Irish published in Volume 3 No. 3 of non-existent, and that Times. Given the role “A Belfast Magazine” for August she had formerly been of the Catholic Church and September, 1988, of and an academic at Trinity in the Irish state, it was concerning the plaintiff and of College, Dublin. However, unsurprising that she and concerning the plaintiff in it was the Professors’ should find herself a her professional capacity as a active membership of position on the political Barrister-at-Law and Teacher the Fianna Fail which scene. As a member of Law, an article entitled “The prompted most concern of Fianna Fail, she was Knitting Professor” on pages 12 and a suggestion generally regarded as and 13 of the said publication. arose that McAleese’s an individual whose rise The text of the said article was appointment was a would be worth watching. as follows:- political move generated Her journalistic skills by the Anglo-Irish were expanded further “The Knitting Professor process. What might when she became a have prompted McAleese presenter on RTE. Thus Mary McAleese has for the Directorship and McAleese seemed to have recently been appointed can any credence might guaranteed herself a high be given to the claim that profile on several fronts in

7 the Republic, particularly that abortion, for example, practical experience of Dublin. would be forced on the working in either branch Irish to bring them into line of the profession. it However, sadly with their fellow European was further suggested for McAleese, things Community members. that the position might started to take a turn for So, at a press conference, suit someone who the worse. Her fellow she questioned whether had recently retired. at RTE— a united Europe was The terms of this angered by her blatant desirable if Ireland was advertisement certainly support of for Fianna not to retain its illiberal fitted the previous director, Fail and the Catholic traditions, while reaping James Russell, and other Church, moved against the economic benefits of staff at the Institute, who her. The trade unions at membership.However, are all experienced legal RTE passed resolutions her claims were treated to practitioners. Unusually, ensuring that any member what she herself termed the position was not filled holding down a job and as “howls of derision” at the first time, and the another full-time position from leading politicians vacancy had to be re- would lose their union including Alan Dukes and advertised. membership, thus being Des O’Malley, who both unable to work at RTE. claimed that the EEC By September it only had jurisdiction over became clear that Ostensibly this move purely economic matters. McAleese had been was to ensure that no More interesting was the appointed. Protests union members would reaction from her fellow immediately arose from be deprived of the Fianna Fail members, who Unionist quarters. Cecil opportunity to work at were not happy about her Walker, Clifford Forsythe RTE. However, the prime attempted sabotage of the and Roy Beggs attempted target was McAleese, Single European Act. It to get the matter who was lecturing full- was alleged that after the debated in the House of time at Trinity College. press conference, Charles Commons, arguing that As a result she was soon Haughey, on leaving the as McAleese had no shunted out of RTE. Dail, was asked what practical experience of Nevertheless, she still had he thought about Mary the Northern Ireland legal her political career, until McAleese’s views. His system, the only reasons she herself demolished response was “Mary for her appointment must these aspirations too. who?”. have been a political. The only response to Observers in Dublin If this anecdote is this accusation came claim that McAleese accurate, this was a from professor Gordon committed political surprising response from Beveridge, the Vice- suicide in April 1987. the to the Chancellor of Queens, She and other lawyers views of one of his party’s who rather weakly stated became concerned rising stars. If it is not, that McAleese was the over what they saw as it still serves to illustrate most suitable applicant for fundamental rights under the isolated position that the job. Either Beveridge the Irish Constitution McAleese found herself in. had not read the job being threatened by Perhaps it is not surprising description or he had no the ratification of the that McAleese decided to conception of what exactly Single European Act. move on to other things, the Directorship of the McAleese’s prime concern but why she chose the Institute involved. was that the abortion laws QUB Legal Institute is not would be liberalised. She clear. The other parties argued that under the involved in the running of Supreme Court’s decision When the vacancy the Institute were silent in the Crotty case, the at the Institute arose, about the appointment. EEC would not be limited it was advertised as These other parties solely to influencing being suitable for include the Law Society, economic matters and someone who had good the Bar Council and the

8 Department of Education; informed her duties as Director. the latter effectively “that all she would be (o) That the plaintiff held having the whip hand, taking up in Belfast would the Institute of Professional because it provides all the be knitting!”. Legal Studies in contempt. financing for the Institute. (p) That the plaintiff It was this department 5. By the said words in was idle and lazy in the which last year effectively their natural and ordinary performance of her duties as prevented the Law meaning the defendants Director. Society from setting up meant and were understood to (q) That the plaintiff its own form of training mean— was improperly holding two for solicitors, as the (a) That the plaintiff appointments simultaneously. Department would have was unfit for her present (r) That the plaintiff was been faced with a massive appointment as Director of the rarely present at the Institute of bill for their efforts. It is Institute of Professional Legal which she was Director. therefore apparent that Studies at Queen’s University (s) That the plaintiff was it is the Department of Belfast. not a fit person to be Director Education which has the (b) That the plaintiff was of the Institute of Professional ultimate say, whether wholly ignorant of the Northern Legal Studies. directly or indirectly, Ireland legal system. (t) That the plaintiff was not on the running of the (c) That the plaintiff was a fit person to be a Barrister-at- Institute. This may well appointed as Director not on Law. explain why McAleese, her merits but due to political an unlikely candidate, intrigues. 6. By reason of the succeeded in receiving (d) That the plaintiff was publication of the said article the Directorship and the held in low esteem by the staff the plaintiff has been greatly salary which accompanied and students of the Institute. injured in her credit, character it. (e) That the plaintiff’s and reputation and in the way religious views made her unfit of her chosen profession and in McAleese eventually for her present appointment. her standing in public life and chose to grace the (f) That the plaintiff was a has been brought into hatred, Institute with her presence bigot. ridicule, odium, public scandal in January, some three (g) That the plaintiff was a and contempt. months after the start of religious extremist possessed the academic year. The of views alien to the people of And the plaintiff claims reason for this was that Northern Ireland. damages. her contract with Trinity (h) That the plaintiff was a Donnell J. Deeny. College would not expire cynical careerist. until then. However, (i) That the plaintiff students at the Institute only applied for her present report that they have appointment because her 3. A De f e n c e In Re p l y not noticed McAleese’s political career in the Republic o h e t a t e m e n t o f presence anymore now of Ireland had foundered. T T S than they did in October. (j) That the plaintiff had Cl a i m She is said to emerge and has no true interest in the occasionally when teaching of law. Served this 27th day of May, visiting VIPs arrive at (k) That the plaintiff had 1989 the Institute. Given that and has no true interest in her by the First-named the former Director ran profession as a Barrister-at- Defendant, Brendan Clifford, several courses as well Law and Teacher of Law. acting in person. as attempting to ensure (l) That the plaintiff was that all the students late in taking up her present 1. The First Defendant leaving the Institute had appointment. admits and avers that the employers, McAleese’s (m) That the plaintiff was Plaintiff was called to the Bar attitude to her job is in breach of her contract of Northern Ireland in 1974 and unusual. regarding her present to the Bar of the Republic in appointment. 1978. The Plaintiff was from Perhaps she was not (n) That the plaintiff was 1975 until 1979 and from 1981 being flippant when she negligent in the performance of

9 until 1987 the Reid Professor PARTICULARS attaches himself to an of Criminal Law, Criminology experienced junior for a and at Trinity College (a). The Plaintiff in or about period of six months… in Dublin. Between 1979 October 1987 was appointed This system worked and 1981 the Plaintiff was Director of the Institute of reasonably well when the employed by Eire Television as Professional Legal Studies at newly called barrister had a reporting on current Queen's University Belfast. very little, if any, work of and political affairs. She has The Institute of Professional his own, but the greatly been Director of the Institute Legal Studies has the function increased amount of work of Professional Legal Studies of filling the gap between available to the very junior at Queen's University, Belfast academic qualification barrister… has led to since October 1987. in knowledge of law and the pupil being unable to experience in the practice of spend sufficient time with 2. Paragraph 2 of the law. The new Northern Ireland the Master or working on Statement of Claim is admitted. jurisdiction established in 1920 his Master's papers…" was deficient in this area. This 3. Paragraph 3 of the deficiency was analysed by the Problems peculiar to Statement of Claim cannot be Armitage Committee, which training as a solicitor were confirmed by the First-Named reported to the Government of described as follows: Defendant. Northern Ireland in 1973, and the Institute was established "31. The main problem 4. It is admitted that the on the basis of the Armitage facing the prospective First Defendant published the Report in 1976. And the apprentice is to find a words set out in paragraph 4 of Armitage Committee set out suitable Master with a the Statement of Claim under guidelines for the appointment practice sufficiently wide the heading "The Knitting of the Director of the Institute in and varied to provide Professor" in the issue of the accordance with the function of him with the necessary magazine "A Belfast Magazine" the Institute. experience, who has Volume 3 Number 3 August/ the time to devote to his September 1988. The said The deficiency in the apprentice's instruction." words formed an article, the full Northern Ireland legal system, context of which will be relied which the Institute was The Armitage Report upon by the First Defendant designed to remedy, was concluded at trial, but paragraph 4 is described in the Armitage otherwise denied. Report as "39. It was clear to us from the evidence 5. It is denied that the said "23. the almost submitted that the words were understood to bear complete lack of any successful completion any meaning defamatory of the satisfactory form of direct of existing courses of Plaintiff whether as alleged in professional training…" professional training paragraph 5 of the Statement provides no guarantee of Claim or at all. "27. The breakdown as to the competence of the pupillage system is or the quality — beyond 6. Further or alternatively, the major dissatisfaction academic quality — of insofar as the words expressed in the evidence a candidate for either complained of mean that there relating to the training branch of the Profession. was reason to doubt whether of barristers. There is We are satisfied that the Plaintiff, by reason of her no Chambers System in the case for change is limited experience in practice Northern Ireland. Each overwhelming." at the Northern Ireland Bar and newly called barrister is by reason of her controversial allocated a seat in the The Armitage Report political and religious views, Bar Library and may recommended that the was an appropriate choice for accept briefs and mark deficiencies in the practical appointment as Director of the fees immediately after training of Solicitors and Institute of Professional Legal Call. No rule of pupillage Barristers should be made Studies at Queen's University exists but the newly good through an Institute of Belfast, the words are true in called barrister normally Professional Legal Studies substance and in fact. which would be established

10 at Queen's University, and was "left in no doubt that difficulty would be removed; would, in close association with for a large section of the and "3.16. We would hope the legal profession, give one practising profession the that those who teach at the year vocational courses to law Institute is regarded as part of Institute would continue to have graduates. the University and therefore experience in practice and remote from practice". It recommend that the full-time Consonant with its considered this view to be staff of the Institute should recommendations for the "profoundly misconceived", maintain as close a contact Institute of Professional Legal and recommended that it be with private practice as is Studies, the Armitage Report broken down by a more active practicable." said, concerning the Director of involvement of the profession the Institute: in "all aspects of the Institute's (b). The first Director of the work["]. Institute of Professional Legal "101. We expect the Studies was James Elliott, of Director to be a person The Bromley Committee the firm, Elliott, Duffy, Garrett, with wide experience considered the advantage of who was also City Coroner and in successful practice. direct control of the Institute a leading Solicitor. He kept Such person could by the profession, but did not up his professional practice, expect to command a recommend this because "It while teaching several courses salary as a practitioner was made clear to us that at the Institute. The second above the maximum Government funding of the Director, James Russell, had Professorial Salary paid Institute would cease if it extensive experience as a by Queen's University. were to become independent; Solicitor in a firm of Solicitors, We therefore recommend the profession left us in no J.W. Russell & Sons, in which that the salary should doubt that it could not find the he was a partner for over be fixed at the maximum resources; consequently an twenty years. He taught four Professorial Salary of the independent institute would courses at the Institute, as University and we would have to be funded entirely by well as using his professional expect this amount to be students' fees." connections to place students supplemented by limited with practitioners of law upon private practice or other The Bromley Committee the conclusion of their course. outside sources." described the Institute as "a On the retirement of James bridge between academic Russell, Max Feeny, a leading The Bromley Committee, study and practice and the figure in the judiciary of many which reported to the aim is to teach intending years standing, filled the post Government of Northern barristers and solicitors the on a temporary basis. The Ireland in 1985, reviewed skills and techniques which Plaintiff, who abandoned the the work of the Institute, they will require especially in practice of law soon after and stressed the need to the early years of practice. qualifying for the Bar, could not strengthen its links with the Unfortunately we have received continue in private practice, legal profession. It expressed evidence of a regrettable gap because she had no private one marked difference with the between the Institute and practice. And since she was Armitage Report: "Experience the profession for which both not a practising member of the has shown that training at must share responsibility… It legal profession, she could an institute cannot replace is therefore essential, in our not transmit the practical training at the job". It therefore opinion, that both sides should experience of the profession recommended that intending find ways of working more to the law graduates at the solicitors should serve a two- closely together" (3.8). Institute. year apprenticeship, one year of which should be in a The Bromley Committee (c). The post of Director of solicitor's office, sandwiched reported the difficulty, pointed the Institute of Professional between two parts of a year out to them by the then Director Legal Studies was advertised at the Institute, and that a of the Institute, of attracting in the of comparable arrangement be staff of the requisite quality April 9th, 1987, in the terms made for intending barristers. from the profession to the set out in the Official Reports Institute, and it agreed that described above. The text of The Bromley Committee salary was an inhibiting factor. the advertisement read: It expressed the hope that this

11 "The Queen's the Personnel Officer, who pointed out that the University of Belfast The Queen's University Plaintiff was brought in from of Belfast, BT7 1NN, a foreign jurisdiction and was DIRECTOR OF Northern Ireland. closing appointed without having the INSTITUTE OF date: May 7, 1987 requisite experience. The PROFESSIONAL LEGAL (Please quote Ref. 87/ House of Commons Motion STUDIES BT). they tabled read as follows: N 130651". "The Institute of "That this House, Professional Legal The Plaintiff met the believing in the principles Studies was established in inessential requirement of merit, equal opportunity 1976 by the University (in of experience in law and fair employment, co-operation with the Inn teaching, but did not meet shares the concern among of Court and Incorporated the definite requirement members of the legal Law Society of Northern of "experience in profession and others Ireland) to provide a professional practice". regarding the appointment full-time vocational year of Mary McAleese as course of professional (d). An Interview Board Director of the Institute legal training for law was set up by the Council of Professional Legal graduates intending to For Legal Education, a Studies at Queen's practise as solicitors or body representative of the University, Belfast; and barristers in Northern profession, the judiciary and calls for an early debate, Ireland. Under the of Queen's University, Belfast, to establish, if the post guidance of the Council to interview candidates for was advertised for a of Legal Education the position. The candidates semi-retired or retired (Northern Ireland), The who applied in response to the practitioner of several Director of the Institute advertisement were considered years standing, if Mary is responsible for the unsuitable. After the advertised McAleese has practical planning of vocational and closing date, members of legal experience, if on other courses, and for the Interview Board privately graduating from Queen's the administration of the canvassed for applications University, Belfast, she Institute. from people, some of whom went to live and work were not in professional law in another jurisdiction, "Applicants for the practice. This altered the namely the Republic Directorship, which will be job description in substance of Ireland, if she has held for a period of five without advertising the fact, ever practised in the years in the first instance, and constituted word of mouth jurisdiction of the United subject to renewal by recruitment not in accordance Kingdom, if she now mutual agreement, should with fair employment spends two days per week preferably be barristers or procedures which all employers on average in Belfast and solicitors, with experience in Northern Ireland are publicly still lectures in Dublin, the in professional practice, exhorted to observe. Three level of salary afforded but not necessarily applications for the post of to the Director of the holding qualifications Director were elicited: a Institute of Professional to practise in Northern Solicitor in a successful Legal Studies at Queen's Ireland. Experience private practice in Northern University, Belfast, the in law teaching would Ireland; an academic with long number of lectures be desirable, but not experience in the teaching of given by Mary McAleese essential. The salary law in Northern Ireland; and since her appointment of the Director is the Plaintiff. at Queen's University, negotiable and will Belfast, to date, whether be comparable to that (e). The appointment of the there is validity in the applicable to posts in the Plaintiff caused considerable speculation that Mary public service outside public concern, and was raised McAleese was nominated private practice. in Parliament by four Members by the Premier of the of Parliament, representing , "Further particulars 246,603 members of the , and may be obtained from Northern Ireland electorate, appointed for political

12 reasons rather than it was Belfast too." She wanted Eire television, as well as on merit, and the number out. The Plaintiff opposes other programmes. After two of applications made traditions of Court practice. years as a full-time television for the position of the In an article published in the journalist, the Plaintiff returned Director of the Institute Sunday Tribune on 5th October to the Reid Professorship, of Professional and 1988, the Plaintiff wrote: while continuing to work part- Legal Affairs at Queen's "Whatever misguided notions time as a television journalist University, Belfast, and about solemnity and formality and presenter on various RTE the qualifications of each ever lay behind the wearing programmes. She has stated applicant." of horsehair wigs and black that she left full-time television gowns in far off days, today in work because she found it (Roy Beggs, Clifford 1986 they convey an element difficult to take it seriously, but Forsythe and A. Cecil of theatrical farce, the net she also had some conflicts Walker, 25th November effect of which is the precise with her fellow-journalists. In 1987; Roy Beggs, Clifford reverse of the effect intended. or about February, 1984, the Forsythe, A. Cecil Walker, It is a ridiculous get-up at best, Plaintiff told Mary Raftery of John D. Taylor, 7th but worse still, it presents an the Irish Times, that "I left RTE December 1987.) image to the client and to the because I found it awfully hard public of a profession steeped to take television seriously." In (f). The Plaintiff was in obsolete etiquette, hostile or about June, 1984, however, born in Belfast in 1951 and to change and only grudgingly the Plaintiff told Caroline completed a Law Degree at adjusting to the 20th century." Walsh of the Irish Times that Queen's University, Belfast The Plaintiff left the practice of her involvement with RTE in 1969-1973, at the age of the law in Northern Ireland and hadn't always been the most 22. She was admitted to the took up academic law in the pleasant of experiences. Her Northern Ireland Bar in 1974. Republic of Eire. year with the "Today Tonight" The Plaintiff's total experience programme, for instance, she at the Northern Ireland Bar (h). In 1975, at the age of remembers as an awful time was gained around the age 24, the Plaintiff took up the post during which she felt that there of 23. The Plaintiff's name of Reid Professor of Criminal was an abysmal ignorance on does not appear on the legal Law, Criminology and Penology the programme about what team of any cases described in Trinity College, Dublin. was happening in the North: in the volumes for 1974 and This is not a Professorship "Joe Mulholland has admitted 1975 of the officially issued in the generally understood lately that probably during the "Northern Ireland Reports". In sense. It is a lecturing post, H-Block hunger strike they 1978, while Reid Professor, paid for partly from outside the were not aware of what was the Plaintiff became a Barrister University Budget by the Reid happening to the Catholic of the King's Inn, Dublin, Trust. It is recruited at junior community in the North. I was but there is no record of her level, and does not carry a full a Northern voice and I spent having practised in Eire. She professor's pay. The Plaintiff's a lot of time there. Every concentrated on the academic professorial title derives solely weekend I was with friends and socio-political side of law. from the Reid Professorship and relations trying to find out and therefore does not in what was happening in the (g). The Plaintiff found itself indicate the mature North but I was not listened to. the Northern Ireland Bar experience of academic law Whenever I tried to explain that and practical work at the and administration which would more and more people were Bar disappointing. She told normally be the concomitant of being drawn into the H-Block Ces Cassidy of the Irish the title, Professor. cause because of the failure Independent in or about of the British Government to February 1984 that she had (i). In 1979 the Plaintiff act they wouldn't listen to me practised at the Bar for a short left Trinity College, Dublin for because they felt that anyone time, but found the experience a change in career. At the who was bringing that message disappointing. "It was very age of 28 she became a full- into the programme had to be a old-fashioned and very much a time television journalist on Provo supporter. It was literally man's world. There were only current affairs topics. She pillorying the messenger for two women besides myself worked as a political reporter bringing the message." practising at the Bar then, and on Frontline and Today Tonight, two programmes on (j). The Plaintiff decided

13 that she was basically a 1984, also, the National Union matters to facilitate the lawyer and to her this was of Journalists, in pursuance of development of closer relations synonymous with academic union policy against "double- with Northern Ireland. life. In or about February 1984, jobbing", suspended the she told Mary Raftery of the Plaintiff's union membership, (n). After her return to Irish Times: "basically I was a thus ending her hobby of academic life the Plaintiff lawyer, and I wanted to go back television journalism; and became a more controversial to academic life". The Plaintiff in February, 1986, the NUJ figure in the public political life held the Reid Professorship terminated her membership. of the Republic of Eire. The at Trinity College, Dublin The Plaintiff was reported, Plaintiff became a member from 1981, until she obtained in the Irish Times of 10th of the Fianna Fail Party in her present appointment in February, 1986, as attributing January 1985, with a view to 1987. On her return to Trinity the move to anti-Catholic standing for parliamentary College, Dublin, the Plaintiff prejudice: "She was satisfied election, and did in fact stand started research on a Doctoral that anti-Catholic prejudice as a candidate in Dublin thesis on women in prison in had influenced some members South-East in the February Ireland, and on a textbook on of the Dublin Broadcasting 1987 election. She failed to Irish criminal law. She also Branch of the National Union win nomination to the Fianna participated in a joint project, of Journalists when it decided Fail election ticket from the making a comparative study that her membership of the local Party machine, but her of child custody in Ireland, union should be suspended. 'I name was added to the Fianna England, Scotland and Wales. have no doubt whatever about Fail ticket in this four-seat (k). The Plaintiff took a it…'" The Sunday Press, on constituency by the National considerable interest in the 9th February, 1986, reported: Executive of Fianna Fail practical shortcomings of the "She says an element with the in November 1986. It was Criminal Justice system, and NUJ decided to move against reported in the Irish Times of served on a Commission of her shortly after she appeared 21st November, 1986, that "The Enquiry on the Irish Penal for the Irish bishops at the New decision to run four candidates System, chaired by the late Ireland Forum… she believes in the… constituency was a Sean McBride. The Plaintiff has the union moved against her considerable surprise and not rebutted a statement which purely because of her Forum it reflected the high regard appeared publicly in a profile of appearance." that the Fianna Fail leader, her by Emily O'Reilly published Mr. Haughey, has for Ms in the Sunday Tribune on 8th (m). In February 1984 the McAleese, who has acted as April, 1984: "Other people Plaintiff was invited by the party advisor on legislation in active in the area of prison Roman Catholic Bishops of recent years." The Plaintiff reform say that her knowledge Ireland to form part of their obtained only 2,243 first of the issues, though broad, is Delegation to the New Ireland preferences on the first count academic and patchy in several Forum. The main message of (the quota was 7,655), despite areas. She was reported to the Bishops to the Forum was her high media profile. She have been reduced to tears that Catholic moral policies had been writing a regular while listening to young men on such matters as Divorce, newspaper column in the give their accounts of wasted should continue to form part months before the election, lives spent in prison and reform of the constitutional law of outlining her views on political schools." the Republic. The Plaintiff and social issues. told Ces Cassidy of the Irish (l). Although the Plaintiff Independent in or about (o). The Plaintiff's political returned to academic life, she February 1984, that she was party, Fianna Fail, opposed retained her connection with briefed by the Bishops. She the Single European Act television journalism on a part- stated: "I just heard what they when it was in Opposition, but time basis, and developed her had to say and found I could supported the Act when it came interest in politics. She also stand over everything they into Government. When the engaged in some newspaper said. I share all the concerns Eire Supreme Court declared journalism. In or about they expressed." The Bishops' the Act unconstitutional, the February, 1984, the Plaintiff Submission to the New Ireland Fianna Fail Government sought told Mary Raftery of the Irish Forum made it clear that they to legalise it by a constitutional Times that broadcasting was would not favour liberalisation Referendum. The Plaintiff her "hobby". In February, of legal provisions on moral did not campaign in support

14 of the new policy of her Party June, 1984 that she opposed to a semantic distinction in the Referendum, as public opposed availability of abortion between Church annulment representatives and aspirant after rape or of handicapped and civil divorce. public representatives of the foetuses. In or about April, Party were expected to do. 1987, the Plaintiff told the Irish (s). The Plaintiff has The Sunday Tribune of 24th Times that she opposed the defended publicly in an article May, 1987 reported informed Single European Act on the entitled, "The Much Maligned political opinion as being that grounds that, if, in the near Opus Dei" in the Sunday dissidents would be severely future, the Community decided Tribune of 7th December, 1986, disciplined by the Party after to harmonise its abortion laws the extremely conservative and the Referendum. The report under new health regulations, active Opus Dei organisation, stated: "Mr. Haughey himself no successful legal action which is committed to a revival was dismissive of the subject could be taken against such a of 19th century Roman Catholic recently. When pressed move in the Irish courts. values, and which is regarded that one prominent member with reservation by many of the party was clearly not (r). The Plaintiff is opposed Catholics. following the party line his to the legal availability of reply was rhetorical: 'Did you Divorce for those who want (t). The Plaintiff told say prominent?', he asked it and has made a video and Caroline Walsh of the Irish the journalist who pressed a cassette on that subject for Times in or about June 1984 him and left it at that. Ms the Catholic agency, Veritas that she admired Mr. Charles McAleese, for her part seems (which is a subsidiary of the Haughey on the grounds that willing to take on the party. Catholic Communications the British Government feared She told one public meeting Institute), as a contribution to him: "I also have a very deep in Arklow recently: 'I'll stay in the campaign to defeat the admiration for anyone whom the shagging party, even if he Referendum proposal of the the British Government fears throws me out.'" Irish Government of Garret and I'm very sure they fear FitzGerald to allow legislation Charlie." (p). The Plaintiff has for limited divorce. The video been prominently associated tape had a documentary- (u). Though the Plaintiff with conservative political format, with several does not advocate the methods Catholicism in Irish public interviews conducted by the by which the Provisional IRA life. She was reported by the Plaintiff. A respected group attempts to transfer Northern Irish Times of 6th April, 1984, of lawyers in Eire (the Labour Ireland to the Republic of as saying that "the division Lawyers Group) criticised Eire, she has expressed between Northern Nationalist the Plaintiff's tape "on the sympathetic understanding and Loyalist was no more basis that it is bare-faced of the Provisional IRA. She bitter, no more real, than the anti-divorce propaganda and told Mary Raftery of the Irish gulf between Catholic and anti- below the objective standard Times in or about February cleric in Dublin." people expect from the legal 1984: "I can understand so profession", and that the easily why people join the (q). The Plaintiff is opposed tape included "loaded anti- IRA. I felt that same desire to Therapeutic Abortion, divorce questions" put by for vengeance tearing at me, such as is legal in Northern Professor McAleese to Mr. but deep down in my psyche Ireland. She told Ces Cassidy William Binchy, both of whom I had strong Christian values. of the on are lawyers. The Plaintiff's I literally chose that path. It or about February 1984: opposition to the availability didn't come naturally." She told "I'm an absolutist; I'm very of civil Divorce in the mid- Colin Kerr of "In Dublin" in or strongly opposed to abortion. 1980s was reported in the about June, 1986, "I can look I felt I had to make a forceful Sunday Tribune of 1st June, at members of the IRA and I statement about it and voting 1986, as being quite different can say 'I don't like what you 'Yes' in the Referendum was to views she had expressed do, I think it's wrong, I think it's that for me." (The Referendum in a forthright manner to the probably immoral'. At the same made legislation for any sort of 1979 Conference of the Irish time I can also understand the abortion unconstitutional.) The Law Society in a long paper, pressures and the pushes and Plaintiff told Caroline Walsh which opposed the idea that it the things which propel people of the Irish Times in or about was divorce in itself that was a into joining the IRA, because social evil, and which objected I've experienced the same

15 frustration and the same anger At a public meeting held in establish that the statement myself. And I can also say: Trinity College, Dublin, in was forced out of him." there but for the grace of God 1984, the Plaintiff opposed go I only that circumstances the strip-searching of women (y). The Plaintiff opposes were different." imprisoned on terrorist extradition from the Republic charges. The Plaintiff, in an on the grounds that there is (v). The Plaintiff is intensely article published in the Sunday no justice to be had in the opposed to The Workers' Tribune in November, 1986, United Kingdom for people Party. She told Caroline Walsh described Northern Ireland as who are Irish and Catholic. of the Irish Times in or about "the archetypal police state", In an article in the Sunday June, 1984, "I would not have and said that the Divis area Tribune on 14th December talked to the Workers' Party of Belfast was subject to "the 1986, the Plaintiff wrote: "The under any circumstances and harrassment of its people by Taoiseach has indicated I very likely would not have successive waves of British that implementation of addressed a meeting of Sinn regiments". the Extradition Act may Fein either". The Plaintiff be delayed until changes did not comment when this (x). On 30th November, are made in policing and curious distinction was picked 1986, the Plaintiff wrote in the up in a reader's letter in the Sunday Tribune against the administration of justice Irish Times on 23rd June, Diplock Courts which function in Northern Ireland. He 1986. The Plaintiff told Colin in Northern Ireland, stating that, ought to be reminded that Kerr in or about June 1986: "None of the research on the among the issues which "Frankly the Workers' Party Diplock courts to date provides jaundice Northern Nationalist have nothing worth saying on cogent evidence of judicial bias attitudes to British justice are the subject of Northern Ireland or prejudice, though comments the spectres of Giuseppe and I would not even glorify from individual members of Conlon who died in prison the Workers' Party by entering the judiciary have managed to for something he did not do, into any analysis with them. I turn such painstaking analysis Annie Maguire, her family, mean these are people who on its head. It is the voice of the Guildford Four, the masquerade as a political the headstrong, bigoted judge party but who have strong which sticks in the mind — Birmingham Six — all jailed known and proven links with not of the statistician." The for being Irish, Catholic and terrorists and with people who Plaintiff objected to the rules of in Britain at the wrong time. believe in the use of violence. evidence and the admissibility Somebody ought to point I don't regard them as a of confession statements out to An Taoiseach, that if legitimate political movement which operate in those Courts: this Extradition Bill had been in any sense of the word. I "Whether the Diplock courts in place in 1974 and had the think they have been guilty of have one judge or three, Maguires fled to Ireland out of an extreme con-trick on the whether those judges are from genuine fear that they would population both North and Northern Ireland or Timbuctoo, not get a fair trial, we would not South". In the same interview the court will still operate the have offered them refuge. We the Plaintiff accused Workers' same rules of evidence and would have extradited them Party adherents of holding of admissibility of confession back to Britain to stand trial. the view that "literally any statements, which in reality Just imagine that we had done Catholic from the North had are the things which most truly so — how would we feel today to be a Provo fellow-traveller". mark the Diplock courts off to have played such a squalid However, the Plaintiff believes from the 'ordinary courts'." The role in such a disgraceful in constitutional politics, and Plaintiff said that the ordinary affair? The new bill, if passed told Ces Cassidy of the Irish common law is very cautious by the Dail, will bring many Independent in or about about admitting in evidence such dilemmas to our own February 1984 that she would statements allegedly made by doorsteps. Without having align herself to the outlook of the accused confessing to the to offer the slightest shred of the SDLP. crime: "Good old Lord Diplock evidence against a person, did away with that because the British can demand their (w). The Plaintiff opposes quite simply it was making life extradition — to a jurisdiction many of the legal measures too tough for the prosecution. which is clearly incapable which are used to control the So in the Diplock courts it is of filtering hysterical racist violence in Northern Ireland. the accused person who must prejudice out of its police, its

16 juries or its judges." politicians who are ministers, (dd) The Plaintiff did not ministers who are politicians teach any courses during her (z). The Plaintiff believes and the influence of religious first year as Director of the that Northern Ireland should be rhetoric in politics in Northern Institute of Professional Legal incorporated into the sovereign Ireland is infinitely stronger Studies. state of a 32 County Ireland. In than anything in the Republic. or about June, 1986, she told I wouldn't deny that you (ee) The courses for the Colin Kerr of In Dublin that she would also find that rhetoric Plaintiff's first academic was committed to the idea of in the Republic, it is hardly year were already planned a thirty-two county republic. surprising that you would in a and in a position to function On 2nd November, 1986, the country with an overwhelmingly when the Plaintiff took up her Plaintiff wrote in the Sunday Catholic population. But to appointment. Tribune of the Anglo-Irish accept that jibe from people Agreement that "reconcilliation who deliberately created (ff) The Plaintiff did not between the two ambitions a Protestant state for a have the same degree of of full membership of Great Protestant people and who contact, academic, professional Britain and a sovereign united make no secret of the fact that or practical, with students at Ireland is simply impossible. they want to get back to that the Institute in her first year as They are, as Unionists keep situation, I simply refuse to Director as her predecessors, telling us, mutually exclusive. If enter into debate with them, I Mr. Elliott and Mr. Russell had that is so, and if our politicians refuse to justify the credentials had. still believe as they purport of this state, whose credentials to, that Ireland's future is best are accepted worldwide, 7. Further or alternatively, secured within the framework against the cheap allegations the said words are fair of a sovereign independent from people whose past history comment on a matter of state, then why participate in terms of sectarian politics, public interest, namely, the in a violent and ineffective speaks for itself." appointment of the Plaintiff to charade which still postpones the Directorship of the Institute indefinitely the search for a (cc). The Plaintiff has of Professional Legal Studies. full and final settlement of the described Northern Ireland Northern crisis?" as being colonial and has PARTICULARS advocated self-determination (aa). The Plaintiff has a by Ireland as a whole to Sub-paragraphs a to z vision of a sovereign United overrule the Northern Ireland and aa to ff inclusive under Ireland in the de Valera mould. majority and establish a state paragraph 6 above are In the Irish Times of 14th May, across the present boundaries. repeated. 1984, the Plaintiff was reported The Plaintiff in April, 1986, as saying at the Fianna Fail chaired the opening session 8. If and insofar as may be National Women's Conference, of a Dublin Pearse Seminar necessary, the First Defendant that Eamon de Valera was entitled "Scoil an Phiarsaigh". will rely upon the provisions Ireland's "greatest visionary". She stated on that occasion: of sections 5 and 6 of the "We desire to be a nation, Defamation (Northern Ireland) (bb). The Plaintiff told Colin a nation state. We believe Act, 1955. Kerr of In Dublin in or about that given the abject failure June 1986 that: "I think there of the colonial model and the 9. Paragraph 6 of the are Northern unionists who devolved government model Statement of Claim is denied. use the Rome rule jibe too in Northern Ireland, that the It is denied that the Plaintiff easily and too maliciously and model of self determination, is entitled to the claimed or when the finger is pointed at not selfish determination, any relief and denied that the the Republic of Ireland as a or sectarian determination, Plaintiff suffered the alleged or sectarian state. Let me tell you but self-determination, any injury or loss either in the something, I have lived in both could secure the future of manner alleged or at all. states and for a confessional our children and of their state and a sectarian state inheritors…" Ireland, the 10. Further the First there is nothing on the map Plaintiff added, would be a Defendant will if necessary to beat Northern Ireland in nation-state "when boundaries rely in mitigation of damages Western Europe. There are of nation and state coincide." upon the publication in a prominent position in the final

17 issue of "A Belfast Magazine", it was hardly the business Sheehan which I had long been Volume Three, Number Five of either of them to act more intending to write. (December 1988) of an apology responsibly than the employer to the Plaintiff, to the precise by refusing to apply for it. I had been in Belfast for terms and effects of which the twenty years. What I had First Defendant will refer at The employer behaved attempted to do there had trial. improperly, breaking what was come to nothing, and by this by then a virtual law. But the time I was certain that it would employer was the law, and come to nothing. So I went 4. So m e Co m m e n t a r y therefore considered himself to London, and the Reading to be above the law. And he Room of the British Museum, McAleese's libel writ was had got himself into a bind to do something else. In the issued on 26th January 1989. with this misconceived Institute event, what I produced was I had received a letter from that nobody, with the requisite two books called Derry And her solicitors a few months experience to be its Director, The Boyne and Belfast In earlier, in the Autumn of 1988, wanted to direct. So he The French Revolution. And indicating that her failure to changed the nature of the job, while I was engaged on these appear before students at solicited applications for it, and I received the libel writ from the Institute during the first gave it to somebody along with McAleese. year of her appointment was a year's grace to find out what I had given my London provided for in her contract of it was. address to her solicitors, and employment. the writ was sent to me there. But there was perhaps a I later found that the High The action was settled suggestion in the article that Court in Belfast was curious before I could get documentary McAleese's failure to appear about how a libel writ had evidence of this in Discovery, before the students in order been served on me outside but once it was said I saw that to communicate experience to the jurisdiction. When I said it it was very likely to be case. them was an act of negligence was sent by post, there was a Her employers must have on her part, when in fact it was muted expression of surprise known very well when giving a provision of her contract, put on the part of the Court. her the job that she was unfit to there in recognition of the fact do it straight off. It made sense that nobody who was qualified What are you supposed to that she should have been for the job would take it. do when you receive a libel given time on the job to learn writ? You're supposed to the job. That was the only semblance purchase law with which to of a mistake in the article. It counter the law purchased by Which is nice work if you was an entirely understandable the person who issues the writ. can get it. Though you can't mistake, as nobody—neither Law is a commodity. All law is always get it if you try. But it McAleese nor her employer— a commodity to some extent, was not even the case that had explained to the students and libel law is nothing but a she got it by trying. It came that the new Director had commodity. to her as a gift from on high. a year's exemption from She had not applied for the appearing before them, But what if you lack the job when it was advertised. I and that they were in effect wherewithal to purchase this presume that she knew as well without a Director for that year. commodity called law? as anybody else that she was Nevertheless, it was possibly a not an experienced solicitor or kind of mistake. And I offered At a certain point I went to barrister, and that the thought to publish an apology for it. the High Court in Belfast, said of applying for the job did not I was being prosecuted for libel cross her mind any more than it When, after a period of by an important functionary crossed David Trimble's mind. weeks, I heard nothing more in the legal profession over a from McAleese, I brought out matter concerning the legal But then the employer what I intended to be a final profession, that I had not the (perhaps in the form of an issue of the magazine, with an money to hire a lawyer, so influential judge) asked her to apology. Then, supposing that what arrangements had the apply for it. And Trimble too the matter was closed, I went legal profession, in its wisdom, was asked to apply for it. And to London with the intention of made for somebody who found starting on a book on Canon himself in my position?

18 The answer, of course, was that it was not granted for to me so that I might contest damn all. But it was not an prosecuting a libel action, but the action. The Court refused answer that anybody liked surely it was available for the to do this. Appearance Forms giving. defence in cases where the had to be collected in person, defendant could not afford to and returned in person. And, if And they were still less be represented by lawyers. I failed to enter an Appearance inclined to give the explanation on time I would lose the action. why no provision had been He assured me that it made for such a situation—that was absolutely not available I managed to "make an it was assumed that such a in libel actions under any appearance" within the situation would not arise, since circumstances. I said sorry seven days allowed by being the purpose of engaging in for wasting his time, and was impersonated by a friend. libel action against somebody about to put the phone down. was to make money out of him. He said to hold on and give The London solicitor So what would be the point of him some idea of what it was suggested that I write a prosecuting where there is no all about. Who on earth would summary of what the case was money? be taking a libel action against about and send it to him, and somebody who couldn't even then call in a couple of days Confronting the High Court pay for legal representation? later to discuss it. in that way about the maverick One of the chiefs of the legal behaviour of the person who profession in Northern Ireland, I had never heard of this firm was training its solicitors and I said. of solicitors, but I found that barristers was a piece of they were very famous, and self-indulgence on my part. I I was speaking from a pay- horrendously expensive. already knew what the situation phone on the street. He took was. the number and rang me back, The solicitor dealing with and took me through the first me was in the top third of a things I had to do if I wanted to very long list of the solicitors contest the action. attached to the firm. I had a o n d o n o l i c i t o r A L S couple of meetings with him The first thing I had to do and additional meetings with a When I received the libel was 'enter an appearance'. junior solicitor attached to him. writ in London I looked up the All that required was putting Law Society in the phone- a tick in a box in a document He gave me a crash course book—there were still phone- accompanying the Writ and in libel law and showed me books attached to public sending it back to the Court. I what a Defence should look phones in those times—rang looked the document over but like. He said that in his opinion up, and asked if they could could find nothing of the kind it was probable that the action recommend a firm of solicitors he described in it or with it. could be struck out in an that would act for me on legal He said in that case Northern English Court on legal grounds, aid in defence of a libel action. Ireland must be operating a but that would require technical I was given two or three names procedure that was obsolete in legal argument and I should not and phone numbers. The England, and that I would need attempt legalisms. names meant nothing to me. I to get a particular form from the discovered later that the reason Court in Belfast, fill it in, and He advised me not to bother they meant nothing to me present it. with a counter-action, which was that I was not a reader of would only complicate things Private Eye. This was the first example for me, with little prospect of I came across of the reward since my time was of I rang the first of the backwardness of British such little commercial value. numbers and was plugged law in the Northern Ireland And he said that, instead of through to a solicitor who jurisdiction, and the way it is keeping cards close to my happened to be free at that arranged to make work for chest, I should put everything moment. I asked if his firm lawyers. I had into the Defence. And would do a libel defence this accorded with my own on legal aid. He said legal I rang up the High Court inclinations. aid was not granted for libel in Belfast and asked for an I returned to Belfast, drew cases. I said I understood Appearance Form to be sent up the Defence, and sent him a

19 copy. He rang me in Belfast to Re s p o n s e To Th e Re p l y financially as I had ever been. go over the Defence, and spent If you've got nothing, you can't about two hours on the phone McAleese's solicitors were lose it. If she lost, her career going over it, and trying to very off-hand with me in a would be wrecked. And, even give me a grasp on some very patronising sort of way at our if she won, it would probably be slippery legal distinctions. initial contacts. But there severely damaged by having I made some enquiries about was a startling change in their attention focussed on it. the cost of employing that firm attitude after I gave them my and I gathered that their rate Defence. It was obvious that I wanted to save the time (seventeen years ago) was the whole thing came as a that would be required to £300 an hour. revelation to them—not only prepare for cross-examining the details of their client's her at a trial, and the energy This solicitor, whose market career prior to her appointment that would go into cross- value was a multiple of the at the Institute, and her examination. But it was her market value of any Belfast contempt for the Northern business, not mine, and it was solicitor, did not seem to Ireland legal system, but even up to her to devise a way of feel he was doing anything the facts about the Institute, stopping the action. extraordinary in helping me the reasons why only a lawyer to construct a Defence. His in successful practice should The solicitors quickly came manner was that of a skilled be Director of it, and the gross up with a paragraph that would craftsman doing his job. And breach of Fair Employment stop the action if I signed it. I his motivation for doing it rules by the Employer in sent it to my very expensive without pay seemed to be changing the job specification solicitors in London. They that his profession was being without advertising the change, said it meant that I had won, brought into disrepute by and in privately soliciting and that I should sign it. Libel another member of it, and applications from particular actions were about money that it just would not do. In individuals. and about nothing else, they other words, he was actuated said. I was making no counter- by a kind of professional From this point on, what claim against McAleese and conscience. I never noticed I encountered was a kind of therefore I had nothing to gain the existence of such a thing in desperation to settle the action, by refusing to settle after she Belfast. but a problem of doing so in a had given up her claim for way that did not give the game damages and costs. I said (Eventually I got some away entirely. the language of the paragraph informal help from a solicitor in given to me for signing was Northern Ireland—though not I told the opposing solicitors extravagant and ridiculous from Belfast or North Down, from the start that all I wanted and I didn't feel like putting and not from a lawyer who was to stop having my time my name to it. They said had experience in libel law. I wasted. I had no wish to that's just the language of the also had considerable help, exploit the advantageous law. Pay no heed to it. The though not from legal people, position in which McAleese had essential thing is that she's in accumulating the material put me. given up her claim for money which I put in the Defence. I and undertaken her own costs. will not name any of the people They knew as well as I did who helped me, because that I could act with impunity. Well, I didn't sign. And the there is no knowing when the If the action went to trial and action rumbled on. fact might be used against I lost, I would lose nothing them. And I will not name except a few weeks of time I told the opposing solicitors the firm of London solicitors and effort. Win or lose, she that there was one possible that helped me, though it is would have to bear the costs mistake in the article, having far beyond the reach of the of the action, since she could to do with her failure to lecture Plaintiff, or anybody connected not get costs or damages from at the Institute during her first with her, because the prurient an unskilled labourer, nearing year on the job. That made curiosity in the matter that was the end of his working life, it possible for me to make observable at the Bar and on who was unemployed as often a concession which would the Bench is not something that as not. Whatever the verdict, otherwise not be warranted. should be satisfied.) I would remain as secure But I would sign nothing that was not expressed in ordinary

20 meaningful language, or that by the Law Society, the Bar, century. And, when Belfast implied that the appointment and the Bench. And, once it finally got a University in the had been made in accordance was made clear what the line 1840s, it came as an external with the official rules governing of the Defence was, it became construction: the product of an Fair Employment. evident that the employer Act of Parliament, and it was wanted the action stopped. It a University more in legal form The solicitors indicated to was therefore credible that than in internal substance. me at this point that they were Charles Brett was trying to get having trouble with their client. the action stopped, but was As I had had to return to She was being stubborn. having some trouble with the Belfast in order to tend to client, who had got stuck in a the libel action, I used the I was naturally inclined to rut of stubborn subjectivism. opportunity to discuss higher dismiss remarks like that. It education, historical and was their business to string At any rate, that was how contemporary, with a number me along in the interest of they depicted her to me. of people. Finlay Holmes was their client. But, on the other one. Dr. Black too had had a hand, their client's business While the action was going superior education, so was not only their client's on I had a meeting with I asked him to meet and talk business. It had become very Dr. Boyd Black, a Queen's about it. But what Dr. Black much her employer's business University economics lecturer wanted to talk about was the too. And her employer was of long standing, at the McAleese case. He wanted to the University, the Bench, the Queen's Students' Union. I know why I was persecuting Bar, the Law Society, and a made an appointment to the poor woman, who had got Department of the State. discuss something with him the job because she was the which had nothing to do with best person for it. I explained Senator Mansergh now McAleese or with the Institute. about the Fair Employment reveals that McAleese's libel aspect of the matter—a thing action was "fully backed by In the course of preparing which in another connection he Queen's". And I assume that reprints of writings by Northern was familiar with. But he didn't this advisor of Taoiseachs, United Irishmen I had got to want to know. This instance of and the party colleague of know quite a bit about the it was too close to home for his McAleese when she was a academic life of Presbyterian comfort. party member, has grounds for Ulster in the 18th century knowing. and the early 19th. The 18th He told me that the century Presbyterian clergy University authorities had It would be surprising and gentry had been educated warned him that he was doing if McAleese had not been at Glasgow College/University. himself no good by associating "backed" by her employer They stopped going there when with me. in various ways. If her the Academical Institution action had gone to trial, the was opened in the early 19th He had been associated substance of the Defence century. The intention was with me in politics at an earlier would have been about what that the Academical Institution time but had gone his own the employer did, rather than should be Belfast University, separate way before this. I about the employee. It would and it was so in the first had published a pamphlet have been about the breach instance as the qualifications against Queen's in 1986, when of Fair Employment rules it awarded were taken to be he was associated with me. I by the employer, and about sufficient for a Presbyterian suppose that connection stuck the fact that the Court itself clergyman. But the Academical in the minds of the University was a constituent part of the Institution did not in the authorities, and they failed employer. long run fill the place of a to notice his subsequent University in Belfast—nor did dissociation, and therefore I doubt that the employee Belfast Royal Academy. It warned him off me in 1990 was encouraged to launch seemed to me that the Act of because of McAleese's libel the action by the employer. Union exercised a disabling action. Perhaps she was by the influence on the rounded self- That warning suggests Queen's element of the reliance which characterised that Queen's had a guilty collective employer, but hardly Presbyterian Ulster in the 18th conscience about McAleese's appointment, knowing

21 that it had broken the Fair reason to produce an Affidavit West Indian athletes. The wife Employment rules by taking in London. I was well used of one of the Plaintiffs gave part in it, and it dealt with to the procedure by this time, evidence for the Defence its guilt by the application of and it all went like clockwork, on the subject of the state authority. until the end. The Affidavit was of their marriage. She was there on the desk as good as confronted in the witness box (I can assure the University any of the others I had done. with a series of Affidavits sworn that Dr. Black was a good boy, But as I was about to pay, some years before, which and heeded their warning, and and pick it up and leave, the contradicted the evidence she has never since exchanged a solicitor reached into a drawer gave in Court. I assume she word with me.) and pulled out a Bible and held had been prepared for this it out towards me. When I by Carman. In superb style I was at that time demanding expressed surprise, he pointed she brushed aside what was Third Party Discovery from out that "I swear" means doing said in her Affidavits as wild the University. A Judge in it with a Bible. But, if I had exaggeration, which she had the High Court (acting for the definite objections to that, the sworn to because the solicitor Plaintiff while on the Bench) Affidavit would have to be re- had advised her that it was told me I was not entitled phrased in different terms. pointless producing Affidavits to get Discovery from the if you merely told the modest University. Nevertheless I got I knew that the Bible was truth in them. it. Which shows how brittle the part of the national religion Establishment position was. of Britain, in which hardly I could be almost grateful anybody believed very much, to McAleese for wasting my Sw e a r i n g or at all. It was a kind of fetish. time and energy because it led I approved of national religions me to seeing the marvellous Before going on to describe of that kind. And God was not performance of Mr. Motivator's the sequence of the action, a subject with which I bothered estranged wife in the witness I will mention a curious my head. If it was acceptable box, nudged along by Carman. discovery I made about to swear in that spirit, I would Swearing. swear. He thought that would And not quite on the be fine, so I did. subject of Affidavits: There I had reason to produce was then, near the University, quite a few Affidavits. Most of If this had happened in and alongside the Moravian them were produced in Belfast. Belfast I would not have Church, a set of offices I drew them up and they sworn. In Belfast there was no which purported to be in the were processed by solicitors established routine of national business of giving legal advice for a standard fee. (On one culture in which these things to citizens. I went along and occasion I chanced to go to a are contained and rendered asked what legal assistance Catholic firm and the solicitor, meaningless. And least of they could give me, a lone intrigued by the nature of all is there a religion which is citizen, without means, being the case, wouldn't take any part of a national culture, on sued for libel by one of the money.) which the individual may touch chiefs of their profession. So lightly on occasion, if he finds what was the case about? An Affidavit includes the it expedient, without becoming Well I just happened to have formula "I swear". I wrote this enmeshed in theology. In my Defence with me: would down, thinking nothing of it. Belfast, religion is religion. And they care to see it? They Books of model documents that presumably is why the would indeed. So they went are published for the legal swearing is done by typewriters to an inner office to look it profession, and I produced a in solicitors' offices in Belfast. over, and returned a short typed copy of the appropriate while later (having done some form and filled in the relevant Further on the matter of photocopying I presumed) particulars. And so these Affidavits: While in London I to say, Sorry, but there was Affidavits were produced and went to the High Court there nothing they could do for me. signed and submitted, and that to see a libel trial. George was that. Carman QC was appearing for the Defence, on behalf of a But on one occasion I had newspaper, which was being sued by a couple of famous

22 La w In Be l f a s t jurisdiction. the White Book.

After I had submitted my Was law in Northern Ireland I then concluded that Defence, I went back to the English law, or Scottish law, Northern Ireland law was High Court and said I wanted or Irish law, or something indeterminate, was largely to be informed about the distinct in itself, or something informal, and was made up as procedures leading to the indeterminate? it went along. In other words, Trial, and on a few occasions it was backward, it was law Masters made themselves I could get no definite for lawyers, and it was loaded available to discuss this. answer to this question against a defendant-in-person: (Masters are minor judges who in Belfast, but the best or at least it was in my case. deal with some of the hearings, bet seemed to go on the preliminary to trial.) assumption that it was English Much was said to me about law. So I got a copy of the the Court making allowances "And the action is being English White Book and figured for the difficulties faced by brought by—ah, yes— out the phases of a Court somebody who had to appear Professor McAleese!"—with action from it—only to discover for himself. It would bend sarcasm. It was notorious in at an early stage that a phrase over backwards in an attempt the Court that the 'Professor' listed in the White Book did not to equalise the conditions was a mere lecturer. apply in Northern Ireland. of conflict between the When I complained professional lawyer and the And where might I get a about this to a Master, he Defendant-in-person. (And, as manual of Court procedure? sympathised of course, but this is being produced, I hear told me I was fortunate that Turlough O'Donnell SC assert Well, there was a loose-leaf my case had not happened a on Prime Time that judges folder, wasn't there? Or was few years earlier. It used to strain to equalise conditions there? Certainly there was. be the case that there were between professional lawyers There must be! hardly any objectively laid and unrepresented litigants.) down procedures which could Where could I get it? be handled bureaucratically by That might possibly be means of forms. Before the the case in an action where At HMSO [Her Majesty's administrative reforms recently the Court itself is a detached Stationery Office] in Chichester introduced, certain things could forum in which the action St. Where else? only be done by barristers takes place, and does not meeting Judges on their way have a vested interest in the But HMSO had never heard back to their chambers on outcome. But, in my case, of it. Thursday afternoons—or the Court was a party to the was it Fridays?—and making action, being a component part Well it must be somewhere. arrangements with them. of the employer who broke They were sure it existed. The Fair Employment rules when Library of the Law Society must I then proceeded on the appointing McAleese. have it. Or the barristers' Law assumption that English law did Library. not apply in Northern Ireland. Take for example that appeal But a time came when a against the Discovery award But I was not a solicitor, Discovery award was made to made by the Master. It was an so the Law Society would not me by a Master and McAleese appeal on a legal technicality. admit me. And I was not a appealed it to a Judge. And I knew nothing of the grounds barrister, so I was excluded what did the Judge do? He of the appeal until the hearing from the Law Library. And yet asked the usher to bring him started. The Judge made one of the chiefs of the legal Gatley On Libel from the reference to a Book Of Appeal, profession had put me in the library, and he read it on the and I noticed that he took it position where I had to act point, and over-ruled the award for granted that McAleese as both barrister and solicitor made by the Master. had given me a copy of this without any published manual document. I let him know that of court procedure, or any Gatley On Libel is the basic she hadn't, and that I knew guide to what law applied to book on libel in English law. I nothing of the ground of the libel in the Northern Ireland had begun reading it, but had appeal until after the hearing left off after my experience with

23 had begun. But the Judge just the answers he wanted. I whether somebody might have let the matter pass. was a feckless Irish labourer helped me with my Defence. who counted for nothing in Might it be a solicitor in this Was it reasonable to expect the scheme of things that place or a barrister in that a Defendant-in-person to concerned him. So he said he place? North Down perhaps. cope with a legal technicality would look into it. Of course he I encouraged them to indulge prepared in advance by the didn't. And I knew he wouldn't. themselves. Plaintiff and sprung on him in Court? I went away and did At a further hearing, to something more useful than fix a date for the trial, the I imagine that, if I had made pursuing justice, having Judge—a Lord Justice this a song-and-dance about acquired hard knowledge time—arranged a date with it, the hearing would have of how Justice worked at McAleese's lawyers without been adjourned to give me the mass level of English reference to me. This was at an opportunity to prepare a society. It was very rough a general setting of dates for defence—and that, if the Court justice indeed. It worked to a impending cases. It was held had not a vested interest in the considerable degree by frame- in a large, crowded room. I case, the Judge would have ups and thuggery and perjury was standing by one wall and suggested this off his own bat on the part of authority, with the McAleese's lawyers were as a matter of equity. But he complicity of all concerned on across the room at the other let it pass. And so did I. the side of justice and authority. side. I objected to the date And, but for that experience, I set, as being too near in view I have an unfortunate might never have been quite of the fact that McAleese had tendency in situations like that sure. not met her obligations in the which inhibits me from fighting Discovery phase in the time my corner—a curiosity to find And what I got from that allocated, but had dragged it out how things work. appeal hearing in the Belfast out for months beyond the set High Court was the definite date, and I had been unable to Shortly after I went to knowledge that the Judge begin preparation for the next London from North Cork in the knew that he was a party to the phase while Discovery was still late 1950s, I was picked up on action he was hearing. going on. the street by two plain-clothes policemen, taken to a Police- And I got that knowledge Lord Justice McDermott box (a thing which no longer cheap. I was denied an then had some discussion exists outside Dr. Who), and element of Discovery, but it sotto voce with McAleese's beaten up. The policemen remained open to me to get it lawyers on the other side of the then took some implements out by amending the Defence— room, which I could not hear, of their pockets and asked me which I set about doing. and which he could not have what I was doing with them. I expected me to hear. And decided that odd behaviour McAleese was represented he also agreed the time to be was my best bet for avoiding by the Bench and the Bar. I do allocated for the trial with them a criminal conviction, and I did not suggest that they wanted without consulting me. it well enough to cause them to win for her. And if the action to decide to let me go and had gone to trial before a jury After this I asked for a find somebody else instead. I the Bench would have had to meeting with a Master and then found out whose authority be very careful indeed about put it to him that it was they came under, went to the favours bestowed. The entirely unreasonable to his station, wrote out an trial would have been a very expect a Defendent-in- account of what happened, different thing from these person, without any manuals and was interviewed by the hot-house legalistic affairs in of Court procedure, or books Superintendent. It was obvious which Bench and Bar might of precedent for the Northern that he did not doubt that what communicate sotto voce with Ireland jurisdiction, to guide I said was true, but the truth one another as if I wasn't there. him, and faced with a battery or falsehood of it was not his of solicitors and barristers concern. He wanted to find out At another hearing before employed by the Plaintiff, who if I had any friends or relations a Judge (the same Judge) was herself one of the chiefs with sufficient influence to the Bench and the Bar put on of the legal profession, to have make trouble. I gave him a very cute double-act about made preparations for trial

24 while the Plaintiff was dragging whom there were said to be the conduct of the Bench (as out the Discovery proceedings. many. a component of the collective And I also set out the additional employer) in soliciting an difficulties that followed from I imagine that it was put to application from a Dublin law my being an unskilled, and at that well-intentioned Master lecturer without experience in present unemployed, building that I was not what I appeared the practice of law, and giving labourer. He conceded that to be, and he was bewildered. her the appointment, should I had a very strong case be questioned. And that a for delaying the trial, and At the outset of the certain Lord Justice should be undertook to inquire into the proceedings he had put it subpoenaed and put on the matter. to me that, if I approached spot. And no barrister with a the Unionist Party, it would career to make in this small, A few days later I came back probably supply me with largely informal, jurisdiction, to him. Looking sheepish, lawyers. It was an obvious was going to do that. he said he thought it was point, and yet it showed how best that the trial should go far he had been left behind by And then there was the ahead as planned. He was a the times. question of whether a fair distinguished-looking, elderly trial could be held within the Protestant gentleman with old- The Judge/barrister double- jurisdiction at all. If the action world manners—but he looked act was convinced that I was a had gone to trial, I intended sheepish. It was obvious that Unionist front, and that behind to challenge the legitimacy he had been given orders by me was Robert McCartney QC. of holding the trial within a the Judge, or the Lord Justice. But, if such had been the case, jurisdiction which was directly I would not have been willing concerned in the action, and The case I put to him was to settle, and would have was therefore prejudiced. true in all its details. But contested every point instead from the details he would of indulging my curiosity. As well as the obvious facts, have inferred a context that I had a letter in response to was not true at all. Life in At a late stage in the an inquiry to the Bar Council Catholic Ireland is not graded proceedings the helpful saying it could not deal with the by division-of-labour as it is in Northern Ireland solicitor I matter as one of its members English society, and Protestant have mentioned asked if he would be trying the case. I society in the North was could inquire whether a certain don't know if that letter was English in that regard though barrister would take the case intended to be a hint about how not in others. The subjective (not McCartney). It was his I should proceed. reality of Catholic persons opinion that no run of the mill is therefore not indicated by barrister would dare to take So much in the way of status within the division-of- the case, even for pay, and general observations. labour, and is therefore not that I was perhaps better off comprehensible to Protestant without a barrister anyway, understanding. And it was given the circumstances of the Se q u e n c e Of Th e in Slieve Luacra and West case. However, this particular Ac t i o n Belfast that the most extreme barrister might take it, being absence of determination of semi-retired. I agreed that he The sequence of events in subjective life by the division- might satisfy his curiosity by the action were the issuing of of-labour prevailed. And I asking. And the answer was, the Writ; the entering of an had come from the one to the No. Appearance by the defendant; other. And for twenty years the entering of a Reply by the I had been engaged in a The Northern Ireland defendant within a specific political enterprise which was jurisdiction is very small, and period; the Discovery phase properly the business of the the influence of Judges in it in which, if the rules are middle class intelligentsia of is proportionately large—the observed, each gives the the Protestant community—or influence of Judges on the other all documents relevant its middle class intellectual, careers of barristers, that is. to the case; and the trial. (In because there was only English procedure there is an one that I ever saw—and of It was evident from the terms intermediate phase between Constitutionalist Catholics, of of my Defence that conduct Discovery and Trial for the of the case would require that

25 purpose of tidying up, but not in struck out. It wasn't struck and he could get an award of Northern Ireland.) out, but I was awarded costs costs against me to counter the for that particular incident. It earlier award of costs against If Discovery rules were wasn't explained to me on McAleese. strictly enforced by the Courts, what formal grounds the I imagine that much of the failure of a professionally- The solicitors had on nonsense would be cut out of represented Plaintiff to make many occasions expressed libel actions. And I know that even a pretence of meeting her sympathy with my difficulties McAleese's action would have Discovery obligations was held as a Defendant-in-person in fallen in the Discovery phase if to be insufficient for ending her coping with Court procedures they had been enforced at all. action. (The actual grounds and the professionals acting were clear enough of course.) against me, saying that if I had In mid-October I gave her any problems about procedure lawyers a Discovery List of 61 I put in a bill for my costs, I had only to ask and they items, covered by Affidavit, and but it wasn't paid. I then would help. As I wasn't born made the documents available discovered that it was standard yesterday, and as I knew for copying. practice not to comply with something about Charles Brett, such awards. If I wanted it I was thoroughly sceptical And a week later they paid, I would have to summon of the offer. I let the London proposed that the action should McAleese to appear before a solicitor know of my scepticism. be settled by me signing a Taxing Master on the issue. As But he assured me that there paragraph drawn up by them, I did not do this, I cannot say were things that solicitors just with no damages or costs; and with certainty whether payment did not do. they told me they had great would automatically follow on a difficulty persuading her to decision by the Taxing Master, He had to revise his opinion agree to this. And I replied in but my guess is that it wouldn't. when Charlie Brett did them. early November that I would not respond to the proposal Some months later I was But, back to Discovery. until I got Discovery from her. asked by McAleese's lawyers to distinguish between fact The piece of paper stuck The final date laid down and opinion in my Defence. I into my hand in the Courtroom for giving a Discovery List asked the London solicitor when McAleese had run over covered by Affidavit was how I should reply to this. He time had nothing in it relevant reached in mid-October, and I said it was not something that to her action. had not received a single item was done in English law. He of Discovery from McAleese, suggested a formula for my I therefore summoned her or any communication from reply and said I should write to to Court to get an order for her regarding Discovery. So McAleese's solicitors asking if it Discovery against her. It was a I applied to the Court for her would meet their requirements. Master's Court again. One of action to be struck out for I did so, but got no answer. her barristers was there bright failure to give Discovery. But, a couple of weeks later, and early, seated at the front I learned that McAleese's desk with a stack of law books As I was waiting in the lawyers had gone to Court on before him. Courtroom for the case to the issue, and the Court found come up, one of her barristers that I had gone over time in the When the case came up, came up to me and tried to matter, and had awarded the I said what I had been given stuff a piece of paper into my costs of it against me. by way of Discovery had no hand. I refused to take it. bearing on the action taken (This was at a Master's Court, I had not been informed, against me. Her attitude where a number of cases were either by McAleese's lawyers appeared to be that I was taken in sequence.) or by the Court, that the matter somehow not entitled to was coming up in Court. The Discovery, though the rules When the case came up, first I heard of it was the award said that I was, and that I McAleese's lawyers could not of costs against me. wanted more. deny my assertion that she had failed absolutely to meet her Charles Brett had obviously The barrister said that Discovery date. I demanded not replied to my inquiry so the Discovery requirement therefore that her action be that I would run out of time had been complied with in

26 accordance with the rules. He mentioned some of them they gave her an undertaking and said they should be made that they would never sell it The Master said to me available to me. again, ever. As far as I knew that I had raised obstacles there was not a scrap of paper against further Discovery by I did not understand how, relevant to it anywhere, except demanding Discovery covered in the light of his explanation the paper it was printed on. by Affidavit in the first instance. to me about the Affidavit, I said that the only books on he put the barrister under McAleese's barrister could the matter available to me as serious obligation to give not dispute this. He had to a guide said that I should do further Discovery. What went accept that further Discovery what I did. He then explained on between them sounded to must be given from his side. that, by getting Discovery with me much more like a serious, And he stalked out of the Affidavit, even though I got next though informal, telling-off by Courtroom, fuming. to nothing by it, in demanding the Master than the handing more I was raising the matter down of a legal decision. One of the obvious of perjury. If I had accepted documents McAleese should Discovery without Affidavit, I I imagine what the Master have given me was her could have come back again was concerned about was how Contract of Employment. and again for more, and more things would look at the trial, if I might be given without any concentrated on the Discovery I was interested to see how suggestion that the Plaintiff, in conduct of the person who the year's exemption, from giving me next to nothing, had was paid a very large salary appearing at the Institute to sworn a false Oath. But the to show law students how to communicate experience of Plaintiff had sworn that she had practice law. legal practice to the students, no other documents that were was formulated. relevant to her action against The barrister tried to me, and in demanding more I retaliate by saying that I also She appealed this item was suggesting perjury. had withheld Discovery. I to a Judge, arguing that I had not given material from was somehow not entitled I said that it was entirely the office files of A Belfast to it because of the way my obvious that there was much Magazine relevant to the Defence was formulated. That more. And, if I had made it article in question. (That I was the hearing at which the impossible to get it because hadn't revealed my source, I Judge had Gatley On Libel I followed the rules, the suppose—which I would have brought from the Library, read it situation was ridiculous. I had been obliged to do under the on the Bench, and decided for no wish to be arguing law in rules if there were documents the Plaintiff. Court with a Plaintiff whose which revealed them, but job was to train barristers and not otherwise. The Plaintiff I then began to amend my lawyers, and with the lawyers seemed anxious to discover Defence so as to cover that that she hired, but I had no the name of the author, loophole and entitle me to get alternative. If the situation perhaps with a view to a further the Contract of Employment in was as described, I thought libel action, if not worse.) Discovery. Unfortunately, on there should be a new rule that the day the hearing to amend people who could not afford I explained that the was held, the Plaintiff decided professional help to defend a Magazine never had an to settle on the terms I had libel action should be found office. That such files as it put to Charles Brett's junior guilty as a matter of course by ever had were thrown in the about eight months earlier—a virtue of that fact. It would be waste-basket as each issue rewriting into ordinary language more sensible than the present produced. (It was produced of the paragraph proposed in carry-on. entirely by voluntary effort, from October, with no implication the writing to the printing.) that Fair Employment The Master then turned to procedures had been the barrister with the stack of I also said that the followed in the making of the law-books in front of him and Magazine no longer existed, appointment. said it was obvious that there as the Plaintiff had stopped must be other documents in its circulation by threatening I don't think it would have the Plaintiff's possession that action against newsagents mattered much whether I got were relevant to her action. who had stocked it, unless the Defence amended in this

27 particular or not. I was getting assume that, when that hearing President McAleese, the law the hang of the law. I saw ended, he inquired into the reformer, got the action put that, for all the good-looking matter. He never brought it up down for trial by a Judge, and rules, Discovery goes on right again—except to insinuate at I had to get it altered. And, for up to the trial, and during it. I a later hearing, in a double-act a Defendant-in-person, who couldn't see how questions with the barrister, that I was had never had the slightest about how she got the job, perhaps being briefed by a inclination to be a lawyer, to do and why she was so retiring barrister in North Down.) even the simplest thing at law during her first year in it, could was difficult. It was like fighting possibly be ruled out of order at one's way through a jungle. the trial. But the trial was quite Ju d g e Or Ju r y ? Nothing was routine. close at this time, and I thought it was as well to get used to The next thing was to The charitable explanation judges. prepare for the selection of of why President McAleese a Jury by getting the Jury put the action down for trial by (Judge Nicholson, who List and finding out personal a Judge is that she wanted to seemed to have made the case details about people on it so wear me down by adding to the his own, was a pompous figure, that I might raise objections to force of attrition which I had given to attitudinising. On my potential Jurors whose outlook to overcome in the course of first appearance before him, would probably be biased getting to the trial. he ran off at the mouth about against me. So I was told by what a nuisance it was when a Master. I got the Jury List Her professed concern for people insisted on appearing for the High Court from the the reform of Northern Ireland for themselves instead of being Crumlin Road Courthouse, law—professed when she was professionally represented. I across a tunnel from the a strong Catholic-nationalist said I was not insisting on Jail—but only as a matter of in Dublin, straddling law, appearing for myself. It came curiosity, because I decided journalism, and politics, and as a surprise to me, when one that I would not play on the flirting with Republicanism—fell of his professional colleagues inherent '' of the away when she became the brought an action against me, Belfast populace any more Plaintiff in an action against that the legal system had made than I had ever done. an unrepresented defendant no provision for professional in Northern Ireland. It representation of defendants But if I had to go in for Jury then became her concern who could not afford to buy it. selection, who would I have to take advantage of the But I had been assured that tried to select? Protestants? backwardness of the system such was the case. However, if Catholics? Others?—meaning which she had criticised until it was his opinion that this was disguised variants of the first she became an important not the case, and if he would two. functionary within it, and to take point me to where solicitors advantage of the difficulties and barristers were available to The position I had held face by an unrepresented act for me even though I could in Belfast politics for twenty defendant. One might even not pay them, then I would years did not fit in with either say that it became her moral go to them and accept their component of the established obligation as an egoist. services. system of community politics. I thought I could make sense of Her lawyers repeatedly Judge Nicholson did my Defence to either Unionists told me how eager they were not dispute the matter with or Nationalists, and that the to help me. Naturally I took me. But neither did he tell most difficult element to reason no heed of this. She was not me where barristers were with was the disguised fringes paying them to help me— available, outside the market of each who constituted the assuming that it wash she who system of law, for defendants Alliance Party. was paying them. She was who could not pay them. He paying them to win. And their tacitly accepted that what I said But I had to do something conduct on the only occasion was true. And I was convinced else before the question of when I asked them anything that he did not know, until I whether to engage in the Jury did not suggest that either they told him so, that legal aid was selection game arose—I had to or President McAleese were not available to impecunious secure trial by Jury. restrained by scruples. defenders of libel actions. I

28 And yet I thought it was McAleese. I thought it would possibility of a settlement outrageous that she should probably be the latter, but had suddenly arisen and a have put down the action for would have made it as difficult dispute over amendment trial by a Judge. as possible. might spoil the atmosphere. I said I wanted the amendment This was not only on I did not want to win. I application dealt with because the grounds that the Jury had better things to do than the Plaintiff had been doing system needed propping winning, and it would have nothing but wasting my time up in Northern Ireland, but put me in the wrong place for six months and this was because the Judges had politically. But, beyond that probably another ploy to the been a component part of the point, my purpose would have same purpose. Nothing new appointing body that solicited been to inflict the greatest had come up. And, if my her application and gave her possible damage on McAleese application wasn't heard, and the job, and they had therefore in cross-examination— the Plaintiff did not accept the a vested interest in finding supposing that the jurisdiction terms that had always been that the appointment had been rejected my argument that it available to her, I would have to properly made. was an unfit forum in which to start again with the application. try the action, because it was The Master (and I assumed Anyhow I got the trial taken itself a party to the action. that by this time they were all away from the Judges and The Cork barrister knew in it together) said that, if the allocated to a Jury. that I did not want to win, as morning passed without the did McAleese's solicitors. At matter being settled, I could least the solicitors knew that I come straight back and have Ac t i o n Ab a n d o n e d said that I didn't want to win, the amendment application and the barrister believed it, dealt with. My final appearance in but because he was a barrister Court was for the purpose of he did not approve. But, All that was new was the amending my Defence in order accepting that I did not want to ultimatum, putting a 24-hour to get Discovery of President win, or to inflict severe damage time limit on the possibility of McAleese's Contract of on McAleese in the course settlement. Employment, under which she of losing (because Juries are was excused from appearing fickle and unaccountable, When we left the Master's before her law students at the though infinitely better than Court, the barrister pulled a Institute for a year. Judges with vested interests), piece of paper from his pocket he suggested that I should tell that would have settled the This was about a fortnight McAleese that this was the matter at any time during the before the trial. I had arranged point of no return, and give her preceding year and a quarter. to spend a long weekend with twenty-four hours to make a a barrister away down in rebel settlement in accordance with I said I also wanted a Cork going over the case, and the terms I had put to her all specific statement that the working out lines of approach along. claim for damages was for the cross-examination. The withdrawn and that McAleese case would have occupied all I delivered this ultimatum would bear her own costs—or of my time during those weeks. to Charlie Brett's offices in that, whoever had been paying It had not done so until then. Chichester Street (a few them would bear them. The It had been an irritant. It had hundred yards from Athol barrister went into the Bar probably lost me one book in Street: Belfast is a small, Library to draft this, or possibly addition to the two I had written neighbourly place) in the late to ask permission for it. He and produced. afternoon. Within minutes came out to ask me something a solicitor dashed out of the and I said all that was If I had gone through offices and hared off to the needed was a couple of plain those two weeks of intensive High Court a couple of hundred sentences. I drafted them and preparation, I would have yards away. The following he signed them. refused a settlement of any morning I appeared in Court kind, and would have insisted to get my Defence amended. I left for Dublin that afternoon on the week or two of trial, or McAleese's barrister objected to give a talk on Canon else capitulation by President to my application being Sheehan's politics. It was heard, because, he said, the attended by Michael McDowell,

29 who did not profit from it. the politics of the state that for Catholics, and cannot solicit preserved communal conflict Catholic applicants through But for the settlement, I in prime condition in Northern Catholics already working would have been on the way Ireland. And I reasoned for him. He must go through to Cork City to work out cross- that forcing members of an elaborate employment examination approaches. As both communities together procedure, in which there is no it was, I went to Slieve Luacra in proportionate numbers in hint of a quota system, employ instead all workplaces would either people strictly on merit, and yet aggravate the communal end up with the same balance conflict or leave it unaffected. in the workforce as if he had Fa i r Em p l o y m e n t And the process of forcing the applied a quota system. In issue was already aggravating other words, he must operate President McAleese's action the situation. a heavily disguised quota against me was interwoven system. with politics on my side. If it I argued the matter on a had not been, I doubt that I number of occasions with If an overt quota system had would have taken any interest Bob Cooper, one-time leader been established, there could in it, as I was beyond her reach of the Alliance Party, who have been no objection on financially—you can't get blood was Chairman of the Fair Fair Employment grounds to out of a stone—and such Employment Commission. the appointment of McAleese reputation as I had was beyond The Alliance rejected the as Director of the Institute. It the power of the likes of her to view that exclusion from would have been the turn of a damage. the politics of the state had Catholic. anything to do with the ongoing The live issue in what 'sectarian' conflict. It insisted But it was officially denied passes for politics in Northern that Northern Ireland was that the Fair Employment Ireland in 1990—leaving aside a functional Constitutional system was a quota system, the attritional conflict of the two entity, that it was democratic and other employers were communities which is always in form, and that it could be being made to jump through with us and within which made democratic in substance hoops in their procedures in everything else happens—was through moral exhortation, order to divert attention from the establishment of the provided employment he fact that it was. And then Fair Employment rules for discrimination was ended. a Director of the Institute of employers. They had been Professional Legal Studies is presented first as guidelines I think enough time has appointed in breach of all the but were in the process of passed to enable me to rules. being made into law. say that the experiment of social engineering through It might be that she was the Behind Fair Employment the enforcement of Fair best person for the job, in the law was the assumption that Employment was a total ordinary sense of those words. the ongoing conflict of the two failure insofar as displacing But that had nothing to do with communities resulted from the politics of communal it. The words 'appointment discrimination by Protestant attrition was concerned. In on merit' had been deprived employers against Catholics, a political matter there is no of their ordinary meaning in and the belief that, if Catholics substitute for politics. And the the bizarre world of Northern and Protestants could be got segregation of the communities Ireland politics. into all workplace in numbers outside the workplace has proportionate to the general increased steadily throughout Consider this situation: An population balance, the conflict the period of operation of Fair employer without the required of communities would ease off. Employment Law. proportion of Catholics in his workforce was held, by virtue My view was that the Fair Employment means a of that fact, to have practised easing of community tensions quota system in effect. But an discrimination: but if he in Britain was a product of employer who simply applies a sought Catholics to employ participation in the democratic quota system will be in breach that too would be held to be party politics of the state, and of Fair Employment law. An discrimination. that it was exclusion from employer who is short of the Catholic quota cannot advertise The ideology of Fair

30 Employment said that a When I became familiar by the two religions—had capitalist who genuinely sought with the Shankill Road in direct political consequences the best people to do the jobs 1969-70 what struck me in a situation from which the that he wanted done would end most about it was the thrifty political activity of governing up with a perfectly balanced and systematic adaptation to the state was excluded. The workforce of Protestants and poverty that was in evidence Catholic and Protestant Catholics. This was applied there. Life was narrow there, Sundays were both public historically. And it was a but its narrowness was not a affairs, and they were entirely breathtaking contradiction of resentful adaptation to imposed incompatible with each other. reality. circumstances. It had its own spirit and its own sense of The Presbyterian Sunday I knew from my own fitness. "Strait is the gate" etc. was still in full operation in experience that it was a gross Belfast when I went to live misrepresentation of things. Catholics might have that there—though Catholics had Catholics and Protestants did same spirit preached to them their own Sunday in areas not have the same economic in sermons at Sunday Mass, sufficiently remote from preoccupations and ambitions, but they were not bred to it. Protestant centres. In mixed or the same inclinations about The essence of the Mass was areas it was problematical. what constituted a congenial something quite different from A public representative of society or a satisfying life. the essence of the Protestant the Northern Ireland Labour Protestants were bred to a service. The latter seemed to Party came in for much tightly-structured vision of be nothing but a sermon—or ridicule from certain quarters how life should be led, and a series of moral reflections for voting against the opening they moulded themselves to and exhortations interspersed of a children's playground that vision. The serving of a with hymns that were sung by on Sundays. Given the long apprenticeship did not the congregation. The Mass, community he represented, appear to be burdensome on the other hand, was a kind he could scarcely have done to young Protestants of the of performance at which the otherwise without losing his working class, because in their congregation had the character representative capacity. view of life, which determined of an audience. A mystery their inclinations, all life was was performed. Presence at The question of whether apprenticeship. The Catholic the performance conferred Sunday is to be a day of way of living was much freer, grace on the audience by profane delight for children, or looser, more open-ended. transcendental means. The a day of restraint and piety, is The feeling of bondage was sermon was something not without significance for the not ingrained in it as it was in extraneous. There were history of the world. Calvinist culture. And, given many Sunday Masses without the choice between embarking sermons. And, where there (Perhaps 'restraint and on a long apprenticeship and was a sermon, it was likely to piety' is the wrong way of becoming a free labourer be brief and perfunctory. And putting it, and the piety is not on the instant, a substantial then the rest of the Sabbath experienced as restraint, but proportion of Catholics would was for pleasure. (I refer that is unimaginable to me.) have been predisposed to the Latin Mass. I know towards the latter on the basis nothing about later variations. I suppose that, with the of inclination. But the Latin Mass is what is total collapse of Christianity relevant to the formation of in the last quarter century, The two cultures tended to the two communities as they these things have become generate different aspirations confronted each other in the incomprehensible. But, in individuals, giving rise to late 1960s.) as late as the 1960s, the different kinds of contentment Protestant Sunday prevailed to and of discontent. They did not The difference might be a considerable degree, even aspire to be the same thing, summed up by saying that for in London. Cinemas could not and therefore the fact that they Catholics the Mass said on open until the late afternoon. were not the same could not Sunday was obligatory and Theatres could not open at all. in the main be attributed to sacred, while for Protestants And there was much agonising discrimination by one against the day itself was sacred. And over whether competitive the other. this difference—exemplifying cricket might be allowed— the different spirit fostered football being simply out of the

31 question. A special Sunday them morning and evening, delivered to an audience of cricket league (limited overs) with a simple menu. But there priests and nuns at Galway was allowed on the condition was not a single Irish cafe in University about forty years that there was no admission the area. It was left to Italians ago, showed that capitalism fee, though programmes might to feed us. And, since they originated in Catholic Europe— be sold. That concession could not bring themselves in the Rhineland and Northern was the breach through to go over completely to Italy—and that its development which the great escape from Irish cuisine—and possibly was rather inhibited in societies Christianity was made. Stoical could not believe that all that which became thoroughly endurance of the Sabbath, was required was bacon, Calvinist. which I suppose was a kind of cabbage, potatoes and turnips virtue in itself, lost its feeling (swedes)—I acquired a taste But, however it was to be of virtue when something else for spaghetti. explained, it was a plainly became possible. The breach observable fact that the in Sabbath Observance was Now that state of affairs did Catholic community had very progressively widened until not result from discrimination different preoccupations from Sunday shopping was added against Catholics, or the Protestant community. And to Sunday games and the against the Irish. There I put it to Bob Cooper that the Supermarket took the place of was undoubtedly an anti- low level of entrepreneurship the Cathedral. Irish sentiment amongst the could not be attributed to English in Camden Town. It discrimination by Protestant The different general showed itself chiefly in Rooms employers, even though the aspirations and preoccupations To Let notices put up by small numbers of Catholics that were prevalent in the two lower middle class English employed by Protestants might. communities, it seemed to me, landladies. But it was only a must have had considerable marginal inconvenience, and, This puzzled him for a influence in determining if the had been while, but the ingenious the employment imbalance entrepreneurial, then it would academics employed by his in various branches of the have been totally irrelevant. Commission eventually came workforce. It was not only in up with an answer to it: At a Northern Ireland that the basic The absence of Irish critical point in the early 19th labour force in the building enterprise in Camden Town (in century the banks, which were industry was predominantly everything except the provision owned by Protestants, stifled Irish Catholic. The post-war of dance halls) was obviously Catholic enterprise by refusing (post 1945) English housing due to something within Irish loans to would-be Catholic estates and motorways were culture rather than to external entrepreneurs. built by a mainly Irish Catholic obstacles. And I could not labour force. I was for a time see that things were entirely I did not bother going part of that English labour different in Northern Ireland. into that. It was too remote force. I had no inclination to from the present for practical raise myself above it, and that There was a fashionable purposes. But it showed made me normal. Life was for sociological theory in those how far Cooper's idea of living, and not for 'improving' days that capitalism was a discrimination was removed oneself into an alien social product of Calvinism and that from the ordinary meaning of structure in which conviviality Catholicism was anti-economic. the word. and conversational liveliness It was given expression with would give way to stilted regard to Ireland about a The term "unconscious posturing and inarticulacy. century ago by M.J.F. McCarthy discrimination" was thought of Middleton, Co. Cork, in up and was applied to the Camden Town in North a book called Priests And outcome of a long historical London around 1960 was an People In Ireland. I produced development. Irish working class area. Irish a selection of McCarthy's labourers were picked up writings in which I rejected An employer in the present, by contractors' lorries in the this view and argued that it whose only concern was morning, taken off for a day's was the Gaelic heritage of to make a profit through work, and brought back in Catholic Ireland that gave it its business, and who employed the evening. There was easy anti-entrepreneurial bias. And a workforce strictly with money to be made by feeding Hugh Trevor-Roper, in a lecture that end in view, and who

32 demonstrated the fitness worker already in their Ma l o n e In t e r l u d e of his judgment by actually employ. But Bob Cooper making a profit, would be made that the great cardinal In 1991 I attended a week- judged to have discriminated sin of discrimination. The end Conference on Robert against Catholics, if his employer must not solicit Lynd at the Ulster People's employees were more than applications for a job in any College in the Malone Road, two-thirds Protestant, even if way, direct or indirect, because hoping to discover why Lynd, he could show that he had in that reinforced the existing a British war-propagandist every instance employed the situation. The procedure of in the Great War, was the applicant best able to do the getting a worker to do a job author of an Introduction to job. He would have engaged had to be made completely post-1916 reprints of James in "unconscious discrimination" impersonal. It had to be Connolly's Labour In Irish because he accepted as given bureaucratised under a set of History, Connolly having been a situation brought about rules and the employer had to on the other side in that war. by active discrimination by keep a record showing how it I got no enlightenment on his ancestors six or seven was done. the matter. But, during the generations back. Conference, a man sitting It was a basic rule that the in front of me turned around And if he pleaded that only employer must never solicit an during an interval and began Protestants had applied for a application from a particular talking to me as if resuming job, he would be held guilty person, but must advertise a conversation that had been of discrimination because he the job universally, specifying interrupted. I had never seen had not advertised in a way clearly what the job was. him before and I asked him that would bring Catholic who he was. He was Joe applicants. That rule was broken Deighan. This was a name outrageously in appointing that I knew. He had been And, if he succeeded in a Director of the Institute of one of Desmond Greaves' getting Catholics to apply, Professional Legal Studies. I lieutenants in the Connolly but all the Catholic applicants pointed out to Bob Cooper Association, which was a front lacked some technical ability that it had been broken. But organisation of the Communist necessary to the doing of it was evident that he would Party. I was persona non grata the job, and he rejected their do nothing about it. For all to the Connolly Association, applications on those grounds his pretensions, he knew his and was even excluded from in favour of a Protestant with place. And it was not his place a showing of The Dawn, which the technical ability, he would to challenge the authority it had put on and advertised be enforcing the consequences under which he acted—the publicly. The reason was that I of a system of discrimination phantom Government of was held to have betrayed the put in place by his remote Northern Ireland, as operated nation and diverted the course ancestors. by Whitehall while we waited of Irish history from its proper for Humpty Dumpty to be put channel by arguing in 1969 that He should ask himself together again. (I am not the Ulster Protestants should why the Catholic lacked the suggesting that there was no be negotiated with as a distinct technical competence to do the religious discrimination in the nationality, instead of being job, and he should have made ordinary sense. There was. subjected to futile denunciation amends for the discrimination But that is not what the Fair for being part of an Irish nation practised by his ancestors Employment rules were about.) and failing to act in accordance by giving the Catholic the job with what it was. and then training him to do The gross procedural breach it, instead of employing the in Fair Rules made when Twenty years later Deighan's Protestant who was ready- appointing a Director of the attitude had changed. He made for the job. Institute brings us to David seemed eager to talk to me, Trimble. But, before going into and I had never refused to talk It is, I think, a widespread that in detail, something should to anybody, so we talked. habit of employers to get be said about the condition of workers by recommendation Unionist Ulster. I put it to him that the as far as possible, including Connolly Association had recommendation by a diligent put across a very successful

33 confidence trick with regard to take advantage of the routine "While he corresponded Ulster Unionist patronage. It opportunities of the welfare with a small liberal wing of had convinced the world that state. And then the fact that unionism, his book on the the Unionists exercised a tight there were no democratic government of Northern control, by means of law and political outlets open to Ireland… did not provide patronage, over intellectual them gave them a purpose the lifeline that some life in Northern Ireland. But, in 'accessing' the patronage two-nations ideologists when I came to live in Belfast, I system that was lacking in the supplied to Unionism saw that there was no Unionist Protestant community. at its most intellectually patronage at all in intellectual belligerent as articulated matters. The purposeful Protestants were in the by David Trimble… operation of a patronage main content with the 1921 Trimble's biography system did not begin until set-up. They had not sought records his debt to them… direct government by Whitehall it but they were content with it. was introduced, and then it They had no ideals to realise, "Some two-nations operated to the advantage of except to become even more theorists exhibit the Catholic community. like they were. It did not extraordinary hostility to disturb them that they were non-unionist persons and Deighan did not deny any of cut out of the political life of institutions with an Anglo- this. Nor did he deny that the the state. Their history over Irish and/or Protestant Communist Party was looked two centuries had made them background and identified on with favour by the Direct profoundly self-sufficient and with Ireland, looking Rule Government, and had apolitical. In the University, as out for opportunities received very large subsidies outside it, their preoccupations to denounce them as by various means. were with technology, science irredeemably English/ and administration. These British. They had depicted me as an preoccupations might be Orange/Imperialist stooge, but I described as practical, but it "It has even been had never received a penny by is a kind of practicality that suggested that to way of Unionist patronage, or has little to do with politics, call writers like Swift, any other, and I was living from and that becomes impractical Berkeley, Goldsmith, hand to mouth on a labourer's when it carries over into a Wilde and Shaw wage, while they were all political crisis. And, when anything but English sitting pretty. "Ah, yes", he Ulster Unionism was plunged is to 'contaminate' the said with a kind of resigned into political crisis in 1969, it notion of an Irish national philosophical acceptance of the had nothing useful to say and literature." (Irish News) way things were, "but you write (leaving aside Brian Faulkner) pamphlets". it was unable to think. Senator Mansergh is able to read and therefore I The implication being: So That was why what I said at must take it that he has not what do you need money for? the time caused such profound misunderstood what I have And perhaps: Much good the resentment. The resentment written about dealing with the money did us in politics. then did not surprise me, Ulster Protestants as a distinct but Senator Mansergh's nationality, but has wilfully extravagant expression of it 36 misrepresented it. The 'two- Pr o t e s t a n t s , No r t h years later does: nations' argument referred exclusively to the Ulster n d o u t h A S "I am proud of Protestants, and could not my father and of his have been taken as including Catholics had already contribution to Irish the Ascendancy Protestants of become dominant in the historical scholarship… the South. Indeed, in 1969-70 intellectual life of Northern Nobody but Clifford has many Southern Protestants Ireland when things went ever described him as indulged in exhibitionist into flux in 1969, and their “thoroughly British”… rejection of any sense of affinity dominance increased Sean Mac Bride told me with the Ulster Protestants, and thereafter. This was chiefly that my father was “a rightly so. They were different because their general outlook marvelous man”… peoples, and they always had made them better fitted to been. And I recall one of those

34 Southern aristocrats—Lord once been considerable. But, while the Anglo-Irish are the Killanin I believe his name unless he made a special effort most articulate of the English. was—burning his British to search in obscure corners, But in the end Anglo-Irish passport in disgust at the turn would one Ulster Protestant articulacy ended up in the of events in the North. writer ever appear on the unrestrained verbosity of G.B. list? Perhaps Forrest Reid Shaw, the Court Jester of the The Ascendancy residue at a pinch. I think he is still Liberal Imperialist era. (When that did not follow its state a name, but who reads him? the new British Library began to England established a Shan Bullock? Who he? He building thirty years ago, the comfortable niche for itself never tickled the fancy of the building site was adorned with in the Free State, and those English and is known only to two big pictures: Shakespeare who did not become active eccentrics. And the author and Shaw. Shakespeare was participants in the new state of My Lady Of The Chimney in place there—and all the tended to their economic Corner? Forget it. Even I have more so if he was in fact a affairs within it by forms of forgotten his name. fraud perpetrated by Bacon for discreet collective action reasons of state. But Shaw! I through the Freemasons and Swift etc. were participants took it for a sign that England various financial institutions. in, and contributors to, had lost its marbles. But he If they are looked at as a English culture. And they all was soon taken down.) distinct community, they established their reputations in are seen to have remained England. Protestant Ulster did not disproportionately wealthy. And Burke, what was he? contribute to the Anglo-Irish And, for the most part, they Not Anglo-Irish. Irish who literature of England, and it lived their separate lives became English, and who most was therefore not a participant quietly, without political likely would never have been in what is now represented ambition. The aggressive heard of if he had not gone to as Irish literature by Senator Southern Unionist revival which England and got an English Mansergh as well as by the has been fostered by the Irish patron. revisionists. Times in recent years was undreamt of then. Had any of them, including Burke, the slightest affinity with I never gave a thought to the Ulster Protestants? Da v i d Tr i m b l e An d the Southern Protestants when t h e r s writing the 'two-nations' articles Swift was, I think, the only O back in 1969. If they had been one on the list who had seen Back around 1970 I raised with me, I would have them close to. He had a job remember saying in reply to placed them with the Catholics. as clergyman at Islandmagee Tomas MacGiolla or Eoghan They exercised some for a while. It might be of Harris that the common influence on the Catholics course that he averted his culture of Ireland, to which who surrounded them, and eyes and held in his nose in they appealed in refutation of themselves came under some their presence (as Geraldine the 'two nations', was British Catholic influence. But— Kennedy, the current Editor culture, and was entirely leaving aside the desperate of the Irish Times, does in the without effect in relations moment in the late 1790s when presence of the ), between nationalists and they enlisted the Orange Order but he knew them well enough Unionists. And it was not in the attempt to sustain their to hate them. They were a culture which would have Irish Parliament—what sense vulgar, but were stubborn in brought about the formation of of affinity had there ever been their vulgarity, and were unfit a separate state in Ireland. between them and the Ulster subjects for the compassionate Protestants? contempt with which he The kind of thing I began regarded the Irish Catholics. writing in September 1969 Senator Mansergh sets out was readable by Protestants the usual list: "writers like And was the subsequent without being unreadable Swift, Berkeley, Goldsmith, history of Ireland not a kind of by Catholics. It was, I think, Wilde and Shaw". He might working out of Swift's attitude? unique in that respect. I have extended the list greatly imagine it was read to some with writers whose fame has The Ulster Protestant is extent by David Trimble, with not endured, though it had inarticulate in English terms,

35 whom I had a brief discussion was still a law lecturer movements within the social in 1970 or 1971 when he was discriminated against mainstream which grappled a student. I did not meet him by the authorities. It with real problems of state again for twenty years. Thirty concerned a legal action in a certain way. In Britain years after that first meeting in which he might have the problems which might he was interviewed for the Irish given evidence and not produce a Fascist movement Independent by Mary Kenny a word about history or were all taken in hand by and apparently told her that policy was exchanged the major parties, leaving no he had been influenced by an between us." space in mainstream politics eccentric Marxist, who was me. for a Fascist Party. (Oswald I sent in a short letter, which Trimble was by then a sort Mosley's pre-War Fascist was published: of world celebrity—the winner movement was closed off of a Nobel Peace Prize—and when Labour Prime Minister "22.1.2000 I suppose he wanted to show Ramsay MacDonald formed a that there was some breadth National Government with the Mary Kenny’s report to his horizon, and that he elites of the Tory and Liberal (Feb 19) that I am an could say something nice about Parties. Post-War Fascism, unorthodox Marxist somebody called Brendan. whether led by Colin Jordan or historian who has (In Belfast, after I had caught Mosley himself, was a kind of influenced David Trimble the ear of a fair number of caricature of itself.) is groundless. I am Protestants, I wished I had not a Marxist historian, been given my brother's name. A Dublin Government to orthodox or otherwise. 'Brendan' wasn't bad, but which Mansergh was political Mr. Trimble’s views on it would have been a really adviser made an Agreement history and politics are uplifting experience for them to with Ulster Unionism as led by entirely contrary to mine. have been in communication David Trimble in 1998. I did I urged Ulster Unionism with a Tadg—the notorious not support it. It was strictly a quarter of a century "Brother Teague" of Lillibulero, based on the 'sectarianism' ago to dissolve itself and still a generic name for of the Northern situation. into the party-politics of Papists who don't know their But I thought it might have Britain and discard its place.) been able to work better absurd conviction of a That Trimble was not than it did if Dublin had a separate destiny. I have influenced by me should have degree of understanding invariably held that a been evident to anybody who of Ulster Unionism (which stable settlement is not knows anything about our was impossible without a possible in the Northern respective political positions. degree of sympathy) and of Ireland framework, only Northern Ireland as a political in a British or an Irish A short time after my brief entity. But the approach of framework, and that meeting with him in 1970-71 he the Government could be the Unionist rejection of became an activist in William summed up as bending over the former necessarily Craig's Ulster nationalist backwards to Save Dave. turned things in the 'Vanguard' movement. And Mansergh's bilious outburst direction of the latter. Mr. Vanguard is the only political against Trimble for being a Trimble, now as ever, is movement I have seen that I Unionist, now that Trimble committed to the Utopia described as Fascist. was of no political account, of a Protestant victory suggests that the post-1998 in the arena of 6 County I am not given to hysterical bonhomie was entirely false, communal attrition. use of language, as Senator and therefore naturally led Such influence as I had Mansergh appears to be. I use Trimble to chill it. What lies just with fringe elements of the word Fascist descriptively, below the surface of calculating Unionism ended with his and not as a mere term of politeness is always visible in election to the leadership. condemnation. The fringe the North. It is what people My ‘acquaintance’ with movements called Fascist have been perfectly attuned to him consisted of two brief that come and go in England by generations of practice. meetings 20 years apart. I never saw as being of any Something very different The first was while he consequence. The Fascist from bending over backwards was still a student. The movements of Italy, Germany, to Save Dave was required second was while he and Spain were from Dublin for the working

36 of the Agreement. But, in the Brian Faulkner went on passed-over law lecturer, absence of insight or sympathy, to make the best attempt obviously discriminated against that is all that was possible. at functional power-sharing on political grounds, was one devolution there has been, thing. Trimble the Unionist MP McAleese said she had only to have it subverted was something else. cleared herself of everything by the SDLP and by Conor but her knitting when she took Cruise O'Brien as Northern The fact that Trimble was up the job at the Institute. Is spokesman of a / willing to give evidence in a trial such a thing possible? Labour Coalition in Dublin. regarding misconduct by the Faulkner's Unionist Party was administration, in a situation She demonstrated that it wrecked as a consequence, where the administration was was not actual with her 'Nazi' and Unionist Parliamentary politically biassed against his outburst as President. Mere representation fell to the Treble community, and in which his good behaviour is always UC—the UUUC, which was a own career had been stalled, vulnerable. The spirit counts tripartite Unionist alliance that might seem to be no great for something. included the remnant of Craig's matter, and in any normal movement. political set-up it would not be. William Craig's 'Vanguard' But Northern Ireland was never was a mainstream movement I don't recall who told a normal political set-up, and dealing with a real problem for me that the powers-that-be by 1990 its Unionist community the Protestant community, and solicited an application from was heavily demoralised. doing so in a way that I thought David Trimble for the job of it reasonable to describe as Director of the Institute. A number of Unionist MPs Fascist. had put down an Early Day I asked Trimble for a Motion about the McAleese (And it had its 'Brownshirt' meeting. He agreed. And he appointment. I contacted aspect, known in the preliminary confirmed that an application them about giving evidence as phase as the Tartan Gangs. had been solicited from him, to why the appointment was At that time I edited a weekly and that he had applied. a matter of public concern. publication, and was in the One of them John Taylor, habit of writing editorials in a We went over the case would have nothing to do with Black And White cafe across for about an hour in a cafe it—or perhaps with me. I the street from what is now the attached to a Car Park near had a meeting with another, Europa Hotel and was then Chichester St. We did not Roy Beggs, at Unionist Party the Central Railway Station. discuss politics. We discussed headquarters, which was then A waitress, taking for granted nothing but law. Nevertheless around the corner from Athol that I was a Catholic since I I got the impression that his Steet. He knew very well that was writing, used to warn me world view remained much as it he ought to be eager to give when the Tartan Gangs were had been in the 1970s. evidence, but he said he would nearby so that I could resume not do so. the bland demeanour of an He agreed to give evidence ordinary decent citizen.) at the Trial, both with regard to A barrister specialising in the solicited application and to commercial law, whom I did The Vanguard movement the functioning of the Institute, not contact, rang me up. We was in serious contention to in which he had not only had a long discussion on the dominate Unionist affairs for a lectured but had been Acting phone, and later I went to short while. But Brian Faulkner Director when the Director was his offices. He agreed that held out against it, with the incapacitated. the facts were as I stated support of the Orange Order them. He considered that the led by Jim Molyneux and the A short time later he gained appointment was disgraceful. Rev. Martin Smyth—a very the Unionist nomination for But he would not agree to give different kind of leadership the safe Unionist seat of evidence. to that given a quarter of a Upper Bann. That made it century later when Ruth Dudley possible for me to make a A defeated state of mind Edwards discovered within settlement with McAleese. But appeared to have set in herself a sense of affinity with for it, I would have felt obliged amongst the Unionist middle it. to see the matter through to class. All of those I discussed the Courtroom. Trimble, the the matter with felt affronted by

37 the appointment, and I would then I will say as much as you based on a series of pamphlets say that some of them felt it oblige me to say. And I hope on the general theme of as a slap in the face. But their you oblige me to say a lot". Parliamentary Sovereignty instinct was to whinge but But that is what I understood and Northern Ireland, which do nothing. What they had him to convey. I had published during the learned from experience was months following the signing that, if they tried to do anything, It was against that of the Anglo-Irish Agreement they would be the worse for it. background of Unionist of 1985. For a couple of The Northern Ireland Office had middle-class demoralisation years it developed as a cross- fearsome powers of patronage, that Trimble's willingness to community movement and was and few 'respectable' people give evidence both about the a strong presence in the media, were entirely beyond the workings of the Institute, and and McCartney came close to possibility of punishment. about how the authorities winning a Westminster seat on solicited from him an its programme. After his failure A former Director of the application for a post whose to win the seat, he reverted to Institute came down to Athol advertised specifications he did a more Unionist position and St. to talk to me—a lawyer in not meet, struck me as spirited. Catholic support fell away. successful practice who had I did not ask Trimble why given it up under a sense he had not taken the manner I had kept my distance from of public duty in the hope of of the appointment to the Fair it up to this point, but then transmitting experience through Employment Tribunal. In the I accepted an invitation to the classroom at the Institute. course of our conversation address its AGM, knowing that He was a Protestant gentleman that question seemed to ask it would be almost exclusively of the kind that now seems itself. Trimble indicated that he Protestant middle-class and to be obsolete—or that only had let it pass at the time on lower-middle-class. I told survives in seclusion. grounds of prudence. Authority the meeting that Catholic would not be forgiving in such predominance in many spheres He came to Athol Street in a matter. But he was now of public life was not the response to a simple inquiry. willing to take a stand on the result of conspiracy against He came under his own issue, and I must say that I Protestants, but came about steam, and sat there amidst found that impressive in the through the withdrawal of the squalor, limp and dignified, circumstances. Protestants from public activity. to be questioned. He agreed My message to them was that with me in general about the (It might be that he was at they should blame themselves, Institute. He agreed that the time virtually certain of the and not the state or the the new appointment was nomination for Parliament, but I Catholics, for the situation they indefensible. He agreed that have no grounds for supposing complained about. something should be done that he was.) about it. So what was he going My audience was taken to do about it? Robert McCartney QC was aback by this and did not written to and asked if he would know how to respond, until The obvious thing was give evidence about concern McCartney stood up and that he should be my expert in the legal profession over the indicated approval. And he witness. Nobody was more McAleese appointment. I was cited the recent appointment familiar with the whole set-up not surprised when he did not of McAleese as Director of the than he was. And he would reply. Institute as a case in point. risk nothing in career terms. He was retired and therefore The sequence of events He was supported by a had nothing to lose. So, what that led to the libel action solicitor, who I think was Neil was he going to do—apart from had begun at a meeting of Farris, who spoke about the sit there looking helpless and the Campaign For Equal need for law reform and the pathetic? (Of course I didn't Citizenship, which I had difficulty of achieving it. put it quite like that. But the addressed on the subject of situation spoke for itself.) the withdrawal of the Unionist That meeting inspired middle class from the affairs a solicitor, who was at the He had too much dignity to of civil society. The story of Institute during McAleese's say in so many words: "Make the CEC will be told in another first year, to write an article me do it. Subpoena me, and issue of this magazine. It was about the appointment, which I

38 published. plastering job, which was taking of established repartee got up all my time and energy as through to both sides. And McCartney reverted to I was not a plasterer by trade I was not going to debase communal Unionism soon but an unskilled labourer. language merely because after that and I had no further Somebody suggested asking Mary McAleese had a contract with him. He preferred Neil Faris to deal with the fancy to sue me for libel. If Conor Cruise O'Brien's letter. I did not know him, but I meaningful language of human approach to mine, and he was told that he was an active communication wasn't good seemed to resent the influence member of the CEC. I agreed enough for her then she could I had on him for a number of that he should be asked to deal have her week in Court. years. with the matter in whatever way he saw fit, on the basis that I (I had ceased to have I got ready a batch of had no wish to stand over any anything to do with the CEC subpoenas in preparation for inaccuracy. The word came by that time. Some time later the Trial. One of them was back that he could not act for Faris took it in hand and he for McCartney. If, as Judge me because McAleese had discovered that what appeared Whatsisname speculated, asked him to act for her and simple and obvious when it McCartney had been priming he had refused on the grounds was being done by others was me for the case, or even if he that he was my solicitor. I don't neither simple nor obvious.) had been a willing witness, I know if that makes sense in doubt that I would have agreed terms of legal protocol, but it is About a year and a half to a settlement. But those who the message that came back after Faris had refused to try to in their own interest should to me. And I was told that he arrange a settlement for me, I have been trying to bind me also advised the publication of interviewed him about giving to the action, and inhibiting a "fulsome" apology. evidence for me regarding the me from settling, all did the Institute. He said that he was contrary. I assume that he meant now doing a lot of lecturing "fulsome" in its original sense, there and that he thought A day or two before I rather than in the meaning of McAleese was doing a good gave McAleese the 24 hour "full" which it was beginning to job as Director. And, regarding ultimatum, I heard on the take on. And fulsome language the mode of the appointment, radio that McCartney had won in the original sense is, of he said the terms had been damages in yet another libel course, the language of the changed. I did not waste action. I believe that was on law, in which wild extravagance time arguing with him. He the day I interviewed Neil Faris is the norm. was saying in effect that his about giving evidence. The evidence would be in favour of combined effect of those two If Faris had undertaken to McAleese. things made me inclined not arrange a settlement, I'm sure only to settle the action, but I would have gone along with If the action had gone to even to agree to an equivocal it, even if 'fulsome' language trial I would probably have put formulation about the terms of had been used. It would have him in the witness-box anyway settlement if McAleese had the been his language not mine, and questioned him about the wit to suggest it. But it seems and fulsomeness characterised appointment in terms of the that neither she nor her lawyers the language of his trade. But Fair Employment rules, just were able to read the situation. when I had to deal with the to see how he had made his The law appears to engender matter myself fulsomeness was way to the other side of the a stilted and stereotypical out. argument. Such things interest mentality, as me. observed with regard to the I had for twenty years French Revolution. (He made not only survived, but made Anyhow it was immediately an exception of advocates who headway, in the political after that interview that I heard somehow develop the ability to minefield of Belfast by means in a radio news headline that reason politically, but I've never of careful and precise use of Robert McCartney QC had met any of those.) words. I had taken care in won yet another libel action for When I got the first letter saying things not to set off damages. And it was close to from Charles Brett regarding conditioned reflexes on either that time that David Trimble the Knitting Professor article, side, and in that way some got the nomination for Upper I was in the middle of a big ideas which were not part Bann. I felt that I was free of

39 all entanglements in the case of McAleese, whom I forgot I sent Justine a letter, C/O and gave McAleese 24 hours as soon as she called off the her publisher: to make me an offer that did action, but because it was not include 'fulsome' language interconnected with something "16th February, 2000 in praise of her. else that should have been written up. But then she came Dear Justine McCarthy, (I assume that, when Faris back into the news, giving up said he thought McAleese was her mission to reform the law It has been brought doing a good job as Director in Northern Ireland in order to to my attention that, in of the Institute, he knew that become Fianna Fail candidate a biography of Mary was not to the point. He would in the Free State Presidential McAleese you say that have had to be a very quick election. The response to her a libel action which she forgetter not to know. The nomination by certain circles in brought against me was point was that the procedure of the Free State was such that, “settled on undisclosed the appointment was in gross for much the same reason that terms”. I don’t know what breach of the Fair Employment I did not want to win against you based this statement rules which the state was her in Belfast, I decided to on. It suggests that she imposing on employers in publish nothing that might be either got something general for a deluded political usable against her in Dublin. for the trouble and purpose. considerable expense of A few years after she suing me, or that there As I write this the Secretary became President there was was a settlement on terms of State (Peter Hain) has a strong reaction of feeling which made this appear to been brought to Court for the in her favour by the Dublin be the case. mode in which he appointed 4 circles which had been so a Victims' Commissioner. He hostile to her at the start. The In fact she settled the seemed not to understand event which precipitated this action, after five Court how he had broken the Fair change of feeling seemed to appearances, without Employment law—which is be her disgraceful comments a penny in damages, like nothing that exists in about the response by without a penny towards Britain or the Free State. He Palestinians to the World Trade her costs, without a pleaded that the Commissioner Centre bombing. Anyhow she published apology, and he appointed was doing a suddenly became the darling of without any agreement good job . Nobody denied it, Dublin 4. by me that the terms of because it was irrelevant. settlement would be kept A biography of her was confidential. The crucial difference published. The author was between this case and the Justine McCarthy, female I was a litigant-in- appointment of a Director of the namesake of the author of person as I could not Institute lies in the community The History Of My Own Times. afford to hire a solicitor from which the appointee One of Justine's remarkable and barrister. And, as came. The interim Victims' contributions to the history of I was by occupation an Commissioner is a Protestant, her time is her revelation that unskilled labourer, at the and the Catholic community Bishop Comiskey (the Vatican bottom of the earnings is not the timid thing that the 2, hail-fellow-well-met, man- scale, this meant that, Protestant community was in of-the-people Bishop of Ferns) under the rules of the such matters in 1990. (The offered to rape her when he game, it was not worth my Protestant community has was drunk. while to claim costs. been much less so since the rise of the DUP.) I have not read this British libel law biography, but I have been presumes that a person told it is not authorised, and is who is not wealthy has somewhat hostile. Somebody no reputation to damage. McAl ee s e Bi o g r a p h i e s sent me a photocopy of a That is the self-evident paragraph in which I am reason why there is no I considered writing up the mentioned: it said that provision for bringing libel libel episode, not because the case was settled "on actions on legal aid. But undisclosed terms". I found that the converse

40 was hardly known at all, I found that there was The reason there was even within the legal one inaccuracy in the no suitable applicant profession — that there is published article she was that no barrister or no provision for legal aid complained of. It was solicitor in successful in the defence of a libel written by a student/ practice would waste his action. When I inquired solicitor at the Institute time on the position. into this, it was explained during Mrs. McAleese’s to me by one of the most first year as its President, The job specification expert libel solicitors in and she took the fact that was therefore altered so London that libel actions Mrs. McAleese never that a law lecturer could had to do exclusively once appeared in the hold it. And applications with money, and that the classroom in that year to for the job as amended presumption was that indicate a neglect of duty. were solicited. somebody who could not But then it appeared that afford legal representation this was in accordance The intensive Fair would not be sued for with Mrs. McAleese’s Employment propaganda libel. (This was before contract of employment, of those times stressed the McDonalds libel and that any blame there that every job should be action, but that case bears may have been attached advertised, and that the very little substantial to her employers (the soliciting of applications resemblance to Mrs. University, the Bar Council by an employer was McAleese’s action against and the Judiciary). That malpractice. me.) inaccuracy enabled me to agree to a settlement. The soliciting of Mrs. McAleese knew applications for a job that before issuing the If Mrs. McAleese had had not been advertised Writ that I would be a agreed to call off the was about the greatest defendant-in-person. All action after I entered my offence that could be I had to lose by seeing defence, I would have committed against Fair the matter through was been happy to agree Employment practice. my time. If I lost I would an “undisclosed terms” And, unless it was only be bankrupted, which formula. It was not an advertised that the job of would have been a matter action I wanted to win, President of the Institute of no consequence to because fighting it would might now be held by me and would have cost have wasted two weeks a law lecturer who had Mrs. McAleese still more of my time at trial, and never practised, then money. It was evident winning it would have the job as given to Mrs. from the manner of her placed me where I did McAleese was never solicitors at first that they not want to be. I did my advertised. expected to be given best to get her solicitors a walkover, because to understand this. I think Discounting all of if I had nothing to lose they did understand it. that—and it is a pretty I also had nothing to And I believe them when large discount—Mrs. gain. After I entered my they indicated to me that McAleese probably was defence their manner they were finding it difficult the best person for the changed. They gave me to get her to act rationally. job as amended (though to understand that they not as advertised) among were trying to persuade I think there are a those whose applications her to end the action, but couple of inaccuracies for it had been solicited. that she was proving to in your account of her Our present First Minister be a difficult person to appointment to the [David Trimble] was get to see reason. It took Institute. I could not more experienced, a further six months of find that the job was but since the Institute legal manoeuvring over re-advertised when was misconceived, our Discovery etc. before no suitable applicant President was probably she agreed to settle for responded to the first more suitable for the job nothing. advertisement. as it actually existed, since she was less of

41 a lawyer and more of a chosen by herself. In cited nineteen grounds of chancer. an apology, the editor defamation… No apology accepted that the was ever published I gathered that a third allegations… were without because, although the application had been foundation, and that damages were reported solicited from a solicitor in they had caused Mary to be small, they were practice, in order to take Mc Aleese considerable enough to put the cheaply the raw look off the thing, distress. Costs were produced magazine out but she denied it." awarded to the plaintiff. of business” (Ray Mac Mary accepted the Mánais, The Road From I don't know if she received prohibition not to reveal Ardoyne: The Making Of it, or whether she read it the amount of the A President p245). if she did, or whether she damages, but it was gave it a second thought if enough to buy all the Alas, it was not so. she read it. I have a realistic Leneghans a present There is no Clifford view of the attention span, each and to give her Apartment in the the range of interests, and parents, her aunts and McAleese property the dedication to factual uncles and their spouses portfolio. And, rather accuracy of contemporary Irish a weekend at a fine than stopping the Belfast journalism. I did what I thought hotel in Dublin. Some Magazine, her frivolous was required of me on the money went to Concern libel action kept it in being. supposition that she wanted and some to charities her book to be as accurate for the deaf, and there If she paid her own as possible. But I did not was enough left to put a costs—I am not saying expect to hear from her or her sizeable deposit on an that she did—then she publisher. And I didn't. apartment in Ballsbridge was heavily out of pocket in Dublin 4. Shortly against me. After four A few years later somebody after the apartment or five preliminary Court sent me photocopies of a few was bought, one of the hearings (at which two pages of another biography of Leneghans christened it barristers and the most McAleese, and I commented on “Independent House”. expensive firm of solicitors them as follows in the February in Belfast acted for her 2005 issue of Irish Political “Brendan Clifford, and nobody acted for me), Review: the publisher and editor she called off the action of Belfast Magazine without either damages "According to a recent must have been paying or costs about a fortnight biography of President scant attention, if any, to before the trial. That McAleese she brought the proceedings of the is why I call the action a libel action against the libel case in Dublin. He frivolous. Libel actions Sunday Independent in published a libellous are about money. Libel 1988: article about Mary in as a popular pastime the August/September was introduced in the “Mary’s legal team 1988 edition of his early 19th century as a endorsed Neil Faris’s magazine. The two-page substitute for duelling. original opinion that they spread, entitled “The When wounding through would never get as far as Knitting Professor”, was the body was being the courtroom”. remarkably similar to the banned, wounding offending article in the through the bankbook was At the moment of trial: Sunday Independent, and facilitated. Mary dealt with A Belfast “an agreement was Magazine exactly as she McAleese placed reached… An apology, had dealt with the Dublin herself in the position dictated by Mary, would newspaper… Donal of taking action against appear in a prominent Deeney, the well known somebody who couldn’t position on the front QC who would later lose, because he lived on page of the next issue…, become chairman of the the income of a labourer, accompanied by a Arts Council of N. Ireland had no bankbook, and photograph of Mary, represented Mary and was propertyless. On the

42 other hand, she herself would, if put to trial, Her Holocaust faux pas could lose heavily if the have been a high-profile had something in common matter went to trial, and political case. The Fair with her libel action, in not just through the costs Employment rules were that it lacked a sense of the action. It seemed broken in a number of of proportion. Leaving to me that her lawyers ways, and David Trimble aside the matter that the appreciated this, but they was involved as a Holocaust is officially held indicated to me that they better-qualified applicant to be unique, comparable had difficulty in getting according to the rules to nothing and therefore her to appreciate it. And, and whose application with lessons for nothing when I offered them a for the job had been else, and taking it to be way out, which would only improperly solicited and a normal genocide, so to cost her her legal fees to then passed over. I didn’t speak, the comparison date, they went for it like a want to be where winning of the Nazi attitude to greyhound out of a trap. would have put me. On with the Protestant the other hand, people attitude to Catholics is At that point I was so like McAleese had to outrageous—though not, fed up with what I had understand that trampling I think, as outrageous seen of the Unionist on me with money was as her denunciation of establishment at close not easy. And so it went. the Palestinians on the quarters that I would day of the destruction of have agreed to some The Belfast Magazine the World Trade Centre. tricky face-saving was launched for a And her amendment only formulation (for her) about purpose which did not made it worse, i.e. that undisclosed damages. work out. Some of the the conditioning to hatred But the other side was people associated with it was mutual. I never so desperate to end the thought it could be made before heard it suggested matter without further commercially viable. I am that the Jews hated the loss, that they did not a kind of anti-commercial Germans before the even notice a hint of this being and I was about to event, and I know that that I gave. hand it over to them when some of them did not find McAleese issued her it easy to cease to be I made it clear from the writ. And so the Belfast German even after the start that I did not want Magazine was saved— event." to win this action and I because I am sure the did not launch a counter- commercial venture would A Belfast Magazine was action. If I had entered not have succeeded. launched to service the political into the egoistic spirit of movement that was called these things, I might have There was a bookshop The Campaign For Equal had a fine old time with in Belfast which stocked Citizenship, whose purpose impunity. (If you haven’t publications that were was to democratise Northern got a bank, you can’t be not distributed wholesale. Ireland into the British state. bankrupted.) But I had McAleese threatened It was not a commercial other things to do, which them with libel action if venture. Commerce has never I thought were valuable they did not undertake interested me. I am an anti- even though they did not that they would not stock commercial sort of person. involve large quantities the Belfast Magazine of money—a thing which again, never, for ever and It came to my knowledge is possibly difficult to ever, Amen. (And small about 30 years ago that Paul understand in Dublin 4. booksellers are timid Johnson, one-time Editor of souls—though no more the New Statesman, instructed McAleese’s timid than large ones in his son that he should never appointment as head Ulster.) Nevertheless, it write a word unless it was for of the Institute of continues, and henceforth money. The value of writing Professional Legal it will acknowledge its debt was established by the money Studies, Belfast, in a to McAleese for putting it that gave rise to it. But I have way that breached the beyond the reach of the never been able to see writing Fair Employment rules likes of her. for money as anything but

43 one of the less savoury forms do with the Magazine. But, McAleese's solicitor, Charles of prostitution. In 40 years I when McAleese started Brett, with whom I had an think I have got about £100 libel proceedings, I took interesting relationship over the in total for writing—a couple responsibility for the publication decades, even though I never of articles for the Times and because I was the person with exchanged a word with him in , for which nothing to lose. person. payment was routine. I was Then, assuming that the offered a column in one of matter would be cleared up Initially I was treated with a the major London magazines, without great fuss and bother, I kind of off-hand contempt by but rejected the offer as published what I intended to be him—or by his firm, because inappropriate politically, with the final issue. personal contact was always a sense of relief that I had a with a junior; but the manner respectable reason for refusing Ray Mac Manais's assertion of the junior was obviously to become a Fleet Street writer. that "although the damages determined by his instructions. were reported to be small, And the manner changed I understand that my attitude they were enough to put the drastically after Brett received to commerce is indefensible cheaply produced magazine my Defence. in this new Ireland which has out of business" is entirely become ashamed of its past. inaccurate—and, I suppose, At the appropriate time I I can only explain myself as defamatory. McAleese did went along to the Great Hall of a product of the culture of not get a penny in costs or the High Court with my mound Slieve Luacra, where I lived damages from me. She did of Discovery items. I met the into my twenties—a culture not even get an agreement for solicitor there and suggested to which was literate, intellectually some equivocal formulation him that he should come along active, and conversational, about 'undisclosed' terms, with me to a photo-copy shop, but in which the profit motive although I tried to indicate that to ensure that I copied it all for was confined to commodity it was available. him. transactions in material goods. The Magazine did not go But he wouldn't hear of The purpose for which I 'out of business' because of it. They were most anxious began the Magazine ceased payment of damages. And, in to help me in every way to be operative in 1989. Some fact, it went 'out of business' they could—of course they people who had taken part in more than a year before the were!—and wouldn't dream of its production wanted to try to action was settled. Mac putting me to the expense and continue it on a commercial Manais has taken little care inconvenience of doing what I basis as a general magazine. with his facts. suggested. Why didn't I bring I agreed that they might take it along to their offices, where it it in hand. I did not think And that would probably could be done in comfort. Fair there was any real prospect have been the end of the enough, I said, lead me to your of commercial success but, Belfast Magazine, and probably photocopier. But, when we got since the political context of of my political connection with to the offices, they wouldn't the Magazine had fallen apart, Belfast if McAleese had not hear of me labouring over a I saw no good reason not to let wasted a considerable part of smelly photocopier myself. them have a go. my time by pursuing a frivolous They had a person for doing libel action for a further these menial tasks, they had, David Young became year—and if, many years after so why didn't I let her get on the Editor in fact. He was the action was proved to be with it and drink a cup of coffee described as "Executive Editor" frivolous by the way it was while I waited. So I said OK. and did all the work of putting ended, McAleese as President it together. I let my name go and Mansergh as Senator had I was not left alone with on as a general Editor so that not tried to put a misleading my coffee. I was helped to it would not be thought that account of it on the record. pass the time with convivial there had been some kind of conversation, all apparently rupture. I read the McAleese free and casual. The copying article before publication and Ch a r l e s Br e t t took a very long time. The thought it was accurate. After coffee was fine. But the another issue or two, I would I should say a word about conversation was curious. have had nothing further to Disparaging remarks were

44 made about their client, though and many others, were sold off copyright if the matter was to not by me. And—me being for a song when revolutionary be remedied. I decided that a socialist you see—I was Marxism took the institution I had better things to do with told that Charlie Brett was a in hand. (But that action was my time and I let the matter socialist. trumped by Queen's University, drop, only refusing to supply which dumped its classics in a the Linenhall with material that I was not told that Charlie skip and set fire to them!) I published, and that it had Brett did not allow Trade Union difficulty in acquiring since very organisation in his firm, and I The library proper had little of it circulated through did not spoil the atmosphere narrow canyons of bookshelves the bookshops. (I sometimes by letting it be known that I in which one could see the relented at the request of knew. (But I did notice that his successive layers of literary the staff, whose attitude was company kindly supplied his fashion since the early 19th very different from that of the employees with clothes—or century. administration, and made was that a livery?) covert deliveries in brown The whole was a kind of paper wrappers.) Many convivial living museum—much more conversations followed that interesting to my taste than So it might be said that first one. And I adopted the museums of dead things. Charlie Brett's advice to the practice of speaking of The Linenhall to make no admission Law as a commodity which I There was a major act of of breach of copyright worked, did not have the wherewithal to cultural vandalism in the early since I did not prosecute. purchase, because I could see 1970s when the Smithfield And it is possible that, on that it was irritating. Equality Market was set on fire. The the basis of that experience, before the Law is a pleasant revolutionary modernising of he concluded that I was illusion. the Linenhall was an event of a pushover, and advised the same kind. McAleese accordingly. This McAleese affair was in fact the second matter on The library is now spaciously I had a number of other which I had something to do arranged. And the newspaper connections, at a distance, with Charlie Brett as a lawyer. room has been remade into with Charlie Brett. He had The first happened a little a restaurant. But I learn that, been Chairman of the Northern earlier and may have had although there are still some Ireland in easier some bearing on the second. books in the library, and they times, and had been its leading The Linenhall Library sold are close to the restaurant, one (perhaps its only) intellectual. the microfilm rights of some is not allowed to read them in But in 1969, when times got publications of which I was the restaurant. harder, he gave up politics. the publisher. It was as clear a breach of copyright—i.e. of The Linenhall I knew was In the early 1970s he theft—as you could imagine. different. And I liked it. But I published an autobiography. I All I required as a remedy did not think I could just ignore forget the exact title, but the was that the Linenhall should its sale of copyrights which did words Long Shadows Before publish an acknowledgement not belong to it. figured in it. The book, as I of the breach in a magazine remember it, was an account and should deal with the matter To add insult to injury the of the Platonic form, Charles with regard to the microfilm Library suggested it was doing Brett, over many generations. company. me a favour by giving wider The story of the present circulation to publications I had incarnation of that eternal form The Linen Hall was in those published. was in it, but the subject of it days a very pleasant place, was the bourgeois dynasty of redolent of the Ulster past, not The matter might have been Brett over the centuries. yet having been spring-cleaned settled very simply and at no by the Socialist Workers' Party. cost to the Library if Charlie It so happened that the It had a newspaper-room in Brett had not been its solicitor Charles Brett incarnation of which I used to read the papers and had not advised it to the 1790s had come to my and journals, surrounded by make no admission. That put notice as I was writing a book shelves of the Greek and Latin me in the position of having on Belfast In The French classics. But those classics, to prosecute for breach of Revolution (which I published

45 in the course of the libel for people like Charles centuries one encounters action), so I made my own little Brett and the Northern a power of imagination contribution to the history of the Star was for people like certainly not less than bourgeois dynasty of Brett in Joseph Cuthbert. They went into the production of that book. Here is what I wrote represented different English fiction… of the Brett of the 1790s: temperaments, rather than different policies. "By contrast, the "The bourgeois public affairs of Belfast gentleman also makes his "The Charles Bretts have in recent centuries appearance in Belfast at were in retreat from been characterised by this time. policy, because policy was an entirely 'practical' unprofitable. But the only turn of mind. And "Two remarkable counter to the political this practicality—the adverts appeared vigour of the Joseph practicality of the Charles regularly in the Northern Cuthberts was inertia, and Brett syndrome—has, of Star in 1793 and 1794: withdrawal into private course, been altogether one by Joseph Cuthbert, concerns. Forceful impractical in its social the other by Charles Brett. disagreement would have consequences. been as imprudent as "Cuthbert advertised active support. So they "Practicality is politically from Carrickfergus Gaol. read their News Letters adequate only in a stable He was an honest man and bided their time" and stationary condition imprisoned by a corrupt (Belfast In The French of things, which runs by administration which Revolution, Athol Books, routine. When a situation treated his demand for 1989, p14). is made unstable by an honest and representative unresolved problem, the government as seditious. "The Joseph Cuthberts practicality of routine An honest man who lives were willing to take on only perpetuates the by the Book cannot be the world in thought and problem… disgraced by being put in action: the Charles Bretts prison—indeed it points made mental reservations, "Belfast, having for five up his honesty to be tended to their business, years been extravagantly imprisoned by rogues… and cultivated private articulate, is suddenly refinements. reduced to incoherent "Charles Brett was a silence. Circumstances much more careful person "Now mental are perfect for the growth than Joseph Cuthbert. reservations, beyond a amongst thinking people He was not in gaol, and very limited point, are of the Charles Brett it is doubtful whether not a form of thought. syndrome—tending to his morale would have They are a stultification one's business and one's survived imprisonment, of thought in the minds family, cultivating a private just or unjust. He sold which hold them. And refinement, having a liquor, narrowed his vision when minds which are few banal maxims to fill down to his family, and eager to think encounter the place of politics, and aspired to gentility. He is all around them nothing keeping one's head down noteworthy only because but the cotton wool of on the great issues. This of his pretentious liquor mental reservations and syndrome is a virus which advert…: “Charles Brett private refinements they attacks those who should is not in the habit of too are thwarted" (p138). be the civilised leaders frequently advertising ; of society—a function but…” "Imagination is to which imagination is indispensable to essential. Those who are "The best sense progressive politics… It unaffected by it are those I can make of the is not possible without it who live in fundamentalist difference between the to do things which were religion, and therefore in two Belfast newspapers never done before… In a different imaginative of the 1790s is that the politics of England sphere" (pp138-141). the News Letter was during the past three

46 My Charlie Brett, though a of Paradise Lost, hoping to what they had actually felt was bit of a cosmopolitan, came restore something of the quality claustrophobia. from the same mould as of life as he had experienced that Charlie Brett. (That's it before 1969. He knew in Very little of this went on the meaning of dynasty, isn't his head that he ought not to amongst Ulster Protestants. it?) There was a faint tinge have experienced the Northern They had continuity of of the Bohemian about him Ireland of his youth as a kind subjective existence. They as he described himself. He of perfection of life, but that were what they were, and that had lived in Paris and in Italy is how he experienced it, and was it. And one of the things for a while after the War (i.e. even looking back on it after they were, unfortunately, was the second British World War it had gone, he could not and profoundly apolitical. But this of the 20th century), before would not reinvent his feelings, is not the place to go into that. coming home to inherit the or deny them. family business. I don't know Charlie Brett, having been if the faintly Bohemian phase That is one of the things I a bit of a Bohemian on the left any lasting impression found admirable about Ulster Continent, was a bit of an on his appearance because I Protestants. They did not outsider in Northern Ireland— never saw him but once, and 'reinvent' themselves to order. not much, just a bit. that only for an instant—on the And they did not in retrospect internal stairs of the Linenhall invent a false experience He thought about the politics Library, which he was coming and project it into a past in of the situation just enough down as I was going up. which they had experienced to know that things were not As an intellectual bourgeois something quite different—as perfect. There was a fly in the who had lived in Paris after began to be done in Dublin ointment—a very big fly. the War, he was of course a around 1980 by Catholics. bit of a socialist and a bit of a What to do about it? republican and a bit of an anti- I was, in a sense, an He joined the NILP, and clerical, so it was in the course outsider in both situations. contributed something of his of nature that he did a stint in From about the age of 13 I was broader outlook on the world to the Northern Ireland Labour out of joint with the culture of this very narrowly-based Trade Party, which was a bit socialist, nationalist Ireland on a single Union party, which was more in a bit republican, and a bit anti- point, that of modernising the nature of a retreat from 'the clerical. Catholicism, which began to Northern Ireland state' than a intrude into my remote part of participant in it. Northern Ireland before its rural Ireland after the War. I Fall was an idyllic place of stayed there for a further 8 And then, in 1969, he retired those whose predispositions years because, leaving religion from political life at the moment had been shaped for it—the aside, life was interesting when it became intensely discreet Presbyterian middle there, and a couple of brief problematical. class, which had habits rather acquaintances with city life did than beliefs, and which felt not attract me to it. Because he had a broader that politics was an unsavoury outlook on affairs than was business. (And the strange It became the custom in general in his community, way in which Northern Ireland the 1980s to describe life in and because he was free of was connected to the British Catholic Ireland as having the passions lurking in the state meant that it was been claustrophobic. I undergrowth, and because excluded from the democratic know that that is not how it he was a bit of a socialist political conflict in Britain, and was actually experienced in and a bit of a republican in had no politics of its own as it rural Ireland in the 1950s, the Continental sense, and was not a state.) and that it is not how it was because he was public-spirited, I know this because I have experienced in Dublin in the his virtuous act after 1969 was known people who experienced 1960s. But people who wrote to retire to private life. it as an idyll, and who did not about it in the 1980s began deny that experience when to imagine from their new That is what I gathered from looking back on it after the Fall. viewpoint the feelings they the blurb on the dust-jacket of thought they ought to have felt his dynastic autobiography. The late Harold McCusker in the old order of things, and entered political life in the era to persuade themselves that If he had published it in 1970

47 I would have been puzzled by to make a distinction between Because it was Athol Street. it. How could a person who Church and State in the had some talent for politics, Republic in a way that had not And what was Athol and who was not submerged been done previously and to Street? It was in 1970 a in the communal passions of agitate for a separation of the small street in the centre of the situation, not only withdraw two in particular areas where Belfast. Today it consists of to private life when the whole they had merged. a single house and a famous semblance of order broke down chip shop. Ever since 1970 into communal conflict, but At a certain point Charlie it has been one of the two present that withdrawal as a Brett noticed this campaign. centres of initiative against virtuous act? A matter for pride And it seemed to him to be the Whitehall concoction rather than shame? the very kind of thing that he called Northern Ireland, had wished to develop in the the other being Provisional By the time the book was North before 1969, combining Republicanism. Athol Street published, I had found out the French republican spirit was entirely Constitutional in through experience what and French anti-clericalism its approach and Sinn Fein the pretensions of the old in a medium of reasonable entirely unConstitutional until Protestant middle class socialism. So he wrote to recently. But Athol Street's amounted to. I understood Dublin expressing approval and Constitutional approach was why those who saw themselves asking if the campaign had a entirely unacceptable to as the most civilised and branch in Belfast with which he Whitehall, because it insisted progressive elements of that could co-operate. that the instability of Northern class responded to the severe And he was referred to Athol Ireland arose from the fact crisis that had overtaken their Street. that it was governed outside community by withdrawing the Constitutional structure of from public life. Their superior He did not approach Athol the state, and that 'internal' culture was entirely unrelated Street to find out what it was. settlements must necessarily to their situation. It was the He did not need to. Athol fail. culture of another situation. Street was notorious amongst But I was still surprised that the polite circles in Protestant To take that stand was to pit Brett should proclaim his Ulster which should have been oneself against the authority withdrawal so publicly, and doing what it was doing. of the state, which had a use with a good conscience. for Northern Ireland, and which Withdrawal to private life by a So he wrote to Dublin in its government of Northern public figure in a political crisis again, more or less asking if Ireland was not subject to would be best done privately his previous letter could be democratic pressure. And and modestly. withdrawn, by way of not being this undemocratic regime mentioned. It was pathetic. commands enormous powers Charlie Brett practised law of patronage, by means of and wrote about old houses, The Campaign was under no which it marginalises the use leaving the political affairs of obligation to keep the matter of reason. And so Charlie his community in the hands of confidential, but it did so. I Brett, though he understood Ian Paisley. Paisley did not mention it now as being to the certain things notionally, was degrade public life. The public point of what I am describing. as disabled in practice as if he life of Paisley's community and understood nothing. Brett's (because it was the It was also conveyed to same community, even though me that Brett understood that And so, at our only meeting, the latter disdained the outlook the Campaign For Labour as we passed each other on of the former) was abandoned Representation, which sought the stairs of the Linenhall by Brett to Paisley. democratisation through the Library, he hesitated, looked Many years later Charlie parties of state, and rejected for a moment as if he would Brett made an approach to me, Northern Ireland as a possible speak, but the prudence of the not knowing it was me. arena of democratic political bourgeois dynast restrained development, had a potential him. No words came from him. In the mid-1970s I had that was lacking in the NILP. Thought was stifled. And he helped to launch a magazine passed on to safety. called Church & State, and a But of course he could not campaign associated with it be associated with it. Why?

48 P S : Th e Pr e s i d e n t i a l considered applying. job; that the Institute was a teaching institution and Bi o g r a p h y "Des Greer explained that her forte was teaching that the selection board the law. She spoke of In writing what appears had not appointed any course construction, of here about Mary McAleese of the applicants; that management, of dealing I had available to me only a they were not putting with students, but photocopy of a few pages from together a list of suitable afterwards she felt that the biography by Ray Mac candidates and that they all her talking was to no Manais. I have now picked up were reserving the right avail. a remaindered copy of it, and to change the advertised I find it includes what appears criteria. In other words, "The interview panel to be a reply to the case made in the process of was chaired by Turlough in my Defence against her headhunting they might O'Donnell, lord justice Statement Of Claim. But it decide to choose an of appeal and chairman confirms my Defence, rather academic lawyer for the of the Council for Legal than refuting it, by describing position. When he asked Education. The selection how she was actually recruited her if he could to [sic] put committee comprised for the job at the Institute her name forward, she twelve members, and although she was unqualified replied that she would like among them were the two for it: to think about it… Since solicitors, representatives returning to Trinity from of the Inn of Court and "…an old friend of RTE, she had been… of the University… They Mary's rang her and said more content in herself; questioned her on every he would like to pay her but in the light of the aspect of the qualifications a visit. The caller was move to , they and aptitude she would Des Greer, professor of decided that applying for bring to the job… By the law, in Queen's University the directorship would be, time she was finished she Belfast, the sympathetic at least, another option. was exhausted… counsellor to whom she Mary rang Des Greer and had brought her worries said she was prepared to "She was at home in when she was a student. let her name go forward. Rostrevor that evening Former lecturer and when Turlough O'Donnell former student had met "She then set about rang to offer her the many times over the finding out as much job. She was delighted, years as Professor Greer as she could about of course, and said as was external examiner the Institute and the much on the phone. for Mary's students in post of director. She She also said she could the School of Law in met the staff and the only accept the job in Trinity College. He told influential members of principle because she had Mary that a new director both professional legal to give notice to Trinity was being sought for the bodies: the Law Society College… Trinity wanted Institute of Professional of Northern Ireland and three months to find a Legal Studies attached the Honourable Society suitable replacement… to Queen's University. of the Inns of Court of she informed the board Mary had read the Northern Ireland. After of the Institute that advertisement for the meeting the two solicitors she would not be able position beforehand representing the Law to work full-time until and had presumed the Society, she felt that they after Christmas… The post was filled. Mainly had set their faces against members of the board because she was happy the appointment of any were happy with the where she was, in academic lawyer. She arrangement… Trinity, but also because argued her case: that she the advertisement had had read all the reports "…When the selection mentioned that the on legal education; that committee had refused to successful applicant her area of expertise, appoint any of the original would be a practising pedagogy, was a applicants for the position, lawyer, she had not significant element of the they had asked a senior

49 law lecturer from Queen's "At the time of Mary's and that their decision University to fill the post in appointment, Trimble was final. a temporary capacity until was chairman of the a permanent director was Lagan Valley Unionist "Mary has this to appointed. This caretaker Association, an influential say about the whole director was a man who member of the Ulster commotion: “There is a had taught land law to Mary Unionist Party, and the certain type of unionist in Queen's, a man by the candidate of choice of who cannot bear the name of David Trimble. many members of that thought of any Catholic Trimble was not happy same party for the job as getting anywhere on their when he learned of Mary's director of the Institute… own merits, who cannot appointment, particularly There was speculation abide the idea of any as he had also been a that the appointment of Catholic breaking out of candidate… He was not Mary McAleese was a the mould in which they alone in his disappointment. political choice designed had been kept for years. In the unionist community to pacify the Irish This was the case with my there was widespread government. Unionists appointment as director anger and frustration drew attention to the of the Institute. Some that a Catholic had been stipulation in the original of those unionists were appointed to one of the advertisement that the choking themselves with most prestigious positions successful candidate bitterness”." in the academic life of would be a practising Northern Ireland. lawyer, pointing out that [In the absence of any Mary McAleese had reference for this statement, "David Trimble's life practised for only one and the formulation "has revolved around Queen's year in the North and this to say", I take it to be a University, the Orange never in the South, and statement made by McAleese Order and unionism. He neglecting to mention to the author for inclusion in the had been a lecturer at that David Trimble had Presidential biography, which Queen's since he graduated never practised at all. continues:] there in 1968… His The campaign at Mary's rise through the unionist appointment culminated "At this time, Mary ranks was by way of the in the tabling of a motion made no public utterance Vanguard Unionist Party… for debate in the… about her detractors' His political pragmatism Commons". attempts to rescind allowed him to be at one her appointment, but time an advocate an [The text of the "early day an incident happened advocate of UDI and at motion" is given at this point. It in August 1995 which another a staunch upholder suggests that McAleese was forced her to break her of the union with Britain. Charles Haughey's nominee. silence on the subject. A Before he became known Early Day Motions are usually UTV production called If for his moderate views damp squibs, as this one was.] I Should Die was being and before he became filmed. In the series a winner… of the Nobel "…Professor Gordon the subjects… were to Peace Prize, David Trimble Beveridge, who was vice- imagine themselves was considered a hardline chancellor of Queen's dead, and guests on unionist. His militant University, defended the show were given reputation was greatly the appointment in the opportunity to speak enhanced in 1995 when a statement which of them in obituary he and Ian Paisley walked effectively put an end to form. The presenter, shoulder to shoulder down the public criticism. He the Revd. John Dunlop, the nationalist Garvaghy said that in the opinion of former moderator of the Road… His “not an inch” the selection committee, Presbyterian Church in stance on that occasion a group representing Ireland, invited Mary to be probably won him the various legal bodies and one of the subjects, and leadership of the Ulster eminent institutions, she he invited David Trimble to Unionist Party… was the most suitable speak about her life and candidate for the post, work. Trimble's political

50 antennae must have people who should be solicited But that the competition was been suffering a bout to apply for a job for which they rigged only made things worse. of insensitivity that day. did not qualify. It would have been better He raised the question simply to appoint McAleese, of her appointment as Reference to "the original rather than pretend there had director of the Institute, advertisement" suggests been legitimate applications. saying that she should that there was a second never have got the job as advertisement in which the But it seems that this bogus her qualifications were job specification was altered. procedure had to be gone not good enough and I searched the three Belfast through because the various repeating the allegation dailies but could find no second parts of the collective employer that her appointment was advertisement at all. If in fact were not in agreement in the due to political pressure the job was re-advertised matter. from Dublin. as being available to law lecturers, McAleese need only McAleese presents herself "Mary's response was have pointed it out to me to (or her biographer presents as succinct as it was puncture my Defence. (While a her) as arguing with the Law incisive: “There were two negative is impossible to prove, Society about altering the candidates shortlisted for it is effectively proved in this nature of the job, rather than the Institute. I was one instance by the failure of the simply showing that she met and he was the other. I law lecturer who got the job to the altered specifications. leave it to people to make show it was advertised as a job up their own minds.” suitable for law lecturers.) If there was widespread anger and frustration at her "The pro-unionist The biography comments appointment because she was newspapers in the North that the Unionist Early Day a Catholic, I failed to notice were not the only ones Motion, while drawing attention it. The Protestant community that were causing trouble to McAleese's minimal practical had many things to be angry for the new director…" experience, neglected to and frustrated about, and this (She then goes into mention that "Trimble had came low on their priority list. incidents in Dublin; The never practised at all". And, insofar as I was aware Road From Ardoyne: The of discontent, it was within a Making Of A President, I can't see the relevance very narrow sphere, and it was 2004, pp237-242). of that comment. Trimble not because "a Catholic had didn't get the job, and he isn't been appointed", but because Her response may have mentioned in the motion. an unqualified person, from been succinct, but it was not another jurisdiction, and that a incisive because it was entirely Trimble, as I recall, told me hostile one, who was herself on beside the point. The point that he conducted one case as record as expressing contempt was that she was given the job a barrister. He did not make of the Northern Ireland legal without meeting its advertised much of it, his point being that system, had been given the qualifications. his practical experience, like job. McAleese's, was negligible, And, while there were two and therefore he had not Of course I cannot say that candidates, is it accurate to say applied for the job of Director this was not dissimulation, that they were "shortlisted"? in the first instance, though he and that what really cheesed Two applications were solicited had been Acting Director. them off was the fact that she from people who did not meet was a Catholic. But that is the specified qualifications. On the strength of the not what I heard said. And, My information was that information now supplied by even if she could somehow there there were no other McAleese, I would say that the know that they were really applications beyond those two Professor and the Lord Justice dissimulating a raw religious solicited ones. So, if there asked her to apply in order to hatred of her—dissimulation was a "shortlist" it was not give her the job; and that they and civilisation are twins, and made from a list of applicants, asked the Acting Director to what is dissimulated tends to but from a list made up by apply in order to deny him the become the reality. Professor Greer and Lord job. A point was being made. Justice Turlough O'Donnell of The issue was all but dead

51 when she stirred it up with her business it was to enforce of nationalities within the libel action. And after that little them. With her capricious North should be relieved by furore had all but died again libel action she obliged me a frank recognition of this she and Senator Mansergh to draw up a comprehensive fact by nationalist Ireland as stirred it up a second time. case against her appointment. a preliminary to negotiation. (I learn from her biography To the best of my knowledge That approach was rejected in that Mansergh, "the party nothing whatever had been favour of continuing to assert guru himself", chose her to published about it but the a de jure right of national be Fianna Fail's Presidential article in this magazine—such sovereignty by the Free State candidate.) was the "campaign" against over the North. The way the her by angry and resentful preferred approach worked As to Fianna Fail influence Unionists—and that piece out in practice was through in her appointment to the was forgotten by the time communal attrition—the ever- Institute, I can say nothing. I she issued her Writ. But the intensifying conflict between took little interest in internal comprehensive case made in the two communities, and Dublin politics in those days, my Defence was widely read their relentless segregation and was not aware of her within the legal profession. It from each other, whether in as a "Haughey babe". But lay in the High Court to be war or peace. McAleese's Dublin had a recognised role in read, and I took it around to appointment to the Institute Northern affairs under the 1985 various bodies on the pretext was an incident within the Agreement. of seeking assistance, knowing conflict of communities. that it would be copied. And I think there can be little I'm sure that the Defence made She was elected to the doubt that she got the an impression on the minds of Presidency in 1997. Her job because she was a those who read it that was far election too was an incident Catholic, among other things. more lasting than the passing within that system of communal Although Queen's broke Fair feeling at the time of her attrition—which is why Dublin Employment procedures appointment that something 4, having become largely outrageously in making the wrong had been done. Unionist in sympathy, if only as appointment, it had become a way of being anti-national, acutely aware of the Fair I don't know how close opposed her. And I suppose Employment issue, in that it Government control over the she was under "Constitutional knew it was short of Catholics President is supposed to be. imperative" (as the Courts had in its higher echelons and it Does an authorised biography said the Government was) to needed to find some. come under it? Did Mansergh contribute to the advancement in his capacity as "party guru" of the sovereignty claim against She was also suitable in approve it? If so, I think it was the Northern Protestants. another way. It had become very foolish. clear to some people in But the Constitution authority that the Institute McAleese displays a was altered in 1998. And was misconceived and that fundamentalist sectarian the authorised biography, somebody whose skills were resentment that is grossly published six years later, is still not narrowly legal was needed inappropriate to her shot through with the story of to make changes. I have pretensions as President to be the triumph of an oppressed no doubt that the Professor a bridge-builder: She was a Catholic over Protestant and the Lord Justice had Catholic who made good in the bigotry. And I cannot see the reason to 'headhunt' her. North (by being headhunted sense in that. But headhunting was the from the South) and all greatest of all sins under Fair who made an issue of the The President is a purely Employment rules. appointment did so because formal head of state, without she was a Catholic (and not Executive authority, and I had for a number of years because she was headhunted debarred from politics. I could been making an issue of the from the South and lacked the never see what use it had in duplicitous nature of Fair requisite qualifications). the functioning of the state. I Employment rules when the thought was McAleese appointment came Almost forty years ago wasted in it—as she must along as a breach of them I proposed that what was have realised when she by the very authority whose evidently an antagonism refused a second term. But

52 it gave her illusions, and she with a foreign-born President situation in these terms for wasted more of her life in the whose relations with her thirty years. If it is a false hope of doing things as a UN country of origin (whether the description, it has never Commissioner which she would UK or Northern Ireland) should been shown to be so. The have known she would not be be in accordance with the issue is evaded, as far as I allowed to do if she had read norms of diplomatic relations can see, because it leads to the UN Charter on realistic with foreign states. fundamental criticism of Britain, assumptions. I think the and that is something of which Phoenix Park is best occupied The Presidential biography the Irish state is no longer by people with a political career refers to "the inequality that capable. behind them. The Presidency was of the very essence of the is not itself a political career. Northern state". And it asserts Somebody who helped It is a facade on the state. that: me to compile the record of And it is unreasonable to McAleese's doings for the expect an ambitious Northern "The state of Northern Defence described her as an Catholic, skilled at securing Ireland was established to over-achiever. I don't think advancement, to become a put a Protestant-unionist that description quite catches mere facade while in her prime government in power and her. In the way I understand and full of beans. But that's to ensure that it would the word, it would apply to her what she wanted to be. And stay in power. Ironically, if in a particular occupation she that's what she got with the the Northern Irish had been promoted beyond help of Senator Mansergh, the unionists wanted… the the reach of her particular guru. And therefore that is very form of government talent. But I cannot see that what she should be required to they had long opposed" she had any settled occupation act as. (p57). or profession. She flitted about between occupations, and Perhaps the problem is In historical fact there was between states, being this or that the guru failed to realise never a Northern Ireland state. that as the occasion required. what it was that he took part The Ulster Unionists in 1914 She had a chameleon quality in in doing in 1998. He recently threatened to set one up under a high degree. And what could condemned me in a Belfast German protection but it never be more advantageous in Free paper for saving Unionism in happened. They went to war State Ireland today, which is 1969 by proposing that the against Germany instead. always 're-inventing' itself, and Ulster Protestant community What was done in 1920 was has little sense of continuity? should be recognised as a not done at the behest of the nationality. But he does not Ulster Unionists. It was an The criticism of her as explain how what he helped arrangement made by the President with relation to the to do 29 years later retains for Imperial Parliament for Imperial newly foreign country of her nationalist Ireland, or for the purposes, without Ulster birth is that she has not been Northern Catholic community, Unionist support. enough of a chameleon. But anything they would have lost perhaps that is because the if the Protestant community Northern Ireland was never guru has failed to adapt to the had been recognised as a anything but a region of the UK state of affairs he helped to nationality when the 'Northern state. The regional variation bring about in 1998, and has Ireland state' blew apart in in its mode of government was therefore failed to devise a role 1969. made by Westminster, and for her with regard to what he was not made in response to now holds to be a legitimate Having aggravated the Unionist demands for Home part of Britain. Protestants from 1969 to 1998, Rule. The Unionists within the Dublin establishment then this strange system had to win The Presidential gave Northern Ireland a de jure every election, not simply to biography tells us that, at her veto on Irish unity. The Six remain in power in Stormont, inauguration, surrounded by Counties was recognised as still less for the pleasure of the panoply of state, "she is still a legitimate part of a foreign oppressing Catholics, but in the slip of a girl from Ardoyne". state, and perhaps even as order to remain connected to And her mind is a hundred itself a foreign state, and no Britain. miles up the road "where all longer claimed as part of the things Irish belonged to the Irish nation. This leaves us I have been describing the ghetto" (p13). Which was

53 perhaps OK in 1997. But not Centre were bombed in which O'Donnell, who led the after 1998. she denounced the jubilation questioning. He was of the Palestinians. Here was assisted by Lord Justice (And what does Senator a people being tormented Kelly, who as Basil Kelly Mansergh, who still asserts that and ethnically cleansed by a had been a Unionist the Ulster Protestants are part regime of conquest. The most M.P. for Mid-Down at of the Irish nation, think of this powerful state in the world, Stormont and was the statement that north of Dundalk which armed and sustained last Attorney General of only the "ghetto" is Irish?) the force that was tormenting Northern Ireland under the them, was hit in its homeland ancien regime. Trimble We are told that she was for the first time ever—and they performed poorly, while always a "constitutional celebrated. Perhaps it was McAleese dealt with the nationalist", and a supporter unstatesmanlike. But what's questions adeptly and of the SDLP from the start, the use of statesmanship she was duly appointed" and perhaps a republican in in Palestine, where being (David Trimble And The the exotic sense—the Charles obedient only makes you Ordeal Of Unionism by Brett sense—that has little easier prey. Dean Godson, 2004, p94). bearing on real life in the North. I suppose that's why she has Then three years later the Of course it wasn't quite like difficulty in adapting to the Presidential biography talks of that. But, in a delicate political new situation. She is on good ghettoes in the North. situation, where the stirring up behaviour. But good behaviour of old resentments on marginal is always in danger of lapsing issues is hardly to the point, since it does not follow from The affair of the Institute is it is a way of presenting it. understanding. briefly dealt with in Trimble's The Presidential biography of biography. It relates how he McAleese would have been After listening to Dublin was authoritatively informed of well-advised to treat the matter politicians or constitutional a political block on promotion as lightly. nationalists it is always a for him—a thing which pleasure to hear somebody was plainly obvious at the The fact that this is the like Gerry Kelly, who has time. He failed to get two authorised biography almost helped to bring about the professorships, but was in line escaped my notice. It is not present situation by thoroughly to become Dean of the Law mentioned in the title page, the unconstitutional methods, and Faculty when authority raised blurb, or the Foreword, but on who acts out of a substantial up a candidate against him, page 381. The Foreword tells understanding when dealing lobbied for her, and he lost on us about the Plantation, when with it. He is at ease, and not the postal vote. And then: the Irish were driven into the on good behaviour. bogs and hills by Chichester "…once again a "to ensure that Britain would It was good behaviour presentable younger have no more trouble with the sustained over historical woman entered the field. north-east corner of Ireland. resentment which led to that Her name was Mary Over 350 years later, another great Presidential lapse of McAleese, a Belfast-born Chichester of the same stock, comparing the Unionists to the Catholic, the 36 year Major James Chichester Clark, Nazis. (And it is curious that Fr. old Reid Professor… at was still trying to achieve that Alec Reid, who helped to make , objective" (p7). her President, had a similar Her publications portfolio lapse not so long afterwards, may have been less I did not follow McAleese's though in more excusable voluminous compared to brief career in the North, circumstances.) that of Trimble, but she between her appointment to had two skills which he the Institute and her nomination But the Unionists can take it, conspicuously lacked: to the Presidency in the Free and retaliate in kind. she marketed herself State, and I did not know that superbly and she was she quickly became a member What struck me most was immensely adept with of many Boards of Directors, her spontaneous television people. The 10 strong including television interview on the day the interview panel was and Northern Ireland Electricity, Pentagon and the World Trade chaired by Lord Justice as well as Pro-Vice-Chancellor

54 of Queen's. We are told that suit against it by Mrs. Mary public affairs is a quality which she was an active member of M'Aleese, the Fianna Fail I know very well both from the Board of NIE and enjoyed politician who was appointed direct experience and from an the process of privatisation. Director of the Institute of acquaintance with the past. And: Professional Legal Studies at Its natural history would be Queen's University last year. an appropriate theme for a "In her work with The correspondence which farewell book on Belfast. NIE, Mary was regularly follows will make it as clear to reminded of the old days the reader as it is to the Editor (Last year Gardner's of the Ulster Workers' what the substance of the libel Bookshop refused to stock a Council strike, when is alleged to be. periodical called Irish Political loyalists gained access Review, on the ground that it to the grid, stopped the The outcome of the libel offended its customers (or a generation of electricity in suit is an irrelevance as far as special category of them), by North Ireland and forced the existence of this Magazine having "Irish" in its title and the British government to is concerned. Mrs. M'Aleese being published in Dublin.) bring an end to the power- did not in the first instance sharing government in approach the publisher of the Mrs. M'Aleese has put an Stormont. Under the new alleged libel, specifying what end to the Belfast Magazine dispensation, the grid was she held to be untrue and with a couple of solicitor's no longer vulnerable to asking that it be remedied. If letters. It remains for her to such a takeover because she had done so, there would prove that I published a libel on electricity generation was have been no difficulty on her. I offered to put right and taken out of the hands of my part about putting right apologise for any inaccuracies NIE. Private companies whatever was wrong. in the article that were made now operated the power known to me. Since that is stations" (p285). She approached the not acceptable to her, a jury distributors of the Magazine will have to decide whether I It seems that I must take with an offer not to prosecute libelled her. But this Magazine issue with the President in them for libel if they undertook will not exist either to admit the another issue of this magazine not to sell the Magazine in error of its ways or to rejoine in that she suppressed, because future. But, interestingly, she being vindicated. that is an utter travesty of what made no formal move during happened in 1974. The guru is the period of sale (August- Since I cannot see how I asleep on the job. September) of the Magazine have libelled Mrs. M'Aleese, I to which she took offence, naturally assume that the jury preferring to wait until the will find in my favour. But I am following (October-November) not sorry that the Magazine Ep i l o g u e issue was on sale. will not exist to celebrate this [The final issue of A Belfast particular victory. Through I Magazine in its old format Two things then happened. cannot agree to be branded came to hand unexpectedly They would have surprised me as a publisher of a libel until after the foregoing had been if twenty years' experience of a libel is demonstrated to me, written. The pages relevant to life in Belfast had not caused I take the view that whatever the libel action are reproduced me to expect them to happen: the outcome of the trial Mrs. below.] Gardner's Bookshop in Botanic M'Aleese has done me an Avenue took the September/ inestimable service. She has October issue off its shelves; pricked a bubble of illusion, and a Solicitor on whom I which I knew to be a bubble of depended, and who knew my illusion. And she has saved me Ed i t o r i a l In Co n c l u s i o n circumstances, refused to act from frittering away the rest of for me against the Director of my life in attempting to make This is the last issue of A the Institute for Professional good the historical default of Belfast Magazine—meaning Legal Studies. the Unionist middle class, as that there won't be any more. I have frittered away the past The moral courage of the twenty years. The Magazine is being commercial and professional wound up because of a libel middle class of Belfast in It is on the face of it absurd

55 that a rich and powerful person Since 1921 it has had was cut off from British politics like Mrs. M'Aleese should sue the comparatively simple and given a pseudo-state to an impoverished magazine with task of making Northern govern. Once Craigavon had a circulation of a few hundred. Ireland governable under the won parity with Great Britain It could happen nowhere else. Government of Ireland Act in social welfare provision, But neither could it happen or demonstrating to political "politics" consisted of turning anywhere else that a magazine opinion in Britain that it is out the Protestant vote. which the Director of a powerful ungovernable in that framework Stormont provided a two-fold public institution saw fit to and should be incorporated illusion for the Protestant take notice of would be utterly into the political life of the middle class: the illusion that it defenceless. The fabric of state. For forty years, was governing a state, and the public life in Belfst may not be Craigavon and Brookeborough illusion that it was part of the rich, but it is bizarre. mesmerised the middle class Tory Party. and acted half sensibly of their The Belfast Magazine is own volition. They kept the (Unionism as a British written, typed, printed, and put devolved government going political movement existed from together free of charge. Its by minimising its functions and 1886 to 1914. The word was cost to the public is the cost its activity, and by securing expressive of the connection of its materials. Not only do integration of the province into between the Tory Party and the the people who produce it get the social welfare system of the Joseph Chamberlain Liberals nothing for producing it, but state. Representative middle — one of those illicit affairs it actually costs them money. class activity took over the through which Toryism has None of those who made its governing of the pseudo-state periodically rejuvenated itself existence possible is wealthy. in 1964, and chaos set in four over the centuries. Though A couple have reasonable years later. those British Unionists fought a salaries. Others live on or great campaign to save Ulster below the official poverty line. The establishment of from Home Rule, their interest Stormont provided the in each other quickly became The Belfast Magazine is a opportunity for substantial independent of the Ulster issue. case of the poor subsidising middle class withdrawal from After the 1914 war the two had the rich. And that is an public life. And democratic become one substance, and arrangement, which so far as politics with any semblance of Chamberlain's son, Neville, I am responsible for it, will not meaning or purpose ceased confirmed their integration continue. to exist. The Protestant by becoming the Tory leader. community had to return a Look at any history of the There is a widespread Unionist majority at Stormont Tory Party, and you will find acknowledgement in the middle every few years in order to much about Chamberlain's class that this Magazine is a keep the province in the UK, Liberal Unionism, and little or good thing. But it is received but development was incapable nothing about Ulster Unionism. as a good thing with about of occurring in provincial But the name "Conservative as much understanding of, politics cut off from the politics and Unionist", and the token or interest in, its means of of the state. connection allowed to Ulster production as the Jews showed Unionism, exerted a reassuring about the Manna they found The social virtue of influence on the Unionist outside their tents every Ulster was middle class and fostered morning. Well, what you hold essentially apolitical even in the delusions.) in your hands is positively the great days of the Volunteers In the Stormont period last allocation of this Manna. and the United Irish. It became "politics" became merely I discovered the public modestly political under the a question of selecting character of the Belfast middle stimulus of British politics in which individuals were to be class in the early seventies. the 19th century. And during elected. The specific virtue of It is entirely absorbed in the Home Rule conflict Carson Presbyterian Ulster showed private interest in a way that and the Salisbury connection itself as a withdrawal from is socially inconceivable in in English Toryism conspired to politics, except for voting for Britain or the Republic. It is a overlay Ulster Unionism with an whoever appeared on the lviing refutation of Macaulay's appearance of politics. Unionist ticket. conception of the role of the middle class in history. In 1920 Ulster Unionism After Brookeborough, this

56 politically unpractised middle a generation ago. And that is in the middle class of the class, which was living in a why it is incapable of offering Protestant community is laid mirage, had to undertake the her any positive opposition. out in property values and apparently simply but actually professional status. subtle business of keeping With a second hand Stormont in being. It quickly duplicating machine costing £5 I could do this only because made a most awful mess of I set about changing all of this. I had just as little respect it. And then, with a perverse for their values as they had feeling that it was doing In September 1969 I for mine. I come of a small something virtuous, it withdrew published in a fringe magazine community in Munster, from politics and aborbed itself called The Irish Communist which evolved from a Gaelic in private affairs, which it found — which still had a circulation aberration, where a sense of more pleasant as well as more much greater than the Belfast equality is bred in the bone, profitable. Magazine ever achieved — and which, though it conducted an article on the history of its economic affairs with British political activity is Unionist Ulster which gave considerable success, retained a complex interaction of civil great offence in Dublin. a fascination with people society and government. The With that article I ruined my independently of property. It various institutions of civil prospects. And whenever I see is perhaps the only place in society act as avenues of what has become of my old Ireland where Pearse's "The bilateral influence between the acquaintance, Eamon McCann, Fool" appears as one of the Government and society at I am profoundly grateful that great poems of the world. And large. I have at least succeeded in the individuals it produces ruining my prospects. have no inhibitions grounded in I was not long in Belfast either property or status. before I saw that, in the Unionist Ulster, having no Protestant community, the inner political life, must attempt And so I set out to teach the impulse of civil society was to judge political matters by Protestant middle class what it extinct. In the Catholic non-political indicators. The was incapable of learning from community the impulse of civil indicators on which it relies me—and what nobody had an society was hale and hearty. in assessing political opinion interest in teaching it. Therefore, the institutions of are wealth and professional civil society, which in the rest status. Because I had neither, I did that for fifteen years. of the state are avenues for it could take no heed of what I then I stopped, feeling that I the representation of private said. But by the same token, had more than done my duty interest to the Government, are nobody whom it was capable of even by the exacting standards in Northern Ireland avenues of taking heed of — that is, with of Canon Sheehan and M.J.F. misrepresentation. And private a substantial private interest to McCarthy. But soon after interest, which in Britain is a tend to — would be capable of I stopped, it seemed that I relative term, is in Protestant saying what needed to be said. had not wasted my time after Ulster an absolute term. all. The Campaign for Equal What we have here is an Citizenship emerged from the Mrs. Thatcher astonished absolute disjunction between trauma (for Protestants) of the Britain about a year ago when vested interest and the Anglo-Irish Agreement. she said: "You know, there is capacity for political thought: no such thing as society: there something which England has I began this Magazine in the are only individual men and always taken great care to hope that it might give some women and their families". avert. depth to the CEC. But the CEC preferred to live at the Britain is incapable of And so, twenty years ago superficial level of slogans. existing like that. And even I embarked on an absurd And last February I was if Mrs. Thatcher rules into enterprise—an enterprise declared anathema to CEC the next century I doubt that which only somebody with members by the CEC leaders, she will make much progress no private property concerns Dr. Laurence Kennedy and towards realising her ideal and no career ambitions could Robert McCartney QC. (I will there. But in Protestant Ulster, have undertaken, and which take my leave of Belfast politics which she has treated so badly, was bound to fail because by publishing a reply to that her ideal was realised at least the basis of understanding anathema, which the Executive

57 of the CEC refused to circulate David Morrison, Joan Jones, by Mrs. Mary McAleese of internally.) Pat Walsh and others. Such the Institute of Professional a thing would have been Legal Studies at the Queen's Mrs. M'Aleese caught the inconceivable ten years ago. University, Belfast, in reference Magazine in flank. Through to an anonymous article the efforts of David Young 10 Oc t o b e r , 1988 appearing in Volume 3 No. 3 and Mark Langhammer a (Aug-Sept 1988) of A Belfast e l f a s t small amount of wholesale B . Magazine. distribution was achieved. But Dear Professor McAleese, this meant producing three This article as a whole issues without income. (This constitutes a serious and Within the past six weeks would have been the third untruthful libel upon our I have twice heard at second issue, after which money would client. Some passages call hand that you threatened have come in four months in particularly for comment from legal action against a Belfast arrears.) us. bookshop in connection with an article about you in A Belfast The sum involved was Our client’s knowledge of the Magazine (Aug-Sept 1988). piffling by commercial Northern Ireland legal system standards, but it involved us in is called into question. In fact As Editor and publisher of debts which were not piffling to Mrs. McAleese:- the magazine I would have us. expected to be the first to a) is an honours graduate be contacted by you in such The business of stopping in law of Queens University; a matter. I have not been a magazine by threatening contacted by you. But I learn distributors with libel action b) read for, was called this morning that Gardiners against an earlier issue to and practised at the Bar of bookshop has received from if they continued to sell it Northern Ireland; you a copy of a solicitor's letter seems to have been begun alleged to have been sent to by the millionaire, Sir James c) taught the criminal law me. I have received no such Goldsmith, against Private and procedure of Northern letter. Eye. The counter, as far as Ireland for 10 years as part of I recall, is for the publisher her course while Reid I wish to make it clear to you to guarantee the distributors Professor of Law at Trinity that if you can demonstrate that against financial loss resulting College Dublin. there is an inaccuracy in the from a successful libel action. Belfast Magazine article about And I couldn't even pay for a With regard to the malicious you, that inaccuracy will be put solicitor's letter. concluding paragraphs of the right. Or if you wish to reply Article we would point out the to the article, your reply will be I have been of the opinion, following:- published. But if you prefer to ever since I grasped the do neither of these things I can character of Northern Ireland a) Mrs. McAleese took only await your pleasure. affairs, that the only secure up her appointment full-time magazine published from in January 1988, with the Yours faithfully, this viewpoint would be agreement of the Institute at Brendan Clifford a subscription magazine. the time of her appointment; And that has now been demonstrated. b) as the academic year It has also been 6t h Oc t o b e r , 1988 had already commenced it demonstrated that times are L'Es t r a n g e & Br e t t was not required of her by the changing in Northern Ireland. Be l f a s t . appointing committee to To make that point I need only undertake the teaching of any say that the Belfast Magazine Dear Sir, courses in that year; although was made possible by the she had overall responsibility voluntary efforts of Davey RE: Our Client - Mrs. Mary for all courses in t hat year; Young, Mark Langhammer, McAleese Sean MacGouran, Davy c) she is in fact teaching Gordon, Niall Cusack, Bill We have been consulted four courses in this academic McClinton, Nicola Jones, year;

58 d) this teaching is in remedy the matter should have I understand that your addition to a very heavy been taken during the period of predecessor as Director had administrative burden, which sale of the issue in question. over twenty years experience has involved the restructuring in the courts; and that other of much of the work If I had been informed of members of the staff have had of the Institute. Even the an inaccuracy in the article extensive working experience, article pointed out that the about you at the time you first as distinct from academic Law Society almost withdrew contacted Gardner's Bookshop, knowledge; and that the job it's [sic] support to the I would have put a correction, specification as advertised Institute BEFORE Mrs. and, if appropriate, an apology, stressed the aspect of practical McAleese's appointment, in the current issue of the experience. indicating the difficult task that magazine. Since you chose faced our client upon her another course of action I could The central point of the appointment. not do that. article was that your career did not seem to meet the We require you at the It is not possible to gather requirmement of extensive earliest opportunity to retract from L'Estrange and Brett's practical experience. And the allegations contained in letter in which particulars the on this point the letter of this article and to apologise for article is held to be inaccurate. L'Estrange and Brett is it. Your readiness to do so will curiously silent. It gives be of relevance to our client's It says the "article as a no details of your practical further actions in relation to this whole" is a libel. But most of experience. matter including the question of the article has to do with you amends. career in Eire politics, in which I took the article on trust you chose a high profile. No because the person who Yours faithfully, inaccuracy is suggested in supplied it is eminently L'Estrange & connection with that part of the trustworthy. (And the Brett article. And I cannot imagine description of it as that it is held to be libellous "anonymous" strikes me as Oc t o b e r 20t h , 1988 to refer to the active political carping since people in legal career, in the recent past, of a practice customarily contribute e l f a s t B . person who for the time being articles for publication under

has adopted an academic the title of "A Special Legal Dear Professor McAleese, profile. Correspondent".) But if you show that you have I have received no reply L'Estrange and Brett list your had extensive practical from you to my letter dated academic credentials. Since experience as a practising October 10th (which was the Belfast Magazine article lawyer in Northern Ireland delivered to you on October did not question your academic courts, I shall certainly 10th). On October 12th I credentials I cannot see the publish an unconditional and received from L'Estrange and relevance of that list. wholehearted apology. Brett a letter dated October 6 but postmarked October 11th. The whole point of the (I'm sure you appreciate I understand that Gardner's article is that the Institute does that, with legislation in the Bookshop and Easons not teach an academic law pipeline making employment received copies of this letter on course. It gives a course for on merit enforceable at law, it October 10th, and that you had people who have completed is now a matter of great public approached Gardners about the academic law course. Its concern that appointments and the matter some weeks earlier. purpose, as I understand it, job specifications should be is to bring people who have seen to match up.) L'Estrange and Brett allege met the academic tests into A secondary point in the malicious libel against the contact with people who have article was that you had Belfast Magazine. If the object extensive practical experience not taken any course from was to get some inaccuracy of work in the courts, and to January 1988 to the end of the rectified, it strikes me as give tips on such things as how academic year. L'Estrange strange that the publisher to get somebody off a driving & Brett inform me that your should be the last to be offence. contract specified that you contacted, and that no action to would not take any courses

59 during the academic year Lo n d o n , in which you took up your APOLOGY No v e m b e r 8t h . appointment. I shall therefore Dear L'Estrange & Brett, publish this explanation in An article in the the next issue, apologise for I have received your letter August/September issue any implied criticism of you dated 28 October. of A Belfast Magazine for the undisputed fact that commented on the fact you did no teaching in the six I am not in a position to that Mrs. Mary M'Aleese months after you took up the "kindly nominate Solicitors" for did not, in the year of her appointment, and point out that the insuperable reason that appointment, carry out the the responsibility lies with your Solicitors cost money and I teaching duties which, as employer. have none. Director of the Institute for Legal Professional But I shall also say that Your client, by effectively Studies, the students were it would have been prudent interfering with the distribution expecting from her. on somebody's part to make of the Belfast Magazine, ended this clause in your contract the only business keeping me While this fact is not known to the people on the in Belfast. Having returned in dispute, we have course so that their natural to London, I am still without a been informed by Mrs. resentment of the fact might permanent address. As soon M'Aleese's Solicitors, have been directed at the party as I get one I'll let you know of Messrs. L'Estrange & Brett, responsible for it instead of at it so that you can serve your that responsibility for it you. writ. lies with Mrs. M'Aleese's Yours sincerely, employers, who agreed to it Brendan Clifford. Your remark that I am as a term of her contract. clearly "not prepared to make an appropriate apology" is We therefore apologise 28t h Oc t o b e r , 1988 puzzling, but I assume it to Mrs. M'Aleese for any is deliberately so. What I suggestion of negligence L'Es t r a n g e & Br e t t , "made clear" was that I would on her part in this matter. Be l f a s t . correct and apologise for any inaccuracies which were At the same time Dear Sir, revealed to me. And I indicated we must observe that, that the one inaccuracy I could especially because of the RE: Our Client - Mrs. Mary infer from your letter dated controversy surrounding McAleese October 28 would be dealt with. the appointment to this post If that was not taken to be an of a politician from another You are aware that we indication of willingness to state, it would have been act for Mary McAleese. We make an appropriate apology, prudent (to say the least) have read your letter of 10th I can only suppose that some if the students had been October, 1988. It is clear that legal game is being played made aware of why the new you are not prepared to make in which words do not have a director was not in the year an appropriate apology. sensible meaning. of her appointment giving the attention which her Accordingly, our instructions Being faced with what predecessors had done. are to issue proceedings seems to be a procedure of against you. Kindly nominate studied unreason, I can only Having been made Solicitors to accept service of await the serving of the writ. I aware of no other proceedings within the next gather that my defence against inaccuracy in the article seven days otherwise we shall the allegation of libel can be in question, there is serve you direct. conducted on legal aid. I shall nothing else that A Belfast therefore get you an address Magazine can apologise Yours faithfully, to serve the writ at as soon as for. L'Estrange & Brett. possible, and thereafter hand the matter over to Solicitors. Yours, B. Clifford.

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