AOH Pennsylvania State Board

For our convention, parking at the hotel – Millennium Hotel Cincinnati  – is Valet only and is $22 per day. There is alternative parking nearby including a city lot adjacent to the hotel. Rates range from $10 – $15 per day but do not allow in and out privileges. See Attached Maps.  Our contact is: Brenda Wellman, Executive Assistant, Millennium Hotel Cincinnati, 150 West Fifth Street, Cincinnati, Ohio 45202, USA, 513.352.2131; bwellman@mill-usa.com; http://www.millenniumhotels.com

To All: This is the type of news from Ireland that proves we are making steady consistent progress on the road to a peaceful political reunification of Ireland.

AOH National PEC

A SOLID STATEMENT THAT NORTH-SOUTH COOPERATION IS HERE TO STAY

Armagh is now on the Irish diplomatic circuit.  Next month the highly regarded Southern Joint Secretary of the North South Ministerial Council (NSMC), Tom Hanney, leaves to become Irish ambassador to Belgium. His successor, Anne Barrington, is finishing her days as ambassador to Tanzania. The man who will fill in over the summer, the current Southern Deputy Joint Secretary, Bill Nolan, used to be ambassador in Zambia and Lesotho. His predecessor, Niall Honohan, is now ambassador to Saudi Arabia. A magazine article some years ago claimed that Armagh was among the dozen most popular postings in the Irish diplomatic service.
We in our small South Ulster metropolis should be honoured. Irish diplomats are highly esteemed all over the world, from the United Nations to the British Foreign Office. Their diplomatic and drafting skills were honed to the limit in the negotiation and formulation of international treaties like the 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement, the 1998 Good Friday Agreement and the 2006 St Andrews Agreement, which are now widely studied as examples of ‘best practice’ in how governments can work together to overcome the ancient and seemingly insoluble problems of inter-communal conflict and clashing sovereignties.
The North South Ministerial Council Joint Secretariat which Anne Barrington is coming in to head, alongside another impressive woman, Northern Joint Secretary Mary Bunting, a senior official from the Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister in Belfast, is itself a success story.
Since May 2007, when the Northern Ireland institutions were restored, five full Northern Ireland Executive-Irish Government meetings have been organised by the NSMC secretariat, along with 65 meetings of Ministers in the agriculture, education, environment, health, tourism and transport areas, and those overseeing the specific areas of cooperation carried  out by the six North South Implementation Bodies.
These meetings are now part of routine government business in both jurisdictions. The fact that the DUP is properly engaged with them makes unionist backbench sniping more difficult. And many unionists, albeit reluctantly, have come to admit that they have their uses. They have brought a €400 million capital investment to the North in the form of Irish government funding for the upgrade of the A5 Aughnacloy-Derry road (also serving Donegal), and the A8 Larne-Belfast road (also serving the whole eastern seaboard).
There have been agreements on mutual action to be taken against disqualified drivers in both jurisdictions; on Irish government funding to clean up Northern region waste dumps containing large amounts of illegal Southern waste; on an all-island suicide prevention plan; on radiotherapy in Belfast for Donegal cancer patients and the all-island provision of heart surgery for children. The work of InterTradeIreland in helping to raise the level of trade and business development across the border, and of Tourism Ireland in bringing in overseas visitors, is widely recognised. These are examples of practical steps that will actually affect people’s lives for the better – North-South cooperation ‘for mutual benefit’ is the mantra of the civil servants in Armagh.
There is more that could be done. The highly innovative collaborative cross-border spatial planning framework devised by the International Centre for Local and Regional Development (also Armagh-based) is still stuck on a deadlocked cabinet table at Stormont, as is the North-West Gateway initiative for Derry and Donegal. The Irish Government would love to see Belfast and Dublin working together on joint adaptation for climate change (hardly a respecter of national borders) and cooperation at a time of deep financial cutbacks in costly areas like higher education, research and development, and health and environmental services.  Now that the hugely irksome issue of devolution of policing and justice has been resolved, maybe the review of the North South bodies completed several years ago can be dusted down, published and acted upon.
In the meantime the NSMC secretariat has moved into smart new offices ‘at the nationalist end of English Street’, as one Armagh wag puts it.  Its concrete exterior may make it look like a not particularly distinguished example of  mid-twentieth century brutalist design,  but actually this building is an appropriate symbol of the ‘architecture of reconcilation’ the 30 odd Northern and Southern civil servants working amicably in partnership inside it are striving to achieve. Indeed it has already won an accolade as the top ‘green’ (in terms of its environmental rating) office building in Ireland, itself symbolic of an era of new challenges on this island.
It may not be beautiful, but the solid new headquarters of the NSMC Joint Secretariat is making a powerful statement: that close and significant – and certainly growing – cooperation between the Northern Ireland Executive and the Irish Government is here to stay. It is part of what we are and what we will be in Northern Ireland and Ireland for many years to come. And all of us, Irish people in both jurisdictions, are the better for it.
Andy Pollak
P.S. Sadly, I also have to pay tribute to my much admired friend, Billy Tate, one of the great unsung heroes of cross-community and cross-border cooperation and mutual understanding, who died after a long illness earlier this month. Whether he was forging links with Monaghan schools during his time as principal of Aughnacloy Primary School in south Tyrone, or introducing his pupils at Belvoir Park Primary School in south Belfast to gaelic football and hurling (see ‘Cross-Community Gaelic Games take to the road’: July 2008), Billy’s brand of unionism was courageous, far-sighted, open-minded and welcoming to all. He will be hugely missed.
‘A Note from the Next Door Neighbours’ will be sent to everyone on the Centre for Cross Border Studies e-mail list on a monthly basis. If you have friends or colleagues who would like to be added to the mailing list for ‘A Note from the Next Door Neighbours’, please send their details to crossborder@qub.ac.uk. or call +44 (0)28 3751 1550.

Gettysburg Division Offers Special Battlefield Tour

Based in historic Gettysburg, Private Barney Devine Division 1 of Adams County, PA is once again offering their popular battlefield tour, “The Irish-American Experience at Gettysburg” on Saturday October 9, 2010 from 9:00am to  2:30pm.  This private tour is specially designed to feature the experience of Irish soldiers from both sides during the Battle of Gettysburg as explained by a licensed Battlefield Guide.  Highlights of the tour will include the Peace Light Memorial, Wheatfield, Peach Orchard, Little Round Top, New York Irish Brigade Monument, Fr. Corby monument, High Water Mark and Soldiers National Cemetery where Abraham Lincoln delivered his famous “Gettysburg Address”.  The cost of the tour is $50 per person and includes transportation via luxury motor coach, guided tour of the battlefield and cemetery plus a buffet lunch.  A portion of the proceeds will benefit battlefield preservation efforts and the division’s Hibernian Hunger Project.  The tour is open to AOH/LAOH members as well as the general public.  Tour tickets must be purchased by September 1 and are available by contacting Jim McGuigan at webmaster@gettysburgaoh.com or 717-360-5704.  For more information, visit www.gettysburgaoh.com

Submitted by:
Patrick Bowling, Historian
AOH – Adams Co. Div. 1
Gettysburg, PA
gpb@gettysburgaoh.com
717-337-5999

Gerry,
I would like to express my thanks and gratitude to all my Hibernian Brothers on the National, Pennsylvania State, County, and Division levels for their prayers, best wishes and expressions of generosity to me on the occasion of my 50th Anniversary of Ordination to the Priesthood.  I feel that it is a great privilege for me to be your Chaplain at every level, but even a greater privilege to be your Brother. With every blessing and best wish – Father Tom O’Donnell

To All: It is important that the first parades in “Marching Season” move through peacefully setting a stone for the balance of the period. In reality very small percentage of parades are contentious but there insistence on infringing on Nationalist neighborhoods is intolerable.

In previous years this parade has been violent with shots being fired at the PSNI by Orangemen who hid behind walls in nearby gardens, of course they removed their bowler hats and collars, several were convicted on video evidence taken from Police Helicoptors and are spending time in jail. That may account for the peaceful attitude of the marchers.

WHITEROCK MARCH PASSES PEACEFULLY

The Whiterock Orange Order parade in west Belfast has passed
off without incident.

Members of one lodge passed through the Workman Avenue
security gate onto the mainly nationalist Springfield Road
to rejoin the rest of the parade.

A large security presence was in place to monitor the
situation. A small number of nationalist residents held a
silent protest as the parade passed by.

In previous years, the parade has been a violent flashpoint.

Chief Superintendent Mark Hamilton said he appreciated the
“dignified” conduct of the marchers and the protesters
during Saturday’s parade.

“I would like to express my appreciation to those
responsible for conducting and marshalling the parade in
such a responsible way,” he said.

“Equally, I recognise the extensive efforts made by the
community in organising a protest that was dignified and
well-managed.  Both sides showed great leadership in
ensuring that this event could pass off without disorder or
major disruption to the community.”

“I would urge everyone to continue to work together and find
local solutions to local issues to ensure that we can
continue to enjoy a peaceful summer.”

During the parade five years ago, police officers were
attacked with petrol and blast bombs, as well as live rounds.

The cost of policing that Whiterock parade and subsequent
rioting in a number of loyalist areas was put at £3m by the
PSNI.
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Irish bishops welcome finding that Bloody Sunday was unjustified

By Cian Molloy
Catholic News Service

DUBLIN (CNS) — Ireland’s bishops welcomed the finding of a report that said British troops’ killing of 14 Catholics in 1972 was not justified.

Two of the bishops were from Londonderry, Northern Ireland, where the incident — widely known as Bloody Sunday — occurred.

“We share the joy and relief of the families of those killed and injured on Bloody Sunday,” the bishops said in a statement June 16, the day after the release of the long-awaited Saville Report. “We acknowledge the hurt and pain of the many people who lost loved ones on these islands during the course of the Troubles. We continue to carry them all in our thoughts and prayers.”

The bishops acknowledged the witness provided by many clergy, including retired Bishop Edward Daly of Derry, “whose part in Bloody Sunday and its aftermath is deservedly recognized.”

One of the most enduring images of Bloody Sunday is a photo of then-Father Daly waving a white flag, while he and others carry a teenager’s body to safety.

Bishop Daly said the people of the city had been vindicated.

“At the time I said mass murder had taken place, and I still believe that today. Perhaps more people now believe that happened,” he said, adding that the report would help him close a chapter in his life.

On Jan. 30, 1972, troops from Britain’s Parachute Regiment opened fire on civil rights demonstrators seeking universal suffrage in Northern Ireland and an end to discrimination against Catholics in employment and access to housing. Despite evidence that one victim was shot in the back while lying on the ground and others were shot while fleeing, the British government’s first inquiry into the massacre, the Widgery Tribunal, exonerated the soldiers after concluding that they had fired in self-defense.

The Widgery findings were rejected by the city’s Catholics, most of whom were nationalists and wanted Northern Ireland reunited with the Irish Republic. Many in the city’s Protestant community, most of whom were unionists and wanted to remain part of the United Kingdom, accepted the report.

In a June 15 statement, Bishop Seamus Hegarty of Derry said: “The ways in which people on different sides of the community have viewed the events of Bloody Sunday and have interpreted their significance has been a source of pain and tension over the past three decades. The publication of this report now presents us with the possibility of some healing of those differences.”

Lord John Saville’s commission to investigate the incident was established in 1998 as part of the Northern Ireland peace process. The inquiry was expected to last a year and a half.

Apologizing to victims’ relatives in a statement to the British Parliament, Prime Minister David Cameron said: “What happened should never, ever have happened. … The government is ultimately responsible for the conduct of the armed forces and for that, on behalf of the government, indeed, on behalf of our country, I am deeply sorry.”

Summarizing the findings, Cameron said: “Lord Saville concludes that the soldiers of the support company who went into the Bogside did so as a result of an order which should not have been given by their commander. He finds that, on balance, the first shot in the vicinity of the march was fired by the British army. He finds that none of the casualties shot by the soldiers was armed with a firearm. He finds that there was some firing by Republican paramilitaries but none of this firing provided any justification for the shooting of civilian casualties. And he finds that in no case was any warning given by soldiers before opening fire.

“He also finds that the support company reacted by losing their self-control, forgetting or ignoring their instructions and training and with a serious and widespread loss of fire discipline. And he finds that many of the soldiers — and I quote knowingly — put forward false accounts to seek to justify their firing,” Cameron said.

A day after the publication, leaders of the Church of Ireland, the Methodist Church and the Presbyterian Church in Northern Ireland met with victims’ families and promised to work with them to forge new intercommunity relationships. The Irish bishops mentioned the visit in their statement.

“We acknowledge the pastoral leadership shown by the representatives of the other Christian Churches as demonstrated by their visit,” the bishops said. “Finally, we call on all those who are still committed to violence to recognize the futility of this approach, and we plead with them to turn to a constructive political path to achieve their goals.”

Brothers, I have made contact with two representatives this morning. One my own Eddie Pashinski, whom I have known since college and one from a district nearby who is a member of the AOH. They both got back to me with the information that the House Resolution went around once several months back.

Both will sign on but we will need to provide information.

I’ll attach two items: The Resolution itself and The Irish Times article by Gerry Adams.

We need to get the point across that

The Good Friday Agreement provides for a way for the citizens of the North to vote for a United Ireland and then the process will begin.

This vote will be sometime in the future.

This resolution gives a sense that the Pennsylvania State House supports a future  peaceful political resolution for a United Ireland.

We need to let them know that this is important to their Irish American Constituents.

We are not interfering in a foreign government, the PA House has a right to support their Irish American voters.

Please make the effort or at least a phone call. www.legis.state.pa.us

I’m checking on a date next week for us to roam the House and pick up those needed co sponsors. Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday.

Let me know your availability.

Click to View Attached Items:

United Ireland Gerry Adams in The Irish Times

Resolution in Support of a United Ireland

In the report on Bloody Sunday, which was not a one off rogue incident, we mentioned Ballymurphy. Here is more on the subject.
All the truth has not been told!

Ballymurphy and Springhill Families deserve Truth – Adams

Sinn Féin west Belfast MP Gerry Adams this morning hosted a press conference to highlight the demand for truth and justice by the families of those killed in Ballymurphy and Springhill almost 40 years ago.

Mr. Adams said:

“On Tuesday the Bloody Sunday families finally achieved truth for themselves and their loved ones.
The British Prime Minister in apologising for the actions of the Paras stated that “Bloody Sunday is not the defining story of the service the British Army gave in Northern Ireland from 1969-2007.”
That is wrong.

Bloody Sunday is the defining story of the British Army in Ireland.

The British Army, British Military Intelligence, and a variety of British intelligence agencies, like the Military Reaction Force and the Force Reconnaissance Unit, along with the UDR and RUC, were directly responsible for 400 deaths in disputed circumstances.

Through collusion and sectarian murders they were responsible for hundreds more.

The Ballymurphy and the Springhill Massacres are examples of this and in these cases, as in so many others, the families still do not have truth.

In Ballymurphy six months before Bloody Sunday, we have another striking example of the brutality with which the Paras acted and how the British system then connived in a cover-up.

In the 36 hours after the introduction of internment in August 1971 eleven people – ten men, including a local priest and a mother of eight children – were killed by the British Army’s Parachute Regiment in the Ballymurphy area.

The accounts of how their loved ones died the bear a striking similarity to the stories told by the Derry families and now vindicated by the Saville report..
Paratroopers also killed others in Belfast in the same period, including a 14 year old  boy in Lenadoon,  a 17 year old in the Clonard area, a student teacher from Downpatrick outside St. Comgalls in Divis Street and Robert McKinnie and Robert Johnstone from the Shankill.
Six months after Bloody Sunday, on 9 July 1972, they shot dead five people in Springhill.
Among the dead was the second Catholic priest to be killed in greater Ballymurphy. He was administering the Last Rites to victims when he himself was cut down.
Of the four others killed, three were teenagers and the last was a father of six children who was with the local priest.
On 9 March 1973 the Parachute Regiment arrived for duty in the Ardoyne area of north Belfast. Within weeks they had shot and killed 5 people, one a 12-year-old boy.
In South Armagh a 12 year old schoolgirl was shot dead on 14 August 1976.
None of those killed had any connection to any armed group. They were all innocent civilians.

All of these families deserve the full support and encouragement of the community, and of the Irish government, in their efforts to secure an independent international investigation in these deaths.

We will be meeting the British secretary of State about these matters.

The British government in acknowledging the wrong done in Derry must acknowledge the wrong done in Ballymurphy and elsewhere and to these families. It must make a public apology for what it and its armed forces did.

The use of We is because many perhaps more than 1,000 members of the AOH/LAOH, including National Board members, National Presidents, and so many members have marched to support the Bloody Sunday Families in the past decade. They may have not had the luck to be present in Derry on 15 June but they well know the story and deserve the credit for doing our part in this massive victory for truth.

AOH National PEC
Report from Derry on 15 June 2010

We arrived in Derry in the morning and were greeted by the AOH BOE National President Jimbo Crossan, representing Derry Division #1, our hosts on all of our visits to Derry. As we told Jimbo all of our visits would have been impossible without the kindness and hospitality of Derry Division #1.
We went to the Guildhall where the families, two for each that died and the surviving injured along with their lawyers previously entered at about 8:00 am, all was quiet in anticipation, we were greeted by the people from the Pat Finucane Center who were making space for the extended families, neighbors, and friends of the of the victims inside a screened in area. We realized that waiting on the sun-drenched Guildhall Square, yes sun drenched, was an option that could not be taken up until after 2:00 pm.
After some tea, we went to the Bloody Sunday Museum, which looks and sounds great with video, sound, and new panels but an overall tension and a 12:30 closing sign. Lunch and a nervous return to the Guildhall Square still ominously quiet with TV cameras, a huge video screen and reporters lurking over an empty screened in square.
At 2:00 pm we walked over to the Bloody Sunday Monument where thousands of relatives, friends, and neighbors were gathering to organize a march to where they had hoped to finish in 1972. This was not our usual Commemoration March with many more families and children, almost everyone from Derry. The gaggle of foreign visitors, so proud to be present, which including the AOH/LAOH each year, was missing from the march because of the short notice.
Tim Pat Coogan famously said that the British propaganda machine built a Paper Wall around the six counties so the truth could not be seen.” The Widgery Report, long considered a strongpoint in that wall was about to be shredded.
There was the unspoken feeling that the Widgery report was to be ripped apart and cast into the bin of history, the families were about to visually demonstrate that.
At 2:00 pm we walked over to the Bloody Sunday Monument where thousands of neighbors, friends, and more relatives were gathering in Free Derry to organize a march to where they had hoped to finish in 1972. This would not be the commemoration march the AOH/LAOH has been a part of each year this decade.
No commotion only a few were speaking in low tones, this was not a celebration, when loud speaking voices, with no bull horns began telling us to begin moving, with applause, as usual there was little organization but with the exception of clapping there was no extraneous noise. As we wound into Williams St. everything stopped short. Realizing something was happening in the front we hurried up a walkway behind Pilot’s Row to just witness the families in the lead crashing through a huge paper barrier symbolically titled the Widgery Report. We moved on with the crowd to the square through photographers, video cameras, and reporters the mood became much more exciting and the crowd sang “We Will Overcome”. The feeling of hope was being replaced by elation
Now on the Guildhall Plaza in front of the wall topped by ancient cannons, pointed toward the Guildhall but now in addition seemingly hundreds of video cameras with all of their requisite human news organizations we moved to the right suspecting the families would come out to a low wooden stage near the door with a barred gate on the right with podium, the huge, now blank, video screen was to our left. The crowd was hushed and so very patient, but buzzing with anticipation, as we stared at the screen with the sun blazing, this was certainly not the Commemoration March of January/February we had come to know.
The first positive sign was electrifying applause and screams for wrists and hands which crept down the open vents in the historical stained glass windows, but prevented by the metal grid from extending, with thumbs pointed up. Next, obvious copies of the documents again with thumbs up were shoved over the vents. Even now the families were communicating. It was then the crowd knew this would be a historical day.
Minutes later at exactly 2:30 pm the video screen came alive with Prime Minister David Cameron speaking the words in the oft seen news bites, that the British were apologizing and declaring those murdered on Bloody Sunday to be innocent. The silent crowd erupted with a Mount St. Helen’s style noise that drowned out the next few words. As Cameron spoke on giving excuses for the state supported terror, the same crowd booed loudly, and finally an accusation based on an anonymous statement written to Saville, that Derry’s own Martin McGuinness had a Thompson Machine gun on that day drew the loudest derisive noises.
When the families bounded out the formerly barred door at the rear of the Guildhall there was not a dry eye in the Square. It was New Years Eve in New York City. Every sign of the government left the stage to the families and the people of Derry as well they should for a government that murdered its own citizens, faked a report absolving themselves, denied it for 38 years, and criminalized those murdered should definitely slither off the platform.
The Bloody Sunday Families had their own intimate moment to share their victory with the people of the city of Derry who had stood with them all of these years.
We were very close to Bishop Edward Daly, the priest waving his handkerchief in the iconic image of the day spoke to a group of reporters said, “Its wonderful when truth emerges … (people) are vindicated, particularly at this level.”
John Hume said, “The British State has now acknowledged the victims innocence and that it’s army murdered on that day.”
Our friend Mickey Bridge, wounded on the day, whom many met in 2009 said “I’ve never felt better in my whole life.” He mourned his friend Mickey Bradley also wounded on the day, standing next to him, while both stood unarmed screaming at the soldiers. Mickey Bradley died of a heart attack one year ago after many AOH Members met him also at the 2009 Commemoration.
Tony Doherty, his father murdered that day, “The victims have been vindicated. The parachute regiment has been disgraced and their medals of honor have to be removed.”
The AOH’s great friend Liam Wray, his brother Liam shot on the ground by the paras as he lay dying, was laughing and crying as he stepped forward to hug us and explain the huge emotional swings which were moving back and forth inside him.
We shared handshakes with Mickey McKinney and John Kelly at the end.
“I was struck by their (relatives) sheer dignity and their palpable belief that the long wait was now over. Two key words came across again and again; innocence and justice”, said Bishop of Derry Seamus Hegarty.
Early on 15 June the people of Derry City were very edgy before the decision with the ominous feeling that the verdict would fall short of the family’s expectations but the reality was a full 180 degrees from the expectations. The families gained 99.99% of what they wished with a total verdict of innocence and vindication.
The actual statements in the enquiry report were almost taken word for word from the people in the streets on 30 January 1972 told in witness statements to, AOH MacBride Award winner Don Mullan’s book, Eyewitness to Bloody Sunday as well as the movies on Bloody Sunday based on his book, produced a few years ago with additions the from the wounded and families.
More often in our studies of and about the conflict the security forces played loose with the truth throughout the Troubles and the people in the streets spoke the truth. As the residents in the nationalist neighborhoods would say, “Even the dogs in the street know the truth.”
The commentators and Unionist spokespersons spoke of the huge cost of Saville. Marty McColgan a Sinn Fein Counselor from Omagh exposed that “The truth costs nothing. What Saville shows is that attempting to hide the truth costs millions.”
State supported terror, while calling the victims terrorists was the general order of the day in the three decade plus conflict. Even after the verdict the terror word was thrown around when Saville’s facts proved the paratroopers and the security forces, along with Widgery were in fact the terrorists.
The British assertion in their statement said essentially that this was a rogue platoon, led by an officer, Derek Wilford, who disobeyed orders is not supported by any factual evidence, including that six months later they gave him a medal for his actions, as well as several of his soldiers, on the day. This medal was for murdering unarmed mostly young men. As several former officers on UTV commented after report, the army knew the truth about the assault and murder of innocent victims almost immediately.
Para 1 in fact murdered and wounded civilian resident British citizens of the Ballymurphy area in Belfast a few short months before Bloody Sunday, including a priest and a woman with many of the same SLRs (self loading rifles) used in Derry.
As Mike Cummings rightly persists in reminding us seeking the truth in the Dublin Monaghan Bombings has proved, through the British refusal to cooperate, that there are more Dirty Tricks to be exposed about the British Security apparatus.
We can never forget Pat Finucane’s assassination; Martin his son was present for the families in the Guildhall Plaza on 15 June and in a conversation with us, before Cameron’s speech, offered that he believed the statement would be very good for them.
Again the news commentators spoke afterwards in terms of the British Security forces keeping the peace when in fact they were protagonists and even instigators in attempting to suppress the nationalist population throughout the 30 + year struggle. Without question the suppressing of the truth about the actions of the British Government in the Six Counties was systemic.
They spoke of Saville being the end, when in truth this is a major tear in the “Paper Wall” Tim Pat Coogan identified but far from the end.
The fiction that the British Security forces are portrayed in as keeping the peace is the reasons they will never be believed when it comes to their actions during the Troubles. The Paper Wall, torn and tattered, much like a torn paper dress as they try to gather the shreds around them to cover their sins.
The Bloody Sunday Families tore up Widgery and The Ancient Order of Hibernians and the LAOH must be sure to do our part in tearing down the rest.

TO ALL: This is the article from the Irish Times that National President Seamus Boyle sent the link to yesterday. Pat O’Brien  from Pittsburgh found the article and copied it into an email also. Our United Ireland Committee presented the article to Senator Michael Stack in Harrisburg PA yesterday as part of our drive to pass a United Ireland Resolution in PA yesterday. BTW National PEC Co-chairman Joe Roche joined us in Harrisburg.

Brothers, This is how I envision our AOH National PEC Office working. Everyone contributes and we all take a piece of the action. This is the Ancoient Order of Hibernians at it’s finest from the National President down to the division we are informed. This is our legacy as well as our Constitutional mandate. That has to feel really good.

New republic not possible without a united island

Orangemen parading in Donegal 11 years ago: those who built the State turned their backs on the North and on the ideals of independence. Photograph: Trevor McBride

http://www.irishtimes.com/comment/

Both North and South have failed miserably as separate entities. The best way forward is to avoid the wastes and inequalities of partition, writes GERRY ADAMS
CITIZENS OF this island need to build a new republic – a truly national republic – encompassing all of the people of this country, as envisaged in the Proclamation of the Irish Republic in 1916.
The Proclamation is as relevant today for a republic of the 21st century as it was almost 100 years ago; it guarantees religious and civil liberty; equal rights and equal opportunities to all its citizens; and a commitment to cherish all the children of the nation equally.
These words are a solemn pledge to every Irish citizen that she and he can share in the dignity of humankind, as equals with equal opportunity; that we can enjoy freedom, educate our children, provide for our families and live together with tolerance and respect for each other.
The two states imposed by the partition of Ireland have failed to deliver these principles. Both have been characterised by economic failure, by emigration, by backwardness on social issues, by inequality and by the failure to protect the most vulnerable of our citizens.
Those who built the State turned their backs on the North. They turned their backs also on the ideals of independence and a genuine republic. As James Connolly predicted, a carnival of reaction followed partition.
The southern state that developed was in hock to the Catholic hierarchy while the six counties became a “Protestant state for a Protestant people”. Two conservative states ruled by two conservative elites.
If the republic we want to build for the 21st century is to be real and meaningful then it must be truly a national republic. Uniting the people of Ireland makes sense.
In the face of grave economic difficulties, more and more people understand the need for an all-Ireland economy. The waste that arises from the duplication of public services because of partition must be eliminated. Together is better.
Many of the social and economic problems now faced by citizens north and south are symptoms of partition.
Towns along the Border remained economically depressed even during the Celtic Tiger era as a result of being cut off from their natural hinterlands.
The political establishments which emerged in the aftermath of the partition of Ireland – the senior civil servants, the judges, the politicians of Cumann na Gael, Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil, and the Ulster Unionist Party, created systems that entrenched their own privilege. In the South, the idealism of the aborted revolution waned as they put their own interests first and prospered at the expense of ordinary citizens.
Laws which have their foundation in the outdated 1937 Constitution do not protect the rights of children nor the socio-economic rights of any of our citizens.
They would not pass the Good Friday test.
The system of economic and political apartheid in the North and the scandals of backhanders and brown envelopes and of financial institutions and developers in the South exemplify how these elites lined their own pockets and how ordinary workers are now expected to carry the can.
It was the same atmosphere that allowed Section 31 censorship to continue for so long, that excluded women from the workplace and public life, and that denied gay and lesbian citizens equality under the law.
Ireland can be changed. But citizens need to be clear about the kind of Ireland that we are seeking to create. That needs a national debate.
Many of the contributions to this series are Dublin-centric. A national vision of the future needs to be broader than that.
Many people are looking again at our country – its good points and its bad and how it can be changed for the better.
This is good.
But redrafting the 1937 Constitution is not enough, especially if it is done within – and to accommodate – the existing partitionist system.
Instead, a more practical proposal is for An Taoiseach to commission a Green Paper on Irish unity to be completed within one year.
This should address all aspects of this national and democratic project, including its political, social, economic, cultural, legal, administrative and international dimensions.
The aim should be to identify steps and measures which can promote and assist a successful transition to a united Ireland and to develop detailed planning for a new state and a new society that all Irish people can share. All stakeholders in society on this island must be given an opportunity to take ownership of the debate and the process it initiates.
A Joint Committee of the Oireachtas on Irish Unity to monitor, assess and report progress on implementation should be established.
A Minister of State should be appointed by the Government with the dedicated and specific responsibility of driving forward and developing policy options and strategies to advance the outcomes of the Green Paper and to direct and co-ordinate the Government’s all-Ireland policies.
A republic – a real one – is based on citizenship and citizens’ rights, so we also need to discuss the type of rights and responsibilities we would expect for citizens in the new republic. But the realisation of these rights cannot wait until then.
Legislative rights should be introduced now.
Also, why not introduce more representative electoral processes, such as the introduction of list systems and the radical reform of political institutions which Sinn Féin and others have long advocated?
Cronyism and privilege must be ended and the emergence of new elites has to be prevented. That means accountability, transparency and an active participatory democracy.
While we have to deal with all of the legacies of two dysfunctional states, we also have to deal with the immediate disaster of Government policies which encouraged over-borrowing by homeowners, and increased unemployment and cuts and threatened cuts to public services.
We need to rebuild our economy, using a stimulus package to create jobs for the unemployed and effectively supporting those sectors that will tap into the skills and ability of our young and highly educated workforce.
Society also needs to cushion the most vulnerable citizens from economic disadvantage. Equality is for everyone.
A new republic must include rural Ireland and the protection of the uniquely rural way of life which is compatible with a new green environmentally sustainable way of living.
That also means ensuring Gaeltacht communities thrive and the Irish language has the support required to flourish as a spoken language in future generations.
Real social, economic and political change is not easily achieved but all those who have a genuine commitment towards building an Irish republic worthy of the name must work together towards that end. That work must start now.
Some will say this is not possible. Bunkum. Everything is possible. The peace process if proof of that.