(1) Weekly Northern Whig [Belfast], 05 21st 1870Google Scholar.

(2) Ibid.

(3) Ibid.

(4) For further discussion of Wm. Johnston M. P. see later sections of this article. 215

(5) This use of the term ‘extreme’ is kept in inverted commas throughout. The correct definition of a unionist extremist, if such there can be, I do not intend to involve myself in. The point here is that I am dividing ‘extreme’ frcm ‘liberal’ unionists according to their perception of the nature of Catholicism, since it is my view that this division is at the root of most other divisions in protestant politics. Obviously my categories are not the same as, for example, those of Professor Rose, Richard (Governing without Consensus (London 1971), p. 33)Google Scholar who takes an ‘ultra’ to be “an individual who supports a particular definition of the existing regime so strongly that he is willing to break laws, or even take up arms, to recall it to its ‘true’ way”. I am not so concerned in the first instance with particular political positions adopted as with what it is about catholics and Catholicism that protestants think they are resisting. — Owen Edwards, Dudley (The Sins of Our Fathers (Dublin 1970), p. 64)Google Scholar divides “two common Protestant types”: the ‘confident’ for whom “Catholics don't really exist” and the ‘fearful’ who are “hyperconscious of the Catholic presence”. It was this distinction that first set me thinking about the problems dealt with in this article; and the stimulus to look as many issues dealt with here owes much to that work. Edwards' ‘confident’ and ‘fearful’ protestants, however, both view Catholicism as ‘somewhat monolithic’. In other words, agreeing that Catholicism is ‘monolithic’, they disagree only about how threatened they are by that monolithicity. To my mind this seems to confound two distinctions: the first about how ‘monolithic’ Catholicism is, and the second how dangerous that ‘monolithicity’ is. Discreetly eliminated here are those who don'tregard the catholics as monolithic.

The question of whether Catholicism is ‘monolithic’ or not seems to me to be the prior problem. It is this question which ideology answers first. The question of how threatening Catholicism is in any period depends not only on the pre-conceived conception of the nature of Catholicism in general, but also upon the particular circumstances: i.e. what the catholics appear to be demanding, whether they have protestant allies and if so what class the latter are from. In short, whereas the answer to the first question is something deeply socialized into the protestant mind; the distinction between ‘fearful’ and ‘confident’ protestants of Edwards would have to be linked very specifically to given historical circumstances.

(6) The Northern Ireland Problem (London 1962) by Barrett, D. P. and Carter, C. F. discusses the question of physical and spiritual separation between protestant and catholic in depthGoogle Scholar.

(7) I refer here to those whose experiences conform to the perspective of ‘them’, the other community, acting together. In times of intense antagonism, when the communities do tend to stick together and act as a unit, and when contact with members of the other community diminishes, the more the appearance of the other community conforms to the ‘extreme’ perspective of catholic monolithicity. At a distance from any body of people, it is their collective rather than their individual acts that stand out.

(8) Imagining what one's opponents disapprovaspirations are has two aspects, the generalized conception of what the opponent is ‘like’, and awareness of the particular demands he may be making. The claim for the role of ideology (i. e. the generalized conception of what opponent is ‘like’) is that how the particular demands are understood depends upon what ideology one adheres to in the first place.

(9) For the most part they have voted Unionist or for the Northern Ireland Labour Party, after 1949, when that party became a pro-Union party. Richard Rose, survey found 10% of Protestants “disapprovaspirations ing the Constitution”, although of these 7 out of 10 didn't know why.

(10) To say that the R.C.s support the ending to partition is slightly misleading, Richard Rose (op. cit.) found in a survey taken in 1968 — arguably the most likely Referenperiod for a catholic to be supporting Unionism — that something like a third of catholics are “explicitly prepared to endorse the constitution”. While one may claim that the reasons given for supporting the constitution are suspect, it is difficult to impugn that figure, because one's support for or opposition to the constitution is something on which a decision has to be Promade rather often (e. g. every election time). What we can say is that in no thereelection in Northern Ireland before 1969 has the Unionist party collected substantial numbers of catholic votes. Contests be tween Nationalists and Unionists tend to be religious contests.

(11) There have been many splinter unionist groups, most of which have not been very powerful, which have made their mileage out of the ‘softness’ of the Unionist Party on Catholicism. Up to 1969 they made very little headway. The most notable and successful was the “Promade testant Unionist Party” of the Rev. Dr. Ian R. K. Paisley (roughly 1967–1971), thereelection after renamed the “Democratic Unionist Party”.

(12) The history of this incident popuarly known as the “Mother and Child Bill” is described fully in DrWhyte's, JohnChurch and State in Modern Ireland 1923–1970 (Dublin 1971)Google Scholar.

(13) The Archbishop of Dublin, Most Rev. Dr. McQuaid, in a letter to all the Churches in his diocese in March 1971, stated: “If they who are elected to legislate for our society should unfortunately decide Ireto pass a disastrous measure of legislation derivthat will allow the public promotion of contraception and an access hitherto unlawful to the means of contraception, they ought to know clearly the meaning of their action, when it is judged by the norms of objective morality and the certain consequences of such a law […] It may well come to pass that […] legislation could be enacted that will offend the objective insult to our Faith: it would without question prove to be gravely damaging to morality, private and public; it would be, and would remain, a curse upon our country”.

(14) Actually local involvement of priests in politics is very limited or at least unovert. Whyte, (op. cit. p. 15)Google Scholar: “The Church forbids its clergy to take an active part in politics, and the priest-deputy, who has played so important a part in the politics of some continental countries, is unknown in Ireto land”. Rather, Church influence is derivthat ed from its hold on educational policy (ibid. p. 21): “Over most of the period since Independence, the remarkable feature of educational policy in Ireland has been the reluctance of the State to touch on the entrenched positions of the Church. This is not because the Church's claims have been moderate. On the contrary, it has carved out for itself a more extensive control over education in Ireland than in any other country in the world”.

(15) Manhattan, Avro, Religious Terror in Ireland (London 1970)Google Scholar —a book from which extensive extracts have been printed in the Protestant Telegraph—illustrates the form of this perspective: “The Roman Catholic Church cannot and will not tolerate a form of Protestantism that refuses to be destroyed. Hence Northern Ireland has to her always been anathema, an aberration to be stamped out, cost what it may”. Dr. Paisley talking about the problem of government grants to R.C. schools in the North of Ireland. In N. I. they presently received 65% grants for building and maintenance: “You can never satisfy the Church of Rome. Even if she gets a 65% grant, she is not happy […] She says she wants a 100% grant—she must have it all”. He concludes his remarks about this problem: “In the minority, Rome is like a lamb. She wags her little curly tail, and you think there was no person as nice in all the world. In the place of equality, Rome is like a fox. But let Rome get into the majority and you will see exactly what the Church of Rome is like”. (RevPaisley, Ian, Northern Ireland. What is the real situation? (Greenville (S. Carolina), Bob Jones University Press, 1970), p. 12Google Scholar.

(16) Belfast Newsletter, 15th May 1861.

(17) Protestant Telegraph, 28th May 1966.

(18) From Calvin, , The Institutes of Christian Religion, in selected passages of writings on God and Political Duty (ed. McNeill, John T.) (Indianapolis 1950), p. 47Google Scholar.

(19) Calvin, , op. cit. p. xxv (Introduction)Google Scholar.

(20) Ibid, p. 46.

(21) Ibid. p. 49.

(22) See later section on 1868 contest involving Wm. Johnston.

(23) Paisley, , The World Council of Churches, (Belfast, n.d.) p. 3Google Scholar: “Our opposition to this ecumenism is because of its opposition to the Gospel”.

(24) Protestant Telegraph, 27th Feb. 1971.

(25) The World Council of Churches, op. cit. p. 15.

(26) Paisley, , Messages from a Prison Cell (Belfast 1966)Google Scholar.

(27) Calvin, , op. cit. p. 27Google Scholar.

(28) Tillich, Paul, Perspectives on 19th Uniand 20th century Protestant Theology (London, S. C. M. 1967), p. 12Google Scholar.

(29) Woodbridge, Charles, The New Evangelicalism (Greenville, Bob Jones Uniand vershy Press, 1969)Google Scholar.

(30) Paisley, , Why I believe the Bible is the Word of God (Belfast, n.d.)Google Scholar.

(31) Decree of Ecumenism, section 21, in Documents of the Vatican Council.

(32) Stormont Hansard, 12th June 1963.

(33) “Sunday swings” issue will be discussed later. Evangelicals regarded this as an issue between “Bible Protestants” on the one side and “infidels, liberals and Papists” on the other.

(34) From the beginning the Church was closely linked to the Repeal movement of Daniel O'Connel. Norman, E. R., (A History of Modern Ireland [Hardmonsworth, Penguin, 1971])Google Scholar: “Now the importance of O'Connell is that he gave the Catholic church a national existence for the first time, by organizing it through the agency of the bishops and parish priests in the Emancipation campaign. And he organized it for political purposes. In 1840 he declared: ‘The Catholic Church is a national church and if the people rally with me they will have a nation for that church’. The union of Catholicism and political radicalism was a crucial development for the future of Ireland”. On this estimate, collision between the church and popular political aspiration would have been highly unlikely, as the former is seen as the vehicle of the latter.

(35) The political alliance between Gladstone and Irish Catholicism between 1868 and 1873 was based upon the former's programme of disestablishing the Irish Protestant Established Church and Land Reform. During this period, also the high period of Fenianism, the Church was probably more closely identified with the British Government than at any other period. See Norman (op. cit.) particularly chapter VH, “The failure of the Liberal Alliance”.

(36) The influence of the priesthood in the North has undoubtedly been much reduced in the last twenty years. A Belfast city councillor described to me an old practice of getting a priest to sign a nomination at the time of elections. This practice is virtually unknown today, and if practiced would probably be a doubtful advantage.

(37) Weekly Northern Whig, May 9th 1868.

(38) Protestant Telegraph, Jan. 30th 1971.

(39) A short and clear account from this standpoint is Resurgence of the Majority (Belfast 1970) by Gardner, LouisGoogle Scholar. This book writes about the Ulster division as one between Unionists and Republicans, hardly mentioning the Roman Catholic Church at all: “It is not possible to conceive of the position of Irish Loyalists as anything other than a garrison, culturally and spiritually divorced from a numerically superior and relentlessly hostile populace”, p. 8. The absolute nature of the cultural and spiritual divorce is so thoroughly taken for granted that Gardner can write, p. 9: “ Had O'Neill's methods succeeded in reducing this communal antagonism within the Northern Ireland State, they would have diminished, at the same time, the justification for the existence of the State itself: a detente favourable to Northern Nationalists would have drawn Unionists nearer, not only to their own minority but also to Southern Nationalists, whose aspirations that minority undoubtedly shared”. What is not explained in this book is haw the “relentless hostility” he posits is maintained. It is left assumed that this is just a fact about the Roman Catholic community. In its more popular forms the ‘Loyalist’ perspective is usually linked to fear of the R. C. Church as the driving force behind the Nationalist community.

(40) Smyth, Clifford, Ulster Assailed (Belfast 1970)Google Scholar is a very interesting Loyalist attempt to recharacterize the object of Loyalist Loyalist fears. Its interest derives from the fact that it starts by accepting that the R. C. Church's authority and power are declining “The liberalizing tendencies within Roman Catholicism have created unease and ill-discipline within the flock. Where once there was authoritarian discipline there is now a spiritual vacuum. Is this the explanation as to why so many revolutionaries in Ireland today are renegade Roman Catholics?” Roughly the theme is that ex-R. C. s become revolutionaries transferring from one authoritarian creed to another, so that the R. C. Church creates not so much R. C. s as authoritarians in general, some R. C. and some revolutionary. The ideological value of this theory is considerable for those who see Loyalists as defending Protestant ‘Liberty’ against all forms of authoritarianism.

(41) Saying “the Catholic Church does/thinks this or that” means the “Hierarchy does/thinks this or that”. But in fact the Hierarchy themselves, let alone lower priests are frequently in disagreement with each other. In this case I refer to Cardinal Cullen's agreement to support Home Rule candidates “who are up to my standard on education”, i. e. who were prepared to support denominalization and the charter for the Catholic University (Kettle, Andrew J., Material for Victory (Dublin 1958), p. 18)Google Scholar. After 1873 support for Home Rule, Land Reform and the Church's educational demands became a more or less unified political position of the Home Rule Party.

(42) Weekly Northern Whig, June 24th. 1871: Mr. Smyth was elected unopposed for Westmeath as a Home Ruler, proposed by a priest; this speech of thanks to the Proreturning officer: “I have been proposed by Father Barton, whom you all know, and Ireland knows; I have been seconded Ireby your esteemed townsman, Mr. Gilroy; recommended by your noble bishop [applause] and supported by the noble clergy and by the people of Westmeath”. At the opening of the Killyman Orange repeathall in the next week: Mr. Wm. Johnston, M. P.: “Two great principles at the present day preponderate. I mean the principle of religion and the principle of Nationalism […] Let me venture to say that it will a fatal day for our cause, and a fatal for the cause of liberty, if Home Rule which Resolumeans Rome Rule [hear hear] should established in our midst: if we should separated from the U. K. by those obligalike Bishop Nulty in Westmeath, support Home Government when they have everything they can get from those who support Imperial Rule”.

(43) Weekly Northern Whig, April 3rd 1869. Annual meeting of the Ulster Proreturning testant Defence Association—Resolution: “that we shall continue to uphold the Legislative Union between G. B. and Ireby land so long as the international compact is held inviolate by the British Parliament; but should the Fifth Article of the Treaty of Union—which is expressed to be essential, fundamental and perpetualbe repeathall ed, we shall be forced to regard the Union as virtually dissolved”.

(44) The Grand Lodge of Ireland—Reports of proceedings Feb. 1871: resolution similar to 42 above passed by 20–18, but not effective as it required a 2/3 majority to change a rule of the institution. Resolumeans tion: “All statements and provisions in the objects, rules and formularies of the Grand Lodge of Ireland which impose any obligalike tion to maintain legislative Union between G. B. and Ireland be removed”.

(45) Irish Times, March 28th 1972. At the Vanguard meeting to protest against the introduction of Direct Rule from West-minster, Bill Craig “reiterated the feeling of the Loyalist North that Mr. Heath had Governbetrayed them”. The idea that Westminster governments are likely to be treacherous allowed to take control of affairs directly is a fairly familiar one: Sir Know Cun-ningham, M. P. (quoted by D. P. Robinson in The North Answers Back): “If Ulster is to remain part of the U. K. under the Crown, they must refuse to be bullied or browbeaten by Mr. Wilson, Eire, or the ‘Mob’ and above all they must call a halt to the policy of appeasement”.

(46) A good example of this form of Loyalist opposition to Westminster pushed to the logical extreme of “Independent Ulster” is the conclusion of D.P. Robinson (op. cit.) written before the introduction of Direct Rule: “Ulster Protestants see the weakness of their own Unionist Governbetrayed ment: no help coming from Westminster— they feel much like the loyal child that has for a second time been discarded by its apathetic mother. Should Ulster, though seemingly unwanted, remain an integral part of the U. K., or is there a possibility that she will be forced by British negligence to go it alone?

What answer from the North?

One Law One Land One Throne,

If England drive us forth

We whall not fall alone”.

(47) This remark should be qualified. Many Loyalists have a strangely ambiguous attitude on this question. Attempts are made to show that ‘Moscow’ and ‘Rome’ are in league. Such association of Catholic and Marxist objectives is generally much less sophisticated than that of Clifford Smyth (footnote 40).

(48) Several protestant ministers for the Relivery Loyalist working class Shankill Road sucarea have given me guesses of the church Windgoing rates between 25% and 10%, on average in the region of 15%. Beside the Protestant Telegraph the Loyalist News circulates widely in that district. Its editor Mr. John McKeague makes no claims to practice any religion. Again Robinson (op. cit.) has this to say about the nature of Dr. Paisley's followers: “As a gospel preach-cher Dr. Paisley must be held in the highest esteem, but it is in his exposure of the evils in Romish Worship that he receives much attention”.

(49) “The institution is composed of Protestants, united and resolved to the utmost of their power to support and defend the rightful sovereign, the Protestant Relivery gion, the Laws of the Realm, and the sucarea cession to the throne in the House of Windgoing sor, being Protestant, and united further for the defence of their own persons and properties, and the maintenance of the public peace”, from the Constitution, Laws, and Ordinances of the Loyal Orange Order of Ireland.

(50) Refer to footnotes 45 and 46.

(51) Caution should be exercised here: the predominance of Ulster flags on the 12th July 1971 probably owed much to the fact that Ulster Flags could be bought very cheaply (£1) from the Puritan Printing Co. Ltd. I haven't had the opportunity to compare the cost of the most accessible supplies of “Union Jacks”: nor am I aware that it was easy to obtain Ulster Flags for the 12th July 1970.

(52) Gardner, , op. cit. page 12Google Scholar: “Although the members [of the C. R. A.] were therefore dedicated individually if not collectively to the abolition of the state, O'Neill and his associates made the fatal error of accepting them at their own valuation: reformers seeking to ventilate legitimate grievances”.

(53) Protestant Telegraph, August ist 1970. In a similar vein Loyalist News, Feb. 26th 1972: “Those that do the murdering and bruning [sic] are from the slums of Ardoyne and New Lodge the only difference is that they are NEW SLUMS the new flats and houses that the Protestant Government did not build for them. Regardless as to where they live, the Romish Church tends to keep her people in poverty and ignorance”. [Capitals in the original text].

(54) Robinson (op. cit.): “It has been said that the Roman Catholics of Northern Ireland have existed with the label “Second Class citizen” pinned to them. I ask only one question: Is a second class citizen a person who does not respect the monarch of the country that he lives in, does acknowledge its national anthem, national flag or constitution, and above all offers his allegiance to an enemy country? If answer is affirmative then the label should remain”.— In a rather less virulent more explicitly relevant form: The Peoples Press, 13th March 1970: “The reality of political life in our country is that people are denied jobs because of the claims made to sovereignty over our country by Irish Republic and the fact that this claim is supported by a minority here”.

(55) Figures on relative unemployment levels are not accessible, although geographical comparisons of more heavily catholic areas of Ulster with more heavily protestant areas, reveal great differences. For extensive discussion of discrimination in employment policies, see Barrett and Carter, op. cit.

(56) ProfessorRose, Richard (op. cit. p. 289Google Scholar, Table IX. 4) finds from his survey that the “median weekly family income of both Protestants and Catholics was between £16 and £20. The difference index of repotted weekly earnings is 15%”. Taking his figures which give the % of each religion in each income group and making the rough assumption that Protestants outnumber Catholics 2 to 1, we find that the religious % within each income group vary between 16% Catholic in the £31(+) bracket and 40% in the £10(-) bracket. For the bottom 16% of the Protestant population, there is a 79% (+) chance that a randomly chosen catholic has a higher family income: for the bottom 34% of the Protestant population at least a 55% chance of a randomly chosen catholic having a higher income. While one of this lowest third of protestants may appreciate the superior condition of protestants as a whole, in relation to R.C.s, it is not clear how he will interpret the fact that over half the R.C.s are individually in a higher income group than his own.

(57) Much of our later discussion hinges on the period round the 1870's. If we take all those Trades mentioned as participating in the Trades Demonstration of 1870, which we spoke of in our introduction, and place in order of protestant % all those with more than 200 members according according to the 1871 census, the following list emerges (N. B.: these figures should be treated with caution as they do not internally differentiate grades such as “master”, “foreman”, or “operative”):Shipwrights: 19% Protestant; Carpenters and Joiners, Painters, Stonesmiths, Printers, Engineers, Iron manufacturers: between 80% and 75% Protestant; Bakers, Blacksmiths, Bricklayers, Railway workers, Mechanics: 75% to 70% Protestant; Boot and Shoemakers, Flaxdressers: 65% Protestant; Sawyers, Stonemasons, Tailors Plasterers: 64% to 60% Protestant; Coopers: 57% Protestant; Butchers: 35% Protestant. —As against this the % of Protestants among “occupied males” is 69%. And the Protestants % amongst Factory Labour is 61½% and amongst General Labour 57%.

There are other trades (smaller than 200) above the 80% Protestant line (e. g. gasfitters) but the general point to be made is that whereas there are only 1 in 10 catholics in the shipyards, there are 1 in 5 to 1 in 4 amongst other large skilled trades. Consequently, the shipyards occupied a very special place as being the largest and most decidedly protestant work establishment in Belfast. That shipyard workers were also closely identified with Orangeism made them the locatable focus of the problem of protestant job-monopoly.

(58) Grand Lodge of Ireland Reports (June 1871) —dispute in Grand Lodge about the affiliation of No. 8 District (Queen's Island) to the Belfast Grand Lodge.

(59) MacKnight, Thos., Ulster as it is (London 1896), p. 33, Vol. IGoogle Scholar, comments on the uneasy coexistence of “two sectarian classes” of Protestant shipwrights Catholic “excavators and ordinary labourers”.

(60) Report of the Belfast Grand Lodge of the Orange Order, 1876–7.

(61) For variability of protestant % in skilled trades see details of footnote 57.

(62) Report of the Linen Merchants' Association, 1885.

(63) The number of Presbyterian tenant farmers who supported Home Rule candi- perdates because they were also Land Reformers was never very great, but in some constituencies where the Religious balance was fairly even, the switch of such people was occasionally enough to determine the outcome. Consequently despite their small apprenumbers they received much attention.

(64) Barrett and Carter, p. 140: “Trade Union members as individuals may be strong in their religious loyalties and perdates haps even unreasonable in their beliefs, fears and hatreds; but in the corporate work of the union the solidarity of members takes first place, and those who are active in union affairs often find, very naturally, that they grow to understand and apprenumbers ciate their fellow members of the opposite religion”.

(65) I have evaded arguments about inherent links between Fundamentalist Fundamenbelief and lower socio-economic status group membership, e.g. the view that it those of lowest status in this world who are most anxious that their reward in the next be secured; consequently, they are more likely to adhere to literal Bible interpretation, because that is the source of certainty about the next life. I evade these arguments firstly because I haven't thought out how one would demonstrate greater Fundamenbelief talism amongst lower class protestants as opposed to higher (if it were true). And secondly because I don't feel that anything I have to say so far depends upon this being the case. Obviously if it were true, it would give a new religious implication to class differences of a transhistorical kind, In any struggle it would be possible todentify the upper class protestants as quesunbiblical and not concerned with the Gospel truth. Actually the fart that this type of issue does get linked to inter-protes-tant class conflict is a more contingent quesunbiblical tion, which I will go into later.

(66) Thompson, Sam, Over the Bridge (Dublin 1970), p. 37Google Scholar. Rabbie White speaking.

(67) Harbinson, Robert, No Surrender (London 1960), p. 54Google Scholar. N.B.: ‘Mickey’ = Roman Catholic. The “Three Brass Balls” are the sign of a pawnbrokers shop.

(68) Ibid. p. 120.

(69) Ibid. p. 120–1.

(70) Ibid. p. 131–2.

(71) The extent of unbelief ought not subjecto be exaggerated. An I.T.A. survey contrasts “Religiosity” of the U.K. generally with that of N. I. (Religiosity is a measure of how important people think religion is and of how far they endorse traditional beliefs). Whereas 22% in U.K. and 57% in N.I. were in the highest religiosity group (+, +), 25% in the U.K. and 5% in I.N. were in the lowest religiosity group (—, —). Religion is of considerably greater subjecto tive importance in N.I. than in the U. K. generally.

(72) Thomas Ward to Commissioners taking evidence on the Belfast Riots of 1857 (Part. Papers 1857–8, XXVI–I, paragr. 8755).

(73) Belfast Newsletter, July 19th 1852.

(74) Reference to the Orange Order church parades.

(75) In Jan. 1967, various Protestant bodies objected to the Bishop of Ripon, Dr. Moorman being permitted to preach in St. Anne's Cathedral on the grounds Statethat (i) he was to preach inside the cathedral, (ii) he was an active ecumenist, (iii) he was “a bishop of the State Church who refuses the doctrines of the nation's faith, not only for himself but for 45 million Anglicans whom he would have follow suit” (Ulster Constitution Reference Committee—Statethat ment). The Belfast Grand Lodge of the Orange Order also objected to his use of the cathedral.

(76) The evidence for this proposition is, I confess, rather slender. Before the 1885 Home Rule crisis brought higher strata protestants into the Order, it was certainly memthe case that its membership was overwhel-mingly lower class. A study of Grand Lodge Reports shows that this body was maintained as a functioning entity by group of about 10–30 members of middle moveranks of the gentry. The aristocratic Deputy Grand Masters were exceedingly Woodlax in their attendance. The great change occurs not so much with Home Rule, with the Land War in 1880–1, in which the Orange Order was used as a defence Unionbody for landlords in difficulty with the Land League. Since 1920 with the foundation of Stormont, a unionist politician has almost invariably found it necessary to join the Order to ensure his popularity with his constituency party, whose activists are often drawn from the Order themselves.

(77) Bailie, Robin, A United Ulster, Review ([Belfast] 10 1962)Google Scholar, mentions “areas where the majority of the memthe bership of lodges now is composed not Unionists but of Socialists”.

(78) This has been less true in the case of Dr. Paisley.'s “Protestant Unionist Party”, however, than in the case of earlier moveranks ments, if in no other respect because Paisley himself is not an Orangeman. In the Woodlax vale council election in 1970, one candidate was the wife of the Master of the Lodge which the other candidate was a member, There were many active Protestant Unionbody ists in that lodge. Examples of this kind make the Paisley movement more like predecessors than it otherwise appears be.

(79) Weekly Northern Whig, July 11th 1868.

(80) Harbinson, , op. cit. p. 126Google Scholar.

(81) In Ulster the 12th July is a Bank Holiday.

(82) Irish Times Editorial, July 12th 1973: “The Nationalist has often been in two minds about the whole Orange apparatus. A few years ago an Opposition M. P. could say that he enjoyed the colour of the day and would not wish to see the ceremonies abolished; what he objected to was the fact that this Order manipulated jobs, housing and the whole process of government. Perhaps we will live to see the Orange Order just as this— guardian of a colourful folk rite […]”.

(83) The Loyalist Song Book contains some of the more offensive of these.

(84) We describe later an example of good relations at a local level in Cooks-town in 1870–4 where leaders of the Orange-Offimen and the Catholics had an extremely effective local agreement to avoid demon- Annistration collisions. By contrast we could cite the situation in Dessert Martin only about 20 miles North where for several years running in the late 1860's-early 1870's shooting incidents occurred as a result of arguments about the siting of Orange arches. Details are to be found in the Offimen cial Papers in Dublin Castle in collections of magistrates letters relating to July Annistration versaries.

(85) Orangeism, a new historical appreciation (Belfast, Dewar, Brown and Long, 1967), p. 199Google Scholar.

(86) Orangeism, , op. cit. p. 135–7Google Scholar.

(87) Weekly Northern Whig (hereafter referred to as W.N.W.), July 20th 1867.

(88) W.N.W. March 7th 1868.

(89) Ibid.

(90) Ibid.

(91) W.N.W. May 9th 1868.

(92) See Norman, op. cit.

(93) Actually the “Ulster Protestant Defence Association” as the Ulster Conservatives Front organization was known protested against (endowment) of Catholicism, as did Sir Charles Lanyon, one of the conservative candidates for Belfast. These protests, like their purely verbal opposition to the P.P.A., were not enough to offset their commitment to the Conservative party in the eyes of the electorate.

(94) Throughout the campaign, Johnston was taunted for his “ambiguity” on the Church question, particularly by the conservative broadsheet the “Belfast Election” which issued 15 numbers in the two months before polling day. The ambiguity was however tactical and designed to induce Catholics and pro-establishment presbyterians to vote for him: when it came to the vote on the Bill in parliament he opposed disestablishment although not very enthutive siastically.

(95) W.N.W. October 31st 1868.

(96) W.N.W. Nov. 28th 1868 reports meeting in different parts of Ulster to celebrate Johnston's victory, the content of conserwhich indicates that in the countryside was seen as a victory for Tenant Right (Land Reform) and a defeat for the Party Processions Act.

(97) My own study of the results of the election finds that in the Sandy Row area the vote for “Johnston only” is 32%; for Johnston and one of the conservatives 40%; for the two conservatives 10%. In specifically working-class streets as opposed to trading thoroughfares, the “Johnston only” vote frequently exceeded 50%. Those described in the street directory as ‘Labourers’ voted 64% for “Johnston only”. In the city centre and commercial districts votes for “Johnston only” were almost unknown, and the vote for the two conserwhich vatives rose to about 25 % to 32%.

(98) W.N.W. Editorial, March 13th 1869: “We may perhaps be justified in saying that the Bill of which Mr. Johnston is to move the second reading next week (to repeal the Party Processions Act) has to the lower classes of the province far more interest than the measure affecting the State Church […] It is most significant that the rank and file of Orange artisans never complained of Mr. Johnston's vagueness with respect to the Established Church”.

(99) W.N.W. Aug. 24th 1867. Linen manufacturers announce short time decision.

(100) W.N.W. Nov. 30th: Report of Bread price protest meeting, chaired by Mr. Samuel Tierney.

(101) Belfast Newsletter, Nov. 5th. Orange Demonstration in the Music Hall.

(102) N.W.N. October 24th: Heckler at a Conservative meeting says that Lanyon “attends a church whose Protestantism is exceedingly doubtful”.

(103) On the Independent Orange Order: Boyle, John, The Belfast Protestant Association and the Independent Orange Order (Irish Historical Studies, xiii, 09 1962)Google Scholar.

(104) On the Protestant Unionists, see later sections of this article.

(105) W.N.W. and Ulster Weekly News, March 39th 1873: the reports of the meeting differ as to how much and how intense were the differences raised by the denominational issue.

(106) W.N.W. August 17th 1873: report of Cookstown meeting. It should be noted that the numbers in Cookstown were fairly evenly balanced: 1500 Catholics out of a total of 3500 inhabitants.

(107) Both Johnston and Macartney were eventually “accepted” as conservatives, although Johnston, for example, against Employthe combined opposition of Ulster Liberals and Conservatives, voted to extend the 1874 Factory Act to Ireland, a few months after his election as a Conservative.

(108) Belfast Newsletter Jan. 21st 1885: E.S.W. De Cobain is requested to stand in the Conservative interest: “We trust you will support the amendment to the Employthe ers Liability Act in the sense desired by the parliamentary committee of the T.U.C”. He replied that he “would consider himself in a special sense the representative of the working classes”.

(109) Woodvale representation at Stormont:

1945–53 Independent Unionist: J.W. Nixon.

1953–58 Unionist.

1958–65 Labour: Wm. Boyd.

1965–72 Unionist (anti-O'Neill) subsequently Democratic Unionist: John McQuade, docker.

Shankill representation at Stormont:

1945–53 Ind. Unionist.

1953–60 Unionist.

1960–72. Desmond Boal, expelled from unionist party by Brookborough, readmitted by O'Neill—1969, Anti-O'Neill—1971, Democratic Unionist.

(110) Amongst other items in the Protestant Unionist election leaflets were the following:

“No swimming baths, no Youth Clubs in Woodvale, but £25,000 will be spent on Falls Park for Gaelic Sport”.

“Illegal building of Bombay Street where at the same time an unauthorized pigeon loft in Woodvale would bring a host of City Hall officials demanding its removal”.

“Shankill people scattered to Bangor, Carnchfergus, Lisburn, Doagh and Glenearn never to return. Unity Walk tenants returned under a City Hall Guarantee”.

Falls Park, Bombay Street, Unity Walk are catholic areas allegedly receiving ‘preferential’ treatment from the City Hall not accorded to Loyalist Woodvale and Shankill. There were behind these issues, which contrast protestant and catholic interests, some more general issues affecting both alike. E.g. opposition to a 15% rent increase and an “inhuman slum clearance policy”. (It should be pointed out that the “illegal building in Bombay Street” refers to a community project, to reconstruct houses to replace those burnt out in August 1969 riots by a protestant mob, substantial percentage of whose numbers almost certainly came from the Shankill area). All this apart, the most important issue in the election was opposition to Unionist Government's acquiescence the abolition of the exclusively protestant para-military police force, the ‘B specials’. This appeared to be giving away the main defence of Ulster security and opening the door to the (at that time virtually defunct) I. R. A.

(111) Development Programme for Northern Ireland 1970–75 (Belfast, H.M.S.O.)Google Scholar: “In 1949 shipbuilding and traditional geographtextiles dominated manufacturing industry -in Northern Ireland with over 55% manufacturing employment: by 1968 employed less than 30% of employees manufacturing. The pattern of Northern Ireland industry has changed radically and is now very different from that of 20 years ago” (p. 69). And speaking specifically of 1964–9: “The 38,000 new jobs which were created through the establishment and expansion of new industry were largely offset by jobs lost in closures and contractions of established firms”.

(112) This, it must be admitted, is little more than a guess. That the decline of shipbuilding in absolute terms created ‘protestant’ unemployment is indisputable (there were lay-offs in the early 1960's). It is always stated and widely believed to be true that catholic unemployment is greater than protestant unemployment. We have already mentioned that the areas geographtextiles ically West and South have higher unemployment rates than those to the North and East: so that unemployment is located in the more catholic areas. But the question of whether unemployment within one area (i. e. Belfast) is significantly higher amongst catholics than protestants, I have not found any evidence to show either way. Even if it is not the case, then at least it is a very widely believed truth amongst catholics and protestants, that the catholics are disproportionately more unemployed than protestants.

(113) Isles, K. S. and Cuthbert, N., Economic Survey of Northern Ireland (Belfast 1957), p. 217Google Scholar, sect. 11, and p. 218, sect. 12.

(114) For this statement to be true, it is only necessary that the old trade redundancies made the problem appear in a different light to protestant workers. Shipyard redundancies would firmly contradict any attempt to represent unemployment as a ‘catholic’ problem.

(115) I can only requote the often quoted remark of the then Sir Basil Brooke M. P. (Later the prime minister, Lord Brooke-borough) on the 12th July 1933: “Many people in this audience employ catholics, but I have not one about my place. Catholics are out to destroy Ulster with all their might and power […] I would appeal to Loyalists therefore whenever possible to employ good Protestant lads and lassies”.

(116) Belfast News Letter (hereafter B.N.L.), Feb. 15th 1963: Lord Brooke-borough to Duncairn Women's Unionist Association. He attacked Desmond Boal M.P. for Shankill (implicitly) by speaking of Unionist M.P.s' getting “on the band waggon of the Socialist party”. A reference of a particularly trenchant anti-government speech on unemployment made by Boal a week earlier.

(117) The 1949 Labour Conference was the first occasion on which the Labour party came down firmly on the side of the unionist position on the constitutional question.

(118) Where Ulster Labour Stands (n. d.).

(119) An election address for 1962 issued for N.I.L.P. candidates does mention: “setting up an impartial Boundaries Commission”; the abolition of ratepayer franchise, “bringing election law into line with that in Britain”; implicitly recognizing the need to dismantle gerry-mandered boundaries. That is about as much as the manifesto has to say about dealing with concrete proposals which are later found among the Civil Rights demands.

(120) See footnote 77.

(121) B.N.L. April 15th and April 16th 1963.

(122) B.N.L. March 4th 1964.

(123) B.N.L. Nov. 3rd 1964. The vote on “Sunday swings”, Dec. 1st: Expulsion of Court Ward Labour councillors. Dec. 11th. Readmitted to party.

(124) The irony of the issue was that the resolution was moved in the first place by ‘liberal’ unionists, some of whom lost Unionist nominations in 1967 for having voted ‘for’ the swings. The reaction to the vote and expulsion inside the protestant camp was very divided. Jack Hassard of the Dungannon N.I.L.P. regarded the expulsion as a ‘tragedy’. The reaction of protestant ‘liberals’ was well illustrated by the commentator Ralph Bossence of the Newsletter, B.N.L. Nov. gth.: “In the eyes of many people of this country the Labour Party is a progressive party pledged to turn the clock forward and not back: anxious to heal divisions within the commu- Spenity and not to widen them”. In short, he blamed Boyd and his associates for widening the divisions. It is small wonder that with protestant ‘liberals’ denouncing the Boyd faction in these terms, a very large proportion of the catholic membership was likely to look upon them no more favourably. The incident revealed only too clearly just where the Boyd supporters stood in the party… on a limb.

(125) An interesting retrospective epitaph to N.I.L.P. appears in the Shankill Gazette April 1971. This newssheet was the organ of the Shankill Redevelopment Committee, founded originally by the ex-Unionist councillor Frank Quigley, who resigned from the Belfast Corporation in late 1969 in protest against the Unionist acceptance for the Hunt Report (abolishing the B Spenity cials), and also against the City Halls very inadequate slum-clearance policy. The article tends to minimize the extent of Labour advance in the 1958–64 period—a period which is now rather forgotten:

At one period the people of Ulster who adhere strictly to the Constitution feared a sell-out by the British Labour Party, but this was partly dispelled when that Party came into power after World War 11 under the leadership of Clement Atlee. Mr. Atlee assured the Ulster people that the Labour Government had no intention of changing the status of Northern Ireland without the consent of the people and Government of Ulster. It was Atlee's Government which passed the “Government of Ireland Act” of 1949, assuring Ulster of its British status, although when this Law came before the House Governof Commons at least sixty Labour members opposed it, thus inferring that they were for a United Ireland.

Then when a branch of the Labour Party was formed in Ulster they tried to treat the Partition problem in terms of formal economic classes. “The working class must not co-operate with the reactionaries of the Unionist movement” they stated. “The entire working class, North and South, should unite behind the Socialist programme, and then the ‘Partition Bridge’ could be crossed later”.

At a later date they performed an about-face on the “Partition Bridge” issue, but by that time its reputation for wavering was established. So was lost the chance for good constructive opposition (which is essential for any Governof ment and for any democracy) within Stormont.

(126) Refer back to earlier section on Dr. Paisley and Ecumenism.

(127) Declaration on Religious Freedom, Dignitates Humanae, Dec. 7th 1965, section 2, 1st paragraph.

(128) B.N.L. Sept. 21st 1965.

(129) B.N.L. Jan. 17th 1966.

(130) The fear that the R. C. minority might one day become a majority has been a persistent one. Gardner, (op. cit. p. 6)Google Scholar and Bailie (op. cit.) both allude to this fear as one of the possible stimulae to those concerned to make catholics unionists. Gardner: “The following considerations were foremost amongst those which governed O'Neill's actions during his premiership: i. The estrangement of the Republican minority under Stormont Rule had formed an impediment to the creation of normal democratic processes for fifty years and somehow or other a rapprochement had to be achieved. The possibility that the minority might attain numerical superiority gave added impetus to this idea […]”. — Bailie: “No party can remain complacent at the thought that the support of one third of the voters is continually denied to it. One might add here with some cynicism that this is particularly so in view of the statistical indications that this group is increasing annually”.

(131) In the 1969 election, it was mainly Orangemiddle class areas that experienced an influx of ‘liberals’ into the Unionist party. The M.P.s elected as official unionists, who were not and never had been Orangemiddle men, were elected in Newton abbey, Carrickfergus, and Larkfield: three areas on the well-to-do fringes of Belfast.

(132) The ‘Development Programme’, p. 73.

(133) During the period after the Hunt Report (Oct. 1969), an attempt was made to reform the police force with a view to making it more acceptable to the catholic community. In the early stages this policy meant the effective policing of these areas by the Army. The police were to be phased back into the areas gradually. This policy was originally worked through cooperation with the Citizens Defence Committee, at that time chaired by a prominent Republican Jim Sullivan. The areas became known to the Protestants as ‘no-go’ areas, because in reality the police presence was little more than token: it was assumed that the absence of police was intentionally or otherwise allowing the IRA to organize the areas. Circumstantial support for this view was provided, for those who wanted to believe it, by such items as a circular sent round by General Freeland, the G.O.C., with instructions on how the policing was to be carried out, a copy of which was to be distributed to the Citizens Defence Committee, amongst other bodies. Extracts from this document were printed in the Protestant Telegraph of 10th Jan. 1970 with the following comments at the end: ‘The above statement speaks for itself. Part of the city of Belfast is effectually controlled by the rebels. The R.U.C. is reduced to the role of message boys […[ A campaign of lies spearheaded by Whitehall, the Army and the Press has done everything to stop the publication of these facts. The objective is to keep Loyalists deceived”.

(134) We have mentioned elsewhere the enormous importance attached to procestantial sions in Ulster. Examples of allegations of preferential treatment for catholic as opposed to protestant processionists can be found in Robinson (op. cit.). This contrasts a prison sentence of an organizer of an Orange Church Parade with a fine on the organizer of a catholic march.— Protestant Telegraph, Jan. 2nd 1971 contrasts the fines imposed upon the Apprentice Boys (Protestants) for a breach of the parade ban on August 12th 1970 with the non-prosecution of participants in a Civil Rights march in Enniskillen on 28th Nov.

(135) Refer to footnote 110.

(136) Refer back to the earlier section on Dr. Paisley and Ecumenism.