by Penn Rhodeen
Lawlor, a Connecticut lawyer, was national vice-chairman of Noraid. When he and Morrison met, Morrison felt that Lawlor made a strong case about the problems in Northern Ireland involving major human rights issues.
Ken Maginnis
He was an Ulster Unionist Party official who helped party leader David Trimble accept the final draft the Good Friday Agreement.
John Major
Major succeeded Margaret Thatcher as Tory prime minister of the UK in 1990. He softened her hardline stance on Northern Ireland and joined with Irish prime minister Albert Reynolds in the 1993 Downing Street Declaration, which relinquished any British claim to Northern Ireland and pledged that its future would be decided by those who lived there. But when the IRA ceasefire finally came in 1994, Major kept imposing preconditions that kept Sinn Féin out of the peace negotiations. He rejected George Mitchell’s deft compromise plan for starting all-party talks, and soon after that, in early 1996, the IRA ended its long ceasefire. In 1997 Major was defeated by Tony Blair, who would go on to be crucial to the success of the peace process.
Sir Patrick Mayhew
Mayhew was the secretary of state for Northern Ireland from 1992 to 1997. He cordially greeted the American team led by Morrison when they visited him at Stormont in 1993, but he told them bluntly that he didn’t like their peace envoy idea, which was a cornerstone of Clinton’s new American policy. In 1995, he was sent to Washington to persuade the Americans of the rightness of the decommissioning precondition. His statement on that point became known as “Washington 3.”
Inez McCormack
McCormack was a Northern Ireland Protestant activist who possessed a bottomless supply of commitment, energy, and good humor in her fight for an end to the violence and for fair treatment of the Irish minority. In the male-dominated world of labor union leadership, she became the first female head of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions in 1999.
Mike McCurry
McCurry was an experienced Democratic operative who became spokesman for the Clinton State Department and then Bill Clinton’s press secretary. He saw how Morrison and others worked to bring Clinton into the Northern Ireland issue and he understood why it appealed to him when Morrison laid it out.
Christopher McGimpsey
McGimpsey called himself “a more left-wing unionist.” As a Belfast councilor in the Ulster Unionist Party, he was impressed with Morrison’s determination to understand all points of view, and he was instrumental in getting his party to agree to meet with Morrison and the unofficial American peacemakers in Belfast in 1993.
Martin McGuinness
McGuinness was a top Sinn Féin leader who later acknowledged that he had been an active IRA member. He became minister of education in the new Northern Ireland government in 1999 and later became deputy first minister in the government in which his political polar opposite, DUP firebrand Ian Paisley, was first minister. The two men wound up getting along so well that reporters called them the Chuckle Brothers.
David McKittrick
Seen by many as the greatest of the Northern Ireland journalists, McKittrick was an astute and brilliant observer and reporter on what was happening in Northern Ireland. He was a longtime writer for the Independent and author or co-author of several books on the Troubles and the peace process.
George Mitchell
The man from Maine presided over the peace talks that led to the Good Friday Agreement. He had been a majority leader of the US Senate, and, before that, a federal judge, so he knew how to be patient in the face of endless droning and bickering. He could also be extremely decisive. After Clinton appointed him economic envoy to Northern Ireland, Mitchell eventually won the trust of all sides, which led to his selection as chairman of the peace talks. He found ways through tangles and obstacles and helped lead the negotiators to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998.
Joe Moakley
Moakley was chairman of the Rules Committee of the House Representatives. When Morrison’s 1990 comprehensive immigration reform bill was suddenly in mortal danger, Moakley and his staff helped rescue it.
Bruce Morrison
After a crushing defeat in the 1990 election for governor of Connecticut—for which he gave up his chance to stay in Congress, where he had been serving since 1983—Morrison became the first indispensable American politician in the Irish Peace Process. (Bill Clinton was the second and George Mitchell the third.) Morrison understood that the more extreme parties associated with those making war were also the key to making peace; he also knew that peace could only be accomplished by running the risk of engaging people who were widely (and often accurately) seen by those on the other side as terrorists. Morrison helped Bill Clinton make his campaign promises to change American policy on Northern Ireland, and when Clinton won the election, Morrison alternately praised him and held his feet to the fire, as needed. In Northern Ireland, he helped the United States be seen as a honest broker available to all sides.
Conor O’Clery
The veteran journalist was the Irish Times’s Washington correspondent in the years when Bill Clinton was changing American policy on Northern Ireland. O’Clery’s fine eyewitness account of events large and small, released in 1996, was called Daring Diplomacy in the United States and The Greening of the White House in Ireland.
Niall O’Dowd
O’Dowd was an Irish immigrant, once illegal, who became the publisher of the influential Irish Voice newspaper and Irish America magazine. One of the most important figures in the Irish American push for peace, he was the impresario of the successful visit of the unofficial American peacemakers in 1993, and he selected Bruce Morrison as the group’s political leader and spokesman. He also became an important and trusted intermediary between Gerry Adams and the White House, a crucial function that contributed greatly to the success of Clinton’s new American policy on Northern Ireland.
Gerry O’Hara / Gearóid O hEára
O’Hara was a Sinn Féin official in Derry whose presence led the Royal Ulster Constabulary to stop the car he was driving and hold him and his American guests, including Congressman Morrison, at gunpoint in 1987. He later became a member of the board of the new Northern Ireland Policing Board.
Ian Paisley
Paisley, politically extreme and vehemently anti-Catholic, was a Presbyterian minister and leader of the breakaway Democratic Unionist Party. He was so relentless in his opposition to peace proposals that he became known as Dr. No. But in 2007, when DUP became the top unionist party, Paisley became first minister, with Sinn Féin’s Martin McGuinness serving as deputy first minister. The two men would go on to govern effectively and with surprising conviviality; when Paisley died in 2014, McGuinness grieved the loss of a true friend.
Jonathan Powell
Powell was one of the British diplomats with whom Morrison met after Clinton’s election to inform them of the new Northern Ireland policy Clinton had promised and urge them to regard it helpful, not intrusive. Later, in 1997, Powell became Tony Blair’s chief of staff and was deeply involved in the peace process.
Dennis Prebensen
Prebensen was an Irish American activist who lived in Morrison’s congressional district. In 1987, he invited his congressman to see the situation in Northern Ireland for himself, and when they were in Derry, he, his congressman, and Gerry O’Hara were held at gunpoint by the RUC for the better part of an hour.
Jackie Redpath
Redpath was a longtime unionist community worker and is the head of the Greater Shankill Partnership, a community-led organization in Belfast focusing on education, jobs, housing, and neighborhood renewal. He met with the American delegation headed by Morrison in 1993 and he helped them meet with a small group of loyalists who had been active in the paramilitary organization UVF.
Janet Reno
As Bill Clinton’s Attorney General, she opposed issuance of a US visa to Gerry Adams.
Albert Reynolds
Reynolds, a successful businessman who was sure that there was always a way to negotiate a
solution to a tough conflict, was prime minister of Ireland from 1992 to 1994. Advancing the peace process was a high priority for him when he took office, and he forged a bond with British prime minister John Major that led to the Downing Street Declaration in late 1993, in which the British and Irish agreed that the future of Northern Ireland would be determined by those who lived there. Reynolds played a pivotal role in the success of the peace process.
Mary Robinson
Irish president Mary Robinson served from 1990 to 1997. She was the head of state, which gave her no substantive governmental role, but she knew how to send a message through symbols: Pictures of her shaking hands with Gerry Adams in the summer of 1993 gave his legitimacy an important boost. Robinson later became U.N. Human Rights Commissioner.
George Schwab
Schwab was a CUNY professor and head of the American Committee on Foreign Policy. When Gerry Adams received a US visa to attend the peace conference that organization convened, he rode from JFK to Manhattan with Schwab, and they found they had plenty in common.
Jean Kennedy Smith
Not long after Smith became US ambassador to Ireland in 1993, she boldly and effectively pushed for a new American policy on Northern Ireland—to the considerable displeasure of the State Department. When change got closer, she pushed harder. She was the sister of a president and two senators, but on Northern Ireland, she was entirely her own woman.
Nancy Soderberg
Soderberg was Bill Clinton’s campaign foreign policy advisor in 1992 and then deputy assistant to the president for National Security Affairs from 1993 to 1997. Although she initially had her doubts about the new policy Clinton had promised, in time she came to accept, as Bruce Morrison urged, that engaging with Sinn Féin was the way to move the IRA away from warfare. Soderberg was instrumental in the success of Clinton’s new policy. She always said that she didn’t care whether Northern Ireland joined the Republic or stayed British; she just wanted the killing to stop.
Gusty Spence
Spence was a UVF man who came to believe while in prison that loyalists should practice politics instead of warfare. He led the group that met in secret with Morrison and the other Americans in 1993, which changed their view of the loyalist community. In 1994, Spence led the way to the loyalist ceasefire.
John Taylor
He was an Ulster Unionist Party official who helped party leader David Trimble accept the final draft the Good Friday Agreement.
David Trimble
Trimble headed the UUP from 1995 to 2005 and was in office during the negotiations that led to the Good Friday Agreement. His decision to accept the agreement draft as it stood after the negotiations had run out the clock on Mitchell’s deadline was the crucial last step to final agreement. Trimble won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1998 and was elected first minister in the new government a few months later.
Gerry Vinton
Vinton was a former UVF man who arranged and participated in the 1993 secret meeting between loyalists and Morrison and the other Americans, which changed the Americans’ view of the loyalist community.
GLOSSARY
Northern Ireland Political and Paramilitary
Terms and Organizations
Alliance Party
The small party that has attempted to appeal to both populations. It became the fifth-largest party in Northern Ireland, supported by less than 10 percent of the voters.
Democratic Unionist Party (DUP)
Now the leading unionist party supported by the Protestant majority, it began as a radical breakaway party led by Ian Paisley.
Irish Republican Army (IRA)
Its incarnation during the Troubles was the Provisional Irish Republican Army, and it carried out the armed republican cause. It was closely allied with Sinn Féin and ultimately accepted Gerry Adams’s urging that it replace armed struggle with politics. Splinter groups claiming to be the only ones left who remain true believers, bestowing names like Real IRA upon themselves, carried out violent actions after Good Friday, including the Omagh bombing that killed twenty-nine people, but they have been consistently denounced by Sinn Féin and what remains of the IRA.
Loyalists
During the Troubles, they were the more extreme members of the Protestant majority, who were more willing to take to the streets and supply manpower to the loyalist paramilitary forces.
Nationalists
During the Troubles, they were the more moderate members of the Catholic minority. They had led the nonviolent opposition to the pervasive discrimination against Catholics. They typically supported the unification of Ireland, but they wanted it done through peaceful means.
Republicans
Those Catholics who were generally more willing to support the armed struggle for reunification of Ireland being waged by the IRA, or at least accepted that reunification might only be possible through military force.
Sinn Féin
Long led by Gerry Adams, during the Troubles it was the smaller and more pro-republican party supported by the Catholic community. It was closely allied with the IRA, but in the mid-eighties Adams began a strategy of seeking to achieve republican goals through politics and to persuade the IRA to turn to politics instead of warfare. Its mastery of grass roots politics has made it the leading party supported by the Catholic community.
Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP)
Long led by John Hume, it was the leading party supported by the Catholic community during the Troubles and was more moderate than Sinn Féin, which has now overtaken it within the Catholic community.
Ulster Defence Association (UDA)
It was the most vicious loyalist paramilitary force.
Ulster Unionist Party (UUP)
Throughout the Troubles, it was the largest party supported by the Protestant majority and was generally more moderate than the radical breakaway DUP, which is currently the leading Protestant party.
Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF)
It was the loyalist paramilitary force that the great David Ervine said was “returning the serve.” Loyalist paramilitary men who turned to politics during the Troubles were typically UVF.
Unionists
The vast majority of unionists are Protestants and they want Northern Ireland to remain part of the UK. They have largely asserted their power through politics and control of civic institutions.
Irish American Organizations
Americans for a New Irish Agenda (ANIA)
This organization succeeded Irish Americans for Clinton-Gore. Headed by Bruce Morrison, ANIA had the express purpose of turning Clinton’s campaign pledges on Northern Ireland into American policy.
Irish Northern Aid Committee (Noraid)
Noraid was for many years the strongest Irish American voice on Northern Ireland. Many of its members were sympathetic to and very supportive of the IRA. The group claimed their fundraising was in order to send money to widows and orphans of the fallen, but the authorities insisted that much of the money went to buying weapons for the IRA.
Index
A
Act of Union, 32–33
Adair, Johnny “Mad Dog,” 121–122
Adams, Gerry
ballot box strategy of, 38–39
Bill Clinton’s greeting of, 181–182
contributions to peace process, 231
and Good Friday Agreement, 219
John Hume’s meetings with, 21, 38–39, 52
influence on IRA and Sinn Féin, 203–204, 226
and IRA ceasefires, 107–108, 147–148, 194
at Kashmir Road meeting, 182–184
as local politician, 181–182, 242
on Mitchell report, 192
Bruce Morrison’s impression of, 9
at National Committee on American Foreign Policy conference, 142, 143
New York visit of, 139–143
Niall O’Dowd’s meetings with, 67
on Omagh bombing, 228
Jean Kennedy Smith and, 113–114
and
“South California IRA,” 137–138
unofficial peacemakers’ meetings with, 76, 92–93, 103
US access for, 172–174
US visa for, 48–50, 52, 54–55, 59, 64, 73, 75, 116–117, 121–145
Ad Hoc Committee on Irish Affairs, xiv, 6–9
adopted child syndrome, 80
AFL-CIO, 12
Ahern, Bertie, 119, 215, 217, 218, 229, 232
Alderdice, John, 142
Alliance Party, 142, 241
all-party talks, 209–222
American, loyalist, and republican views of, 210–211
American-quality of, 212–213
Clinton administration’s support for, 171–178
and drafting of Good Friday Agreement, 215–221
importance of Sinn Féin in, 197–199
Bruce Morrison on, 214–215
and new IRA ceasefire, 209–210
preconditions for, 160–163, 168, 169, 195–196
twin-track approach to, 175–178
American government, 194–195, 199–203. see also Clinton, Bill, and administration; United States
Americans for a New Irish Agenda (ANIA), 57–62, 128, 129
Anglo-Irish Agreement, 38
Anglo-Irish Treaty (1921), 36
ANIA. see Americans for a New Irish Agenda
Annesley, Hugh, 203, 204
Apple, R. W., 187
Atlantic Philanthropies, 70
B
Baker, James, 26
Baldwin, Ted, 18
ballot box strategy, 38–39
Barry, Bill, 141
Begin, Menachem, 141
Begley, Thomas, 121, 122
Belfast, Northern Ireland
Bill Clinton’s trip to, 179–180, 184–186
Jackie Redpath on, 93–94
response to Good Friday Agreement in, 232–233
during unofficial peacemakers’ trip, 81–83