The article reproduced below was written by Fr. Sean McManus, President of the Irish National Caucus. It first appeared in the Irish Echo on 19 October 2016. Fr McManus has kindly granted us permission to republish it. The “Dublin Government, all of the parties in the South, plus the SDLP, and for a while Sinn Fein, all opposed the Mac Bride Principles,” he recalls.
For details about the Mac Bride Principle see: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacBride_Principles
Of particular interest is the fact that the British papers acknowledge that the Irish National Caucus was committed to non-violence. As Fr McManus put it: “For all these years they had nonetheless, and falsely, briefed the media and the Congress that I was a front for the IRA.”
How the British got MacBride campaign right
Say what you like about the Brits, but their spying is always accurate.
Their propaganda is reckless, distorted, libelous, and outrageous.
But when the British spies report to their political masters and to Her Majesty’s Government, you can believe it.
It is done without spin— “Just the facts, Your Majesty, just the facts.”
This is very clearly illustrated by the recently released British/Northern Ireland Office State Papers, and by what they say about our [i.e, the INC’s] MacBride Principles campaign.
The papers were released by the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland (PRONI), and cover the period 1980 to 1989.
The papers were released under the “30/20” rule , the phased release of official documents that were previously secret for 30 years, but are to be released after 20 years. (Google PRONI CAIN for the released papers).
The British Government in its propaganda efforts against our MacBride Principles campaign would often claim the campaign was launched by the Irish National Caucus and by Irish Northern Aid.
Irish Northern Aid had nothing to do with the launching of the campaign.
But this was the British way of trying to smear the campaign by falsely linking it with the organization that the British Government claimed was a front for the IRA.
The Brits knew full well that, initially, Sinn Fein and the Irish Republican Movement opposed the MacBride Principles, likening them to Reagan’s ‘constructive engagement with South Africa’ – a fact that Martin Galvin, former Publicity Director of Irish Northern Aid, publicly acknowledged (maybe for the first time) on Radio Free Eireann on Saturday, September 3, [2016].
Galvin said the Republican Movement’s position was that the MacBride Principles were “too reformist.”
Therefore, of course, that meant that Irish Northern Aid was, to put it mildly, cool on the principles.
It was only much later, when our MacBride campaign was driving the British Embassy up the wall, that Sinn Fein and the Republican Movement were forced to change their position, thereby allowing Irish Northern Aid to support, at least in some measure, the MacBride campaign.
However, when the British Embassy confidentially reported — this as distinct from its public propaganda — to the British Government and the Northern Ireland Office, it was in no doubt as to whom is behind the MacBride Principles.
The embassy reported that the MacBride campaign was “instigated,” “canvassed” “incredibly well organized,” by the Irish National Caucus.
Amazingly, one Irish-American organization, now defunct, once described itself as the “primary sponsor of the Mac Bride Principles”— even though it had only a minor role.
In this regard it is revealing to note another report by the British Embassy in their “Spying Papers” (February 26, 1987): “The main proponent of the campaign is the Irish National Caucus which has a strong ally in Comptroller (Harrison ‘Jay’) Goldin of New York…”
Again, strictly accurate, just the facts Your Majesty.
However, some have tried to invert this by trying to suggest that it was the Irish National Caucus that joined a Goldin campaign to stop U.S. dollars subsidizing anti-Catholic discrimination in Northern Ireland.
In fact, of course, our campaign predated Goldin’s involvement by years.
Nonetheless, we greatly welcomed Comptroller Goldin to our campaign, and we have abundantly acknowledged his important contribution.
Indeed, I wanted Goldin to join me in my Press Release that officially launched the Mac Bride Campaign on November 5, 1984, but he backed out.
Then he further backed off by opposing MacBride laws, just wanting Resolutions by cities and states, whereas we insisted, “there had to be a law.”
All this was well documented at the time by the New York Times, and Daily News.
It is also recounted, chapter and verse, in my Memoirs: My American Struggle for Justice in Northern Ireland. [Third U.S. Edition. 2019].
This insistence on laws is why today there are MacBride laws (as distinct from Resolutions) in 18 States, and many cities and why MacBride is enshrined in US law.
Will future British ‘Spying Papers’ reveal that attempts to denigrate the central role of the Irish National Caucus were also part of British propaganda (as distinct from their confidential, factual reports based on intelligence)?
That such denigration was not petty jealousy on the part of some, but rather the work of provocateurs?
After all, the current batch of released State Papers show, beyond doubt, that the British had their spies in Irish-American organizations.
One final note on the British papers. They state that the Irish National Caucus “expouses non-violence”. (May 22, 1986).
This is the first time in 44 years that I’ve ever seen the British embassy acknowledge we were committed to nonviolence.
For all these years they had nonetheless, and falsely, briefed the media and the Congress that I was a front for the IRA.
