Monthly Archives: January 2017
Peter Graham – revolutionary militant
Peter holding Young Socialists banner, Dublin 1968
by Mick Healy
“In 1966 we in Ireland celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Easter Rebellion (1916). The writings of James Connolly, which prior to then had been read little, and then only by the older hands’, began to be read more widely. The younger generation found through his writings that he was not quite as the Christian Brothers in school taught – “only the 7th leader’ of 19l6.” They found in his writings Connolly the revolutionary, the worker, the union organiser and Marxist”.
– Peter Graham, Workers Fight, June 1968.
Funeral of Peter Graham, Dublin, 1971; Tariq Ali at centre
Comrades who have read about the Irish Revolution know something about the contributions made by Nora Connolly O’Brien, Michael Davitt, Liam Mellows and Frank Ryan, but many do not understand the important contributions made by significant but lesser-known figures such as revolutionary Marxist Peter Graham. Peter came from 46 Reginald Street in the Liberties of Dublin and attended Bolton St College of Technology. Working as an electrician in CIE he was a shop-steward for the Electrical Trade Union. He joined the Labour Party, but discontented with their lack of radicalism shifted over to the Communist Party. Disillusioned with their reformism, he left and became involved with Irish Workers Group and then the League for a Workers’ Republic, an organisation openly declaring itself revolutionary and Marxist, identifying with the Trotskyist current of Marxism.
With single-minded dedication he was the Read the rest of this entry
New book on Margaret Skinnider
This taken from emyvale.net, here. I’ve divided it into paragraphs and corrected some typos and punctuation.
The launch of the much-anticipated book on Margaret Skinnider took place in the Markethouse, Monaghan, on Tuesday, January 17th 2017. MC for the event was Josephine O’Hagan, who introduced the various speakers. Mackie Rooney, who had a major input in the production of the book, gave a detailed history of the Margaret Skinnider Appreciation Society and the developments since its foundation.
The increasing interest in the person of Margaret Skinnider and her connection to North Monaghan, and Cornagilta in particular, as the ruins of her family homestead are situated there, led to the production of the book and, even though there were a number of difficulties to be overcome, the book was now ready for launch.
During this background it was pleasing to hear that emyvale.net was instrumental in Read the rest of this entry
The fight for women’s right to abortion in Ireland
Right to abortion march, Dublin, September 2015. Pic: Amnesty International
by J. McAnulty
On 25th November thousands of activists demonstrated in Dublin calling for the abolition of the 8th amendment to the Irish constitution – a section that asserts equal rights to life between the mother and foetus (the wording refers to the “unborn” which assumes that that life begins at conception). The demonstration was in part was a celebration of the decision by ICTU, the Irish trade union congress, to support the call to repeal the 8th. In tribute to recent mobilisations by Polish women, many wore black – the main symbol for the Polish demonstrations.
Yet the two campaigns are very different, and the comparison shows up many weaknesses in the Irish movement. They are similar in that both involve the mobilisation of tens of thousands of women, fed up with church and state ruling over their bodies. However in Poland we had a spontaneous movement that took strike action and went onto the streets in an instant and successful counter to an attack by the right, designed to extend the law to prevent abortion under any circumstances. The Irish movement is based around a call for a referendum to remove a decades old element of the constitution and is heavily dominated by the trade union bureaucracy and the populist and reformist politics they espouse.
The colour and militancy of the demonstrations tends to disguise the fact that the repeal campaign, as with anti-austerity campaigns and protests against water charges led by the union bosses, is at its heart a lobbying campaign aimed at persuading the Irish bourgeoisie to change direction. This limits both policy and tactics.
Weak campaign
Of course the idea that the constitution poses such a direct threat to women is repulsive and should always be opposed, but it is the Read the rest of this entry
Kevin Bean on revolution and counter-revolution in Ireland, c1880-1930
Kevin’s book The New Politics of Sinn Fein (Liverpool, Liverpool University Press, 2007) is essential reading for tracing the evolution of the Provos and how the British state drew them into a process of betrayal. The talk below is from last August (August 2016), given at the Communist University in London.
Where to for republicans?
Paddy Browne is 4th from right
by Paddy Browne (1916 Societies, writing in personal capacity; I took this from The Pensive Quill, here)
It was a campaign that sent shivers through the British establishment and rocked it to its foundation. The commitment and ingenuity of the Óglaigh in the IRA and INLA – and the price paid by both organisations and the community in general – will never be forgotten. And while they may not have achieved the ultimate goal they most certainly advanced it.
People have been trying to mimic the campaign from 1997 without major success. They need to realise it is not enough to profess to fight a war when it is far from a reality – when your greatest contribution is to send our young men and women to gaol.
I believe the success of republicanism will come from the trust of the community in which we previously relied – heavily – in the past. It is through them that we must present our argument, for approval, and it is them that we need to support in their time of need.
Before we have unity in Ireland, with substance, we need a social revolution that will Read the rest of this entry
When gardai brutally attacked march on 1st anniversary of Bloody Sunday
Gardai attacking marchers at Garden of Remembrance
by Mick Healy
There was a march in Dublin on the first anniversary of Derry’s Bloody Sunday. The march started from the burned-out British embassy in Merrion Row. It included more than a thousand supporters of the Irish Civil Rights Association, including a large contingent from the People’s Democracy group. The marchers aimed to walk peacefully through the city, carrying black flags to the Garden of Remembrance in Parnell Square, but at the Garden they were confronted with a cordon of over a hundred Garda wielding batons.
The main speaker from the People’s Democracy called for a minute’s silence and asked could the gardai lower the Tricolour in respect to the victims of Bloody Sunday, but the cops refused. Ciaran McAnally of ICRA told the crowd that the gardai had refused to lower the flag and said they would not interfere with the flag. He called for a peaceful commemoration, while noting that the Derry dead had been insulted by refusal to lower the Tricolour.
It did not take the Southern state long to get Read the rest of this entry
the irish revolution 