Irish Republicans
Much of this website has, I must admit, focused on the ills of the Protestant/Unionist side, and I have been hoping greatly, that I have not come as too biased in my writings. However, I fear this page may not help me; because I somewhat find the IRA the least interesting aspect of the Troubles. They perpetrated a massive and well organized terrorist campaign but, where as the Unionist Protestant Elite were (and some still) making racist comments and their paramilitaries coming random acts of violence against the Catholic population, and the British Army was committing crimes against the catholic population, and the poor civilian population was just hoping not to get caught up in it all, and strangely and famously going about their days like nothing was wrong, the IRA was, for sure, planting a lot of bombs, but attacking mostly military bases and British soldiers. They did attack civilian workers who worked to repair the military bases they destroyed, bombed England, and they also tried to target the economy of Northern Ireland, which amounted to a lot of shopping centers and such, but it didn’t take long for them to correctly realize that civilian deaths were very bad for their image and recruitment, counterproductive to their ends (insurgent warfare often ends up being a matter of winning over people by allowing the other side to villainize themselves almost through violent reactions against civilians), and so started calling in evacuation codes to minimize civilian casualties. For a terrorist organizations that’s nearly commendable (because they are still a terrorist organization and thus do not deserve to be commended). But that also makes their actual violent actions during the troubles not the most interesting, at least to me.
What is more interesting are all the schisms they underwent, though this is nearly irrelevant to the troubles, as no IRA other than the Provisionals had a real impact on the conflict as a whole. The Real IRA is probably the most relevant as it splits off after the Good Friday Agreement as the people who didn’t like the agreement, and they did commit a horrific bombing, where they planted it at the evacuation location for the civilians, the 1998 Omagh bombing. But they are also tiny and really outside the bounds of The Troubles, more a lingering effect.
There was the Hunger Strike, and the debate over weather or not IRA prisoners should have been considered Political ones or even POWs, and the deaths that resulted as the British government held fast, though, in the end, the 5 Demands they kid out all came to be met, some informally though.
Perhaps I simply need to do more research into their actions. My dead line has forced me to focus on some things more than others. I hope to revisit this page one day with more to report but for now, the IRA os the faction with the least interning story.
The ’37 Constitution
The ROI on the other hand does have something interesting about it.
The modern Constitution of the Republic of Ireland was adopted back in 1937. Notably it made Ireland practically and effectively (though not officially) independent, and changed the name from the Irish Free State to the Republic of Ireland (ROI). While that is all quite nice, the constitution also had a flaw that would lead to much suffering in the Republic all the way into the 90’s. The involvement of the Catholic Church.
The Catholic Church was given much sway in the final draft of the constitution, meaning that church and state did not end up particularly separated (through full freedom of religion persisted), and Catholic morals made it into law, for much the worse. Divorce was banned until 1996 and Abortion until 2018. It gave rights to married families, but did nothing for unmarried or single families. Worst of all though, was the sexism.
Women had the right to vote, but the constitution directly stated their place was in the home, and that the state should make sure that “mothers shall not be obliged by economic necessity to engage in labour to the neglect of their duties in the home.” What this really meant was a continuation of a Marriage Bar placed on female teachers and social workers back in 1932. If a women in one of these professions married, she lost her job.
Whatsmore, as mentioned afore, married couples had privilege under the law. Single mothers on the other hand, became a target. They could easily be deemed unfit to care for their children and have them taken away and put up for adoption or into an Industrial School. Singlet fathers on the other hand were not at risk of this. But that’s not all, single mothers could be sent to Magdalene Laundries, a kind of institution from the Victorian era for “fallen” or “immoral women” that originally targeted prostitutes but saw a very long life in Ireland and expanded its abductions to single mothers.
These were laundry businesses (like a laundromat but the customer does not wash their own clothes, instead handing them off to be washed, they also typically did bulk orders for institutions) owned by Nunneries and staffed by these “fallen” women, who were not allowed to leave, were not payed, and were subjected to abuse. They were effectively slave labor, and were imprisoned by the Nunnery.
The aforementioned Industrial Schools were not much better. These were operated by catholic religious orders but funded publicly, and boarded orphaned and other familyless (taken from their single mothers) children. However, the children here were often heavily abused, in every way. This would come to light in 2009 with the publication of the Ryan Report, the culmination of the first government commitment to investigate these institutions. However the commission was blocked from naming the abusers it found after a legal challenge by a Catholic Organization. So while the crimes committed in the Industrial Schools and Laundries are well known, the people who actually perpetrated them were never brought against the law.
The women and children affected by these crimes are entitled and receive restitution payments these days, however there is controversy there too, as the Catholic Church and the individual orders responsible have refused to pay this restitution themselves, leaving it to be payed with taxpayer money.
Regardless. How this plays into the troubles is that the Catholic influence on the ’37 constitution was obvious even before the abuse was brought to light in the 21st century. And it was obvious in more then just the treatment of women. This deep rooting of Catholicism in ROI law and government had an effect on the perception of Catholics in Northern Ireland by the already bigoted against them Protestant elite. It helped fuel paranoia over what the Catholics and the Republicans might do in Northern Ireland.