Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association

"The Civil Rights Mural - The Beginning".^[1]

The Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (Irish: Cumann Chearta Sibhialta Thuaisceart Éireann) was an organisation which campaigned for equal civil rights for the all the people in Northern Ireland during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Its central demand for full 'British' rights for all in what was universally recognised as part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland was exactly what made the peaceful NICRA campaign 20 November 2011 (UTC)such a powerful threat to the corrupt Unionist Party regime in Northern Ireland. The Ulster Unionist Party operated an entrenched system of party patronage in the allocation of state jobs and social housing and activily conspired to delay and distort the appication of British local franchise reform to Nortern Ireland. It actively promoted discrimination against the Roman Catholic minority and witheld the basic right of 'One man One Vote' as the very foundation of local government in Northern Ireland. Inspired by the ideals and tactics of American Civil Rights Movement, NICRA brought this currupt system crashing to the ground. It did so by peaceful means alone. It did so without resort to armed struggle. It won a series of fundamental political reforms that marked the end of the corrupt Unionist Party regime. This was and still is the legacy of the Civil Rights Revolution in Nothern Ireland. ^[2]Brian B 111111 (talk) 13:34,

Origins

According to Joseph Ruane and Jennifer Todd, the ethos of the Northern state was unashamedly and unambiguously sectarian, although Senia Paseta argues that discrimination was never as calculated as nationalists maintained nor as fictional as unionists claimed.^[3]. The civil rights campaign which began in the mid-1960s attempted to achieve reform by publicising, documenting, and lobbying for an end to abuses in areas such as housing, unfair electoral procedures, discrimination in employment and the Special Powers Act. ^[4]

Since Northern Ireland's creation, the Roman Catholic community had suffered from discrimination under the government.^[5][6][7] The Northern Ireland government accused NICRA of being a political front for Republican and Communist ideologies.^[8]

Internationally, there was concern with civil and minority rights with Northern Ireland part of this international trend. NICRA therefore secured much wider international and internal support than traditional nationalist protest. ^[9] According to the authors of Northern Ireland: 1921/2001 Political Forces and Social Classes, the one area which exemplified the formation of the northern state was the constitution of the security forces. They say that the strategy pursued by the Unionist middle class along with the British government's diplomatic strategies were responsible for the establishment of a sectarian-populist flavour in Northern Ireland.^[10]

In a conscious imitation of tactics used by the American Civil Rights Movement,^[11] and modelled somewhat on the National Council for Civil Liberties, the new organisation held marches, pickets, sit-ins and protests to pressure the Government of Northern Ireland to grant these demands. NICRA had five main demands:

• one man, one vote which meant extension of the local government franchise from ratepayers to all those over 21
• an end to gerrymandering which meant Unionists were elected even in districts with Catholic majorities
• an end to discrimination in housing
• an end to discrimination in jobs
• the disbandment of the B-Specials, the Ulster Special Constabulary, which many viewed as sectarian.

First civil rights march

On 27 April 1968, NICRA held a rally to protest at the banning of a Republican Easter parade. On 24 August 1968 the Campaign for Social Justice (CSJ), NICRA, and other groups, held the first civil rights march in Northern Ireland from Coalisland to Dungannon, in County Tyrone. Loyalists organised a counter demonstration in an effort to get the march banned and in fact the rally was officially banned. Despite this the march took place and passed off without incident. The publicity surrounding the march encouraged other protesting groups to form branches of NICRA.^[12]

On 27 August 1968, the Derry Housing Action Committee (DHAC), which protested against housing discrimination and provision in Derry, organised another protest in the Guildhall, Derry council chamber. Immediately after the protest Eamon Melaugh telephoned NICRA and invited them to organise a march in Derry.^[12]

Derry march

In September 1968, NICRA organised a march to be held in Derry on 5 October 1968. On 1 October, a Protestant fraternal organisation, the Apprentice Boys of Derry, announced their intention to march the same route on the same day and time.^[13] William Craig, the Northern Ireland Home Affairs Minister chose to ban civil rights marches.^[13]

Civil Rights demonstrators defied the ban. They were repeatedly attacked by the Royal Ulster Constabulary, who injured many marchers, including West Belfast MP Gerry Fitt. Television pictures of the march taken by RTÉ cameraman, Gay O'Brien, shocked viewers across the world. Following these events, Catholics in Derry rioted against police for two days. Students such as Bernadette Devlin at Queen's University, Belfast were radicalised by these events and formed a more radical civil rights organisation People's Democracy.^[14]

Unionist Prime Minister O'Neill made his 'Ulster at the crossroads' speech on television on 9 December, appealing for calm. As a result of the announced reforms, the more moderate civil rights associations declared halt to marches until 11 January 1969. The People's Democracy ignored the government's statement.^[15]

1969 riots

Main articles: Battle of the Bogside and 1969 Northern Ireland riots

Events escalated until August 1969, when an Apprentice Boys of Derry march was attacked after trying to march through the nationalist Bogside area of Derry. The RUC intervened, and a three day riot ensued between the RUC and the Bogside residents (allied under the Derry Citizens' Defence Association. Rioting spread throughout Northern Ireland, where at least seven were killed, and hundreds wounded. Thousands of Catholics were driven from their homes by Loyalists. These events were often seen as the start of the Troubles.

Bloody Sunday

Bloodstained civil rights banner after the Bloody Sunday shootings of 1972, depicted in a mural in the Bogside in Derry.

Main article: Bloody Sunday (1972)

The British government introduced internment on 9 August 1971. The British Army in co-operation with the RUC, but acting on out of date intelligence interned hundreds of men and women. This eventually rose to several thousand. Most of those interned were innocent of involvement with the PIRA. The PIRA having being tipped off about the internment either went underground or fled across the border. Many of those imprisoned were civil rights activists.

By this stage support for NICRA began to wane. However NICRA organized marches against internment. In Derry on 30 January 1972, fourteen unarmed demonstrators were shot and killed by British troops during an anti-internment march. This became known as Bloody Sunday. The army later claimed it had come under fire. No guns were uncovered. Most of the victims were shot in the back, indicating they were running away. The British government's Saville Report published 2010 cleared the names of the protestors as innocent victims and blamed a "breakdown in the chain of command" for the deaths.

People associated with NICRA

Malachy McGurran Chairman, Frank Gogarty, Ivan Barr, Denis Haughey, Michael Farrell, Vice Chair, Vincent MacDowell vice chair. Patrons of NICRA included Kader Asmal, Anthony Coughlan, Bernadette Devlin, and John Hume. The first chair of NICRA was Betty Sinclair (Communist Party) from 1968-1969; other committee members included Paddy Devlin (NILP), Ivan Cooper, Robin Cole (Young Unionists), Kevin Agnew, Conn McCluskey, Jack Bennett, Madge Davidson, and Fred Heatley. NICRA's Official Secretary was Edwina Stewart, a Protestant who replaced Betty Sinclair in the executive in 1968.

References

1. ^ The wall murals http://www.cain.ulst.ac.uk. Retrieved 2007-07-15.
2. ^ "Madge Davidson", Communist Party of Ireland
3. ^ Senia Paseta (2003), Modern Ireland: A Very Short Introduction, p.107. Oxford Paperbacks
4. ^ Ruane & Todd, Pg. 121-125
5. ^ Tonge, Jonathan. Northern Ireland. Polity. pp. 20–21. ISBN 978-0745631417. 
6. ^ Minahan, James B.. One Europe, Many Nations: A Historical Dictionary of European National Groups. Greenwood Press. p. 335. ISBN 978-0313309847. 
7. ^ Lydon, James. The Making of Ireland: A History. Routledge. pp. 393–394. ISBN 978-0415013475. 
8. ^ Jarman, Neil: Material conflicts: parades and visual displays in Northern Ireland. Berg Publishers, 1997. Page 77. ISBN 1859731295
9. ^ Ruane & Todd, Pg. 126-127
10. ^ Bew, Gibbon and Patterson, Pg.27
11. ^ Weiss, Ruth. Peace in Their Time: War and Peace in Ireland and Southern Africa. p. 34. 
12. ^ ^{a b} "A Chronology of the Conflict - 1968". Conflict Archive on the Internet (CAIN). http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/othelem/chron/ch68.htm. Retrieved 11 July 2009. 
13. ^ ^{a b} Martin Melaugh. "The Derry March - Chronology of Events Surrounding the March". CAIN. http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/events/derry/chron.htm. Retrieved 2008-02-16. 
14. ^ 1968: Londonderry march ends in violence — BBC On This Day article
15. ^ Bew, Paul; Gordon Gillespie. "1968". Northern Ireland : A Chronology of the Troubles, 1968-1993. Dublin: Gill & MacMillan. p. 10. ISBN 0-7171-2081-3. 

External links

• Key Events - Civil Rights Campaign (1964-1972) — from the University of Ulster's CAIN project
• Northern Ireland Civil Rights Movement — from the BBC History website
• WE SHALL OVERCOME....The History of the Struggle for Civil Rights in Northern Ireland 1968-1978 — from the University of Ulster's CAIN project