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==Bloody Sunday==
==Bloody Sunday==

[[File:Bloody Sunday Mural Bogside 2004 SMC.jpg|thumb|right|upright|Bloodstained civil rights banner after the Bloody Sunday shootings of 1972, depicted in a mural in the Bogside in Derry.]]
{{main|Bloody Sunday (1972)}}
{{main|Bloody Sunday (1972)}}


Revision as of 22:29, 7 April 2013

"NICRA" redirects here. For other uses, see NICRA (disambiguation).

The Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (Irish: Cumann Chearta Sibhialta Thuaisceart Éireann) was an organisation which campaigned for civil rights in Northern Ireland during the late 1960s and early 1970s.[1] The organisation was formed in Belfast on 29 January 1967,[2] and initially included Unionist politicians, with Young Unionist Robin Cole taking a position on the executive committee.[3] The organisation was created to campaign for social justice on issues such as discrimination against Roman Catholics in employment and housing, the Gerrymandering of electoral boundaries, the rights of Irish Travellers, and nuclear disarmament.[4]

Origins

Since Northern Ireland's creation, the Roman Catholic minority community had suffered from discrimination under the unionist and wholly Protestant government.[5][6][7] While some historians regard the ethos of the Northern state as unashamedly and unambiguously sectarian,[8] there are some who argue that discrimination was never as calculated as nationalists maintained nor as fictional as unionists claimed.[9] The security forces in particular were identified with the Protestant and Unionist majority.[10]

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.[11]

NICRA had six main demands:

  • "one man, one vote" which would allow all people over the age of 18 to vote in elections and remove the multiple votes held by business owners
  • an end to gerrymandering which meant unionists were elected even in districts with Catholic majorities
  • prevention of discrimination in the allocation of government jobs
  • prevention of discrimination in the allocation of council housing
  • the removal of the Special Powers Act which allowed internment
  • the disbandment of the B-Specials, a 100% Protestant Ulster Special Constabulary force that was established in September 1920

In a conscious imitation of tactics used by the American Civil Rights Movement,[12] 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. Internationally, given the widespread concern in the late 1960s with civil and minority rights, NICRA secured much wider international and internal support than traditional nationalist protest.[13]

Allegations against NICRA

The Northern Ireland government accused NICRA of being a front for Republican and communist ideologies.[14] After the failure of the IRA's Border Campaign, some of its left-wing elements had become involved in organisations such as NICRA, Trade Unions and the Northern Ireland Labour Party.[15]

The radical views of individuals within NICRA were highlighted by a commission of inquiry set up by the British Government following the spread of civil unrest in 1969. The report by a Scottish judge, Lord Cameron stated, "certain at least of those who were prominent in the Association had objects far beyond the 'reformist' character of the majority of Civil Rights Association demands, and undoubtedly regarded the Association as a stalking-horse for achievement of other and more radical and in some cases revolutionary objects, in particular abolition of the border, unification of Ireland outside the United Kingdom and the setting up of an all-Ireland Workers' Socialist Republic."[16]

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.[17]

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.[17]

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.[18] William Craig, the Northern Ireland Home Affairs Minister, chose to ban civil rights marches.[18]

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 and others, such as Bernadette Devlin and Kevin Boyle at Queen's University, Belfast were moved by these events to form a more radical civil rights organisation, People's Democracy.[19]

Unionist Prime Minister Terence O'Neill made his 'Ulster at the crossroads' speech on television on 9 December, appealing for calm. As a result of the announcement of various reforms, NICRA declared a halt to marches until 11 January 1969, while People's Democracy disagreed with this stance.[20]

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 banner). 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.

In a subsequent official inquiry, Lord Scarman concluded, "We are satisfied that the spread of the disturbances [in Derry in August 1969] owed much to a deliberate decision of some minority groups to relieve police pressure on the rioters in Londonderry. Amongst these groups must be included NICRA, whose executive decided to organise demonstrators in the Province so as to prevent reinforcement of the police in Londonderry."[21]

Bloody Sunday

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 Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA). The IRA, having been 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, Fionnbarra Ó Dochartaigh, Robin Cole (Young Unionists), Kevin Agnew, Conn McCluskey, Jack Bennett, Madge Davison and Fred Heatley. NICRA's Official Secretary was Edwina Stewart, a Protestant who replaced Betty Sinclair in the executive in 1968.

References

  1. ^ "Madge Davidson", Communist Party of Ireland
  2. ^ Bardon, Jonathan (1992). A History of Ulster. Belfast, UK: The Blackstaff Press. p. 651. ISBN 0-85640-476-4. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  3. ^ Bardon, Jonathan (1992). A History of Ulster. Belfast, UK: The Blackstaff Press. p. 652. ISBN 0-85640-476-4. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  4. ^ Bardon, Jonathan (1992). A History of Ulster. Belfast, UK: The Blackstaff Press. p. 655. ISBN 0-85640-476-4. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  5. ^ Tonge, Jonathan (2006). Northern Ireland. Polity. pp. 20–21. ISBN 978-0-7456-3141-7. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  6. ^ Minahan, James B. (2000). One Europe, Many Nations: A Historical Dictionary of European National Groups. Greenwood Press. p. 335. ISBN 978-0-313-30984-7. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  7. ^ Lydon, James (1998). The Making of Ireland: A History. Routledge. pp. 393–394. ISBN 978-0-415-01347-5. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  8. ^ Joseph Ruane & Jennifer Todd, The Dynamics of Conflict in Northern Ireland: Power, Conflict and Emancipation, Cambridge University Press (FP 1996) 2000, ISBN 0-521-56879-X
  9. ^ Senia Paseta (2003), Modern Ireland: A Very Short Introduction, p107. Oxford Paperbacks
  10. ^ Bew, Gibbon and Patterson, Northern Ireland: 1921/2001 Political Forces and Social Classes, p27
  11. ^ Ruane & Todd, Pg. 121-125
  12. ^ Weiss, Ruth. Peace in Their Time: War and Peace in Ireland and Southern Africa. p. 34.
  13. ^ Ruane & Todd, pp126-127
  14. ^ Jarman, Neil: Material conflicts: parades and visual displays in Northern Ireland. Berg Publishers, 1997, p77. ISBN 1-85973-129-5
  15. ^ Bardon, Jonathan (1992). A History of Ulster. Belfast, UK: The Blackstaff Press. p. 651. ISBN 0-85640-476-4. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  16. ^ Lord Cameron, 'Disturbances in Northern Ireland: Report of the Commission appointed by the Governor of Northern Ireland' (Belfast, 1969)
  17. ^ a b "A Chronology of the Conflict - 1968". Conflict Archive on the Internet (CAIN). Retrieved 11 July 2009.
  18. ^ a b Martin Melaugh. "The Derry March - Chronology of Events Surrounding the March". CAIN. Retrieved 2008-02-16.
  19. ^ 1968: Londonderry march ends in violence — BBC On This Day article
  20. ^ Bew, Paul (1993). "1968". Northern Ireland : A Chronology of the Troubles, 1968-1993. Dublin: Gill & MacMillan. p. 10. ISBN 0-7171-2081-3. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  21. ^ 'Violence and Civil Disturbances in Northern Ireland in 1969', Scarman Tribunal, April 1972

External links

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