Abstract
From the very start of Northern Ireland as an entity the issue of parading had particular political significance. Among the first enactments of the new parliament was the Civil Authorities (Special Powers) Act which came into effect in April 1922. This sweeping statute, designed, according to its preamble, ‘to empower certain authorities of the Government of Northern Ireland to take steps for preserving the peace and maintaining order’, came to represent the unacceptable, coercive face of the Ulster unionist regime. In February 1969, the People’s Democracy, embodying much of early pressure for civil rights’ reform, gave high priority to its abolition. Following the first demand on their manifesto — ‘one man one vote’ — came ‘an end to repressive legislation and partial law enforcement by repeal of the Special Powers Act’.1 Linked with this was the 1951 Public Order Act, which had superseded the Special Powers Act in the matter of regulating public demonstrations.
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Notes
Paul Arthur, The People’s Democracy 1968–73 (Belfast, 1974), appendix C, p. 119.
The most complete legal analysis of this legislation is in Colm Campbell, Emergency Law in Ireland 1918–1925 (Oxford, 1994).
The political and military context may be followed in Charles Townshend, The British Campaign in Ireland 1919–1921 (Oxford, 1975).
This is a longstanding feature of unionist mentalité. See Keith Jeffery (ed.) ‘An Irish Empire’? Aspects of Ireland and the British Empire (Manchester, 1996), pp. 15, 82–3, 155;
Bryan A. Follis, A State under Siege: the Establishment of Northern Ireland 1920–1925 (Oxford, 1995);
and Arthur Aughey, Under Siege: Ulster Unionism and the Anglo-Irish Agreement (Belfast, 1989).
Paddy Devlin, Yes We Have No Bananas: Outdoor Relief in Belfast, 1920–39 (Belfast, 1981), says that the banned march was to go to the workhouse, to coincide with the holding of a Poor Law Guardians board meeting (p. 95), but there is no mention of this is the relevant Cabinet and Ministry of Home Affairs files on the incident.
4 October 1934, memo by Pirn (ibid.). For Pirn’s career see Chris Ryder, The RUC: a Force Under Fire (London, 1990), pp. 79–80.
Philip L.F. McVicker, ‘Law and Order in Northern Ireland, 1920–36’ (unpublished PhD thesis, CNAA (University of Ulster), 1985), pp. 198–200 (Cabinet quotation from Cabinet conclusions, 22 June 1932 (PRONI, CAB 4/303/1)).
A.C. Hepburn, ‘The Belfast Riots of 1935’, Social History, vol. 15, no. 1, 1990, pp. 75–96.
Steve Bruce, God Save Ulster! The Religion and Politics of Protestantism (Oxford, 1986), pp. 38–9;
Ed Moloney and Andy Pollock, Paisley (Swords, Co. Dublin, 1986), pp. 24–9. Paisley was born on 6 April 1926.
Brian Faulkner, Memoirs of a Statesman, ed. John Houston (London, 1978), p. 25.
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Jeffery, K. (2000). Parades, Police and Government in Northern Ireland, 1922–69. In: Fraser, T.G. (eds) The Irish Parading Tradition. Ethnic and Intercommunity Conflict Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780333993859_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780333993859_6
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