Colbert is the fourth youngest of thirteen children of Michael Colbert, a farmer, and Honora McDermott. His family moves to the village of Athea when he is three years old. He is educated at the local national school. In 1901, his family is living in the townland of Templeathea West. A younger brother, James, and a cousin, Michael Colbert, later serve as Teachtaí Dála (TDs).
Colbert leaves Athea at the age of 16 and goes to live with his sister Catherine in Ranelagh, County Dublin. He continues his education at a Christian Brothers school in North Richmond Street. He is employed as a clerk in the offices of Kennedy’s Bakery in Dublin. In 1911, he is living with Catherine, two other siblings and two boarders at a house on Clifton Terrace, Rathmines. He is a deeply religious Catholic and refrains from smoking or drinking.
Colbert is sworn into the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) by his cousin Art O’Donnell in Art’s home in 1908. He joins Fianna Éireann at its inaugural meeting in 1909 and rises to Chief Scout. The following year he becomes a drill instructor at St. Enda’s School, founded by Patrick Pearse. In 1912, he becomes head of an IRB circle within the Fianna started by Bulmer Hobson. During 1913 he is one of a number of Fianna who conduct military training at the Forester’s Hall in Rutland Square (now Parnell Square), and in November of that year he joins the Provisional Committee of the newly formed Irish Volunteers.
In the weeks leading up to the Rising, Colbert acts as bodyguard for Thomas Clarke. Before the Rising, because he lives out of the city, he stays with the Cooney family in the city centre. During Easter Week, he fights at Watkin’s Brewery, Jameson’s Distillery and Marrowbone Lane. Thomas MacDonagh surrenders to Brigadier GeneralWilliam Lowe at 3:15 p.m. on Sunday, April 30. MacDonagh then goes around the garrisons under his command to arrange for their surrender.
Colbert surrenders with the Marrowbone Lane Garrison along with the South Dublin Union Garrison, which had been led by Éamonn Ceannt. When the order to surrender is issued, he assumes the command of his unit to save the life of his superior officer, who is a married man.
They are marched to Richmond Barracks, where Colbert is later court-martialed. Transferred to Kilmainham Gaol, he is told on Sunday, May 7, that he is to be shot the following morning. He writes no fewer than ten letters during his time in prison. During this time in detention, he does not allow any visits from his family. Writing to his sister, he says a visit “would grieve us both too much.”
The night before his execution Colbert sends for Mrs. Ó Murchadha, who is also being held prisoner. He tells her he is “proud to die for such a cause. I will be passing away at the dawning of the day.” Holding his Bible, he tells her he is leaving it to his sister. He hands her three buttons from his volunteer uniform, telling her, “They left me nothing else.” He then asks her to say a Hail Mary for the souls of the departed when she hears the volleys of shots in the morning for Éamonn Ceannt, Michael Mallin and himself. The soldier who is guarding the prisoner begins crying according to Mrs. Ó Murchadha, and records him as saying, “If only we could die such deaths.”
The next morning, May 8, 1916, Colbert is shot by firing squad.
Colbert Railway Station in Limerick, Con Colbert Road in Dublin and the Fianna Fáilcumann in the University of Limerick are named in his honor. Colbert Street in his native Athea, County Limerick, is named after him, as is the local community hall. Colbert Avenue and Colbert Park Janesboro, Limerick, are also named after him.
On May 4, 1958, a plaque is erected over a bed in Barringtons Hospital, County Limerick. The plaque has since disappeared.
In May 2016, one hundred years after his execution, a full-scale limestone sculpture of Colbert is unveiled at the gable of his one-time house in Moanleana, County Limerick.
Lee is married to Mary Lee (née Kitson) and they have two children, Alison and Harry, and live in Cabinteely. He famously travels to work at RTÉ using a Segway, once giving it a test ride live on Tubridy Tonight.
Lee joins the civil service as an executive officer in the Central Statistics Office (CSO). Two years later he enters University College Dublin where he studies economics under academics such as Brendan Walsh and Peter Neary.
Prior to his move into broadcasting, Lee lectures at NUI Galway and then works as a journalist with The Sunday Business Post. He is also a Senior Economist at Riada Stockbrokers. He also works as Treasury Economist with FTI and as a research economist with the Central Bank of Ireland.
From 1992 to 2009 Lee worked at RTÉ, the public broadcasting service of Ireland. He is appointed Economics Editor with RTÉ in 1996. He is named Irish Journalist of the Year, along with Charlie Bird, in 1998 after they uncover a major tax evasion and overcharging scandal at National Irish Bank. He has devised, researched and presented several television series, including Moneybox, More to Do, Winds of Change, and Beyond the Berlin Wall. He is thought of as an “economics guru.” He leaves RTÉ in the late 1990s to work for BCP Stockbrokers. He leaves the job and returns to his RTÉ post the next day.
Before embarking on his political career, Lee films a four-part series based on the fall of the Berlin Wall in 2008. It is aired on RTÉ One in November 2009.
Lee is parodied in the 1990s comedy Bull Island, where he is seen “menacingly staring down the lens of a camera,” and is also featured on RTÉ 2fm‘s Nob Nation.
On May 5, 2009, on RTÉ News at One on RTÉ Radio 1, Lee announces that he is resigning as Economic Editor with RTÉ and announces his intention to seek the Fine Gael nomination for the Dublin Southby-election in 2009. He takes a year’s unpaid leave from RTÉ in May 2009. On May 6, 2009, he is chosen as the Fine Gael candidate for the by-election. He is the only candidate for the nomination.
Lee is elected on the first count to represent Dublin South on June 6, 2009. He receives over 53% of the 1st preference vote. In total he receives 27,768 1st preference votes. When elected, he is referred to as a “Celebrity TD.” His RTÉ position is filled by Europe editor Sean Whelan, but only as correspondent. Instead, David Murphy is promoted to Business Editor.
Lee highlights the failure of EMPG, the holding company for U.S. publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, and the potential impact on the Irish taxpayers of the loans given by Anglo Irish Bank to the investors in EMPG on January 13, 2010. He sees this as another example for the urgent need of an investigation into the Irish banking crisis.
On February 8, 2010, Lee announces his resignation from Fine Gael and from Dáil Éireann, due to having “virtually no influence or input” into shaping Fine Gael’s economic policies at a time of economic upheaval. It emerges that on February 2, he met with the Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny and told him of his intention to resign. Kenny then offered Lee the frontbench position as spokesman on economic planning. Speaking to reporters outside Leinster House soon after his announcement, Lee says it would have been dishonest of him to accept the position. “I had absolutely no input for nine months. I think I had to be honest with myself and honest with the electorate about that and not pretend.” Asked if his resignation is a vote of no confidence in Kenny, he says there are “certainly lots of large mutterings at the moment in relation to the leader’s position.” He says he had “minimal involvement” with Fine Gael finance spokesman Richard Bruton.
Kenny notes Lee had been appointed chair of the party’s committee on economic policy and also its forum. “I had anticipated a very important role for [George Lee] in the coming period with Fine Gael.” Kenny’s spokesman later dismisses the proposition that the resignation had implications for his leadership. He cited the public endorsement of Kenny by 20 Dáil deputies over the course of the weekend. Former Fine Gael leader Michael Noonan says he is surprised at the decision. “I thought that George Lee was fitting in well,” adding that he believes he would have been a cabinet member in a Fine Gael-led government.
Lee is criticised after his resignation by Senator Eoghan Harris, who is speaking on the Lunchtime programme of Newstalk Radio. Harris suggests financial considerations and long working hours of politicians are the reasons for Lee’s resignation. Fine Gael TDBrian Hayes, who is Lee’s campaign manager in the Dublin South by-election, says that in discussions with Lee, the latter had complained about “a major reduction in his income” since leaving RTÉ to become a Dáil backbencher. Lee denies that financial considerations had anything to do with his decision to quit politics.
RTÉ receives a letter from Lee confirming his intentions to return after his leave of absence. The Sunday Tribune says on February 14, 2010, that he will have to wait for three months before returning to RTÉ. Exactly a year after leaving RTÉ, he returns to the broadcaster on May 5, 2010. He works as an advisor on the RTÉ business desk. He presents Mind Your Business on RTÉ Radio 1 on Saturday Mornings as a summer replacement for The Business.
When John Murray moves to present his own programme, Lee takes over The Business slot on September 4, 2010, on Saturday mornings on RTÉ Radio 1. In addition to the radio edition, he has presented a televised version on RTÉ One, also titled The Business.
Lee has been Environment Correspondent for RTÉ since June 27, 2019.
Christened as William O’Brien, the seventh child of Arthur O’Brien, clerk, and Mary O’Brien (née Christie), who is from County Meath, Ó Briain takes an interest in the Irish language from an early age and begins learning Irish by himself from a grammar book, as it is not encouraged by his teachers at the Christian Brothers’ O’Connell School nor spoken by his parents. While still at the O’Connell School, he starts using the Irish version of his name. He also attends meetings of the Gaelic League, then attends University College Dublin (UCD) on a scholarship, where he studies French, English and Irish, receiving a BA (1909) and an MA (1910).
UCD decides to start awarding one annual scholarship for overseas travel in 1911, and Ó Briain wins the first one, using it to visit Germany and study under Kuno Meyer and Rudolf Thurneysen. After three years, he returns home, where he rejoins the Gaelic League and begins teaching French at UCD. He also joins the Irish Volunteers then, the following year, Seán T. O’Kelly convinces him to join the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB).
Around this time, Ó Briain joins Sinn Féin, and he stands unsuccessfully for the party in Mid Armagh at the 1918 United Kingdom general election in Ireland, taking 5,689 votes. His campaign leads, indirectly, to his arrest and three months in jail in Belfast. In 1920, following his release, he is appointed a judge in the then-illegal republican court system in Galway, and visits both France and Italy to try to source weapons for the Irish Republican Army (IRA). In November 1920, he is arrested in the UCG dining room by Black and Tans, and is imprisoned for thirteen months, first in Galway and then in the Curragh camp in County Kildare, thereby missing the conclusion of the Irish War of Independence. By the time he is released, the Anglo-Irish Treaty has been signed. He supports the treaty and takes no further part in militant activity.
In the newly independent Ireland, Ó Briain remains a professor at Galway. He also stands in the 1925 Seanad election, although he is not successful. He is the founding secretary of the Taibhdhearc na Gaillimhe theatre, also acting in many of its productions, and spends much time translating works from English and the Romance languages into Irish. He stands to become president of UCG in 1945, but is not elected, and in the 1940s and 1950s is best known for his many appearances on television and radio.
From his retirement in 1959, Ó Briain lives in Dublin. In 1974, the National University of Ireland (NUI) confers an honorary doctorate on him. He dies on August 12, 1974, at St. Gabriel’s Hospital, Cabinteely, County Dublin. His funeral to Glasnevin Cemetery is almost a state occasion, with a huge attendance of public figures, and a military firing party at the graveside, where the oration is given by Micheál Mac Líammóir and a lesson is read by Siobhán McKenna. For days after his death, the newspapers carry tributes to his many-sided career and personality. On the one hundredth anniversary of his birth, Proinsias Mac Aonghusa and Art Ó Beoláin write commemorative articles in Feasta.
On September 1, 1921, Ó Briain marries Helen Lawlor, of Dublin, who dies two years before him. The couple’s only child is Eibhlín Ní Bhriain, who is a journalist for The Irish Times and other periodicals.
Living in the nationalist Beechmount neighbourhood of the Falls, he stands for the Falls as a candidate for the Dock Labour Party in a city council by-election in 1956, but loses to Paddy Devlin of the Irish Labour Party, who later becomes his close ally. In 1958, he is elected to Belfast City Council as a member of the Irish Labour Party.
Many sympathetic British Members of Parliament (MPs) are present at a civil rights march in Derry on October 5, 1968, when Fitt and others are beaten by the Royal Ulster Constabulary. Fitt also supports the 1969 candidacy of Bernadette Devlin in the Mid Ulster by-election who runs as an anti-abstentionist ‘Unity‘ candidate. Devlin’s success greatly increases the authority of Fitt in the eyes of many British commentators, particularly as it produces a second voice on the floor of the British House of Commons who challenge the Unionist viewpoint at a time when Harold Wilson and other British ministers are beginning to take notice.
In August 1970, Fitt becomes the first leader of a coalition of civil rights and nationalist leaders who create the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP). By this time Northern Ireland is charging headlong towards near-civil war and the majority of unionists remain hostile.
After the collapse of Stormont in 1972 and the establishment of the Northern Ireland Assembly in 1973 Fitt becomes deputy chief executive of the short-lived Power-Sharing Executive created by the Sunningdale Agreement.
Fitt becomes increasingly detached from both his own party and also becomes more outspoken in his condemnation of the Provisional Irish Republican Army. He becomes a target for republican sympathisers in 1976 when they attack his home. He becomes disillusioned with the handling of Northern Ireland by the British government. In 1979, he abstains from a crucial vote in the House of Commons which brings down the Labour government, citing the way that the government had failed to help the nationalist population and tried to form a deal with the Ulster Unionist Party.
In 1979, Fitt is replaced by John Hume as leader of the SDLP and he leaves the party altogether after he agrees to constitutional talks with British Secretary of StateHumphrey Atkins without any provision for an ‘Irish dimension’ and then sees his decision overturned by the SDLP party conference. Like Paddy Devlin before him, he claims the SDLP has ceased to be a socialist force.
In 1981, he opposes the hunger strikes in the Maze prison in Belfast. His seat in Westminster is targeted by Sinn Féin as well as by the SDLP. In June 1983, he loses his seat in Belfast West to Gerry Adams, in part due to competition from an SDLP candidate. The following month, on October 14, 1983, he is created a UK life peer as Baron Fitt, of Bell’s Hill in County Down. His Belfast home is firebombed a month later and he moves to London.
Gerry Fitt dies in London on August 26, 2005, at the age of 79, after a long history of heart disease.
Ó Muircheartaigh grows up on the family farm and is educated locally in Dingle. In September 1945, he begins studying at Coláiste Íosagáin in Ballyvourney in the County CorkGaeltacht where he trains to be a teacher. It is at this all-Irish language school that his name changes from Michael Moriarty to the Irish version Mícheál Ó Muircheartaigh. He says that Irish is his stronger language. In September 1948, he begins the final year of his teacher training at St. Patrick’s College of Education in Drumcondra, Dublin.
In early March 1949, Ó Muircheartaigh, along with ten other students from the college, and several from other colleges, do a test commentary on a hurling match at Croke Park. Each student has to commentate for five minutes in Irish and the most successful is to be selected for further commentary work. Up to this point, he has never seen a game of hurling before in his life. He is the one selected and his first assignment is to provide an all-Irish commentary on the 1949 Railway Cup final on Saint Patrick’s Day.
Ó Muircheartaigh graduates from St. Patrick’s College a little later and also completes a Bachelor of Arts degree from University College Dublin (UCD) in 1952. He also completes a Higher Diploma in Education in 1953. He teaches economics, accountancy and Irish in both primary and secondary schools throughout Dublin, the majority of which are run by the Christian Brothers. He continues teaching up until the 1980s, when he becomes a full-time broadcaster with RTÉ.
For the early part of his broadcasting career, Ó Muircheartaigh commentates on Minor GAA matches, in the Irish language. He also replaces the legendary Michael O’Hehir when he is not available to commentate. Eventually when O’Hehir is forced to retire in the mid-1980s Ó Muircheartaigh takes over as the station’s premier radio commentator. He develops his own inimitable style of commentary, and his accent is unmistakably that of a native Irish speaker. He is a true lover of Gaelic Athletic Association, and it is reflected in the enthusiasm he brings to matches. His unusual turn of phrase makes him a much-loved broadcaster and often imitated character. He becomes particularly famous in Ireland for his unusual turns of phrase in the heat of the moment while commentating. Towards the end of his life, he commentates on RTÉ Radio 1. In 2004, he publishes his autobiography, From Dún Sion to Croke Park.
On March 5, 1988, Ó Muircheartaigh presents the Saturday Live show on RTÉ 1. In 1990, he holds an impromptu interview with Britain’s Prince Edward, after his greyhound had won at the English Greyhound Derby qualifier when he was commentating.
Ó Muircheartaigh’s commentaries for RTÉ Radio 1’s Sunday Sport show win him a Jacob’s Award in 1992. He is also the Parade Grand Marshal for the 2007 St. Patrick’s Festival, having been given the honour by the chairman of the festival in recognition and appreciation of his unique contribution to Irish culture. He is the Parade Grand Marshal for the 2011 St. Patrick’s Parade in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, also in recognition and appreciation of his unique contribution to Irish culture.
On September 16, 2010, Ó Muircheartaigh announces his retirement from broadcasting. The last All-Ireland he commentates on is the 2010 All-Ireland Senior Football Championship Final on September 19, 2010.
On October 29, 2010, it is announced that the 2nd International Rules test at Croke Park would be Ó Muircheartaigh’s final broadcast as commentator on RTÉ Radio 1. The following day he commentates his final commentary alongside RTÉ’s pundit and former Meath footballer Bernard Flynn.
Ó Muircheartaigh is contracted to officiate at the 2011–2012 Volvo Ocean Race finish in Galway where he commentates on the finish to the round-the-world race, giving it a uniquely Irish conclusion. Sailing is his longtime hobby.
Ó Muircheartaigh writes a weekly sports column for Foinse, the Irish-language newspaper free with the Irish Independent each Wednesday. He is invited to read out a piece in Irish and in English at an event called “Laochra” in Croke Park on April 24, 2016, to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Easter Rising.
In 2007, Ó Muircheartaigh is awarded the UCD Foundation Day Medal. His nephew by marriage, John McGuire, has presented several programmes on RTÉ.
Ó Muircheartaigh dies in hospital in Dublin at the age of 93 on June 25, 2024.
Ó Muircheartaigh is awarded an honorary doctorate by NUI Galway in 1999 for his lifetime service to broadcasting. Shortly after his 90th birthday, he is awarded the only GAA GPA All Stars Award of 2020. No further All Stars can be awarded as competition is suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic and only completed that December.
Hogan is called to the Bar in July 1984 and becomes a Senior Counsel in 1997. He appears domestically in cases in the High Court and the Supreme Court and internationally at the European Court of Human Rights and the European Court of Justice.
Hogan is noted in particular for his experience in constitutional law. He acts for the Attorney General of Ireland in references made by President Mary Robinson under Article 26 of the Constitution of Ireland to the Supreme Court regarding the Information (Termination of Pregnancies) Bill 1995 and the Employment Equality Bill of 1997. He appears again for the Attorney General (with Dermot Gleeson and Paul Gallagher) in another reference made by President Mary McAleese regarding the Health (Amendment) (No. 2) Bill 2004.
Hogan is a law lecturer and fellow at Trinity College Dublin from 1982 to 2007. He lectures on constitutional law, competition law and the law of tort. He is regarded as “one of the foremost constitutional and administrative lawyers in Ireland.” He is the co-author of Administrative Law in Ireland and JM Kelly: The Irish Constitution, the core Irish legal texts in Irish administrative and constitutional law respectively. He also writes a text on political violence and a book chronicling the origins of the Constitution of Ireland.
Hogan appears for Katherine Zappone and Ann Louise Gilligan in Zappone v. Revenue Commissioners in the High Court and Miss D in her case related to the rights to travel abroad for an abortion. He represents the State in the High Court and the Supreme Court in litigation that emerges following a court finding that an offence of unlawful carnal knowledge is unconstitutional. In 2008, he acts for Colm Murphy and Seamus Daly in the Supreme Court who are contesting an action taken by families of victims of the Omagh bombing when they are refused access to books of evidence.
Hogan is the first barrister to appear in an Irish court without a wig, following the enactment of the Courts and Court Officers Act 1995.
Throughout his career, Hogan has been a member of committees and boards in areas requiring legal expertise. He chairs the Department of Justice‘s Balance in Criminal Law Review Group and is a member of three other review groups: the Constitution Review Group, the Competition and Mergers Review Group and the Offences Against the State Acts Review Group. He is also a member of the Competition Authority‘s Advisory Panel and the Committee on Court Practice and Procedure.
Hogan is appointed a Judge of the High Court in 2010. Soon after his appointment, he holds an emergency hearing in his home regarding a blood transfusion for a sick baby. He is one of three judges who hears a case taken by Marie Fleming, seeking a right to die in 2012. His reference to the European Court of Justice in 2014 regarding the International Safe Harbor Privacy Principles, results in a declaration by the Grand Chamber that the Safe Harbour Decision is invalid. He subsequently becomes a Judge of the Court of Appeal upon its establishment in October 2014.
In May 2018, Hogan is nominated by the Government of Ireland for appointment as the Advocate General to the European Court of Justice. His term begins in October 2018 and was scheduled to expire in October 2024. Anthony Collins is appointed in 2021 to complete his term following his appointment to the Supreme Court. He concludes his term on October 7, 2021.
In one of his first opinions, on a reference from the French Conseil d’État, Hogan finds that Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 of the European Parliament and of the Council of October 25, 2011, requires that products originating from Israeli-occupied territories should indicate if these products come from such a territory. His opinion is followed by the Court of Justice.
In April 2021, the Irish government nominates Hogan to the Supreme Court of Ireland. He is appointed in October 2021.
Diarmaid Ó Súilleabháin, Irish language writer whose chosen theme is contemporary urban life, dies on June 5, 1985. He is acknowledged as an important Irish language modernist. He is also active in the Irish republican movement and a member of Sinn Féin.
Ó Súilleabháin is born on the Beara Peninsula in County Cork on July 29, 1932. His mother, Máire Áine Ní Dhrisceoil, is a primary school teacher and his father, John O’Sullivan, is a small farmer. He marries Úna Ní Chléirigh on October 28, 1954, and they have two sons and three daughters.
Best known now for his literary work, Ó Súilleabháin writes ten novels, two of them for teenagers. Maeldún (1972) is a pioneering Irish novel that explores sexuality. He writes seven unpublished plays but most of them are shown in Damer Hall and the Peacock Theatre. Three plays that he writes include Bior, Ontos and Macalla and he writes a collection of short stories, Muintir (1970). A story from Muintir called ‘D’ is translated into English and adapted for the stage by Vivian McAlister and is performed by the Dublin University Players in May 1977.
Like Eoghan Ó Tuairisc, Ó Súilleabháin “challenged the critical orthodoxy by openly proclaiming that their standards could not be those of the Gaeltacht and by demanding a creative freedom that would acknowledge hybridity and reject the strictures of the linguistic purists.” He and Máirtín Ó Cadhain are considered the two most innovative Irish language authors to emerge in the 1960s. He often writes in a stream of consciousness, and his style influences younger writers. His writing “explores the problem of recovering idealism and cultural wholeness in an increasingly shallow and materialistic Irish society.” He is elected as a member of the Irish Academy of Letters and wins more literary prizes than any other living Irish author.
Ó Súilleabháin writes a collection of poetry, Cosa Gréine, which is published and launched in Dublin in 2013, twenty-eight years after his death.
Ó Súilleabháin is an active Irish republican, particularly in publicizing the republican struggle, and is a member of Sinn Féin’s ruling body beginning in 1971. He spends short periods in prison because of activities related to his political beliefs.
Ernest Bernard (Ernie) O’Malley, Irish republican revolutionary and writer, is born on May 26, 1897, in Ellison Street, Castlebar, County Mayo, the second child among nine sons and two daughters of Luke Malley, solicitor’s clerk, of County Mayo, and Marion Malley (née Kearney) of County Roscommon. Christened Ernest Bernard Malley, his adoption of variations on this name reflects his enthusiasm for a distinctively Irish identity – an enthusiasm that lay at the heart of his republican career and outlook.
In 1906, O’Malley’s family moves to Dublin, where he attends the Christian Brothers‘ School, North Richmond Street. In 1915, he begins to study medicine at University College Dublin (UCD). Having initially intended to follow his older brother into the British Army, he rather joins the Irish Volunteers in the wake of the 1916 Easter Rising, as a member of F Company, 1st Battalion, Dublin Brigade. He becomes a leading figure in the Irish Republican Army (IRA) during the Irish War of Independence which the Easter Rising helps to occasion. In 1918, having twice failed his second-year university examination, he leaves home to commit himself to the republican cause. He is initially a Volunteer organiser with the rank of second lieutenant, under the instruction of Richard Mulcahy, operating in Counties Tyrone, Offaly, Roscommon, and Donegal. His work in 1918 involves the reorganisation, or new establishment, of Volunteer groups in the localities.
In August 1918, O’Malley is sent to London by Michael Collins to buy arms. During 1919 he works as an IRA staff captain attached to General Headquarters (GHQ) in Dublin, and also trains and organises Volunteers in Counties Clare, Tipperary, and Dublin. He has a notable military record with the IRA during the Irish War of Independence and is a leading figure in attacks on Hollyford barracks in County Tipperary (May 1920), Drangan barracks in County Kilkenny (June 1920), and Rearcross barracks in County Tipperary (July 1920). His IRA days thus involve him with comrades such as Dan Breen, Séumas Robinson, and Seán Treacy. In December 1920, he is captured in County Kilkenny by Crown forces. He escapes from Dublin’s Kilmainham Gaol in February 1921, to take command of the IRA’s 2nd Southern Division, holding the rank of commandant-general.
O’Malley’s republican commitment has political roots in his conviction that Ireland should properly be fully independent of Britain, and that violence is a necessary means to achieve this end. But the causes underlying his revolutionism are layered. Family expectations of respectable, professional employment combined with a religious background and an enthusiasm for soldiering provide some of the foundations for his IRA career. As an IRA officer he enjoys professional, military expression for a visceral CatholicIrish nationalism. He also finds excitement, liberation from the frequent dullness of his life at home, defiant rebellion against his non-republican parents, an alternative to his stalled undergraduate career, and, in political and cultural Irish separatism, a decisive resolution of the profound tension between his anglocentrism and his anglophobia.
O’Malley rejects the 1921 Anglo–Irish Treaty as an unacceptable compromise. He spends the 1921 truce period training IRA officers in his divisional area, in preparation for a possible renewal of fighting. He is, in the event, to be a leading anti-treatyite in the 1922–23 Irish Civil War. In the Four Courts in 1922, at the start of the latter conflict, he is captured on the republicans’ capitulation on June 30 but then manages to escape from captivity. Subsequently he is appointed assistant Chief of Staff of the anti-Treaty IRA and also becomes part of a five-man anti-Treaty army council, along with Liam Lynch, Liam Deasy, Frank Aiken and Thomas Derrig.
O’Malley is dramatically captured and badly wounded by Free State forces in Dublin in November 1922. Imprisoned until July 1924, he is during the period of his incarceration elected as a TD for Dublin North in the 1923 Irish general election and is also a forty-one-day participant in the republican hunger strike later that year. Following release from prison, he returns home to live with his parents in Dublin. He decides not to focus his post-revolutionary energy on a political career. During 1926–28 and 1935–37 he unsuccessfully tries to complete his medical degree at UCD, but increasingly his post-1924 efforts are directed toward life as a Bohemian traveler and writer. He spends much of 1924–26 on a recuperative journey through France, Spain, and Italy; and 1928–35 traveling widely in North America. During 1929–32 he spends time in New Mexico and Mexico City. In Taos, New Mexico, he mixes with, and is influenced by, writers and artists as he works on what are to become classic autobiographies of the Irish revolution: On Another Man’s Wound (1936) and The Singing Flame (1978).
O’Malley meets Helen Hooker, daughter of Elon and Blanche Hooker, in Connecticut in 1933. They marry in London in 1935, each rejecting something of their prior lives in the process: he, his Irish republicanism, through marriage to somebody entirely unconnected with that world; she, her wealthy and respectable upbringing, through liaison with a Catholic, Irish, unemployed, bohemian ex-revolutionary. They settle first in Dublin then, from 1938 onward, primarily in County Mayo. Burrishoole Lodge, near Newport, is his main base until 1954, when he moves to Dublin. Three children are born to the O’Malleys: Cahal (1936), Etáin (1940), and Cormac (1942). Sharing enthusiasm for the arts, he and Helen enjoy several years of intimacy. However, by the mid-1940s their relationship has frayed. In 1950, Helen kidnaps (the word is used by both parents and by all three children) the couple’s elder two children and takes them to the United States. From there she divorces O’Malley in 1952. Cormac remains with his father.
O’Malley’s post-American years are devoted to a number of projects. He writes extensively, including work for The Bell and Horizon. He is involved with the film director John Ford in the making of his Irish films, including The Quiet Man (1952). He gives radio broadcasts on Mexican painting for BBC Third Programme (1947), and on his IRA adventures for Radio Éireann (1953). In the latter year he suffers a heart attack, and his remaining years are scarred by ill health. He dies of heart failure on March 25, 1957, in Howth, County Dublin, at the house of his sister Kathleen. Two days later he is given a state funeral with full military honours. He is buried in the Malley family plot in Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin.
O’Malley exemplifies some important themes in modern Irish political and intellectual history. His powerful memoirs form part of a tradition of writing absorbedly about Ireland, while under idiosyncratic emigrant influences which lend the writing much of its distinctiveness. His aggressive republicanism exemplifies a persistent but ultimately unrealisable tradition of uncompromising IRA politics. His unflinching single-mindedness is the condition for much courageous and striking activity, but also lay behind his infliction and his suffering of much pain. Literary, intellectual, and defiantly dissident, he is the classic bohemian revolutionary. His historical significance lies in his having been both a leading Irish revolutionary and the author of compelling autobiographical accounts of those years. His memoirs are distinguished from their rivals on the shelf by subtlety, self-consciousness, and literary ambition. In particular, his preparedness to identify motives for Irish revolutionary action, beyond the terms of ostensible republican purpose, renders his writing of great value to historians. Similarly, the large body of archival material left in his name (especially, perhaps, the papers held in UCD archives, and those in the private possession of his children) leaves scholars in his debt. The most striking and evocative visual images of O’Malley are, arguably, the set of photographic portraits taken in 1929 by Edward Weston and held at the University of Arizona‘s Center for Creative Photography (CCP). These capture with precision his reflective concentration, his piercing earnestness, and his troubled intensity.
(From: “O’Malley, Ernest Bernard (‘Ernie’)” by Richard English, Dictionary of Irish Biography, http://www.dib.ie, October 2009 | Pictured: Photograph of Ernie O’Malley taken by Helen Hooker, New York City, 1934)
Higgins returns to Ireland and attends University College Dublin (UCD), studying English and French. For several years he is a teacher in several Dublin inner city schools. While at university he joins the Labour Party and becomes active in the Militant Tendency, an entryistTrotskyist group that operates within the Labour Party. Throughout his time in the Labour Party, he is a strong opponent of coalition politics, along with TDs Emmet Stagg and Michael D. Higgins. He is elected to the Administrative Council of the Labour Party by the membership in the 1980s. In 1989, he is expelled alongside 13 other members of Militant Tendency by party leader Dick Spring. The group eventually leaves the party and forms Militant Labour, which becomes the Socialist Party in 1996.
Higgins speaks out against the Iraq War while a TD, and addresses the Dublin leg of the March 20, 2003 International Day of Action. He is also prominent in the successful 2005 campaign to bring Nigerian school student Olukunle Eluhanla back to Ireland after he had been deported. He remains an opponent of the deportation policy.
Higgins uses his platform in the Dáil to raise the issue of exploitation of migrant and guest workers in Ireland. He and others claim that many companies are paying migrants below the minimum wage and, in some cases, not paying overtime rates. He expresses opposition in the Dáil to the jailing of the Rossport Five in July 2005. He raises the outsourcing of jobs by Irish Ferries in the Dáil in November 2005, requesting new legislation to regulate what he describes as “these modern slavers.”
Higgins is elected again as TD for Dublin West at the 2011 Irish general election. He wins the third seat (of four) with 8,084 first preference votes. In his first speech in the 31st Dáil, he opposed the nomination of Fine Gael‘s Enda Kenny as Taoiseach. On May 4, 2011, Kenny is forced to apologise to Higgins in the Dáil after falsely accusing him of being a supporter of Osama bin Laden after Higgins offers criticism of his assassination by the CIA. He had asked the Taoiseach, “Is assassination only justified if the target is a reactionary, anti-democratic, anti-human rights obscurantist like bin Laden?”
In the Dáil, Higgins accuses TánaisteEamon Gilmore of doing nothing for the 14 Irish citizens being held “incommunicado” by Israel in November 2011. In December 2011, he describes as a disgraceful campaign of intimidation the fines imposed by the government on people who are unable to pay a new household charge brought in as part of the latest austerity budget and says to Enda Kenny that he will be “the new Captain Boycott of austerity in this country.” He asks that Minister for FinanceMichael Noonan provide EBS staff with the 13th month end-of-year payment they are being denied.
In September 2012, Higgins publicly disagrees with former Socialist Party colleague Clare Daly, saying it is “unfortunate” that she has resigned from the party, but that it is impossible for Daly under the banner of the Socialist Party to continue to offer political support to Mick Wallace, who is at that time embroiled in scandal.
Higgins announces in April 2014 that he will not contest the next Dáil election. At the time he states his belief that the “baton of elected representation” should be carried by another generation of Socialist Party politicians — like Ruth Coppinger and Paul Murphy.
Born into a political family in Wexford, Howlin is the son of John and Molly Howlin (née Dunbar), and named after Brendan Corish, the local Labour TD and later leader of the Labour Party. His father is a trade union official who serves as secretary of the Irish Transport and General Workers’ Union (ITGWU) in Wexford for 40 years. He also secures election as a Labour member of Wexford Corporation, where he serves for eighteen years, and is also election agent to Brendan Corish. His mother is also strongly involved in local Labour politics. His brother Ted is a former member of Wexford County Council and Lord Mayor of Wexford. He is raised on William Street in Wexford with his three siblings.
Howlin grows up in Wexford town and is educated locally in the Faythe and at Wexford CBS. He later attends St. Patrick’s College, Dublin, and qualifies as a primary school teacher. During his career as a teacher, he is active in the Irish National Teachers’ Organisation (INTO), before embarking on a career in full-time politics.
Howlin credits his introduction to politics to his involvement in the Irish anti-nuclear movement. The chair of Nuclear Opposition Wexford (NOW), he is involved in the organisation of a protest against the building of a nuclear power plant in Carnsore Point, which draws 40,000 protestors. In 1979, he is asked to run for Wexford Corporation and is selected in his absence but declines to run in order to continue as chair of NOW.
Howlin contests his first general election at the November 1982 Irish general election. He runs as a Labour candidate in the Wexford constituency, but despite the existence of a large left-wing vote in the area, he is not elected. In spite of this setback, a Fine Gael-Labour Party coalition government comes to power, and he is nominated by the Taoiseach, Garret FitzGerald, to serve in Seanad Éireann as a Senator. He secures election to Wexford County Council in 1985 and serves as Mayor of Wexford in 1986.
In 1987, the Labour Party withdraws from the coalition government and a general election is called. Howlin once again contests a seat in Wexford and is elected to Dáil Éireann. Labour are out of office as a Fianna Fáil government takes office. In spite of his recent entry to the Dáil, he is subsequently named Chief Whip of the Labour Party, a position he holds until 1993.
The 1992 Irish general election results in a hung Dáil once again. However, the Labour Party enjoys their best result to date at the time. After negotiations, a Fianna Fáil-Labour Party coalition government comes to office. Howlin joins the cabinet of Taoiseach Albert Reynolds as Minister for Health. During his tenure the development of a four-year health strategy, the identifying of HIV/AIDS prevention as a priority and the securing of a £35 million investment in childcare are advanced. He, however, is also targeted by anti-abortion groups after introducing an act which would allow information regarding abortion.
In 1994, the Labour Party withdraws from government after a disagreement over the appointment of Attorney GeneralHarry Whelehan as a Judge of the High Court and President of the High Court. However, no general election is called and, while it is hoped that the coalition could be revived under the new Fianna Fáil leader Bertie Ahern, the arithmetic of the Dáil now allows the Labour Party to open discussions with other opposition parties. After negotiations a Rainbow Coalition comes to power involving Fine Gael, Labour and Democratic Left. In John Bruton‘s cabinet, he becomes Minister for the Environment.
Following the 1997 Irish general election, a Fianna Fáil-Progressive Democrats coalition government comes to power and the Labour Party returns to the opposition benches. In the announcement of the party’s new front bench, Howlin retains responsibility for the Environment.
In late 1997, Dick Spring resigns as leader of the Labour Party and Howlin immediately throws his hat into the ring in the subsequent leadership election. In a choice between Howlin and Ruairi Quinn, the former gains some early support; however, the leadership eventually goes to Quinn by a significant majority. As a show of unity, Howlin is later named deputy leader of the party and retains his brief as Spokesperson for the Environment and Local Government.
In 2002, following Quinn’s resignation as party leader after Labour’s relatively unsuccessful 2002 Irish general election campaign, Howlin again stands for the party leadership. For the second time in five years, he is defeated for the leadership of the party, this time by Pat Rabbitte, who is formerly a leading figure in Democratic Left. He is succeeded as deputy leader by Liz McManus.
While having been publicly supportive of Rabbitte’s leadership, Howlin is perceived as being the leader of the wing of the party which is sceptical of Rabbitte’s policy with regard to future coalition with Fianna Fáil. Rabbitte explicitly rules out any future coalition with Fianna Fáil, instead forming a formal alliance with Fine Gael in the run-up to the 2007 Irish general election (the so-called Mullingar Accord).
On June 26, 2007, Howlin is appointed the Leas-Cheann Comhairle (deputy chairperson) of Dáil Éireann.
After the 2011 Irish general election, Fine Gael and the Labour Party form a government, and Howlin is appointed to the new office of Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform. In May 2011, he says that over the next 20 years the number of people in Ireland over 65 is set to increase by almost half a million, a situation that could see the annual health budget soar – rising by €12.5 billion in the next decade alone. While reform is a major part of government attempts “to regain full sovereignty over economic policy,” he tells a meeting of the Association of Chief Executives of State Agencies they will in any event face key “imperatives” in coming years. He says a new public spending review, on which he has briefed the cabinet in recent days, will not be a simple assessment of where to make cuts, but will also consider the way public sector services are delivered. He reiterates the government’s commitment not to cut public sector pay, “if the Croke Park Agreement works.” “These are just some of the challenges that our society is facing in the coming decade – crisis or no crisis. In the good times, tackling them was going to be difficult. Today, in these difficult times, tackling them is going to be imperative.” He says Ireland is facing a profound and complex economic crisis “where we are fighting a battle on three fronts – mass unemployment, a major failure in banking, and a fiscal crisis.”
Howlin retains his seat in the Dáil following the 2016 Irish general election, though only six of his Labour colleagues do likewise and the party returns to the opposition benches. Following the resignation of Joan Burton, he contests the 2016 Labour Party leadership election unopposed and is elected Leader of the Labour Party on May 20, 2016.
In March 2018, Howlin criticises Taoiseach Leo Varadkar for failing to personally invite him to accompany him as he meets ambulance crews in Howlin’s constituency of Wexford. Varadkar replies that he has been far too busy dealing with the recent weather crisis and Brexit “to organise invitations to Deputies personally in order that they felt included.” It is separately said of Howlin’s complaint, “It appears that the Taoiseach, the chief executive of the State, needs the imprimatur of local politicians when he enters their bailiwick, and needs to be accompanied and monitored by those same politicians while he is in their realm.”
Alan Kelly challenges Howlin for the party leadership in 2018, stating that he has failed to “turn the ship around.” He states that Kelly’s comments are a disappointing and unnecessary distraction. He also says that there is not a single parliamentary party member that supports the challenge, and that Kelly has the backing of a minority of councillors.
In September 2018, Howlin states that winning 14 seats in the 33rd Dáil is a realistic goal. During the campaign in 2020, he states his wish to end the United States‘s use of Shannon Airport for military related activities. In the 2020 Irish general election, party first preference vote drops to 4.4% of first preference votes and returns 6 seats – a record low. Howlin announces his intention to step down as leader on February 12, 2020. He also says that the Labour Party should not formally enter government, a view that is backed by the parliamentary party. He also states that he will not back any candidate in the following contest. On February 15, 2020, he rules himself out as a candidate for Ceann Comhairle of the 33rd Dáil, with the polling day to elect his successor set for April 3, 2020.
In 2020, Howlin’s legislation (Harassment, Harmful Communications and Related Offences Bill) is passed and signed into law by Michael D. Higgins. This bill makes the distribution of intimate images or “revenge porn” a criminal offense and makes other forms of cyberbullying and harassment punishable.
Howlin is a single man. He has spoken publicly of receiving hate mail relating to his private life and questioning his sexual orientation. In an interview with The Star during the 2002 Labour Party leadership contest, in response to repeated speculation, he announces he is “not gay.”
seamus dubhghaill 