seamus dubhghaill

Promoting Irish Culture and History from Little Rock, Arkansas, USA

Tag Archives: Teachta Dála


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Birth of Pat Rabbitte, Labour Party Politician

pat-rabbitte

Patrick Brendan Rabbitte, former Labour Party politician, is born near Claremorris, County Mayo on May 18, 1949. He serves as Minister of State for Commerce, Science and Technology from 1994 to 1997, Leader of the Labour Party from 2002 to 2007 and Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources from 2011 to 2014. He serves as a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Dublin South-West constituency from 1989 to 2016.

Rabbitte is raised in Woodstock, Ballindine, County Mayo. He is educated locally at St. Colman’s College, Claremorris before emigrating to Britain to find employment. He returns shortly afterward to attend University College Galway (UCG) where he studies Arts and Law.

Rabbitte becomes involved in electoral politics for the first time in late 1982, when he unsuccessfully contests Dublin South-West for the Workers’ Party (WP) at the November general election. He is elected to Dublin County Council in 1985. He enters Dáil Éireann as a Workers’ Party Teachta Dála (TD) for Dublin South-West at the 1989 election. He retains his seat at every election until 2016.

After Tomás Mac Giolla‘s retirement as President of the Workers’ Party in 1988, Rabbitte is seen as one of those who wants to move the party away from its hard left position. In 1992, he plays a prominent role with Proinsias De Rossa in an attempt to jettison some of the party’s harder left positions. This eventually splits the Workers’ Party.

In 1994, a new ‘Rainbow Coalition’ government of Fine Gael, the Labour Party and Democratic Left comes to power. Rabbitte is a member of the junior ministerial team, serving as Minister of State to the Government, as well as Minister for State at the Department of Enterprise and Employment with responsibility for Commerce, Science and Technology.

Following the 1997 general election the Rainbow Coalition loses power. The following year sees a merger between the Labour Party and Democratic Left, with Rabbitte participating in the negotiations. In October 2002 he succeeds Ruairi Quinn as the new leader of the Labour Party. Under his leadership the party makes some gains in the local elections of 2004.

The Labour Party agrees to enter a pre-election pact, commonly known as ‘The Mullingar Accord,’ with Fine Gael in an attempt to offer the electorate an alternative coalition government at the 2007 general election. This move causes some tension in the parliamentary party, as some members prefer not to be aligned with any party in advance of an election.

Following the disappointing result in the election for Labour, Rabbitte announces he is stepping down as leader on August 23, 2007. He is succeeded as party leader by Eamon Gilmore. Rabbitte is re-elected on the first count in the 2011 general election. His running mate Eamonn Maloney is also elected. On March 9, 2011, he is appointed as Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources.

In July 2014, Rabbitte is replaced by Alex White as part of a reshuffle of the cabinet. He does not contest the 2016 general election.


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Birth of Proinsias De Rossa, Labour Party Politician

File source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Proinsias_De_Rossa.jpg

Proinsias De Rossa, former Irish Labour Party politician, is born in Dublin on May 15, 1940. He serves as Minister for Social Welfare from 1994 to 1997, leader of Democratic Left from 1992 to 1999 and leader of the Workers’ Party from 1988 to 1992. He serves as Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the Dublin constituency from 1989 to 1992 and 1999 to 2012. He is a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Dublin North-West constituency from 1989 to 2002.

Born as Francis Ross, he is educated at Marlborough Street National School and Dublin Institute of Technology. He joins Fianna Éireann at age 12. Soon after his sixteenth birthday he joins the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and is politically active in Sinn Féin from an early age. During the IRA Border Campaign, he is arrested while training other IRA members in Glencree in May 1956. He serves seven months in Mountjoy Prison and is then interned at the Curragh Camp.

De Rossa takes the Official Sinn Féin side in the 1970 split. In 1977, he contests his first general election for the party. He is successful on his third attempt and is elected at the February 1982 general election as a Sinn Féin TD for the Dublin North-West constituency. He retains his seat until the 2002 general election when he stands down in order to devote more time to his work in the European Parliament.

In 1988, De Rossa succeeds Tomás Mac Giolla as president of the Workers’ Party. The party had been growing steadily in the 1980s and has its best-ever electoral performance in the general and European elections held in 1989. The party wins 7 Dáil seats with 5% of the vote. De Rossa himself is elected to the European Parliament for the Dublin constituency, where he tops the poll, and the party almost succeeds in replacing Fine Gael as the capital’s second-largest party. However, the campaign results in a serious build-up of financial debt by the Workers’ Party, which threatens to greatly inhibit the party’s ability to ensure it will hold on to its gains.

Long-standing tensions within the Workers’ Party come to a head in 1992. Disagreements on policy issues are exacerbated by the desire of the reformers to ditch the democratic centralist nature of the party structures, and to remove any remaining questions about alleged party links with the Official IRA. De Rossa calls a special Ardfheis to debate changes to the constitution. The motion fails to get the required two-thirds majority, and subsequently he leads the majority of the parliamentary group and councillors out of a meeting of the party’s Central Executive Committee the following Saturday, splitting the party.

De Rossa and the other former Workers’ Party members then establish a new political party, provisionally called New Agenda. At its founding conference in March 1992, it is named Democratic Left and De Rossa is elected party leader. Later that year he resigns his European Parliament seat, in favour of Democratic Left general secretary Des Geraghty.

Following the collapse of the Fianna Fáil–Labour Party coalition government in 1994, Fine Gael, Labour and Democratic Left negotiate a government programme for the remaining life of the 27th Dáil, which becomes known as the “Rainbow Coalition.” De Rossa becomes Minister for Social Welfare, initiating Ireland’s first national anti-poverty strategy, a commission on the family, and a commission to examine national pension policy.

The 1997 general election results in the defeat of the outgoing coalition. At this point, Democratic Left, having accumulated significant, merges with the Labour Party. Labour leader Ruairi Quinn becomes leader of the unified party. De Rossa takes up the symbolic post of party president, which he holds until 2002.

In 1999, De Rossa is elected at the European Parliament election for the Dublin constituency. He is re-elected at the 2004 European Parliament election. He does not contest his Dáil seat at the 2002 general election.

As a member of the European Parliament, De Rossa takes a strong pro-integration approach from a distinctly social democratic perspective, as well as a keen interest in foreign policy and social policy. He is a member of the European Convention which produces the July 2003 draft European constitution. He is chair of the European Parliament’s delegation for relations with the Palestinian Legislative Council, a member of the Committee on Employment and Social Affairs and the Conference of Delegation Chairs, and a substitute member of the Committee on Development and the delegation to the Euro-Mediterranean Parliamentary Assembly.

On January 16, 2012, De Rossa announces his decision to resign as an MEP and steps down on February 1.


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Birth of Ray MacSharry, Fianna Fáil Politician

raymond-mcsharry

Raymond MacSharry, Fianna Fáil politician who serves in a range of cabinet positions, most notably as Tánaiste, Minister for Finance, and European Commissioner, is born on April 29, 1938, in Sligo, County Sligo.

MacSharry is educated at the local national school before later briefly attending Summerhill College. After leaving school he works as a livestock dealer throughout Sligo and Mayo before becoming involved in the Meat Exporters Factory in his native town. MacSharry also owns his own haulage firm.

Although MacSharry comes from a non-political family, he himself becomes an active member of Fianna Fáil in Sligo. In 1967 he makes his first move into politics when he secures election to both Sligo Borough Council and Sligo County Council. It was from this local base that he launches his national election campaign.

MacSharry is first elected to Dáil Éireann as a Fianna Fáil Teachta Dála (TD) for the Sligo–Leitrim constituency at the 1969 general election. He is re-elected to the Dáil at the 1973 general election, however, Fianna Fáil are out of power as a Fine Gael–Labour Party government comes to power. In Jack Lynch‘s subsequent front bench reshuffle, MacSharry is appointed opposition spokesperson on the Office of Public Works.

Following the 1977 general election, Fianna Fáil returns to government with a massive twenty-seat Dáil majority. With the introduction of the new Minister of State positions in 1978, MacSharry finally secures a junior ministerial post, as Minister of State at the Department of the Public Service.

Charles Haughey succeeds in becoming party leader after Jack Lynch’s resignation in 1979, albeit by a narrow margin of just six votes, and is later elected Taoiseach by the Dáil. MacSharry’s loyalty is subsequently rewarded when he is appointed Minister for Agriculture in the new government.

Fianna Fáil falls out of power in 1981 but returns to power following the February 1982 general election. MacSharry is promoted to the positions of Tánaiste and Minister for Finance, however, the government falls after just nine months in office and a new coalition government of Fine Gael, and the Labour Party take office.

In 1983 MacSharry resigns from the Fianna Fáil front bench due to a telephone tapping controversy, when it is revealed that as Tánaiste and Minister for Finance, he had borrowed police tape recorders to secretly record conversations with a cabinet colleague. He spends a number of years in the political wilderness following the phone-tapping scandal. He is elected to the European Parliament as a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for Connacht–Ulster in 1984.

Following the 1987 general election MacSharry is returned to the Dáil once again. He resigns his European Parliament seat when he is appointed Minister for Finance in Haughey’s new government. In 1988 his loyalty to Haughey is rewarded when he is appointed European Commissioner. As a result of this he resigns his Dáil seat and ends his domestic political career.

Following the completion of his term as Commissioner, MacSharry retires from politics to pursue business interests. He is currently a director on the boards of a variety of companies including Bank of Ireland and Ryanair Holdings. In 1999 he is appointed chairman of Eircom plc. He is also a member of the Comite d’Honneur of the Institute of International and European Affairs.


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Barry’s Tea Centennial

barrys-tea

On April 4, 2001, former employees and staff join three generations of the Barry family in a celebration of 100 years in business for Barry’s Tea which has become an Irish institution.

Barry’s Tea is an Irish tea company founded in 1901 by James J. Barry in Cork, County Cork. In 1934, Anthony Barry, son of the founder, is awarded the Empire Cup for Tea Blending, confirming his expertise in the tea trade. Until the 1960s, the tea is only sold from a shop in Prince’s Street, but thereafter the company expands its wholesaling and distribution operations.

In 1960, Peter Barry, Anthony’s son, pioneers the concept of wholesaling tea and begins sourcing tea from East Africa. There is an incredible reaction to these new blends, and they become something of a Barry’s Tea signature.

By the mid-1980s Barry’s Tea has become a national brand. According to their website, www.barrystea.ie, they are currently responsible for 38% of all tea sales in the Irish market, which is worth an estimated €85 million annually. Today, Barry’s Tea is also available in the United Kingdom, Spain, and in some areas of Canada, Australia, France, Luxembourg and the United States where there are significant Irish immigrant communities.

Members of the Barry family have been elected representatives for Fine Gael: the founder’s son Anthony Barry (TD 1954–1957 and 1961–1965), Anthony’s son Peter Barry (TD 1969–1997) and Peter’s daughter Deirdre Clune (TD 1997–2001 and 2007–2011, and MEP since 2014).

In May 2018, it was revealed that many of Barry’s Tea teabags are made with polypropylene and are not compostable.


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Birth of William X. O’Brien, Politician & Trade Unionist

william-x-obrien

William X. O’Brien, politician and trade unionist, is born on January 23, 1881, in Clonakilty, County Cork. He is christened “John William.”

O’Brien moves with his family to Dublin in 1897 and quickly becomes involved in the Irish Socialist Republican Party (ISRP). He is described as “a very significant figure in the ISRP” by ISRP historian David Lynch. He is a member of the Socialist Party of Ireland, serving on its executive.

A close friend and associate of James Connolly, O’Brien helps establish the Irish Transport and General Workers’ Union (ITGWU) in 1909 and is instrumental in the Dublin lock-out strike in 1913.

A member of the Irish Neutrality League and Anti-Conscription Committee during World War I, O’Brien is interned on several occasions by the Dublin Castle government. During one of these instances, he stands in the 1920 Stockport by-election but is refused a release to campaign in it.

With the formation of the Irish Free State, O’Brien is elected as Teachta Dála (TD) for Dublin South at the 1922 general election, and again for Tipperary in June 1927 and again in 1937.

An important figure in the Labour Party in Ireland in its formative days, O’Brien resists James Larkin‘s attempt to gain control of the Party on release from prison. Taking Larkin to court over his occupation of ITGWU headquarters, the Larkin-O’Brien feud results in a split within the labour and trade union movements, and the formation of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions.

In 1930, O’Brien seeks to have Leon Trotsky granted asylum in Ireland, but the head of the Free State government, W. T. Cosgrave, refuses to allow it.

Active in politics and the trade union movement into his 60s, O’Brien retires in 1946 and dies on October 31, 1968.


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Birth of Eileen Christine Desmond, Labour Party Politician

eileen-desmond

Eileen Christine Desmond (née Harrington), Irish Labour Party politician who serves as Minister for Health and Minister for Social Welfare from 1981 to 1982, is born in Kinsale, County Cork on December 29, 1932. She serves as a Teachta Dála (TD) from 1965 to 1969, 1973 to 1981 and 1981 to 1987. She serves as a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the Munster constituency from 1979 to 1984. She is a Senator for the Industrial and Commercial Panel from 1969 to 1973.

Harrington is educated locally at the Convent of Mercy in Kinsale, where she is one of only two girls in her class to sit the Leaving Certificate examination. Before entering politics, she works as a civil servant with the Department of Posts and Telegraphs. She marries Dan Desmond in 1958.

Desmond is first elected to Dáil Éireann in a by-election on March 10, 1965, due to the death of her husband who had been a Teachta Dála (TD) since 1948. Her victory in the Cork Mid constituency leads Taoiseach Seán Lemass to dissolve the 17th Dáil and call a general election. She is elected for the second time in a year but loses her seat at the 1969 general election. However, she is then elected to the 12th Seanad on the Industrial and Commercial Panel, where she serves until her re-election to the 20th Dáil at the 1973 general election.

Desmond is elected to the European Parliament at the 1979 European Parliament election for the Munster constituency. However, her time in Europe is short-lived, as she returns to domestic politics when she is offered a position as Minister and the chance to impact upon national legislation. At the 1981 general election she switches her constituency to Cork South-Central. A Fine Gael–Labour Party coalition comes to power, and she is appointed Minister for Health and Social Welfare.

Desmond’s cabinet appointment is historic, as she is only the second woman to be a member of cabinet since the foundation of the state in 1922, and the first in any Fine Gael or Labour Party cabinet. Countess Markievicz had held the cabinet post of Minister for Labour in the revolutionary First Dáil in 1919, but only one woman had held cabinet office after the foundation of the state, Máire Geoghegan-Quinn of Fianna Fáil who was appointed as Minister for the Gaeltacht in 1979.

Desmond retires from full-time politics at the 1987 general election for health reasons. She dies suddenly in Cork, County Cork on January 6, 2005.


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Founding of the Progressive Democrats

progressive-democratsProgressive Democrats is founded on December 21, 1985 by Desmond O’Malley, Mary Harney, and politicians who had split from Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. The party is a member of the European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party (ELDR). Its youth wing is the Young Progressive Democrats.

The Progressive Democrats take liberal positions on divorce, contraception, and other social issues. The party also supports economic liberalisation, advocating measures such as lower taxation, fiscal conservatism, privatisation, and welfare reform. It enjoys an impressive début at the 1987 general election, winning 14 seats in Dáil Éireann and capturing almost 12 per cent of the popular vote to temporarily surpass the Labour Party as Ireland’s third-largest political party.

Although the Progressive Democrats never again win more than 10 seats in the Dáil, they form coalition governments with Fianna Fáil during the 26th Dáil (1989–92), the 28th Dáil (1997–2002), the 29th Dáil (2002–07) and the 30th Dáil (2007–09). These successive years as the government’s junior coalition partner gives the party an influence on Irish politics and economics disproportionate to its small size. In particular, the party has been credited with shaping the low-tax, pro-business environment that contributes to Ireland’s Celtic Tiger economic boom during the 1990s and 2000s, as well as blame for contributing to the subsequent Irish financial and economic crisis.

On November 8, 2008 the party begins the process of disbanding and is formally dissolved on November 20, 2009. The two Progressive Democrat politicians elected to the 30th Dáil, Mary Harney and Noel Grealish, continue to support the government as independent Teachta Dálas (TD), and Mary Harney also continues as Minister for Health and Children.


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Death of Jim Mitchell, Fine Gael Politician

jim-mitchell

Jim Mitchell, senior Irish politician who serves in the cabinets of Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald, loses his three-year battle with cancer in Dublin on December 2, 2002.

Mitchell begins his political involvement when he supports Seán MacBride, leader of the radical republican Clann na Poblachta in the 1957 general election. He joins Fine Gael in 1967, becoming that party’s unsuccessful candidate in a by-election in 1970. He seeks a party nomination to run in the 1973 Irish general election. However, he agrees not to contest the seat to allow Declan Costello, a senior figure in his party and son of former Taoiseach John A. Costello, to be elected. Costello goes on to serve as Attorney General of Ireland in the 1973-1977 National Coalition of Fine Gael and the Labour Party.

Mitchell is elected to Dublin Corporation in 1974. In 1976, at the age of 29, he becomes the youngest ever Lord Mayor of Dublin. He is an unsuccessful candidate for Dáil Éireann in the 1973 general election in Dublin South-West and loses again in the 1976 by-election in the same constituency, to Labour’s Brendan Halligan.

In the 1977 general election he is elected to the 21st Dáil for the new constituency of Dublin Ballyfermot. With the party’s loss of power in 1977, the new leader, Garret FitzGerald appoints Mitchell to the Party’s Front Bench as spokesman on Labour. At the 1981 general election Mitchell is elected for the Dublin West and Fine Gael dramatically increases its number of seats, forming a coalition government with the Labour Party. On his appointment as Taoiseach, Garret FitzGerald causes some surprise by excluding some of the older conservative ex-ministers from his cabinet. Instead, young liberals like Mitchell are appointed, with Mitchell receiving the high-profile post of Minister for Justice, taking responsibility for policing, criminal and civil law reform, penal justice, etc. The Fine Gael-Labour government collapses in January 1982 but regains power in December of that year. Mitchell again is included in a FitzGerald cabinet, as Minister for Transport.

As Minister for Transport, Mitchell grants the aviation license to a fledgling airline called Ryanair on November 29, 1985. This is granted despite strong opposition by Ireland’s national carrier Aer Lingus. The issue of the license breaks Aer Lingus’ stranglehold on flights to London from the Republic of Ireland.

Mitchell, who is seen as being on the social liberal wing of Fine Gael, is out of favour with John Bruton when he becomes Fine Gael leader in 1990. When Bruton forms the Rainbow Coalition in December 1994, Mitchell is not appointed to any cabinet post.

Mitchell contests and wins Dáil elections in 1977, 1981, (February and November) 1982, 1987, 1989, 1992, 1997. He runs for his party as its candidate to become a member of the European Parliament in the 1994 and 1998 elections. He also is director of elections for Austin Currie, the Fine Gael candidate, in the 1990 presidential election.

In 2001, Bruton is deposed as Fine Gael leader and replaced by Michael Noonan. Mitchell serves as his deputy from 2001 to 2002. He also chairs the key Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee. The Committee’s work under his chairmanship is widely praised for its inquiry into allegations of corruption and wide-scale tax evasion in the banking sector.

Though regarded in politics as one of Fine Gael’s “survivors,” who holds onto his seat amid major boundary changes, constituency changes and by attracting working class votes in a party whose appeal is primarily middle class, Mitchell loses his Dublin Central seat in the 2002 general election. That election witnesses a large-scale collapse in the Fine Gael vote, with the party dropping from 54 to 31 seats in Dáil Éireann. Although Mitchell suffers from the swing against Fine Gael in Dublin, he is not aided by the fact that Inchicore, which is considered his base in the constituency has been moved to Dublin South-Central. He chooses not to run in that constituency as his brother, Gay, is a sitting Teachta Dála (TD) running for re-election for that constituency.

Mitchell earlier has a liver transplant in an attempt to beat a rare form of cancer which had cost the lives of a number of his siblings. Though the operation is successful, the cancer returns. Although he appears to be making a recovery, Jim Mitchell ultimately dies of the disease on December 2, 2002.

His former constituency colleague and rival, Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, describes Jim Mitchell as having made an “outstanding contribution to Irish politics.”


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Birth of Albert Reynolds, Taoiseach & Fianna Fáil Leader

albert-reynolds

Albert Reynolds, politician and businessman, is born in Rooskey, County Roscommon on November 3, 1932. He serves as a Teachta Dála (TD) from 1977 to 2002, Minister for Posts and Telegraphs from 1979 to 1981, Minister for Transport from 1980 to 1981, Minister for Industry and Energy from March 1982 to December 1982, Minister for Industry and Commerce from 1987 to 1988, Minister for Finance from 1988 to 1991, Leader of Fianna Fáil from 1992 to 1994 and as Taoiseach from 1992 to 1994.

Reynolds is educated at Summerhill College in County Sligo and works for a state transport company before succeeding at a variety of entrepreneurial ventures, including promoting dances and owning ballrooms, a pet-food factory, and newspapers. In 1974 he is elected to the Longford County Council as a member of Fianna Fáil. He enters Dáil Éireann, lower house of the Oireachtas, the Irish parliament, in 1977 as a member representing the Longford-Westmeath parliamentary constituency and becomes Minister for Posts and Telegraphs in the Fianna Fáil government of Charles Haughey (1979–81). He is subsequently Minister of Industry and Commerce (1987–88) and Minister for Finance (1988–91) in Haughey’s third and fourth governments. He breaks with Haughey in December 1991 and succeeds him as leader of Fianna Fáil and as Taoiseach in February 1992.

The Fianna Fáil–Progressive Democrats coalition that Reynolds inherits breaks up in November 1992 but, after the general election later that month, he surprises many observers by forming a new coalition government with the Labour Party in January 1993. He plays a significant part in bringing about a ceasefire between the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and unionist paramilitary groups in Northern Ireland in 1994, but he is less effective in maintaining his governing coalition. When this government founders in November 1994, he resigns as Taoiseach and as leader of Fianna Fáil, though he remains acting prime minister until a new government is formed the following month. He unsuccessfully seeks his party’s nomination as a candidate for the presidency of Ireland in 1997. He retires from public life in 2002.

In December 2013, it is revealed by his son that Reynolds is in the final stages of Alzheimer’s disease. Albert Reynolds dies on August 21, 2014. The last politician to visit him is John Major. His funeral is held at Church of the Sacred Heart, in Donnybrook on August 25, 2014. Attendees include President Michael D. Higgins, Taoiseach Enda Kenny, former British Prime Minister John Major, former Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) leader and Nobel Prize winner John Hume, Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Theresa Villiers, former President of Ireland Mary McAleese, former Taoiseach Liam Cosgrave, Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin and the Lord Mayor of Dublin Christy Burke. An unexpected visitor from overseas is the frail but vigorous Jean Kennedy Smith, former United States Ambassador to Ireland, who is the last surviving sibling of John Fitzgerald Kennedy. Reynolds is buried at Shanganagh Cemetery with full military honours.


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Death of Kathleen Clarke, Founder of Cumann na mBan

kathleen-clarke

Kathleen Clarke (née Daly), a founder member of Cumann na mBan, and one of very few privy to the plans of the Easter Rising in 1916, dies in Dublin on September 29, 1972. She is the wife of Tom Clarke and sister of Edward “Ned” Daly, both of whom are executed for their part in the Rising. She is subsequently a Teachta Dála (TD) and senator with both Sinn Féin and Fianna Fáil, and the first female Lord Mayor of Dublin (1939–41).

Kathleen Daly is born into a prominent Fenian family in Limerick on April 11, 1878, the third daughter of Edward and Catherine Daly. Her paternal uncle, John Daly, is at the time imprisoned for his political activities in Chatham and Portland Prisons in England. He is released in 1896 and returns home to Limerick. When Tom Clarke, who had been imprisoned with her uncle, is released in 1898 he travels to Limerick to receive the Freedom of the City and stays with the Daly family.

In 1901 Daly decides to emigrate to the United States to join Tom, who had been there since 1900, having secured work through his Fenian contacts. They marry on July 16, 1901, in New York City. Through his contacts in the Clan na Gael and the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB), Tom Clarke continues to be involved in nationalist activity. Kathleen joins the Gaelic League while in the United States and they return to Ireland in November 1907.

In 1914 Clarke becomes a founder member of Cumann na mBan. Her husband forbids her permission to take an active part in the 1916 Easter Rising as she has orders regardless of how the events pan out. As Tom Clarke is the first signatory of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic, he is chosen to be executed for his part in the Easter Rising. Her younger brother, Ned Daly, is also executed for taking part in the rising. She visits both of them before they are executed. After the Rising, Michael Collins establishes contact with her while in prison in his attempts to re-build the IRB network. She also sets up the Irish National Aid Fund to aid those who had family members killed or imprisoned as a result of the Easter Rising, closely aided by Sorcha MacMahon.

Clarke becomes a member of Sinn Féin and in 1917 is elected a member of the party’s Executive. During the German Plot she is arrested and imprisoned in Holloway Prison for eleven months. During the Irish War of Independence, she serves as a District Judge on the Republican Courts in Dublin. In 1919 she is elected as an Alderman for the Wood Quay and Mountjoy Wards of Dublin Corporation and serves until the Corporation is abolished in 1925.

Clarke is elected unopposed as a Sinn Féin TD to the Second Dáil at the 1921 elections for the Dublin Mid constituency. She is not re-elected at the 1922 Irish general election, however, and supports the Anti-Treaty forces during the Irish Civil War. In 1926 she becomes a founder member of Fianna Fáil and has to resign from Cumann na mBan. She is re-elected to the short-lived 5th Dáil at the June 1927 Irish general election as a Fianna Fáil member for the Dublin Mid constituency but loses her seat at the September 1927 Irish general election and does not regain it. She is elected as one of six Fianna Fáil Senators to the Free State Seanad for nine years at the 1928 Seanad election under the leadership of Joseph Connolly. She remains a member of the Seanad until it is abolished in 1936.

In 1930 Clarke is elected to the re-constituted Dublin Corporation for Fianna Fáil along with Robert Briscoe, Seán T. O’Kelly, Thomas Kelly and Oscar Traynor. She serves as the first Fianna Fáil Lord Mayor of Dublin as well as the first female Lord Mayor, from 1939 to 1941. She opposes the Constitution of Ireland as she feels that several of its sections would place women in a lower position that they had been afforded in the Proclamation of the Irish Republic. She is criticised by many in the Fianna Fáil organisation as a result and, while she resigns from the Thomas Clarke Cumann, she remains a member of the Fianna Fáil Ard Chomhairle.

While Clarke does not support the Irish Republican Army (IRA) bombing in England during World War II, she appeals for those sentenced to death by the Irish Government to be given clemency. Ultimately this leads to her breaking with the party completely after her term as Lord Mayor finishes in 1941. She declines to stand as a Fianna Fáil candidate at the 1943 Irish general election.

In 1966, as part of the celebrations of the Easter Rising, Clarke and other surviving relatives are awarded honorary Doctor of Law by the National University of Ireland. Following her death on September 29, 1972, she receives the rare honour of a state funeral. She is buried at Deans Grange Cemetery, Dublin.