Michael Golden

Up to the time of his death he said no Republican should support the sell-out that was taking place. Mick’s coffin was draped in the National Flag and there was a large turn out at his funeral. He will be a sad loss to all who knew him.

Deepest sympathy is extended to his son Brendan, to his daughter Doreen and all the family.

Contents

Comhbhrón

I gCuimhne

What they said

The marks of Ireland’s nationhood are incon-testable — a geographic unit, a national language, a separate culture and code of laws, a homogeneous people, a distinctive national tradition. Her churches and religious bodies — Catholic, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist, the Religious Society of Friends, the Jewish Congregations, and other denominations — are now, as in the past, organised on a national all-Ireland basis. Her learned bodies, her major universities, her sports organisations are, and have been, nationwide. The people in all parts of the country are, and speak of themselves as, Irish.

— ‘Ireland’s Right to Unity’, published by the All-Party Anti-Partition Conference, Mansion House, Dublin, 1949

The [Six-County] assembly idea is an attempt to produce an internal settlement. It would move nothing forward.

— AP/RN editorial column, February 8, 1996. Two years on and another U-turn by the Provisionals, the Six-County wing of the greatest U-turn party of them all — Fianna Fáil.

[Provisional] Sinn Féin must now decide what to do with the power-sharing executive seats that will surely be on offer. They can take a confrontational attitude in government with Trimble and risk bringing the whole house down or they can work constructively with their old adversaries. You can bet on the latter. This is a well-trodden path in Irish politics — Fianna Fáil and the Workers Party have been here already — and history shows that the system changes revolutionaries much more than they change it.
— — Journalist Patrick Farrelly, Irish Echo (New York), April 29, 1998.

I welcome Sinn Féin’s acceptance that Northern Ireland is a part of the United Kingdom and that this status cannot be changed without the consent of the people in Northern Ireland.
— John Taylor of the Ulster Unionist Party, Irish News, May 11, 1998.

Their [Provisionals] decision is a logical step in their transformation into a reformist constitutional party. Any talk of going into Stormont to wreck it has now been dropped.
— Ruairí Ó Brádaigh, President, Republican Sinn Féin, Irish News, May 12, 1998.

The alternative to the Stormont deal is, in Strand One, a nine-county Ulster parliament with almost every power of government; in Strand Two co-operation with the other three provinces in foreign affairs, national defence and overall financing; and in Strand Three a Celtic League providing for co-operation between a free Ireland and independent Scotland, Wales, the Isle of Man and even Cornwall and Brittany.
— Ruairí Ó Brádaigh, writing in an opinion article in the Irish Times, May 13, 1998.

[Provisional] Sinn Féin voted to accept by massive numbers to accept an assembly, institutional change, the Northern Ireland state as it is and to participate in it in government.
— Bertie Ahern, Irish Times, May 14, 1998.

What is required is for the British government to work positively with the 26-County government to bring about the transition from partition to national democracy and Irish unity in a peaceful and stable way.
— Provisional Seán Mac Brádaigh, AP/RN, May 21, 1998. Just don’t mention the flying pigs . . .

RSF says nationalists stampeded into voting Yes.
— Headline, Irish Times, May 21, 1998.

In trade union terms the republican leadership told those it represents that it had secured them a six-day week and lower wages.
— Anthony McIntyre, Guardian, May 22, 1998 on the Provisionals’ Ard-Fheis backing for the Stormont deal.

Regardless of today’s outcome in referendums in two geographical fragments of Ireland, Republican Sinn Féin will continue to campaign for British disengagement from Ireland and for a new four-province federation with maximum devolution to local level as the best guarantee of a permanent peace in our country.
— Statement from Republican Sinn Féin President, Ruairí Ó Brádaigh, May 23, 1998.

The 38% “No” to the Amsterdam Treaty is very commendable and shows growing support for the idea that European Union integration has already gone far enough and that neutrality must be safeguarded. Public awareness and debate on these issues are of vital importance to our people and we deplore the holding of two referendums in the 26 Counties on the same day.
— Ruairí Ó Brádaigh.

I think, too, of John Hume, the Great One, whose massive wingspan covers all the thirty years (sic) of the Troubles . . . he has been the captain on the stormy sea and the boat is now in sight of harbour. The least they can do is give him the Nobel Prize.
— Niall O’Dowd, Ireland on Sunday, May 24, 1998. Good grief, Niall, relax; keep the above comments for the Valentine card in February — just address it to ‘The Great One, Earth’.

The British forces and the RUC are the legitimate forces of law [in the Six Counties].
— Bertie Ahern, defender of British rule, RTÉ Radio One, May 24, 1998.

The [Provisional] Republican Movement (both political and military) has moved from being a revolutionary force to being a constitutional one, despite periodic outbursts of robust republican rhetoric . . . but the reality is that [Provisional] Sinn Féin and the [Provisional] IRA have embarked on a one-way track which will lead to the normalisation of the Six-County State, and to its transformation into a viable political entity.
— Sunday Business Post, editorial comment, May 24, 1998. And those working that “viable political entity” will be well paid, to ensure their co-operation in dealing with Republicans.

[Provisional] Sinn Féin, expressing concern at Mr Hunter’s selection, said Mr Trimble must ensure UUP anti-agreement elements were “not allowed to enter the assembly with the intention of wrecking it”.
— No wreckers there! Irish Times, May 27, 1998. Contents

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