Source D is a quote from a former player-manager of Linfield football club, he says “ If you’re a Linfield scout and you see a lad who’s good, the second or third question is “what school do you go to son” and if it’s saint something, then all of a sudden the boy isn’t good enough. He kicks with the wrong foot”. This is saying that good players were not being scouted purely because they were Catholic. This source is good because it is an expert’s opinion. However, this is just one person from one club and doesn’t give a wide picture.
Source E is from a document by the Ulster Protestant Action Party, which was formed by Ian Paisley and other unionists. It is advising employers to “Keep Protestants and loyal workers in preference to fellow Catholic workers” This is blatant discrimination against Catholics and it is a good source because it is from a document that may have affected numerous people. However, it is just an opinion of someone who is famously extreme in his views and does not speak for the opinions of all Protestants by any means.
Overall the sources are useful as they give an insight into the opinions of some people at the time. However we do not get a feeling of the overall extent of discrimination as they are both from relatively small sections of the community and are based on experience, opinion and feeling.
4. The two sources F and G agree with each other in that they both think Catholics are being treated worse than Protestants but they completely disagree on how they should be treated.
Source F is a quote from the Prime Minister of Northern Ireland at the time Basil Brooke speaking in a newspaper interview in 1963. He says that there is “a feeling of resentment that most Roman Catholics are anti-British and anti-Northern Ireland” and that “this is nothing to do with religion at all” but asks the question “how can you give somebody who is your enemy a higher position in order to allow him to come out and destroy you?” He is saying that Catholics were not getting jobs because Protestants saw them as their enemy and seems to try to justify this by saying that the Catholics would stab the Protestants in the back if they did.
Source G is a quote from a former Prime Minister of Northern Ireland Terence O’Neill speaking to a newspaper in May 1969. He says that “if you give Roman Catholics a good job and a good house they will live like Protestants” This is saying that if Protestants treat Catholics well then they won’t stab them in the back but will conform to Protestant ideas. This contrasts greatly to the ideas in source F. However, it then says “ If a Roman Catholic is jobless and lives in the most ghastly hovel, he will rear 18 children on National Insurance” So this is agreeing in with source F in that this is why they are seen as anti-British and anti-Northern Ireland because they feed off the Government out of resentment.
5. Sources H, I and J refer to Londonderry, the second city of Northern Ireland. Source I shows that in Londonderry, the Catholic population, represented in source I as Nationalist votes, outnumbered the Protestant or Unionist population by a factor of 2:1. Source I shows that this Catholic majority was grossly under-represented in the election process due to gerrymandering. Londonderry was an extreme example of gerrymandering at work, the electoral ward boundaries were set up so that Unionists would control the city council, despite being a minority in terms of voter numbers. This is shown in source J, where North Ward is able to elect the same number of councillors as South Ward, despite having only about half the number of voters. South Ward is a predominantly Catholic area.
There was a system of discrimination against Catholics in the political process, and also in housing and jobs, so that Catholics were generally worse off and living in poorer conditions. Control of local councils was very important as local councils built and allocated housing, as well as a lot of jobs. Housing conditions in Northern Ireland were generally quite poor , and source H shows an example of this. Although the picture shows a Catholic family’s home in the 1960s, conditions are more like the 1930s or 1940s, as clearly the house lacks a bathroom and inside toilet. The large concentration of an underprivileged Catholic population in Londonderry, who were discriminated against economically and politically, explains why this city became a centre of the civil rights movement.
6. In source K Ian Paisley says, when asked who was behind civil rights, that “The Irish Republican Army, or at that time those who were dedicated to the views and objectives of that army” were.
Source L is from Michael Farrell a member of the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association. This source admits that in the Civil Rights Association “There were a number of Republicans and the proportion varied from time to time” and agrees with source K again in that Republicans “were also used as stewards on civil rights marches” However source L disagrees fundamentally with source K by saying that the Republicans “never dominated it” and “were never in control”. The source then continues to disagree with Ian Paisley by saying that when they were used as stewards on civil rights marches they “always played the role of trying to prevent trouble” and that “ in fact the younger People’s Democracy often had clashes with the stewards because we felt that the stewards were co-operating too much with the police” However, source L is a biased source as it is from a member of the Civil Rights Association.
Source M agrees with source K in that is says “there is no doubt the IRA has taken a close interest in the Civil Rights Association from its beginning” However, it disagrees with source K because it says the IRA weren’t the only people involved in the Civil Rights Association. It says “The membership was politically varied” and included “members of the Northern Ireland and liberal parties” Source M also says “it has been the policy of the association to refuse to permit the display of provocative symbols and banners, in particular the Republican tricolour” which the IRA surely would have allowed if they had been solely in charge.
Sources L and M agree with source K as they both admit the involvement of the IRA but they both disagree with K as they say the IRA did not dominate it.
7. Source N is a political cartoon, which presents the Troubles in Northern Ireland as a kind of insoluble puzzle or conundrum in which one step forward is one step back, and no real progress can be made. The figures pursuing each other around the staircase represent different aspects of the problem. One is a priest, as the conflict between catholic and protestant religious denominations is at the heart of the issue. Another figure is a black beret wearing terrorist. Both communities in Northern Ireland have produced terrorist groups prepared to act violently and outside the law, the IRA and the UDA to give two examples. Terrible acts of terrorism have taken place over many years in Northern Ireland and in Britain.
Another figure in the cartoon is a politician, showing that the political process in Northern Ireland has tended to be part of the problem rather than offering a solution to the conflict between the two communities. Catholics and Protestants tend to vote for different parties, historically Catholics have been under-represented in the political process and the Unionist politicians have been supported by the British government. The working man in the cartoon refers to the conflict over jobs in the province, with Catholics being discriminated against in employment. The last figure is a mother holding her baby representing the fear and hatred that is bred into young people as they are brought up continuing the problems through the generations and the poverty that many Catholics had to suffer.
There are four pieces of graffiti on the wall representing different problems there have been in history.
REM 1960- the battle of the Boyne where the Catholic king James the 2nd was defeated by William of Orange.
1916- the Catholic rebellion of 1916 and the need for Catholic rights.
Up the Provos- The provisional IRA.
Ulster says no- That the Protestants are against home rule.
Sources A-M support the points made in the cartoon. Sources A, B, C and E all show the problems Catholics had in employment (the worker in the cartoon). Source H illustrates the economic and social problems that to do with Catholic unemployment and sources J, D, and G all show the social problems especially the poor living conditions Catholics had to cope with (the mother and child). Sources F, I and J all show the political problems (the politician) and source L talks about the problems with politics and terrorism (the terrorist). Most importantly, however, all of the sources are to do with religion, as are the problems in Northern Ireland (the priest).
I agree with the cartoon because I think it cleverly summarises the complexity of the troubles in Northern Ireland and refers in a brief way to the long history of political and economic conflict. As the reference to the battle of the Boyne shows we need to go back several hundred years to understand the historical causes of the modern conflict. The British government in the 17th century took land away from native Irish Catholics to give to loyal Scottish and English settlers. Catholics in rural Ireland became poor tenant farmers and many died in the great famine of 1845-9. The British government remained in control of Ireland despite the resistance of Nationalist organisations. After the partition of Ireland in 1921 the British remained in control of the North and the Unionist politicians discriminated against Catholics who continued to resist leading to the crisis in 1968-72. Attempts by the British Government to resolve the crisis by imposing power sharing in 1974 and by tough military action against the IRA failed due to the entrenched positions on both sides. The long history of enmity which had become inbuilt in the Irish through separate education, social organisations and political parties could not be overcome by short-term solutions imposed by Britain.