LOBBYISTS PAID THOUSANDS A DAY TO FIGHT FAIR EMPLOYMENT GUIDELINES

Posted By: August 28, 2023

IRISH CONGRESSIONAL BRIEFING

Distributed to Congress by Irish National Caucus

The Irish National Caucus launched the Mac Bride Principles on November 5, 1984.

The Sunday Times of London wrote: “The [MacBride] campaign is being run by the Irish National Caucus… The move, inspired by Fr. Sean Mc Manus, who has been consistently opposed to British policy, is particularly well-timed. For even if the law is never passed, it provides an opportunity to link, however, tenuously, the issues of South Africa and Northern Ireland …”—Fr. Sean McManus

The great Sean Mac Bride of Ireland personally gave me permission to name the Principles after him. Sean had served from August 1979 to his death on January 15, 1988, as the Chairman of the Irish National Caucus Liaison Group in Ireland.

The Mac Bride Principles were fiercely opposed by the British government/British Embassy—and, shamefully by the Irish government/Irish Embassy—and all the political parties (at least initially) in Ireland, North and South. And opposed by some powerful Congressional Leaders … But, thank God, we prevailed against all odds. And now even the British Embassy would admit that our MacBride Principles are the most effective campaign ever against employment discrimination in Northern Ireland.

So, God rest the great Sean MacBride, his celebrated mother Maud Gonne-MacBride, and his hero father John, executed by England with the other 1916 heroes. And God bless all the great Americans who made the Mac Bride Principles victories possible in the individual States and in the U.S. Congress.

The magnificent story of the Mac Bride Principles campaign is completely and authoritatively detailed in my Memoirs: My American Struggle for Justice in Northern Ireland (2023 U.S.A.RE-PRINT). Available on Amazon.