Bernadette Devlin McAliskey: Difference between revisions

| name = Bernadette Devlin McAliskey

| image = Bernadette Devlin McAliskey, 2011 (1986cropped).jpg

| caption = Devlin in [[Amsterdam]], September 19862011

| birth_date = {{birth date and age|1947|04|23|df=y}}<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/people/miss-bernadette-devlin/index.html|title=Miss Bernadette Devlin (Hansard)|website=api.parliament.uk[[Hansard|Parliamentary Debates (Hansard)]]|access-date=6 May 2020|archive-date=18 June 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180618075847/https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/people/miss-bernadette-devlin/index.html|url-status=live}}</ref>

| nationality = [[NorthernRepublic of Ireland|Irish]]

'''Josephine Bernadette McAliskey''' (née '''Devlin'''; born 23 April 1947), usually known as '''Bernadette Devlin''' or '''Bernadette McAliskey''', is an Irish civil rights leader, and former politician.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Miss Bernadette Devlin (Hansard)|url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/people/miss-bernadette-devlin/index.html|access-date=2021-05-11|website=api.parliament.uk[[Hansard|Parliamentary Debates (Hansard)]]|archive-date=18 June 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180618075847/https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/people/miss-bernadette-devlin/index.html|url-status=live}}</ref> She served as [[Member of Parliament (United Kingdom)|Member of Parliament]] (MP) for [[Mid Ulster (UK Parliament constituency)|Mid Ulster]] in Northern Ireland from 1969 to 1974. McAliskey came to national and international prominence at the age of 21 when she became the youngest person ever (at that time) to become a member of the British Parliament. McAliskey broke the traditional [[Irish republican]] policy of [[abstentionism]] and took her seat in Westminister. McAliskey's ascension came at the outbreak of [[the Troubles]], an ethno-nationalist conflict which would come to dominate Northern Ireland for the next 30 years. For the majority of that time, McAliskey would be politically active, advocating for a 32-county socialist Irish republic to replace the two states on the island of Ireland. Originally linked to the [[People's Democracy (Ireland)|People's Democracy]] group, McAliskey was later a founder of the [[Irish Republican Socialist Party]]. However, McAliskey left the party after a year when members voted that its paramilitary wing, the [[Irish National Liberation Army]], did not have to obey the political wing.

After engaging, on the side of the residents, in the [[Battle of the Bogside]] in August, she was convicted of incitement to riot in December 1969, for which she served asix shortmonths jailimprisonment.<ref>{{Cite termweb |date=14 March 2019 |title=House of Commons Briefing Paper |url=https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN04594/SN04594.pdf |access-date=11 July 2024 |website=parliament.uk |publisher=House of Commons Library |no-pp=y}}</ref><ref name="onthisday">{{cite web |title=ON THIS DAY - Dates - 26 - 1970 Violence flares as Devlin is arrested |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/onThisDay/hi/dates/stories/june/26/newsid_2519000/2519711.stm |access-date=1 April 2021 |date=1 February 2003|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030201100926/http://news.bbc.co.uk/onThisDay/hi/dates/stories/june/26/newsid_2519000/2519711.stm |archive-date=1 February 2003 }}</ref> After being re-elected at the [[1970 United Kingdom general election|1970 general election]], Devlin declared that she would sit in Parliament as an independent [[socialist]].<ref>[[F. W. S. Craig]], "British Parliamentary Election Results, 1950–1973", Parliamentary Research Services, Chichester, 2nd ed. 1983, p. 687.</ref>

===U.S. Tourtour and meetings with Black Panthers===

Almost immediately after the Battle of the Bogside, Devlin undertook a tour of the [[United States]] in August 1969, a trip which generated a significant amount of media attention. She met with members of the [[Black Panther Party]] in [[Watts, Los Angeles]] and gave them her support. She also made an appearanceappearances on ''[[Meet the Press]]'' and ''[[The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson Show]]''. At a number of speaking events, she made parallels between the struggle in the U.S. by African-Americans seeking civil rights and Catholics in Northern Ireland, sometimes to the embarrassment of her audience. During an event in [[Philadelphia]], she had to goad an African-American singer to sing "[[We Shall Overcome]]" to the Irish-American audience, many of whom refused to stand for the song. In [[Detroit]], she refused to take the stage until African-Americans, who were barred from the event, were allowed in. In New York, Mayor John Lindsay arranged a ceremony to present Devlin with a [[Freedom of the City|key to the city]] of New York. Devlin, frustrated with conservative elements of the [[Irish Americans|Irish-American community]], left the tour to return to Northern Ireland and, believing the freedom of New York should go to the American poor, sent [[Eamonn McCann]] to present the key on her behalf to a representative from the [[Harlem]] chapter of the Black Panther Party.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.historyireland.com/20th-century-contemporary-history/fidel-castro-in-a-miniskirt-bernadette-devlins-first-us-tour/ |title='Fidel Castro in a miniskirt': Bernadette Devlin's first US tour |last=Keenan-Thomson |first=Tara |date=August 2009 |website=historyireland.com |access-date=18 November 2019 |archive-date=18 November 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191118055653/https://www.historyireland.com/20th-century-contemporary-history/fidel-castro-in-a-miniskirt-bernadette-devlins-first-us-tour/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Dooley |first=Brian |date=1998 |title=Black and Green: The Fight for Civil Rights in Northern Ireland & Black America |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lI5TDscIjLcC&pg=PA66|publisher=Pluto Press|isbn=978-0-7453-1295-8|page=66 }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |author=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |date=3 March 1970 |title=Irish Give Key to City To Panthers as Symbol |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1970/03/03/archives/irish-give-key-to-city-to-panthers-as-symbol.html |work=[[The New York Times]] |access-date=18 November 2019 |archive-date=18 November 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191118055644/https://www.nytimes.com/1970/03/03/archives/irish-give-key-to-city-to-panthers-as-symbol.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

Having witnessed the [[Bloody Sunday (1972)|Bloody Sunday]] massacre in [[Derry]] in 1972, Devlin was infuriated that she was later consistently denied the floor in the House of Commons by the Speaker [[Selwyn Lloyd]], despite the fact that parliamentary convention decreed that any Member of Parliament witnessing an incident under discussion would be granted an opportunity to speak about it therein.<ref>{{cite news|title=Daughters of Ireland|author=Ros Wynne-Jones|url=http://findArticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_19970309/ai_n14092582/pg_2|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080524113024/http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_19970309/ai_n14092582/pg_2|url-status=dead|archive-date=24 May 2008|newspaper=[[The Independent]]|date=9 March 1997|access-date=2 June 2007}}</ref><ref>[httphttps://hansardapi.millbanksystemsparliament.comuk/historic-hansard/commons/1972/jan/31/northern-ireland Transcript (31 January 1972)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150324044912/http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1972/jan/31/northern-ireland |date=24 March 2015 }}, hansardapi.millbanksystemsparliament.comuk; accessed 22 March 2015.</ref>

The day following Bloody Sunday, Devlin slapped [[Conservative Party (UK)|Conservative]] [[Secretary of State for the Home Department|Home Secretary]] [[Reginald Maudling]] across the face when he incorrectlyfalsely asserted in the House of Commons that the [[Parachute Regiment (United Kingdom)#1970s Northern Ireland|Parachute Regiment]] had fired in self-defence on Bloody Sunday.<ref name="Independent"/> Asked by an all-male press corps if she intended to apologise to Maudling, Devlin said: "I'm just sorry I didn't get him by the throat".<ref>Jo Coburn, [https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m00088h7 'Archive on 4. The First Political Youthquake' (16.03)]. BBC Sounds, 7 September 2019. Retrieved 22 January 2023</ref>

Thirteen years later, former British Prime Minister [[Edward Heath]] recalled the event: "I remember very well when an hon. Lady rushed from the Opposition Benches and hit Mr. Maudling. I remember that vividly because I thought that she was going to hit me. She could not stretch as far as that, so she had to make do with him."<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1985/nov/20/televising-of-the-house#S6CV0087P0_19851120_HOC_229|date=20 November 1985|title=Televising of the House (Hansard, 20 November 1985)|website=api.parliament.uk[[Hansard|Parliamentary Debates (Hansard)]]}}</ref>

Devlin helped to form the [[Irish Republican Socialist Party]] (IRSP) with [[Seamus Costello]] in 1974.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.rte.ie/archives/2015/1130/750277-mass-resignations-in-the-irsp/ |title=Irish Republican Socialist Party Loses Members 1975 |publisher=rte.ie |access-date=25 December 2016 |archive-date=25 December 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161225214648/http://www.rte.ie/archives/2015/1130/750277-mass-resignations-in-the-irsp/ |url-status=live }}</ref> This was a revolutionary socialist breakaway from [[Official Sinn Féin]] and, onlater thethat afternoon after the morning the party wassame establishedday, Costello also created the [[Irish National Liberation Army]] (INLA) as a split from the [[Official Irish Republican Army]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Holland, Jack|author2=McDonald, Henry|title=''INLA Deadly Divisions''|publisher=Poolbeg|year=1996|page=49|isbn=1-85371-263-9}}</ref> Devlin did not join the INLA and while she served on the party's national executive in 1975, she resigned when a proposal that the INLA become subordinate to the party executive was defeated. In 1977, she joined the [[Independent Socialist Party (Ireland)|Independent Socialist Party]], but it disbanded the following year.<ref>Peter Barberis, John McHugh and Mike Tyldesley. ''Encyclopedia of British and Irish Political Organisations'', Pinter Publishers (March 2000); {{ISBN|1-85567-264-2}}</ref>{{page needed|date=April 2024}}

DevlinMcAliskey stood as an [[independent (politician)|independent candidate]] in support of the prisoners on the [[blanket protest]] and [[dirty protest]] at [[Long Kesh]] prison in the [[1979 European Parliament election in the United Kingdom|1979 elections]] to the [[European Parliament]] in the [[Northern Ireland (European Parliament constituency)|Northern Ireland constituency]], and won 5.9% of the vote.<ref>{{cite web|title=''Northern Ireland and the European Parliament''|author=Nicholas Whyte|url=http://www.ark.ac.uk/elections/fe04.htm|publisher=ARK|date=18 April 2004|access-date=11 March 2007|archive-date=4 April 2007|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070404234444/http://www.ark.ac.uk/elections/fe04.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> She was a leading spokesperson for the Smash H-Block Campaign, which supported the [[1981 Irish Hunger Strike|hunger strikes in 1980 and 1981]].

On 16 January 1981, Devlin and her husband were shotattacked by members of the [[Ulster Defence Association|Ulster Freedom Fighters]], a cover name of the [[Ulster Defence Association]] (UDA), who broke into their home near [[Coalisland]], [[County Tyrone]].<ref>[http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/othelem/chron/ch81.htm#Jan Chronology of the Conflict: January 1981] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101206152438/http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/othelem/chron/ch81.htm#Jan |date=6 December 2010 }}, CAIN</ref><ref>Peter Taylor, ''Loyalists'', p. 168</ref> The gunmen shot Devlin nine times in front of her children.<ref>CAIN: Chronology of the Conflict: January 1981</ref>

British soldiers were watching the McAliskey home at the time, but they failed to prevent the assassination attempt. Allegations were subsequently made that elements of the security forces had colluded with the UDA in planning the botched assassination.<ref name=Independent/><ref>{{cite book|last=Taylor|first=Peter|author-link=Peter Taylor (Journalist)|title=''Loyalists''|publisher=[[Bloomsbury Publishing]]|year=1999|page=168|isbn=0-7475-4519-7}}</ref> An army patrol from [[3rd Battalion, Parachute Regiment|3 Para]] entered the house beforeafter waiting outside for half an hour. Devlin has claimed that the patrol "were there to make sure that the gunmen got into my house and that they were caught on the way out." Soldiers from the [[Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders]] (ASH) then arrived and transported her by helicopter to a nearby hospital.<ref>[http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20079124,00.html McAliskey shootings] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402103853/http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20079124,00.html |date=2 April 2015 }}, people.com; accessed 23 March 2015.</ref>

===Dáil Éireann elections===

== =South Tyrone Empowerment Programme ===

*[https://play.acast.com/s/blindboy/9264e6a2-c5c5-43ac-8b73-229b56c48d08 Podcast Interview with Bernadette Devlin McAliskey]. [[The Blindboy Podcast]]. 2018