John Redmond and Irish Parliamentary Traditions|Martin O’Donoghue & Emer Purcell|UCD Press
John Redmond and the issue of women’s suffrage
by Martin O’Donoghue & Emer Purcell
Debates about John Redmond and the late Irish Parliamentary Party have a long history in Irish politics, and, almost as long an origin story. That debates, centred on Redmond, would last a century after his death would not necessarily have been apparent when he died on 6 March 1918. Narratives of his funeral all emphasise the passing of Redmond from a changed Ireland that had rejected him as leader. Historians have noted the decision to hold a funeral in his native Wexford rather than Dublin for fear of ‘hostile demonstration’. While the level of mourning should not be understated even then, especially in the south-east, in a country where political funerals have often carried the power of remarkable political import, this was not an event to turn a political tide or a moment apparently to be nurtured for later generations of Irish nationalists. Yet, it was one that was soon commemorated.
the term ‘Redmondite’ – for good or for ill – has never fully disappeared from the Irish political lexicon
Redmond entered politics, following his father, who was a supporter of Isaac Butt, the intellectual father of Home Rule. John E. Redmond himself would then spend the first half of his career a follower of the next major home rule leader, Charles Stewart Parnell. When Redmond passed away in 1918, his son succeeded him in the parliamentary seat, and the term ‘Redmondite’ – for good or for ill – has never fully disappeared from the Irish political lexicon through war, democratisation, independence, partition, the creation and renewal of new political movements, and even centenary commemoration. The story of Redmond and the Irish Parliamentary Party therefore calls us to examine a range of important questions about modern Ireland stretching from the 1870s right up to today.
In this volume, Redmond’s career and the IPP are situated within the many contexts of the politics of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries: the British Empire, Home Rule, Nationalism, Unionism, the First World War and the 1916 Rising. More broadly, Anglo-Irish relations are considered across an extended timeframe, encompassing the twenty-first century context of Brexit and its implications for both islands where questions of sovereignty, diplomacy, and nationality were again contested and reassessed.
Margaret Ward’s chapter emphasises how Redmond’s opposition to suffrage was more than mere political expediency and reflected longer term doubts about granting women the vote
The contributors are interested in analysing the core political principles of Redmond and the party (as well as their predecessors and successors) and how they have been viewed in historiography and popular memory. The chapters reflect on aspects of Redmond and the party that have not always been to the fore in previous analyses and public debates – scrutinising how he related to Butt and Parnell and how he viewed the crucial question of suffrage in the pre-war years.
The volume offers new insights into the Irish Parliamentary Party’s relationship with the women’s suffrage movement and gender. Margaret Ward’s chapter emphasises how Redmond’s opposition to suffrage was more than mere political expediency and reflected longer term doubts about granting women the vote. The IPP was perhaps the least progressive party of its era in terms of suffrage; yet ironically, Bridget Redmond, emerged as a representative of the Redmondite tradition in Waterford and became the longest serving female TD up to that point. The 33rd Dáil elected in 2020 still had less than 23 per cent representation of women.
Ward analyses the voting record of the IPP and the impact upon the suffrage campaign of the Party’s determination to win Home Rule for Ireland. She argues that the grand narratives of Irish history disregard the gendered implications of a Home Rule settlement that omitted the female half of the population. In so doing, they ignore the misogyny that existed within the Irish Party. She constructs an alternative narrative that focuses on histories of the suffrage movement and suffrage newspapers in Ireland and Britain.
The 33rd Dáil elected in 2020 still had less than 23 per cent representation of women
McGing examines the political career of Bridget Redmond through the lens of gender. Situating her in the male-dominated political culture of the Free State as well as bringing to the fore Redmond’s input beyond simply the political organisation inherited from her husband, William Archer Redmond. She analyses Redmond’s role as a legislator and her political philosophy, with focus on her contributions to women’s issues and her remarkable record of electoral success. While her election to the Dáil took place within the context of enduring Redmondite loyalty in Waterford, McGing demonstrates that the TD first elected in 1933 was more than just a Redmond.
Pointing to her work at constituency level, including her high-profile role in the Blueshirt movement in the south-east, as well as her parliamentary interventions, McGing highlights the complexity of Redmond and her political milieu and the need to examine her career in its own right and its own context. Scrutinising Dáil debates, her examination of Redmond’s career as TD reveals a more wide-ranging and significant career than has often been acknowledged in the past.
