Sir, – Roy Foster suggests it to be a "stupid assumption . . . made often by people" (who else?) "that Irish Protestants are unionists", on the basis that his Church of Ireland parents "thought that partition was a tragic mistake" ("Interview – The Irish argue about history all the time", October 1st.
But southern Protestants who opposed partition were unionists, mainly. They favoured Ireland as a whole remaining in the union and felt betrayed by Ulster unionists. Roman Catholic unionists felt somewhat the same way. Protestants experienced a generational shift in a nationalist direction during and after the second World War, as reflected in The Irish Times transition from John Healy's retirement in 1934 to Douglas Gageby becoming editor in 1963.
As for partition being a tragedy for southern Protestants in particular, how so? The Church of Ireland Gazette observed of Southern Ireland in May 1922, "the Protestant community holds a commanding position in the economic life of the country". That remained the case for many decades. As late as 1972, 50 years after State formation, the less than 4 per cent Protestant population provided an estimated 25 per cent of senior managers in industry and 36 per cent of all bank directors.
One of a series of Irish Times articles by Michael Viney in 1965 opened with: "'For Heavens sake,' said a Protestant accountant, 'don't make us out to be whingers, we've nothing to whinge about.' As a working citizen the Protestant of the Republic of Ireland has little to complain of. Among the poor, he is unlikely to be poorer for being Protestant. Among the wealthy, he is likely to be wealthier for it."
In return for the preservation of relative affluence, including employment discrimination, and separate institutions in health and education, thoughtful Protestants did not complain too much about the irritations of overarching Roman Catholic controls. The controls began fall apart when those they were mainly aimed at, Roman Catholics, began to express a lot more than irritation.
One of the reasons why many Protestants kept their heads down in independent Southern Ireland is not because they were treated badly, rather the opposite (why upset the apple cart?). So much so, former Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald advertised the advantages of being a southern Protestant to northern unionists.
Forced discrimination in favour of Protestants in Northern Ireland, or by consent in Southern Ireland, probably would not have survived a united Ireland. It might have been good for the island’s people (whatever their assumptions) though.
It seems to me that Prof Foster’s is a typical revisionist historian’s observation, in which he erected a straw target, knocked it down, wiped his hands and walked away. It is called proof by constant assertion. I wish him well in his retirement from Oxford. – Yours, etc,
NIALL MEEHAN,
Faculty Head,
Journalism & Media,
Griffith College,
Dublin 8.