James W. Upton’s unpublished silver jubilee history of the Gaelic Athletic Association. By Tony Keating and Mark Reynolds On 27 April 1932, the annual congress of the GAA approved a request by the association’s central council to advertise for expressions of interest from ‘suitable’ authors to write an official history of the GAA, to mark … Read more
Women’s opposition to the 1937 Constitution. By Joyce Padbury The women’s campaign against the 1937 Constitution was a short and, in the end, unsuccessful intervention in a major political debate, though it did initially achieve amendments to some provisions of the draft document. The campaign is worth remembering as a lively articulation of feminist opinion … Read more
While recent attention has naturally focused on the significance of the Act for the extension of the franchise to women, this was only one of its provisions. By Brian Walker The Representation of the People Act brought in a number of changes to electoral laws that had an important effect on the 1918 general election. … Read more
The political conversion of Orangeman Frederick Youell. By Quincey Dougan In its 21 January 1909 edition, the Belfast Weekly News contained an editorial entitled ‘The Vanguard County’, a report on the proceedings of the recently held meeting of the County Grand Orange Lodge of Leitrim, and it was unusual in that it also included portraits … Read more
Brexit or no Brexit, the Irish border is a subject of interest to many. People have been killed as a direct or indirect result of its existence and it has facilitated criminality for generations. There is, however, a lighter side. By Cormac Bourke It would make for instructive television to challenge unionists and nationalists to … Read more