HISTORY: The illiberality of Unionism
Who do you think you are kidding Mr Trimble?
As Ronald Reagan memorably swatted aside Jimmy Carter in the presidential debate of 1980, so we should ignore David Trimble’s recent attempt to appeal to scare UUC delegates by warning them of some vast right wing conspiracy determined to destabilise the policy he has formulated.
A quick reading of his recent Belfast Telegraph article reveals that Mr Trimble’s real concern is to protect the devolutionist position of the UUP, which he believes to be under threat from sinister elements — he even manages to blame Enoch Powell for all of Unionism’s ills since 1974 in a bravura piece of revisionist mea non culpa that would impress even Bart Simpson.
For a man always very careful about his choice of words, it is unlike Trimble to use the descriptive terminology of “Right” as equaling “bad” without there being a tactical reason for it.
From being the “foulmouthed Ulster Tories” despised by Randolph Churchill 130 years ago, to being among the most reactionary (in the literal sense of the term) members of the Conservative Party’s National Union until the mid-1980s, the UUP has been unashamedly wedded to the right.
Indeed, Mr Trimble himself has talked up the re-marriage of the two parties, although he has said that he voted Liberal Democrat in the London local elections in the past. Fig leaves such as the Ulster Unionist Labour Association, and individuals like Harry Midgeley or even Harold McCusker were the exceptions which proved the rule — Unionists, as any electoral reference book of the time will tell you, were Conservatives.
The Orange Order — midwife or mother of Unionism depending on your point of view — still has a political dimension which is, if not exactly Conservative, more a sort of nineteenth century Whiggery which has gravitated to Conservatism by default, and which has permeated every level of the UUP.
David Trimble’s pejorative use of the term is surprising since, to his credit, he has looked east to the conservatives in the USA and to the possibilities of building relations with their political action committees to benefit Unionism.
The UUP leader, for example, recently addressed the Heritage Foundation: a think tank close to the Bush administration which venerates Reagan, and Thatcher, and has a robust view of politics which would cause many British conservatives to blanch.
His views have appeared in other right wing organs such as The American Spectator, and the Moonie-owned Washington Times, either advanced by himself or some of the small group of thinkers around him, and he has always willingly met with conservative opinion formers such as Michael Barone.
And yet, as his comments this week show, there is almost a residual sense of embarrassment shame that such contacts exist. Perhaps its an American thing, just as Sinn Fein keep US visitors away from the pro-Palestinian murals in West Belfast, or perhaps it’s a cultural bias tilted more towards Wagner and Europe than Elvis and America.
Unionism has always been poor at selling itself in the USA, (especially the DUP which has never fully exploited its links with the Bible belt) for reasons perhaps grounded in a dismissive view of our colonial cousins often expressed by certain elderly Tory MPs and Jeremy Clarkson (political giants, mind you, in comparison to the average UUP party tactician.)
As with most things in life, Unionism has much more to gain from embracing its roots rather than concealing them. The type of politics which is prevalent in Europe, the stale philosophies of Christian Democrat against Social Democrat seems to have an appeal for many in the business sector and to those self styled progressives in the UUP.
In actual fact it is a road to assimilation into the European political mush which passes for debate in the Republic of Ireland. One reason Sinn Fein/IRA is popular in the Republic is that it is not afraid to swim against the tide, albeit by promoting a divisive nationalism and impractical socialism.
An obvious effect of the sloppy terminology of politics today is that Sinn Fein, both nationalist and socialist, is deemed a “left wing” party, whilst those such as M. Le Pen in France, who have many similarities to Sinn Fein’s volkish ethnic violence and gangsterism, are deemed to be “right wing”.
Strangely Mr Trimble himself is often seen at Eurosceptic meetings in London, yet allows his MEP to affiliate to the federalist European People’s Party in a manner which betrays an alarming tendency to compartmentalise political beliefs separately from political actions.
Unionism could look to its antecedents and prosper by predicating its actions on the self-evident truths in its history, as both parties in the US must do to maintain their credibility.
The US is a multi-cultural and multi-ethnic society and their founding fathers may not mean much to large sections of the population, but no American politician can afford to ignore the history of his nation, as there are enough citizens who have bought into their constitutional rights to punish any who do.
A weakening of communal identity has not yet affected Northern Ireland to an irretrievable degree, as the manner in which the Unionist middle classes instinctively identified with the Orangemen of Drumcree in the initial protests showed; even if they had until that point been disinterested in the Institution, it was a benign disinterest which aroused strong feelings when it was perceived to be under attack.
Likewise, if the last twenty years can be perceived as a series of setbacks for Unionism, that need not have resulted in a weakening of the cultural aspects of Unionism which are the cement in any community.
The southern states of the United States, settled in large measure by the descendants of Ulster Scots, have suffered immeasurably greater changes — many positive but habitually mostly imposed from above, rather than promoted from below — and there has been no noticeable weakening in the Southern identity or spirit.
Mr Trimble’s Ulster Unionism could learn much from how the Southern states repeatedly adapted to each new political dispensation, instead of the arrogant assumption that Northern Ireland was home to the local equivalent of the Yellow Dog Democrat.
No student of Unionism can be confident that a new Unionism can emerge which is centrist enough to retain its current base and liberal enough to reactivate the hundred thousand one-off Referendum voters.
The argument that a rising tide raises all boats, and that it is good for Unionism to have a strong Liberal party and a strong Conservative party is specious. There has never been a strong liberal Unionist Party that did not become clientist for whichever administration held office — even in the time of Gladstone — and thus, therefore, sustained those who sought to undermine the Union. Home Rulers used to abuse pro-Union catholics as being “Castle Catholics” ie patsies of the Dublin Castle administration. Today there are ‘Hillsborough Unionists’ for whom the patronage of the Secretary of State matters more than the long-term health of the Union.
Just look at the Trimble claims for the Belfast Agreement: it is a ‘victory’, for instance, to have the Irish Government remove an unenforceable territorial claim, in return for the allocation of power to the most strident voice of nationalism, so that it can undermine Northern Ireland from within Government.
It is weakness to attempt to be what you are not, and Unionism is unashamedly, gloriously and unapologetically right wing in its history, ethos and philosophy. Pretending otherwise is fooling no-one, only promoting contempt, in the same way that Gerry Adams’ attempts to pretend he was never in the IRA alienates his friends and provokes derision amongst his enemies.
This is particularly the case when it is handled in such a ham-fisted manner as the UUP has demonstrated, by wanting to persuade the Orange Order to move out but remain “just good friends”.
The irony — and the mystery — is that David Trimble, the student of Popper and Burke, and a man made by Drumcree, has abandoned his own political roots so completely while understanding them more than possibly any other Unionist leader.
David Brewster, a longtime Ulster Unionist activist, has recently departed to the DUP; this article originally appeared on Slugger O’Toole.
David Brewster, March 25, 2004 06:31 PM