I want to tell you a story today about two men born in the age of Parnell.
 
Ireland after Parnell, in the dying years of the 1800s, was a grey place of paralysis. Politically stuck and fighting with itself.
 
The opportunity to right the wrongs of the Act of Union seemed lost.
The promise of Home Rule forlorn.
 
Yet [...]

Labour is primarily an urban party and must make inroads in rural constituencies if it wants to succeed, writes ELAINE BYRNE in the IRISH TIMES April 20 2010
 
EAMON GILMORE is good at oratory. His “One Ireland” rhetoric at the Labour Party’s annual conference in Galway paid tribute to the hope of an Ireland defined by [...]

RENEWING THE REPUBLIC: This series has shown a thirst for political reform coupled with an uncertainty about how to achieve it, writes ELAINE BYRNE in the Irish Times April 3 2010
 
ACCOMPANYING THIS series has been an image of our national flag, contorted at the centre by a knot. The narrative embarked upon by the various [...]

The strength of party whips has ensured a parliamentary system contrary to the spirit of the Constitution, writes ELAINE BYRNE in the Irish Times March 16, 2010
 
CONFUSION OCCURS when there is an absence of clarity. When confusion reigns, disorientation persuades the collective memory to forget about the past and look forward to an undefined future. [...]

The country’s power dynamic must change if we truly aspire to be a republic in which citizens come first, writes ELAINE BYRNE in THE IRISH TIMES February 23 2010
 
OUR CONSTITUTION does not contain the word republic. Although the memory of the republic is rehearsed each year at the gravesides of Wolfe Tone and others, it [...]

Reform of the Irish political system will only happen when the public takes ownership of the reform process In the IRISH TIMES February 2 2010
 
HENRY GRATTAN retired from parliament in 1797 in protest over his proposed political reforms being ignored. He was convinced that in the absence of vital and fundamental reform, Ireland was drifting [...]

Page of accounts from a well known public figure in the 1940s.
Can anybody explain what the purpose of the different figures/columns mean to someone without an accountancy background? In particular, I’m confused why there are two sets of figures. For example there is a dividend of £500 and then on the same line there is [...]

Any debate about the Seanad must focus on how it forged the original Republic. Revamped, it can be potent again, writes ELAINE BYRNE in The Irish Times October 27, 2009
 
‘I CONSIDER that a country which has reached that stage of degradation, not to speak of a party that is prepared to submit to be dragooned [...]

Comments on the Conditions of Gaelscoil An Ghoirt Álainn

“The constitution may for a time seem lost. The character of the country cannot be lost. The ministers of the Crown will find that it is not so easy to put down for ever an ancient and respectable nation by abilities, however great, and by power and corruption, however irresistible. Liberty may repair her golden [...]