Ian Paisley

See also Ian Paisley, Jr.

The Reverend and Right Honourable Ian Richard Kyle Paisley, MP, MLA (born 6 April 1926); also known as Dr. Ian Paisley, is a prominent politician and church leader from Northern Ireland. He is founder and Moderator of the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster, and Leader of the Democratic Unionist Party.

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The Reverend and Right Honourable Ian Richard Kyle Paisley

Background

Ian Paisley was born in what was then the town of Armagh, County Armagh in Northern Ireland, and brought up in the town of Ballymena, County Antrim where his father James Kyle Paisley was an independent Baptist pastor. His Scottish mother Isabella Paisley was instrumental in his evangelical conversion at the age of six. After completing his education at the Model School in Ballymena, he went to work on a farm in Sixmilecross, County Tyrone. During his time there he felt constrained to enter the Christian ministry. He undertook theological training at the fundamentalist Barry School of Evangelism (eventually renamed the South Wales Bible college), and later, for a year, at the Reformed Presbyterian Theological Hall in Belfast, though he graduated from neither.

In 1946 he was ordained, in a ceremony at the independent Ravenhill Evangelical Mission Church on the Ravenhill Road in Belfast, by four ministers from four different denominations whose ecclesiastical authority from their churches to ordain is disputed. A common mistake is the assumption that Ian Paisley personally led an exodus from the mainstream Presbyterian Church in Ireland (the largest Protestant denomination in Northern Ireland). In fact, Ian Paisley was never a member of that church, and was never one of its ministers. He is a member of the loyalist Apprentice Boys of Derry. He has never been a member of the controversial Orange Order, although he addresses the annual gathering of the Independent Orange Order at Portglenone every Twelfth of July.

Paisley's use of the title 'Dr.' derives from an honorary Doctor of Divinity degree awarded by an unaccredited Christian college called Bob Jones University in Greenville, South Carolina. The right-wing segregationist Bob Jones, Jr. was a close personal friend and a co-leader with Ian Paisley in the international Fundamentalist movement.

In the early 1950s Ian Paisley helped to establish the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster. He then, following a vote in his own church, joined the Free Presbyterian Church and was subsequently elected its second moderator, a post he has held for several decades. He eventually set up his own newspaper, the Protestant Telegraph, a strongly anti-Catholic paper, as a mechanism for further spreading his message. A website, the European Institute of Protestant Studies, fills that role today. He has authored numerous books and pamphlets on religious and political subjects. One book, a commentary on Romans, was penned while serving a prison sentence in Crumlin Road Jail. He is also the founder and leader of the Democratic Unionist Party which is currently the largest party in Northern Ireland, the fourth largest party in the United Kingdom in terms of representation at Westminster, and the fourth largest in Ireland in terms of votes. Paisleyites, as Paisley's supporters are known, do not necessarily belong to his church.

'No Surrender'

In the 1960s he campaigned against Prime Minister of Northern Ireland Terence O'Neill's rapprochement with the Republic of Ireland and his meetings with Taoiseach of the Republic, Seán Lemass, a former member of the IRA. He opposed efforts by O'Neill to deliver civil rights to the minority nationalist community in Northern Ireland, notably the abolition of gerrymandering of local electoral areas for the election of urban and county councils. In 1964 his demand that the RUC remove an Irish Tricolour from Sinn Féin's Belfast offices led to two days of rioting, after this was followed through (see Flags and Emblems Act - the public display of the Irish flag was illegal until the mid-1980's). Paisley's approach (summed up in his catchphrase "no surrender") led him in turn to attack O'Neill's successors as prime minister, Major James Chichester-Clark (later called Lord Moyola) and Brian Faulkner.

In 1966 he helped to set up the Ulster Constitution Defence Committee (UCDC) and the paramilitary Ulster Protestant Volunteers (UPV). The UPV commenced a bombing campaign in order to destabilise O'Neill's government. This group later amalgamated with the Ulster Volunteer Force, with whom it had an overlapping membership. In March 1969, he was jailed along with Ronald Bunting (whose son, Ronnie Bunting, went on to join the INLA, and was assassinated) for organising an illegal counter-demonstration against a Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association march in Armagh. He was released during a general amnesty for people convicted of political offences.

Paisley opposed the 1972 suspension by the British government of Edward Heath of the Northern Ireland parliament and government (known collectively by the term Stormont due to the location of Parliament Buildings on the Stormont estate). He opposed the Sunningdale Agreement which sought to rework relationships between Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom, and which provided for a power-sharing executive (government) involving both communities in Northern Ireland, and a controversial (among unionists) all-island Council of Ireland linking Northern Ireland and the Republic on a legal but not constitutional level. Sunningdale collapsed following the Ulster Workers' Strike, which cut water and electricity supplies to many homes, and the failure of the British Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Merlyn Rees and the British Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, to defend the power-sharing executive. Supporters of Paisley played an important role in orchestrating the strike. In January 1974, he (Paisley) was subdued and thrown out of the Stormont Assembly by members of the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

In April 1977 Paisley famously declared he would retire from politics if a forthcoming United Unionist Action Council general strike was unsuccessful. The strike failed, but Paisley, to the joy of his supporters, broke his promise.

Political Life

In the 1970 Westminster general election Paisley was elected MP for the North Antrim constituency which he has retained ever since and is now the longest serving MP from Northern Ireland. The following year Paisley, sometimes known as Big Ian, Dr. No, or the Ayatollah, established the most successful and longest lasting of his political movements, the Democratic Unionist Party which replaced his Protestant Unionist Party. It soon won seats at local council, province, national and European level; Paisley was elected one of Northern Ireland's three Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) at the first elections to the Brussels and Strasbourg-based European Parliament in 1979. On his first day he attempted to interrupt the then President of the European Council Jack Lynch, but was shouted down by fellow MEPs. He easily retained his seat in every European election until he stood down in 2004, receiving the highest popular vote of any Irish or British MEP (although as Great Britain uses a different electoral system it is hard to compete with this total) and one of the highest anywhere in Europe. In an address by Pope John Paul II to the Parliament in 1988, Paisley accused him of being the Antichrist (see Historicism), repeatedly interrupting his speech by shouting and holding up placards. He was removed from the chamber by other MEPs disgusted at his behaviour. The DUP also holds seats in the British House of Commons and has been elected to each of the Northern Ireland conventions and assemblies set up since the party's creation. It was for a long time the principal challenger to the major unionist party, the Ulster Unionist Party (known for a time in the 1970s and 1980s as the Official Unionist Party (OUP) to distinguish it from the then multitude of other unionist parties, some set up by deposed former leaders). In February 1981 Paisley claimed the UUP were conspiring to kill him. In December of the same year the United States revoked his visa, concerned at the effects of his inflammatory speeches, which often fomented violence.

In the 2003 Northern Ireland Assembly elections, the DUP overtook the UUP, achieving 30 seats to the UUP's 27, and in the 2005 UK General Election, the DUP very nearly wiped out the UUP, achieving almost twice their voteshare and taking 9 seats to the UUP's 1 (successfully unseating then UUP leader David Trimble).

During the 2003/2004 session of the Westminster parliament, he claimed the third highest Additional Costs Allowance of £20,333 out of 658 MPs. His voting record at the House of Commons shows him to be largely loyal to the government, regardless of the political party in power. He has attended roughly 49% of votes in the British parliament, placing him at 619th out of 645 MPs.

Ian Paisley says 'Ulster says no'

In the 1980s Paisley like all the major unionist leaders opposed the Anglo-Irish Agreement (1985), signed by British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Irish Taoiseach (prime minister) Dr. Garret FitzGerald. The AIA provided for an Irish input into the governing of Northern Ireland, through an Anglo-Irish Secretariat based at Maryfield, outside Belfast and meetings of the Anglo-Irish Conference, co-chaired by the Republic's Minister for Foreign Affairs and Britain's Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.

Vast crowds attended mass rallies addressed by then UUP leader James Molyneaux and Paisley at which the slogan "Ulster Says No" was used to express unionist opposition by what its critics alleged was a form of joint authority over Northern Ireland. Paisley was once again ejected from the European Parliament for continually interrupting a speech by Thatcher. Masked RUC men told a television interviewer they would refuse to enforce any aspect of the Agreement. Paisley controversially set up an unofficial paramilitary unit which met secretly called the Third Force, which began to import arms from South Africa. However though violent resistance to what was claimed to be "Dublin rule" was threatened, it did not materialise from the Third Force, which was soon discredited and faded away.

A Loyalist paramilitary-style organisation was formed on 10 November 1986 by Ian Paisley, then leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), Peter Robinson of the DUP, and Ivan Foster. The initial aim of Ulster Resistance was to bring an end to the Anglo-Irish Agreement. Following a rally in the Ulster Hall in Belfast, other rallies were held in towns across Northern Ireland. The group was organised in nine 'battalions' and members wore a red beret. In November 1988 there was an arms find in County Armagh and the subsequent arrest of a former DUP election candidate brought accusations of links between DUP politicians and armed paramilitary groups. The DUP claimed that party links with the organisation had ended in 1987. Two members of Ulster Resistance were arrested in April 1987 in Paris along with a South African diplomat. The weapons imported from South Africa were divided between the UDA, the UVF and Ulster Resistance. The arms consisted of 200 AK47 assault rifles, 90 Browning pistols, 500 fragmentation grenades, 30,000 rounds of ammunition and 12 RPG 7 rocket launchers.

In 1981, he appeared on a hillside at dead of night with 500 men brandishing firearms licenses and later had a brief alliance with Ulster Resistance, which (like the UDA at the time) was not an illegal organisation, but was ostensibly set up to defend Unionists near the border that they believed the British government was ignoring. The DUP now down plays this association.

In 1985 he and the rest of the Unionist MPs resigned from Parliament at Westminster in protest at the Anglo-Irish Agreement and were all but one (Jim Nicholson, who lost his seat to the SDLP's Seamus Mallon) returned in the resulting by-elections.

The Good Friday Agreement

Paisley's DUP was initially involved in the negotiations under former United States senator, George J. Mitchell that led to the Belfast Agreement of 1998 (also known as the Good Friday Agreement on account of the day on which it was signed.) However the party withdrew in protest when Sinn Féin, a republican party with links to the Provisional Irish Republican Army, was allowed to participate after the ceasefire. In March 1998 the Loyalist Volunteer Force (an offshoot of the UVF) stated in a "policy document" that they backed the DUP's approach to the negotiations, saying Paisley had got it "absolutely right". Paisley and his party opposed the Agreement in the referendum that followed its signing, and which saw it approved reasonably comfortably in Northern Ireland and by over 90% of voters in the Republic of Ireland.

Although Paisley often stresses his loyalty to the Crown, he accused Queen Elizabeth of being Tony Blair's "parrot" when she voiced approval of the Agreement.

As part of the deal, the Republic changed the wording of the controversial Articles 2 and 3 of the Constitution of Ireland, which had originally claimed its government's de jure right to govern the whole island of Ireland, including Northern Ireland.

The DUP fought the resulting election to the Northern Ireland Assembly, to which Paisley was elected, while keeping his seats in the Westminster and European parliaments. The DUP took two seats in the multi-party power-sharing executive (Paisley, like the leaders of the Social Democratic and Labour Party and Sinn Féin chose not to become a minister) but while serving as ministers refused to sit in at meetings of the Executive Committee (cabinet) in protest at Sinn Féin's participation.

The Executive ultimately was suspended over unionist unhappiness on the nature of Provisional IRA disarmament (The Provisional IRA and Sinn Féin justified this by drawing attention to the fact that others' parties to the deal, notably the unionists and the British Government, were slow in implementing other areas of the Agreement, such as demilitarisation and policing reform, that were of great importance to republicans). The alleged discovery of a republican spy network operating among civil servants in the seat of government and parliament, Stormont, led to the UUP's decision to suspend the institutions created under the Belfast Agreement. (Despite many arrests and the confiscation of a large amount of material by the PSNI during a widely publicised investigation, no convictions resulted. In December 2005, the supposed ringleader, Sinn Féin's Denis Donaldson, was exposed as a British intelligence agent - having been recruited in the 1980s.)

While the Agreement has not been scrapped, its institutions remain suspended, pending a resolution of the issues of policing, demilitarisation and paramilitary disarmament and the full implementation of all the Agreement's provisions. The DUP have repeatedly pledged to destroy the Agreement, however in recent times since becoming the leading Unionist Party have backed it with the 'Comprehensive Agreement' (December 2004) where the principles of the Belfast Agreement where upheld.

A Complex Man

Though fiercely anti-Catholic, and often condemned for using extreme and provocative language against Roman Catholicism, Paisley has nonetheless attracted a small number of Catholic votes in his Westminster and European constituencies. Though critical of the Republic of Ireland, he has religious followers in the Republic; and it was specifically in this capacity that he agreed to meet the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, in Government Buildings in Dublin. He reversed this stance when he met Bertie Ahern in Dublin in September 2004 in his capacity as leader of the Democratic Unionist Party. At a further meeting with Ahern, at the Irish embassy in London, when offered breakfast Paisley characteristically asked for boiled eggs, joking that "it would be hard for [Ahern] to poison them" [1]. From the 1960s, one of his main rivals was civil rights leader and second leader of the nationalist SDLP, John Hume. Though their parties are often at loggerheads, Hume and Paisley worked jointly on behalf of Northern Ireland in the European Parliament and on occasion worked jointly in the House of Commons. Indeed the complexity of their relationship was demonstrated when it was discovered that Hume had visited Paisley's home to dine with Ian and his wife, Eileen, on St. Stephen's Day (Boxing Day) one year in the 1990s. When Hume resigned the leadership of the SDLP, Paisley gave very warm praise of "John" and a very accurate estimation of how difficult the SDLP would find it to fill the void left by the departing leader. (Some suggested that the comments by Paisley were given because he thought he was just chatting to journalists and that the TV cameras weren't on. The sight of an affable, low-key Paisley at that moment contrasted with the usual media image of the forceful, loud, aggressive Paisley people were used to seeing.) In one particular instance of irony, having spent most of his career, as he himself jokingly admitted once, saying 'No', Paisley assumed the chairmanship of the Agriculture committee of the Northern Ireland Assembly created by the Belfast Agreement, where he was praised (even by Sinn Féin members with whom he worked) as an effective, co-ordinating chairman. He had a particularly good working relationship with the Minister for Agriculture, the SDLP's Bríd Rogers, an Irish-speaking Catholic with Protestant roots. Paisley, an ardent teetotaller all his life, often asked journalists and nationalist politicians "let me smell your breath" when they asked him particularly tough questions, insinuating they had first taken on board some "Dutch courage".

Defender or Demagogue?

His critics see his work in the European Parliament and in Stormont of late and argue that he could have been, had he so wished, one of the greatest builders of a new inclusive Northern Ireland. To his supporters, Ian Kyle Paisley is seen as a passionate and brilliant defender of the union between Northern Ireland and Great Britain. They argue that he stood up for unionists who were under attack from nationalists, from the Republic of Ireland and from British governments willing to give away "unionist rights" and ignore unionist fears to placate nationalists and the IRA. To one side, he is seen as the wrecker whose extremism almost destroyed Northern Ireland. To the other, Ian Paisley is the great defender, the protector who saved Northern Ireland from "Rome Rule" and "Dublin rule".

To his opponents however, Paisley is seen as a demagogue, a crude rabble-rouser who spent his political career saying 'no' and being passed by; no to O'Neill's reform, no to contacts with the Republic, no to Sunningdale, no to the convention, no to James Prior's rolling devolution, no to the Anglo-Irish Agreement, no to the Belfast Agreement. To his opponents (including many in unionism) he is seen as a uniquely destructive influence whose extremism lost potential friends and helped alienate people outside Northern Ireland sympathetic to unionism. In the 1980's, the Ulster Unionist Party's Robert McCartney described Paisley as a fascist. Former members of loyalist terrorist groups on ceasefire because of the Good Friday Agreement verbally attacked Paisley at one press conference, saying that as impressionable teenagers they had been attracted to extreme loyalism by his violent and provocative speeches, blaming him for much of the violence that resulted. Paisley has never accepted any culpability for any violence, despite his many fiery speeches, which often presented the political conflict in stark Biblical terms as a millenarian battle between good and evil (see Historicism). In September 2005, he was criticized for stoking unionist violence in Belfast over the 75 meter diversion of a provocative Orange Order march along a throughfare serving as a boundary between nationalist and unionist communities. Quoted by The Guardian newspaper, he called the diversion "the spark which kindles a fire there could be no putting out" [2]. Widespread loyalist riots followed, producing, among other results, what Northern Ireland secretary Peter Hain called "serious attempts to kill police in some instances" [3].

Anti-Gay Campaigining

In 1977, Paisley launched his "Save Ulster from Sodomy" campaign, prompted by an increasingly inclusive attitute to homosexuality in Britain and his fear that Northern Ireland's law may be changed to decriminalise homosexuality. His fears were fired in 1974, when the Campaign for Homosexual Law Reform (Northern Ireland) appealed to the European Court of Human Rights to force the UK to extend to Northern Ireland the 1967 Sexual Offences Act which decriminalised homosexual acts between two men over 21 years of age and ‘in private’. The 1967 Act applied only to England and Wales but not to Scotland and Northern Ireland (which have distinct legal systems). After a successful legal appeal, homosexuality was decriminalised in Scotland in 1980. Northern Ireland therefore, alone within the UK, maintained a policy outlawing same-sex sexual relationships. In 1980, the European Commission ruled unanimously that the British government was guilty of breaching Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights by refusing to legalise consenting homosexual behaviour in Northern Ireland, and a year later the European Court of Human Rights made a similar ruling. In 1982, male homosexuality was decriminalised in Northern Ireland with the passing of law reform in the House of Commons.

Nearing Retirement

In recent years, Paisley has been in physically poor health. His health appears to have improved somewhat, but he has aged noticeably. He has lowered his political profile, instead devoting much of his time to working with his church on the missions in Africa, where he has some followers. On January 19, 2004, he announced he would not be standing for the European Parliament in the 2004 elections at the age of 78. Both admired and held in contempt, Ian Paisley defied his critics in early 2005 by confirming he would again contest the North Antrim seat in the next British general election in 2005, which he won, at the age of 79. He traditionally celebrates every election victory with a hymn in the count centre. Paisley was made a Privy Councillor on 21 October 2005 [4], a post to which he became entitled as leader of the fourth largest political party in the British Parliament.

Currently his party controls half of Northern Ireland's seats in Westminster, and holds about a third of seats in the Northern Ireland Assembly and the District Councils. His deputy leader of the DUP, Peter Robinson has served as a Minister in the Northern Ireland Executive, where he acquitted himself well, and is seen as a possible First Minister of Northern Ireland in the next Northern Ireland Executive. Robinson is predicted to move the DUP to a more moderate, pragmatic position within electoral unionism. Robinson may however be challenged for the leadership by Ian Paisley, Jr., Paisley's son, or, more likely, Nigel Dodds, a member of Paisley's church.

Family confirms seriousness of 2004 illness

In July 2004 Paisley's family stated that he had been undergoing tests for an undisclosed illness. The family suggested that the release of the information was to quell widespread rumours within Northern Ireland and abroad that Paisley was suffering from a potentially terminal illness; widespread rumours in Northern Ireland suggested either cancer or heart disease. The family declined to indicate the nature of the suspected illness, citing privacy. Though the family statement was reported in general terms, the media in Northern Ireland, the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland unusually opted not to speculate as to the nature, if any, of Paisley's illness. Political opponents, both unionist and nationalist, also declined to discuss the marked physical deterioration in Paisley's health other than to wish him a full recovery. Martin McGuinness, Sinn Fein's chief negotiator, commented: "I look forward to sharing power with Ian Paisley, if he survives."

In 2005, Paisley's son and political heir, Ian Paisley Jr confirmed that his father had been gravely ill in 2004 and suggested that his family had prepared for what they feared was his impending death. While the full nature of the illness has not been confirmed, Paisley by 2005 had made a recovery, and noticeably gained in weight again.

Family

Ian Paisley and his wife Eileen have five children, three of whom have followed their father into politics or religion; Kyle, into the church, their son Ian (a DUP assemblyman) and daughter Rhonda (a graduate of Bob Jones University), who served as a member of Belfast City Council but has long since left politics. She once presented a TV chat show on the Republic's Radio Telifís Éireann, Saturday Live where one of her guests was her father Ian, who charmed some viewers with his personality and good humour, in contrast to the normal 'Ian Paisley' seen on news bulletins. Another guest on that show was Irish Catholic comedian Brendan Grace. In the summer of 1991, she described some minor UDA bombings in the Republic as "understandable". In 2005 Rhonda Paisley launched a legal action alleging gender discrimination against the DUP, which names her father Ian Paisley after she failed in her application to a post in the policy and communications unit in the DUP.

Famous Quotes

In 1958 he denounced Princess Margaret and the Queen Mother for "committing spiritual fornication and adultery with the Antichrist", after a visit by them to the new Pope, John XXIII.
"This Romish man of sin is now in Hell!"; to a packed Ulster Hall after the death of John XXIII in June 1963.
"I will kill all who get in my way", after a loyalist rally in 1968. He shouted this out at some reporters.
When Terence O'Neill arrived at Stormont for a meeting with Sean Lemass, Paisley shouted at his car "No mass! No Lemass!"
After a loyalist rally in 1968, Ian Paisley justified the burning of Catholic homes by claiming: "Catholic homes caught fire because they were loaded with petrol bombs; Catholic churches were attacked and burned because they were arsenals and priests handed out sub-machine guns to parishioners"; he also said discrimination in employment and allocation of public housing for Catholics existed because "they breed like rabbits and multiply like vermin".
In reference to the Ulster Unionist Party's Jewish candidate, Harold Smith, he said, "The Unionist party are boasting he (Harold Smith) is a Jew. As a Jew, he rejects our Lord Jesus, the New Testament, Protestant principles, the Glorious Reformation and the sanctity of the Lord's day. The Protestant throne and the Protestant constitution are nothing to him."
In 1968, in a heated debate with the fierce Republican Bernadette Devlin, he responded to her accusations of his hypocrisy by saying he, "would rather be British than be fair."
During a visit from the Pope, Ian Paisley yelled "I denounce you, Anti-Christ!" several times at the European Parliament. The whole affair can be heard on sermonaudio.com
"We are not prepared to stand idly by and be murdered in our beds."
"Save Ulster from sodomy!" - Paisley's slogan in a 1970s and 80s campaign against legalising homosexuality.
Addressing a crowd at Loughgall; "I am anti-Roman Catholic, but God being my judge, I love the poor dupes who are ground down under that system."
"The Provisional IRA is the military wing of the Roman Catholic Church.
Describing the then head of the Catholic Church in Ireland, Tomás Ó Fiaich; "The IRA's bishop from Crossmaglen."
"I would never repudiate the fact that I am an Irishman."
"Ulster Resistance is not for the faint or half hearted and we will use all means which are deemed necessary to defeat the Agreement." Ulster Resistance rally, Belfast, November 1986

Quotes about him

"No constituency which gives its political support to such a leader as Paisley possesses a plausible vision of its own future. We are witnessing the last writhings of a society left beached by the march of history." - Max Hastings in The Guardian, September 15, 2005 [5]

Theology

External links

References

Steve Bruce, God save Ulster! The religion and politics of Paisleyism. Oxford: Clarendon Press. 1986.
Dennis Cooke, Persecuting Zeal: a portrait of Ian Paisley, Brandon Books, 1996.
Martin Dillon, God and the Gun, Orion Books, London.
Martha Abele Mac Iver, "Ian Paisley and the Reformed Tradition", Political Studies, September 1987.
Ed Moloney & Andy Pollak, Paisley, Poolbeg Press, 1986.
Rhonda Paisley, Ian Paisley: My Father, Marshall Pickering, 1988.
Clifford Smyth, Ian Paisley: Voice of Protestant Ulster. Edinburgh: Scottish Academic, 1987.