THE SDLP Leader, Mr John Hume, was quintessentially a man of government but except for a very short period there had been no opportunity for him to show what he could do in power, Senator Joseph Lee said last night.
The Independent senator and professor of history was launching Personal Views Politics, Peace and Reconciliation in Ireland, a collection of writings by Mr Hume published by the Dublin company, Town House. The publication has an introduction by Mr Douglas Gageby, former editor of The Irish Times, and a foreword by Senator Edward Kennedy.
Present for the launch at Dublin Castle were the Minister for Health, Mr Noonan Ministers of State Mr Austin Currie, Ms Joan Burton and Mr Bernard Durkan the Fianna Fail leader, Mr Bertie Ahern his party colleague, Dr James McDaid and the US Ambassador, Mrs Jean Kennedy Smith.
Others present included Mr Sean Donlon, special adviser to the Taoiseach Mr James Tansley, first secretary, British Embassy Mr Joe Mulholland of RTE Professor Enda McDonagh the writer and Irish Times columnist John Waters and musicians Kathleen Watkins and John O'Conor.
In the book, Mr Hume recalls his childhood and upbringing in Derry and he traces the development of his political philosophy throughout the Troubles.
Senator Lee said Irish leaders had not been short of physical courage, but moral courage, such as John Hume possessed, was a much scarcer quality.
He said he felt a "sense of sadness" for the John Hume who had been lost to Ireland because Hume was quintessentially a man of government. The SDLP had of necessity been a party of opposition and it must be extraordinarily frustrating for many of the ablest people in Irish public life to be condemned to opposition.
Mr Hume had stressed time and again that even if there could be a military solution or "victory" for Irish nationalism one should not seek in principle to go in that direction. He had refused to contemplate the possibility of one ascendancy superseding another.