Madam, - It was disappointing, though not surprising, to read Micheál Mac Donnacha's attempt to "contextualise" Arthur Griffith's commitment to non-violent politics (December 1st).
I assume he was trying to establish a direct link between the Sinn Féin party founded by Griffith in 1905 and the current holders of the franchise - who, as we all know, wholeheartedly endorsed the bloody, politically futile 30-year campaign of violence directed by the Army Council of the Provisional IRA.
In relation to the 1904 Griffith quotation, taken by Mr Mac Donnacha from Griffith's United Irishman newspaper, on the right of the Irish nation to engage in armed resistance against the British, it is worth recalling that the Provisional IRA campaign of violence was opposed by the vast majority of the Irish nation, as shown by the lack of electoral support for Provisional Sinn Féin throughout the Troubles.
At a personal level, Arthur Griffith was primarily responsible for the effective functioning of the first and second Dáils, in the midst of the turbulent War of Independence. His record of achievement stands in stark contrast to that of Provisional Sinn Féin. This political party doesn't sit at the House of Commons, yet claims over £500,000 sterling in expenses annually, and shares responsibility,with the DUP for the ongoing suspension of the Stormont Assembly. Ideologically dormant during what the Provisional movement describes as the "struggle", Provisional Sinn Féin only ever acted as a doormat for the Army Council of the Provisional IRA.
Furthermore, Mr Mac Donnacha, in his "contextualising", omits the fact of Griffith's non-membership of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, unlike most of the other senior figures of the War of Independence. How does this compare with the the curriculum vitae of a senior Provisional figure such as Gerry Adams, who has never admitted to his decades-long membership of the Army Council of the Provisional IRA?
In several critical respects, therefore, Arthur Griffith had little in common with Gerry Adams, other than facial hair. - Yours, etc,
Cllr BRIAN GILLEN, (Fine Gael, Dublin South-East), Leicester Avenue, Dublin 6.