An important day in the calendar of constitutional nationalism on this island will be marked when Mr Seamus Mallon steps down as deputy leader of the SDLP. The proud man from Markethill, who has operated at the coalface of the Northern conflict for almost 40 years, relinquished the reins of power to the new Deputy First Minister, Mr Mark Durkan, earlier this week. He will formally retire from the SDLP leadership at the party's annual conference in Newcastle today.
A former teacher and Gaelic footballer from Co Armagh, Mr Mallon has played a pivotal role in the evolution of the political landscape in Northern Ireland. He has served his party at each and every parliamentary forum presented over the years - including the Seanad and the nationalist forerunner to the Anglo-Irish Agreement, the New Ireland Forum. He has given distinguished service to the SDLP since he became deputy leader to John Hume in 1979. As Justice spokesman, he has been the party's standard-bearer on the need for reform of the policing system for close on two decades.
He first came to prominence in Northern politics as chairman of the Mid-Armagh Anti-Discrimination Committee in 1963 and in the civil rights campaign later that decade. He tried on three occasions in 1974, 1979 and 1983 to win a seat in the Westminster elections. A glorious day for Northern nationalism was recorded in January 1986, when he unseated Mr Jim Nicholson of the Ulster Unionist Party in a by-election. Seamus Mallon, MP for Newry and Armagh, had come unto his own.
While John Hume won glamour for the SDLP on the international stage, Seamus Mallon led the grassroots of the party for most of his career. In the stagnant years of nationalist estrangement from the political system in Northern Ireland, he was the foot soldier on the ground.
His dominant characteristic throughout all those painful years fighting for parity of esteem was that he was a man who called a spade a shovel. He was known by his opponents to honour any deal done. He was the greenest nationalist politician in public life on this island and, to his great credit in the IRA cock-pit of Armagh, remained unflinching in his devotion to non-violence to the end.