Mála Poist

The courage of the incarcerated

A Chairde,

I work freelance and am up before dawn each day to make the most of the quiet before the phone rings.I often look at the An Phoblacht website, which gets better and better.

The death of Joe Cahill comes at such a significant time for Sinn Féin. Back in the 1940s, he would never have dreamt he would live to see the huge expansion of the party in the whole of Ireland.

On reflection, even ten years ago those of us engaged in 'the struggle' in England would have laughed sardonically if someone had told us we would live to see Sinn Féin, a proscribed and vilified party, rise like the phoenix. We worked hard but had no real sense that all our campaigning, collecting, demonstrating and public meetings would achieve much beyond informing the few who would listen and making ourselves a nuisance to the establishment. All we knew is that we had to carry on, regardless of the huge obstacles and the permanent feeling of not getting anywhere.

We didn't have a community around us like that of West Belfast. We were individuals out on a limb who came together to campaign and debate, often courting the suspicion and disapproval of those close to us, with our phones tapped. All rather nerve-racking.

Whenever I felt despondent, I used to survey the list of POWs (many of whom I knew) blu-tacked to the inside of the kitchen door, and drew encouragement from them. It seemed to me that if they and their families were courageous enough to face life sentences for a cause, which was true and right, then I and my friends could 'go on' too.

None of us could have dreamt, even ten years ago, what was just around the corner on the political scene, The Downing Street Declaration, the Good Friday Agreement, the revelations about collusion and corruption which confirmed what republicans had been saying for years.

We have lived to see the breakthrough, so did Joe Cahill, but let us not forget all those who didn't but were not deterred. We should constantly keep before our eyes that nothing Sinn Féin has achieved today would have been possible without the breathtaking courage of all those incarcerated down the years for the cause of an independent and united Ireland. For them it would have felt like a dream to be achieved by a distant generation.

We must never forget them, for it is their courage and sacrifice alone that forms the bedrock upon which Sinn Féin is founded, and which continue to inspire its dynamic politics today.

Moya St Leger,

Connolly Association.

London, England

Joe Cahill never bent the knee

A Chairde,

I'll miss Joe.

I always considered him a friend. Whether I asked for it or not, Joe always gave me good advice. And I always took it.

I've been reading a lot of the news stories about Joe. One BBC news headline read, "Cahill's life was like a Hollywood movie". Well, I hope some day they do make a movie about Joe's life. An honest one.

But Uncle Joe's life was not a Hollywood movie. Joe's life was reality. It was the harsh reality of living under British imperialism.

Joe lived through it all. The discrimination, harassment, demonisation, the pogroms, internment, juryless courts and prison. Just as all nationalists did in the North. But we're stronger today because of people like Joe who fought back. However, the fundamental reality has changed little. Under the guise of fighting "terrorism" the imperialists can implement internment and the Diplock Court system again at any time. These laws are still on the books. Joe fought to put an end to these injustices.

Joe fought against them every day of his life. He was a lifelong revolutionary and enjoyed every minute of it. He loved getting one over on the bosses, whether they were the heads of factories or countries. When he came over in 1998 he told everybody at the meetings he addressed: "Imagine, a convicted murderer walking the halls of Stormont and getting a visa to enter the country from the president of the United States himself."

But what impressed me most about Joe was that he never lost his class consciousness. Joe knew that the enemy of a united Ireland was not another religious organisation but the system that kept the North of Ireland a colonial state for so long.

Joe grew up in a working-class neighborhood in Belfast, worked as a printer and later a joiner. The Outdoor Relief Riots of the '30s where thousands of nationalists and Protestants went on strike together made a big impression on him. He also worked in the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast, where it was almost impossible for nationalists and Catholics to find work.

Joe's co-workers knew he was a Catholic and didn't even mind when his picture turned up in the newspaper at an Easter Commemoration. That shows the solidarity he had built and the respect he won from his co-workers.

Although he escaped the noose of the British hangman, it was that job that gave him the asbestosis that finally killed him. And even just a few months ago, he fought, along with his co-workers, in a lawsuit against the shipyard for exposing them to asbestos and successfully won that fight.

Joe fought against the system that was trying to divide the working people of Ireland on religious lines till the day he died.

I recently read that a US reporter had once asked Joe why he didn't wear neckties. Joe just winked and said: "Nothing goes around my neck." Which reminded me of a quote from Bobby Sands, who said: "You cannot put a rope around the neck of an idea."

Nowadays, when anyone who stands up to injustice is called a terrorist. The best thing we can do is to follow Joe's example and never bend our knee to imperialism — be it British or American — anywhere around the globe. And if we can have a laugh while we do it, well, Joe would like that too.

Larry Quinn

Socialist Workers' Party, USA,

Former editor, the

Irish People newspaper.