Postulación del Proceso

The practice of parading changed a great deal in the first half of the 19th century. From the isolated Twelfth of July parades in the late 1790s organised by the nascent Orange Order, an extensive range of annual commemorations were established marking a number of ideologically distinct and separate anniversaries across the whole of the north of Ireland. Although the banners and flags of the parading orders did not vary much in time or space, the introduction of Orange arches was an innovation which continued to be developed over the years, although still predominately based on short lived floral displays. Arches were as transitory and ephemeral as the parades themselves and often generated as much reaction, especially when erected in communal areas. But a major part of the Orange ethos, then as now, was to claim rights of access and dominance to the communal spaces across the province. The expression of specific and focused ideas and ideals through visual display still remained undeveloped in the 1860s.

The parades followed a regular, cyclical pattern. Peaceful displays increased in scale until they provoked an aggressive response from the "other party". There then followed a period of escalating violence before the state banned or attempted to ban all parades. This was usually only partially successful and bans were only obeyed where absolutely necessary. When the ban was allowed to lapse, the cycle began again. These cycles of rising violence coincide loosely with the larger themes of early 19th century political life in Ireland, that is with the events recorded in the history books. The early clashes at parades occurred at a time of rising Catholic political expectations in the years between 1810 and 1813, but the major escalation of violence after 1818 began before the next constitutional movement, the Repeal campaign was launched in 1823. After this there was a reduction in

random Ribbon violence and a greater emphasis on formal parades. It was during this period of Repeal agitation that the major florescence of Orange parades and displays occurred across the north, as the Orangemen reacted to O'Connell's campaign by marching more often, in more places and with more people. While the threat of violence remained as an undercurrent (Wright 1987), the parades were expanded as local expressions of power and dominance, but ones which needed constant re-affirmation. A large parade could only ever be a temporary and localised display of strength, and with a constant background of uncertainty, both political and economic, one response was to mark more anniversaries by taking to the roads. This growing culture of parading also served both to build more connections between people and places of similar faith,but at the same time intensify the social distance from those of the other faith. Commemorative parades thereby helped to consolidate the sense of difference and distinctiveness between Protestants and Catholics. For a time the Freemasons appeared to bridge the divide but ultimately the march to polarisation was too strong.

Nor was the state, either through policing or through the law, able to contain the importance of public displays of faith. The 1832 law was reasonably successful in constraining major violent outbreaks but not the parades themselves, but it was the commemorative displays of identity that were most insistently marked. National politics such as O'Connell's Repeal Campaign of the early 1840s generated less passion than the marching season. When they were legalised after 17 years, parades and displays flourished through the worst of the famine years. The anniversaries were celebrated more energetically than ever and almost immediately provoked a descent into riotous behaviour. Although the worst of the clashes were fought a few months after the failure of the Young Irishmen rising in 1849, there is little to suggest a connection.

Throughout all these upheavals the major consideration of the nationalist movements whether the Catholic Association, the Repeal Association or the Young Irishmen was the attempt to mobilise Catholic opinion and, through that, to alter the relations between Ireland and Britain. Ulster was of marginal importance on the political stage, it was relegated to the wings as the major tactical plays were made between Dublin and London. But, at the same time as the north east corner of Ireland was realigning itself as part of the growing industrialised society, so the northern Protestants confirmed their dominance in the public life of the region. The changing nature of the displays and parades can only partly be explained in conjunction with major political and economic events of the time: the participants responded to these changes but were not determined or bound by them. But nor were the Orangemen the simple agents of the landlords that Wright (1987) implies, although they often shared a common agenda. Orangemen, Ribbonmen and Freemasons largely fought out their battles on the smaller arena of local disputes, of rights to walk and dominate a local public arena. As such they remained largely outside of the influence of the respectable members of society. Local authority and the law seemed unable to control or direct the energies of the lower classes to their agendas.

The events documented above appear largely unpoliticised in relation to outside events and matters of state, but parades, and the attendant displays, steadily became one of the major expressions of lower class socio-political aspirations. Sectarianism emerged as a major factor in Ulster life in the early 19th century. In the 1780s and 90s it had been mapped out by sporadic violence and nocturnal raiding and was acted out on the margins of society. By the 1840s the sectarian division had become openly celebrated, structured and clarified by the ritual ceremony of commemorative parades. In the 1780s King William and Hibernia, the crowned harp and the shamrock could still be

displayed as diverse facets of a single movement, while St Patrick could treated as a national symbol. Fifty years later this was no longer possible, these symbols signified opposing political desires. But the sectarian division of Ulster society was by no means a foregone conclusion: the evidence of the Freemasons suggests alternative possibilities, that a third path was still open even after the violence of 1798. When the parades were once more legalised after 1870 it was in large part as a result of populist politicians recognising the potential of Orange and Ribbon societies as popular mass movements in support of the national debates. The third path had disappeared.

PART ONE, CHAPTER 4.