‘A Protestant parliament for a Protestant people’?
Published in 20th-century / Contemporary History, Issue 4 (Jul/Aug 2008), Letters, Letters, Northern Ireland 1920 - present, Volume 16Sir,
—Niall Meehan has two errors in his letter on James Craig (HI 16.3,May/June 2008). He says that in my own letter in the previous edition Iquoted the historian Jonathan Bardon as saying that Craig was no bigot.In fact, I did not even mention Bardon. I did, however, refer toPatrick Buckland’s remarks in his biography of Craig. Mr Meehan alsosays that I did not identify any original sources for the Craigquotation I used. I gave the title, publisher and date of Buckland’sbiography, and twice pointed out that he drew on Stormont House ofCommons records. My original letter was prompted by an earlier articlemisquoting Craig, which I had sought to correct. I referred to apassage from Buckland’s book, which quotes Craig comparing the southern‘Catholic State’ with the northern ‘Protestant Parliament andProtestant State’. Unfortunately, the paragraph in my letter in which Igave the date—April 1934—was removed by the editor for reasons oflimited editorial space.
—Yours etc.,
JOHN DRAPER
London
