Ronald Reagan had, in effect, invited himself to Ireland in 1984, the US election year, writes Joe Carroll
The visit of President Reagan and his wife, Nancy, to Ireland in June 1984, far from being a Kennedyesque celebration of an Irish emigrant family made good, was in the words of the then Taoiseach, Garret FitzGerald, "rather nerve-wracking". This was because of the widespread anti-American feelings generated by Reagan's policies in Central America. Irish missionaries and aid workers in El Salvador and Guatemala were bringing back harrowing accounts of murder and torture by the security forces, which were backed by a Reagan administration obsessed by what it saw as a Communist threat in the US's backyard.
Likewise, there was resentment in Ireland at the way the US was covertly supporting the right-wing Contras in their armed rebellion against the democratically elected socialist government of the Sandanistas in Nicaragua. Reagan had in effect invited himself to Ireland in a US election year.
Bishop Eamonn Casey, who was a frequent visitor to Central America in his role as chairman of Trócaire, the hierarchy's Third World development agency, was the most outspoken critic. He was especially angry that Reagan would be coming to Galway to receive the freedom of the city and an honorary degree from the city's university. The biggest anti-Reagan demonstrations were planned for Galway around the university. In an interview with me on the day of the conferring, Bishop Casey said he was refusing to attend the ceremonies "out of solidarity with the oppressed people in Central America and the Third World". Prompted by him, other bishops intended to boycott any ceremonies they might be invited to, while not admitting that this was the plan. Both Cardinal Ó Fiaich and Archbishop Dermot Ryan arranged to be out of the country and so could not attend the official dinner in Dublin Castle. Other bishops who were on the governing body of Galway university also absented themselves from the conferring ceremony.
Dr FitzGerald was criticised by the protesters for putting pressure on the university to award Reagan the degree. In his memoirs seven years later he explained that the pressure had come on him from the university and "I felt I must respond positively". The ceremonies in Galway passed off without violent confrontations. The protesters kept to their allotted section.
The security regime imposed by the US secret service was more heavy-handed than for the visits of Presidents Kennedy and Nixon. But then Reagan had already survived an assassination attempt and the armed security men were taking no chances.
There was a scramble to get Reagan and his party out of Galway and back to Ashford Castle by helicopters. Peter Barry, who was then foreign minister, had lingered to shake hands and was left behind. He had to travel by car. He was not pleased and his wrath was long remembered in the Department as a warning to "never leave your Minister behind". Peter Barry had tried to get Reagan to attend the Munster hurling semi-final between Cork and Limerick but the security men would not hear of it. "What if they rushed the field?" asked one of them.
Officials privately believed that the security being demanded for the Reagan visit was over the top. One senior official recalled with disbelief that if Reagan could not travel to Ballyporeen from Ashford Castle by helicopter because of fog and had to go by road, the secret service demanded that "every crossroads" on his route be manned by gardaí and all manholes be sealed.
Reagan's address to a joint session of the Dáil and Seanad had nothing of the emotional rhetoric of the John F. Kennedy occasion. The most memorable part was the planned walk-out by the two Workers' Party deputies, Tomás MacGiolla and Proinsias De Rossa, and Independent Tony Gregory. Reagan had been tipped off that it would happen and handled it with his usual good humour.
The State dinner in Dublin Castle went off well and Garret FitzGerald managed to get in some indirect criticism of US policy in Central America, apparently without offending Reagan. Bishop Casey sent Dr FitzGerald a "warm telegram" of appreciation.
Gemma Hussey, then minister for education, was flattered when Reagan referred to her work in the area when they were introduced but "Nancy just shook my hand glacially". In her cabinet diaries, At the Cutting Edge, she summed up the visit: "The whole Reagan weekend has been odd. A mixture of television success, worries about demonstrations, Garret performing extraordinarily well, security gone mad, sentimentality and commercialism in Ballyporeen, which was a bit embarrassing."
Joe Carroll is a former Washington correspondent of The Irish Times.