APH
By Aggie Qualter
Source: Contact Magazine 1981
It was said many times from public platforms that emigration was the curse of the nation. Taking into account the loss, sadness and mental anguish suffered by those left behind, I agree to some extent with the statement, but when we consider the economic conditions of the time, we must face reality and ask ourselves was emigration a curse, or a blessing in disguise?
After the Famine
The floodgates of emigration opened from this country after the potato famine. Our people took flight from death, starvation and colonial oppression. They set sail to Australia, Canada and Newfoundland to any country offering them refuge, but America was the land of their choice. They went in their hundreds of thousands.
It was only in recent decades that our emigrants went to England to swell the great labour army of Britain. Their going released the economic and social pressures at home.
By 1860, emigration to America was at its highest and continued right into the 1920s. The Irish entered the New World without money or education, broken in mind and body – a shattered people. The Irish image in the world outside was then poor. They had no status, and were on the same status as the Negroes, but they had the courage and determination of the Irish, a willingness to work at the most menial jobs and a firm resolve to succeed.
Soon they proved their worth. They moved up the ladder of success, won respect throughout the land, educated themselves and their families, and finally won fame and renown. Today, the names of second and third generation Irish are written across the world’s horizon. We have names like Kennedy, Kelly, Dwyer, Fulton-Sheehan, O’Neill, Moynihan – to mention but a few.
Our Missionaries
Our missionaries have gone in their thousands to far off lands, bringing with them the Irish Christian influence. One from our own parish is Cardinal Terence Cooke of New York – a man who has his humble rural roots at Shudane. He was mothered, reared, guided and influenced by the simple country girl, Mary Gannon, from the same area.
The great Irish nation in America has sprung from the emigration of the mid-19th century, a period which covers the most tragic pages of Ireland’s history. Today, the Irish vote, estimated at 25 million, is the most coveted, forceful power within the American political structures. The dollars sent back by our emigrants in the dark days kept the survivors alive and helped them keep their little homes together. These are some of the blessings with flowed to the homeland.
Scrap Heap or Dole Queue
Recent statistics have revealed that our unemployed numbers almost 130 thousand – this with our school-leavers coming onto the work market in increasing numbers each year – poses a serious problem for our Government. Will our educated youth accept that their fate is to be consigned to the scrap heap of the dole queue? Such a policy would have serious social repercussions. Would not it be a great blessing if any country absorbed them in meaningful secure work until the wind of recession spins itself out?
The tragedy now is that the pattern of emigration has completely reversed. All countries have closed their doors to outsiders, all having their own internal problems. We are now a country with an increasing population and nearly a thousand million pounds in debt; and EEC with seven million unemployed – a figure that will reach twelve million within a decade (or so they tell us) and to crown it all, an oil find in the porcupine that new looks like ‘pie in the sky’ – not a rosy picture for the future.
The questions which now arise are:
Is the government prepared to implement harsh but necessary measures?
Is the nation prepared to cut her cloth according to measure?
Will the people turn back from the path of squander mania which they new follow?
Will the government curtail the special allowances to the rich? (Double Children’s Allowance).
How about the 5% who cream for the nation?
Five million from the banks was just a mere pittance. Let the government create the work, but also get rid of the drones – one worker carrying two drones is just not good enough. Conservation of energy is a must.
1981s education geared to fit children for life – and education suited to the needs of our society?
At the heel of the hunt, it is only the people, by hard work and sacrifice, who can build prosperity for the nation. Can we succeed? Of course we can, depending on our willingness to try hard and to persevere. The testing time is NOW.
