The Irish Voted. The Treaty Lost. That’s Democracy.

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Safehouse
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Distrust of Politicians and EU Agenda?


LETTERS

Published: June 21, 2008


To the Editor:


Ireland has indeed benefited greatly from the European Union. But as a full member of the union, Ireland is entitled to judge the Lisbon Treaty on its merits and to reject it if necessary.

During the referendum campaign, the political class in Ireland did not propose one positive reason why voters should accept this treaty, repeating only that “the Lisbon Treaty is essential.”

As for using the referendum to kick “unresponsive politicians,” it is reasonable to do this when leading politicians were recommending a treaty that they admitted they had not read completely themselves.

If it is unconscionable for the Irish to exercise their sovereign legal and political rights, then Mr. Cohen’s claim that Europe is “whole and free” must ring hollow.

Joseph Keogh
Balbriggan, Ireland, June 19, 2008


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To the Editor:

An American resident in Ireland for eight years, I, too, voted “no” on the Lisbon Treaty because the treaty was the most turgid, opaque, endless and incomprehensible sheaf of bureaucratic gobbledygook I have every attempted to read — the antithesis of the American Bill of Rights.

Does Roger Cohen want the European Union to have reduced representation for smaller states and ramped-up regulatory powers? Why?

And why aren’t other countries in the European Union allowing their citizens to enjoy a referendum on this turkey that has nothing to do with Turkey?

The prime minister of Ireland, Brian Cowen, who supported the treaty, confessed he had not read all of this miserably written document.

The Irish voted with proud thoughtfulness and independence of spirit. If an equivalent document had been proffered as the cornerstone of the United States, there would be no United States.

David Monagan
Cork, Ireland, June 19, 2008

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To the Editor:

The failure of the Lisbon Treaty is hardly the fault of the more than 862,000 Irish voters who exercised their democratic right in rejecting the treaty through a popular referendum.

European Union leaders are trending down a path where national sovereignty becomes subservient to a hyperstate that has the potential to create laws that run counter to the legal and constitutional traditions of a significant number of member states.

The “no” vote in Ireland should not be any more of a surprise than the rejection of a European constitution by Dutch and French voters in 2005 or the Czech Senate’s postponement of a vote on the Lisbon Treaty pending an opinion from the Czech Constitutional Court.

Given these trends, I wonder how many European Union member states would “ratify” the treaty if they allowed it to be put to a popular referendum.

Frank Costello
Washington, June 19, 2008

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To the Editor:

The Irish are very much in favor of the European Union, but the latest treaty would have taken substantial power away from smaller states like Ireland and concentrated more power in Brussels.

And while the political leadership of Ireland favored the treaty, many of those leaders admitted they had never read the treaty in full.

The people of Ireland are not the only ones who are against this treaty. The Irish just happen to be lucky enough to be the only nation in the European Union that allows its people to vote on such matters.

Until Europe’s leaders hear the voice of the people, the mission of true integration and democracy will forever be stalled.

Guthrie Alberts
Woodside, Queens, June 19, 2008

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To the Editor:

As one whose family originated in Ireland’s “beer-soaked backwater,” let me remind Roger Cohen that this tiny nation twice before refused invitations to join larger unions.

First, the Roman Empire. When it fell and Europe descended into darkness, Irish monks rose from the “muck” long enough to preserve the continent’s heritage in manuscripts of unsurpassed beauty.

Centuries later, Oliver Cromwell extended his bloody invitation to join the British Empire. Once again, the Celts were “ungrateful” enough to demur.

Ignoring all but the most recent past, Mr. Cohen upbraids the Irish for “narrow insularity” in rejecting a treaty that he himself describes as “impenetrable.” Perhaps this time Ireland should defer to the judgment of its betters?

If Mr. Cohen’s response to the Irish reflects the attitude of Europe at large, then let me answer the European Union with a phrase from America’s own policy toward my ancestors: “No Irish need apply.”

Rick Topper
Glenside, Pa., June 19, 2008

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To the Editor:

As a New Yorker living in Ireland, I disagree with Roger Cohen’s column criticizing the Irish “no” vote on the Lisbon Treaty. He suggests that the vote failed because of fear of “Polish plumbers,” Turkish membership in the European Union and a union “without borders and limits.”

The “Polish plumbers” comment is offensive to both Poles and Irish.

Mr. Cohen might at least have mentioned that the “no” campaign was very well organized and effective, while the government-backed “yes” campaign was vague, confusing and overconfident.

This vote was as much a referendum on the increasing power of the European Union as it was on the general level of trust the Irish people hold for their politicians.

Carol Ann Conlon
Dublin, June 19, 2008


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To the Editor:

Roger Cohen suggests that Ireland, a “beer-soaked backwater,” owes its recent success mainly to participation in the European Union project.

Ireland owes its success to several factors, among which are its low rate of corporate taxes, well-managed labor relations, an educated work force and, of course, its membership in the European Union.

Ireland joined the European Economic Community in 1973, 15 years after it began a visionary program for economic expansion that radically altered Ireland’s global economic posture and laid the foundation for its recent success.

The rejection of the Lisbon Treaty was not an example of “narrow insularity” nor a demonstration of “the worst of little-Englandism.” The reasons the Irish people rejected the treaty do not include some perverse post-colonial neurosis.

Patrick Mair
New York, June 19, 2008

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To the Editor:

Roger Cohen’s column did not change my views on the Lisbon Treaty. I am still completely confused.

Mr. Cohen offered no convincing argument for why Irish voters should have approved the treaty, but instead attacked their character, portraying the electorate as isolationist ingrates who don’t know what’s good for them.

I am British, with Irish roots. I know that Europeans feel conflicted about an empowered European Union, because they see the best and worst of American federalism.

When the United States protects minority rights and local laboratories of democracy, Europe envies America. When it tramples the rights of states to innovate freely within their borders, Europe justly recoils.

Whenever my faith in the American union recedes, I read the Federalist Papers and marvel at the possibilities for your form of government, and the persuasive power of Alexander Hamilton and James Madison that helped create it. Europeans need a similarly convincing masterpiece to make this leap into the unknown.

Tom Cowell
Brooklyn, June 19, 2008

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To the Editor:

I agree with most of what Roger Cohen wrote in his June 19 column. As someone who has traveled to Ireland repeatedly since the 1970s, I have witnessed firsthand what participation in the European Union did for that country.

I object, however, to Mr. Cohen’s description of Ireland as a former “beer-soaked backwater.” Depiction of the Irish as drunks was a racist weapon of the English. His use of these words plays into the worst of anti-Irish stereotypes.

Stephen Casey
Ossining, N.Y., June 19, 2008


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To the Editor:

Even were I not of Irish heritage, I would be deeply offended by Roger Cohen’s characterization of the Irish as residents of a former “beer-soaked backwater” who are “ungrateful” for “enormous E.U. farm subsidies, access for foreign investors to the E.U. market, and the liberation from a Britain complex.”

Wherever the European Union has brought its farm subsidies and other illusory benefits, it has eradicated local, unique, diverse cultures in favor of an imposed lock-step conformity.

In the arena of agriculture, Poland, a new member state, is the latest victim of the union’s rigid, top-down dictates.

As reported by The Times, Poland’s 1.5 million small traditional farms are now threatened by the European Union-enabled expansion of industrial-agriculture giants like the pork producer Smithfield Farms (“Old Ways, New Pain for Farms in Poland,” news article, April 4).

Rather than being, as Mr. Cohen calls them, “ungrateful” for the European Union’s debilitating subsidies, perhaps the Irish are in the vanguard of a hopeful wresting of local control back from a distant, parasitic, tax-financed bureaucracy.

Mary-Louise Zanoni
Canton, N.Y., June 19, 2008

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beer now
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