Talk:Seán MacBride

Prizes
Nelson Mandela also won both the Nobel and Lenin prizes. &mdash;Fleminra 07:44, Jun 6, 2004 (UTC)

"...joined the Irish Volunteers..."
Were they the Volunteers or the IRA when he joined them? I believe the Volunteers became the IRA in 1916, so if he joined the Volunteers it would have been at a very young age. --Ryano 11:48, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

IRA Abwehr WW2
Hello, MacBride was working with German intelligence in WW2. Some details IRA Abwehr World War II Fluffy999 18:09, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

From Sean McBride, duplicate article, now redirect

 * Sean McBride was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his life's work in 1974. He also received the Lenin Peace Prize in 1977. When he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1974 he was described as a man who "mobilised the conscience of the world in the fight against injustice."
 * In 1961 he was elected President of the International Board of Amnesty International, a post he held for the next 14 years, campaigning vigorously against persecution, intolerance and injustice.
 * He was also elected to serve as Secretary-General of the International Commission of Jurists between 1963 and 1970, during which time he created - and chaired - a joint committee for the various non-governmental organisations championing the cause of human rights. Appropriately this committee was set up in 1968 - the UN International year for Human Rights. Following this, he was also elected Chair (1968-1974) and later President(1974-1985) of the International Peace Bureau.
 * In 1973 he was elected by the General Assembly of the United Nations to the post of UN Commissioner for Namibia with the rank of Assistant Secretary-General of the United Nations - a fitting position for one who had worked tirelessly to ensure peace and protection for peoples the world over.
 * Sean McBride was born to Irish parents in Paris on 26 January 1904. Growing up with his mother in France, he returned to Ireland after his father was executed for his part in the 1916 Easter Rising - the Irish rebellion against British rule. As a young man MacBride faced the full anguish and horror of a country struggling for its independence. He became active in the independence movement and was imprisoned on several occasions as a result. His experiences were to prove an enduring influence on his future work.
 * After the Second World War, MacBride started a political party, Clann na Poblachta, and was elected to the Irish parliament - the Dáil Éireann - in 1947. The following year, 11 Clann na Poblachta representatives were elected and MacBride became the Minister for External Affairs, a post he was holding when the Council of Europe was drafting the European Convention on Human Rights.
 * This aim of the Convention was to guarantee international protection of human rights. MacBride served as President of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe from 1949-1950 and is credited with being a key force in securing the acceptance of this convention, which was finally signed in Rome on November 4, 1950. His passionate commitment to the rights enshrined by the Convention meant that he continued to devote his life to the protection and promotion of fundamental human rights until his death in 1988, nearly forty years later.
 * As if being an architect of one of the greatest European human rights triumphs wasn't enough, the energy and compassion of Sean McBride allowed him to hold a number of key positions in the wider international sphere also - many of these at the same time.
 * Through his contributions to Amnesty International, the International Peace Bureau, the United Nations and the European Convention on Human Rights, Sean MacBride has left an enduring and remarkable legacy.
 * is work was both to campaign for, and to create structures that would allow, the universal protection of human rights in a peaceful world.

What is the "American Medal of Justice"?
Can anyone heldp? A google search reveals that the only person who is supposed to have received that Medal is Sean MacBride. No other name is mentioned in connection with that prize. Everyone seems to have copied from one and the same source (Wikipedia?). Two explanations: 1) this Medal is a joke and someone wanted to smuggle in something nice so as to counterbalance the Lenin Peace Prize. 2) the prize does exist and MacBride actually received it, but the official name is different. Any takers? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Special:Contributions/ (talk)

- In the book "coincidance" from Robert Anton Wilson is an Interview with McBride and it says that he got that Medal of Justice. -
 * http://unescoscience.blogspot.ie/2007/03/on-st-patricks-day-homage-to-sean.html says

'He later received the American Medal for Justice (1975) from President Carter and the UNESCO Silver Medal (1980).' It also tells us he's the most distinguished Irishman ever to work for UNESCO. I've posted the following Comment (which may or may not appear there): Why doesn't UNESCO educate its readers that Sean MacBride, Nobel and Lenin Peace Prize-winning former Chief of Staff of the IRA, Ireland's favourite bunch of terrorists/freedom fighters, was such a distinguished servant of Peace and Human Rights, that Jimmy Carter, US President 1977-1981, hired a Time Machine to go to award MacBride the American Medal for Justice in 1975 :)


 * The Official Nobel website (http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1974/macbride-cv.html) gives: Honours American Medal of Justice (1975).
 * http://www.judicialmonitor.org/archive_fall2009/leadingfigures.html gives it to him in 1978.
 * http://trumbull.aoh-laoh.com/aboutus.html has Carter giving it to him in 1978.
 * http://www.biography.com/people/se%C3%A1n-macbride-215216 tells us it was 1978.

Other searches of Google and Wikipedia yield nothing, suggesting it doesn't exist. I first remember it mentioned in an ad by some peace crowd calling on the world's governments to give 100 million dollars from their defence budgets for peace research. Me, I'll gladly save them 99 million by doing a spot of peace research for just one million :) At any rate it would seem the American Medal for Justice was invented to balance his Lenin Peace prize (which was real). Tlhslobus (talk) 04:41, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

On reflection it probably really was awarded to him - by some self-appointed bunch of peace activists :) Tlhslobus (talk) 04:52, 27 February 2013 (UTC)


 * The relevant US Government award is the Medal of Freedom that can be awarded for peace activism. But he is not on the List of Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients.78.17.53.134 (talk) 12:42, 11 June 2019 (UTC)

Nobel Prize images
see: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Infoboxes where a discussion on this subject has been initiated. --emerson7 17:57, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I appreciate the link to said discussion, emerson. However, nothing in that discussion justifies the deletion of the image.  The original deleting editor offered no explanation whatever, which is, to my mind, bad form. ---  RepublicanJacobite  The'FortyFive'  21:10, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Having read the discussion, I have to agree, nothing in that discussion justifies the deletion of the image.--Domer48 (talk) 17:19, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

McBride and NATO
"He was responsible for Ireland not joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO)." Not on his own, as there were many other politicians opposed to it in 1949, including his opponents.86.42.192.72 (talk) 08:30, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Correspondence between Irish and American politicians in the late 1940s shows that NATO did not need Ireland, in the new era of missiles, and did not want to pay to beef up the Irish military, but this was often misportrayed by Irish politicians as the result of their principled stand against the partition of Ireland. The reality was that Ireland wanted to join NATO but was politely rebuffed. MacBride's lifelong interest in ending partition was a convenient part of this charade.78.16.66.226 (talk) 09:02, 15 May 2020 (UTC)
 * No. There were no missiles to speak of in the late 1940s, and the Republic of Ireland could not accede to the North Atlantic Treaty because the Treaty forbids border disputes and the Republic maintained an illegal claim to Northern Ireland until the 1990s. It was nothing to do with MacBride, a man who never achieved anything in his life except to win fishy committee-awarded 'prizes' for over-remunerated sinecure roles that he gained by privilege. Khamba Tendal (talk) 19:28, 8 March 2024 (UTC)

Nobel icon debate
See the discussion at Nobel icon, where some editors are proposing to delete the Nobel icon. Please weigh in with your opinion!Utternutter (talk) 14:53, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

TfD nomination of Template:Nobel icon
Template:Nobel icon has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for Deletion page. Thank you. Utternutter (talk) 21:35, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 05:51, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

Dates as Chief of Staff of the IRA
The article says that he held that post from 24 April 1936 – 9 July 1939. However: -

1. It also says that "In 1937, MacBride was called to the bar. He then resigned from the IRA when the Constitution of Ireland was enacted later that year. "

2. Chief of Staff of the Irish Republican Army says that MacBride left that post in late 1936, citing "Seán MacBride That Day's Struggle. A Memoir, ed. Caitríona Lawlor, Dublin: Currach Press, 2005. ISBN 1-85607-929-5", but no page number.

3. Tom_Barry_(Irish_republican) says that "In 1937, he succeeded Seán MacBride as chief of staff."

4. 1937 is also the date given by the Dictionary of Irish Biography in its artilces on MacBride and Tom Barry.

I propose to amend both this article and Chief of Staff of the Irish Republican Army to say that he left that post in 1937.

Comments?

Alekksandr (talk) 22:22, 11 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Due to the clandestine nature of the IRA even the chronology of the position can be hard to trace, nevermind the exact dates, so I have no objection to logical deductions based on multiple sources.CeltBrowne (talk) 15:34, 12 October 2020 (UTC)