Irish Legal History Reception
Saloon, Provost's House, Trinity College
Friday, 15 February 2013
Chief Justice; President, Officers and Members of the Irish Legal History Society; distinguished guests; you are all very welcome.
Twenty-five years ago this week, this society was formally inaugurated, here in the Provost’s house at Number 1 Grafton Street, in the presence of the then Chief Justice of Ireland, the Honourable Mr. Justice Finlay, and of the Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland, the Right Honourable Lord Lowry. I’m delighted that Judge Finlay has honoured us tonight by returning for this celebration.
I would like to thank at the outset Dr Patrick Geoghegan for organising this reception, and for reminding me that the Society was inaugurated here on the 12th of February 1988, at a reception hosted by my predecessor, the late Provost Bill Watts.
The Society’s stated objective is to encourage the study of the history of Irish law, and to advance its study through annual lectures and publications. It has succeeded admirably in both objectives over the past quarter of a century.
One of the Society’s defining characteristics is that it brings together scholars and practitioners from both parts of the island of Ireland. This cross-border dimension has been one of its most significant contributions.
A driving force in the establishment of the society was Professor Niall Osborough. On the society’s tenth anniversary in 1998, he delivered the autumn discourse and admitted then that the programme of work he had devised ten years earlier would have kept the society busy until the year 2088. The impressive list of publications and of discourses over the past 25 years would, I think, be the envy of any Society.
From my point of view, the publications and discourses are invaluable since so many of them have a Trinity theme. It seems that Trinity staff and students have, in their diverse ways, helped shape the legal history of Ireland.
Fifteen years ago, in 1998, the late great R.B. McDowell, then a mere 85 years old, gave the spring discourse on “Edmund Burke and the Law”. R.B. quoted, with approval, Burke’s view of the law as
“a subject whose study carries no difficulty to those who already understand it – and no difficulty to those who will never understand it! But all those poor unfortunates caught between those two extremes will ‘have a hard task of it’.”
It seems probable that Burke cast himself as one of those “poor unfortunates” since, as we know, he didn’t get too far with his study of the law. However he did at least enrol in the Middle Temple in London, unlike his Trinity contemporary, Oliver Goldsmith, who was given £50 by his uncle to go to London to study law, but promptly lost the money, gambling in Dublin…
Goldsmith and Burke now have pride of place in the College, gazing out on College Green from the front of Regent House. You will also have passed replicas of those statues as you came up the stairs to this Saloon. This should not be taken as the College’s endorsement of their laxity towards legal studies!
In fact the house we’re standing in now was built 250 years ago by a Provost, Francis Andrews - also trained as a lawyer. His portrait hangs behind me here. And another distinguished ‘legal’ Provost was John Hely-Hutchinson, who was called to the Irish bar in 1748, and became Provost in 1774. This lawyer-Provost got off to a poor start – the Fellows reacted badly to an outsider coming in with no scholarly achievements and he was challenged to a number of duels. But he is now recognised for his achievements. He seems to have had an enviable talent for securing government endowments for professorships – and for building projects. So Trinity does rather well under Provosts from the legal world…
I should say that my knowledge of these Provosts comes from the Dictionary of Irish Biography, which I take great pleasure in consulting when I need to check up on past Trinity men and women – staff and students. The Dictionary is, of course, edited by another of your former presidents, James McGuire.
And this evening we’ve had the pleasure of hearing Daire Hogan, also a former president, deliver the spring discourse on James Campbell who as a Trinity student won the Hist’s gold medal for oratory in 1873 and went on to represent this university in parliament. According to the Dictionary of Irish Biography, in his last years Campbell spent ‘quite a lot of time and money on the tables at Monte Carlo, and on an attractive Spanish girl who numbered tennis among her accomplishments’ – and he didn’t leave enough money to cover the numerous bequests in his will…
I congratulate Daire on an excellent discourse, and I’m delighted that it had a Trinity theme. I’d also like to take this opportunity to acknowledge Daire’s and his firm’s contribution to Trinity’s newest professorship – the McCann FitzGerald Chair for Corporate Law.
If I may mention a final discourse – one of our recent Trinity graduates, the medieval historian Dr. Peter Crooks, delivered the spring discourse four years ago, in the Science Gallery, on "Reconstructing the Past: Later Medieval Ireland and the Irish Chancery Project". I had the great pleasure of launching last year the website of the Chancery Project, which is a tremendous online public resource, hosted on Trinity’s server.
In this, and in other projects to encourage the study of the history of Irish law, the Legal History Society’s and Trinity’s aims often dovetail. I know we will continue our mutual support and partnership.
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One of the great strengths of the Irish Legal History Society over the past twenty-five years is that it has acted as a bridge between North and South, creating a forum for the exchange of ideas and for co-operation on intellectual and scholarly pursuits.
We have always been proud that Trinity has served a similar purpose on this island. We have always seen ourselves as a university for the whole island, attracting students from all 32 counties. In fact in 1917, the Irish Convention, which was the last valiant attempt to hold the ‘centre’ together, was held here in Regent House, with the imperious figure of Provost Mahaffy making his presence felt. Since independence, Trinity has continued to act as a bridge between north and south, as well as a bridge between Ireland and Britain, a role made possible by our history and traditions.
Unfortunately in recent years we have seen a sharp decline in the numbers of students we admit from Northern Ireland. There are a number of reasons for this, and some of the problems have been of our own making. But under my provostship we have taken active steps to reverse this decline.
The College’s Senior Lecturer, Dr Patrick Geoghegan, who is also, of course, a vice-president of this Society, has recruited volunteer student ambassadors from every county on the island to encourage other students from their home areas to come to Trinity. You can see some of these student ambassadors make their case on Youtube.
We are also bringing forward policy changes, so that every student on this island, whether they do the Leaving Cert or A-Levels, is treated the same when they apply here. This represents part of our ongoing work to ensure that our research-inspired curriculum is made available to all those with the academic ability and potential to benefit from it. And it connects with our global strategy, spearheaded by another of your Council members, Jane Ohlmeyer, the university’s Vice-President for Global Relations.
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Speaking in 1998, Professor Osborough recognised the four qualities needed for success in the world of legal history: ‘skill, dedication, imagination, and perseverance’. They could serve as a suitable motto for this society, and they are indeed qualities I like to encourage in our students.
I congratulate the society on reaching this important anniversary – and in doing so in such style. I wish you all the best over the next twenty five years.
And I hope that you’ll invite me back to this house in 2038, when the society celebrates its 50th anniversary.
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