A Man Misjudged by Most: Why I Was Wrong About Albert Reynolds

If someone made a best-of list of Taoisigh, they could place Reynolds anywhere north of Bruton and south of Ahern.

Like most who wrote about Reynolds at the time, I probably would have pushed him further down.

The more perspective we get on this era, the clearer it becomes that Reynolds was misjudged by most of us and surpassed all of his contemporaries.

Such rankings are of course pointless. All epochs are characterized by an immeasurable spectrum of forces. It is hopelessly subjective to judge the impact of any of them – the work of whoever the Taoiseach is.

The “some money” Albert’s pal took out of his pocket was a thick roll of cash that would choke the proverbial horse: twenties, fifties, and bills of a color and denomination I was unfamiliar with.

He took out a couple of twenties and gave them to a young chap hanging around HQ and sent him off to a nearby shop.

If you write about politics for any length of time, you’re bound to get some things wrong. I’ve stopped counting my mistakes, but one stands out – Albert Reynolds.

Has there been a Taoiseach lately who has not missed his stated goals? Any Taoiseach that has exceeded expectations, including his own?

The record is not impressive.

Jack Lynch was Taoiseach when I got my first typewriter. Too many political journalists at the time saw politics as a choice between the Lynch faction and the Haughey faction of Fianna Fáil – and the media eventually turned staunchly against Haughey. So Lynch was portrayed as a soft-spoken saint.

Then he got a huge Dáil majority and didn’t know what to do with it. Eventually someone said to him and he scurried off, leaving the throne to Haughey – who was even worse.

Lynch didn’t really want to achieve anything – and he succeeded.

It was years before we understood the extent of his wrongdoing during the arms crisis.

The arms crisis was a small political maneuver that went spectacularly wrong. Fianna Fáil’s sham republicanism clashed with the reality of a northern state crumbling under the weight of its own contradictions.

Because of the gun crisis, Haughey was said to have “a whiff of gunpowder about him” for years — an undeserved celebrity. The only whiff some of us got from Haughey was plain old Eau de Corruption.

Haughey was a thief and a liar – the evidence, carefully examined by Justices Moriarty and McCracken, proved that beyond doubt.

Fianna Fáil and the establishment sneaking up on Haughey knew the score but pretended not to.

Haughey has never hidden his wealth. He owned a villa in Dublin, bought an island off the west coast and built another villa there. He had as many horses and helicopters as the average sheikh and a yacht to sail to his island.

All this on the salary of a Taoiseach. He scoffed at Vincent Browne’s questions about where the wealth came from, and political correspondents laughed at his jokes.

As a young minister in the 1960s, Haughey was imaginative and committed to reform. As a Taoiseach in the 1980s, he was an aspiring chancellor. The political corner boys he rallied around him gave Fianna Fáil a well-deserved reputation for smut that will never fade.

One of the prominent chancellors – now dead, let’s omit his name – was a notorious shakedown artist. Do you want to do business here? I have ministers in my pocket. Cut me in, I’ll clear the way for you. Cut me out, watch the ground crumble beneath you.

When an Oireachtas ethics committee needed a candidate, guess who Fianna Fáil suggested as their guardian of integrity? Yes, Mr Shakedown.

In a series of elections, Fine Gael’s Haughey and Garret FitzGerald alternated as Taoiseach. While Haughey was clearly a crook, there was never a hint that FitzGerald would even think to pocket change. He was full of ideas about a liberal, secular society, but when the bishops barked, FitzGerald was in step with Haughey. Together, they devised the amendment that brought the Catholic Church’s abortion law into the constitution for decades.

So the political choice fell on an ineffective Fine Gael Liberal and a spectacularly corrupt Fianna Fáil Chancellor – ah, the good old days!

When Albert Reynolds succeeded the disgraced Haughey, few of us doubted that he too was a chancellor. First of all, there were stories that accompanied him from his time as a successful businessman in the west.

My favorite was the supposedly highly insured commercial building when it caught fire. I have no idea if the story was true, but it had a great punch line in the nickname by which Albert was remembered in certain circles – “Ronson Reynolds” (Ronson was a well-known brand of lighters).

Reynolds was continued by Haughey. His successor was Bertie Ahern, who ended up on the witness stand in a court of inquiry. While there, Ahern tried to explain how various deposits, including pounds sterling and dollars, got into his bank account, to no avail.

Reynolds has done an excellent job as communications secretary. Ireland’s telephone system was notoriously unreliable – a stumbling block for investors. Reynolds went to Hyannis Port and used one of the Kennedys to get a meeting with a top executive at AT&T, the leading US phone company. He pumped the AT&T folks for any information he needed about the new digital technology that was then on its way. He then left AT&T in favor of more technically advanced French and Swedish companies.

The move transformed our phone system, bringing it up to date with the latest technology and laying the foundation for telecommunications for the huge surge in foreign investment that followed.

Reynolds proved to be an essential cog in the process of the Belfast Peace Accords.

He believed, based on his own contacts, that the English – militarily and politically – had come to the conclusion that they could not defeat the IRA, and based on his own contacts that the IRA had realized they would not be displacing the British Army. John Hume tried to get everyone to draw the obvious conclusion.

There was a determination in the Irish establishment to inflict a moral defeat on the IRA. When the ceasefire came, there were demands that the IRA should immediately hand over their arms to the nearest Garda station and turn themselves in.

Reynolds knew this was fantasy stuff and an opportunity for peace could be missed. He had been preaching all along: Retiring guns was the last step. Morale victories are fine, but not at the cost of prolonging the bloodshed.

In an interview with American researchers, he spoke about his persistent – and successful – argument for decommissioning: “Last, not first; last, not first; not at last—”

Reynolds was a conservative Fianna Fáiler. He wasn’t averse to strokes. Noel Hanlon, his bankroll pal, had a charming life, taking positions on board after board – Albert’s clout came in handy. And other buddies were fine too. There were plenty of buddies who could flash piano rolls.

Favoritism is deplorable, but as Irish as Coddle.

By regarding Reynolds as just another Fianna Fáil chancellor on the mooch, too many of us did him an injustice. He didn’t have the vision of a Lemass, but he was just as smart: and he far outstripped the braggarts who came after him.