Muller, Jane Conlon.

Paul O’Dwyer

Born in Lismirrane, Parish of Bohola, County Mayo, Ireland, O'Dwyer was a politician and lawyer noted for his dedication to civil rights. Arriving in the U.S. in 1925, O'Dwyer enrolled in St. John's Law School the following year and graduated in 1931. In 1932, he joined the law firm O'Dwyer and Bernstein. He began his career defending pickets against labor-organizing injunctions, opposing the deportation of foreign-born agitators, and defending the rights of unionists to organize. He was a member of the National Lawyers Guild and served as president of the New York chapter in 1947.

O'Dwyer gained success in the courtroom, where he continuously fought for the underdog. He participated in almost every civil-rights struggle in America during the second half of the twentieth century. He worked at registration drives for African Americans in Mississippi during the 1960s, defended Communists and Communist sympathizers during the McCarthy era, vigorously protested the Vietnam War, and battled for the foundation of the state of Israel.

O'Dwyer participated in politics both by working behind the scenes on other candidates' campaigns and by running his own campaigns. He assisted in John F. Kennedy's 1962 presidential campaign and David Dinkins' 1998 mayoral campaign. O'Dwyer's own campaigns were less successful; out of a dozen electoral efforts, he lost all but two: the 1963 race for councilman-at-large in Manhattan and the 1973 race for City Council President.

O'Dwyer managed to maintain his identity as an Irish nationalist and fully embrace his role as an Irish American. The quest for a united Ireland remained close to his heart and during his frequent visits back to Ireland, he met with all sides of the conflict, including the Irish Republican Army, the Ulster Defense Association, and the Irish government. He introduced the McBride principles to the United States government, which prevent U.S. government agencies from investing in Northern Ireland companies that discriminate against their employees. He transformed his childhood home into the O'Dwyer-Cheshire home for disabled children and adults and established the O'Dwyer Forestry Foundation, both to fund the Cheshire home in the future, and also in an effort to reforest part of Ireland.

In addition to his civil rights work in the U.S., O'Dwyer was involved in many Irish-American organizations, including the United Irish Counties Association, the Mayo Men's Patriotic and Benevolent Association, the New York St. Patrick's Day Parade Committee, and the Gaelic Athletic Association. His love for New York City and its history led him to assist in the creation of the Department of Records and Information Services (D.O.R.I.S.) to oversee the Municipal Archives and to become the Manhattan Borough Historian in 1986. He was the founder in 1950 of the Irish Institute of New York, Inc., a philanthropic group.

In 1990 O'Dwyer was appointed the New York City Commissioner to the United Nations and Consular Corps. In this capacity he was instrumental in having the Brehon Law Society admitted to the UN as a non-governmental organization.

O'Dwyer, time and again, demonstrated his commitment to protect the rights of people, regardless of their race, religion, or gender and did so with remarkable grace and sense of purpose. After a series of small strokes, O'Dwyer retired to his home in Goshen, New York where he died on June 12, 1998.

Michael Flannery

Michael Flannery, a militant Irish nationalist, was born in Knockshegowna, a small village in the North of County Tipperary, Ireland. He spent his early childhood working on his parents' farm and attending school, but by 1916, the year of the Easter Uprising, Flannery left school to join the Irish Volunteers, a nationalist organization that would later become the Irish Republican Army (IRA). During his active duty with the IRA during both the War for Independence (1919-1921) and the Civil War (1922-1923), Flannery patrolled the Irish countryside, ambushing British soldiers. The British eventually captured him and sent him to prison for two years. In 1927, Flannery emigrated to the United States, married, settled in Jackson Heights, Queens, NY and found a job with Metropolitan Life Insurance Company.

A devout Catholic, Flannery attended Mass every morning at his local church and neither smoked nor drank. His quiet, undemonstrative character and devotion to the Irish nationalist cause brought him respect and admiration in the Irish-American community. Flannery's participation in a multitude of organizations including the Clan na Gael, American Congress for Irish Freedom, Gaelic Athletic Association, and Irish Action Committee, earned him the following remark from his lawyer, Frank Durkan: "If there was going to be a meeting of six people in the north Bronx in the middle of a snowstorm, the only man you knew would be there was Michael Flannery."

As the civil rights movement in Northern Ireland gained momentum in 1969, tensions increased between Catholics and Protestants and the IRA again rose to the forefront of the struggle. Flannery helped to found the Irish Northern Aid Committee (Noraid) in 1970 to raise funds in the United States to support the families of IRA soldiers who were killed or imprisoned in the North. While the British, Irish, and United States governments believed Noraid to be a front for the IRA, Flannery insisted that, while he supported the IRA's tactics, the money raised by Noraid did not go to buy arms.

In 1981, Flannery and four other men were charged with gunrunning for the IRA ( U.S. vs. Harrison, Falvey, Mullen, Gormley and Flannery ). The FBI accused Flannery of handling the money in the transaction. The counsel defending Flannery and the other men took an aggressive strategy during the trial by putting forth the idea that the defendants believed that they were working for the CIA. Since the CIA has a license to export weapons, they did not believe they were breaking any laws. This tactic put the burden on the prosecution to prove that the CIA was not involved and the jury found all five men innocent. Flannery was the only one of the defendants to testify, and he used that opportunity to deliver an impassioned speech about Irish history and British oppression.

Capitalizing on the publicity from the trial, Irish republicans campaigned to elect Flannery as the Grand Marshal of the New York St. Patrick's Day Parade in 1983. Given Flannery's open support of the IRA and the recent trial, his nomination did not come without a swarm of controversy. But despite opposition by prominent politicians, community leaders, the Catholic Church and the Irish government, the parade drew a record crowd.

In 1989, Noraid altered its focus to acknowledge the Dublin government and incorporate political measures in resolving the conflict. Flannery and other veterans of his generation believed that a focus on political activities would detract from the fundraising aspects of Noraid and would ultimately compromise the primary function of the organization. After failing to resolve the differences between his personal beliefs and the new direction the organization was taking, Flannery resigned from Noraid in 1986. He joined the Friends of Irish Freedom in 1989, which had the exclusive purpose of raising money for families of IRA prisoners. He continued his support for FOIF and the militant republican cause until his death in 1994.

Charles J. Hynes

Charles J. Hynes was born in Brooklyn in 1935. As a second-generation Irish American, Hynes first remembers developing his Irish identity from the stories that his grandfather would tell him about emigrating to Boston and the discrimination against the Irish that he witnessed. Although a member of the Ancient Order of Hibernians since the early 1970s, Hynes only became publicly active in Irish-American activities during the 1981 hunger strikes. His outrage at how the British government was treating the hunger strikers led him to join in the protests at the British Embassy and eventually to co-found Irish Solidarity Day.

Hynes graduated from St. John's University Law School in 1961. He began his public service career as an associate attorney with the Brooklyn Legal Aid society. He later became a special state prosecutor in 1985, where he remained until he was elected as the Brooklyn District Attorney in 1989. Hynes has run two unsuccessful primary campaigns for other elected positions: the 1994 race for state attorney general and the 1998 race for governor of New York. He has also taught as an adjunct professor at St. John's Law School, Brooklyn Law School, and Fordham Law School.

All the interviews were conducted in 1990 and 1991 by Jane Conlon Muller, an attorney and member of the Roundtable. She first interviewed O'Dwyer, who suggested that she also interview Flannery. At this time, Muller worked in the Kings County DA's office, which was the impetus for interviewing Hynes. Jane Conlon Muller (b. 3/16/1942) is the granddaughter of Irish immigrants from counties Donegal, Leitrim and Clare. She holds a bachelors degree from Queens College and a Juris Doctorate from CUNY Law School. After leaving the Kings County DA's office, she opened her own law practice, which specializes in construction law, elder law, wills, trusts and estates as well as real estate.

Sources:

From the guide to the Jane Conlon Muller Oral History Collection, 1990-1991, (Tamiment Library / Wagner Archives)