Mary McAleese

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Mary McAleese
President of Ireland
Image:marymca.jpg
Career
Rank 8th President
2 Terms 11 November 1997 - present
Preceded by Mary Robinson
Succeeded by (Incumbent)
Party   Fianna Fáil
Personal
Date of birth   27 June 1951
Place of birth   Belfast, Northern Ireland
Spouse   Martin McAleese
Profession  Former Pro-Vice Chancellor QUB,
journalist

Mary Patricia McAleese (Irish name Máire Pádraigín Mhic Ghiolla Íosa; born 27 June 1951) is the eighth, and current, President of Ireland. She was first elected president in 1997 and was re-elected, without contest, to another seven year term in 2004. Born in Belfast in Northern Ireland, prior to becoming president she was a barrister, journalist and academic. She was ranked the 55th most powerful woman in the world on a list of The World's 100 Most Powerful Women by Forbes.

Contents

[edit] Background

McAleese was born Mary Patricia Leneghan (Irish: Máire Páidrigín Ní Lionnacháin) on 27 June 1951 in Ardoyne, Belfast where she grew up. Her family were forced to leave the area by loyalists when the Troubles broke out. She was educated at St. Dominic's High School, the Queen's University of Belfast (from which she graduated in 1973), and Trinity College in Dublin. She was called to the Northern Ireland Bar in 1974 and is today also a member of the Bar in the Republic of Ireland. In 1975 she was appointed Reid Professor of Criminal Law, Criminology and Penology in Trinity College, succeeding Mary Robinson (a succession that would repeat itself twenty years later, when McAleese assumed the presidency).

During the same decade she acted as legal advisor to, and a founding member of, the Campaign for Homosexual Law Reform, but she left this position in 1979 to join RTÉ (the national television service) as a journalist and presenter, during one period as a reporter and presenter for their 'Today Tonight' programme. In 1976 she married Martin McAleese. In 1981 she returned to the Reid Professorship, but continued to work part-time for RTÉ for a further four years. In 1987 she returned to Queen's University to become Director of the Institute of Professional Legal Studies. In the same year she stood, unsuccessfully, as a Fianna Fáil candidate in the general election.

McAleese was a member of the Catholic Church Episcopal Delegation to the New Ireland Forum in 1984 and a member of the Catholic Church delegation to the North Commission on Contentious Parades in 1996. She was also a delegate to the 1995 White House Conference on Trade and Investment in Ireland and to the subsequent Pittsburgh Conference in 1996. In 1994, she became the Pro-Vice Chancellor of the Queen's University, Belfast, the first woman to hold the position. Prior to becoming president in 1997 McAleese had also held the following positions:

[edit] Presidency

Styles of
Mary McAleese,
President of Ireland
Reference style Uachtarán, President
spoken style Uachtarán, President
Alternative style A Shoilse/Soilse, His/Her Excellency

In 1997 McAleese defeated former Taoiseach Albert Reynolds in an internal, party election held to determine the Fianna Fáil nomination for the Irish presidency. Many commentators criticised Fianna Fáil's decision to nominate McAleese, claiming the election of a Belfast Catholic would harm relations with Britain. The right wing journalist and commentator Eoghan Harris referred to her as a "tribal time bomb". Her opponents in the 1997 presidential election were Mary Banotti of Fine Gael, Adi Roche (the Labour candidate) and two independents: Dana Rosemary Scallon and Derek Nally. On 11 November, 1997, she was inaugurated as the eighth President of Ireland, the first time in history that a woman had succeeded another woman as an elected head of state anywhere in the world.

McAleese's initial seven year term of office ended in November 2004, but she announced on 14 September of that year that she would be standing for a second term in the 2004 presidential election. Following the failure of any other candidate to secure the necessary support for a nomination, the incumbent president stood unopposed, with no political party affiliation, and was declared elected on 1 October. She was officially re-inaugurated at the commencement of her second seven year term on 11 November. McAleese's very high job approval ratings were widely seen as the reason for her re-election, with no opposition party willing to bear the cost (financial or political) of competing in an election that would prove very difficult to win1.

McAleese has said that the theme of her presidency is "building bridges". The first individual born in Northern Ireland to become President of Ireland, President McAleese is a regular visitor to Northern Ireland, where she has been on the whole warmly welcomed by both communities, confounding the critics who had believed she would be a divisive figure. However, she is still viewed with suspicion by a large number of DUP supporters, and a considerable number of UUP supporters. She is also an admirer of Queen Elizabeth II, whom she came to know when she was Pro-Vice Chancellor of Queen's. It is said to be one of her major personal ambitions to host the first ever visit to the Republic of Ireland of a British head of state. In March 1998, McAleese announced that she would officially celebrate the Twelfth of July as well as Saint Patrick's Day, recognising the day's importance among Ulster Protestants.

On 27 January 2005, following her attendance at the ceremony commemorating the sixtieth anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz concentration camp, she caused controversy by making reference to the way in which some Protestant children in Northern Ireland had been brought up to hate Catholics just as German children were encouraged to hate Jews under the Nazis. These remarks caused outrage among unionist politicians. McAleese later apologised, conceding that, because she had criticised only the sectarianism found on one side of the community, her words had been unbalanced.

On 22 May, 2005, she was the Commencement Speaker at Villanova University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. The visit prompted protests by conservatives due to the President's liberal views on homosexuality and women priests. [1] She was the commencement speaker at the University of Notre Dame on May 21, 2006. In her commencement address, among other topics, she spoke of her pride at Notre Dame's Irish heritage, including the nickname the "Fighting Irish".

Since November 19, 2005 she is the longest-serving current female elected Head of State following the retirement of Chandrika Kumaratunga of Sri Lanka.

[edit] Council of State

[edit] Meetings

No. Article Reserve power Subject Outcome
1. 1999 meeting Address to the Oireachtas The new millennium Address given
2. 2000 meeting Referral of bill to the Supreme Court (a) Planning and Development Bill, 1999
(b) Illegal Immigrants (Trafficking) Bill, 1999		 (a) Bill referred
(b) Bill referred
(Both upheld)
3. 2002 meeting Referral of bill to the Supreme Court Housing (Miscellaneous Provisions) (No. 2) Bill, 2001 Bill not referred
4. 2004 meeting Referral of bill to the Supreme Court Health (Amendment) (No. 2) Bill, 2004 Bill referred
(Struck down)

[edit] Presidential appointees

First term

Second term

[edit] External links

[edit] Footnote

  1. See "President would defeat Higgins, poll shows". February, 2004 article from The Irish Times.


Presidents of Ireland
Uachtaráin na hÉireann

Douglas Hyde | Seán T. Ó Ceallaigh | Éamon de Valera | Erskine H. Childers | Cearbhall Ó Dálaigh |
Patrick Hillery | Mary Robinson | Mary McAleese

see also Áras an Uachtaráin | Blue Hussars | Constitution of Ireland | Council of State | DeV's car | External Relations Act | Governor-General |
Lord Lieutenant of Ireland | Official Seal | Presidential Inauguration | Presidential Standard | Republic of Ireland Act | Secretary-General to the President | Presidential Commission | Viceregal throne
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