to depose Haughey and the Attorney general who energetically blocked the Beef tribunal's access to cabinet minutes was... Harry Whelehan.
Dick Spring made his reputation denouncing Fianna Fail sleaze and Haughey, but to everyone's surprise he entered a coalition with Reynold's after Haughey's fall.
Reynolds gave evidence to the Beef Tribunal and leaked a preview which claimed to exonerate him from any wrong doing in the Goodman affair.
In spite of this "bounce' and fairly clear evidence that Reynold's role was not quite so squeaky clean as the press made out, Spring bit his tongue and stayed in government.
He obviously felt the need to assert himself, especially after Labour lost a recent by-election in Cork to Labour's left rival -the Democratic Left (formerly party of the Workers Party).
Making a point
It's doubtful if Spring wanted to do anything more than to make a point to Reynolds and Fianna Fail by opposing the appointment of Harry Whelehan to the Presidency of the High Court. Reynolds called his bluff by going ahead anyway.
Spring was preparing to slink back under the cover of some face-saving scheme when he discovered that Whelehan had been 'sitting' on the extradition papers of a priest wanted in the north for alleged child sexual abuse and that Reynolds was lying to the Dail.
Reynolds had claimed not to know about it when he appointed Whelehan to the High Court. The rest of the story is soap opera.
Even being identified as the broker of the IRA cease-fire and the prime mover of the 'peace process' was not enough to save Reynolds this time pure coincidence to all but the most hardened cynics.
Fianna fail was until recently the largest party in the south and when things were bad they beat the republican drum.
It is a measure of how much things have changed that they now attempt to save their political skins by preaching the virtues of peace and heading off any hope of a united Ireland, even though they still refer to themselves as the republican party.
Spring's torpedoing of Reynolds is a reflection of the political level of deeper changes in the Dublin ruling class as it wins 'independence' from Britain by trying to move itself more closely into the EU.
He may have discovered the lever by accident but by focussing on the hidden hand of the Catholic Church's interference in the state to appear to be ad vancing the cause of secular modernisation of the 26 coun ties.
The tone of reporting in the British press clearly shows he was preferred to Reynolds. His problem is that he does not have the political clout to deliver the concessions (on say articles 2 and 3 of the constitution - the so-called constitutional claims on the six counties) which the British want removed as part of the new settlement.
Sinn Fein's political strategy, which consisted mainly of relying on Reynolds and to a lesser extent the US to put pressure on the British, was never viable even before the Whelehan affair. It led them to rush to Reynolds' defence with heavy hints about the effects on the "peace process'.
Secular republicans must have asked if supporting a Fianna Fail leaders appointing to the highest legal post in the land a right-wing conservative The danger of misplaced optimism is that it confuses and demoralises the republicans' mass base and opens the way to damaging splits which would weaken it still further.
To those in British left organisations who believe the cease-fire gives 'real' politics a chance and provides the basis for working "class unity' there remains the problem of the sectarian state created out of partition in 1921 with the express purpose of preventing class unity.
It cannot be reformed and any 'peace' deal based on the undemocratic 1921 settlement enforced by the British state will soon degenerate.
For the British left there is the danger of moralising from the sidelines. In these discussions Fourth Internationalists unconditionally take the side of the republicans against the British state. For socialists to advance the peace process means getting Britain out of Ireland -nothing else will bring peace. • Annual Bloody Sunday march in Manchester on Saturday January 28. Starting at Platt Fields in Rusholme to a rally in Albert Square to hear Labour MPs, Sinn Fein and one of the victims the Bloody Sunday atrocity.
For more details, phone the Troops Out Movement on 0171 609 4463.
SOCIALIST OUTLOOK No.73-74, December 1994, Page 7