Barring any unseen provocations by some of Ulster's highly opinionated-which, in that province, is like barring life itself-Northern Ireland should be free for the next month or so of the kind of fighting and battling that took place this summer. The major Orange and Irish holidays for 1969 are over and the summer's troubles were provoked by celebration of these partisan holidays.

To be sure, there will be squabbles between the British "peace-keeping" forces and Orange extremists or between the military and People's Democracy extremists; but the lack of partisan, tradition-bound anniversary dates and the presence of the Queen's Army should keep the general populace quiet.

Ulster then will probably disappear from the front pages of the New York Times and from the Huntley-Brinkley show for the rest of the year. It will be back, however, next year regardless of what solutions are proposed for the province's difficulties. Ulster has been undergoing periodic civil war since 1640 and there's no reason to suppose that the province's factions will lay down their arms and their tradition-encrusted minds this year.

The past colors so much of what happens in Ulster today that it's probably wise to begin with the past. Ulster, although it is a political part of the United Kingdom and a geographical part of Ireland, is a nation unto itself too. It has its own prejudices, traditions, and insights but these did not receive expression until 1922 when Ulster received its first government.

To put the whole thing simply, the British government had proposed a home rule government for all of Ireland as a means of ending the centuries-old strife between Britain and Ireland. Under this plan, Ireland would have had a parliamentary government autonomous in domestic affairs, but impotent in foreign affairs, and it would have its capital at Dublin. Only two factions in Ireland were really opposed to this idea; the extremists who wanted an independent Irish Republic, and the protestant politicians in six northeastern counties-Antrim, Armagh, Down, Fermanagh, Derry, and Tyrone.

These counties had received a large influx of protestant settlers in the 17th century. These settlers were not unlike the American colonists of the same period and the attitude of the Ulster settlers towards the native Irish was much like the attitude of Americans towards Indians. The natives were a nuisance and were subhuman, furthermore they were Catholic.

In these six counties particularly, the native Catholic population was subjected to all sorts of economic and political liabilities. The early 20th century politicians of the six counties feared that an Irish government would mean an end to the elaborate and delicate system through which the ascendency of the Ulster settler's descendents was maintained. These folk, known as Unionists, organized a small but efficient army to force Britain to reject the idea of Irish Home Rule.

The British Compromise

The British came up with a compromise. Instead of creating just one government at Dublin, they decided to make two. One at Dublin for twenty-six of the Irish counties, and one at Belfast for six of them.

It seems clear that the British intended or at least hoped that this would be a temporary solution and that Ireland would eventually have one home rule government. But as it turned out, the Southern Province became a Free State, which left the Northern Province in an interesting position.

In an effort, perhaps, to reinforce the power and legitimacy of the Northern Ireland government, the British began to construct an elaborate Parliament Building for the Northern Irish parliament. This parliament building looks something like the Cambridge Post Office and sits in a triumphal landscaped formal estate at the Belfast suburb of Stormont. Adjacent to the parliament building is a castle with a tin roof which became the official residence of the Prime Minister of Northern Ireland.

Stormont Castle, which looks like the workshop of your average prosperous Mass Ave, undertaker, has had only four residents. All four-Craigavon, Brookeborough, O'Neill, and Chichester-Clark-have been members of the Unionist Party. The Unionists have ruled Ulster since 1922. The Unionists have been unable to prevent all non-Unionists from voting in elections, but they have managed to do the next best thing to make the opposition impotent.

The small, official opposition in the parliament is the Nationalist Party. The Nationalists reject or rejected the notion of Ulster and at the base of their party was the notion that Ulster should be part of the whole Irish nation. Basing the politics of the province on such a fundamental question had the effect of stalling, until this last year, effective opposition to the Unionist regime.

Those Unionists who might be tempted to join another party have been reluctant to do so because of the "republican character" of the Nationalist party (and the much smaller labor parties). And the Nationalists, who certainly sensed back in the '20s and '30s that the security of the Ulster regime was solid, had been bribed into maintaining a false opposition to the Unionist governments. The Ulster system serves those who serve it well and most Nationalist politicians were willing to serve the regime in turn for some small patronage and prestige. By the 1950's the rhetoric of Ulster politics had little to do with the reality.

The rhetoric was important, however, to the safety of the Unionist government. So the government did little to discourage the extremist protestant fringe (i. e., Ian Paisley's own special church) which further fanned the rhetorical fires. Nor did it do anything to ban or de-emphasize the Ulster laws providing for the imprisonment without charge of probable traitors, or to de-emphasize the Ulster Auxiliary Police. These auxiliary policemen, known as "B-Specials," are, like the regular Royal Ulster Constabulary, armed. Furthermore, the B-Specials exclude Catholics and their official purpose is to help the regular police beat back those who would subvert the state.

Just to keep everybody fully aware, the anniversaries of famous battles in the 17th century have been annually celebrated with parades, the firing of miniature cannons, the singing of partisan songs ("No Surrender," "Remember King Billy," "Ireland: Long A Province, Be A Nation Once Again," "A Soldier's Song") and the smashing of heads.