Out of Step

By Ray O’Hanlon

After months of rising tensions between both sides, the leadership of the Ancient Order of Hibernians in America moved this week to cut the order’s remaining ties with the organizers New York St. Patrick’s Day Parade.

While the move was not entirely unexpected, it is certain nevertheless to send shock waves through the Irish-American community in the city and beyond, as for over a century the Hibernians and the parade have been virtually synonymous.

The Hibernian move could open the parade to a reinvigorated legal effort by the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organization to gain a place in the parade line of March on March 17.

Over the last decade, parade organizers have repeatedly repelled ILGO’s attempts to march in the parade, both in the courts and in the court of public opinion, by proclaiming that the parade is a Catholic event in honor of St. Patrick run by a Catholic organization, the AOH.

However, the Hibernian rampart between the parade and forces outside it now appears to be dissolving unless there is a dramatic reconciliation between the AOH leadership and the parade organizers in the shape of the Parade and Celebration Committee and its more recent offshoot, the St. Patrick’s Day Parade Corporation, which is headed by businessman Bill Flynn.

The move to cut the umbilical cord linking the AOH and the parade’s organizational structure came in the form of a letter from New York State AOH President Timothy T. Comerford.

The letter was sent to David J. Killkenny, president of the New York County Board of the AOH. The County Board is ostensibly the controlling body for the parade, with the Parade and Celebration Committee being its subsidiary.

However, in recent years, many observers and parade-affiliated groups have sensed that the Parade Committee, headed by chairman John Dunleavy and executive secretary James Barker, have been calling the shots in all parade matters.

The apparent removal of the County Board from the parade decision-making process — a process that includes parade finances, the permit application process and the choosing of each year’s grand marshal — was reinforced by statements earlier this year from parade leaders, including Barker, to the effect that control of the parade now rested another step beyond the County Board and in the hands of the parade corporation headed by Flynn.

An attempt to convene a summit meeting between AOH National President Tom Gilligan and Flynn by March 30 was not successful.

At that point, the AOH leadership indicated that it would be calling on the County Board, which is made up of Manhattan AOH division leaders, to take action to end the standoff.

The call took form in the letter from Comerford to Killkenny. In the letter, Comerford expressed "a great deal of sadness" over the fact that the County Board had been unable to make progress in the matter of it "reobtaining" the parade permit on behalf of the AOH while additionally organizing a vote aimed at dissolving the parade corporation.

"The only discussion was whether the Parade was going to be a Hibernian function or not. The Parade Committee could no longer be allowed to be Hibernians only when it suited them to be so," Comerford wrote Killkenny.

Comerford wrote that he had "no other choice" but to order Killkenny to draft a letter stating that "the Ancient Order of Hibernians is no longer associated with the New York City St. Patrick’s Day Parade Committee Inc. in any form."

Comerford ordered Killkenny to send copies of the letter by certified mail to a variety of individuals, including New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and the city’s police, fire and sanitation commissioners.

He also instructed Killkenny to send a copy to Bill Flynn, himself an AOH member and a former parade grand marshal.

"He [Flynn] is to be instructed to cease to use and to remove immediately, the name and logo of the Ancient Order of Hibernians from all documents, by-laws, or any other items or correspondence in use by the New York City St. Patrick’s Day Parade Committee Inc."

Comerford added that copies of the letter should also be sent to the Irish Echo, New York Times and New York Post for publication. Additional copies would have to be sent to the New York State Secretary of State and a range of AOH leaders, including National President Gilligan.

"The deadline for all of the above is April 30, 2001. This is non-negotiable," Comerford stated in the letter while also warning Killkenny that he was facing "immediate disciplinary action" if he failed to carry out "any portion of this order."

Two days before the April 30 deadline, the impending rupture was flagged in a Daily News report. The report stated that AOH spokesman Michael Cummings was of the view that the severing of ties with the parade would remove the "fig leaf" that the committee was affiliated with a Roman Catholic group, namely the Hibernians. This, the report added, could end up enhancing the chances of gay groups marching in the parade.

In a statement responding to the AOH move, the St. Patrick’s Day Parade and Celebration Committee outlined its view of events in recent years, not least the point that a separate parade corporation had been created at the behest of the AOH leadership back in 1992.

It is widely viewed that Hibernian leaders at that time, fearful of possible endless costly court battles, wanted to create a buffer between the organization and the parade in the form of a distinct, if still Catholic-rooted, corporation.

The committee statement said that AOH leaders Comerford and Gilligan had "never attended a parade meeting and do not have any knowledge of the workings or operation of the annual parade. They continue to issue press releases that are irrelevant and do not state the facts as they are."

With regard to the "fig leaf" comment by Mike Cummings, the committee statement said that the New York parade was "operated under the teachings of St. Patrick and the Roman Catholic Church."

The statement added that the AOH logo had never been on any stationary or parade literature under the present parade corporation.

"It was also stated that the parade committee had total disrespect for higher authority. This is totally incorrect because the parade committee’s higher authority is the directors of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade Inc. and not the Ancient Order of Hibernians because as stated previously, they divested themselves of the parade in 1992."