David Trimble has died at 77. For the New York Times obituary, go here. He was my kind of politician — a wonderful politician: clear-thinking, problem-solving, and brave. In 1998, he won the Nobel Peace Prize, with John Hume, his fellow Northern Irishman. Seldom has the prize been so well deserved.
Trimble and Hume won for the Good Friday Agreement. What was that? Here is a refresher, from my history of the Nobel Peace Prize, Peace, They Say:
It was a multi-party agreement that strove to build institutions for reconciliation and a lasting peace. . . . The agreement was meant to alter relations between Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland; between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland; and between the Irish and British governments. The agreement was signed on April 10, 1998 — Good Friday, as it happened. And it was ratified by voters in both Northern Ireland and Ireland on May 22. It was natural for the Nobel committee to bless this agreement — and further the chances of its fulfillment — later in the year.
Hume? “. . . a Catholic and nationalist — but a reform-minded, democratic, and peaceable nationalist. The description usually applied to him was ‘moderate nationalist.’” Trimble? A Protestant and the leader of the Ulster Unionist Party. “He had no tolerance of extremists and killers, wherever they came from, but he was ready to deal when a deal was to be had.”
The following is the big point, I would say: “Both Hume and Trimble were despised by extremists: seen as compromised, because compromising.”
A bit more, on David Trimble (and let me hasten to say that John Hume was just as good, but it is Trimble whom we are eulogizing):
The cool, practical, and skeptical nature of Trimble was illustrated in his response to the Nobel announcement. He said that he was “a bit uncomfortable” about the prize. And “I hope very much that this award doesn’t turn out to be premature.” Someone should have told him — maybe someone did — that [Alfred] Nobel wanted his prize to go for honorable work done in the preceding year, plain and simple: whether that work was cinching or not.
Okay, some more:
Trimble gave a lecture that was smart, nimble, wise — and very funny. I count it one of the best in Nobel history. He said that many, many people had contributed to peace in Northern Ireland, and that many thousands of others were performing heroic work for peace around the world. “Having said that, I am at the same time anxious to allay any fears on your part that I might fail to pick up the medal or the check. The people of Northern Ireland are not a people to look a gift horse in the mouth.” Toward the end of his lecture, he said, “What we democratic politicians want in Northern Ireland is not some utopian society but a normal society.”
I just love that — sweet, blessed normality. You will remember that David Ben-Gurion and the other founders of Israel wanted, fervently, a “normal country” — a country in which one might live in peace.
The below words, I wrote in 2011 or so, but I think they hold up today:
Since 1998 and the Good Friday Agreement and the Nobel prize, there have been many problems in Northern Ireland, including terrorism and killings. But the Troubles have not returned, full-blown. Northern Ireland is pretty much a normal society (one of the highest conditions a society can aspire to). Many years ago, the American political writer George F. Will said that there were two “intractable” problems in the world: Northern Ireland and the Arab–Israeli conflict. And he said this well before the Cold War wound down, and the Soviet Union expired. The Arab–Israeli conflict is still with us — but the intractability of Northern Ireland seems to have been cracked. The 1998 Nobel Peace Prize was a very good award: given to good people who had worked hard and well to solve a terrible problem (and who had done this work in the preceding year . . .). People in Northern Ireland and elsewhere can hope that 1998’s will be the last Nobel prize concerning the Troubles.
There had been one other: that for 1976, given to Betty Williams and Máiread Corrigan. They are quite a story unto themselves. But this post is for the purpose of saying: Well done, Lord Trimble, and hearty thanks.