Editing Charles Haughey (section)

== Ministerial office ==

===Minister for Justice===
When Traynor retired in 1961, Haughey succeeded him as [[Minister for Justice (Ireland)|Minister for Justice]]. As such, he initiated an extensive scale of legislative reforms. He introduced new legislation including the Adoption Act 1964; the Succession Act 1965, which protected the inheritance rights of wives and children;<ref name=it-8>[http://www.irishtimes.com/focus/haughey/ITstories/story8.htm  'Irish solutions for Irish problems'] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101107212106/http://www.irishtimes.com/focus/haughey/ITstories/story8.htm |date=7 November 2010 }} – ''The Irish Times'' obituary.</ref> the Criminal Justice Act 1964, which severely restricted the application of [[Capital punishment in Ireland|capital punishment]]; and the Extradition Act 1965, which virtually prevented extradition for IRA offences. Haughey also introduced the Special Military Courts which helped to defeat the [[Irish Republican Army (1922–1969)|Irish Republican Army]]'s [[border campaign (Irish Republican Army)|border campaign]].<ref name=it-3/>

===Minister for Agriculture: 1966 Farmers' Strike===
In 1964, Lemass appointed Haughey as [[Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine|Minister for Agriculture]].{{efn|The previous Minister for Agriculture, [[Patrick Smith (politician)|Paddy Smith]], had resigned over a policy dispute.}} Criticism was voiced from the [[Irish Farmers' Association|National Farmers Association]] (NFA) of the appointment of a non-rural person to the position, and there was increased antagonism from farmers towards the government. Haughey became embroiled in a series of controversies with the NFA and with another organisation, the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers Association (ICMSA).<ref name=it-3/> Twenty-seven ICMSA picketers outside [[Leinster House]], were arrested on 27 April 1966 under the [[Offences Against the State Act]], an act originally intended for use against the IRA. 78 were arrested the following day, and 80 a day later as the dispute escalated. Haughey, who did not rely on rural voters, was under intense pressure from fearful members of his party to negotiate a deal and reduce the tension. It was Haughey's first alienation of a significant voting block, and probably damaged him electorally in later years as many farmers remembered the events, known in folk memory as the Farmers' Strike.

===1966 presidential election===
[[File:Charles Haughey 1967 (cropped).jpg|thumb|left|200px|Haughey in 1967]]
Haughey was appointed by Fianna Fáil to run President [[Éamon de Valera]]'s re-election campaign for the [[1966 Irish presidential election|1966 presidential election]]. [[Fine Gael]] chose a comparatively young [[Teachta Dála|TD]] and [[barrister]], [[Tom O'Higgins]] (nephew of [[Kevin O'Higgins]]), to run against de Valera. By then, de Valera was 84 years old and almost blind. Haughey knew this might compare unfavourably to O'Higgins, whose campaign drew comparisons with the equally youthful [[US President]] [[John F. Kennedy]], and launched what was seen as a political stroke. He insisted that it was beneath the presidency to actively campaign, meaning that de Valera would have a low profile. Therefore, in the interests of fairness, the media was asked to give O'Higgins an equally low profile, ignoring his speeches and publicity campaign. The print media, both nationally and locally, ignored Haughey's suggestion. But the state-run [[RTÉ]], facing criticism from Lemass's government for being too radical in other areas, agreed and largely ignored the O'Higgins campaign.

De Valera got a high media profile from a different source, the fiftieth-anniversary commemoration of the [[Easter Rising]], of which he was the most senior survivor. While O'Higgins's campaign was ignored by RTÉ, de Valera appeared in RTÉ coverage of the Rising events regularly. To add further to de Valera's campaign, Haughey as Agriculture Minister arranged for milk price increases to be given to farmers on the eve of polling, as a way of reducing farmer disquiet after they had effectively become an opposition movement to the government.<ref name=dib>{{cite web |url=https://www.dib.ie/biography/haughey-charles-james-c-j-a9531 |title=Haughey, Charles James (C.J.) |work=[[Dictionary of Irish Biography]] |last1=Maume |first1=Patrick |access-date=12 January 2023 |archive-date=29 April 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240429125720/https://www.dib.ie/biography/haughey-charles-james-c-j-a9531 |url-status=live }}</ref>

O'Higgins came within less than one per cent of winning the vote, with de Valera re-elected by a narrow margin of ten thousand votes out of a total of nearly one million. De Valera came to distrust Haughey; [[Frank Aiken]], [[Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade|Minister for External Affairs]] under de Valera and his lifelong political confidant, dismissed Haughey's political motives as being entirely selfish, and believed he was motivated to hold power for its own sake and not duty.

===Minister for Finance===
In November 1966, the [[Taoiseach]] [[Seán Lemass]] retired. Haughey declared his candidature to succeed Lemass in the consequent [[1966 Fianna Fáil leadership election|leadership election]], and [[George Colley]] and [[Neil Blaney]] did likewise. As this meant that three strong candidates held strong and divisive views on the future of the party, the party elders sought to find a compromise candidate. Lemass himself encouraged his [[Minister for Finance]] [[Jack Lynch]], to contest the party leadership, and encouraged Colley, Haughey and Blaney to withdraw in favour of Lynch, arguing that they would not win a contest against him. However, Colley refused the Taoiseach's request and insisted on remaining in the race, but he was defeated by Lynch. Upon Lynch's election as Taoiseach, Haughey was appointed Minister for Finance by Lynch, in a cabinet reshuffle, which indicated that Haughey's withdrawal was a gain at the expense of Colley. The socially inclusive initiatives that Haughey made caught the public imagination; these included popular decisions to introduce free travel on public transport for pensioners, subsidise electricity for pensioners, the grant special tax concessions for the disabled and tax exemptions for artists. They increased Haughey's appeal and his support in the media and artistic community.

As Minister for Finance, Haughey on two occasions arranged foreign currency loans for the government which he then arranged to be left on deposit in foreign countries ([[Germany]] and the [[United States]]), in the local currencies, instead of immediately changing the loans to [[Irish pound]]s and depositing them in the exchequer. These actions were unconstitutional because they effectively meant that the Minister for Finance was making currency speculation against his currency. When this was challenged by the Comptroller and Auditor General [[Eugene Francis Suttle]], Haughey introduced a law to retrospectively legalise his actions. The legislation was passed on 26 November 1969.

===Arms crisis===
{{More citations needed section|date=March 2007}}
{{Main|Arms Crisis}}
The late 1960s saw the old tensions boil over into an eruption of violence in [[Northern Ireland]]. Haughey was generally seen as coming from the pragmatist wing of the party and was not believed to have strong opinions on the matter, despite having family links with [[Derry]]. Indeed, many presumed that he had a strong [[antipathy]] to [[physical force Irish republicanism]]; during his period as Minister for Justice, he had followed a tough anti-IRA line, including using [[internment]] without trial against the IRA. The {{em|hawks}} in the cabinet were seen as [[Kevin Boland]] and [[Neil Blaney]], both sons of founding fathers in the party with strong [[Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)|Old IRA]] pasts. Blaney was also a TD for [[Donegal North-East (Dáil constituency)|Donegal North-East]]; a staunchly [[Irish Republicanism|Republican]] area which bordered [[Derry]]. They were opposed by those described as the "doves" of the cabinet; [[Tánaiste]] [[Erskine Hamilton Childers|Erskine Childers]], [[George Colley]] and [[Patrick Hillery]]. A fund of £100,000 was set up to give to the Nationalist people in the form of aid. Haughey, as Finance Minister would have a central role in the management of this fund.<ref name=it-obituary>[http://www.irishtimes.com/focus/haughey/ITstories/story12.htm Arms and the man] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101107212155/http://www.irishtimes.com/focus/haughey/ITstories/story12.htm |date=7 November 2010 }} — Charles Haughey obituary, from ''[[The Irish Times]]'' newspaper.</ref>

There was a general surprise when, in a series of events known as the [[Arms Crisis]], Haughey and Blaney were sacked from Lynch's cabinet amid allegations of the use of the funds to import arms for use by the [[Irish Republican Army (1922–1969)|IRA]]. The Garda [[Special Detective Unit|Special Branch]] informed the Minister for Justice [[Mícheál Ó Móráin]] and Taoiseach Jack Lynch that a plot to import arms existed and included government members, however Lynch took no action until the Special Branch made Leader of the Opposition [[Liam Cosgrave]] aware of the plot.<ref name=it-obituary/> Cosgrave told Lynch he knew of the plot and would announce it in the Dáil the next day if he didn't act. Lynch subsequently requested Haughey and Blaney to resign from the cabinet. Both men refused, saying they did nothing illegal. Lynch then asked President de Valera to dismiss Haughey and Blaney from the government, a request that de Valera was required to grant by convention. Boland resigned in sympathy, while Mícheál Ó Móráin was asked to resign one day earlier in a preemptive strike to ensure a subservient Minister for Justice was in place when the crisis broke. Lynch chose government chief whip Desmond O'Malley for the role. Haughey and Blaney were subsequently tried in court along with an army Officer, Captain [[James Kelly (Irish Army officer)|James Kelly]], and [[Albert Luykx]], a former Flemish [[National Socialist]] and businessman, who allegedly used his contacts to buy the arms.<ref name=dib /><ref>{{cite book |last1=Dillon |first1=Martin |author-link1=Martin Dillon |year=2012 |title=The Dirty War |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=er3HfXL7CKQC&q=charles+haughey+neil+blaney+james+kelly+albert+luykx+trial&pg=PA20 |publisher=[[Random House]] |page=20 |isbn=9781407074801 |access-date=24 October 2013 |archive-date=31 May 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210531053342/https://books.google.com/books?id=er3HfXL7CKQC&q=charles+haughey+neil+blaney+james+kelly+albert+luykx+trial&pg=PA20 |url-status=live }}</ref> All the accused were acquitted. Although cleared of wrongdoing, it looked as if Haughey's political career was finished. Blaney and Boland eventually resigned from Fianna Fáil but Haughey remained. He spent his years on the backbenches – the wilderness years – building support within the grassroots of the party; during this time, he remained loyal to the party and served the leader, but after the debacle of the "arms crises" neither man trusted the other.