Editing Patrick Hillery (section)

===Phone calls to Áras an Uachtaráin===
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It was in 1982 that Hillery's reputation as President was arguably made. In January 1982, the Fine Gael-Labour Party coalition government of Taoiseach [[Garret FitzGerald]] lost a budget vote in [[Dáil Éireann]]. Since this was a [[loss of supply]], FitzGerald travelled to [[Áras an Uachtaráin]], to ask for a dissolution of the Dáil. Under Article 13.2.2°,{{efn|Under Article 28.10 of the Irish Constitution, a Taoiseach who has "ceased to retain the support of a majority in Dáil Éireann" (e.g., defeat in a budget or loss of confidence) must either (i) resign, or (ii) seek a parliamentary dissolution. Under Article 13.2.2°, where a Taoiseach in such circumstances requests a parliamentary dissolution, the President may "in his absolute discretion" refuse that request, forcing the Taoiseach back to the only other option, resignation. The president of Ireland {{em|cannot}} ask someone to form a government; a Taoiseach is nominated by a vote of Dáil Éireann and only thereafter appointed by the president, so had Hillery refused FitzGerald a dissolution, he could not have asked Haughey to form a government. Haughey would have had to have been nominated by Dáil Éireann.}} If Hillery refused FitzGerald's request for a dissolution, FitzGerald would have had to resign. Had this happened, Haughey, as Leader of the Opposition, would have been the next contender to form a government. While Hillery was considering FitzGerald's request, a series of phone calls (some published reports claim seven, others eight) was made by senior opposition figures urging Hillery to refuse the dissolution, allowing Haughey a chance to form a government.

Hillery regarded such pressure as gross misconduct, and ordered one of his aides de camp, Captain Anthony Barber, not to pass on any telephone calls from opposition figures. He might also have been motivated by a conflict between the English and Irish versions of the Constitution. While the English version vests the President with certain powers that he uses "in his absolute discretion," the Irish version states that these powers are used {{lang|ga|as a chomhairle féin}}, which usually translates to "under his own counsel". While "absolute discretion" implies that presidents have some latitude in whether to initiate contact with the opposition under these circumstances, "under his own counsel" has been understood to mean that no contact whatsoever can take place with the opposition. Whenever there is a conflict between the Irish and English versions, the Irish one takes precedence. In the end, Hillery granted the dissolution. (No Irish president to date has ever refused such a request.)

By 1990, Hillery's term seemed to be reaching a quiet end, until the events of 1982 resurfaced. Three candidates had been nominated in the [[1990 Irish presidential election|1990 presidential election]]: the then [[Tánaiste]], [[Brian Lenihan Snr|Brian Lenihan]] from Fianna Fáil (heavily tipped as the certain winner), [[Austin Currie]] from Fine Gael and [[Mary Robinson]] from the Labour Party. In May 1990, in an ''[[Journalism sourcing#.22On the record.22|on the record]]'' interview with [[Jim Duffy (author)|Jim Duffy]], a post-graduate student researching the Irish presidency, Lenihan had confirmed that he had been one of those phoning President Hillery in January 1982. He confirmed that Haughey too had made phone calls. [[Jim Duffy (author)|Jim Duffy]] mentioned the information in a newspaper article on the history of the Irish presidency on 28 September 1990 in ''[[The Irish Times]]''. In October 1990, Lenihan changed his story, claiming (even though he had said the opposite for eight years) that he had played "no hand, act or part" in pressurising President Hillery that night. He made these denials in an interview in ''[[The Irish Press]]'' (a Fianna Fáil–leaning newspaper) and on ''[[Questions and Answers (TV programme)|Questions and Answers]]'', an [[RTÉ 1]] political show,.

When it was realised that he had said the opposite in an on-the-record interview in May 1990, his campaign panicked and tried to pressurise Duffy into not revealing the information. Their pressure backfired, particularly when his campaign manager, [[Bertie Ahern]], named Duffy as the person to whom he had given the interview in a radio broadcast, prompting Duffy to release the relevant segment of his interview with Lenihan. In the aftermath, the minority partner in the coalition government, the [[Progressive Democrats]], indicated that unless Lenihan resigned or was dismissed from cabinet, they would pull out of the coalition and support an opposition [[motion of no confidence]] in Dáil Éireann, bringing down the government and forcing a general election. Publicly, Haughey insisted that it was entirely a matter for Lenihan, his "friend of thirty years" and that he was putting no pressure on him. In reality, under pressure from the PDs, Haughey gave Lenihan a letter of resignation to sign. When Lenihan refused, Haughey formally advised President Hillery to sack Lenihan from the cabinet. As required by Article 13.1.3 of the Constitution,<ref>{{cite web|title=Constitution of Ireland|url=https://www.irishstatutebook.ie/eli/cons/en/html#article13|website=[[Irish Statute Book]]|publisher=[[Attorney General of Ireland]]|access-date=24 January 2023}}</ref> Hillery did so. Lenihan's campaign never recovered, and he became the first candidate from Fianna Fáil to lose a presidential election, having begun the campaign as the favourite. Instead, Labour's Mary Robinson became the first elected President of Ireland from outside Fianna Fáil, and the first woman to hold the office.

The revelations, and the discovery that Hillery had stood up to pressure in 1982 from former cabinet colleagues, including his close friend Brian Lenihan, substantially increased Hillery's standing. From a low-key, modest presidency that had been seen as mediocre, his presidency came to be seen as embodying the highest standards of integrity. His reputation rose further when opposition leaders under parliamentary privilege alleged that Haughey, who in January 1982, had been Leader of the Opposition, had not merely rung the President's Office but threatened to end the career of the army officer who took the call and who, on Hillery's explicit instructions, had refused to put through the call to the president. Haughey angrily denied the charge, though Lenihan, in his subsequently published account of the affair, noted that Haughey had denied "insulting" the officer, whereas the allegation was that he had "threatened" him. Hillery, it was revealed, had called in the Irish Army's Chief of Staff the following day and as Commander-in-Chief of the Army had ordered the Chief of Staff to ensure that no politician ever interfered with the career of the young army officer. About ten years after the incident, RTÉ attempted to interview the young officer with regard to the allegations but as a serving officer, he was unable to comment.