JFK in Ireland: Four Days that Changed a President. Ryan Tubridy
it was Scott McLeod, Kennedy responded “Oh, he’s no good”, before adding “I’m going to send you a really good ambassador, an ambassador that will really represent America.”
Despite this statement, the next ambassador, Edward G. Stockdale, was of the same mould and dismissed by Kiernan as “a very, very poor type … [who had] very little intelligence … His I.Q. wasn’t very high. And that’s all we got.” Kiernan was disappointed and felt that “it showed President Kennedy’s lack of interest in Ireland at the time. He certainly had no intention of sending a good ambassador.” The truth is probably that the President’s choice of Stockdale was rooted in his contribution to party coffers, as was the normal practice, but it was a setback for Kiernan. Having a US ambassador in Dublin with whom he could work closely, in confidence, would have been a huge help, but Stockdale was not going to be that person.
The Irishman decided to play the long game. The Kiernan approach involved putting away the sledgehammer and going the softly, softly route. First things first for the Ambassador was not to play the Green Card, “There was no question of attempting to take advantage of the fact that his ancestors had come from Ireland. we bent backwards to avoid any kind of what I would regard as an intrusion.” Despite this, the Irish card made a natural apearance anyway. On 17 March, St Patrick’s Day, an Irish delegation gets annual access to the White House for what’s called the Shamrock Ceremony, during which the President is given a bowl of the famous Irish greenery. In recent years, the Taoiseach has made the trip but in 1961, the Ambassador did the honours and so, just a month after their first encounter, Dr Kiernan found himself back in the White House. In preparation for the ceremony, the wily diplomat made a call to the Office of Heraldry in Dublin and arranged for them to create a coat of arms that would bring together the O’Kennedy and the Fitzgerald clans. The two men met and Kiernan presented the bowl of shamrock and the coat of arms to the President, who was very appreciative. A rapport was slowly building beween them. It was a critical relationship in the story that was about to unfold.
Just three weeks later, on 11 April, the secretary at the Irish Department of External Affairs, C.C. Cremin, wrote to Kiernan noting that Kennedy was due to visit President de Gaulle in Paris at the end of May and adding “If the President and Mrs Kennedy should desire to come to Dublin they would, of course, be heartily welcome.” He went on to express his desire not to take advantage of Kennedy’s heritage or what the secretary described as the President’s “friendly sentiments for Ireland”. Cremin was at pains to stress that the Irish Government didn’t wish to embarrass Kennedy by issuing a formal invitation which he might in the circumstances feel it difficult to refuse and he urged Kiernan to take a discreet approach. Cremin finished this missive by mentioning a series of dates that wouldn’t be suitable because ministers would be otherwise occupied; these included early June (there was to be a visit from the German foreign minister), mid–June (Princess Grace of Monaco was bringing her husband to town) and late June (when there was to be a week of ceremonies, prayer and pageantry marking 1,500 years since the death of St Patrick).39
Kiernan decided not to force the issue. On 15 April the US army began the ill–fated Bay of Pigs invasion and it was obvious that President Kennedy’s thoughts would be elsewhere, so he didn’t issue an invitation on that occasion. Kiernan’s strategy was still, like Augustus’, festina lente, and in order to make haste slowly, the diplomat had to take advantage of every opportunity, no matter how tiny, to turn the President’s attention to things Irish. He didn’t have long to wait before another opportunity arose.
Courting Kennedy: Dr Thomas J. Kiernan, Irish Ambassador to the United States, with JFK after presenting him with a vase of shamrock for St Patrick’s Day. This photograph was taken in the Oval Office on 15 March 1963.
The people of Wexford, home to the original Kennedys, decided through their local political representatives that they would like to present the President and his wife with a christening cup for their baby son, John Jr, who had been born in November 1960. The seventeenth–century cup made its way across the Atlantic and into the hands of Dr Kiernan, who gave it to his wife, who in turn arranged to hand the gift to Jacqueline Kennedy at a small ceremony in the White House. President Kennedy had sent his apologies, citing meetings that day, but just as they were leaving home, the Kiernans’ phone rang. It was the White House. Kiernan was informed that the President would leave the meeting he was attending, so keen was he to attend the christening cup ceremony.
This was a most welcome diplomatic development. The Kiernans made their way briskly to Pennsylvania Avenue. Kiernan’s main concern that morning was that he hadn’t written a speech and couldn’t decide what to say. When he got to the podium, facing a battery of cameras and pressmen, he had to think on his feet. With Mrs Kennedy to his left and the President to his right, Kiernan had a lightbulb moment. He turned to Kennedy: “I asked him if, instead of a speech, I might recite a poem which had been [written] for my son the day he was born.” The President nodded and Kiernan proceeded.
… When the storms break for him
May the trees shake for him
Their blossoms down;
And in the night that he is troubled
May a friend wake for him
So that his time is doubled;
And at the end of all loving and love
May the Man above
Give him a crown.40
The President was moved. He whispered to Kiernan “I wish that was for me,” before making his way up to the microphone. As a reciprocal gift, the President presented to the people of Wexford a piece of the podium at which he had been inaugurated, to be delivered by Dr Kiernan.
It was little ceremonies like this one, and the increasingly relaxed nature of the President’s encounters with the Irish Ambassador, that helped build the bridge to Ireland.
Finding a reason to visit
The dispatches from the embassy in Washington back to the Department of External Affairs in Dublin suggest that Kiernan and Kennedy were discussing the possibility of a visit to Ireland by early 1962. Writing to C.C. Cremin in May 1962, Kiernan explained that Kennedy had expressed an interest in making a special visit to Ireland and not just one that was tacked on to some other journey (which is exactly what would happen). The problem for the President was that he needed what Kiernan called an “occasion”. Kennedy said he would visit without such an event but that a justifiable reason for the trip would be preferable.
Kiernan wracked his brains. De Valera had visited America before, so he wondered whether they could present this as a return visit: “I had thought of President de Valera’s eightieth birthday next October, which would be an occasion for the timing of a return visit by Kennedy; but there is no visit of President de Valera to return … I wonder if I [should] throw out the idea of reciprocity, for the visit of our President, as justification for a return visit?”41 The arguments didn’t stack up, though, since it was some time since de Valera’s last visit.
Kiernan would go on to suggest the unveiling of a plaque at the Kennedy homestead in Dunganstown, County Wexford, or the naming of the Agricultural Institute after the President as a thank–you for the American aid which had helped in its establishment.42 The Ambassador was adamant in his dispatches that the conferring of an honorary university degree would not constitute enough of an occasion. He described them as “small change in the United States” and added “the President has picked up twenty–three in his first year”. He felt