Some “Modest Proposals” for St. Patrick’s Day

Last updated on: March 17, 2009 at 9:58 am by Pat McNamara

Some “Modest Proposals” for St. Patrick’s Day 2009-03-17T09:58:00-06:00 Pat McNamara

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Monsignor William McGuirl (1859-1933) was Pastor of St. Joseph’s Church on Pacific Street in Brooklyn and the first Brooklyn priest to serve as a police chaplain. In a 1917 St. Patrick’s Day address at the Waldorf Astoria, he made some “modest proposals” for preserving Irish-American identity:

What provisions are we making to keep alive the Irish spirit—the spirit of religion and sentiment, and wit, and poetry, and derring-do?… In the first place we could petition Congress. Enough members of Congress have appeared at these dinners to help us enact a law prohibiting any immigration for three decades, except from the Irish. For thirty years none but Irish need apply. This is the real suggestion.

Two others might help, one is to quicken the blood of our Irish by having a boy in every family named Patrick or a girl christened Patricia. The virtues of the great old Saint might be perpetuated by psychology. Something of strength is in Patrick or Paddy or Pat—a boy so named is a regular fellow; there is something reliable about him. He takes his knocks and gives them. The name of Patrick is good for a prayer, a fight or a frolic. Too many of the mothers of our race have their boys christened Clarence or Reginald or Montmorency. The helpless fathers stand by their helpless men-babies and squirm—and the priest of Celtic blood who christens them says to himself, “poor kid.” Such a child has to fight from the start. Some of them overcome the handicap—more power to them. They are the hidden heroes. But most of them wear their hair in ribbons and in curls all their lives.

The final suggestion for the preservation of the Irish spirit is one that needs extraneous help. When Isaac Isaacson, or Ivan Ivanovitch or Marco Boleario comes up for citizenship, why not make each one take the name of Patrick? “But my name is not Patrick.” “It is, from henceforth, now and forever,” the Judge could say. “You are Patrick Ivan Ivanovitch in this free country. Patrick you are and Patrick you remain without hyphenation.”

These, my friends, are the suggestions of a lover of St. Patrick and of the Race.

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