Sub-series 1 - Presidential election campaign

6 SubSubSeries, 3 SubSubSubSeries, 92 files, 3 items

Material in this subseries relates to Mary Robinson (MR)'s Presidential Election campaign from her nomination as candidate, through to her successful election, and includes campaign committee minutes, press releases, correspondence, reports and polls, posters, cuttings and other ephemera. Nominated by both Labour and The Workers' Party to become candidate of political left, MR chose to remain independent from either party, and made history as both the first female candidate and eventual winner. The margin of victory between the three candidates [MR, Brian Lenihan (Fianna Fáil) and Austin Currie (Fine Gael)] was one of the tightest in history, and the final few weeks featured personal attacks from rival parties, scandal and resignation of Lenihan from Government, and internal bickering amongst Fianna Fáil party members. Fine Gael's leader, Alan Dukes, would later resign following Currie's poor third place showing. Ruairí Quinn, Deputy Leader of the Labour party, worked as MR's Campaign Director and the election took place on 7th November 1990.

[Archivist's Note: In January 1982, then Taoiseach, Garret FitzGerald, asked then President, Patrick Hillery, to dissolve the Dáil, which Hillery did. If Hillery had refused a dissolution, Charles Haughey as Leader of the Opposition, could have formed an alternative government. Lenihan among others called Hillery seeking to pressure him to refuse to dissolve the Dáil, something Lenihan denied doing in October 1990 during the Presidential election campaign. However, tapes existed of an interview he did with postgrad student and journalist, Jim Duffy, in May 1990, in which he stated he had done so, and (sections of) these tapes were subsequently released by Duffy following Lenihan's denial. Haughey dismissed Lenihan from government but supported him as Fianna Fáil's candidate in presidential election. This became known as the (Duffy) "Tapes Affair". To support Lenihan and weaken MR's standing with voters, a fellow Fianna Fáil government colleague, Pádraig Flynn, launched a personal attack which questioned MR's loyalty to her family among other insults, which, along with the "Tapes Affair", was seen to have gifted MR the election.

However, a letter in P143/4/1/3/5 from Robin J Addis, Managing Director, Lansdowne Market Research, references an unpublished poll showing MR had already almost caught up with Lenihan in estimated first preference votes, and stated pollsters would most likely have predicted MR to win regardless, without any assistance from these events.]

Ref: P143/4/1

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