Critics of John Bruton’s Home Rule advocacy are thinking wishfully

With respect to your correspondents (August 16, 2014) who have attacked John Bruton, their approach has been unhistorical wishful-thinking and not an empirical appraisal.

I do not share most of Bruton’s general socio-economic philosophy, but, having watched his political development since his election to Dáil Éireann in 1969, I respect him as a serious and hard-working politician.

Part of what he identifies as “Redmondism” could better be described as “constitutionalism”: The belief that rights, the protection of the weak and disadvantaged, the cherishing of all children equally, can only be guaranteed by a political system and culture based on, and faithful to, the rule of law as formulated by parliament mandated by the people.