Law & Order

Ben Stone: ...Same way you ended up with the name of a real Irish patriot. Stone is referring to Daniel O'Connell (1775-1847), the foremost politician of Ireland in the first half of the 1800s. O'Connell advocated for the reform of governing Ireland through peaceful and political means, rather than by force. He campaigned for Catholic Emancipation (i.e., the removal of all anti-Catholic legislation enforced in Ireland) and a repeal of the 1801 Act of Union to promote Irish independence. There is a street and statue dedicated to O'Connell in Dublin.

Ben Stone: My grandmother was Irish. Fahey. She thought it was a holy war. Michael Collins, Robert Emmett -- she'd recite those names like they were saints in Heaven. Michael Collins (1890-1922) was an Irish revolutionary leader. He served as the Irish Republic's Minister of Finance and Director of Intelligence for the Irish Republican Army. In 1920, the British offered a £10,000 bounty on him, dead or alive. In 1921, he was part of the delegation that negotiated the Anglo-Irish Treaty, which allowed for the formation of an Irish Free State. He was assassinated at the age of 31 in 1922. Robert Emmett (1778-1803) protested the Act of Union between Great Britain in Ireland in 1801. In 1803, he led a small uprising in an attempt to settle an Irish Republic, but the uprising was prematurely exposed and failed. He was captured and later executed on September 20, 1803.

Ben Stone: McCarter thinks of himself as a soldier, a loyal member of a long-standing army that has been under arms in one form or another since the Battle of the Boyne, and that was about 300 years ago. The Battle of the Boyne was fought on July 1, 1690, between King James II and William of Orange, for control of English, Scottish, and Irish thrones. William's victory confirmed British and Protestant rule over the country for over a century. It is a very symbolic battle, still celebrated by Unionist communities in Northern Ireland today.