From: dwilkins@maths.tcd.ie (David Wilkins)
Subject: Re: Irish Rejects Associated (IRA)
Organization: Dept. of Maths, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland.
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 23:29:49 GMT

In article <cmp0136.718987750@oxygen.sys.uea.ac.uk> cmp0136@sys.uea.ac.uk (P. Arnold) writes:
[Somebody else (possibly Ulick Stafford?) writes]
>>Bullshit.  6 was the number over which there was a comfortable unionist 
>>majority.  At least 2 and maybe 4 of these counties had Nationalist
>>majorities.
>
>Could someone explain this?  How can there be a Unionist and a Nationalist
>majority in the same county??

I hope the following info does not provoke the usual NI flame-war!

Here are some figures concerning the distribution of population by
religion in the area concerned.  These tables are quoted from the
beginning and end respectively of `Ireland 1912-1985: politics
and society' by J. J. Lee (Cambridge U.P.)

   Distribution of population by religion in Ulster counties, 1911
   County   Protestants (%)   Catholics (%)
   ----------------------------------------
   Antrim       79.5              20.5
   Down         68.4              31.6
   Armagh       54.7              45.3
   Londonderry  54.2              45.8
   Tyrone       44.6              55.4
   Fermanagh    43.8              56.2
   Monaghan     25.3              74.7
   Donegal      21.1              78.9
   Cavan        18.5              81.5

   Source: Census of Ireland, 1911.

(N.B., Northern Ireland consists of the six counties of
Antrim, Down, Armagh, Londonderry (or Derry), Tyrone and Fermanagh.
The remaining three counties of Ulster, namely Monaghan, Donegal
and Cavan are in the Republic.)

The Unionists had, and have, a comfortable majority in the
six counties of Northern Ireland.  At the time of partition,
they had a very slim majority in the nine counties of the
province of Ulster.  However Fermanagh and Tyrone had
nationalist majorities.

Lee also quotes more recent (and detailed) information concerning
the percentage of Catholics in the district council areas of
Northern Ireland, 1981.  This information, taken from `Ireland,
a positive proposal' by K. Boyle and T. Hadden, is presented in
the form of a map.  (I have attempted to assign district
areas to counties in the final column of the following table:
some districts appear though to span two or more counties.)
The 1981 figures are

   District    Catholics (%)  County
   ------------------------------
   Moyle             51      Antrim
   Ballymoney        29      Antrim
   Ballymena         19      Antrim
   Larne             24      Antrim
   Antrim            33      Antrim
   Newtonabbey       13      Antrim
   Carrickfergus      8      Antrim

   Belfast           38      Antrim/Down
   Lisburn           21      Antrim/Down (?)

   North Down         9      Down
   Castlereagh        8      Down
   Ards              13      Down
   Banbridge         28      Down
   Down              59      Down

   Newry and Mourne  74      Down/Armagh

   Armagh            45      Armagh
   Craigavon         41      Armagh

   Derry             68      Londonderry
   Limavady          54      Londonderry
   Coleraine         24      Londonderry
   Magherafelt       57      Londonderry

   Strabane          61      Tyrone
   Omagh             64      Tyrone
   Cookstown         53      Tyrone
   Dungannon         53      Tyrone

   Fermanagh         54      Fermanagh

(Religious affiliation is strongly correlated with
Unionist/Nationalist culture)

DRW

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