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I'm going to post a relatively long thread about the interactions between Seamus Woulfe and the judiciary based on the publications so far that aims to answer the question: 'how did we end up with the threat of impeachment?' Feel free to mute this thread due to the length.
This is based on the materials published by the judicial council, on the letters published earlier this week, and other sources (I think I indicate all the other sources as I go, apologies if I miss someone). Here is the reconstructed chronology:
19 August – dinner occurs in Clifden.
21 August - There are are 2 phone conversation between the CJ and Woulfe J (will use Woulfe in future for brevity). The contents of the first phone conversation are not clear, but the outcome is: it results in the apology issues by Woulfe J:
21 August - There are are 2 phone conversation between the CJ and Woulfe J (will use Woulfe in future for brevity). The contents of the first phone conversation are not clear, but the outcome is: it results in the apology issues by Woulfe J:
The text of the apology, issued on the afternoon of 21 August, is as follows. The CJ refers to this in his letter of 5th Oct as a ‘limited apology’.
In the 2nd phone call, the CJ communicates that damage was being caused to the judiciary and that ‘reasonable people’ (which must include the judiciary) are forming this view, and that it was not a ‘media frenzy’.
So, at the end of 21st August, there was an apology for attendance at the event, followed by a communication by the CJ that the controversy wasn’t a media frenzy, and that reasonable people were concerned that it was damaging the judiciary.
25th August, the CJ writes to Susan Denham on behalf of the Supreme Court asking her to consider certain questions. These are:
4th September – the Irish Times reports that Woulfe has retained the counsel of Michael Collins SC and is ‘digging in to fight his corner’.
8th September – an interview takes place between Woulfe and Denham concerning the incident.
8th September – an interview takes place between Woulfe and Denham concerning the incident.
The process is relatively technical. The points that I want to draw out relate to the conversation of 21st Aug. Recall (1): the CJ has indicated to Woulfe that it is not a ‘media frenzy’. Woulfe comments on the media in the interview are pretty wideranging, but here is a flavour:
Recall (2): the apology is issued by Woulfe J after the first conversation with the CJ. In the transcript, Woulfe equivocates about this apology, appearing to suggest it was unnecessary but restating it at times:
Recall (3): the CJ has presented the view of ‘reasonable people’. It is not a stretch to consider that this includes the views of senior judges, who the CJ would have sounded out. Here is Woulfe in the transcript:
In his letter of Nov, Woulfe indicates that the only members of the judiciary who have contacted him are the CJ and one other colleague, so it seems likely this impression was formed in part on the basis of the August phone calls.
The end result of the transcript is that Woulfe J has essentially repudiated all of the views that had been put forward by the CJ in August. 1 October – the Denham Report is published without the appendices. It contains the following conclusion:
The report is seen as damaging but, in and of itself, not sufficient to require resignation. Here is the Irish Times editorial view:
What is clear in later exchanges with the CJ in Nov is that there is a point of tension between what Woulfe and the CJ believes that the Denham report did. Woulfe repeatedly refers to facts, but the CJ points out that Denham could not make findings of fact:
2 October – Woulfe is to meet with three senior colleagues. The CJ responds to Woulfe’s suggestion that he bring an SC to the meeting with disfavour, but suggests he can bring a senior judge along. This is contained in a letter, the phone conversations of August are over.
Woulfe meets three senior judges. The meeting does not go well, but at least one of the judges present indicates that they do not think that Woulfe should resign:
On the same day, it is not clear whether before or after this meeting, the appendices (which contains the transcript of the interview) are published:
This is apparently done, somewhat astonishingly in retrospect, with the agreement of Woulfe himself. It seems safe to conclude that the he did not believe that they were damaging.
The shift in temperature is almost immediate. The Sunday Times editorial of 4 Oct:
What implications can we draw from the above in terms of how the judiciary interact? I think that the phone conversations of August are intended to indicate in a collegial manner what the temperature of the judiciary is.
This suggested a means by which to deal with the matter in the subsequent process: accept the issue on the lines suggested, apologise profusely, and move on. In contrast, the strategy taken by Woulfe is to insist upon legality.
This is compounded by the subsequent interview, where Woulfe takes the opportunity to push back against all of the elements of the August phone conversations. The Denham report is seen by Woulfe as largely vindicating his position.
In contrast, knowing that Denham could not make findings of fact, the other members of the judiciary appear to be unconvinced. These contrasting positions comes to a head subsequently in the letters that were published earlier this week.
It’s not clear what the next steps are, but they will be decided by the politicial branches. Laura Cahillane, David Kenny, and Tom Hickey have set out different positions on this.
1 potential irony,however,is that for years there have been claims that Woulfe as AG was prone to excessively legalistic interpretations of the Constitution.This approach may have created the fissure between himself& the other members of the SC which resulted this week's events.
End and sorry for cluttering up your timeline.
