An immigration center
finds itself in a controversy involving Martin Sheen, Daniel Berrigan and
Philadelphia’s most famous murder.
At last year’s fundraising luncheon
for the Philadelphia Immigration Resource Center (PIRC), the lights went out
for a moment while Mary McAleese, president of Ireland, addressed the crowd. If
that’s the worst thing that happens at this year’s event, PIRC board chair Anne
O’Callaghan will breathe a heavy sigh of relief.
Because by then she will have been
dealing with a controversy involving this year’s honorees — peace and civil
rights activist Father Daniel Berrigan, and actor Martin Sheen, star of The
West Wing— for more than a month. Fewer people are impressed by the PIRC’s
coup in securing commitments from both men to attend the May 16 event, it
seems, than are outraged over statements they’ve made in the past regarding a
wholly unrelated matter that has surprising resonance in the Philadelphia-area
Irish-American community: the case of convicted cop killer Mumia Abu-Jamal.
Located in Upper Darby, the PIRC is
a source of great pride for the various Irish-American organizations that
established it in 1999, partly in response to the unceremonious jailing and
deportation of some young Irish nationals the previous year. Last year’s
fundraiser, featuring McAleese, attracted hundreds and was an unqualified
success.
This year, the board of directors
decided to use the event to bestow a new honor, the Dennis Clark Solas Award.
(Clark is a late historian, and author of The Irish in Philadelphia: Ten
Generations of Urban Experience; "solas" is the Irish Gaelic
word for light.) The award will be given to those who fight for the rights of
"the dispossessed," as O’Callaghan puts it.
Berrigan, perhaps best known for
his demonstrations against the war in Vietnam, and Sheen, who wrote the forward
to Berrigan’s last book, Job: And Death No Dominion, were chosen
"because of their steadfast and universal commitment to the rights of
oppressed minorities and immigrants around the world, including the Irish
communities in the United States and in Ireland," according to a statement
from the board. "Their work is most deserving of the Solas award named in
honor of Dennis Clark."
The board’s vote had been
unanimous. Abu-Jamal’s name wasn’t raised until weeks later, when O’Callaghan
put out the word about the selection. Someone observed that the honorees are
"pretty liberal," she recalls, and wondered aloud whether either has
ever spoken out on Mumia’s case.
O’Callaghan searched online, and
sure enough, they have. In an audio clip from a CD that accompanies Abu-Jamal’s
book All Things Censored, Sheen calls the death row inmate an
"incisive critic of our criminal justice system" and a "voice of
the voiceless." Berrigan is named on a lengthy list of known Abu-Jamal
supporters maintained by the Grand Lodge of the Fraternal Order of Police.
O’Callaghan says she then contacted
fellow PIRC board member Robert Hurst, a former head of the FOP in
Philadelphia, and he confirmed that Mumia supporters "would not be welcome
in Philadelphia," she says, "and that my best bet would be to
cancel."
Apparently word spread quickly, and
O’Callaghan soon learned that intense discussions were taking place with and
between board members. Those opposed to the speakers "tried to stir up
passions that they knew were there," she says.
So another board meeting was
called. After three and a half hours of debate, the members voted 13-6 to
proceed with the event as planned. O’Callaghan and another member, attorney
Mark Kearney, drew up a statement that reads in part: "The honoring of the
work performed by Fr. Dan Berrigan and Martin Sheen, however, does not in any
way endorse or express support for every view expressed by them, particularly
any view either expressed or held by these men regarding the murder of
Philadelphia Police Officer Daniel Faulkner.
"To the contrary, the Board
stands with, and fully supports, Maureen Faulkner, Ken Faulkner, their families
and their friends in demanding justice for the murder of Officer Daniel
Faulkner."
But this wasn’t enough for Hurst,
who resigned from the PIRC board. An open letter to O’Callaghan, posted on the
website of the organization Hurst heads, the Mayo Association of Philadelphia,
cited "strong disagreement with the selection of the honorees."
"Mumia Abu-Jamal was found
guilty and sentenced to death for the murder of Officer Danny Faulkner,"
Hurst wrote. "Now years later, we are asked to honor people who publicly
support his murderer. As a former law enforcement officer and president of the
Fraternal Order of Police … I can no longer in good faith be associated with
the Philadelphia Immigration Resource Center."
Hurst could not be reached before
press time.
Much of the local Irish-American
community is fiercely protective of Faulkner’s memory and loyal to his family.
A recent benefit concert dubbed Artists for Daniel Faulkner, organized by local
pop band Cloning Einstein, ended up consisting almost entirely of Irish acts;
other bands were too worried about negative publicity. Faulkner’s name shows up
on various signs and floats in the St. Patrick’s Day parade every year, and a
Philadelphia division of the Ancient Order of Hibernians (AOH), an Irish-Catholic
group, is named for him.
"I think it’s because [Mumia
supporters] have generated all this publicity for him," says Bob Gessler,
president of the Philadelphia board of the AOH. "The Irish have always
liked the underdog."
Gessler says the matter will be discussed
at an upcoming meeting of AOH division leaders, but he believes the
organization will not support the PIRC’s event. Nor, however, will the AOH take
part in demonstrations outside the Wyndham Franklin Plaza during the luncheon,
as some have suggested should occur. The AOH’s boycott, Gessler stresses,
"is not going to affect our support for the immigration center."
Rich Costello, president of the
local lodge of the FOP, is taking a similar tack. While not pleased that
"supporters of the cold-blooded killer of a Philadelphia police
officer" are being honored "for anything," Costello says he
would not accept an offer to join a protest. Maureen Faulkner, widow of the
slain officer, recently asked him not to take action against another non-profit
group’s event, around the same time, at which another person who once ran afoul
of the pro-Faulkner camp will speak.
Councilman Jim Kenney, a supporter
of the PIRC and Irish groups in general, also is opting out. "I know the
people [at the PIRC] well, and I know Martin Sheen’s views [on Mumia] don’t
reflect their own, but I won’t be attending," he says.
So the PIRC officers are left
wondering who will come, and how this all became so heated, so fast.
"I don’t think anybody
expected this firestorm would come up," says PIRC board member Pat
Coughlan, a regional director for the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees
International. "And I don’t think the board has done anything to support a
cop killer.… I don’t know one person on this board who would even support a new
trial for this creep."
When O’Callaghan discusses the
controversy, her tone alternates between saddened and defiant.
"We selected these guys
because they have consistently stood for the same values we have stood
for," she says. "And for supporters of Daniel Faulkner and his
grieving family to make [the event] about Mumia is a travesty.… Either they
have another agenda, or they’re totally confused.
"This is not about
Mumia," she continues, "and [for the board] to act according would
compound the situation, and really make me question my own integrity."
So her principles are intact, but
the tension remains. Maureen Faulkner, the slain officer’s widow, says she
won’t attend the event, but won’t call for or endorse any demonstrations.
"The good [the PIRC is] doing outweighs who they’ve chosen to speak,"
she says. Still, she flatly rejected a good-faith measure offered by the board:
to arrange a meeting between Berrigan and Sheen and members of the Faulkner
family.
"I will not meet with
them," she says. "These people come out and make statements before
educating themselves on the case.… So no, I have nothing to say to them."
O’Callaghan, who’s already weary of
the controversy, jokes that the late Dennis Clark, for whom the award is named,
may have a hand in all of this.
"He wouldn’t want the event to
be harmed, and he would support the mission of the immigration center,"
she says, "but he certainly enjoyed controversy and working it
through."