Loyal Orange Association

The Loyal Orange Institution, commonly known as the Orange Order, is an international Protestant fraternal order based in Northern Ireland and primarily associated with Ulster Protestants, particularly those of Ulster Scots heritage. It also has lodges in England, Scotland and the Republic of Ireland, as well as in parts of the Commonwealth of Nations, Togo and the United States. The Orange Order was founded by Ulster Protestants in County Armagh in 1795, during a period of Protestant–Catholic sectarian conflict, as a fraternity sworn to maintain the Protestant Ascendancy in Ireland. It is headed by the Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland, established in 1798. Its name is a tribute to the Dutch-born Protestant king William of Orange, who defeated Catholic king James II in the Williamite–Jacobite War (16881691). The order is best known for its yearly marches, the biggest of which are held on or around 12 July (The Twelfth), a public holiday in Northern Ireland.

The Orange Order is a conservative, British unionist and Ulster loyalist organisation. Thus it has traditionally opposed Irish nationalism/republicanism and campaigned against Scottish independence."Scottish independence: Orange Lodge registers to campaign for a 'No' vote"
. BBC News. 25 June 2014. Retrieved 12 July 2014. The Order sees itself as defending Protestant civil and religious liberties, whilst critics accuse it of being sectarian, triumphalist and supremacist. As a strict Protestant society, it does not accept non-Protestants as members unless they convert and adhere to the principles of Orangeism, nor does it accept Protestants married to Catholics."... No catholic and no-one whose close relatives are catholic may be a member." Northern Ireland The Orange State, Michael Farrell Orange marches through Irish Catholic neighbourhoods are controversial and have often led to violence, such as the Drumcree conflict.

History

The Orange Institution commemorates the civil and religious privileges conferred on Protestants by William of Orange, the Dutch prince who became King of England, Scotland, and Ireland in the Glorious Revolution of 1688. In particular, the Institution remembers the victories of William III and his forces in Ireland in the early 1690s, especially the Battle of the Boyne.

Formation and early years

Since the 1690s commemorations had been held throughout Ireland celebrating key dates in the Williamite War such as the Battle of Aughrim, Battle of the Boyne, Siege of Derry and the second Siege of Limerick. These followed a tradition started in Elizabethan England of celebrating key events in the Protestant calendar. By the 1740s there were organisations holding parades in Dublin such as the Boyne Club and the Protestant Society, both seen as forerunners to the Orange Order.

Armagh disturbances

Throughout the 1780s, sectarian tension had been building in County Armagh, largely due to the relaxation of the Penal Laws. Here the number of Protestants and Catholics (in what was then Ireland's most populous county) were of roughly equal number, and competition between them to rent patches of land near markets was fierce. Drunken brawls between rival gangs had by 1786 become openly sectarian. These gangs eventually reorganised as the Protestant Peep o' Day Boys and the Catholic Defenders, with the next decade in County Armagh marked by fierce sectarian conflict between both groups, which escalated and spread into neighbouring counties.

Battle of the Diamond

In September 1795, at a crossroads known as "The Diamond" near Loughgall, Defenders and Protestant Peep o' Day Boys gathered to fight each other. This initial stand-off ended without battle when the priest that accompanied the Defenders persuaded them to seek a truce, after a group called the "Bleary Boys" came from County Down to reinforce the Peep o' Day Boys. When a contingent of Defenders from County Tyrone arrived on 21 September, however, they were "determined to fight". The Peep o' Day Boys quickly regrouped and opened fire on the Defenders. According to William Blacker, the battle was short and the Defenders suffered "not less than thirty" deaths.

After the battle had ended, the Peep o' Days marched into Loughgall, and in the house of James Sloan they founded the Orange Order, which was to be a Protestant defence association made up of lodges. The principal pledge of these lodges was to defend "the King and his heirs so long as he or they support the Protestant Ascendancy". At the start the Orange Order was a "parallel organisation" to the Defenders in that it was a secret oath-bound society that used passwords and signs.

One of the very few landed gentry that joined the Orange Order at the outset, William Blacker, was unhappy with some of the outcomes of the Battle of the Diamond. He says that a determination was expressed to "driving from this quarter of the county the entire of its Roman Catholic population", with notices posted warning them "to Hell or Connaught". Other people were warned by notices not to inform on local Orangemen or "I will Blow your Soul to the Low hils of Hell And Burn the House you are in". Within two months, 7,000 Catholics had been driven out of County Armagh. According to Lord Gosford, the governor of Armagh:

A former Grand Master of the Order, also called William Blacker, and a former County Grand Master of Belfast, Robert Hugh Wallace have questioned this statement, saying whoever the Governor believed were the "lawless banditti", they could not have been Orangemen as there were no lodges in existence at the time of his speech. According to historian Jim Smyth:

Later apologists rather implausibly deny any connection between the Peep-o'-Day Boys and the first Orangemen or, even less plausibly, between the Orangemen and the mass wrecking of Catholic cottages in Armagh in the months following 'the Diamond' – all of them, however, acknowledge the movement's lower-class origins.

The Order's three main founders were James Wilson (founder of the Orange Boys), Daniel Winter and James Sloan."James Wilson and James Sloan, who along with 'Diamond' Dan Winter, issued the first Orange lodge warrants from Sloan's Loughgall inn, were masons.
The Men of no Popery, The Origins Of The Orange Order
, by Jim Smyth, from History Ireland Vol 3 No 3 Autumn 1995 The first Orange lodge was established in nearby Dyan, and its first grandmaster was James Sloan of Loughgall. Its first-ever marches were to celebrate the Battle of the Boyne and they took place on 12 July 1796 in Portadown, Lurgan and Waringstown.

United Irishmen rebellion

The Society of United Irishmen was formed by liberal Presbyterians and Anglicans in Belfast in 1791. It sought reform of the Irish Parliament, Catholic Emancipation and the repeal of the Penal Laws. By the time the Orange Order was formed, the United Irishmen had become a revolutionary group advocating an independent Irish republic that would "Unite Catholic, Protestant and Dissenter". United Irishmen activity was on the rise, and the government hoped to thwart it by backing the Orange Order from 1796 onward.The Cause of Ireland: From the United Irishmen to Partition, Liz Curtis, Beyond the Pale Publications, Belfast, 1994, pg.9 Irish nationalist historians Thomas A. Jackson and John Mitchel argued that the government's goal was to hinder the United Irishmen by fomenting sectarianism, thereby creating disunity and disorder under pretence of "passion for the Protestant religion".Thomas A Jackson, ''Ireland Her Own'', page 142–3 Mitchel wrote that the government invented and spread "fearful rumours of intended massacres of all the Protestant people by the Catholics".Mitchel, John. ''History of Ireland, from the Treaty of Limerick to the Present Time: Vol I''. 1869. Page 223. Historian Richard R Madden wrote that "efforts were made to infuse into the mind of the Protestant feelings of distrust to his Catholic fellow-countrymen". Thomas Knox, British military commander in Ulster, wrote in August 1796 that "As for the Orangemen, we have rather a difficult card to play ... we must to a certain degree uphold them, for with all their licentiousness, on them we must rely for the preservation of our lives and properties should critical times occur".

The United Irishmen saw the Defenders as potential allies, and between 1794 and 1796 they formed a coalition.Welsh, Frank: ''The Four Nations: A History of the United Kingdom'', page 230–1 The United Irishmen, despite seeing the Defenders as "ignorant and poverty-stricken houghers and rick-burners" would claim in 1798 that they were indebted to the Armagh disturbances as the Orangemen had scattered politicised Catholics throughout the country and encouraged Defender recruitment, creating a proto-army for the United Irishmen to utilise.

The United Irishmen launched a rebellion in 1798. In Ulster, most of the United Irish commanders and many of the rebels were Protestant. Orangemen were recruited into the yeomanry to help fight the rebellion and "proved an invaluable addition to government forces". No attempt was made to disarm Orangemen outside the yeomanry because they were seen as by far the lesser threat. It was also claimed that if an attempt had been made then "the whole of Ulster would be as bad as Antrim and Down", where the United Irishmen rebellion was at its strongest. However, sectarian massacres by the Defenders in County Wexford "did much to dampen" the rebellion in Ulster. The Scullabogue Barn massacre saw over 100 non-combatant (mostly Protestant) men, women, and children imprisoned in a barn which was then set alight,Dunne, Tom; ''Rebellions: Memoir, Memory and 1798''. The Lilliput Press, 2004. with the Catholic and Protestant Gahan, D
"The Scullabogue Massacre, 1798"
, ''History Ireland'', v4 (1996), 3 rebels ensuring none escaped, not even a child who it is claimed managed to break out only for a rebel to kill with his pike. In the trials that followed the massacres, evidence was recorded of anti-Orange sentiments being expressed by the rebels at Scullabogue. Partly as a result of this atrocity, the Orange Order quickly grew and large numbers of gentry with experience gained in the yeomanry came into the movement.

The homeland and birthplace of the Defenders was mid-Ulster and here they failed to participate in the rebellion, having been cowed into submission and surrounded by their Protestant neighbours who had been armed by the government. The sectarian attacks on them were so severe that Grand Masters of the Orange Order convened to find ways of reducing them. According to Ruth Dudley Edwards and two former Grand Masters, Orangemen were among the first to contribute to repair funds for Catholic property damaged in the rebellion.

One major outcome of the United Irishmen rebellion was the 1800 Act of Union that merged the Irish Parliament with that of Westminster, creating the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Many Catholics supported the Act, but the Orange Order saw it as a threat to the "Protestant constitution" and 36 lodges in counties Armagh and Monaghan alone passed declarations opposing the Union.

Suppression

In the early nineteenth century, Orangemen were heavily involved in violent conflict with an Irish Catholic secret society called the Ribbonmen. One instance, publicised in a 7 October 1816 edition of the ''Boston Commercial Gazette'', included the murder of a Catholic priest and several members of the congregation of Dumreilly parish in County Cavan on 25 May 1816. According to the article, "A number of Orangemen with arms rushed into the church and fired upon the congregation". On 19 July 1823 the Unlawful Oaths Bill was passed, banning all oath-bound societies in Ireland. This included the Orange Order, which had to be dissolved and reconstituted. In 1825 a bill banning unlawful associations – largely directed at Daniel O'Connell and his Catholic Association, compelled the Orangemen once more to dissolve their association. When Westminster finally granted Catholic Emancipation in 1829, Roman Catholics were free to take seats as MPs (and take up various other positions of influence and power from which they had been excluded) and play a part in framing the laws of the land. The likelihood of Irish Catholic members holding the balance of power in the Westminster Parliament further increased the alarm of Orangemen in Ireland, as O'Connell's 'Repeal' movement aimed to bring about the restoration of a separate Irish Parliament in Dublin, which would have a Catholic majority, thereby ending to the Protestant Ascendancy. From this moment on, the Orange Order re-emerged in a new and even more militant form.

In 1836 the Order was accused of plotting to place Ernest Augustus, Duke of Cumberland and Imperial Grand Master of the Orange Order, on the throne in place of Victoria when King William IV died; once the plot was revealed the House of Commons called upon the King to disband the Order. Under pressure from Joseph Hume, William Molesworth and Lord John Russell, the King indicated measures would have to be taken and the Duke of Cumberland was forced to dissolve the Orange lodges.

Hume laid evidence before the House of Commons of an approach in July 1832 to Lord Londonderry. A letter from Lieutenant-Colonel W. B. Fairman, Deputy Grand Secretary of the Orange Institution of Great Britain, advised the Marquess that following "a death of importance" (the passing of the King), the Orangemen would abandon their policy of "non-resistance" to the present "Popish Cabinet, and democratical Ministry" (the parliamentary reform ministry of Earl Grey) and that "it might be political to join" them. Londonderry demurred: he had no doubt that the Duke of Cumberland would be persuaded that "the present state of liberal Whig feeling in this very Whig county ... entirely preclude the possibility of successful efforts at this juncture".

In 1845 the ban was again lifted, but the notorious Battle of Dolly's Brae between Orangemen and Ribbonmen in 1849 led to a ban on Orange marches which remained in place for several decades. This was eventually lifted after a campaign of disobedience led by William Johnston of Ballykilbeg.

Revival and the Independent Order

By the late 19th century, the Order was in decline. However, its fortunes were revived in the 1880s after its embrace by the landlords in opposition to both the Irish Land League and later Home Rule. The Order was heavily involved in opposition to Gladstone's first Irish Home Rule Bill 1886, and was instrumental in the formation of the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP). Protestant opposition to Irish self-government under Roman Catholic influence was intense, especially in the Protestant-dominated province of Ulster.

In 1903, the Order suffered a split when Thomas Sloan left the organisation to set up the Independent Orange Order. Sloan had been suspended after running against the official unionist candidate on a pro-Belfast Protestant Association platform in the 1902 Belfast South by-election. For at least some of the independents, the split was a protest against what they saw as the co-optation of the Orange Order by the Ulster Unionist Party and its alignment with the interests of landlords and employers (the "fur coat brigade"). Their Grand Master, R. Lindsay Crawford outlined the new order's democratic manifesto in ''Orangeism, its history and progress: a plea for first principles'' (1904). However, his subsequent call in the Magheramorne Manifesto (1904) on Irish Protestants to "reconsider their position as Irish citizens and their attitude towards their Roman Catholic countrymen" proved too much for Sloan and most of the membership, and Crawford was eventually expelled.

Role in the partition of Ireland

In 1912 the Third Home Rule Bill was introduced in the British House of Commons. However, its introduction would be delayed until 1914. The Orange Order, along with the British Conservative Party and unionists in general, were inflexible in opposing the Bill. The Order helped to organise the 1912 Ulster Covenant – a pledge to oppose Home Rule which was signed by up to 500,000 people. In 1911 some Orangemen began to arm themselves and train as militias. In 1913 the Ulster Unionist Council decided to bring these groups under central control, creating the Ulster Volunteer Force, an Ulster-wide militia dedicated to resisting Home Rule. There was a strong overlap between Orange Lodges and UVF units. A large shipment of rifles was imported from Germany to arm them in April 1914, in what became known as the Larne gun-running.

However, the crisis was interrupted by the outbreak of the World War I in August 1914, which caused the Home Rule Bill to be suspended for the duration of the war. Many Orangemen served in the war with the 36th (Ulster) Division, suffering heavy losses, and commemorations of their sacrifice are still an important element of Orange ceremonies.

The Fourth Home Rule Act was passed as the Government of Ireland Act 1920; the six northeastern counties of Ulster became Northern Ireland and the other twenty-six counties became Southern Ireland. This self-governing entity within the United Kingdom was confirmed in its status under the terms of the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921, and in its borders by the Boundary Commission agreement of 1925. Southern Ireland became first the Irish Free State in 1922 and then in 1949 a Republic.

Since 1921

The Orange Order had a central place in the new state of Northern Ireland. From 1921 to 1969, every Prime Minister of Northern Ireland was an Orangeman and member of the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP); all but three Cabinet Ministers were Orangemen; all but one unionist Senators were Orangemen; and 87 of the 95 MPs who did not become Cabinet Ministers were Orangemen. James Craig, the first Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, maintained always that Ulster was in effect Protestant and the symbol of its ruling forces was the Orange Order. In 1932, Prime Minister Craig maintained that "ours is a Protestant government and I am an Orangeman". This was in response to a speech the year before by Eamonn de Valera in the Irish Free State claiming that Ireland was a "Catholic nation" in a debate about protests against Protestant woman Letitia Dunbar-Harrison. Two years later he stated: "I have always said that I am an Orangeman first and a politician and a member of this parliament afterwards ... All I boast is that we have a Protestant Parliament and a Protestant State".

At its peak in 1965, the Order's membership was around 70,000, which meant that roughly 1 in 5 adult Ulster Protestant males were members. Since 1965, it has lost a third of its membership, especially in Belfast and Derry. The Order's political influence suffered greatly after the unionist-controlled government of Northern Ireland was abolished in 1973.
In 2012, it was stated that estimated membership of the Orange Order was around 34,000.

After the outbreak of "the Troubles" in 1969, the Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland encouraged Orangemen to join the Northern Ireland security forces, especially the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) and the British Army's Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR). The response from Orangemen was strong. Over 300 Orangemen were killed during the conflict, the vast majority of them members of the security forces."Memorial to honour the Orange victims"
. ''Portadown Times''. 27 April 2007. Retrieved 1 April 2011. Some Orangemen also joined loyalist paramilitary groups. During the conflict, the Order had a fractious relationship with loyalist paramilitary groups, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), the Independent Orange Order and the Free Presbyterian Church. The Order urged its members not to join these organisations, and it is only recently that some of these intra-unionist breaches have been healed.

Drumcree dispute

The Drumcree dispute is perhaps the most well-known episode involving the Order since 1921. On the Sunday before 12 July each year, Orangemen in Portadown would traditionally march to-and-from Drumcree Church. Originally, most of the route was farmland, but is now the densely populated Catholic part of town. The residents have sought to re-route the march away from this area, seeing it as "triumphalist" and " supremacist".Mulholland, Peter. "Drumcree: A Struggle for Recognition". ''Irish Journal of Sociology, Vol. 9''. 1999

There have been intermittent violent clashes during the march since the 19th century.Bryan, Fraser, Dunn. ''Political Rituals: Loyalist Parades in Portadown – Part 3 – Portadown and its Orange Tradition''.
CAIN The onset of the Troubles led to the dispute intensifying in the 1970s and 1980s. At this time, the most contentious part of the march was the outward leg along Obins Street. After serious violence two years in a row, the march was banned from Obins Street in 1986. The focus then shifted to the return leg along Garvaghy Road.

Each July from 1995 to 2000, the dispute drew worldwide attention as it sparked protests and violence throughout Northern Ireland, prompted a massive police/army operation, and threatened to derail the peace process. The situation in Portadown was likened to a "war zone" and a "siege". During this time, supporters of the Orangemen murdered at least six Catholic civilians. In 1995 and 1996, residents succeeded in stopping the march. This led to a standoff at Drumcree between the security forces and thousands of loyalists. Following a wave of loyalist violence, the march was allowed through. In 1997, security forces locked down the Catholic area and forced the march through, citing loyalist threats. This sparked widespread protests and violence by Irish nationalists. From 1998 onward the march was banned from Garvaghy Road and the Catholic area was sealed-off with large barricades. For a few years, there was an annual major standoff at Drumcree and widespread loyalist violence. Since 2001, things have been relatively calm, but the Order still campaigns for the right to march on Garvaghy Road. The dispute led to a short-lived boycott of businesses owned by Orangemen and their supporters elsewhere in the region.

Membership rates

Membership of the Order was historically lower in areas where Protestants are in the majority, and vice versa. In County Fermanagh, where the Catholic and Protestant populations are close to parity, membership in 1971 was three times as high as in the more Protestant counties of Antrim and Down, where it was just over 10% of adult Protestant males. Other factors that are associated with high rates of membership are levels of unemployment that more closely match Catholic levels, and low levels of support for the Democratic Unionist Party among unionists.

Beliefs and activities

Protestantism

The basis of the modern Orange Order is the promotion and propagation of "biblical Protestantism" and the principles of the Reformation. As such the Order only accepts those who confess a belief in a Protestant religion. As well as Catholics, non-creedal and non-Trinitarian Christians are also banned. This includes members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), Jehovah's Witnesses, Unitarians, and some branches of Quakers.

Previous rules specifically forbade Roman Catholics and their close relatives from joining but the current rules use the wording "non-reformed faith" instead. Converts to Protestantism can join by appealing to Grand Lodge.

Masonic influences

James Wilson and James Sloan, who issued the warrants for the first Lodges of the Orange Order along with 'Diamond' Dan Winter, were Freemasons, and in the 19th century many Irish Republicans regarded the Orange Order as a front group established by Unionist Masons as a more violent and jingoist vehicle for the promotion of Unionism. Some anti-Masonic evangelical Christian groups have claimed that the Orange Order is still influenced by freemasonry. Many Masonic traditions survive, such as the organisation of the Order into lodges. The Order has a similar system of degrees through which new members advance. These degrees are interactive plays with references to the Bible. There is particular concern over the ritualism of higher degrees such as the Royal Arch Purple and the Royal Black Institutions.

Sabbatarianism

The Order considers important the Fourth Commandment, and that it forbids Christians to work, or engage in non-religious activity generally, on Sundays. When the Twelfth of July falls on a Sunday the parades traditionally held on that date are held the next day instead. In March 2002, the Order threatened "to take every action necessary, regardless of the consequences" to prevent the Ballymena Show being held on a Sunday. The County Antrim Agricultural Association complied with the Order's wishes.

Politics

The Orange Order is strongly linked to British unionism. This is a political ideology that supports the continued unity of the United Kingdom. Unionism is thus opposed to, for example, the unification of Ireland and Scottish independence.

The Order, from its very inception, was an overtly political organisation. In 1905, when the Ulster Unionist Council (UUC) was formed, the Orange Order was entitled to send delegates to its meetings. The UUC was the decision-making body of the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP). Between 1922 and 1972, the UUP was consistently the largest party in the Northern Ireland Parliament, and all Prime Ministers of Northern Ireland and the vast majority of senior UUP figures were members of the Order. Due to its close links with the UUP, the Orange Order was able to exert great influence. The Order was the force behind the UUP no-confidence votes in reformist Prime Ministers Terence O'Neill (1969), James Chichester-Clark (1969–71), and Brian Faulkner (1972–74). At the outbreak of The Troubles in 1969, the Order encouraged its members to join the Northern Ireland security forces. The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) attracted the most seats in an election for the first time in 2003. DUP leader Ian Paisley had been clashing with the Order since 1951, when the Order banned members of Paisley's Free Presbyterian Church from acting as Orange chaplains and later, from the 1970s, when it openly endorsed the UUP against the DUP. Recently, however, Orangemen have begun voting for the DUP in large numbers due to their opposition to the Good Friday Agreement. Relations between the DUP and Order have healed greatly since 2001, and there are now a number of high-profile Orangemen who are DUP MPs and strategists.

In December 2009, the Orange Order held secret talks with Northern Ireland's two main unionist parties, the DUP and UUP. The main goal of these talks was to foster greater unity between the two parties, in the run-up to the May 2010 general election. Sinn Féin's Alex Maskey said that the talks exposed the Order as a "very political organisation". Shortly after the election, Grand Master Robert Saulters called for a "single unionist party" to maintain the union. He said that the Order has members "who represent all the many shades of unionism" and warned, "we will continue to dilute the union if we fight and bicker among ourselves".

In the October 2010 issue of ''The Orange Standard'', Grand Master Robert Saulters referred to 'dissident' Irish republican paramilitaries as the "Roman Catholic IRA". SDLP MLA John Dallat asked Justice Minister David Ford to find if Saulters had broken the hate speech laws. He said: "Linking the Catholic community or indeed any community to terror groups is inciting weak-minded people to hatred, and surely history tells us what that has led to in the past". In a 2011 survey of 1,500 Orangemen throughout Northern Ireland, over 60% believed that "most Catholics are IRA sympathisers".

In 2015, the Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland made a submission to the Northern Ireland Department of Arts, Culture and Leisure opposing the introduction of an Irish Language Bill. In its submission, the Lodge stated that it respected "Irish as one of the indigenous languages of the British Isles". However, the Lodge argued an Irish Language Act would promote inequality because it would be "directed towards a section of the Roman Catholic community".

Parades

Parades are a big part of the Order's activities. Most Orange lodges hold a yearly parade from their Orange hall to a local church. The denomination of the church is quite often rotated, depending on local demographics.

The highlights of the Orange year are the parades leading up to the celebrations on the Twelfth of July. The Twelfth, however, remains in places a deeply divisive issue, not least because of the alleged triumphalism, anti-Catholicism and anti-Irish nationalism of the Orange Order. In recent years, most Orange parades have passed peacefully. All but a handful of the Orange Order parades, at so-called "interface areas" where the two communities live next to each other, are peaceful.
The locations used for the annual Twelfth parades are located throughout the six counties of Northern Ireland with County Down having the most venues with thirty-three. Counties Armagh and Fermanagh having a smaller population both have twelve host venues. Some smaller villages such as Carrickmore, Cushendall, Rostrevor, Crossmaglen and Draperstown are not marched in at all and areas with a sizeable population like Coalisland and Dungiven have never been the host for a major Twelfth parade.

The Grand Lodge of Ireland does not recognise the Parades Commission, which it sees as having been founded to target Protestant parades, as Protestants parade at ten times the rate of Catholics. Grand Lodge is, however, divided on the issue of working with the Parades Commission. 40% of Grand Lodge delegates oppose official policy while 60% are in favour. Most of those opposed to Grand Lodge policy are from areas facing parade restrictions like Portadown District, Bellaghy, Derry City and Lower Ormeau.

In a 2011 survey of Orangemen throughout Northern Ireland, 58% said they should be allowed to march through Irish nationalist and Catholic areas with no restrictions; 20% said they should negotiate with residents first.

Orange halls

Monthly meetings are held in Orange halls. Orange halls on both sides of the Irish border often function as community halls for Protestants and sometimes those of other faiths, although this was more common in the past. The halls often host community groups such as credit unions, local marching bands, Ulster-Scots and other cultural groups as well as religious missions and unionist political parties.

Of the approximately 700 Orange halls in Ireland, 282 have been targeted by arsonists since the beginning of the Troubles in 1968. Paul Butler, a prominent member of Sinn Féin, has said the arson is a "campaign against properties belonging to the Orange Order and other loyal institutions" by nationalists. On one occasion a member of Sinn Féin's youth wing was hospitalised after falling off the roof of an Orange hall. In a number of cases halls have been badly damaged or completely destroyed by arson, while others have been damaged by paint bombings, graffiti and other vandalism.Belfast Newsletter 18 December 2007, p.1 The Order claims that there is considerable evidence of an organised campaign of sectarian vandalism by Irish republicans. Grand Secretary Drew Nelson claims that statistical analysis shows that this campaign began in the last years of the 1980s and continues to the present.

Historiography

One of the Orange Order's activities is teaching members and the general public about William of Orange and associated subjects. Both the Grand Lodge and various individual lodges have published numerous booklets about William and the Battle of the Boyne, often aiming to show that they have continued relevance, and sometimes comparing the actions of William's adversary James II with those of the Northern Ireland Office. Furthermore, historical articles are often published in the Order's monthly newspaper ''The Orange Standard'' (available in a print edition and also electronically) and the Twelfth souvenir booklet. While William is the most frequent subject, other topics have included the Battle of the Somme (particularly the 36th (Ulster) Division's role in it), Saint Patrick (who the Order argues was not Roman Catholic), and the Protestant Reformation.

There are at least two Orange Lodges in Northern Ireland which they claim represent the heritage and religious ethos of Saint Patrick. The best known is the Cross of Saint Patrick LOL (Loyal Orange lodge) 688, instituted in 1968 for the purpose of (re)claiming Saint Patrick. The lodge has had several well-known members, including Rev Robert Bradford MP who was the lodge chaplain who himself was killed by the Provisional IRA, the late Ernest Baird. Today Nelson McCausland MLA and Gordon Lucy, Director of the Ulster Society are the more prominent members within the lodge membership. In the 1970s there was also a Belfast lodge called Oidhreacht Éireann (Ireland's Heritage) LOL 1303, which argued that the Irish language and Gaelic culture were not the exclusive property of Catholics or republicans.

William was supported by the Pope in his campaigns against James' backer Louis XIV of France, and this fact is sometimes left out of Orange histories.

Occasionally the Order and the more fundamentalist Independent Order publishes historical arguments based more on religion than on history. British Israelism, which claims that the British people are descended from the Israelites and that Queen Elizabeth II is a direct descendant of the Biblical King David, has from time to time been advanced in Orange publications.

War commemoration

The Order has been prominent in commemorating Ulster's war dead, particularly Orangemen and particularly those who died in the Battle of the Somme (1916) during World War I. There are many parades on and around 1 July in commemoration of the Somme, although the war memorial aspect is more obvious in some parades than others. There are several memorial lodges, and a number of banners which depict the Battle of the Somme, war memorials, or other commemorative images. In the grounds of the Ulster Tower Thiepval, which commemorates the men of the Ulster Division who died in the Battle of the Somme, a smaller monument pays homage to the Orangemen who died in the war.

Relationship with loyalist paramilitaries

The Orange Order has been criticised for associating with loyalist paramilitary groups such as the UVF and UDA, which are classified as terrorist organisations. However, it has publicly condemned terrorism and paramilitary violence. Some bands that appear at Orange marches openly display support for loyalist paramilitary groups, such as by carrying paramilitary flags or sporting paramilitary names and emblems. For example, prominent loyalist John Gregg was a member of ''Cloughfern Young Conquerors'' band, while Coleraine-based ''Freeman Memorial'' band was named after a UVF member who was killed by his own bomb. It has also been claimed that paramilitary groups approach certain bands asking the band to carry a flag of their organisation with financial assistance sometimes offered for doing so.

A number of prominent loyalist militants were members of the Orange Order at the same time. This includes Gusty Spence