The Workers' Party is an Irish republican, Marxist–Leninist communist party active in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.
Tomás Mac Giolla served as leader of the Workers' Party for over a quarter of a century
Proinsias De Rossa
Image: Tomás Mac Giolla (cropped)
Image: Proinsias De Rossa, cropped
Sinn Féin is the name of an Irish political party founded in 1905 by Arthur Griffith. It became a focus for various forms of Irish nationalism, especially Irish republicanism. After the Easter Rising in 1916, it grew in membership, with a reorganisation at its Ard Fheis in 1917. Its split in 1922 in response to the Anglo-Irish Treaty which led to the Irish Civil War and saw the origins of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, the two parties which have since dominated Irish politics. Another split in the remaining Sinn Féin organisation in the early years of the Troubles in 1970 led to the Sinn Féin of today, which is a republican, left-wing nationalist and secular party.
Arthur Griffith, founder (1905) and third president (1911–17)
President of Sinn Féin Éamon de Valera resigned from the party in 1926 and led the rump of the membership out of the party and into Fianna Fáil, an event which left Sinn Féin crippled for decades
Tomás Mac Giolla took leadership of Sinn Féin in 1962 as part of a new guard of Irish Republicans who sought to take Sinn Féin back to the left after 20 years of pursuing a right-wing stance
Gerry Adams became President of Sinn Féin in 1983, a position he'd go on to hold for 35 years