Máire Treasa Úna Mhic Róibín = Mary Therese Winifred Robinson

Mary Robinson (née Bourke) was born in the family of medical doctors. She was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, King's Inns, Dublin, and Harvard University. From 1969 to 1975, she was Reid Professor of Law in Trinity College. In 1969 she was elected to Seanad Éireann for the University of Dublin (1969-1989). As a lawyer she had been involved in many constitutional cases in both Ireland and the European courts. In 1976 Robinson joined the Labour Party and in 1977 and 1981 unsuccessfully contested Dáil elections. She resigned from the party after the 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement in protest at the exclusion of Unionists from the prior negotiations. In 1988 she founded the Irish Center for European Law. Robinson accepted a Labour party nomination for the presidential election on condition that she did not have to rejoin the party or run strictly as a Labour candidate. Her election (7 Nov 1990) as Ireland's first woman president was widely welcomed. Robinson was the most active president in the history of Ireland, one of her priorities being visits to deprived or disaster-stricken areas of the world. She was also assiduous in visiting places like Warrington and Manchester to show solidarity with the victims of paramilitary violence. She became the first Irish head of state to pay an official visit to Britain, where she was received with appropriate ceremonial by Queen Elizabeth II. She did not seek a reelection in 1997 but instead accepted an appointment as the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and formally resigned as President of Ireland on 12 Sep 1997. Biography source: [1]