When the first civil rights activists marched from Coalisland to Dungannon on Saturday August 14 1968 they demanded, among other things, protection for the rights of the individual.
This was later formulated into a bill of rights and 35 years later their demand has still not been implemented.
Despite massive political reform and seismic shifts in the legislative landscape since then, the one unmet demand from the civil rights campaign is a bill of rights. Events in recent weeks suggest that it may be as far off as ever.
What we have instead is a row over what should be in such a bill.
It is a row which is now attracting some heavyweight political involvement because at its core stands the culture of much of our existing equality legislation and even the ethos of the Good Friday Agreement (GFA) itself.
Leaving aside the personalities involved, the growing argument centres on two opposing groups with conflicting concepts of equality. At the risk of over-simplifying the debate, it comes down to whether equality means group rights or individual rights.
The obvious answer, that it means both, has not yet had much of a hearing.
The group rights view is that equality refers to rights of Protestants and Catholics, men and women, Chinese and Portuguese in our society.
This is the key thinking behind the Good Friday Agreement – no one group can be allowed to have unfair advantage over another. But a consultation document on a bill of rights indicates a more individual-centred approach, which supporters claim also caters for the unique situation here.
Their view is that because rights here are defined in sectarian terms our society is becoming even more divided.
The difficulty in the proposed new bill is that it may undermine existing legislation such as fair employment laws.
It could also be the basis for a challenge on the assembly's voting system which requires MLAs to be designated as unionist, nationalist or other.
Hence the political involvement: does the GFA infringe individual liberties? In employment terms, for example, if a male scientist who opposes government policy on genetically modified foods is turned down following a job interview with the Department of Agriculture, he can seek legal redress on the basis of his gender or religion.
He cannot use alleged discrimination against his individual views as the basis for a legal challenge.
To allow him to do so, it would appear, runs counter to the GFA.
It is the sort of debate which in most societies philosophers would wrestle with and lawyers make a fortune from but in this country there is a danger that it will be settled by sheer political muscle.
Part of the proposed bill includes socio-economic rights which would mean that judges would be able to hold government to account and ensure that actions promised are implemented, thereby adding an extra layer of accountability.
The South African Bill of Rights contains socio-econo-mic rights and recent cases there involving housing rights and the right to health care clearly indicate that such rights would be realistic and enforceable here.
It would, of course, put more pressure of accountability on those potential ministers and assembly members who now express reservations about the ethos of the Bill.
The group rights concept underpins the GFA which tends to label rights in a cultural context.
The promotion of the Irish language is welcome, but it is wrongly portrayed as a nationalist cultural right. Unionists have effectively been denied cultural affinity to the language and offered instead Ulster Scots as a quick-fix, alternative cultural totem.
But just as some unionists speak Irish, most Ards hurlers are fluent in Ulster Scots.
The inference, for example, that a young, under-educated and unemployed woman on the Shankill Road can have her rights protected by having her dole card printed in Ulster Scots is one of the more embarrassing aspects of our legal system.
The belief that the GFA is untouchable runs deep in many sections of our society but the question must now be faced: does it restrict our individual rights?
In their understandable rush for peace did our politicians forget something?
If we have a potential legal conflict between the GFA and the rights of the individual we face an even more serious obstacle than that thrown up by the current political impasse.
The last thing we need now is a row. An open and honest debate would be helpful. Anything less will be an insult to the people who marched from Coalisland to Dungannon.
