Those who will be voting Yes on September 18 will not be voting for the SNP, or indeed for Alex Salmond.

Even so, we are where we are largely because of the efforts of the SNP, and the party should be accorded the credit it deserves but too rarely receives.

I also believe that Labour should be praised for the way it delivered devolution, despite the misgivings of many in the party. Devolution helped us along the road, and the legacy of Donald Dewar in particular is there for all to see. Some people who are going to vote Yes seem now to detest the Labour Party and all it has stood for in the past. This is peculiar as until recently many of them were happy enough to vote Labour.

I think the history of the SNP is particularly commendable because of the way it transformed itself so rapidly and credibly from being a fringe party of protest to a mainstream party of government.

It was once a bad joke, a rather ludicrous organisation that had more than its share of idiots. It also had to cope with constant splits and divisions. That it held together was something of a miracle.

Its lunatic fringe made it easy prey for mocking journalists and, to my shame, I wrote some pretty vicious stuff about the SNP when I was a young Turk. Now that I'm an old Turk I readily confess the error of my ways.

It's salutary to think that just 50 years ago the annual conference of the party, held in a small hall in Bridge of Allan, was attended by a mere handful of people and was covered by just one journalist, a stringer working for several papers who got bored and left early.

In the 1964 general election the party fought in only 15 constituencies. A Scottish Labour MP of the time, Peter Doig, spoke for many when he described SNP supporters as ignorant, pointless nuisances.

Well, at least they were nuisances. They never shut up and went away.

There were also people like Jimmy Halliday, people who are little remembered today. Jimmy was chairman of the party in the late 1950s, when he was in his early thirties. A history teacher, he was the embodiment of visionary, responsible nationalism, a man who truly understood Scotland.

A generation later, Stephen Maxwell was an intellectual of vast cerebral scope. He had wide knowledge and a fastidious mind. He did much excellent work for the SNP on policy development, even if that work remains, to this day, largely unsung.

These people, and others like them, were giants.

Some of those who transformed the SNP had to show considerable personal bravery. Winnie Ewing has written candidly about the vicious macho bullying and contempt she suffered when, having won a dramatic by-election, she arrived at the House of Commons in 1967 as the then sole SNP MP.

The bullies who were nastiest to her were a small group of male Scottish Labour MPs.

But most people in the Labour Party were decent folk. Donald Dewar, the man who kept the devolution flame burning during Labour's long and tormented 18 years of opposition between 1979 and 1997, was a very honourable man.

The speed and smeddum with which Scotland's new parliament at Holyrood was delivered after Labour's resounding general election victory in 1997 is a testament to his dogged determination. It was his personal crusade to ensure that his party's commitment to devolution was never dropped or diluted.

If we do vote Yes, I'm pretty sure that September 19 will be the happiest day of my life. I hope it will not be tarnished by any spite or triumphalism.

The opponents of Scottish independence have, for the most part, played a perfectly worthy part in the journey of the Scottish people.

We've had, and are still having, an impressive extended debate and conversation.

This needs two sides. The great majority of those who oppose Scottish independence deserve respect. This is no time for pettiness.