Thompson says: Some modern historians say that if Home Rule had been brought in, the result would have been civil war in Ireland, between the heavily armed unionists, resisting it, and the majority nationalists, defending it.

Wait! Wait! Wait! What was that thing that happened in Ireland between 1922 and 1923?

I wrote up a theory of combat this morning, applying it to the conduct of discussions at Mudcat, but I think it applies to many things in life: The militants who promote a cause, are convinced that because their cause is unquestionably righteous, all means are justified in their quest to ensure that the cause prevails. In most cases, there is another group of people (usually a much larger group) who also support the cause, but are unwilling to employ coercive measures. They prefer to use facts, logic, persuasion, and patience.
And then there is a huge number of people who don't really care, and are simply annoyed by all the squabbling. They are much more concerned about keeping their jobs and making sure their kids do their homework at night; and they have no time to concern themselves with lofty political matters. And at Mudcat, those people have the annoying habit of wanting to talk about folk music rather than politics, but that's another matter. In Ireland, I'm sure the dairy farmers were far more concerned about cows, than they were about Home Rule. Annoying, but true.

Anyhow, my thinking on all this is starting to gel as this thread progresses (at those times when it's not going around in circles).

I'm sure there were many moves to separate Ireland from England in earlier years, but it seems to me that the final drive to separate Ireland began in 1798 - and lasted until 1921, more or less. I'm sure that for most of the people of Ireland, life went on during the 19th century; and most people were not constantly involved in the campaign to separate from England. And it seems to me that at times, people would have grown weary of the whole thing. So, it would seem to me that by 1916, most people in Ireland just didn't care any more. I think Keith may be quite right that most people in Ireland didn't want the Rising. The militants did, and it seems to me that credible evidence has been presented here that there were significant shortcomings in the Home Rule bill that had passed Parliament. So, the militants brought about the Easter Rising. And it's clear that the campaign was a failure, and that a whole lot of people just didn't care about it. Most of Ireland was calm - the battle was only in a small portion of Dublin. But it was guerrilla warfare in the middle of a crowded city, so many noncombatants were affected.

But then the British responded to the Easter Rising by condemning ninety Irish militants to death. Now, it's true that only 15 were executed, but 90 families were at one point quite sure that their sons were to be executed. On top of that, Wikipedia says a total of 3,430 men and 79 women were arrested, although most were subsequently released. 1,836 men were interned at internment camps and prisons in England and Wales. Although Teribus finds it significant that only Kent was executed because of how he responded to this widespread roundup of Irish people, I'm sure most of the people of Ireland viewed these mass arrests as brutal imperialism on the part of the British.

Now, it appears to me that Britain had stationed officers in Ireland who were considerably less than the cream of the crop. A number of these officers were political extremists, not prone to diplomacy. And so, their response to the Easter Rising was brutal.

All of a sudden the Irish people had a reason to care about independence - and they got it.

And after that, they got the Irish Civil War and more than a half-century of Protestant-Catholic conflicts. I'm still trying to understand that part of the story, but I think my analysis of the Easter Rising has some merit. Thoughts?

-Joe-