Nationalism and the Irish Party Provincial Ireland 1910-1916 [Hardcover]

John Redmond's constitutional, parliamentary, Irish Party went from dominating Irish politics to oblivion in just four years from 1914-1918. The goal of limited Home Rule, peacefully achieved, appeared to die with it.

Given the speed of the party's collapse, its death has been seen as inevitable. Though such views have been challenged, there has been no detailed study of the Irish Party in the last years of union with Britain, before the world war and the Easter Rising transformed Irish politics.

Through a study of five counties in provincial Ireland - Leitrim, Longford, Roscommon, Sligo, and Westmeath - that history has now been written. Far from being 'rotten', the Irish Party was representative of nationalist opinion and still capable of self-renewal and change. However, the Irish nationalism at this time was also suffused with a fierce anglophobia and sense of grievance, defined by its enemies, which rapidly came to the fore, first in the Home Rule crisis and then in the war. Redmond's project, the peaceful attainment of Home Rule, simply could not be realised.

1. Introduction
2. The Waning of Popular Politics
3. 'Still Flourishing More or Less' - Organizations, Societies, and Clubs
4. Nationalist Political Language - New Hopes or Old Hatred?
5. 'The Inner Wheels which are Working in the County' - Localism in Roscommon
6. Laurence Ginnell's Revolt
7. The Aldermen, the AOH, and Labour in Sligo Town
8. 1910-13: Before the Home Rule Crisis
9. Crisis and Volunteering
10. War, Takeover, and Dissent
11. 'Ireland in is a Profound State of Peace' - Before the Rising
12. Conclusions
Appendices
Bibliography
Index