The Home Rule Bill, which was the product of those shameful years of debility and disgrace, was so poor and paltry a thing as to be almost an insult to Irish patriotism and intelligence.  It proposed to establish merely a nominal Parliament in Dublin.  It was financially unsound, besides being a denial of Ireland’s right to fix and levy her own taxes.  As a matter of fact, the power of taxation was rigorously maintained at Westminster with a reduced Irish representation of two-thirds.  And this was the measure which was proclaimed to be greater than Grattan’s Parliament or than any of the previous Home Rule Bills!  Furthermore, it made no provision for the completion of land purchase, but Mr Asquith was not really to be blamed for this, as Mr Dillon proclaimed that one of the great attractions of the Bill was that it would leave the remnant of the landlords to be dealt with by him and his obedient henchmen.  Finally, neither the Liberal Party nor their faithful Irish supporters would hear of any concessions to Ulster.

These people were now so arrogant in the fancied security and strength of their position to do just as they pleased that Mr Redmond rashly undertook “to put down Ulster with the strong hand” and rather prematurely declared:  “There is no longer an Ulster difficulty.”  One further financial infamy the Bill perpetrated.  The twenty millions sterling which were, under the Land Purchase Act of 1903, to have been a free Imperial grant to lubricate the wheels of agrarian settlement, was henceforth and by a “Home Rule Government” to be audaciously charged as a debt against Ireland.  And this, be it noted, was part of the pact come to with the “Nationalist” leaders at the Downing Street breakfast-table, where Ireland’s fate was sealed, and which they joyously supported in the House of Commons against such opposition as the All-for-Ireland minority was allowed to give it by the ruthless application of the guillotine.

The Independent Nationalist members were willing to make the best of a very “bad bargain,” if only they could succeed in getting adopted three amendments which they regarded as vital to the success of the measure:  (1) A new financial plan; (2) the completion of land purchase, and (3) such concessions as would win the consent of Ulster.  But our reward for thus endeavouring to make the Bill adaptable to Irish requirements and acceptable to the whole of Ireland was to be dubbed “factionists” and “traitors” by the official Irish Party, who never once during three years’ debates in Parliament made the slightest attempt to amend or improve the Bill, but who remained silent and impotent as graven images on the Irish benches whilst the way was being paved for all the ruin and desolation and accumulated horrors that have since come to Ireland through their compliant and criminal imbecility.

They had a perfect Parliamentary unity; they certainly seemed to have the most perfect understanding with their Liberal friends, but they had no more claim to represent an independent, vigilant, self-respecting nation than they had to represent, say, “Morocco”!