1. That the people of Ireland constitute a distinct and separate nation, ethnically, historically, and tested by every standard of political science; entitled therefore, to self-determination;

2. That Ireland never voluntarily accepted British domination and that that domination has been consistently challenged through the centuries;

3. That the people of Ireland in a general and regular parliamentary election, in effect a national plebiscite, held under British supervision (thus eliminating completely any question of illegitimate influences in favor of the Republic) declared unmistakably by an overwhelming majority, their desire to be an Independent Republicwhich is, therefore, and ought to be accepted by other nations as Ireland's definite choice by self-determination;

4. That the people's representatives elected for the purpose and summoned to meet in a National Congress (Dail Eireann) duly met in public session in the nation's capital at Dublin, formally proclaimed Ireland's independence as a Republic, and notified its establishment as a Republic to all the nations of the world;

5. That the National Congress thus assembled elected and set up a government, which government is, on democratic principles, the de jure, and has ever since been functioning in fact as the obeyed, de facto government of Ireland, entitled, therefore, to international recognition as the rightful and actual government of Ireland;

6. That the rival (British) authority in Ireland is an alien usurping authority, commanding neither the respect nor the obedience of the people of Ireland, unable even to maintain discipline among its own forces ignored and "non-existent" save within the immediate shadow of the fortresses of the Army of Occupation, without a title, therefore, either in morality or in fact to recognition as the government of Ireland, unless, as President Cleveland expressed it, "the will of the military officer in temporary command of a particular district can be dignified as a species of government."

7. That the standards heretofore announced in principle and approved in practice by the United States, entitle Ireland to recognition from the United States.

In the face of indisputable facts such as these the right of self-determination would be but a "mere phrase" indeed were the Republican Government of Ireland now to be denied recognition.

IRELAND A NATION

The people of Ireland undoubtedly constitute a nation—one of the oldest and most clearly defined in Europe. Their nation is not a nation merely-in the sense of modern political science it was a sovereign independent state for over a thousand years knowing no external master but moulding its own institutions to its own life in accordance with its own will.

The original Norman came as an invader and an aggressor, and down through the long seven centuries and one-half during which its successors have sought to secure their domination in

Ireland the Irish have consistently challenged their authority and have resisted it with courage and a perseverance for which there is no parallel in history. Neither Czecho-Slovakia nor Jugo-Slavia, nor Finland nor Armenia nor Poland itself, nir any of the other newly established states of Europe, whose independence is now rightly recognized, even approach the perfection of nationhood manifested by Ireland nor can their claim compare with Ireland's on other grounds. These nations, for instance, had no elected or organized government of their own to point to as Ireland has, ready to discharge the duties of a responsible government, not only, but actually discharging the most essential of them.

IRELAND'S TITLE TO SELF-DETERMINATION ON THE BASIS OF AMERICAN PRINCIPLES

The entry of the United States into the late war raised that struggle once for all from the slough of contending imperialisms to the level of a crusade for "the inviolable rights of peoples and mankind.".

Long before the United States had declared war, you, Sir, had well expressed it, May 27, 1916, as the "passionate conviction of America" that

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the principle of public right must henceforth take precedence over the individual interests of particular nations.

every people has a right to choose the sovereignty under

which they shall live.

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the world has a right to be free from every disturbance of its peace that has its origin in aggression and disregard of the rights of peoples and nations,"

and as the war approached, you confirmed these views in a famous address to the Senate:

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** No peace can last or ought to last which does not recognize and accept the principles that governments derive all their just powers from the consent of the governed *

taking it for granted that statesmen everywhere were agreed that 66* * ** henceforth inviolable security of life, of worship, of industrial and social development should be guaranteed to all peoples who have lived hitherto under the power of governments devoted to a faith and purpose hostile to their own,

and proposing that

66* * * no nation should seek to extend its polity over any other nation or people but that every people should be left free to determine its own polity, its own way of development unhindered, unthreatened, unafraid, the little along with the great and powerful,"

concluding

"These are American principles, American policies. We could stand
for no others.
They are principles of mankind and must

prevail."

*

These principles were the fundamental ones in the program with which you, Sir, went before the Nation. They are embodied as a plank in the platform of the Democratic Party, adopted in St. Louis in 1916, and were emphatically endorsed by the American people at the elections.

"We believe that every people has the right to choose the sovereignty under which it shall live; that the small states of the world have a right o enjoy from other nations the same respect for their sovereignty and for their territorial integrity that great and powerful nations expect and insist upon; and that the world has a right to be free from every disturbance of its peace that has its origin in aggression or disregard of the rights of peoples and nations. At the earliest practical opportunity our country should strive earnestly that all men shall enjoy equality of right and freedom lands wherein they dwell."

* *

* in the

The responsible spokesman of the American people had in these words made clear to the masses everywhere that their thought was also his thought, and they knew that America's President, proclaiming such principles and with the will to realize them, backed by America's might, could achieve the common ideal, could, in the conditions, prevailing, really reform the world and reconstruct it on a basis of justice, bringing to war-weary and harassed humantiy the secure and lasting peace for which it yearned.

The British Imperialists themselves had not dared to oppose. Mr. Bonar Law, speaking for the British War Cabinet had said, when this Address was published:

"What President Wilson is longing for we are fighting for."

The people of Ireland in particular welcomed your lofty program in the universal adoption of which they saw the consummation of all their nation had struggled for through seven centuries and one-half of ceaseless endeavor; and when America entered the war

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* to fight thus for the ultimate peace of the world and for the liberation of its peoples * * for the rights of nations great and

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small and the privilege of men everywhere to choose their way of life and obedience * * * for democracy * * * for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world itself at last free,'

-America

"privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles that gave her birth and happiness and the peace which she has treasured," they confidently believed that a new day had dawned for them in common with all the other oppressed peoples of Nations that

“have called out to the world generation after generation for justice, liberation, and succor, and no cabinet in the world has heard them,' and that

"have waited for this day when the friends of liberty should come across the sea to shake hands with us to see that the new world was constructed upon a new basis and foundation of justice and right." Such a world as this was the world they had ever been hoping for, and America's might and her unselfish record joined with her pledged word, was the assurance that their hopes would at last be fulfilled.

On Easter Monday, April 24, 1916, a year before America entered the war, a small band of Irish patriots went forth to give to British rule in Ireland the challenge in arms that had been given in practically every preceding generation, to assert once more their country's right to liberty, and to proclaim her an independent Republic.

Ill-equipped comparatively and hopelessly outnumbered, their effort could be a protest only, but the independence they proclaimed they knew to be Ireland's right and they knew it accorded with the aspirations of the Irish people.

To convince the world that might not believe, when America entered the war for the "ultimate peace of the world" and "for the rights of the nations great and small," Irish Republicans organized themselves as a political party to be ready should occasion offer to secure the indisputable evidence of the people's vote as the basis of Ireland's claim in any world-settlement on American ideals.

The war progressed, and to the very close, there was no indication of any change of viewpoint on your part concerning the necessity of universal acceptance of the principle of self-determination if a lasting peace were to be secured. It was evident from your addresses that you were prepared to contemplate even

"a somewhat radical reconsideration of many of the rules of international practice hitherto thought to be established,"

where these might be necessary for your program, that you faced the fact that the price of such a peace as you wished for would necessarily be

"full, impartial justice-justice done at every point and to every
nation
* * our enemies as well as our friends."

*

"Impartial justice in every item of the settlement no matter whose interest is crossed

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"The impartial justice meted out must involve no discrimination between those to whom we wish to be just and those to whom we do not wish to be just a justice that plays no favorites.' a price which all who came to the peace table must be prepared

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to pay. Ireland was seeking nothing but justice; so when the General Parliamentary Elections were announced for December 14, 1918, the Sinn Fein or Republican Party put the establishment of the Republic a direct issue to the Electors.

The result was that of the one hundred and one (101) popularly elected representatives the Republicans secured seventy-two (72);

The so-called Parliamentary Party (who were self-determinationists and did not oppose the idea of a Republic as such, but deemed it at the moment unobtainable) secured six (6);

The official Unionists twenty-one (21); and the Independent Unionists, two (2).

The Republican representatives therefore won in a majority of practically two and one-half to one (212 to 1) over all other parties, whilst the self-determinationists (Republicans and Parliamentarians taken together) secured a majority of nearly three and one-half to one (312 to 1) over hose in favor of union with England.

In terms of the total popular vote, 311,210 votes only were cast for union with England out of a total of 1,519,898; that is a bare twenty per cent (20%).

The people of Ireland were asked what they wanted-their answer, given as above, was unmistakable and has not been questioned either by the minorities in Ireland or by the British Premier himself (Appendix).

Absolute unanimity in politics is, of course, out of question. The degree of unanimity attained in this general plebiscite of the people of Ireland was extraordinary-far higher than that required in the conservative Senate of the United States even for its most conservative act, the ratification of treaties with foreign powers.

To pretend that absolute unanimity must be obtained, or to refuse to accept as final in determining the will of the nation such