JOHN REDMOND

The sudden death of the Irish Nationalist leader removes from British politics one of its oldest and most prominent figures. A member of Parliament since 1881, Redmond became the leader of the Nationalist party in 1900 after reorganizing its elements which had been scattered by Parnell's downfall ten years earlier. An Irishman, possessed of the peculiar Irish genius for oratory and parliamentary fencing, he compelled and retained for the Nationalist minority the alliance with the great Liberal party which forced the passage of the Home Rule bill a few months before the outbreak of the war. Redmond was deprived of the consummation of his triumph by the great events of August, 1914, and he saw the progress attained by years of unremitting effort lost through the stubborn resistance of the Ulstermen and the excesses of the Sinn Fein revolutionists. Unembittered by these reverses, Redmond from the first counselled complete Irish co-operation in the British Empire's fight against Prussian militarism, and maintained to the end his uncompromising hostility toward the pro-German factions in Ireland.

We do not need to be Home Rulers to admire this man for the fight he made. By thirty-six years in Parliament of sincere and effective advocacy of Irish autonomy, he wins a place beside O'Connell and Parnell as a hero of the Home Rule movement. By his ultimate loyalty to the endangered empire, without regard to internal issues, he wins an enduring place among the statesmen and patriots of the United Kingdom.