Easter Rising Leadership

The Easter Rising is the defining event of the modern Irish republican tradition. Most Irish nationalists regard the Rising as the most important event in twentieth-century Irish history. Without it, Irish politics would have been shaped by the moderate constitutional nationalism of John Redmond’s Irish Parliamentary Party, and southern Ireland may have remained part of the British Empire for much of the twentieth-century.
One of the driving forces behind the rebellion was Patrick Pearse, an Irish teacher, barrister, poet, writer, nationalist and political activist. He became interested in Irish culture while he was attending St. Enda’s school in Dublin. Pearse joined the Gaelic League and was devoted to the language movement. Up to 1912 he …show more content…
Formally, the Irish Volunteer’s leadership consisted of individuals like Eoin MacNeill, Bulmer Hobson and Roger Casement. However, an informal but substantial degree of authority was exercised by members of the IRB who had helped to establish and control the Irish Volunteers for their own purposes. The leadership of the Irish Volunteers had never made it very clear what the organisation stood for. Although its formation was triggered by the establishment of the Ulster Volunteer Force, the leaders of the Irish Volunteers professed to admire rather than resent the revolutionary precedent set by the UVF. The Irish Volunteers were not formed to fight the British government, but rather to ensure that the government did not waver in its intention to enact the Home Rule legislation which it had initiated in 1912. The split within the Irish Volunteers over Redmond’s support for the British war effort clarified matters. The radical minority who remained within the Irish Volunteers were advanced nationalists who regarded Home Rule as an insufficient measure of Irish freedom. However, many within this group, including Bulmer Hobson and Eoin MacNeill, remained unconvinced that an unprovoked Rising was an effective strategy. MacNeill opposed the Rising because he believed it had no realistic chance of survival. He believed that unless a rebellion had a reasonably calculated prospect of success it “would …show more content…
Its most noteworthy outcome was the transformation of the IRB. This small group planned and directed the insurrection in 1916. This organisation was acting on the old republican principle: ‘England’s difficulty is Ireland’s opportunity’. In August 1915, this group formed the IRB Military Council, which was eventually composed of seven members; Thomas Clarke, Sean MacDermott, Patrick Pearse, Eamonn Ceannt, Joseph Plunkett, James Connolly, and Thomas MacDonagh. All seven approved and signed the Proclamation, and together they declared themselves to be the ‘Provisional Government’ of the Irish Republic when the Rising began. They were aided throughout by an Irish-American organisation, ‘Clan na Gael’, which shared their aims and virtually provided the only channel of contact between the rebels and Germany, from whom they hoped to receive military backing. When a Free State government was formed it contained members of the Gaelic League and individuals sympathetic to the aims of what had been a very well supported, cultural movement of the preceding 30 years. One of the most influential factors was the Gaelic League, founded in 1893 by the Protestant nationalist, Douglas Hyde and Eoin MacNeill. Its dream was of a Gaelic-speaking independent Ireland, and it soon became, in the words of Patrick Pearse, a ‘school for separatists’, creating the atmosphere for the Easter