Rising was justified given the politics of the time

The legacy of Pearse’s oration at the graveside of O’Donovan Rossa was very fitting for the occasion and shows up the shallowness of contemporary Redmondism.

The Home Rule Act was signed into law earlier by King George to be implemented at the end of the war.

This misses the most important political development of 1915, of a new all-party government at Westminster without an electoral mandate that included leading opponents of home rule like Sir Edward Carson and Andrew Bonar Law.