Page:Home rule; Fenian home rule; Home rule all round; Devolution; what do they mean?.djvu/20

16 "in the event of war with Germany, the Irish and Germans in America would be united in opposing them.'"

On 3rd December, 1910, the Clan-na-Gael, protesting against the apparent "lowering of the flag" by Mr. Redmond and Mr. T. P. O'Connor in their recent speeches in America and Canada, published in the Gaelic American this manifesto:—

"We, the Clan-na-Gael of New York, assembled to honour the memory of the men judicially murdered on the scaffold in Manchester on November 23rd, 1867, for their devotion to Ireland, reaffirm our allegiance to the cause of Irish National Independence for which the Martyrs gave up their lives.

"We pledge to the people of Ireland our continued support to enable them to shake off the English yoke, to sever all political connection with England, and to erect on Irish soil an Independent National Government, under which all Irishmen, irrespective of creed, race or class, shall have equal rights, and whose sole object shall be to protect the interests and uphold the honour of the whole Irish people.

"We denounce as a deliberate betrayal of Ireland the statements recently made in the United States and Canada by John E. Redmond and T. P. O'Connor—evidently by prearrangement with the British Government—that Ireland is willing to renounce her God-given right to Nationhood and to accept in lieu thereof, as a final settlement of her differences with England, a petty local legislative assembly having no power over the most vital interests of the country and subordinate to the British Imperial Parliament, and we brand as a shameless falsehood the assertion that such a beggar's pittance would be, either in form or substance, the same as the Home Rule which Charles Stewart Parnell was willing to accept as a first instalment of Ireland's rights &hellip;&hellip;

"We thank our German fellow-citizens throughout the land for their splendid co-operation in frustrating all attempts to bring about an Anglo-American Alliance. We pledge to them and to the Fatherland our utmost support, moral and material, in any struggle that may come between Germany and England, and assure them that neither Redmond, O'Connor, nor any man, has the right to promise that Irish citizens of this Republic will forego, or abate in the smallest degree their