Irish Home Rule.(Review)

Irish Home Rule, 1867-1921, by Alan O'Day; pp. lxiii + 346. Manchester and New York: Manchester University Press, 1998, [pound]57.10, [pound]17.82 paper, $79.95, $24.95 paper.

(All history ought to begin with "Once upon a time," and this review will do so.) Once upon a time, we thought we understood the political history of Ireland under the Union: there were two traditions of Irish resistance to British rule, between which Irish history oscillated. One was a "physical force" or revolutionary tradition--the United Irishmen of 1798, Young Ireland in 1848, the Fenians, the Irish Republican Brotherhood all the way to the insurgents of 1916 and after. And the other was a "moral force" or constitutional tradition, pursuing political action from Daniel O'Connell's Emancipation and Repeal movements through the movement for …