The Convention had been summoned, not to receive a final report from the Grand Committee, but to face a new situation.  An offer had been put forward by one group which altered the whole complexion of the controversy.  Grand Committee had abstained from deciding whether to counsel acceptance or rejection.  But for the first time an influential body of Irish Unionists had agreed, not as individuals but as representatives, to accept Home Rule, in a wider measure than had been proffered by the Bills of 1886 and 1893 or by the Act of 1914.  Limitations which were imposed in all these had been struck out by Lord Midleton’s proposals.

On the other hand, it was certain that the Ulster group would reject the scheme.  Conversation among Nationalists made it plain that if Ulster would agree with Lord Midleton we should all join them.  For the sake of an agreement reached between all sections of Irishmen, but for nothing less conclusive, Dr. O’Donnell and Mr. Russell were content to waive the claim to full fiscal independence.  Such an agreement, they held, would be accepted by Parliament in its integrity.  But if Ulster stood out, there would be no “substantial agreement,” and the terms which Nationalists and Southern Unionists might combine to propose would be treated as a bargaining offer, certain to be chipped down by Government towards conformity with the Ulster demand.  In the result there would be an uprising of opinion in Ireland against a measure so framed; the fiasco of July, 1916, would repeat itself.

Against this, and prompting us to acceptance, was the view very strongly held by Redmond, that Government urgently needed a settlement for the sake of the war, and would use to the utmost any leverage which helped them to this end.  An agreement with Lord Midleton would mean a Home Rule proposal proceeding from a leading Unionist statesman who spoke for the interest in Ireland, which, if any, had reason to fear Nationalist government.  This would mean necessarily a profound change in the attitude of the House of Lords and of all those social influences whose power we had felt so painfully.  Government could undoubtedly, if it chose, carry a measure giving effect to this compact.

Further, weighing greatly with the instincts of the rank and file was the motive which prompted Irish Nationalists to welcome the advance made by those whom Lord Midleton represented.  The Southern Unionists were the old landowning and professional class, friendly in all ways of intercourse, but politically severed and sundered from the mass of the population.  Now, they came forward with an offer to help in attaining our desire—­quite frankly, against their own declared conviction that the Union was the best plan, but with an equally frank recognition that the majority was the majority and was honest in its intent.  The personality of the men reinforced the effect of this:  Lord Oranmore, for instance, whom most of them had only known by anti-Home Rule speeches in the House of Lords, revealed himself as the friendliest of Irishmen, with the Irish love for a witty phrase.