Proclamation of the Irish Republic facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Proclamation of the Republic
A retouched copy of the original Proclamation
Signers	7 members of the Provisional Government of the Irish Republic
Purpose	To announce separation from the United Kingdom

The Proclamation of the Republic (Irish: Forógra na Poblachta) is a very important document. It is also known as the 1916 Proclamation or the Easter Proclamation. This document was created by groups like the Irish Volunteers and the Irish Citizen Army. They issued it during the Easter Rising in Ireland, which began on April 24, 1916.

In the Proclamation, a group called the "Provisional Government of the Irish Republic" announced that Ireland was now independent. They wanted Ireland to be separate from the United Kingdom. Patrick Pearse read the Proclamation outside the General Post Office (GPO) in Dublin. This public reading officially started the Easter Rising. The Proclamation was inspired by a similar document from an earlier rebellion in 1803 led by Robert Emmet.

What the Proclamation Said

Even though the Easter Rising did not succeed in its military goals, the ideas in the Proclamation were very important. They influenced many Irish politicians for years to come. The document made several key statements:

• The leaders of the Rising believed they spoke for all of Ireland.
• The Rising was another step in Ireland's fight for independence.
• The Irish Republican Brotherhood, the Irish Volunteers, and the Irish Citizen Army were central to this fight.
• It declared that "the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland" was very important.
• It stated that Ireland's new government would be a republic.
• It promised "religious and civil liberty, equal rights, and equal opportunities to all its citizens." This was the first time gender equality was mentioned in such a document in Ireland. At that time, Irish women could not vote under British law.
• It promised that everyone, both men and women, would have the right to vote. This was very new for the time, as only a few countries allowed this.
• It promised to treat "all the children of the nation equally." This phrase means all Irish people, not just young children.
• It said that disagreements between different groups in Ireland were caused by the "alien government." This meant the British government.

How the Proclamation Was Printed

The Proclamation was printed before the Easter Rising. It was made at Liberty Hall, which was the main office of the Irish Citizen Army. The people printing it had some challenges. They did not have enough metal letters (type) to print everything perfectly.

Because of this, the document was printed in two parts. First, they printed the top half, then the bottom half on the same sheet of paper. The paper came from a mill called Swift Brook Paper Mills. The people who set the type were Willie O'Brien, Michael Molloy, and Christopher Brady. They had to use different sizes of the letter 'e' because they ran out of the correct size. This is why some 'e's look smaller than others.

The Proclamation sounds like it was signed by the leaders of the Rising. However, there is no proof that an actual signed copy ever existed. If it did, it might have been destroyed after the Rising. Michael Molloy, one of the printers, said he set the text from a handwritten copy. He claimed he destroyed a separate paper with signatures on it while in prison. But other people involved in the Rising disagreed with his story.

About 30 original copies of the Proclamation still exist today. You can see one at the National Print Museum. Sometimes, later copies are mistakenly thought to be originals. After British soldiers took back Liberty Hall, they found the printing press. They reportedly printed some "half-copies" as souvenirs. This is why many incomplete copies exist.

The Signatories

The names of the leaders who signed the Proclamation were:

• Thomas J. Clarke
• Seán Mac Diarmada
• Thomas MacDonagh
• P. H. Pearse
• Éamonn Ceannt
• James Connolly
• Joseph Plunkett

You might notice that Tom Clarke's name is first, not Patrick Pearse's. If the names were in alphabetical order, Éamonn Ceannt would be first. Clarke's wife said that Clarke was meant to be the President of the new Irish Republic. This might explain why his name was at the top. However, other people involved in the Rising did not agree with her.

Later documents from the rebels often put Pearse's name first. He was called 'Commanding in Chief the Forces of the Irish Republic' and 'President of the Provisional Government'. Historians still wonder if Clarke was meant to be a symbolic leader and Pearse the actual head of government. Or if Pearse was always meant to be the main leader.

All seven people who signed the Proclamation were executed by the British military. This happened after the Rising. James Connolly was wounded in the fighting and was executed while sitting in a chair. The British saw their actions as going against the government during wartime (the First World War).

British leaders later regretted these executions. The British Prime Minister, H. H. Asquith, and later prime minister David Lloyd George said they wished the leaders had been treated under civilian law, not military law. At first, many Irish people were not sympathetic to the Rising. The Irish Independent newspaper even called for the leaders' execution. But public opinion changed because of how the leaders were treated and executed. Eventually, the British government stopped the executions. But by then, all the signatories and several others had already been executed.

The Proclamation Today

A stone copy of the Proclamation in Greystones

Today, full copies of the Easter Proclamation are seen as a very important Irish national symbol. In December 2004, a copy was sold at an auction for €390,000. A copy that belonged to Seán T. O'Kelly, who took part in the Rising, is now on display. He later became President of Ireland and gave his copy to the Irish parliament buildings, Leinster House. You can see it in the main entrance hall.

Other copies are on display in the GPO, where the Rising began and the Proclamation was first read. You can also find copies in the National Museum of Ireland, the Trinity College Library's Long Room, and the GAA Museum in Croke Park. Many museums around the world also have copies. You can buy copies as souvenirs in Ireland. The text is often displayed in Irish schools and pubs worldwide. Every Easter Sunday, an officer from the Irish Defence Forces reads the Proclamation aloud outside the GPO. This happens during the Easter Rising commemorations.

Text

POBLACHT NA hÉIREANN
THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT OF THE IRISH REPUBLIC TO THE PEOPLE OF IRELAND

IRISHMEN AND IRISHWOMEN:
In the name of God and of the dead generations from which she receives her old tradition of nationhood, Ireland, through us, summons her children to her flag and strikes for her freedom.

Having organised and trained her manhood through her secret revolutionary organisation, the Irish Republican Brotherhood, and through her open military organisations, the Irish Volunteers and the Irish Citizen Army, having patiently perfected her discipline, having resolutely waited for the right moment to reveal itself, she now seizes that moment and supported by her exiled children in America and by gallant allies in Europe, but relying in the first on her own strength, she strikes in full confidence of victory.

We declare the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland and to the unfettered control of Irish destinies, to be sovereign and indefeasible. The long usurpation of that right by a foreign people and government has not extinguished the right, nor can it ever be extinguished except by the destruction of the Irish people. In every generation the Irish people have asserted their right to national freedom and sovereignty; six times during the past three hundred years they have asserted it in arms. Standing on that fundamental right and again asserting it in arms in the face of the world, we hereby proclaim the Irish Republic as a Sovereign Independent State, and we pledge our lives and the lives of our comrades in arms to the cause of its freedom, of its welfare, and of its exaltation among the nations.

The Irish Republic is entitled to, and hereby claims, the allegiance of every Irishman and Irishwoman. The Republic guarantees religious and civil liberty, equal rights and equal opportunities to all its citizens, and declares its resolve to pursue the happiness and prosperity of the whole nation and of all its parts, cherishing all the children of the nation equally, and oblivious of the differences carefully fostered by an alien Government, which have divided a minority from the majority in the past.

Until our arms have brought the opportune moment for the establishment of a permanent National Government, representative of the whole people of Ireland and elected by the suffrages of all her men and women, the Provisional Government, hereby constituted, will administer the civil and military affairs of the Republic in trust for the people.

We place the cause of the Irish Republic under the protection of the Most High God, Whose blessing we invoke upon our arms, and we pray that no one who serves that cause will dishonour it by cowardice, inhumanity, or rapine. In this supreme hour the Irish nation must, by its valour and discipline, and by the readiness of its children to sacrifice themselves for the common good, prove itself worthy of the august destiny to which it is called.

Signed on behalf of the Provisional Government:

THOMAS J. CLARKE

See also

• Sinn Féin Manifesto 1918
• Irish Declaration of Independence
• Message to the Free Nations of the World