[ 17] 
Nationalists support Home Rule, Unionists denounce 
it, but all Irishmen unite in opposing the dismem- 
berment of Ireland. Once convince the Ulster 
Unionists that Home Rule is inevitable, and they 
will accept the inclusion of Ulster as the lesser of 
two evils. 
It is not hard to show that the policy of exclusion 
was never supported on its merits by any section of 
Irishmen. The real issue between Irish Nationalists 
and Unionists was, Home Rule or no Home Rule for 
a united Ireland. For more than a century the 
battle was fought on this issue by O’Connell, Butt, 
Parnell, McCarthy, and Redmond. Home Rule was 
denounced by the Unionists as “treason,” “rebellion,” 
and “dismemberment of the Empire” It was ap- 
plauded by the Nationalists as the liberation and 
regeneration of Ireland ; but through all those years 
there was never a hint from any party that the solu- 
tion of the question could be found in the dismem- 
berment of Ireland. 
In the strenuous second reading debate in 1886, . 
when Mr. Gladstone first raised the question, Home 
Rule for all Ireland was the only issue before Parlia- 
ment. In 1893 I was present every day in the 
House when Home Rule was discussed, week after 
week, month after month, on second reading, com- 
mittee, and report, and I never heard from any 
quarter the faintest suggestion that any part of Ire- 
land should be excluded from the jurisdiction of the 
Irish Parliament. 
During the fierce agitation in Ulster in the autumn 
of 1912 there was never a hint of exclusion. The 
famous Covenant, so enthusiastically adopted, so 
universally signed by the Unionists of Ulster, was in 
effect a repudiation of the policy of exclusion. It is 
important for the right understanding of the present 
Irish situation to recall the pledge of mutual support 
contained in the Covenant :—