Irish Independence Quotes

Give Ireland back to the Irish, don't make them have to take it away.

The British Government has no right in Ireland, never had any right in Ireland, and never can have any right in Ireland.

The Irish light as been extinguished by the foulest means that sword and tyranny ever practiced …. Any attempt to rekindle it is to be treated as sedition.

Stop at home. Arm for Ireland. Fight for Ireland and no other land.

Advance the cause of Ireland’s national independence by … the discontinuance of anything tending towards the Anglicization of Ireland … The development of an Irish foreign policy.

The cause of the rebellion [Irish Rebellion of 1641] was the desire of the Romanists to recover the Church Revenues, worth about 110,000 per annum, and of the common Irish to get back all the Englishmen's estates, and of the ten or twelve grandees to get the empire of the whole.

Generations will continue to meet the same fate unless the perennial oppressor-Britain-is removed, for she will unashamedly and mercilessly continue to maintain her occupation and economic exploitation of Ireland to judgment day, if she is not halted and ejected.

England cannot afford to go on with Irishmen in her Parliament.

As a Nationalist, I do not regard as entirely palatable the idea that forever and a day Ireland's voice should be excluded from the councils of an empire which the genius and valor of her sons have done so much to build up and of which she is to remain

Before Irish Home Rule is conceded by the Imperial Parliament, England as the predominant member of the three kingdoms will have to be convinced of its justice and equity.

In the 19th century, we didn't much like the loud annexationist voices south of the border or American support for Sinn Fein adventurers who thought, by seizing the Canadian colonies, they could force Britain out of Ireland.

Repeal and Repeal alone is and must be the grand basis for all future operations, hit or miss, win or lose. The people will take nothing short of that …. I say there can be no other basis for association [of Ireland with Britain] save the Repeal, the glorious Repeal

The day will dawn when all the people of Ireland will have the desire for freedom to show. It is then we'll see the rising of the moon.

To quell all nations - to dethrone all Kings, and plant the Tree of Liberty in our Irish land.

Is there to be no living Irish nation?

Altho that is so, Ireland has always denied and Ireland still denies that the Union was binding upon her either legally or morally. And here on this historic occasion we have assembled to renew our protest and to place it upon record.

We went out to break the connection between this country and the British Empire, and to establish an Irish Republic …. We succeeded in proving that Irishmen are ready to die endeavoring to win for Ireland those national rights which the British Government has been asking them to die to win for Belgium. As long as that remains the case, the cause of Irish freedom is safe…. I personally thank God that I have lived to see the day when thousands of Irish men and boys, and hundreds of Irish women and girls, were ready to affirm that truth, and to attest it with their lives if need be.

Why should Ireland be treated as a geographical fragment of England - Ireland is not a geographical fragment, but a nation.

It seems that the historic inability of Britain to comprehend the Irish feelings and sensitivities still remains.

They won't break me because the desire for freedom, and the freedom of the Irish people, is in my heart.

The Ireland I now inhabit is one that these Irish contemporaries have helped to imagine.

Talk not to me of peace. Ireland is not at peace, it is smothered war. England has sown her laws as dragon's teeth, and they have sprung up as armed men.

THE IRISH PEOPLE TO THE WORLD History bears testimony to the intensity of our sufferings …. Our war is against the aristocratic locusts, whether English or Irish, who have eaten the verdure of our fields—against the aristocratic leeches who drain alike our blood and theirs. Republicans of the entire world, our cause is your cause…. Avenge yourselves…. Herewith we proclaim the Irish Republic

More Irishmen died fighting for Britain in World War I than died fighting against her in all of Ireland's bids for independence combined.

If you remove the English army to-morrow and hoist the green flag over Dublin Castle, unless you set about the organization of the Socialist Republic your efforts would be in vain. England would still rule you. She would rule you through her capitalists, through her landlords, through her financiers, through the whole array of commercial and individualist institutions she has planted in this country and watered with the tears of our mothers and the blood of our martyrs.