Why did the Liberals fail to get Home Rule before 1914?

In 1906, the Liberals won one of the most convincing election victories of all time and for the first time in over ten years the Nationalists could press for a Home Rule Bill with some hope of actually achieving it. Their position was however severely weakened by the fact that the Liberals had such an overwhelming majority that they were not dependent on the support of the Irish Nationalists. This meant that the difficult topic of Home Rule was not top of the agenda for the Liberals immediately after the 1906 election, but that is not to say that they totally ignored the pleas of the Irish Nationalists.

The Irish Council Bill of 1907 would have given Ireland control over local government, district government, agriculture, education, public works and limited control over finances, it would have greatly enlarged Irish control of local affairs but stopped short of Home Rule. However, the Unionists or the Nationalists, who feared that it might work too well and that people would be satisfied and no longer Want Home Rule did not support the Bill. This episode taught the Liberals an important lesson and one perhaps that Asquith should have taken more notice of later on- that there was no middle ground that the Liberals could support, they either had to go all the way with Home Rule or not bother doing anything.

910 must have been a pleasing year for the Nationalists, as they first saw the Liberals majority drop to such an extent that they now needed their support and then saw the powers of the Lords weakened so that it was now only possible for them to block Bills for two years and not completely veto a Bill. So, Home Rule was now a distinct possibility and it wasn't just the Nationalists who realised this: the Ulster Unionists and the Conservatives both made it clear that they would not accept Home Rule.

Things came to a head in 1912, when the Third Home Rule Bill was introduced. This time the Bill had every chance of being passed, with a enough people in favour of the Bill in the Commons, and the Lords with only the power to delay it for two years. The Bill made provision for a two chamber Irish Parliament with control over Ireland in all but foreign affairs and finances; however, the Bill was only provisional so the Irish could alter it to give themselves more power. The Bill was totally unsatisfactory for the Ulster Unionists, as it made no provisions for them and as a result, steps were taken to arm and resist the imposition of the Bill. The Ulster Volunteer Force received weapons from various sources and the Irish Volunteers were also arming themselves and preparing for battle. There was slim chance of a compromise as the two sides were totally unwilling to back down, so it was up to Asquith and his Liberal government to sort out the problems and prevent a civil war. Admittedly this was a difficult task, but Asquiths "wait and see" tactics did not help the situation, his only chance of solving the matter was to either stick to his original plan of granting the whole of Ireland Home Rule or to bring into operation the Agar-Roberts Plan, thereby separating some of the Ulster states from the rest of Ireland. In order to carry out the former of these choices successfully, he would have had to ban organisations like the Ulster Volunteer Force and mobilise the British army in order to coerce Ulster into accepting Home Rule if the need arose. Alternatively he could have separated the counties with a Protestant majority and kept these as part of the British Isles, this would have meant taking a harder line with Redmond and the Irish Nationalists by depriving them of one of the industrial heartland's of the country. Asquith's weak leadership almost resulted in civil war and this disastrous event was probably only avoided due to even more worrying happenings on the continent.

Home Rule for Ireland was not achieved by 1914 because of a number of factors then: for much of this time the Conservatives were in power and Home Rule was against their policy and philosophy, until 1910 the Lords had the power to block Bills and so Home Rule was an impossibility. When the chance finally did arrive for Home Rule to take place, the combination of weak leadership and the bitter determination of the Ulster Unionists and to some extent the Conservative government that Home Rule should not cover the whole of Ireland meant that it never did and that it was only achieved for southern Ireland a few years later.