The Resurrection of Hungary was a book published by Arthur Griffith

Arthur Griffith

Arthur Griffith was the founder and third leader of Sinn Féin. He served as President of Dáil Éireann from January to August 1922, and was head of the Irish delegation at the negotiations in London that produced the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921.-Early life:...

 in 1904 in which he outlined his ideas for an Anglo-Irish

Anglo-Irish

Anglo-Irish was a term used primarily in the 19th and early 20th centuries to identify a privileged social class in Ireland, whose members were the descendants and successors of the Protestant Ascendancy, mostly belonging to the Church of Ireland, which was the established church of Ireland until...

 dual monarchy

Dual monarchy

Dual monarchy occurs when two separate kingdoms are ruled by the same monarch, follow the same foreign policy, exist in a customs union with each other and have a combined military but are otherwise self-governing...

. He proposed that the former kingdoms which had created the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was the formal name of the United Kingdom during the period when what is now the Republic of Ireland formed a part of it....

 in 1801, namely, the Kingdom of Great Britain

Kingdom of Great Britain

The former Kingdom of Great Britain, sometimes described as the 'United Kingdom of Great Britain', That the Two Kingdoms of Scotland and England, shall upon the 1st May next ensuing the date hereof, and forever after, be United into One Kingdom by the Name of GREAT BRITAIN. was a sovereign...

 and the Kingdom of Ireland

Kingdom of Ireland

The Kingdom of Ireland refers to the country of Ireland in the period between the proclamation of Henry VIII as King of Ireland by the Crown of Ireland Act 1542 and the Act of Union in 1800. It replaced the Lordship of Ireland, which had been created in 1171...

, return to the pre-1801 arrangement whereby they had two governments but a shared king. The policy, which was modelled on Hungary

Hungary

Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...

's achievement of equal status with Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

 under the Habsburg

Habsburg

The House of Habsburg , also found as Hapsburg, and also known as House of Austria is one of the most important royal houses of Europe and is best known for being an origin of all of the formally elected Holy Roman Emperors between 1438 and 1740, as well as rulers of the Austrian Empire and...

 emperor/king, became the basis for the policy of Griffith's new Sinn Féin

Sinn Féin

Sinn Féin is a left wing, Irish republican political party in Ireland. The name is Irish for "ourselves" or "we ourselves", although it is frequently mistranslated as "ourselves alone". Originating in the Sinn Féin organisation founded in 1905 by Arthur Griffith, it took its current form in 1970...

 party. He proposed an Anglo-Irish Empire to be the equivalent of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

Griffith summed up his ideas in the book by comparing the relative status of Hungary vis-à-vis Austria and Ireland vis-à-vis Great Britain:
He advocated a policy of abstentionism

Abstentionism

Abstentionism is standing for election to a deliberative assembly while refusing to take up any seats won or otherwise participate in the assembly's business. Abstentionism differs from an election boycott in that abstentionists participate in the election itself...

 from the institutions of the United Kingdom and a return to the Constitution of 1782

Constitution of 1782

The Constitution of 1782 is a collective term given to a series of legal changes which freed the Parliament of Ireland, a Medieval parliament consisting of the Irish House of Commons and the Irish House of Lords, of legal restrictions that had been imposed by successive Norman, English, and later,...

agreed between the British government and the Parliament of Ireland

Parliament of Ireland

The Parliament of Ireland was a legislature that existed in Dublin from 1297 until 1800. In its early mediaeval period during the Lordship of Ireland it consisted of either two or three chambers: the House of Commons, elected by a very restricted suffrage, the House of Lords in which the lords...

 in 1782.

Griffith called his new party, Sinn Féin, a “King, Lords and Commons Party.” The Anglo-Irish Empire idea, though strongly associated with Griffith, was not uniquely his creation. As early as the mid-1880s Lord Salisbury, leader of the Conservative Party

Conservative Party (UK)

The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...

 had contemplated using the 1867 Austro-Hungarian example as a model for a reformed relationship between Britain and Ireland.

From 1917 the party while maintaining its commitment to abstentionism, abandoned Griffith's proposal for having the British monarch on the Irish throne as King of Ireland

King of Ireland

A monarchical polity has existed in Ireland during three periods of its history, finally ending in 1801. The designation King of Ireland and Queen of Ireland was used during these periods...

. Instead it was split between republicans (those associated with the Easter Rising

Easter Rising

The Easter Rising was an insurrection staged in Ireland during Easter Week, 1916. The Rising was mounted by Irish republicans with the aims of ending British rule in Ireland and establishing the Irish Republic at a time when the British Empire was heavily engaged in the First World War...

 in 1916 and who had subsequently joined Sinn Féin) who advocated the creation of a new republic with an elected head of state, and those who advocated the creation of an Irish monarchy, albeit now with a monarch chosen from any royal house

Royal House

A royal house or royal dynasty consists of at least one, but usually more monarchs who are related to one another, as well as their non-reigning descendants and spouses. Monarchs of the same realm who are not related to one another are usually deemed to belong to different houses, and each house is...

 but the House of Windsor

House of Windsor

The House of Windsor is the royal house of the Commonwealth realms. It was founded by King George V by royal proclamation on the 17 July 1917, when he changed the name of his family from the German Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to the English Windsor, due to the anti-German sentiment in the United Kingdom...

.

In 1917 the party's Ard Fheis

Ard Fheis

Ardfheis or Ard Fheis is the name used by many Irish political parties for their annual party conference. The term was first used by Conradh na Gaeilge, the Irish language cultural organisation, for its annual convention....

adopted a motion committing the party to establishing a republic before holding a referendum on whether to install a monarchy or not, once the monarch chosen was not from the House of Windsor. The party later committed itself unambiguously to supporting a republic.

Given its introduction of the concept of abstentionism, and its formative role in the appearance of Sinn Féin, The Resurrection of Hungary was one of the most influential texts in 20th century Irish history.

Sources

• Arthur Griffith, The Resurrection of Hungary: A Parallel for Ireland (UCD Press, 2003 reprint)
• F.S.L. Lyons, Ireland Since the Famine