WE HAVE a diverse coalition preparing to commemorate the 90th anniversary of the 1916 Rising. This coalition includes Sinn Féin who believe that 'republicans' always have a mandate from the dead generations to kill for Ireland.

The government parties, along with the opposition, sometimes seem uneasy about fully endorsing that version of democracy. Nevertheless, this will not stop them from commemorating the violence that Pearse and his associates brought to the streets of Dublin.

The problem with the 1916 Rising is that it is not just history but also politics. The reasons the state stopped commemorating it were and are related to political realities.

It is because 1916 is a political issue that much of the debate in relation to it is adversarial. It might therefore be useful to try and approach it from two key historical aspects on which there is more or less agreement and tease these out: 1) There was no democratic mandate for the Rising at the time, and 2) Its aim was a 32-county Republic.

The hundreds of deaths and terrible destruction caused by the Rising could only have been justified in the most extreme of circumstances and, even then, only with a democratic mandate.

Accepting that such a mandate did not exist leads to the inescapable conclusion that the Rising was morally and politically inexcusable. Retrospective endorsement is often cited as justifying 1916. However, in relation to morality this merely means that something that was considered to be immoral then has become moral now, presumably because we have less moral qualms about killing and destruction than did the population of Ireland in 1916.

When one views 1916 against the stated aims of its leaders, it was a dramatic failure. The main aim was the establishment of a 32-county Republic. Ninety years after the event and this is no closer to being achieved than it was at the time.

The concern that 1916 may become the exclusive possession of irredentist republicans hardly seems justified. Three former taoisigh were 1916 veterans. The journey of these veterans from starry-eyed idealists to genuine democrats is something that should be loudly proclaimed. We should indeed be grateful to many 1916 veterans for the painful compromises they subsequently made in the interests of peace.

But the Rising was undemocratic and therefore has no place in democratic politics. Pretending it to be otherwise is playing into the hands of those whom the government would claim it is trying to protect us from.

Tony Moriarty, 6 Shanid Road, Kenilworth Park, Dublin 6.