heralded the end of a political era, the context for a wider federalist debate was at once overhauled.Jackson, Alvin: pp. 212, 222 Its dualism signalled the end of All-Ireland Home Rule and the end of an optional federal engagement with Ireland, which had it succeeded and if the Convention's Report had been implemented in full, would have established a novel form of federal government at the heart of Europe Although the Convention appeared to have failed in its immediate objective, it generated ideas and reactions and revealed standpoints that had an independent and lasting significance. Prolonged crisis On 11 April government ministers formed a cabinet committee to supervise the drafting of Home Rule as recommended by the Convention. The committee was chaired by Walter Long, self-claimed to be the best informed person on Irish affairs, also a champion of federalism, a lifelong Unionist and committed adversary of Home Rule. In particular his manipulative interpretation of the negotiated agreement in July 1916 between Redmond and Carson had created an ambiguity which caused them to repudiate it. On 16 April 1918 the Military Service (Ireland) Bill passed into law. The prospect of All-Ireland Home Rule being introduced led Carson to agree with Nationalists – that Ireland had suffered from nothing in its history as much as the 'broken pledges of British statesmen'. In contrast he supported conscription, because he saw no more detestable domination than that which the Germans were trying to impose. On the official announcement of the dual policy of Home Rule and conscription, Dillon and O'Brien led their party members out of the Commons and returned to Ireland. The Home Rulers united with Sinn Féin in the anti-conscription pledge of 21 April at the height of the Conscription Crisis, at the Dublin Mansion House Conference and the great one-day strike and demonstration of 23 April. Dillon believed that Lloyd George had 'let HELL loose in Ireland' as part of a Machiavellian plot to evade his promise to grant home rule. This radicalisation of the Home Rule movement came too late to stem the electoral swing. Arthur Griffith, founder of Sinn Féin, defeated the Home Ruler in the East Cavan by-election on 20 June. The failure of the German offensives after American intervention and success of the Allied counteroffensives led to a significant improvement in the British situation on the Western Front, permitting the cabinet by 20 June to postpone