 O'Brien championed the smallholders against the large graziers while Davitt, whose original idea had been state ownership and agrarian socialism, was not particularly enamoured by peasant proprietorship.Though O’Brien claimed that his organisation had no political objective, he became intrinsically aware that to further their cause the three split factions of the IPP needed to be re-united.He strongly believed that only agitational politics combined with constitutional pressures, rather than physical force, were the best means of achieving its goals.