In
the 18th century attempts were made to obtain full political and civil
liberties to British and Irish Roman Catholics.
In Ireland, where the majority of the population were Catholics, the
Relief Act of 1793 gave them the right to vote in elections, but not
to sit in Parliament.
In England the leading campaigners for Catholic emancipation were
the Radical members of the House of Commons,
Sir Francis Burdett and Joseph
Hume.
By the beginning of the 19th century, William
Pitt, the leader of Tories, became converted to the idea of Catholic
emancipation. Pitt and his Irish Secretary, Lord
Castlereagh, promised the Irish Parliament that Catholics would
have equality with Protestants when it agreed to the Act
of Union in 1801. When King George III
refused to accept the idea of religious equality, Pitt and Castlereagh
resigned from office.
In 1823 Daniel O'Connell founded the
Catholic Association to campaign for the removal of discrimination
against Catholics. In 1828 he was elected as M.P. for County Clare
but as a Catholic he was not allowed to take his seat in the House
of Commons. To avoid the risk of an uprising in Ireland, the British
Parliament passed the Roman Catholic Relief Act in 1829, which granted
Catholic emancipation and enabled O'Connell to take his seat.
J. Doyle,
drawing of Sir Francis Burdett,
Joseph Hume & Daniel O'Connell
celebrating Catholic Emancipation (1834)
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