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Summary essay plan for question: successes or failures of constitutional Nationalism and Unionism was based on the level of support from the British Government in the period £3.39
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Summary essay plan for question: successes or failures of constitutional Nationalism and Unionism was based on the level of support from the British Government in the period
full essay answer for successes or failures of constitutional Nationalism and Unionism was based on the level of support from the British Government in the period . 2982 words. very descriptive covers a lot of information and the whole time period throughly
“Successes or failures of constitutional Nationalism and Unionism was based on the
level of support from the British Government in the period 1800-1900.” How far do
you agree?
The strength of the British Government and its response to political developments in
Ireland was undoubtedly a huge influential factor as to whether or not Nationalism
and Unionism were successful in achieving their aims. It can be argued that in the
case of nationalism strong British Government’s lead to failures in their aims
whereas weak government’s allowed them to succeed. However, it is the opposite
which is the case for unionism as strong government’s allowed them to uphold their
aim of maintaining the union whereas weak government’s that gave concessions to
nationalists lead to some failures in their aims. However, other factors were
important in determining the success or failure of nationalism and unionism such as
role of the individual, mass support and the church.
There is a correlation between the success of constitutional nationalism and support
of the British Government. The first constitutional Nationalist was Grattan and he
was a parliamentarian and therefore knew he needed the support of the British
Government in order to achieve Catholic emancipation. Grattan used deferential
political tactics, which meant that he was building support for his cause through
great speeches at Westminster which lead to him losing his final vote by only 2
votes. However, crucially Grattan did not have the support of the majority of the
government in the House of Commons, nevermind the House of Lords who would
have vetoed Catholic Emancipation even though it was coupled with the Act of
Union by Pitt who promised the Catholic Relief Act would come into law.
Initially, O’Connell and the emancipation campaign did not have the support of the
British Government and in 1825 the government suppressed O’Connell’s Catholic
Association and arrested him under the charge of incitement to rebellion.
O’Connell’s tactic of brinkmanship and the use of the Clare by-election in 1828
forced the government to introduce the emancipation act as they feared
constitutional meltdown as O’Connell was a Catholic MP elected but Irish Catholics
could not hold seats in the House of Commons and therefore emancipation bill was
introduced in February 1829 and passed. however there was a limitation to this
success as it was accompanied by an amendment to the franchise that the freehold
qualification was now raised from 40 shillings to £10. Wellington’s government felt
that this would restore influence to the men of property and therefore stabilise
Ireland. This shows that Constitutional Nationalism did need some government
support to gain emancipation however their policy of brinkmanship aided their
campaign, however the British Government were able to maintain their control by
introducing the amendment reducing the size of the Irish franchise.
A key example that constitutional nationalism was successful based on the position
of the British Government was the success of Irish reforms under the Lichfield House
Compact in 1835. After the January 1835 general election, the Conservative party
was left in a minority government; the Irish party joined an alliance with the Whigs
to take office. This Whig government from 1835 to 1840 was still weak and reliant on
, other parties to remain in office, this allowed O’Connell to exploit this weak
government to gain Irish reforms. During this time there was the passing of the Tithe
Rent Charge Act in 1838, which scaled down payments and wrote off arrears,
Corporations Act 1840, powers were given to local councils yet not as extensive as in
England and the Irish Reform Act 1832 which gave Ireland 5 additional seats but
failed to return the franchise to 40 shilling freeholders. As well as these specific
successes arguably the success here was that O’Connell’s methods would inspire
future leaders such as Parnell or Redmond to use his method of working with the
British Government by guaranteeing Irish votes in return for Justice. This period of
the century saw mixed successes for constitutional nationalism but showed early
signs of the pattern that they were going to achieve their most success through
working with the Whigs rather than the Tories. Out of O’Connell’s relationship with
the Whigs he obtained a sympathetic executive in Dublin Castle who were keen to
reform the justice and police system. This led to Catholics being admitted to the
judiciary. In 1836, the Irish Constabulary was set up with many Catholics in it. Finally,
there were four Catholics in succession held the office of Attorney General in Ireland
under the Whigs.
The failure of O’Connell’s repeal campaign can also be strongly linked to the lack of
support from the British Government. Many British parties saw repeal as a ‘leap in
the dark.’ Unlike emancipation, which had support in the House of Commons and
eventually the support of Wellington and Peel, Repeal was strongly opposed by the
British Government in both Houses. At this time, the government was strong and
united under Peel and in the vote in the Commons for repeal, only one British MP
voted in favour. Peel’s approach was a mix of coercion and conciliation, the army
was strengthened in Ireland during this period. Peel was in a much stronger positin
than Wellington during the emancipation crisis. As Prime Minister, he commanded a
strong united government. The repeal campaign had almost no support outside of
Ireland despite large monster meetings with up to 1 million people in Ireland
attending such as Clontarf in 1843, however it never happened as it was shut down
by Peel. It is evident that repeal failed due to lack of British Government support as
they had larger ambitions of preserving the empire. The British Government adopted
a policy that was known as ‘killing repeal by kindness’ to ensure its failure yet
coupled it with Irish reforms such as trebling the annual grant to Maynooth. The
repeal struggle had been very different to that of Emancipation. The Irish electorate
were no longer formidable due to the disenfranchisement of the 40 shilling
freeholders. The O’Connellites were down to 19 MP’s after the election in 1841 and
it was evident that the government were totally united in opposition to repeal.
In regards to achieving lard reforms, Parnell saw success again when supported by
the British Government. Gladstone was sympathetic towards the Irish and he
beloved it was his personal duty to ‘pacify Ireland,’ and therefore was willing to pass
Irish reforms. Gladstone was transforming the Liberal Party into the party of the
Celtic Fringe and the General Election of 1868 was fought and won by Gladstone on
the issue of the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland (which was later to come
in 1869). The very fact that Gladstone was able to win the election on an Irish issue,
presents success on the part of nationalism for making an impact and shows the
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