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Quebec and the Irish Catholic Relief Act of 1778: An Institutional Approach
Author(s) -
STANBRIDGE KAREN
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
journal of historical sociology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.186
H-Index - 26
eISSN - 1467-6443
pISSN - 0952-1909
DOI - 10.1111/1467-6443.00212
Subject(s) - irish , emancipation , negotiation , politics , political science , law , character (mathematics) , sociology , political economy , public administration , philosophy , linguistics , geometry , mathematics
The following attempts to clarify the origins and character of the “movement” toward Catholic emancipation in the British empire by examining the negotiation of two early relief measures, the Quebec Act (1774) and the Irish Catholic Relief Act (1778), from an institutional perspective. It explores how institutions structuring Anglo‐Quebec and Anglo‐Irish political relations affected policy outcomes in each case, and what influence the Quebec case had on the Irish act four years later. While the Quebec Act offered a response to the Catholic question that was to assist supporters of the Irish bill, both were hard won against the inertia of institutional precedent. Neither act was accompanied by indications that greater freedoms were forthcoming. An institutional analysis thus challenges leading approaches that can represent the “movement” toward Catholic emancipation as more spontaneous and less contested than is sustained by actual events.