Ambrose Macaulay has been a student of ecclesiastical history for many years and has published widely in the area. This forensically researched book examines the role of the Catholic hierarchy in Ireland and England in their efforts to seek relief from the penal laws, and the bishops’ laborious and protracted dealings with the governments in Dublin and London, and with the Holy See, throughout the second half of the eighteenth century until the eventual granting of emancipation in 1829.

Traditionally, the campaign for Catholic emancipation has been associated in the public mind with Daniel O’Connell, and has generally been encapsulated into that narrow timeframe of the existence of the Catholic Association. Macaulay’s examination of the campaign begins long before that, in the eighteenth century, when although the Catholic laity was encouraged to continue enduring the penal laws, which they had done with such constancy, the hierarchy had already embarked on negotiations in an effort to remove some of the burdens imposed upon their congregations. However, as the dangers of hostilities broke out between Britain and its American colonies, the question of the oath, whereby Catholics would swear allegiance to the Protestant state, became ever more urgent as the possibility grew of recruiting soldiers from Ireland, and some form of an oath of allegiance was needed which would absolve Catholics from suspicion.

Drawing on his encyclopaedic knowledge of the subject, Macaulay’s great strength is his ability to interweave the efforts of many of the prominent members of the clergy into the narrative of the emancipation campaign, and by doing so, to show their talents as negotiators and diplomats and sometimes too, their weaknesses and human frailties. He examines the roles of men including the Irish bishops John Troy, Daniel Murray and James Doyle, the English bishops, William Poynter, John Milner and Paul MacPherson, and in Rome, Monsignor Giovanni Quarantotti and Cardinals Lorenzo Litta and Ercole Consalvi, in particular.

The early chapters of the book catalogue the move towards a diminution of the power of the papacy in eighteenth century Europe, and the fear of the Irish hierarchy as they observed the newly-formed Catholic Committee in Ireland extolling the radical doctrines of the French Revolution. As the Committee sought reform in Ireland, the hierarchy feared what might happen to the Irish church after seeing how the French National Assembly tried to turn the church in France into a state church. One of the fascinating sections in the book outlines the impact of the French Revolution on the Irish clergy, and in particular, the loss of the church’s main source of education and training as Irish seminarians were expelled from France. This led the bishops to try to impress on the administration that Irish ecclesiastics would be better educated at home in a move towards establishing seminaries that could be wholly controlled by the Catholic bishops. Eventually, negotiations between the bishops and Dublin Castle resulted in the establishment and endowment of a seminary in Maynooth. However, a harsh strain of intolerance still existed towards Catholic demands, and the rebellion of 1798 and its aftermath provided an opportunity for ultra-Protestants to depict the rebellion as a Catholic uprising and resulted in a set-back in the campaign for Catholic relief.

The book examines in considerable detail the requirements laid down by the government in return for any concessions. Prior to the (British) Catholic Relief Act of 1791, the wording of the oath was unacceptable to the clergy. When some modifications were made, and reliefs were passed, the positions of those who opposed the oath became even more entrenched, resulting in the establishment of groups like the Cisalpine Club in 1792, which opposed ultramontanism. Macaulay describes in depth how the first modest attempt by English Catholics to obtain some relief from the penal laws, following the passing of the act, led to bitter and acrimonious infighting.

The Irish bishops generally supported the introduction of the Act of Union as they believed that direct rule from London would be less sectarian and more beneficial to Catholics than the rule of an Irish parliament. It was, after all, the London government that had supported the establishment of the seminary at Maynooth. Whenever the question of emancipation was discussed, however, the government sought securities, among which was the power to veto episcopal appointments and to examine official correspondence from Rome to the bishops. Macaulay examines this veto controversy in minute detail from chapter five onwards. He describes the absence of unity and cooperation among those who fought for Catholic rights, and particularly the battle between Troy and Poynter on their interpretation of the fifth resolution regarding the veto. He also refers to the perceived attempts of Irish interference in English ecclesiastical affairs when Troy, who was Rome’s principal informant on Irish affairs and the channel of Roman instruction to the Irish church, believing that Milner could play that same role in London, intervened to have him transferred to London so that he could negotiate with ministers and members of parliament about the interests of the Catholic church. However, the plan failed, and created ill-feeling between Troy and Poynter that was never fully resolved. Tensions and vested interests, including the involvement of the Irish bishops in 1808, in a dispute involving the French church in England, further added to the complications of the struggle for emancipation.

Henry Grattan’s 1813 bill for Catholic relief and the strong opposition to it in the form of demands for safeguards and securities and in the person of the then chief secretary, Robert Peel, is examined in chapter nine. Tensions continued between the vicars apostolic of England and Scotland and the Irish bishops, and a pastoral letter issued by the vicars apostolic appeared to indicate that they were willing to surrender their ecclesiastical freedom in order to obtain emancipation. Arguments continued over the veto, and there was a widespread distrust among Catholics as to the motives of the government in seeking to interfere in episcopal appointments. When the dispute was referred to Rome, the Holy See was slow in reaching a decision on the dispute between the Irish bishops and the vicars apostolic which had convulsed the religion of the two islands for more than four years. As Rome sought a solution to the problem, MacPherson advised that the Irish clergy should be commanded to mind its own business and that Milner, who had been advocating on its behalf, should be kept away from Britain to prevent him exercising ecclesiastical jurisdiction there.

The conflicting expectations of Consalvi and Castlereagh of the outcomes of the Congress of Vienna in 1814 are carefully detailed. They reflected, too, the increasing differences between the English Catholic church and the Irish Catholic church, and they coincided with the growth in power of lay orators in Ireland, such as O’Connell, who detected a conspiracy between Castlereagh and Consalvi by which the cardinal would give Britain effectual supremacy over the church in Ireland in return for the restoration of the pope to his states.

Macaulay goes into considerable detail about the huge efforts that were put into the Roman missions by the Irish delegations. When the Irish attempted to represent their opposition to the veto in Rome, they either faced prejudices sown by English prelates, or were unfortunate in their choice of representatives, as in the person of Richard Hayes of the Catholic Association. (At one point, there were two Irish delegations in Rome, but they disagreed as to the best means of progressing the campaign for emancipation.) The Roman missions overall had no success, either due to their distrust of each other, or their common distrust of the government, as well as the lack of understanding of those in power in Rome of the situation in which the Irish bishops found themselves back on the ground in Ireland. Furthermore, despite all their efforts, it began to appear that those who supported the veto were winning the upper hand when a select committee, appointed to inquire into the nature and substance of laws existing in foreign states respecting the regulation of their Roman Catholic subjects, found that many states did indeed interfere in ecclesiastical matters and previewed papal correspondence. When the vicars apostolic began to agree among themselves that emancipation might come at too high a price, this led to further divisions with the Irish bishops. The failure of the continued efforts of Lord Donoughmore and Grattan in parliament, combined with the growing popularity of the Catholic Board and its increasingly aggressive attitude, caused further problems for Archbishops Troy and Murray who knew, from many years of negotiation, how slowly the wheels of the papal administration turned.

Notwithstanding Daniel O’Connell’s later successes in the struggle for emancipation, Macaulay is quite critical of his initial efforts in the campaign, claiming that in the early years of the Catholic Board, O’Connell misinterpreted, and was too quick to criticise, many of the actions of the bishops. While the bishops’ objections to the various bills were generally reasoned, well thought-out, and diplomatically expressed, and were borne of long years of experience of the Holy See’s administrative processes, O’Connell’s objections were often more reactive and hostile.

The final four chapters detail the shift in power in the struggle for and the eventual achievement of emancipation. Following the long series of failures of the various efforts to gain emancipation through parliamentary means, it was only in 1821 that it was becoming apparent that Catholics, both lay and clergy, needed to cooperate in the struggle for emancipation. The establishment of the Catholic Association in 1823, and the cooperation of Irish and English Catholics, and clergy and laity working together towards a common goal, meant that by 1826 there was cause for optimism as some of the Protestant prejudices about Catholic doctrines and claims were eventually cleared away. Although the clergy were still engaged in the struggle, O’Connell and the Catholic Association were now the most prominent activists in the campaign. It was unfortunate that men like Milner, Poynter and Troy did not live long enough to see the coming of emancipation in February 1829.

Macaulay had access to a wide range of state, diocesan and Vatican archives, and this book is thoroughly researched. While at times, the detail can be a little overwhelming, the work makes a significant contribution to our understanding of the long and protracted campaign that was waged for emancipation, even before that campaign became a public and national one.