The Fall of the Catholic Cosmopolitan: Charles O'Conor and the Catholic Debate on the Act of Union

This article addresses the writing and politics of Charles O'Conor, grandson of the noted antiquarian and founder of the Catholic Committee, Charles O'Conor of Belangare, who as librarian to George Nugent-Temple-Grenville, Marquis of Buckinghamshire, at Stowe played a crucial role in articulating Irish Catholic responses to the 1801 Act of Union. The paper argues O'Conor represented a Catholic perspective that felt an historic compromise between the political authority of the British constitution and the religious authority of the Catholic Church was possible.