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The Duke of Wellington's speeches on Catholic Emancipation (10)

26 February 1829

These documents are taken from: The Speeches of the Duke of Wellington in Parliament, collected and arranged by the late Colonel Gurwood, C.B., K.C.T.S., (London, John Murray, Albemarle Street, 1854)

Lord PLUNKETT stated what he had understood the intentions of the Government to be, when, in 1825, he had brought in a bill for the suppression of the Catholic Association of that day.

THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON said:

My Lords, I can assure your Lordships that it was not my intention to have taken any part in this discussion; but in consequence of an observation which has fallen from the noble and learned Lord, I feel myself called upon to say a few words. The noble and learned Lord has stated that when he brought in the Bill, in 1825, for the suppression of the last Catholic Association, he understood that measure was to be followed by another measure of a conciliatory character.

Lord PLUNKETT did not mean to say as a public measure; it was only the expression of his private opinion that such ought to have been the case.

THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON said:

Now that is what I complain of. My noble and learned friend, if he will allow me to call him so, himself intended to propose a measure which he afterwards desisted from doing. I perfectly recollect, in a paragraph of a letter from my noble relative, the then Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, there was mention made of some such proposition. That letter was referred back to the noble Marquis on that particular point; and he returned for answer that it was not his intention to suggest to the Government that any further measure should follow the one which had been proposed by the noble and learned Lord. I thought it right to say thus much, in justice to the Government, and in order that no misunderstanding on the subject should exist, because, had there been any such en­gagement, I am sure it would have been fulfilled.

Lord PLUNKETT repeated that his was entirely a private opinion.