Above : Painting Of Lord George Beresford

In 1826 another Catholic Petition was presented, and met the same fate as its numerous predecessors. Direct political action was now resolved on. There was a Parliamentary vacancy in Waterford, and Lord George Beresford, brother of the Marquis of Waterford, expected to be returned unopposed. It was decided that Mr. Villiers Stuart, member of an old Protestant family, but a man of very liberal views, should be introduced as a rival candidate under the auspices of the Association.

At this time the majority of the electors in most rural districts consisted of “forty-shilling freeholders”. It had always hitherto been considered that the votes of these men were at the absolute disposal of their landlords, and on this occasion the Duke of Devonshire issued a general direction to his tenants to abstain from voting for either party in the coming contest. The old order was, however, passing away. For several weeks before the election there was the fiercest excitement over the whole county. In every chapel the priest exhorted the electors to vote according to their consciences ; to bear in mind the interests of their faith ; and to strike a blow against the Ascendancy which had so long oppressed them. The Association’s agents travelled from parish to parish, exciting enthusiasm, encouraging the timid, waking that love of self-sacrifice for creed and country which has always been a marked trait of the Irish peasant.

In truth, the consequences of following their consciences might well, or many of these poor men, prove serious enough. The voting was open, and he who dared at the poll to defy his landlord’s will would be liable to ecome a mark for vengeance. Still, the courage of the peasants did not On the day when the contest was to begin they marched in their city of Waterford, barony by barony, each under its anner. Four thousand soldiers had been sent by the authorities but they had nothing to do for there was not the slightest much Beresford had, by a silly and insolent speech, alienated the small amount of popular support on which he might other-wise have counted. After a few days he abandoned the contest in despair and Villiers Stuart was declared to be duly elected.

Encouraged by its victory the Association intervened in other elections, and succeeded in placing its nominee in one of the two vacancies in Derry.

To the Ascendancy in Ireland, and their supporters in England, the result of the Waterford election caused the utmost surprise and anger, They cried out loudly against the influence of the priests, and tried, though in vain, to prove that they had coerced the voters by threats of spiritual penalties.

During the Session of 1828 the Test and Corporation Acts, which virtually excluded Protestant Dissenters from office and from the membership of Corporations, by requiring the taking of the sacrament according to the rites of the Established Church, were repealed. The Catholics had backed up the demand of the Dissenters for relief, and had presented a petition in their favour signed by 800,000 persons.