Defining Liberalism: the first Home Rule crisis in the Scottish capital

Abstract

The nature of liberalism was at the heart of the political debate surrounding the first Irish Home Rule bill in Edinburgh. The rhetoric of the campaign was dominated by the fight for the ownership of liberalism, and it was pivotal for all the candidates standing in Edinburgh to present themselves as liberals, and to define their stance on the Irish question by associating it to a core value of liberalism. Democracy and the protection of minorities were the two values used to justify the candidates’ stances on Irish Home Rule, and the perceived threat of Irish Catholicism was often the focus of the associated arguments. The discourse that resulted from this justification centred on a fight to define the essence of liberalism. Therefore, the Irish Home Rule debate in Edinburgh demonstrates that the Liberal split was more nuanced than the traditional assessment of a Whig versus Radical split. Instead, the debate on the Irish question signified the struggle of liberalism.