The Catholic electoral arrangements which gave rise to such protests involved attaching two members from every county and major town in the country to the existing Dublin-based Committee. The meeting of these delegates became the celebrated Catholic Convention of December 1792. Arrangements were master-minded by the handful of men composing the sub-committee in Dublin, but more often than not by Tone and Keogh alone. Each parish was to nominate two electors to attend county meetings, where delegates to the national convention would be chosen. Unlike the landed gentry of the earlier Committee, who acted as individuals and were responsible only to themselves, delegates chosen in 1792 were to ‘hold themselves accountable to those from whom they derive their trust’, and were liable to removal by those same ‘constituents’ if they acted ‘in opposition to the general will, and the public good’. The authorities denounced the plan as French in inspiration. The Catholics denied the charge, claimed that it was thoroughly English, and cited Hume's Essay on a Perfect Commonwealth as the model. Although the original plan of maintaining constant communication with the mass of the people was dropped as ‘too hardy’, the stridency of the Protestant response should be seen in the light of this phenomenon of a national body of lay Catholics meeting for the first time that century, utterly convinced of the justice of their cause, and using methods of political organisation which were nothing short of revolutionary.

I

By 1 October 18 of Ireland's 32 counties had returned members, and a further 9 were also expected to do so. However, several areas continued to present difficulties. Kenmare's influence in Kerry worked against the campaign. But Mayo presented the main problem. Here the moderately reformist MP, Denis Browne, was trying to boost his own electoral interests by persuading the Catholics to break away from the national movement and present a separate petition. The delay in Mayo was also affecting Galway. The national effort could not afford to lose these, the country's two main Catholic counties and heartland of the original Catholic Committee.