Britain's relations with the Vatican, 1880-1922

Abstract

In this thesis I have set out to examine the course of Britain's political relations with the Vatican between 1880 and 1922: This work starts with the attempts made during Gladstone's Cabinet to establish a working arrangement with the Vatican and ends with the decision of Lloyd George's coalition cabinet to retain the diplomatic representation established at the beginning of the First World War At the time that this study begins, Britain and the Vatican needed one another's support in their respective outstanding objectives. Until 1870, the Pope had ruled over a state and was therefore a proper temporal prince, but after the loss of Rome he had no territory to back his claim to sovereignty. Pope Leo XIII, elected in 1878 into a disinherited papacy threatened ·with political extinction, sought to rebuild its political power by pursuing an active diplomacy. Leo XIII' s election coincided with the return of the Irish question to the forefront of British politics. [...]