ABSTRACT
None of the British comic newspapers openly supported the Home Rule bill, although Fun and Punch did seem to lean in favour at times, if only out of sympathy with William Gladstone. If the Funny Folks cartoon signals the beginning of the Union of Hearts, that in the 28 December 1889 Weekly Freeman marks its pinnacle. Home rule had become the most salient fault line in British politics, forcing an alliance between the IPP and the Liberals. In February 1886, however, Lord Randolph Churchill travelled to Belfast to whip up public opposition to Home Rule and coined his famous phrase, ‘Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right’. In this article the Saturday Review posits Irish Home Rule as the first item in a long list of Radical measures that include disestablishing the Church, dissolving the House of Lords, and plunging Britain into socialism.
