Peel had triumphed. The profound division which had broken out among the supporters of Catholic emancipation threw back for many years a cause which had been almost gained, though in 1817 an Act was passed without opposition throwing open to the Catholics the military and naval positions which Grenville had vainly attempted to open in 1807. Few things could have been eventually more disastrous both to Ireland and to the Empire than the defeat of the influence represented by Grattan and by the Catholic gentry, and the growing ascendancy of O'Connell and the democratic and sacerdotal party in Irish popular politics. Grattan had long predicted that, if concession was not speedily and wisely made, population in Ireland would drift away from the guiding and moderating influence of property; that seditious and anarchical men would gain an ascendancy which would make the whole problem of Irish Government incalculably difficult; that a priesthood unconnected with the English Government would lead to a 'Catholic laity discorporated from the people of England.' In the Irish Parliament the strong bias of Conservatism in his policy had been repeatedly displayed, and it was equally apparent in the Imperial Parliament. In 1807 he had supported the Insurrection Act, in opposition to many of his friends, on the ground that there was a real and dangerous French party in Ireland, which the common law was insufficient to suppress. In 1814 he expressed his full approval of the proclamation suppressing the Catholic Board. He steadily and earnestly maintained that, although it was vitally necessary that Catholic emancipation should be speedily carried, it should be accompanied by measures for securing, as far as possible, the loyalty of the higher Catholic clergy, and uniting them in interest and sentiment with the British Government. He looked with bitter hostility on the rise and policy of O'Connell. He accused him of 'setting afloat the bad passions of the people,' making grievances instruments of power without any honest wish to redress them, treating politics as a trade to serve a desperate and interested purpose.