Anti-Catholicism Catholics, and his replacement by a Dutch Protestant. For decades the Stuarts were supported by France in plots to invade and conquer Britain, and anti-Catholicism persisted. The Gordon Riots of 1780 were a violent anti-Catholic protest in London against the Papists Act of 1778, which was intended to reduce official discrimination against British Catholics. Lord George Gordon, head of the Protestant Association warned that the law would enable Catholics in the British Army to become a dangerous threat. The protest evolved into riots and widespread looting. Local magistrates were afraid of reprisals and did not issue the riot act. There
Anti-Catholicism in the United Kingdom was to open it. The Great Fire of London in 1666 was blamed on the Catholics and an inscription ascribing it to 'Popish frenzy' was engraved on the Monument to the Great Fire of London, which marked the location where the fire started (this inscription was only removed in 1831). The 'Popish Plot' involving Titus Oates further exacerbated Anglican-Catholic relations. The beliefs that underlie the sort of strong anti-Catholicism once seen in the United Kingdom were summarized by William Blackstone in his "Commentaries on the Laws of England": The gravamen of this charge, then, is that Catholics constitute an "imperium