General League of Roman Catholic Electoral Associations

During the 19th century, Catholics were a disadvantaged minority in the Netherlands. They enjoyed considerable independence in the southern provinces North Brabant and Limburg, where they formed 90% of the population. In the north, however, Catholics were not allowed to organise religious rallies and demonstrations. Until 1848, the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church was forbidden in the Netherlands. A mix of Protestantism and nationalism, inspired by the struggle for independence against the Catholic Spanish, was a reason.

Until the 1890s, the most important ally of the Catholics were the liberals, who advocated freedom of religion. Catholics supported several liberal governments but were divided between two groups: those for the progressive Schaepman and those for the conservative Bahlman. The progressives favoured a corporatist economy and extension of suffrage, but the conservatives, who represented business interests, opposed both. Meanwhile, the organisation of the Catholics was concentrated on the district or province. The Brabant caucuses was exceptionally strong.

In the late 1880s, the Catholics became disillusioned with the liberals because, although they supported the freedom of religion, they refused to finance Catholic, or otherwise religious, schools. That became an important issue that united the Catholics. In 1888 the Catholic parliamentary party switched its allegiances to the Protestant Anti-Revolutionary Party and became part of the first Coalition cabinet, led by Aeneas Mackay. The new cabinet also jump started the formation of a new party in 1896. All Catholic candidates then rallied around one programme, written by Schaepman. The programme was inspired by the encyclical Rerum novarum, which advocated social Catholic politics. From 1897, Catholic MPs began to meet regularly.

Finally, on 15 October 1904, the General League was founded as a federation of district and provincial Catholic caucuses and parliamentarians.

The 1905 election was the first election contested by the League. It retained the same number of seats as previously held by Catholic candidates: 25 (out of 100). That number remained remarkably stable in subsequent elections. The party governed between 1908 and 1913 together with the ARP and the Protestant CHU, in the cabinet led by Heemskerk. Between 1913 and 1918, the party was out of power by a liberal minority cabinet, which was preparing an important constitutional revision to solve the two most pressing political issues of the past three decades: suffrage and equal financing for religious schools. All parties were involved in the process, and in 1917, the changes were implemented.

Then, the General League grew in power. In the 1918 election, held under proportional representation, the League became the largest party, and its alliance with the ARP and CHU won a considerable majority. For the first time in Dutch political history, a Catholic, Charles Ruijs de Beerenbrouck, became Prime Minister.

That responsibility put considerable pressure on the party. In 1919, Van Groenendael was removed from the party ranks because the MP supported the independence of Dutch Limburg. In 1922 another Catholic party, Roman Catholic People's Party, was founded by former members of the General League and was oriented towards Catholic workers. In 1923, 10 Catholic MPs caused the fall of the second Ruijs de Beerenbrouck cabinet by voting against the budget of the Ministry for the Navy. Ruijs de Beerenbrouck continued with a new cabinet. In 1925, the orthodox Protestant MP Kersten caused the fall of the first Colijn cabinet. Kersten had proposed every year for the Dutch representative at the Holy See to be abolished. Each year, the conservative Protestant CHU, which was in government with the General League, had supported the proposal. Now, the socialist and liberal opposition supported the proposal as well, which was unacceptable for the Catholic ministers, and their departure caused the cabinet to fall. Those events and the pressure of governing accelerated the General League's change to a tightly-organised mass party. In 1926, it formed a new party, the Roman Catholic State Party, which was the continuation of the General League with a stronger organisation.

The party was a loose league of caucuses, with little party discipline. The weak party organisation was dependent on the party's parliamentary party.

The General League had close links to many other Catholic institutions such as the Roman-Catholic Church, and together they formed the Catholic pillar. These organisations included a Catholic labour union, the Catholic employers' organisation, the Catholic farmers' organisation, Catholic Hospitals united in the Yellow-White Cross, and Catholic Schools.

The General League was allied to the Protestant Anti-Revolutionary Party and Christian Historical Union, in alliance called the Coalition. Their shared issue was the equal financing for religious schools by the government. The relationship with the ARP, which also supported the extension of suffrage and recognised the Catholic religion, was considerably better than with the CHU, which opposed the extension of suffrage and sought to minimise the rights of Catholics.