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Life
Mentor of James Fintan Lalor; supposedly the illeg. son of Arthur O’Connor; studied law and theology; in receipt of land rent; issued A Letter to the people of Ireland of the present disturbed state of the country, addressed to Christians of all denominations (1822), arguing that landlords should pay the tithe, inter al.; issued The great doctrines of Christianity stated and defended [...] a reply to the [...] clergy of Munster (1826), deriding extreme unction as hogs-grease, and defending the 39 Articles; arrived at the view that the Irish question could be solved by fixed rents determined by independent valuers (‘a valuation and a perpetuity’), c.1830; toured Ireland making speeches during Tithe War; issued The Speeches of William Conner Against Rack-rents [...] (1832); visited London in 1835 to pursue his scheme among economists and - repub. his Speeches in The true political economy of Ireland [... &c.] (1835);
he dismissed Malthusian predictions about Irish population and opposed Poor Laws as an encouragement to idleness; issued An Axe Laid to the Root of Irish Oppression(1840); joined Repeal Movement and arrested at Mountmellick for incitement, 1842; published The Prosecuted Speech delivered at Mountmellick; opposed by O’Connell who considered his proposal entrenched landlord rights; published Letter to the Right Hon. the Earl of Devon, Chairman of the Land Commission (1843) proposing Griffith’s valuation as the basis of a settlement; expelled from Repeal Association, 1846;
wrote to The Times disputing T. C. Foster’s charge that indolence not rackrent was the cause of Irish poverty; sometime associated with James Fintan Lalor but dismissed by him as an irrelevant ‘spouter’ at a meeting at Holycross, Co. Tipperary, in Sept. 1847; blows exchanged on the platform when Conner accused the other of ‘squeezing’ his tenants for rents; issued A Cathecism of Valuation and perpetuity in Tenure, and A Letter to the Tenantry containing an exposition of the rackrent system (1850); praised by John Stuart Mill as ’indefatiguable’ apostle’ of Irish land reform; suffered poverty in later years and failed to raise support; his claim to kinship with Arthur O"Connor disputed when R. R. Madden forwarded a petition for support to to O"Connor"s lawyer in France, 1852; date of death unknown; best remembered for his contentious relation swith James Fintan Lalor. RIA DIB
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Works
Inc. The Speech of William Conner, Esq., against rackrents, &c. (Dublin 1832); The true political economy of Ireland; or rack-rent the one great cause of all her evils, with its remedy (Dublin 1835); The axe laid to the root of Irish oppression (Dublin 1840); The prosecuted speech delivered in proposing a petition to Parliamne in favour of a valuation and a perpetuity of his farm to the tenant, &c. (Dublin 1842); A letter to the tenantry of Ireland contianing an exposition of the rackrent system (Dublin 1842); The catechism of valuation and perpetuity of tenure (3rd. Edn. Dublin 1850) [all cited in David Buckley, James Fintan Lalor,
1990).
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