The Irish Tories were the conservative faction of Irish politics from 1678 to 1834, opposing the Irish Whigs and the associated Irish Patriot Party.
During the 17th century, the Gaelic term toraigh was used to refer to large and well-organized bodies of Catholic guerrillas who fought for Confederate Ireland during the Irish Confederate Wars and for King Charles I of England during the English Civil War. During the 17th century, Irish Catholics were proud royalists for the most part and even celebrated the Gaelic ancestry of the House of Stuart, formally aligning themselves with the Cavaliers in 1649. King Charles II of England and James II of England would also draw on Irish Catholic support because they were less hostile to Catholicism than the Protestant Parliamentarians; when James was overthrown in the Glorious Revolution, he fled to Ireland, where Catholics again fought doggedly and in vain for the Stuart monarch.
After William III of England's victory over James' Jacobite cause in 1691, Ireland was mostly pacified. Ireland had its own all-Protestant parliament during the whole of the 18th century, in which Tories tended to support Royal authority and the established Anglican Church of Ireland, while Whigs tended to favor greater power for the Irish Parliament and tolerance for non-conforming Protestants. After 1703, Irish politics took on a far more confrontational hue amid the "Rage of Party", as the ruling Anglican elite feared subversion from both the majority Catholic population and the growing Presbyterian population in Ulster. Irish Tories regarded Ireland's Catholics as a spent force and focused their efforts on dealing with the island's growing Presbyterian population, supporting the Sacramental Test clause of the 1704 Popery Act to exclude those from public office who refused to receive the sacrament in the Anglican manner. In 1713, however, Irish public opinion rallied behind the Whigs due to their fears about a return of the Jacobites. On polling day in Dublin, the Tories enjoyed a great deal of popularity with the Catholic Jacobites in the city, but, as the voting was held in the Whig stronghold of Tholsel in the city center, the Whigs shut out the Tory supporters from the polls, leading to an election riot. The Whigs and Tories eventually voted in separate buildings, but the Whigs won both seats; many Tories who had cast their votes were proved to not be eligible to do so under the Penal Laws.
By the 1720s, the Tories were aligned with the interests of the Catholic majority and the Gaelic Irish population, criticizing British influence in Ireland and seeking to protect Irish autonomy and Catholic rights. The Tories generally advocated for more conservative and nationalist policies, opposing the dominance of the Protestant Ascendancy.
Elections in Ireland would be held irregularly, requiring elections only with the passing of a monarch; new elections were held in 1715, 1727, 1761, 1768, 1776, 1783, 1790, and 1797. In 1793, the outbreak of war with France led to the Tory government suppressing political clubs such as the United Irishmen. That same year Roman Catholic Relief Act enabled propertied Catholics to vote, and opposition to the Tory prime minister William Pitt the Younger's security policies fed into the Irish Patriot Party's strength. However, simmering discontent with British rule led to mass abstention in the election and the Irish Rebellion of 1798, which was bloodily suppressed. The result of the uprising was the 1800 Act of Union, which eliminated the Irish Parliament and merged it with the Parliament of the United Kingdom. In addition, Ulster Presbyterians and other dissenters soon diverged from the Irish republican movement due to religious differences with the Catholic majority, and many of them were bought off by the Anglican ruling elites with the development of shipbuilding and mills in Ireland. The Tories would remain a significant force in Irish politics into the 19th century, winning 32.1% of the vote and 27.18% of Parliament seats at the 1832 election, while the Repeal Association becoming the largest party with 35.77% of the vote and the Whigs falling in second with 32.67%. In 1834, the Tories became the Irish Conservative Party on the Tories' transition into the organized Conservative Party, and this party would win 42.4% of the vote and 35.23% of parliamentary seats at the 1835 election, their strength mostly drawn from Northern Ireland.