In November 1792 John Reeves, with the explicit approval and active sup-port of both the government and the Windhamite Whigs, and with the countenance of the duke of Portland and his friends, instituted a movement of loyalist associations which quickly spread throughout the country. The movement was founded in reaction to an enthusiastic resurgence of British radical activity which followed the defeat of the combined armies under the duke of Brunswick, and it rallied a now militant conservative sentiment in favour of detecting and suppressing by intimidation and public prosecution all allegedly seditious activities. This crisis in public opinion, which was at once the parent and the offspring of the loyalist association movement, was not the first to have occurred in 1792. An earlier crisis occurred in favour of the political left during the late spring of 1792 and was followed by a relatively mild reaction to the right. It seems clear that, during the earlier months of 1792 at least, there were considerable bodies of both conservative and liberal opinion of various shades in the country. But by the beginning of the following year the complexity and ferment of the political scene had become so great that it is not at all clear to what extent or how rapidly liberal opinion had been supplanted in the country by conservative sentiment. The purpose of this paper is to reassess the nature, effect and significance of the loyalist association movement by undertaking a more careful examination of the phraseology of many of its addresses and declarations as well as of the proceedings and circumstances peculiar to the meetings in which they were approved.