In 1828 the Friends of Ireland formed in the United States in order to support Daniel O’Connell’s Catholic Association in Ireland. The Catholic Association campaigned for Catholic Emancipation, a successful movement that promoted the participation of Catholic elites in the United Kingdom Parliament. In the 1840s the Friends of Repeal formed in the United States in order to support Daniel O’Connell’s Repeal Association in Ireland. This organization sought the repeal of the Act of Union of 1800, which had created the United Kingdom and dismantled the Irish Parliament. This time, the movement failed due to mounting sectionalism and sectarianism in both countries. Using Charleston's Catholic Miscellany and the Boston Pilot as primary sources, this thesis explores how Irish Americans participated in the Jacksonian-era public sphere and how the Emancipation and Repeal campaigns illuminated the sometimes competing claims of liberalism and democracy in the Atlantic world.