Background
He was born at Ballygannon, County Waterford, where he attended the local Columbia Broadcasting System school.
He was born at Ballygannon, County Waterford, where he attended the local Columbia Broadcasting System school.
He was Lord Mayor of Dublin 1888–1889. He was first elected Member of Parliament for County Sligo in the 1880 general election, for South Sligo in the 1885 general election, then for Belfast West in the 1886 election and for North Kerry in the 1892 election. He was a cosignator of the Number Rent Manifesto issued in 1881.
He was regarded as one of the finest orators of the Irish Party, but handicapped by a querulous temperament.
In the report of the committee, published in 1896, he wrote a minority report showing that the tax burden on Ireland had been steadily increased throughout the nineteenth century, at the same time as its people were steadily impoverished. After retiring from the Freeman"s Journal he became Chairman of Boland"s Mill, and during World War I denounced wartime taxation and in 1918 endorsed Sinn Féin.
At the end of his career he supported Fianna Fáil because it promised tariff protection for flour-milling.
Following the party split over Parnell"s leadership, he sided with John Dillon"s anti-Parnellite faction, then in 1896 retired from parliamentary politics, disgusted at the bitter factionalism following the failure of the second Home Rule bill. He was hostile to the Irish Land Acts (1903) on financial grounds, and regarded by William O"Brien as one of the principal players involved in his subsequent marginalisations from the Irish Party.
22nd United Kingdom Parliament. 23rd United Kingdom Parliament. 24th United Kingdom Parliament.
25th United Kingdom Parliament.
26th United Kingdom Parliament]
He became a leader-writer on The Nation newspaper and a member of the Parnellite Irish Parliamentary Party. Sexton was a member of the Committee, chaired by Hugh Childers, to enquire into the financial relations between Great Britain and Ireland.