Catholics were not actively persecuted by the authorities; they were not deported to the south; only a comparatively small number, nearly all active republicans, ever experienced internment without trial. The Catholic Church was free to go about its business, and to run its own schools and hospital facilities, though there was much wrangling about whether the Unionist government was adequately contributing to their upkeep. Nationalist newspapers, in particular the Belfast-based Irish News, were generally free to criticise the government and unceasingly did so.
