attaching to the earliest political crisis at all resembling
those of quite recent times. It is at this moment that Party
Government in the modern sense actually commenced. William the
Third with military instinct had always been reluctant to
govern by means of a party. Bound as he was, closely, to the
Whigs, he employed Tory Ministers. ... The new idea of a
homogeneous government was working itself into shape under the
mild direction of Lord Somers; but the form finally taken
under Sir Robert Walpole, which has continued to the present
time, was as yet some way off. Marlborough's notions were
those of the late King. Both abroad and at home he carried out
the policy of William. He refused to rely wholly upon the
Whigs, and the extreme Tories were not given employment. The
Ministry of Godolphin was a composite administration,
containing at one time, in 1705, Tories like Harley and St.
John as well as Whigs such as Sunderland and Halifax. ... Lord
Somers was a type of statesman of a novel order at that time.
... In the beginning of the eighteenth century it was rare to
find a man attaining the highest political rank who was
unconnected by birth or training or marriage with any of the
great 'governing families,' as they have been called. Lord
Somers was the son of a Worcester attorney. ... It was
fortunate for England that Lord Somers should have been the
foremost man of the Whig party at the time when constitutional
government, as we now call it, was in course of construction.
By his prudent counsel the Whigs were guided through the
difficult years at the end of Queen Anne's reign; and from the
ordeal of seeing their rivals in power they certainly managed,
as a party, to emerge on the whole with credit. Although he
was not nominally their leader, the paramount influence in the
Tory party was Bolingbroke's; and that the Tories suffered from
the defects of his great qualities, no unprejudiced critic can
doubt. Between the two parties, and at the head of the
Treasury through the earlier years of the reign, stood
Godolphin, without whose masterly knowledge of finance and
careful attention to the details of administration
Marlborough's policy would have been baffled and his campaigns
remained unfought. To Godolphin, more than to any other one
man, is due the preponderance of the Treasury control in
public affairs. It was his administration, during the absence
of Marlborough on the Continent, which created for the office
of Lord Treasurer its paramount importance, and paved the way
for Sir Robert Walpole's government of England under the title
of First Lord of the Treasury. ... Marlborough saw and always
admitted that his victories were due in large measure to the
financial skill of Godolphin. To this statesman's lasting
credit it must be remembered that in a venal age, when the
standards of public honesty were so different from those which
now prevail, Godolphin died a poor man. ... Bolingbroke is
interesting to us as the most striking figure among the
originators of the new parliamentary system. With Marlborough
disappeared the type of Tudor statesmen modified by contact
with the Stuarts. He was the last of the Imperial Chancellors.
Bolingbroke and his successor Walpole were the earlier types
of constitutional statesmen among whom Mr. Pitt and, later,
Mr. Gladstone stand pre-eminent. ... He and his friends,
opponents of Marlborough, and contributors to his fall, are
interesting to us mainly as furnishing the first examples of
'Her Majesty's Opposition,' as the authors of party government
and the prototypes of cabinet ministers of to-day. Their ways
of thought, their style of speech and of writing, may be
dissimilar to those now in vogue, but they show greater
resemblance to those of modern politicians than to those of
the Ministers of William or of the Stuarts. Bolingbroke may
have appeared a strange product of the eighteenth century to
his contemporaries, but he would not have appeared peculiarly
misplaced among the colleagues of Lord Randolph Churchill or
Mr. Chamberlain."
_R. B. Brett,
Footprints of Statesmen,
chapter 3._
ALSO IN:
_W. Coxe,
Memoirs of Marlborough,
chapters 89-107._
_W. Coxe,
Memoirs of Walpole,
volume 1, chapters 5-6._
_G. Saintsbury,
Marlborough._
_G. W. Cooke,
Memoirs of Bolingbroke,
volume 1, chapters 6-13._
_J. C. Collins,
Bolingbroke._
_A. Hassall,
Life of Bolingbroke,
chapter 3._
ENGLAND: A. D. 1711-1714.
The Occasional Conformity Bill and the Schism Act.
"The Test Act, making the reception of the Anglican Sacrament
a necessary qualification for becoming a member of
corporations, and for the enjoyment of most civil offices, was
very efficacious in excluding Catholics, but was altogether
insufficient to exclude moderate Dissenters. ... Such men,
while habitually attending their own places of worship, had no
scruple about occasionally entering an Anglican church, or
receiving the sacrament from an Anglican clergyman. The
Independents, it is true, and some of the Baptists, censured
this practice, and Defoe wrote vehemently against it, but it
was very general, and was supported by a long list of imposing
authorities. ... In 1702, in 1703, and in 1704, measures for
suppressing occasional conformity were carried through the
Commons, but on each occasion they were defeated by the Whig
preponderance in the Lords." In 1711, the Whigs formed a
coalition with one section of the Tories to defeat the
negotiations which led to the Peace of Utrecht; but the Tories
"made it the condition of alliance that the Occasional
Conformity Bill should be accepted by the Whigs.
{918}
The bargain was made; the Dissenters were abandoned, and, on
the motion of Nottingham, a measure was carried providing that
all persons in places of profit or trust, and all common
councilmen in corporations, who, while holding office, were
proved to have attended any Nonconformist place of worship,
should forfeit the place, and should continue incapable of
public employment till they should depose that for a whole
year they had not attended a conventicle. The House of Commons
added a fine of £40, which was to be paid to the informer, and
with this addition the Bill became a law. Its effects during
the few years it continued in force were very inconsiderable,
for the great majority of conspicuous Dissenters remained in
office, abstaining from public worship in conventicles, but
having Dissenting ministers as private chaplains in their
houses. ... The object of the Occasional Conformity Bill was
to exclude the Dissenters from all Government positions of
power, dignity or profit. It was followed in 1714 by the
Schism Act, which was intended to crush their seminaries and
deprive them of the means of educating their children in their
faith. ... As carried through the House of Commons, it
provided that no one, under pain of three months'
imprisonment, should keep either a public or a private school,
or should even act as tutor or usher, unless he had obtained a
licence from the Bishop, had engaged to conform to the
Anglican liturgy, and had received the sacrament in some
Anglican church within the year. In order to prevent
occasional conformity it was further provided that if a
teacher so qualified were present at any other form of worship
he should at once become liable to three months' imprisonment,
and should be incapacitated for the rest of his life from
acting as schoolmaster or tutor. ... Some important clauses,
however, were introduced by the Whig party qualifying its
severity. They provided that Dissenters might have
school-mistresses to teach their children to read; that the
Act should not extend to any person instructing youth in
reading, writing, or arithmetic, in any part of mathematics
relating to navigation, or in any mechanical art only. ... The
facility with which this atrocious Act was carried, abundantly
shows the danger in which religious liberty was placed in the
latter years of the reign of Queen Anne."
_W. E. H. Lecky,
History of England, 18th Century,
chapter 1._
The Schism Act was repealed in 1719, during the administration
of Lord Stanhope.
_Cobbett's Parliamentary History,
volume 7, pages 567-587._
ALSO IN:
_J. Stoughton,
History of Religion in England,
volume 5, chapters 14-16._
ENGLAND: A. D. 1713.
Ending of the War of the Spanish Succession.
The Peace of Utrecht.
Acquisitions from Spain and France.
See UTRECHT: A. D. 1712-1714;
CANADA: A. D. 1711-1713;
also, NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1713;
and SLAVERY, NEGRO: A. D. 1698-1776.
ENGLAND: A. D. 1713.
Second Barrier Treaty with the Dutch.
See NETHERLANDS (HOLLAND): A. D. 1713-1715.
ENGLAND: A. D. 1713-1714.
The desertion of the Catalans.
See SPAIN: A. D. 1713-1714.
ENGLAND: A. D. 1714.
The end of the Stuart line and the beginning of the
Hanoverians.
Queen Anne died, after a short illness, on the morning of
August 1, 1714. The Tories, who had just gained control of the
ministry, were wholly unprepared for this emergency. They
assembled in Privy Council, on the 29th of July, when the
probably fatal issue of the Queen's illness became apparent,
and "a strange scene is said to have occurred. Argyle and
Somerset, though they had contributed largely by their
defection to the downfall of the Whig ministry of Godolphin,
were now again in opposition to the Tories, and had recently
been dismissed from their posts. Availing themselves of their
rank of Privy Councillors, they appeared unsummoned in the
council room, pleading the greatness of the emergency.
Shrewsbury, who had probably concocted the scene, rose and
warmly thanked them for their offer of assistance; and these
three men appear to have guided the course of events. ...
Shrewsbury, who was already Chamberlain and Lord Lieutenant of
Ireland, became Lord Treasurer, and assumed the authority of
Prime Minister. Summons were at once sent to all Privy
Councillors, irrespective of party, to attend; and Somers and
several other of the Whig leaders were speedily at their post.
They had the great advantage of knowing clearly the policy
they should pursue, and their measures were taken with
admirable promptitude and energy. The guards of the Tower were
at once doubled. Four regiments were ordered to march from the
country to London, and all seamen to repair to their vessels.
An embargo was laid on all shipping. The fleet was equipped,
and speedy measures were taken to protect the seaports and to
secure tranquility in Scotland and Ireland. At the same time
despatches were sent to the Netherlands ordering seven of the
ten British battalions to embark without delay; to Lord
Strafford, the ambassador at the Hague, desiring the
States-General to fulfil their guarantee of the Protestant
succession in England; to the Elector, urging him to hasten to
Holland, where, on the death of the Queen, he would be met by
a British squadron, and escorted to his new kingdom." When the
Queen's death occurred, "the new King was at once proclaimed,
and it is a striking proof of the danger of the crisis that
the funds, which had fallen on a false rumour of the Queen's
recovery, rose at once when she died. Atterbury is said to
have urged Bolingbroke to proclaim James III. at Charing
Cross, and to have offered to head the procession in his lawn
sleeves, but the counsel was mere madness, and Bolingbroke saw
clearly that any attempt to overthrow the Act of Settlement
would be now worse than useless. ... The more violent spirits
among the Jacobites now looked eagerly for a French invasion,
but the calmer members of the party perceived that such an
invasion was impossible. ... The Regency Act of 1705 came at
once into operation. The Hanoverian minister produced the
sealed list of the names of those to whom the Elector
entrusted the government before his arrival, and it was found
to consist of eighteen names taken from the leaders of the
Whig party. ... Parliament, in accordance with the provisions
of the Bill, was at once summoned, and it was soon evident
that there was nothing to fear. The moment for a restoration
was passed."
_W. E. H. Lecky,
History of England, 18th Century,
chapter 1 (volume 1)._
{919}
"George I., whom circumstances and the Act of Settlement had
thus called to be King of Great Britain and Ireland, had been
a sovereign prince for sixteen years, during which time he had
been Elector of Brunswick-Lüneburg. He was the second who ever
bore that title. By right of his father he was Elector; it was
by right of his mother that he now became ruler of the United
Kingdom. The father was Ernest Augustus, Sovereign Bishop of
Osnaburg, who, by the death of his elder brothers, had become
Duke of Hanover, and then Duke of Brunswick and Lüneburg. In
1692 he was raised by the Emperor to the dignity of Elector.
... The mother of George I. was Sophia, usually known as the
Electress Sophia. The title was merely one of honour, and only
meant wife of an Elector. ... The Electress Sophia was the
daughter of Elizabeth, daughter of King James I., and
Frederick, the Elector Palatine [whose election to the throne
of Bohemia and subsequent expulsion from that kingdom and from
his Palatine dominions were the first acts in the Thirty
Years' War]. ... The new royal house in England is sometimes
called the House of Hanover, sometimes the House of Brunswick.
It will be found that the latter name is more generally used
in histories written during the last century, the former in
books written in the present day. If the names were equally
applicable, the modern use is the more convenient, because
there is another, and in some respects well known, branch of
the House of Brunswick; but no other has a right to the name
of Hanover. It is, however, quite certain that, whatever the
English use may be, Hanover is properly the name of a town and
of a duchy, but that the electorate was Brunswick-Lüneburg.
... The House of Brunswick was of noble origin, tracing itself
back to a certain Guelph d'Este, nicknamed 'the Robust,' son
of an Italian nobleman, who had been seeking his fortunes in
Germany. Guelph married Judith, widow of the English King,
Harold, who fell on the hill of Senlac. ... One of Guelph's
descendants, later, married Maud, the daughter of King Henry
II., probably the most powerful king in Europe of his day, at
whose persuasion the Emperor conferred on the Guelphs the
duchy of Brunswick."
_E. E. Morris,
The Early Hanoverians,
book 1, chapter 2._
ALSO IN:
_P. M. Thornton,
The Brunswick Accession,
chapters 1-10._
_Sir A. Halliday,
Annals of the House of Hanover,
book 10 (volume 2)._
_J. McCarthy,
History of the Four Georges,
chapters 1-4._
_W. M. Thackeray,
The Four Georges,
lecture 1._
_A. W. Ward,
The Electress Sophia and the Hanoverian Succession (English
History Review, volume 1)._
See, also, ENGLAND: A. D. 1701,
THE ACT OF SETTLEMENT.
ENGLAND: A. D. 1714-1721.
First years of George I.
The rise of Walpole to power and the founding of Parliamentary
Government.
"The accession of the house of Hanover in the person of the
great-grandson of James I. was once called by a Whig of this
generation the greatest miracle in our history. It took place
without domestic or foreign disturbance. ... Within our own
borders a short lull followed the sharp agitations of the last
six months. The new king appointed an exclusively Whig
Ministry. The office of Lord Treasurer was not revived, and
the title disappears from political history. Lord Townshend
was made principal Secretary of State, and assumed the part of
first Minister. Mr. Walpole [Sir Robert] took the subaltern
office of paymaster of the forces, holding along with it the
paymastership of Chelsea Hospital. Although he had at first no
seat in the inner Council or Cabinet, which seems to have
consisted of eight members, only one of them a commoner, it is
evident that from the outset his influence was hardly second
to that of Townshend himself. In little more than a year
(October 1715) he had made himself so prominent and valuable
in the House of Commons, that the opportunity of a vacancy was
taken to appoint him to be First Commissioner of the Treasury
and Chancellor of the Exchequer. ... Besides excluding their
opponents from power, the Whigs instantly took more positive
measures. The new Parliament was strongly Whig. A secret
committee was at once appointed to inquire into the
negotiations for the Peace. Walpole was chairman, took the
lead in its proceedings, and drew the report." On Walpole's
report, the House "directed the impeachment of Oxford,
Bolingbroke, and Ormond for high treason, and other high
crimes and misdemeanours mainly relating to the Peace of
Utrecht. ... The proceedings against Oxford and Bolingbroke
are the last instance in our history of a political
impeachment. They are the last ministers who were ever made
personally responsible for giving bad advice and pursuing a
discredited policy, and since then a political mistake has
ceased to be a crime. ... The affair came to an abortive end.
... The opening years of the new reign mark one of the least
attractive periods in political history. George I. ... cared
very little for his new kingdom, and knew very little about
its people or its institutions. ... His expeditions to Hanover
threw the management of all domestic affairs almost without
control into the hands of his English ministers. If the two
first Hanoverian kings had been Englishmen instead of Germans,
if they had been men of talent and ambition, or even men of
strong and commanding will without much talent, Walpole would
never have been able to lay the foundations of government by
the House of Commons and by Cabinet so firmly that even the
obdurate will of George III. was unable to overthrow it
See CABINET, THE ENGLISH.
Happily for the system now established, circumstances
compelled the first two sovereigns of the Hanoverian line to
strike a bargain with the English Whigs, and it was faithfully
kept until the accession of the third George. The king was to
manage the affairs of Hanover, and the Whigs were to govern
England. It was an excellent bargain for England. Smooth as
this operation may seem in historic description, Walpole found
its early stages rough and thorny." The king was not easily
brought to understand that England would not make war for
Hanoverian objects, nor allow her foreign policy to be shaped
by the ambitions of the Electorate. Differences arose which
drove Townshend from the Cabinet, and divided the Whig party.
Walpole retired from the government with Townshend, and was in
opposition for three years, while Lord Stanhope and the Earl of
Sunderland controlled the administration. The Whig schism came
to an end in 1720, and Townshend and Walpole rejoined the
administration, the latter as Paymaster of the Forces without
a seat in the Cabinet. "His opposition was at an end, but he
took no part in the active work of government. ... Before many
months had passed the country was overtaken by the memorable
disasters of the South Sea Bubble.
See SOUTH SEA BUBBLE.
{920}
All eyes were turned to Walpole. Though he had privately
dabbled in South Sea stock on his own account, his public
predictions came back to men's minds; they remembered that he
had been called the best man for figures in the House, and the
disgrace of' his most important colleagues only made his
sagacity the more prominent. ... He returned to his old posts,
and once more became First Lord of the Treasury and Chancellor
of the Exchequer (April 1721), while Townshend was again
Secretary of State. Walpole held his offices practically
without a break for twenty-one years. The younger Pitt had an
almost equal span of unbroken supremacy, but with that
exception there is no parallel to Walpole's long tenure of
power. To estimate aright the vast significance of this
extraordinary stability, we must remember that the country had
just passed through eighty years of revolution. A man of 80 in
1721 could recall the execution of Charles I., the protectorate
of Oliver, the fall of Richard Cromwell, the restoration of
Charles II., the exile of James II., the change of the order
of succession to William of Orange, the reactionary ministry
of Anne, and finally the second change to the House of
Hanover. The interposition, after so long a series of violent
perturbations as this, of twenty years of settled system and
continuous order under one man, makes Walpole's government of
capital and decisive importance in our history, and
constitutes not an artificial division like the reign of a
king, but a true and definite period, with a beginning, an
end, a significance, and a unity of its own."
_J. Morley,
Walpole,
chapters 3-4._
ALSO IN:
W. Coxe,
Memoirs of Sir Robert Walpole,
chapters 9-21 (volume 1).
ENGLAND: A. D. 1715.
The Jacobite rising.
See SCOTLAND: A. D. 1715.
ENGLAND: A. D. 1716.
The Septennial Act.
The easy suppression of the Jacobite rebellion was far from
putting an end to the fears of the loyal supporters of the
Hanoverian dynasty. They regarded with especial anxiety the
approaching Parliamentary elections. "As, by the existing
statute of 6 William and Mary [the Triennial Act, of 1694],
Parliament would be dissolved at the close of the year, and a
new election held in the spring of 1717, there seemed great
probability of a renewal of the contest, or at least of very
serious riots during the election time. With this in view, the
ministers proposed that the existing Parliament should be
continued for a term of seven instead of three years. This,
which was meant for a temporary measure, has never been
repealed, and is still the law under which Parliaments are
held. It has been often objected to this action of Parliament,
that it was acting arbitrarily in thus increasing its own
duration. 'It was a direct usurpation,' it has been said, 'of
the rights of the people, analogous to the act of the Long
Parliament in declaring itself indestructible.' It has been
regarded rather as a party measure than as a forward step in
liberal government. We must seek its vindication in the
peculiar conditions of the time. It was useless to look to the
constituencies for the support of the popular liberty. The
return of members in the smaller boroughs was in the hands of
corrupt or corruptible freemen; in the counties, of great
landowners; in the larger towns, of small place-holders under
Government. A general election in fact only gave fresh
occasion for the exercise of the influence of the Crown and of
the House of Lords--freedom and independence in the presence
of these two permanent powers could be secured only by the
greater permanence of the third element of the Legislature,
the House of Commons. It was thus that, though no doubt in
some degree a party measure for securing a more lengthened
tenure of office to the Whigs, the Septennial Act received,
upon good constitutional grounds, the support and approbation
of the best statesmen of the time."
_J. F. Bright,
History of England,
period 3, page 938._
ALSO IN:
_Lord Mahon (Earl Stanhope),
History of England, 1713-1783,
volume 1, chapter 6._
ENGLAND: A. D. 1717-1719.
The Triple Alliance.
The Quadruple Alliance.
War with Spain.
See SPAIN: A. D. 1713-1725;
also, ITALY: A. D. 1715-1735.
ENGLAND: A. D. 1720.
The South Sea Bubble.
See SOUTH SEA BUBBLE.
ENGLAND: A. D. 1721-1742.
Development of the Cabinet System of ministerial government.
See CABINET, THE ENGLISH.
ENGLAND: A. D. 1725.
The Alliance of Hanover.
See SPAIN: A. D. 1713-1725.
ENGLAND: A. D. 1726-1731.
Fresh differences with Spain.
Gibraltar besieged.
The Treaty of Seville.
The Second Treaty of Vienna.
See SPAIN: A. D. 1726-1731.
ENGLAND: A. D. 1727.
Accession of King George II.
ENGLAND: A. D. 1727-1741.
Walpole's administration under George II.