A Ministerial Crisis, and a Change of Government in
Scotland--The Government is defeated--The Limitations
again--Fletcher’s Duel with Roxburghe--The Act for a Treaty of
Union passed.
The English Ministers had for some time suspected that Tweeddale and
his party were not strong enough to carry on the Government of
Scotland, and in February 1705 Argyll wrote to Leven, informing him
that there was to be a change. Tweeddale was to be offered the place
of President of the Council. Seafield was to be Lord Chancellor.
Annandale was to be Secretary of State. ‘And I am to be Commissioner,’
he added. He had already been consulted as to the changes; but he had
taken no one into his confidence except Queensberry and Annandale.
They alone were in the secret; but ‘the Whigs here[7] are positive
that Mr. Jonson must be out.’ Johnston, who had been Lord Clerk
Register, was dismissed; and a few days after that event the new
Commissioner started for the north.
[7] In London.
The young Duke of Argyll, although not yet thirty, had already
distinguished himself as a soldier, and was believed to possess the
talents which were needed in the troublesome office of Commissioner to
the Scottish Estates. But besides his personal qualifications there
were other reasons for appointing him. His great-grandfather had been
one of the first victims of the Restoration. His grandfather was that
Earl of Argyll whose rash expedition to Scotland Fletcher had
attempted in vain to prevent, but whose calmness on the eve of death
had overwhelmed his enemies with shame, and made such an impression on
his countrymen that ‘the last sleep of Argyll’ was, for long years
afterwards, spoken of as a noble example of Christian and patriotic
fortitude. His father, who had returned from exile at the Revolution,
was the first Duke of Argyll. The fortunes of the family, ruined under
the Stuart tyranny, were now mending. The young Duke was hereditary
Justiciar of Scotland. It was said that three thousand clansmen were
ready to draw the claymore at his call. He was trusted by the
Presbyterians--an important matter, as Godolphin was well aware. Above
all things, the Argylls were to be depended upon in an emergency such
as the present. In office or out of office, whether their private
characters were good or bad, they never swerved from their Whig
principles. The place of Commissioner had therefore been offered to
the Duke. He hesitated, and would have declined, if left to himself,
but Queensberry persuaded him to accept the office; and on the 9th of
April he started for Scotland, ‘attended,’ says Cunningham, ‘with a
number of highlanders and swordsmen, in whom he took great delight.’
When the Commissioner reached Scotland the effects of the Alien Act
were beginning to be felt. About thirty thousand head of cattle and
great flocks of sheep had been annually exported from Scotland to
England. But since the passing of the Act these had to remain on the
north side of the Cheviots, and the breeders had no market for their
stock, or had to sell at a ruinous loss in Scotland. Every branch of
trade was paralysed; and no one knew what to propose as a remedy for
the deplorable condition of the country.[8] It was a time when any
scheme, however chimerical, was listened to; and amongst those who,
full of projects for retrieving the finances of Scotland, awaited the
arrival of the Commissioner were two well-known men, Hugh Chamberlen
and John Law of Lauriston. Chamberlen’s proposal of a Land Bank,
already tried and found wanting in England during the last reign, was
now about to be propounded in Scotland. Law was on intimate terms with
Argyll and with Tweeddale, both of whom were charmed by his high
spirits and good breeding. He had just published his proposals for
curing the ills of Scotland. His intimacy with the Commissioner was
certain to gain at least a fair hearing for his plans; but, in the
meantime, Argyll’s time was fully occupied with preparations for the
meeting of Parliament.
[8] Roxburghe to Godolphin, 24th March 1705. Add. MSS. 28,055.
In the intrigues of the next few weeks, which are now to be described,
the political parties in Scotland took the form which they retained
until the Parliament of Scotland came to an end. Argyll and
Queensberry had already agreed privately that the Scottish Ministry
was to be rearranged; and as soon as he reached Edinburgh Argyll came
to the conclusion that the ‘New Party’ must be dismissed at once. He
then took the advice of Glasgow and Annandale as to how the business
of the session was to be managed, and their opinion was that
Tweeddale, Roxburghe, and some of their friends must resign before
Parliament met. It was agreed that letters expressing this opinion
should be written to Godolphin. ‘If her Majesty,’ Glasgow wrote, ‘be
pleased to make the Government all of a piece, thoroughly upon the
Revolution bottom, it is the only means left to retrieve the
mismanagement of the last Parliament, when the prerogative and the
monarchy so extremely suffered, and to pull us out of the confusion we
at present lie under.’ Seafield declined to advise Godolphin; but in
his letter he gives an account of the general drift of opinion amongst
the members of Parliament. ‘All,’ he says, ‘that I speak with of the
Old Party are of one of these two opinions: First, that there be a
treaty set on foot for an entire Union betwixt the two kingdoms, or
for commerce and other advantages, leaving the nomination of the
Commissioners to her Majesty; or second, that there be an Act of
Succession, with conditions and limitations on the successor, and that
we have free trade and commerce established with England as we had
before the Act of Navigation.’ Annandale also wrote and expressed his
approval of the proposal to change the Ministry.[9]
[9] These letters of Glasgow, Seafield, and Annandale to
Godolphin are all dated 26th April 1705. Add. MSS. 28,055.
Argyll and Annandale had long been friends, and during the preceding
winter and spring their friendship had increased. By the influence of
Argyll, Annandale had been appointed to represent her Majesty at the
General Assembly of the Scottish Church, which had just been held. It
was on his advice that the letters to Godolphin had been written. But
at this point differences arose between them, which ended in a
complete separation. Argyll, having no doubt that the English
Ministers would agree to the dismissal of the New Party, wished to
settle at once how the vacant offices were to be filled, and, a few
days after the letters to Godolphin had been despatched, he called a
meeting of his friends to discuss the subject. At this meeting
Annandale was for delay. It would be time enough, he said, to think
about new appointments when they had received an answer from London.
Argyll, however, said that he had promised to send a list of names
‘within two or three days’; and at the same time he suggested that
Loudoun should be Secretary, in place of Roxburghe. Annandale muttered
something to himself, and then said that Loudoun was well fitted for
the place, but he was married to Stair’s daughter, and to appoint him
would be to aggrandise the Stair family, and that would ‘raise a dust
in the Parliament.’ On this Argyll gave way for the sake of peace, and
nothing was arranged.
But in a few days Glasgow and Leven waited upon Annandale, and
informed him that the Commissioner begged him to concur in
recommending Loudoun as Secretary. Annandale was a most difficult man
to deal with. ‘Even those of the Revolution Party,’ says Lockhart,
‘only employed him, as the Indians worship the devil, out of fear.’ He
refused, point blank, to comply with Argyll’s request, and never after
acted cordially with him. There can be no doubt that this episode was
the real cause of Annandale’s opposition to the Union in the following
year.
The next post from London brought a letter, from which it was evident
that the Ministers wished to delay the change of Government in
Scotland. Argyll instantly sent off an answer, in which he said that
he would not act as Commissioner unless his advice was taken. This
threat of resignation produced the desired effect, and Argyll
received authority to construct an Administration as he thought best.
Forthwith Tweeddale, Rothes, Roxburghe, Selkirk, Belhaven, and Baillie
of Jerviswoode were informed that their resignations would be
accepted. They took their dismissal with a good grace, and formed
themselves into the party which was thenceforth known as the Squadrone
Volante--a name which perhaps Fletcher, the student of Italian, may
have suggested. Led by Tweeddale, Montrose, Rothes, Roxburghe, and
Marchmont among the peers, and by Baillie of Jerviswoode among the
commons, the policy of the Squadrone was to hold the balance between
the Government and the combined forces of the Jacobites and the Old
Country Party, to which Fletcher and the irreconcilable nationalists
adhered. They mustered about thirty votes. Belhaven, piqued at losing
office, did not join them, but preferred to form schemes for breaking
up the Parliament.
The arrangements for the new Administration were soon completed, and
in the list which was sent up to London, Loudoun and Annandale were
named as Secretaries, Glasgow became Treasurer-Depute, Queensberry was
Lord Privy Seal, while Cockburn remained in office as Lord
Justice-Clerk, and Seafield as Chancellor.
It was entirely a Whig Ministry, but there were differences of
opinion as to what line they should take. It was soon found that
Annandale and Cockburn were in favour of pressing the settlement of
the Hanoverian Succession, and leaving the Union alone. Sir James
Stewart, the Lord Advocate, whose great influence with the
Presbyterians made it desirable that he should act cordially, refused
to commit himself. Baillie, now a member of the Squadrone, had an
interview of two hours with him at this time, when he first said he
intended to support a Succession Act, and then that he was in favour
of an Union; and at last Baillie came to the conclusion that he was
‘for no settlement whatsoever.’
The Commissioner, acting on the advice of Stair, used all his
influence in favour of an Union. Queensberry had not yet left London.
Lockhart goes so far as to say that he was so unpopular that he was
afraid to face the Scottish Parliament, and that he had sent down
Argyll, ‘using him as the monkey did the cat in pulling out the hot
roasted chestnuts.’ The help of Queensberry was, however, urgently
needed, and Glasgow was of opinion that the only way to settle the
Succession question was for him to come down to assist Argyll. A
combination of their friends would, he was certain, secure a majority.
Meantime the meeting of Parliament was close at hand, and it was
necessary that the views of the Scottish Government should be laid
before the Ministers in London, so that the Queen’s letter to the
Estates might be prepared in time. On the night of the 30th of May
Argyll consulted his colleagues. At this meeting (a ‘Cabinet Council’)
Annandale insisted that the Succession should be earnestly pressed.
Argyll pointed out that the support of Queensberry’s friends could not
be counted on. In the last session they had supported Hamilton’s
resolution postponing the settlement of the Crown until a commercial
treaty with England had been adjusted. They would not, he feared,
‘make so short a turn.’ But if a Treaty of Union was proposed, they
would probably support it, and also vote the supplies. Another
proposal was that the Succession should be tried first, and if it
failed, then they could fall back upon the Union. Cockburn was
strongly in favour of a Succession Act. ‘In my opinion,’ he said, ‘the
treaty is but a handle to throw off the Succession, for I don’t find
ten men of the Parliament will go in for an entire and complete Union;
so there is no prospect of a treaty taking effect.’
Of eight members of the Government who gave their opinions, six were
in favour of a Treaty of Union, and two, Cockburn and Annandale, were
for a Succession Act. But, in the end, two draughts of a royal letter
were sent up to London. In one of these the Union was put foremost,
and in the other the Succession. The responsibility of advising the
Queen which she should sign was left to Godolphin and his colleagues.
In due course the royal letter arrived, along with the Queen’s
instructions to Argyll, and it was found that the preference had been
given to the draught in which the Succession Act was put foremost. The
instructions were to the effect that the Commissioner was to do his
best to secure the passing of a Succession Act for Scotland, in terms
similar to that by which the Crown of England had been settled on the
house of Hanover. If the Estates would not agree to this, then an Act
for the Union of England and Scotland was, if possible, to be carried,
and it was to contain a clause leaving the appointment of
Commissioners in the hands of the Queen. He was also expressly
forbidden to allow the question of the Scots Plot to be opened up
again.[10]
[10] I have taken my account of the ministerial crisis in
Scotland, and of the events which took place there before the
session of 1705, chiefly from the _Godolphin Correspondence_ in
the British Museum, Add. MSS. 28,055, and from a memorial dated
21st Sept. 1705, among Add. MSS. 28,085 (fol. 225). This
memorial seems to be Argyll’s account of the session written for
the use of Godolphin. An article in the _Edinburgh Review_, No.
362 (Oct. 1892), contains further information, and may be
compared with ‘A Brief View of the late Scots Ministry, _Somers
State Tracts_, xii. 617, and a pamphlet entitled _Vulpone; or,
Remarks on some Proceedings in Scotland relating to the
Succession and the Union_. Printed 1707.
The result of the recent changes in the Ministry, and of the intrigues
which have just been described, was that the various political
parties in Scotland now took the shape which they retained until the
Parliament of Scotland was abolished. There were the supporters of the
Government, known as the Old or Court Party, or simply as the Whigs.
There was the regular Opposition, consisting partly of Jacobites or
Tories, and partly of Fletcher’s followers, the Old Country Party, who
were determined to oppose the Union and the Succession also unless
they could obtain good terms for Scotland. In the third place there
was the Squadrone Volante, the party formed by the discarded Ministers
out of what had been called the New Party when Tweeddale was in
office. They declined to commit themselves; but it would be a great
injustice to assert that the Squadrone acted, in any way, the part of
dissatisfied placemen. They were certainly reserved in their attitude
towards the Ministry, but they never behaved in a factious or
discreditable manner. ‘They were in great credit,’ says Burnet,
‘because they had no visible bias on their minds.’
When the Parliament met on the 28th of June, the position of Argyll
and the other Ministers was one of peculiar difficulty. In six months
the Alien Act would come into full force, if they did not succeed in
persuading the Estates to accept either the Hanoverian Succession or a
Treaty of Union. Even now Scotland was suffering from those clauses
of the Act which were already in force; but if the Estates were
obdurate greater evils were in store, and the coming Christmas would
bring to the people of this island a message, not of peace and
goodwill, but of civil war and discord. And it was soon apparent that
the members were not in a complacent mood; for on the 17th of July,
Hamilton moved that the Parliament should refuse to name a successor
to the throne until the commercial relations of the two countries were
settled; and further, that before naming a successor they should fix
such conditions of government as would secure the independence of
Scotland. This motion was carried, through the help of Queensberry’s
friends, who supported Hamilton to the number of thirty, by a majority
of forty-three. Next day the Ministers met, and resolved that the
Succession must be given up, and an Act for a Treaty of Union
introduced.[11]
[11] Seafield to Godolphin, 18th July 1705. Add. MSS. 28,055.
In the meantime the Government had been anxiously awaiting the arrival
of Queensberry; and now, news having come that he was on his way to
the north, Mar, on behalf of the Ministers, introduced an Act for a
Treaty of Union. This was on the 20th of July, and three days later
Queensberry arrived. ‘He made,’ Boyer says, ‘a public entry with
greater splendour and magnificence than the three times he had been
Commissioner.’ On the following morning he took his seat as Lord
Privy Seal.
The members of the Parliament were now canvassed by Seafield, Argyll,
and Queensberry, and it was found that many of them were prepared to
vote for an Union. But, when the question came before the Estates, it
was evident that the Opposition were as determined as ever. Fletcher
made a long speech, in which he argued that no treaty should even be
considered until the hostile clauses of the Alien Act were repealed;
and Hamilton moved that the Estates should discuss the questions of
trade and limitations before that of Union. The discussion showed a
formidable combination against the Government, who were defeated by a
majority of four. It seemed as if Fletcher and Hamilton had brought
all business to a deadlock, and as if neither the Succession nor the
Union could be carried. In the opinion of Argyll, however, the
division showed who were for the Government, and who aimed at ‘nothing
but confusion.’ The Ministers, accordingly, resolved not to adjourn,
but to sit, and see ‘if we could not retrieve the treaty.’
Trade and limitations on the next Sovereign of Scotland now engaged
the attention of the Parliament. The rival schemes of Law and
Chamberlen were brought forward--schemes for improving the financial
condition of Scotland, by means of Land Banks and a wholesale issue
of paper money. Preposterous as these plans were, they were fully
debated; and there seems to have been a feeling in favour of
Chamberlen’s proposal, because the English Parliament had rejected it.
Argyll and Tweeddale gave some support to Law. Hamilton laughed at
them both; and, in the end, a resolution was passed ‘that the forcing
any paper credit by an Act of Parliament was unfit for this nation.’
During the discussions on this subject, Fletcher moved that the two
financiers should be confronted with each other. Roxburghe said it
would be unfair to Law to make him appear, without first finding out
if he was willing. ‘Mr. Law,’ he said, ‘or any gentleman that has
employed his time and thoughts for the good of his country, ought to
be treated with good manners.’ ‘If any one,’ said Fletcher, ‘taxes me
with bad manners, he is unmannerly, and not I.’
On this Roxburghe turned to the Chancellor, and said, ‘I did not mean
to accuse any member of bad manners, but since that worthy member
thinks himself struck at, he may, if he pleases, take it so.’ ‘I take
it as I ought,’ retorted Fletcher. The Commissioner, seeing that a
challenge was inevitable, gave orders that, as soon as the House rose,
both should be arrested. Roxburghe was taken into custody at his own
house, where he remained in charge of an officer.
Fletcher was found in a tavern. When the officer came to take him, he
said there must be some mistake, as he had given no occasion for being
arrested; and so adroit was he that the officer actually went away to
ask the Commissioner for orders. Fletcher, who had already sent a
challenge, by the hands of Lord Charles Kerr, to Roxburghe, at once
left the tavern--probably Patrick Steel’s?--and drove down with Lord
Charles to Leith, where he remained all next day waiting for his
opponent.
Roxburghe, meanwhile, hearing that Fletcher was at liberty, induced
his friends to persuade Argyll to remove the arrest; and, as soon as
he was free, he and his second, Baillie of Jerviswoode, drove to Leith
about six in the evening. There they found Fletcher waiting on the
sands. The seconds tried to make up the quarrel, but Fletcher insisted
in obtaining satisfaction for the affront which he considered himself
to have received in Parliament House. Roxburghe was as ready, and they
drew their swords. But Baillie ‘stept between ’em,’ and said that a
duel with swords would be unfair, as Roxburghe had a weak right leg.
At these words Fletcher sheathed his sword, and, producing two pairs
of pistols, offered Roxburghe his choice. At that moment a party of
the Horse-guards, who had been sent to look for them, appeared in
sight, to the joy of the seconds, who persuaded their principals to
fire two shots in the air; and then the whole party drove back to
Edinburgh.[12]
[12] Add. MSS. 28,055, fol. 248. This is a document endorsed,
‘To Mr. Harley.’ It is evidently the report of a spy, one of the
many employed by Harley.
When the Estates went into the question of Limitations, Rothes
introduced a measure for regulating the mode of appointing Privy
Councillors and other officers of the Crown, and Belhaven introduced
another for triennial Parliaments. Both these measures were popular
with the House. But Fletcher was not satisfied, and he again brought
forward his own pet scheme. His Twelve Limitations, which the Estates
had, in the session of 1703, declined to incorporate in the Act of
Security, were now known as the Duodecem Tabulæ, the Twelve Tables of
the Law. But Fletcher himself was in no joking humour when he moved
that the Estates should solemnly adopt them as a Claim of Rights, not
requiring the consent of the Sovereign.
On the 15th of August he made an elaborate speech upon the subject. He
was listened to in silence, and, when he sat down, was asked to
withdraw his motion. But the more he was appealed to the stiffer he
became. A debate of four hours followed, in the course of which he
fell foul of Stair. Stair had sneered at the tenth limitation, which
provided that no pardon granted by the Crown, for any offence, should
be valid without the consent of Parliament; and Fletcher thereupon
exclaimed, ‘It is no wonder his Lordship is against this, for had
there been such a law he would have been hanged long ago for the
advice he gave King James, the murder of Glencoe, and his whole
conduct since the Revolution.’ But the feeling of the House was
against him. He saw this, and, muttering to himself, ‘Well, is it so?
I’ll serve them a trick for it,’ he announced that he would not press
the subject, but would move that the House should consider the
measures which had been brought in by Rothes and Belhaven.[13]
[13] Add. MSS. 28,055, fol. 277.
On the following day, when Rothes moved the second reading of his
measure, Fletcher again tried to bring forward his favourite subject,
which led Stair to say that the honourable member was resolved to do
by his Limitations as the ape did by her young, grasp them so tight
that she stifled them. Fletcher lost his temper, and called out that
the noble lord had, in the days of King James, stretched the
prerogative till it nearly cracked, when he penned the declaration of
arbitrary power.
This was a very palpable hit, but the Chancellor rose and stopped the
altercation by moving that the House should proceed to business; and
on a vote being taken whether the Estates, or the Sovereign with the
consent of the Estates, should appoint Privy Councillors, Judges, and
other officers, it carried in favour of the Estates by twenty-three,
in spite of the opposition of the Government. Nothing, however, came
of these wild expedients for limiting the power of the Crown. The
Estates passed Acts for triennial Parliaments, for giving to
Parliament the power of appointing officers of the Crown, and for
securing the presence of Scottish ambassadors at the making of all
treaties, but to these enactments the royal assent was refused. The
proposals for improving the trade of the country took the form of a
number of measures, only a few of which received the royal assent. The
general purpose of these measures was Protection to home trade and
manufactures, and retaliation on England for passing the Alien Act. Of
these the royal assent was given to an Act forbidding the importation
of English, Irish, and foreign butter and cheese, to an Act for
assisting the fisheries of Scotland, to an Act for encouraging the
exportation of beef and pork, and to another declaring Scottish linen
and woollen manufactures free of duty at exportation. In addition to
these there was a statute, which was considered the most important of
all, for appointing a Council of Trade for Scotland.
In the meantime the Government were waiting an opportunity for again
bringing forward the question of the Union; and at last, on the 24th
of August, Mar’s resolution on the subject was discussed. Fletcher
moved, a few days later, an address to the throne, complaining of the
way in which Scotland had been treated by the English Parliament,
which he declared to be ‘injurious to the honour and interest of this
nation.’ Though this address was not adopted, Hamilton pressed upon
the House a resolution binding the Estates to resist any Union which
would change the fundamental laws of the Scottish constitution. At
this point the Country Party appear to have agreed to the principle of
an Union; but they were resolved that the Scottish Parliament, the
outward sign and instrument of an independent national existence, must
not be abolished. Gradually the Act for a Treaty of Union took shape;
but, when the Government were congratulating themselves on having
weathered the storm, Fletcher moved to amend the Act by inserting a
clause to provide that the Commissioners for Union should not meet
until the ‘Alien Clause’ of the recent English Act was repealed. He
and his friends, both Jacobites and members of the Old Country Party,
probably believed that England would refuse to treat on such terms,
and that, therefore, the Union, which he now saw was threatening the
independence of Scotland, would collapse. It was likely that the
Government would be defeated if Fletcher’s amendment was openly
opposed, and the dexterous hand of Queensberry is seen in the way in
which the difficulty was met. The Government professed to agree with
the object of the amendment, but proposed that, instead of adding it
to the Union Act, the House should, as soon as that Act was passed,
proceed to consider whether the question of the Alien Clause should
form the subject of a resolution of the Estates or of a separate Act
of Parliament. Fletcher agreed to this, and his motion stands on the
rolls of the Scottish Parliament in these terms: ‘Then agreed and
ordered, _nemine contradicente_, that the Commissioners to be named by
Her Majesty for the Kingdom of Scotland shall not commence the Treaty
of Union until the clause in the English Act declaring the subjects of
Scotland aliens be rescinded.’ The Scottish Ministers, in transmitting
this resolution to London, carefully explained that they had found it
necessary, if the Union was to go on, to comply with the wish of the
Estates that some resentment should be expressed against England.[14]
[14] Halifax to Godolphin, 4th Sept. 1705. Add. MSS. 28,055.
But before this point was reached there had been a very sharp debate
regarding the appointment of the Commissioners on Union. The story is
told by Lockhart, and is well known. At a late hour on the evening of
Saturday the 1st of September, when most of the members had left in
the belief that the House was about to rise, Hamilton suddenly
addressed the Chancellor, and moved that the nomination of the
Commissioners should be left to the Queen. Some members of the
Opposition rushed from the House, shouting that they were betrayed;
but Fletcher sprang to his feet, and made a personal attack on
Hamilton for his inconsistency in making this proposal. ‘Saltoun
opposed that most bitterly,’ says Sir David Hume, in his diary. But it
was in vain. The vote was called for, and Hamilton’s motion was
carried.[15] ‘From this day,’ says Lockhart, ‘we may date the
commencement of Scotland’s ruin.’
[15] Lockhart says, ‘by a plurality of eight voices, of which
His Grace The Duke of Hamilton had the honour to be one’
(_Memoirs_, i. 133). Sir David Hume says the majority was forty.
The session ended quietly on the 21st of September, when the
Commissioner touched with the sceptre the Acts to which he had
obtained leave to give the royal assent, of which the most important
was the ‘Act for a Treaty with England.’