A Political and Social History of Modern Europe Part 30

[Sidenote: Era of Whig Domination, 1714-1761]

[Sidenote: Robert Walpole and his Policies]

Under George I (1714-1727) it became customary for the king to absent himself from cabinet-meetings. (It will be remembered that George could not speak English.) This tended to make the cabinet even more independent of the sovereign, as shown by the fact that Anne was the last to use her prerogative to veto bills. From 1714 to 1761 was the great era of Whig domination. Both George I and George II naturally favored the Whigs, because the Tories were supposed to desire a second restoration of the Stuarts. Certainly many of the Tories had partic.i.p.ated in the vain attempt of the "Old Pretender" in 1715 to seat himself on the British throne as James III, and again in 1745 extreme Tories took part in the insurrection in Scotland, gallantly led by the Young Pretender, "Prince Charlie" the grandson of James II. Under these circ.u.mstances practically all cla.s.ses rallied to the support of the Whigs, who stood for the Protestant monarchy. Great Whig landowners controlled the rural districts, and the aristocracy of the towns was won by the Whiggish policy of devotion to public credit and the protection of commerce. The extensive and continued power of the Whigs made it possible for Sir Robert Walpole, [Footnote: Created earl of Orford in 1742.] a great Whig leader, to hold office for twenty-one years (1721-1742), jealously watching and maintaining his supremacy under two sovereigns--George I (1714-1727) and George II (1727-1760).

Though disclaiming the t.i.tle, he was recognized by every one as the "prime minister"--prime in importance, prime in power. The other ministers, nominally appointed by the sovereign, were in point of fact dependent upon him for office, and he, though nominally appointed by the crown, was really dependent only upon the support of a Whig majority in the Commons.

[Sidenote: William Pitt, Earl of Chatham]

Walpole's power was based on policy and political manipulation. His policy was twofold, the maintenance of peace and of prosperity. We shall see elsewhere how he kept England clear of costly Continental wars. [Footnote: See above, p. 256, and below, pp. 309 ff., 324 f.] His policy of prosperity was based on mercantilist ideas and consisted in strict attention to business methods in public finance, [Footnote: Walpole was called the "best master of figures of any man of his time."] the removal of duties on imported raw materials, and on exported manufactures. In spite of the great prosperity of the period, there was considerable criticism of Walpole's policy, and "politics"

alone enabled him to persevere in it. By skillful partisan patronage, by bestowal of state offices and pensions upon members of Parliament, by open bribery, and by electioneering, he secured his ends and maintained his majority in the House of Commons.

Walpole's successors,--Henry Pelham and the duke of Newcastle,--like him represented the oligarchy of Whig n.o.bles and millionaires, and even outdid him in corrupt methods. Another section of the Whig party under the leadership of William Pitt the elder (the earl of Chatham) won great popularity by its condemnation of political "graft." Pitt's fiery demands for war first against Spain (1739-1748) and then against France (1756-1763) were echoed by patriotic squires and by the merchants who wished to ruin French commerce and to throw off the restrictions laid by Spain on American commerce. Pitt had his way until George III, a monarch determined to destroy the power of the Whigs, appointed Tory ministers, such as Lord Bute and Lord North. The attempt of George III to regain the power his great-grandfather had lost, to rule as well as to reign, was in the end a failure, and later Hanoverians might well have joined George II in declaring that "ministers are kings in this country."

[Sidenote: Significance of English Const.i.tutional Development in the Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Centuries]

This indeed is the salient fact in the evolution of const.i.tutional government in England. While in other countries late in the eighteenth century monarchs still ruled by divine right, in England Parliament and ministers were the real rulers, and, in theory at least, they ruled by the will of the people. That England was able to develop this form of government may have been due in part to her insular position, her const.i.tutional traditions, and the ill-advised conduct of the Stuart kings, but most of all it was due to the great commercial and industrial development which made her merchant cla.s.s rich and powerful enough to demand and secure a share in government.

[Sidenote: Great Britain Parliamentarian but not Democratic]

In their admiration for the English government, many popular writers have fallen into the error of confounding the struggle for parliamentary supremacy with the struggle for democracy. Nothing could be more misleading. The "Glorious Revolution" of 1689 was a _coup d'etat_ engineered by the upper cla.s.ses, and the liberty it preserved was the liberty of n.o.bles, squires, and merchants--not the political liberty of the common people.

[Sidenote: The Unreformed Parliament]

The House of Commons was essentially undemocratic. Only one man in every ten had even the nominal right to vote. It is estimated that from 1760 to 1832 nearly one-half of the members owed their seats to patrons, and the reformed representatives of large towns were frequently chosen by a handful of rich merchants. In fact, the government was controlled by the upper cla.s.s of society, and by only a part of that. No representatives sat for the numerous manufacturing towns which had sprung into importance during the last few decades, and rich manufacturers everywhere complained that the country was being ruined by the selfish administration of great landowners and commercial aristocrats.

Certain it is that the Parliament of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, while wonderfully earnest and successful in enriching England's landlords and in demolishing every obstacle to British commerce, at the same time either willfully neglected or woefully failed to do away with intolerance in the Church and injustice in the courts, or to defend the great majority of the people from the greed of landlords and the avarice of employers.

Designed as it was for the protection of selfish cla.s.s interests, the English government was nevertheless a step in the direction of democracy. The idea of representative government as expressed by Parliament and cabinet was as yet very narrow, but it was capable of being expanded without violent revolution, slowly but inevitably, so as to include the whole people.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE HOUSE OF STUART]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE HANOVERIAN SOVEREIGNS OF GREAT BRITAIN (1714-1915)]

ADDITIONAL READING

GENERAL. Brief surveys: A. L. Cross, _History of England and Greater Britain (1914)_, ch. xxvii-xli; T. F. Tout, _An Advanced History of Great Britain (1906)_, Book VI, Book VII, ch. i, ii; Benjamin Terry, _A History of England (1901)_, Part III, Book III and Book IV, ch. i-iii; E. P. Cheyney, _A Short History of England (1904)_, ch. xiv-xvi, and, by the same author, _An Introduction to the Industrial and Social History of England (1901)_. More detailed narratives: J. F. Bright, _History of England_, 5 vols. (1884-1904), especially Vol. II, _Personal Monarchy_, 1485-1688, and Vol. III, _Const.i.tutional Monarchy, 1689-1837_; _Cambridge Modern History_, Vol. IV (1906). ch. viii-xi, xv-xix, Vol. V (1908), ch. v, ix-xi, xv; H. D. Traill and J. S. Mann (editors), _Social England_, illus. ed., 6 vols. in 12 (1909), Vol. IV; A. D. Innes, _History of England and the British Empire_, 4 vols.

(1914), Vol. II, ch. x-xvi; G. M. Trevelyan, _England under the Stuarts_, 1603-1714 (1904), brilliant and suggestive; Leopold von Ranke, _History of England, Princ.i.p.ally in the Seventeenth Century_, Eng. trans., 6 vols. (1875), particularly valuable for foreign relations; Edward Dowden, _Puritan and Anglican_ (1901), an interesting study of literary and intellectual England in the seventeenth century; John Lingard, _History of England to 1688_, new ed. (1910) of an old but valuable work by a scholarly Roman Catholic, Vols. VII-X; H. W.

Clark, _History of English Nonconformity_, Vol. I (1911), Book II, ch.

i-iii, and Vol. II (1913), Book III, ch. i, ii, the best and most recent study of the role of the Protestant Dissenters; W. R. W.

Stephens and William Hunt (editors), _History of the Church of England_, the standard history of Anglicanism, of which Vol. V (1904), by W. H. Frere, treats of the years 1558-1625, and Vol. VI (1903), by W. H. Hutton, of the years 1625-1714. On Scotland during the period: P.

H. Brown, _History of Scotland_, 3 vols. (1899-1909), Vols. II, III; Andrew Lang, _A History of Scotland_ from the Roman Occupation, 2d ed., 4 vols. (1901-1907), Vols. III, IV. On Ireland: Richard Bagwell, _Ireland under the Tudors_, 3 vols. (1885-1890), and _Ireland under the Stuarts and during the Interregnum_, 2 vols. (1909). Convenient source- material: G. W. Prothero, _Select Statutes and Other Const.i.tutional Doc.u.ments Ill.u.s.trative of the Reigns of Elizabeth and James I_, 4th ed.

(1913); S. R. Gardiner, _The Const.i.tutional Doc.u.ments of the Puritan Revolution_, 1628-1660, 2d ed. (1899); C. G. Robertson, _Select Statutes, Cases, and Doc.u.ments, 1660-1832_ (1904); E. P. Cheyney, _Readings in English History Drawn from the Original Sources_ (1908); Frederick York Powell, _English History by Contemporary Writers_, 8 vols. (1887); C. A. Beard, _An Introduction to the English Historians_ (1906), a collection of extracts from famous secondary works.

THE ENGLISH CONSt.i.tUTION IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. F. W. Maitland, _The Const.i.tutional History of England_ (1908), Periods III, IV, special studies of the English government in 1625 and in 1702 by an eminent authority; D. J. Medley, _A Student's Manual of English Const.i.tutional History_, 5th ed. (1913), topical treatment, encyclopedic and dry; T. P. Taswell-Langmead, _English Const.i.tutional History_, 7th ed. rev. by P. A. Ashworth (1911), ch. xiii-xvi, narrative style and brief; Henry Hallam, _Const.i.tutional History of England from the Accession of Henry VII to the Death of George II_, an old work, first pub. in 1827, still useful, new ed., 3 vols. (1897).

The best summary of the evolution of English parliamentary government in the middle ages is A. B. White, _The Making of the English Const.i.tution, 449-1485_ (1908), Part III. In support of the pretensions of the Stuart kings; see J. N. Figgis, _The Divine Right of Kings_, 2d ed. (1914); and in opposition to them, see G. P.

Gooch, _English Democratic Ideas in the Seventeenth Century_ (1898).

JAMES I AND CHARLES I. S. R. Gardiner, _The First Two Stuarts and the Puritan Revolution_, 7th ed. (1887), a brief survey in the "Epochs of Modern History" Series by the most prolific and most distinguished writer on the period, and, by the same author, the elaborate _History of England from the Accession of James I to the Outbreak of the Civil War_, 10 vols. (1883-1884), _History of the Great Civil War, 1642- 1640_, 4 vols. (1893), and _Const.i.tutional Doc.u.ments of the Puritan Revolution_ (1899); F. C. Montague, _Political History of England, 1603-1660_ (1907), an accurate and strictly political narrative; _Cambridge Modern History_, Vol. III, ch. xvi, xvii, on Spain and England in the time of James I. Clarendon's _History of the Great Rebellion_, the cla.s.sic work of a famous royalist of the seventeenth century, is strongly partisan and sometimes untrustworthy: the best edition is that of W. D. Macray, 6 vols. (1886). R. G. Usher, _The Rise and Fall of the High Commission_ (1913), is an account of one of the arbitrary royal courts. Valuable biographies: H. D. Traill, _Strafford_ (1889); W. H. Hutton, _Laud_ (1895); E. C. Wade, John Pym (1912); C. R.

Markham, _Life of Lord Fairfax_ (1870).

THE CROMWELLIAN ReGIME. The standard treatise is that of S. R.

Gardiner, _The History of the Commonwealth and Protectorate_, 4 vols.

(1903). Among numerous biographies of Oliver Cromwell, the following are noteworthy: C. H. Firth, _Cromwell_ (1900). in "Heroes of the Nations" Series; S. R. Gardiner, _Cromwell_ (1899), and, by the same author, _Cromwell's Place in History_ (1897); John (Viscount) Morley, _Oliver Cromwell_ (1899); A. F. Pollard, _Factors in Modern History_ (1907), ch. ix-x; Thomas Carlyle, _Cromwell's Letters and Speeches_, ed. by S. C. Lomas, 3 vols. (1904). The _Diary_ of John Evelyn, a royalist contemporary, affords naturally a somewhat different point of view: the best edition is that of H. B. Wheatley, 4 vols. (1906).

Various special phases of the regime: C. H. Firth, _Cromwell's Army_, 2d ed. (1912); Edward Jenks, _The Const.i.tutional Experiments of the Protectorate_ (1890); Sir J. R. Seeley, _Growth of British Policy_, Vol. II (1895), Part III; G. L. Beer, _Cromwell's Policy in its Economic Aspects_ (1902); Sir W. L. Clowes, _The Royal Navy: a History_, Vol. II (1898); G. B. Tatham, _The Puritans in Power, a Study of the English Church from 1640 to 1660_ (1913); W. A. Shaw, _History of the English Church, 1640-1660_, 2 vols. (1900); Robert Dunlop, _Ireland under the Commonwealth_, 2 vols. (1913), largely a collection of doc.u.ments; C. H. Firth, _The Last Years of the Protectorate_, 2 vols. (1909).

THE RESTORATION. Richard Lodge, _The Political History of England, 1660-1702_, a survey of the chief political facts, conservative in tone; J. N. Figgis, _English History Ill.u.s.trated from Original Sources, 1660-1715_ (1902), a convenient companion volume to Lodge's; Osmund Airy, _Charles II_ (1901), inimical to the first of the restored Stuart kings. Of contemporary accounts of the Restoration, the most entertaining is Samuel Pepys, _Diary_, covering the years 1659-1669 and written by a bibulous public official, while the most valuable, though tainted with strong Whig partisanship, is Gilbert (Bishop) Burnet, _History of My Own Times_, edited by Osmund Airy, 2 vols. (1897-1900).

See also H. B. Wheatley, _Samuel Pepys and the World he Lived In_ (1880). Special topics in the reign of Charles II: W. E. Sydney, _Social Life in England, 1660-1660_ (1892); J. H. Overton, _Life in the English Church, 1663-1714_ (1885); John Pollock, _The Popish Plot_ (1903); G.B. Hertz, _English Public Opinion after the Restoration_ (1902); C. B. R. Kent, _The Early History of the Tories_ (1908).

JAMES II AND THE "GLORIOUS REVOLUTION." The best brief account is that of Arthur Ha.s.sall, _The Restoration and the Revolution_ (1912). The cla.s.sic treatment is that of T. B. (Lord) Macaulay, _History of England, 1685-1702_, a literary masterpiece but marred by vigorous Whig sympathies, new ed. by C. H. Firth, 6 vols. (1913-1914). Sir James Mackintosh, _Review of the Causes of the Revolution of 1688_ (1834), an old work but still prized for the large collection of doc.u.ments in the appendix; _Adventures of James II_ (1904), an anonymous and sympathetic account of the career of the deposed king; H. B. Irving, _Life of Lord Jeffreys_ (1898), an apology for a much-a.s.sailed agent of James II; Alice Shield and Andrew Lang, _The King over the Water_ (1907), and, by the same authors, _Henry Stuart, Cardinal of York, and his Times_ (1908), popular treatments of subsequent Stuart pretenders to the British throne. A good account of the reign of William III is that of Sir J. R. Seeley, _Growth of British Policy_, Vol. II (1895), Part V.

GREAT BRITAIN IN THE FIRST HALF OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. General histories: _Cambridge Modern History_, Vol. VI (1909), ch. i-iii; I. S.

Leadam, _Political History of England, 1702-1760_ (1909), conservative and matter-of-fact; W. E. H. Lecky, _A History of England in the Eighteenth Century_, new ed., 7 vols. (1892-1899), especially Vol. I, brilliantly written and very informing, and, by the same author, _A History of Ireland in the Eighteenth Century_, 5 vols. (1893); C. G.

Robertson, _England under the Hanoverians_ (1911), ch. i, ii, iv; Earl Stanhope (Lord Mahon), _History of England from the Peace of Utrecht to the Peace of Versailles, 1713-1783_, 5th ed., 7 vols. (1858), particularly Vols. I, II, tedious but still useful especially for foreign affairs. On the union of England and Scotland: P. H. Brown, _The Legislative Union of England and Scotland_ (1914); W. L.

Matthieson, _Scotland and the Union_, 1695-1747 (1905); Daniel Defoe, _History of the Union between England and Scotland_ (1709). On the rise of the cabinet system: Mary T. Blauvelt, _The Development of Cabinet Government in England_ (1902), a clear brief outline; Edward Jenks, _Parliamentary England: the Evolution of the Cabinet System_ (1903); and the general const.i.tutional histories mentioned above. The best account of _Sir Robert Walpole_ is the biography by John (Viscount) Morley (1889).

CHAPTER IX

THE WORLD CONFLICT OF FRANCE AND GREAT BRITAIN

FRENCH AND ENGLISH COLONIES IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

In the sixteenth century, while Spain and Portugal were carving out vast empires beyond the seas, the sovereigns of France and England, distracted by religious dissensions or absorbed in European politics, did little more than to send out a few privateers and explorers. But in the seventeenth century the England of the Stuarts and the France of the Bourbons found in colonies a refuge for their discontented or venturesome subjects, a source of profit for their merchants, a field for the exercise of religious zeal, or gratification for national pride. Everywhere were commerce and colonization growing apace, and especially were they beginning to play a large part in the national life of England and of France. We have already noticed how the Dutch, themselves the despoilers of Portugal [Footnote: See above, pp. 58f] in the first half of the seventeenth century, were in turn attacked by the English in a series of commercial wars [Footnote: The Dutch Wars of 1652-1654, 1665-1667, and 1672-1674. See above pp. 59, 243, 278.]

during the second half of the seventeenth century. By 1688 the period of active growth was past for the colonial empires of Holland, Portugal, and Spain; but England and France, beginning to realize the possibilities for power in North America, in India, and on the high seas, were just on the verge of a world conflict, which, after raging intermittently for more than a hundred years, was to leave Great Britain the "mistress of the seas."

[Sidenote: Relative Position of the Rivals in 1688. In North America]

Before plunging into the struggle itself, let us review the position of the two rivals in 1688: first, their claims and possessions in the New World and in the Old; secondly, their comparative resources and policies. It will be remembered that the voyage of John Cabot (1497) gave England a claim to the mainland of North America. The Tudors (1485-1603), however, could not occupy so vast a territory, nor were there any fences for the exclusion of intruders. Consequently the actual English settlements in North America, made wholly under the Stuarts, [Footnote: However much modern Englishmen may condemn the efforts of the Stuart sovereigns to establish political absolutism at home, they can well afford to praise these same royal Stuarts for contributing powerfully to the foundations of England's commercial and colonial greatness abroad.] were confined to Newfoundland, to a few fur depots in the region of Hudson Bay, and to a strip of coastland from Maine to South Carolina; while the French not only had sent Verrazano (1524), who explored the coast of North America, and Cartier (1534- 1536), who sailed up the St. Lawrence, but by virtue of voyages of discovery and exploration, especially that of La Salle (1682), laid claim to the whole interior of the Continent.

Of all the North American colonies, the most populous were those which later became the United States. In the year 1688 there were ten of these colonies. The oldest one, Virginia, had been settled in 1607 by the London Company under a charter from King James I. Plymouth, founded in 1620 by the Pilgrims (Separatists or Independents driven from England by the enforcement of religious conformity to the Anglican Church), was presently to be merged with the neighboring Puritan colony of Ma.s.sachusetts. Near these first, New England settlements had grown up the colonies of Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New Hampshire: Maine was then a part of Ma.s.sachusetts. Just as New England was the Puritans'

refuge, so Maryland, granted to Lord Baltimore in 1632, was a haven for the persecuted Roman Catholics. A large tract south of Virginia, known as Carolina, had been granted to eight n.o.bles in 1663; but it was prospering so poorly that its proprietors were willing to sell it to the king in 1729 for a mere 50,000. The capture of the Dutch colony of New Netherland [Footnote: Rechristened New York. It included New Jersey also.] in 1664, and the settlement of Pennsylvania (1681) by William Penn and his fellow Quakers [Footnote: The Swedish colony on the Delaware was temporarily merged with Pennsylvania.] at last filled up the gap between the North and the South.

Numerous causes had contributed to the growth of the British colonies in America. Religious intolerance had driven Puritans to New England and Roman Catholics to Maryland; the success of the Puritan Revolution had sent Cavaliers to Virginia; thousands of others had come merely to acquire wealth or to escape starvation. And America seemed a place wherein to mend broken fortunes. Upon the estates (plantations) of southern gentlemen negro slaves toiled without pay in the tobacco fields. [Footnote: Subsequently, rice and cotton became important products of Southern agriculture.] New England was less fertile, but shrewd Yankees found wealth in fish, lumber, and trade. No wonder, then, that the colonies grew in wealth and in population until in 1688 there were nearly three hundred thousand English subjects in the New World.

The French settlers were far less numerous [Footnote: Probably not more than 20,000 Frenchmen were residing in the New World in 1688. By 1750 their number had increased perhaps to 60,000.] but more widespread.

From their first posts in Acadia (1604) and Quebec (1608) they had pushed on up the St. Lawrence. Jesuit and other Roman Catholic missionaries had led the way from Montreal westward to Lake Superior and southward to the Ohio River. In 1682 the Sieur de La Salle, after paddling down the Mississippi, laid claim to the whole basin of that mighty stream, and named the region Louisiana in honor of Louis XIV of France. Nominally, at least, this territory was claimed by the English, for in most of the colonial charters emanating from the English crown in the seventeenth century were clauses which granted lands "from sea to sea"--that is, from the Atlantic to the Pacific. The heart of "New France" remained on the St. Lawrence, but, despite English claims, French forts were commencing to mark the trails of French fur-traders down into the "Louisiana," and it was clear that whenever the English colonists should cross the Appalachian Mountains to the westward they would have to fight the French.

[Sidenote: In West Indies]

French and English were neighbors also in the West Indies. Martinique and Guadeloupe acknowledged French sovereignty, while Jamaica, Barbados, and the Bahamas were English.[Footnote: The following West Indies were also English: Nevis, Montserrat, Antigua, Honduras, St.

Lucia, Virgin Islands, and the Turks and Caicos Islands. St. Kitts was divided between England and France; and the western part of Haiti, already visited by French buccaneers, was definitely annexed to France in 1697. The Bermudas, lying outside the "West Indies," were already English.] These holdings in the West Indies were valuable not only for their sugar plantations, but for their convenience as stations for trade with Mexico and South America.

[Sidenote: In Africa]