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The Constitutional Significance of the Financial Settlement of 1690*
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
Extract
Historians have displayed a curious ambivalence towards the English Revolution of 1688. On the one hand, they have argued that it preserved the monarchy; on the other, that it altered it. Edmund Burke was one of the earliest to voice this ambivalence. ‘The Revolution was made', he wrote in 1790, ‘to preserve our ancient, indisputable laws and liberties and that ancient constitution of government which is our only security for law and liberty.’ But then he added,’ They [who led at the Revolution] secured soon after the frequent meeting of parliament, by which the whole government would be under the constant inspection and active control of the popular representative and of the magnates of the kingdom.’ Macaulay expressed the same uncertainty in a single sentence: ‘But, though a new constitution was not needed, it was plain that changes were required.’
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References
1 Burke, Edmund, Reflections on the Revolution in France, edited by Mahoney, Thomas H. D. (New York, 1955), pp. 31, 35Google Scholar; Macaulay, Thomas Babington, The History of England from the Accession of James II (London, 1862), III, 407.Google Scholar
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7 Carter, Jennifer, ‘The Revolution and the Constitution’, in Britain After the Glorious Revolution, ed. Holmes, Geoffrey (London, 1969), p. 55Google Scholar; Keir, Sir David Lindsay, The Constitutional History of Modern Britain Since 1485 (1st edn, 1938, 6th edn, Princeton, N.J., 1960), p. 273Google Scholar; Williams, , Eighteenth Century Constitution, p. 4Google Scholar. Western, Reitan, Jones, and Kemp also call attention to the effect that the war had on the constitution.
8 Will. & Mary, c. 4; 6 Will. & Mary, c. I, in Statutes of the Realm, VI (1882), 166–9, 508–10Google Scholar. Thomson, Mark (A Constitutional History of England 1640–1801, London, 1938, p. 201)Google Scholar wrongly states that the customs were voted in 1690 for five years. He probably erred by following Bishop Burnet's report to that effect (Burnet, Gilbert, History of His Own Time, Oxford, 1823, IV, 75).Google Scholar
9 2 Will. & Mary, Sess. I, c. 3, in Statutes of the Realm, VI (1822), 164–6Google Scholar. The bill declaring the hereditary revenue vested in their majesties can be read in HMC, House of Lords MSS, 1690–91, pp. 81–7Google Scholar. For the estimates of these revenues see Commons Journal (hereafter cited as CJ), x, 37–8.Google Scholar
10 Column one is drawn from CJ, x, 27–8 (with the petty farms added to the small branches). The second and third columns are based on The Calendar of Treasury Books (hereafter cited as CTB), IX, part 1, ccii–ccxiiGoogle Scholar. For the years 1689–91 I have added 1/36th ID the sum given by the auditor (to bring it to a full three years), then divided by three. I have not done this for the excise, since it is already increased by the additional 9d. per barrel between 24 July and 29 Sept. 1689. The fourth column is based on figures given in CTB, XI, cccxxviii-ccdxxxvii.
11 Column one is drawn from CJ, x, 55. In column two the sum for the civil affairs is based on CTB, IX, part 1, ccv (though I have increased the sum for civil affairs by 1/36th and then divided by three). The sum for the navy is an estimate made by the Commons in 1689 of the cost of the navy on peace footing (CJ, x, 80). The figure for the ordnance and the guards and garrisons is the average yearly expenditure during the last four years of Charles II's reign (CJ, x, 55). The sum for civil affairs in column three is drawn from CTB, IX, part 1, ccviii-ccxiii; the other figures are the same estimates as in column two. Column four is based on figures given in CTB, XI, Introduction, cccxxviii-ccdxxxvii. In column four I have adjusted the figures for the guards and garrisons so as to omit the cost of disbanding the army, arrears of wages, and the half-pay of officers.
12 The impositions on wine, vinegar, tobacco, sugar, and on French linens, silks, and brandies were, at first, used to pay for the cost of the Revolution, not of the war. In August 1689 parliament charged these revenues with the £600,000 needed to repay the Dutch for the money spent on William's expedition to England (1 Will. & Mary, Sess. I, c. 28, in Statutes of the Realm, VI, 93–4)Google Scholar. These new revenues varied in the length for which voted: the Additional Excise was voted for three years, the Double Excise for one, the Low Wines for five, the East India goods for five (ibid. vi, 80–1, 218–19, 221–5, 225–6, 236–7).
13 2 Will. & Mary, Sess. I, c. 3,4; CJ, x, 357,362. Three-fourths of the customs and excise were used to repay these loans.
14 CJ, x, 55, 109. W. A. Shaw's discussion of these debts (CTB, IX, part 1, xlvi) is marred by two errors. First, he overstates the crown's indebtedness by £477,000. He does so by adding that sum to the Old Debt, not noticing that the Commons1 statement of the Old Debt already comprehends that sum. Secondly, he declares that the cost of servicing the debt was £140,000 a year, when his own calculations seem to require him to give the figure of £179, 566. The reader would be well advised to go directly to the Commons Journal for his information, which is where Shaw got his.
15 Baxter, Stephen, William III (London, 1966), pp. 262–3Google Scholar; Western, , Monarchy and Revolution, p. 355.Google Scholar
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17 2 Will. & Mary, c. 3, Statutes of the Realm, VI, 164.Google Scholar
18 Grey, , Debates, x, 9–11, 13, 16–17, 19–20Google Scholar. Other members speaking for lives were Sir Edmund Jennings, Sir Robert Cotton, Henry Pelham, Heneage Finch, and William Ettrick.
19 Foley, Williamson, Sacheverell, Colonel Austen, and Sir William Williams spoke directly of the need for frequent parliaments; Seymour, Sir John Thompson, and Sir John Guise implied such a need. Maynard, who moved that the customs be given for three years, offered no reasons. Charles Hutchinson cited the example of James in opposing ‘lives’. Musgrave argued from the need to secure a fund of credit. See Grey, , Debates, x, 8–22.Google Scholar
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11 Grey, , Debates, IX, 36, 119, 123Google Scholar; CJ, x, 35; Constantijn Huygens, Journal, Eerste Deel, Warken van het Historish Genootschap, Nieuwe Serie, No. 23 (Utrecht, 1876), p. 19. The anonymous author of The Life of William III (3rd edn, London, 1705), p. 201Google Scholar, states that the Commons on 26 February named a committee to regulate their Majesties’ revenue, and notes that ‘some of that Committee were inclined to have it settled on them for three years’.
22 30 July 1689, B.M. Loan 29/142/10. E. A. Reitan ('From Revenue to Civil List’, Historical Journal, XIII, 578Google Scholar) states that he could find no copy of this bill. This makes Sir Edward's letter all the more valuable; it is the only description of the bill we have.
23 Cobbett, , Part. Hist, v, 497Google Scholar; I Will. & Mary, Sess. 2, c. 3, in Statutes of the Realm, VI, 145–6Google Scholar. Gilbert Burnet (History of His Own Time, IV, 23Google Scholar) observes that many of the whigs would vote the king revenues for only one year, in order ‘to oblige the king to such a popular method of government as should merit the constant renewal of that grant’.
24 Grey, , Debates, x, 19–20.Google Scholar
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26 Roger Morrice, Entering Book, III, 36, in Dr Williams’ library.
27 B.M. Egerton MSS 3346, fos. 16–17.
28 Scouller, R., ‘The Mutiny Acts’, Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research, L (1972), 43Google Scholar. I am indebted to Professor Henry Horwitz for the information that no act was passed in 1692.
29 CJ, x, 56, 80; Grey, , Debates, IX, 178.Google Scholar
30 CJ, VIII, 150. Chandaman, C. D. in The English Public Revenue 1660–1688 (Oxford, 1975)Google Scholar observes (pp. 200–1) that the Commons found the expenses of Charles I during the years 1637–41 to be approximately £1,100,000 a year. He suggests that the Commons voted Charles II £1,200,000 a year because they believed that governmental expenses had risen £100,000 from what they were in 1637–41.
31 Grey, , Debates, IX, 125, 162, 176–7Google Scholar. In his Charles II and the Cavalier House of Commons (Manchester, 1966), pp. 17–19, 25, 125–7Google Scholar, Denis Witcomb demonstrates that, contrary to W. A. Shaw's opinion, the Cavalier parliament made a genuine effort to increase the revenues to £1,200,000 and by 1671 very nearly succeeded. C. D. Chandaman (English Public Revenue, pp. 77–9, 138, 203–7, 218–22, 235, 264Google Scholar) tells a similar story, though he remarks that the Hearth Tax was the last addition to Charles's permanent revenue, and brought it to only £1,082,000 a year.
32 Grey, , Debates, X, 12.Google Scholar
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37 Foxcroft, H. C., Life and Letters of Sir George Savile, Bart., First Marquis of Halifax (London, 1898), I, 444Google Scholar. Chandaman has shown (English Public Revenue, pp. 256–60Google Scholar) that parliament voted James II precisely the permanent revenue they voted Charles II, and could not have known that an expansion in the yields of the customs, the excise and the Hearth Tax would bring that revenue to £1,600,000 a year.
38 HMC, H. of L. MSS, 1692–3, pp. 72–3.Google Scholar
39 Grey, , Debates, IX, 110.Google Scholar
40 Ibid. x, 13, 20–1. Propriety demanded that distrust be expressed of ministers, not the king, but William's authoritarian temper was known. Halifax records that William told him, ‘the Revenue once settled, he would take his measures’. Halifax added, ‘It is to be supposed, the Parliament was apprehensive of it.’ Foxcroft, Halifax, II, 228.
41 Van Citters to the States General, 28 Mar./7 Apr. 1690, B.M. Add. MSS 17677 KK, fo. 71.
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43 Carter, , ‘Revolution and Constitution’, in Britain After the Revolution, p. 40.Google Scholar
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