A History of Parliamentary Elections and Electioneering 17

A History of Parliamentary Elections and Electioneering 17

If any man shall pervert this good meaning and motion of yours,

and inform his Majesty, _’Tis a Derogation from his Honour to

yield to his subjects upon Conditions_, his Majesty shall have

good cause to prove such men’s eyes malicious and unthankful,

and thereby to disprove them in all their outer actions; for

what can it lessen the reputation of a Prince whom the subject

only and wholly obeyeth, that a _Parliament_ which his Majesty

doth acknowledge to be his highest Council, should advise him,

and he follow the advice of such a Council? What dishonour

rather were it to be advised and ruled by one Councillor alone,

against whom there is just one exception taken of the whole

Commonwealth?

 

Marcus Portio saith, that that Commonwealth is everlasting,

where the Prince seeks to get obedience and love, and the

subjects to gain the affection of the Prince; and that Kingdom

is unhappy where their Prince is served out of ends and hope of

reward, and hath no other assurance of them but their service.”

 

The substitution of Oxford, “the hot-bed of Toryism,” for Westminster

as the place of assembly for what proved Charles II.’s last parliament,

was violently opposed by the members, who naturally resented this royal

manœuvre of cutting off the representatives from the protection of the

citizens. A petition remonstrating against the change was presented by

Essex and sixteen other Peers; this darkly set forth dangers to the

Crown, and reminded the king of the disasters which had always followed

similar departures from the rule of London parliaments. Charles

frowned, but took no heed. The parliament, forced into submission,

attended at Oxford, Shaftesbury and other adherents taking with them

a body-guard of armed retainers, citizens of London, wearing the

Association green ribbons, with the legend, “No Popery: no Slavery!”

 

“Who was ’t gave out, that a thousand Watermen

Had all conspir’d to Petition, when

The parliament to Oxford were conven’d,

That they might sit at Westminster for them;

But ne’er were heard of more than Smith and Ben?[25]

Who was ’t endeavour’d all that preparations

To guard the City Members in their stations

To Oxford; which look’d far more Arbitrary

Than _Forty-One_, or absolute Old Harry.”

 

The doctors were dispossessed from their seats to make way for the

legislators:--

 

“The safety of the King and ’s Royal Throne

Depends on those five hundred Kings alone.”

 

Parliament met March 21, 1681. Of its short existence of eight days,

three were consumed in formalities, the choice of a Speaker, and

other preliminaries. The course of the action of the members was

predetermined. They were to insist on the banishment and exclusion

of the Duke of York from the succession. The impeachment was to be

proceeded with of Fitz-Harris, who was imprisoned and awaiting trial,

on an information of Everard, for being the author of a treasonable

libel; it was understood, or at least expected, that the Duchess

of Portsmouth and others of the Court would be implicated in his

confession. The Lords voted that he should be proceeded against at

Common Law, by which decision the Commons were craftily involved in a

struggle for privilege and power with the Peers, who were also less

impatient than themselves to carry the Exclusion Bill, the Lower House

resolving that “it is the undoubted right of the Commons in parliament

assembled to impeach before the Lords in parliament any Peer or

Commoner for treason or any other crime or misdemeanour; and that the

refusal of the Lords to proceed in parliament upon such impeachment is

a denial of justice and a violation of the constitution.”[26]

 

This squabble between the two branches of the legislature exactly

answered the king’s occasions; he made this a pretence for again

dissolving the parliament, thus saving his brother and the Duchess

of Portsmouth from the designs of the Commons. As it was, Charles

coolly dismissed them as impracticable and useless, telling them, “he

perceived there were great heats between the Lords and Commons, and

their beginnings had been such as he could expect no good success of

this parliament, and therefore thought fit to dissolve them.” This was

on the 28th of March. On this point the Rev. J. W. Ebsworth, M.A., who

has edited the “Bagford Ballads,” which illustrate the last years of

the Stuarts, remarks--

 

“Had they been in London, there can be no doubt they would

have resisted, calling the City to support them, and voted

themselves permanent, to the defiance of the King and a

commencement of civil war. He saw their plan, and conquered

them.”

 

It was the lesson of “forty-one” to be taught again, as was

prophetically hinted by “the ghost of the late Parliament to the New

One to meet at Oxford.” In reference to the tyranny of the Commons,

as opposed to the absolutism of the Crown, we find a _Loyal Poem_,

entitled--

 

 

“THE PARLIAMENT DISSOLVED AT OXFORD.

 

MARCH 28, 1681.

 

“Under five hundred kings Three Kingdoms grone:

Go, Finch,[27] Dissolve them, Charles is on the throne,

And by the grace of God, will reign alone.

 

“The Presbyterians, sick of too much freedom,

Are ripe for Bethle’m, it’s high time to bleed ’em,

The Second Charles does neither fear nor need ’em.

 

“I’ll have the world know that I can dissipate

Those _Impolitick Mushrooms of our State_,

’Tis easier to _dissolve_ than to _create_.

 

“They shan’t cramp Justice with their feigned flaws;

For since I govern only by the Laws, (!)

Why they should be exempt, I see no cause.”

 

The actual “Oxford Poem” in the Bagford Collection is addressed:--

 

 

“ON PARLIAMENT REMOVING FROM LONDON TO OXFORD.

 

“You London lads be merry,

Your Parliament friends have gone

That made us all so sorry

And would not leave us alone.”

 

 

“THE WHIGS’ DOWNFALL.

 

“To perfect which, they made their choice

Of parliaments of late,

Of members that had nought but voice,

And Megrims in their pate.

_Wi Williams_ he the Speaker was,

And is’t not wondrous strange;

The reason’s plain, he told it was,

Because they would not change;

He told you truth, nor think it strange;

He knew well their intent,

They never meant themselves to change,

But change the Government.

For now cry they ‘The King’s so poor,

He dares not with us part;

And therefore we most loyally

Will break his royal heart.’”

 

For a fine, ancient, divine-right-of-kings effusion commend us to the

following full-flavoured High Tory manifesto:--

 

 

“TO MR. E. L. ON HIS MAJESTY’S DISSOLVING THE LATE PARLIAMENT AT

OXFORD.

 

“An Atheist now must a Monster be,

Of strange gigantic birth

His omnipotence does let all men see,

That our King’s a God on earth.

 

“_Fiat_, says he, by proclamation,

And the parliament is created:

He repents of his work, the Dissolution

Makes all annihilated.

 

“We Scholars were expell’d awhile,

To let the Senators in;

But they behav’d themselves as vile,

So we return again:

 

“And wonder to see our Geometry School

All round about be-seated,

Though there’s no need of an Euclid’s rule

To demonstrate ’em all defeated.

 

“The Commons their Voting Problems would

In Riddles so involve,

That what the Peers scarce understood,

The King was forc’d to solve.

 

“The Commons for a good omen chose

An old consulting station:

Being glad to dispossess their foes

O th’ House of Convocation.