1649-1685. CHARLES II. everything that was infamous and degrading:-from the effects of such policy arose the necessity for the recent " Municipal Corporation Act." Corporation Act of 1661 produc The 13 Charles II. c. 1, for the "well-governing and tive of mischief. regulation of corporations," was productive of great mischiefs, as it afforded an excuse and precedent for non-residence; the commissioners removing those persons who had been illegally placed in office by the commons, and substituting in the stead of several of them, some of the great officers of state, and these instances were subsequently cited in order to support the claims of the non-residents. Alterations in the municipal records. Charter to Liverpool. Origin of the doctrine, that municipal charters may be granted and an It is however a fact, which justifies a suspicion of fraud in order to veil the illegal origin of "non-residents," that the admission books in most of the boroughs, previous to 1660, are destroyed, and commence at a period when non-residents were permitted to exercise the rights of burgess-ship. In 1677, the king granted a charter to Liverpool, which appointed a common council of sixty persons therein nominated, thirty of whom, together with the mayor and bailiffs, were to have power to elect and name the mayor, bailiffs, common council, and freemen of the town, thereby placing the whole power in their hands. The burgesses protested against this grant, and several of the common councilmen nominated, in the charter, refused to act under it, and tumults took place in the town. But the spirit of the times stifled all opposition, and the common council continued to exercise the whole authority till the charter of William III. Charters of this nature were introductory of the general doctrine, that "municipal rights and privileges exclusively depended upon charters of incorporation, and that such charnulled as pleased ters might be surrendered, granted, and annulled as pleased the crown;" and from the proclamation for the restoration of corporations by James II., in the fourth year of his reign, 1679 appears to be the period at which great irregularities in the granting of charters were committed. the crown. The modes in which surrenders It was requisite for Charles II., previous to his giving charters embodying the foregoing principles, that the governing charters should be surrendered, and Chief Justice Jefferies and Earl Bath were two of his most powerful and unprincipled tools. The manner in which surrenders were obtained, was by 1649-1685. charters were fraud and violence; thus, in Thetford, the mayor was detained CHARLES II. in prison until he procured the surrender of the charters,which he effected, although there were seventeen against the of municipal surrender, and only fourteen in favour of it; but the former obtained. were never summoned when the surrender was agreed upon: and the mayor, in order to procure an assembly of the requisite number, admitted his son, a boy under sixteen years of age, and an excommunicated person, as members of the corporation. If, however, neither the king nor his ministers could by means of falsehoods or threats prevail on the burgesses to surrender their charters, informations of quo warranto were filed against them. Thus Roger North, in his Life of the Lord Keeper Guildford, says," Either to court or frighten harmless or orderly corporations to surrender, or upon refusal to plunge them in the chargeable and defenceless condition of going to law against the crown, whereby that which would not come by fair means, was extorted by violence"." Roger North also says," that the trade of charters ran to excess, and turned to an avowed practice of garbling corporations for the purpose of carrying elections to the parliament." Chief Justice Jefferies, when on circuit as a criminal judge, by threats and machinations compelled Lincoln and other towns to surrender their charters. In the debate which arose on the Corporation Bill, in the reign of William and Mary, Sir Thomas Clarges stated, that he knew a corporation of 600l. per annum advised by Jefferies to surrender, or else, if judged against, the lands would go to the next heir of the grantor. Sir William Williams, in the same discussion, said,-" that in some corporations of six hundred who had a right to give consent to a surrender, not above thirty-four were for it, and they prevailed. And how came this about?—this was a packed common council by Lord Jefferies." But for such proofs of loyalty, and triumph over national freedom, Jefferies was received by Charles II. at Windsor, as one of the most distinguished ornaments of the bench3. The Earl of Bath was equally industrious in the West, and returned from Cornwall only the day after the king's death with powers of attorney to surrender the charters of thirteen 2 Roger North, in his Life of Lord Keeper Guildford, 115. 3 3 Kennet, 423. M. & S. Hist. Boroughs, 1689-1943. Garbling of corparliamentary porations for elections. A corporation, having 600l. per by Jefferies to annum, advised surrender. Surrenders from thirteen boroughs procured by the Earl of Bath. 1649-1685. CHARLES II. or fourteen boroughs: and he was said to have "no less than fifteen charters, so that some called him the Prince Elector,' and he put into those charters for Cornwall the names of various officers of the guards'." National privileges in a state of insecurity. The plan of influencing the commons by bribes, reduced to a regular system. Insidious at an absolute monarchy. These proceedings, as Hume correctly observes, "left no national privileges in security, but enabled the king, under like pretences, and by means of like instruments, to recal anew all those charters which at present he was pleased to grant. And every friend to liberty must allow, that the nation, whose constitution was thus broken in the shock of faction, had a right by every prudent expedient, to recover that security, of which it was so unhappily bereaved"." 17. Attempts to create an Absolute Monarchy. Lord John Russell observes', that, "It was in this reign that the plan of influencing the members of the Lower House by gifts and favours of the crown was first systematically framed. The name of Pensioner Parliament,' given to the House of Commons which sate for seventeen years without dissolution, is a sufficient index of the general opinion concerning it. Many of the poorer members sold their vote for a very small gratuity. Offices and favours were granted to the speakers most worth buying; the rest were glad of a sum of money. The trifling sum of 12,000l. was allowed by Lord Clifford, for the purpose of buying members. This was increased by Lord Danby. By the report of a committee of secrecy appointed in 1678, it appears that many members received money or favours of one kind or another for their votes. "There can be no doubt that the practice was continued during the reign of William. Sir John Trevor was convicted, when speaker, of receiving bribes from the city of London, to procure the passing of the Orphans' Bill. Mr. Hungerford was expelled for the same offence." In addition to these practices, there was every insidious tempts to create attempt to create an absolute monarchy; and for the consummation of such base and infamous ends, scarcely any circumstances could have been more favourable than the “popish plot," the "insurrections of Russell and Sydney," and the 1 Essay on the English Government, 186, ed. 1821, M. and S. Hist. Boroughs, 1887, 1888, 1649-1685. "violence of the commons," which created a party for the CHARLES II. king, that he would not otherwise have possessed; and so effectually did the court emissaries work upon the popular passions, that under the apprehension of a recurrence to the disorders of Charles I. the doctrine of passive obedience was Doctrine of pasgenerally received, and our liberties were in the greatest generally redanger of being absolutely surrendered to the perfidious ceived. keeping of Charles II.; but his death, and the less hypocritical policy of James II.-preserved them from ultimate destruction. The reign of Charles II. was, as Mr. Hallam observes, the transitional state between the ancient and modern schemes of the English constitution; between that course of government where the executive power, so far as executive, was very little bounded except by the laws, and that where it can only be carried on, even within its own province, by the consent and co-operation, in a great measure, of the parliament'. sive obedience The reign of Charles II. was the transitional state of the Eng lish constitution. SECTION IV. JAMES II., February 6, A.D. 1685,-February 13, A.D. 1689. James II. commenced his reign, similar to that of Mary, JAMES II. by a wilful falsehood, voluntarily promising the privy council to preserve the government, both in church and state, as it was then by law established. 1685-1689. The king had, however, on a previous occasion, expressed Declaration of sentiments of a similar description; thus, in 1678, when the James, in 1678. "test" was discussed, he managed to introduce a proviso, for excepting himself;—and it is asserted, in Burnet's History, that, "speaking with great earnestness and with tears in his eyes, he solemnly protested, that whatever his religion might be, it should only be a private thing between God and his own soul, and that no effect should ever appear in the * Mackenzie, Jus Regium, 39, 46. Collier, 902. 8 Somers' Tracts, 420, 3 2 Hallam's Const. Hist. 481, 482. JAMES II. government;" but unfortunately, the records of history belie 1685-1689. that promise; and prove his total repugnancy from the preservation of the constitution, and all his lawless proceedings may be ascribed to his anxiety of introducing his papistical creed; in fact, every situation of power, honour, or emolument, was forcibly wrested from the holders, and bestowed upon his worthless parasites, until the nation, roused by such infamy, justly drove him from the country, over which he might have reigned so nobly, to close his days amidst the insignificance of St. Germaine's, and the squalid penances of La Trappe. Illegal taxation. Religious prosecutions discou raged. Boroughs in slavish dependance on the crown. The parliamentary grant of one-half of the excise, and of the whole of the customs, expired at the death of Charles II., and the king, to evince his respect for the constitution, illegally ordered the continued exaction of such duties, till the meeting of parliament. James likewise commanded the judges to discourage prosecutions on matters of religion, and ordered, by proclamation, the discharge of all persons who were confined for refusing the oaths of allegiance and supremacy. In consequence, the dissenters enjoyed a respite from the restrictions which they suffered under the Conventicle Act; and Catholics, to the number of some thousands, and Quakers to the number of twelve hundred, were liberated from imprisonment'. The king likewise evinced his attachment to the Romish church by going publicly to mass; and, in order to crush any expression of public indignation, borrowed money from the King of France. 2. The Parliament of 1685. The open and direct attacks which Charles II., towards the close of his reign, made upon most of the corporations, had, in so many instances, been submitted to, that the boroughs were in the power of the crown; for all the new charters contained clauses of election and amotion, by which the king controlled the parliamentary and municipal elective franchise'. 12 Sewell, 451, 454, 456, 478, edit. 1795. 8 Lingard, 303. 2 Letters of Barillon, published in App. to Fox, April 16, May 17, July 16, and those of Louis, July 26, and December 6. Reresby's Mem. 272. Com. Journ. May 27, 29, 1685. Lonsdale, 5, 8. 3 Burnet, 38. Barillon, in Fox, App. 90, 95, |