Page 32 of 163
*Rot. Glaus. 38. Hen. III. pp. 7. and 12. d.; as also Ret.
Claus 12 Hen. III. m. 1. d. Prynne’s Pref. to Cotton’s
Abridgment.
** Brady’s Answer to Petyt, from the records, p 151.
*** Brady’s Treatise of Boroughs, App. No. 13.
But there were other important consequences, which followed the diminution and consequent disuse of the ancient feudal militia. The king’s expense in levying and maintaining a military force for every enterprise, was increased beyond what his narrow revenues were able to bear: as the scutages of his military tenants, which were accepted in lieu of their personal service, had fallen to nothing, there were no means of supply but from voluntary aids granted him by the parliament and clergy, or from the talliages which he might levy upon the towns and inhabitants in royal demesne. In the preceding year, Edward had been obliged to exact no less than the sixth of all movables from the laity, and a moiety of all ecclesiastical benefices[*] for his expedition into Poictou, and the suppression of the Welsh: and this distressful situation which was likely often to return upon him and his successors, made him think of a new device, and summon the representatives of all the boroughs to parliament. This period, which is the twenty-third of his reign, seems to be the real and true epoch of the house of commons, and the faint dawn of popular government in England. For the representatives of the counties were only deputies from the smaller barons and lesser nobility; and the former precedent of representatives from the boroughs, who were summoned by the earl of Leicester, was regarded as the act of a violent usurpation, had beer, discontinued in all the subsequent parliaments; and if such a measure had not become necessary on other accounts, that precedent was more likely to blast than give credit to it.
* Brady’s Treatise of Boroughs, p. 31, from the records.
Heming vol. i. p. 52. M. West. p. 422. Ryley, p. 462
During the course of several years, the kings of England, in imitation of other European princes, had embraced the salutary policy of encouraging and protecting the lower and more industrious orders of the state; whom they found well disposed to obey the laws and civil magistrate, and whose ingenuity and labor furnish commodities requisite for the ornament of peace and support of war. Though the inhabitants of the country were still left at the disposal of their imperious lords, many attempts were made to give more security and liberty to citizens, and make them enjoy unmolested the fruits of their industry. Boroughs were erected by royal patent within the demesne lands; liberty of trade was conferred upon them; the inhabitants were allowed to farm, at a fixed rent, their own tolls and customs,[*] they were permitted to elect their own magistrates; justice was administered to them by these magistrates, without obliging them to attend the sheriff or county court: and some shadow of independence, by means of these equitable privileges, was gradually acquired by the people.[**] The king, however, retained still the power of levying talliage or taxes upon them at pleasure;[***] and though their poverty and the customs of the age made these demands neither frequent or exorbitant, such unlimited authority in the sovereign was a sensible check upon commerce, and was utterly incompatible with all the principles of a free government. But when the multiplied necessities of the crown produced a greater avidity for supply, the king, whose prerogative entitled him to exact it, found that he had not power sufficient to enforce his edicts, and that it was necessary, before he imposed taxes, to smooth the way for his demand, and to obtain the previous consent of the boroughs, by solicitations, remonstrances, and authority. The inconvenience of transacting this business with every particular borough was soon felt; and Edward became sensible, that the most expeditious way of obtaining supply, was to assemble the deputies of all the boroughs, to lay before them the necessities of the state, to discuss the matter in their presence, and to require their consent to the demands of their sovereign, For this reason, he issued writs to the sheriffs, enjoining them to send to parliament, along with two knights of the shire two deputies from each borough within their county,[****] and these provided with sufficient powers from their community to consent, in their name, to what he and his council should require of them.
* Madox, Firma Burgi, p. 21.
** Brady of Boroughs, App. No. I, 2, 3.
*** The king had not only the power of talliating the
inhabitants within his own demosnes, but that of granting to
particular barons the power of talliating the inhabitants
within theirs. See Brady’s Answer to Petyt, p. 118. Madox,
Hist, of the Exch. p. 518.
*** Writs were issued to about one hundred and twenty cities
and boroughs.
“As it is a most equitable rule,” says he, in his preamble to this writ, “that what concerns all should be approved of by all; and common dangers be repelled by united efforts;”[*] a noble principle, which may seem to indicate a liberal mind in the king, and which laid the foundation of a free and an equitable government.
After the election of these deputies by the aldermen and common council, they gave sureties for their attendance before the king and parliament: their charges were respectively borne by the borough which sent them; and they had so little idea of appearing as legislators,—a character extremely wide of their low rank and condition,[**]—that no intelligence could be more disagreeable to any borough, than to find that they must elect, or to any individual than that he was elected, to a trust from which no profit or honor could possibly be derived.[***] They composed not, properly speaking, any essential part of the parliament: they sat apart both from the barons and knights,[****] who disdained to mix with such mean personages: after they had given their consent to the taxes required of them, their business being then finished, they separated, even though the parliament still continued to sit, and to canvass the national business.[*****] And as they all consisted of men who were real burgesses of the place from which they were sent, the sheriff, when he found no person of abilities or wealth sufficient for the office, often used the freedom of omitting particular boroughs in his returns; and as he received the thanks of the people for this indulgence, he gave no displeasure to the court, who levied on all the boroughs, without distinction, the tax agreed to by the majority of deputies.[******]
* Brady of Boroughs, p. 25, 33, from the records. The writs
of the parliament immediately preceding, remain: and the
return of knights is there required, but not a word of the
boroughs: a demonstration that this was the very year in
which they commenced. In the year immediately preceding, the
taxes were levied by a seeming free consent of each
particular borough, beginning with London. Brady of
Boroughs, p. 31, 32, 33, from the records. Also his Answer
to Petyt, p. 40, 41.
** Reiiquia Spel. p. 64. Prynne’s Pref. to Cotton’s Abridg.
and the Abridg. passim.
*** Brady of Boroughs, p. 59, 60.
**** Brady of Boroughs, p. 37, 38, from the records, and
Append. p. 19. Also his Append, to his Answer to Petyt,
Record. And his gloss. in verb. Communitas regn. p. 33.
Abridg. p. 14.
****** Bradv of Boroughs, p. 52, from the records. There is
even an instance in the reign of Edward III., when the king
named all the deputies. Brady’s Answer to Petyt, p. 161. If
he fairly named the most considerable and creditable
burgesses, little exception would be taken; as their
business was not to check the king, but to reason with him,
and consent to his demands. It was not till the reign of
Richard II. that the sheriffs were deprived of the power of
omitting boroughs at pleasure. See Stat. at large, 5th
Richard II. cap. iv.
