during her reign of a duty upon foreign cloth, imposed without assent of parliament; an encroachment unprecedented since the reign of Richard II. Several proofs might be adduced from records of arbitrary inquests for offences, and illegal modes of punishment. The torture is, perhaps, more frequently mentioned in her short reign than in all former ages of our history put together; and probably from that imitation of foreign governments, which contributed not a little to deface our constitution in the sixteenth century, seems deliberately to have been introduced as part of the process in those dark and uncontrolled tribunals which investigated offences against the state.57 A commission issued in 1557, authorising the persons named in it to enquire, by any means they could devise, into charges of heresy or other religious offences, and in some instances to punish the guilty, in others of a graver nature to remit them to their ordinaries, seems (as Burnet has well observed) to have been meant as a preliminary step to bringing in the inquisition. It was at least the germ of the high-commission court in the next reign.58 One proclamation, in the last year of her inauspicious administration, may be deemed a flight of tyranny beyond her father's example; which, after denouncing the importation of books filled with heresy and treason from beyond sea, proceeds to declare that whoever should be found to have such books in his possession should be reputed and taken for a rebel, and executed according to martial law.59 This had been provoked as well by a violent libel written at Geneva by Goodman, a refugee, exciting the people to dethrone the queen; as by the recent attempt of one Stafford, a descendant of the house of Buckingham, who, having landed with a small force at Scarborough, had vainly hoped that the general disaffection would enable him to overthrow her government.60
The House of Commons recovers part of its independent power in these two reigns.—Notwithstanding, however, this apparently uncontrolled career of power, it is certain that the children of Henry VIII. did not preserve his almost absolute dominion over parliament. I have only met with one instance in his reign where the Commons refused to pass a bill recommended by the Crown. This was in 1532; but so unquestionable were the legislative rights of parliament, that, although much displeased, even Henry was forced to yield.61 We find several instances during the reign of Edward, and still more in that of Mary, where the Commons rejected bills sent down from the upper house; and though there was always a majority of peers for the government, yet the dissent of no small number is frequently recorded in the former reign. Thus the Commons not only threw out a bill creating several new treasons, and substituted one of a more moderate nature, with that memorable clause for two witnesses to be produced in open court, which I have already mentioned;62 but rejected one attainting Tunstal Bishop of Durham for misprision of treason, and were hardly brought to grant a subsidy.63 Their conduct in the two former instances, and probably in the third, must be attributed to the indignation that was generally felt at the usurped power of Northumberland, and the untimely fate of Somerset. Several cases of similar unwillingness to go along with court measures occurred under Mary. She dissolved, in fact, her two first parliaments on this account. But the third was far from obsequious, and rejected several of her favourite bills.64 Two reasons principally contributed to this opposition; the one, a fear of entailing upon the country those numerous exactions of which so many generations had complained, by reviving the papal supremacy, and more especially of a restoration of abbey lands; the other, an extreme repugnance to the queen's Spanish connection.65 If Mary could have obtained the consent of parliament, she would have settled the crown on her husband, and sent her sister, perhaps, to the scaffold.66
Attempt of the court to strengthen itself by creating new boroughs.—There cannot be a stronger proof of the increased weight of the Commons during these reigns, than the anxiety of the court to obtain favourable elections. Many ancient boroughs undoubtedly have at no period possessed sufficient importance to deserve the elective franchise on the score of their riches or population; and it is most likely that some temporary interest or partiality, which cannot now be traced, first caused a writ to be addressed to them. But there is much reason to conclude that the counsellors of Edward VI., in erecting new boroughs, acted upon a deliberate plan of strengthening their influence among the Commons. Twenty-two boroughs were created or restored in this short reign; some of them, indeed, places of much consideration, but not less than seven in Cornwall, and several others that appear to have been insignificant. Mary added fourteen to the number; and as the same course was pursued under Elizabeth, we in fact owe a great part of that irregularity in our popular representation, the advantages or evils of which we need not here discuss, less to changes wrought by time, than to deliberate and not very constitutional policy. Nor did the government scruple a direct and avowed interference with elections. A circular letter of Edward to all the sheriffs commands them to give notice to the freeholders, citizens, and burgesses within their respective counties, "that our pleasure and commandment is, that they shall choose and appoint, as nigh as they possibly may, men of knowledge and experience within the counties, cities, and boroughs;" but nevertheless, that where the privy council should "recommend men of learning and wisdom, in such case their directions be regarded and followed." Several persons accordingly were recommended by letters to the sheriffs, and elected as knights for different shires; all of whom belonged to the court, or were in places of trust about the king.67 It appears probable that persons in office formed at all times a very considerable portion of the House of Commons. Another circular of Mary before the parliament of 1554, directing the sheriffs to admonish the electors to choose good catholics and "inhabitants, as the old laws require," is much less unconstitutional; but the Earl of Sussex, one of her most active counsellors, wrote to the gentlemen of Norfolk, and to the burgesses of Yarmouth, requesting them to reserve their voices for the person he should name.68 There is reason to believe that the court, or rather the imperial ambassador, did homage to the power of the Commons, by presents of money, in order to procure their support of the unpopular marriage with Philip;69 and if Noailles, the ambassador of Henry II., did not make use of the same means to thwart the grants of subsidy and other measures of the administration, he was at least very active in promising the succour of France, and animating the patriotism of those unknown leaders of that assembly, who withstood the design of a besotted woman and her unprincipled counsellors to transfer this kingdom under the yoke of Spain.70
Causes of the high prerogative of the Tudors.—It appears to be a very natural enquiry, after beholding the course of administration under the Tudor line, by what means a government so violent in itself, and so plainly inconsistent with the acknowledged laws, could be maintained; and what had become of that English spirit which had not only controlled such injudicious princes as John and Richard II., but withstood the first and third Edward in the fulness of their pride and glory. Not, indeed, that the excesses of prerogative had ever been thoroughly restrained, or that, if the memorials of earlier ages had been as carefully preserved as those of the sixteenth century, we might not possibly find in them equally flagrant instances of oppression; but still the petitions of parliament and frequent statutes remain on record, bearing witness to our constitutional law and to the energy that gave it birth. There had evidently been a retrograde tendency towards absolute monarchy between the reigns of Henry VI. and Henry VIII. Nor could this be attributed to the common engine of despotism, a military force. For, except the yeomen of the guard, fifty in number, and the common servants of the king's household, there was not, in time of peace, an armed man receiving pay throughout England.71