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Rolls of Parliament. On this occasion the Commons were not consulted; but the Lords of the Council having reproved Gloster for his foolish and mischievous proceedings in Hainault, the Commons took part with their favourite in the next Parliament, and added to their grant of supply a request that his Duchess might be assisted in such a manner as to maintain the connection between her dominions and England-a proposal as hurtful in its tendency to the public interest, and as much the result of ignorance, as the vehement zeal of the same body on behalf of the Palatine in the reign of James I.2

The settlement of the Regency, however, was the most important matter submitted to the Parliament; and though it was at first discussed by the Lords alone, with the assistance of the judges, it afterwards became the subject of statutory provision, the "assent" of the Commons being set forth as well as the "assent and advice" of the Lords. The nomination of the Council was made by them, but with the same assent. The proclamation which, under the necessity of the case, they had issued to assemble the Parliament, was sanctioned, and the session rendered valid, by an act as soon as it met; and that act was made in the name of all the three estates, the King nominally, he being a year old, the Lords and Commons really. The powers of the Protector were in like manner conferred by statute. The whole proceeding may justly be termed Parliamentary, and

1 Rot. Par. iv. 296.

2. Rot. Par. iv. 319: Note LXIII.

cannot be deprived of that title by the circumstance that by far the greater share in it belonged most probably to the Lords. It was far otherwise when they in the reign of Richard II., without any consent of the Commons, and without in any way taking notice of them, appointed a Council of Regency, and settled its powers during the King's minority. In like manner, when Henry VI. laboured under illness and incapacity, the Lords, without any interference of the Commons, took upon themselves even the settlement, indeed the change, of the succession to the Crown; but the civil war had then broken out, and no conclusion can be drawn from such proceedings as to the form or the practice of the constitution at that time. It is, however, to be observed that though some of the precedents from this reign have been occasionally cited, without due discrimination, as authorities upon the great question of a Regency which has arisen twice of late years, yet there is no reason to deny the weight of the first proceedings taken in consequence of Henry's minority.

Though the accidents which have been referred to, joined with the infirmity of the Lancastrian title, encouraged and enabled both the Lords and the Commons to encroach upon the prerogative, and though the utmost gratitude is due to them for the steadiness with which they persisted in establishing their legislative rights, and their title to interfere in the administration of public affairs, yet we must not

1 Rot. Par. iii. 3.

Notes LV., LXIV.

shut our eyes to the faults and the crimes which they committed in the use of the power that they acquired. Their conduct towards individuals and parties was almost always profligate and unjust in the greatest possible degree, and their submission to the tyranny of those who for the time had the mastery was uniform and shameful. During all Henry VI.'s reign, all Edward IV.'s, and Richard III.'s, down to the accession of Henry VII., they blindly obeyed the dictates of the faction that had the upper hand, the Prince whose success in the field had defeated his competitors. The history of those proceedings is a succession of contrary decisions on the same questions, conflicting laws on the same title, attainders and reversals, consigning one day all the adherents of a party to confiscation and the scaffold, reinstating them the next and placing their adversaries in the same cruel predicament. The reign of Richard II. did not present a more disgraceful picture of this kind, though the proceedings of Parliament were in a less fixed and regular course, and the rogative of the Crown was more uncontrolled.

pre

It is not correct to state, as some writers have done, that the privilege of Parliament was in any material respect confirmed or extended in Henry VI.'s reign.' But a very important change was made in the election law, indeed in the constitution of the House of Commons, soon after his accession, by the restriction of the elective franchise in counties.

1 Note LII.

The

original structure both of the Parliament and of the constituent body is involved in great obscurity. But there is every reason to suppose that the knights of the shire were the representatives or delegates of the lesser barons, the less considerable tenants in capite of the Crown, when these had ceased to sit in person, and that afterwards the rear vassals, or those holding of mesne lords, were considered as standing in the same predicament, and had the right of choosing the representatives. It is at least certain that this franchise was enjoyed without any regard to the extent or value of the freehold, the subject of the tenure. Consequently, when the division of property multiplied those holdings, the number of electors was exceedingly increased. It was to prevent the disorders consequent upon the crowds which attended the county courts at the election of knights, that the restraining law in the eighth year of Henry's reign was passed. The preamble plainly shows that a seat in Parliament had already become an object of ambition; for it sets forth the danger to the public peace from "excessive numbers," and "riots and divisions among the gentlemen and other people," and the remedy affirmed to be necessary is preventing all from voting who have not forty shillings a year, clear of all charges, from their freehold, equal to above twenty pounds at the present day. Important regulations were added to control the returning officer, and the residence of the voter was required-a salutary condition, and which has long since been dispensed with. It would be wrong

to deprive of their vote all who do not reside where their property lies; but it is quite as wrong to give votes to the same individual in a great number of counties: each should choose his district, and there alone give his vote.

The marriages of Catherine, the King's mother, and Jaquette, Bedford's widow, gave rise, the former to an act of Parliament, the latter to a proceeding under the feudal law. Owen Tudor having been twice arrested for marrying the Queen Dowager, and escaped, no further steps were taken against him for what was then only the offence, punishable by fine and imprisonment, of marrying a tenant of the Crown without royal licence. But the act made it punishable with forfeiture of lands and goods. Woodville, who married the Duchess of Bedford, was fined for the feudal misdemeanour. Henry's wonted kindness of disposition was shown in his treatment of Catherine's sons, whom he always acknowledged as brothers. One became a priest; but on the other two he conferred earldoms; and his nephew, heir to that of Richmond, afterwards became King of England under the name of Henry the Seventh.

The Regency which was occasioned in France by the illness of Charles VI., and by the death of Henry V., was in England first occasioned by his decease and afterwards by the illness of his son; but before this could affect the Government of France, his reign had ceased over that kingdom.

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