1494.] PARLIAMENTS AND SUPPLIES. 161 name, and lose no time, for I have called this parliament wholly for this cause." The parliament advised the king, with great alacrity, to undertake the war with France, and consented that commissions should go forth for the gathering and levying a benevolence from the more able sort.1 The supplies which Henry obtained on the ground of his wars, were a source of wealth to him, and his submission to parliament of the expediency of his wars, was the result of his avarice, rather than of his patriotism. "The truth is (says Lord Bacon) he did but traffic with that war, to make his return in money." 2 The benevolence assented to by parliament was contrary to the statute of Richard III., which so vehemently denounced that mode of raising supplies; and how much its enforcement depended on the commissioners employed to raise it, and how arbitrary and undefined was their power, we learn from Lord Bacon, who informs us that "there was a tradition of a dilemma that Bishop Morton, the chancellor, used, to raise up the benevolence to higher rates; and some called it his fork, and some his crotch. For he had couched an article in the instructions to the commissioners who were to levy the benevolence, that if they met with any that were sparing, they should tell them that they must needs have, because they laid up; and if they were spenders, they must needs have, because it was seen in their port and manner of living; so neither kind came amiss." The benevolence, although originally illegal, was countenanced by a shoring or underpropping act,' which made the sums agreed to be paid, but not brought in, leviable by course of law.4 1 Bacon's Henry VII., p. 119. The speeches of Morton and Henry to the second and third parliaments are not found in the Rolls of Parliament. 'They are to be taken," observes Mr. Spedding, the learned editor of Bacon's works, “as a representation of what Bacon imagined, in such circumstances, with such ends in view, would or should have been said," (vol. v. p. 75.) Mr. Spedding has also expressed an opinion that the assemblies addressed on these occasions, were great councils, and not parliaments. (Idem, App., p. 247.) 2 Idem, p. 120. 4 11 Hen. VII., c. 10. Bacon's Hen. VII., , p. 160. 3 Idem, p. 121. Henry, for the gratification of his insatiable avarice, employed two celebrated instruments of extortion, Empson and Dudley,-"lawyers in science and privy counsellors in authority,—who turned law and justice into wormwood and rapine." Dudley was made Speaker of the House of Commons in the parliament of 1503; on which Lord Bacon remarks, that a man may easily guess how absolute the king took himself to be with his parliament, when Dudley, that was so hateful, was made Speaker of the House of Commons."? Throughout the acts of Henry's seven parliaments there is only one that can be considered as relating to public government. Its object was to smooth the course of allegiance to Henry as king de facto. "It ordained that no persons that attend upon the king, for the time being, in his person, and do him true and faithful service of allegiance in the same, or be in other places by his commandment in his wars, within this land or without, shall for so doing be convict or attaint of high treason, nor lose nor forfeit life nor lands."3 It was tried to make the act irrevocable by providing that any act made contrary to it should be void;—a provision (observes Lord Bacon) which was illusory; "for a supreme and absolute power cannot exclude itself; neither can that which is in its nature revocable, be made fixed."4 This act settled an important question as to the effect of acts of attainder passed during the Civil War, as each faction prevailed, and got possesion of parliamentary power. The question was referred to the judges in the first parliament of Henry, who resolved "that the descent of the crown of itself takes away all defects and stops in blood, by reason of attainder." This act confirmed that decision, and in effect declared the constitutional principle to be,-that allegiance to a king de facto protects the subject from future question: it was brought into operation at the critical period of the Revolution, when it was made the justification of the acceptance of William III. 1 Bacon's Henry VII., p. 217. 3 11 Henry VII., cap. 1. 5 Rot. Par., 1 Henry VII. 1494.] THE STAR-CHAMBER, 163 as king, by many who found difficulty in getting over the divine right of James II.1 Another statute reconstituted the Court of Star-Chamber, which long afterwards exercised tyrannical authority over the community. It had existed many years before, as an appendage to the power of the king's council. It is described by Lord Bacon as one of the sagest and noblest institutions of the kingdom. For in the distribution of courts of ordinary justice (besides the high court of parliament) in which distribution the king's bench holdeth the pleas of the crown; the common-place, pleas civil; the exchequer, pleas concerning the king's revenue; and the chancery, the pretorian power for mitigating the rigour of the law, in case of extremity, by the conscience of a good man; there was, nevertheless, always reserved a high and pre-eminent power to the king's council in causes that might, in example or consequence, concern the state of the commonwealth; which, if they were criminal, the council used to sit in the chamber called the Star-chamber; if civil, in the white chamber, or Whitehall. And as the chancery had the pretorian power for equity, so the star-chamber had the censorian power for offences under the degree of capital."3 The act of Henry gave the judicial power to the chancellor and treasurer of England, for the time being, and keeper of the king's privy seal, or two of them, calling to them a bishop, and a temporal lord of the king's most honourable council, and the two chief-justices of the king's bench and common-place, for the time being, or other two justices in their absence. It declared the jurisdiction of the court to 1 Lord Macaulay's History, vol. ii. p. 18. 2 The judges declared in Chambers's case that the court of Star-chamber was not created by the statute 3 Henry VII., but was a court many years before, and one of the most high and honourable courts of justice. -Croke's Reports, vol. v. ch. i. p. 168. 3 Bacon's Henry VII., p. 85. 4 We may anticipate here so far as to state that, by the statute 21 Henry VIII., cap. 20, the president of the king's council was added to the court of Star-chamber. It was also declared that the President of be over "unlawful maintenances, giving of liveries, signs and tokens, and retainders by indentures, promises, oaths, writings, or otherwise other embraceries of his subjects; untrue demeanings of sheriffs in making of panels, and other untrue returns, by taking of money, by juries, by great riots, and unlawful assemblies; whereby the policy and good rule of the realm was almost subdued." It declared the mode of proceeding to be," by bill or information put to the chancellor for the king, or any other (a subject); whereupon the court had authority to call the misdoers before them by writ, or privy seal, and to examine them and others, by their discretion, by whom the truth might be known; and such as they found therein defective, to punish them after their demerits, after the form and effect of statutes thereof made, in like manner and form, as they should and ought to be punished, as if they were thereof convict after the due order of law."1 The constitution of this famous court made it easy for it to acquire the tyrannical power it afterwards exercised, and to overstep the "due order of law," to which the act restricted it. Its jurisdiction, as expressed in the act, too, seems very undefined. Lord Bacon's explanation shows that it was applicable to inchoate and incomplete crimes: "This court of star-chamber is compounded of good elements; for it consisteth of four kinds of persons,―counsellors, peers, prelates, and chief judges: it discerneth also principally of four kinds of causes; forces, frauds, crimes various of stellionate, and the inchoations or middle acts towards crimes capital or heinous, not actually committed or perpetrated. But that which was principally aimed at by this act was force, and the two chief supports of force, combination of multitudes, and maintenance or headship of great persons." " the council should be associated in the naming of sheriffs, and settlings of prices of wines, and all acts appointed to be done by the chancellor, treasurer, and keeper of the king's privy seal, for the time being. 3 Henry VII., cap. 1. 2 Bacon's Henry VII., p. 85. 1494.] HIS LAWS. 165 Henry had two sons, Arthur, and Henry, Duke of York. On the 14th of November, 1501, Arthur was married to the lady Katherine, fourth daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, king and queen of Spain; Arthur being about fifteen years of age, and Katherine rather older.1 Arthur died on the 2nd of April, 1502. On the 18th of February following, Henry was created Prince of Wales, and Earl of Chester and Flint : the dukedom of Cornwall devolved to him by statute. At twelve years of age he was contracted with the Princess Katherine; "the secret providence of God ordaining that marriage to be the occasion of great events and changes.”2 In the same year the lady Margaret, the king's eldest daughter, was espoused to James, King of Scotland, through which marriage the crown, in the course of time, devolved upon the Stuart kings. The Parliament gave him an aid of £36,000 for her marriage-portion.3 Lord Bacon eulogizes Henry for his good laws. He describes him "as the best lawgiver to this nation since King Edward I." Of these laws none besides those that have been mentioned relate to public government; and few, if any of the others, remain at the present day, except the statute which conferred a sort of constitutional right, on "such persons as are poor, to sue in formá pauperis,” in the courts of law and equity, without payment of fees, and to have counsel and attorneys assigned to them by the courts, "without any reward for their counsel, help, and business in the same. "4 1 Lord Bacon says 'eighteen,' but Miss Strickland, on the authority of a Spanish MS., states that Katherine was born on the 15th of December, 1485, therefore not quite sixteen at her marriage. See note to Bacon's Henry VII., p. 212. 2 Bacon's Henry VII., passim. 4 Bacon's Henry VII., p. 92. 3 Parl. Hist., vol. ii. p. 458. 5 11 Henry VII., cap. 12. |
