Playing with Fire: The 4th Duke of Hamilton's Jacobite Politics and the Union

James Hamilton, duke of Hamilton and the Scots jacobites are generally linked in analyses of the final years of the Scots polity. Indeed, Hamilton is often presented as the leader of the jacobite party in the Scottish parliament. Yet both contemporaries and historians have been unsure what to make of his on-again, off-again, conduct with respect to the exiled Stuarts and France. This has fuelled an ongoing debate about Hamilton's erratic and highly enigmatic behaviour during the winter of 1706–7, when the Union was passing the Scottish parliament. Was he genuinely opposing the Union? Was he duped by the court? Or was he, ‘bought and sold for English gold ’? This essay takes a fresh look at the duke and his part in the Union crisis in the light of new and previously underused jacobite sources with a view to better understanding Hamilton's aims, objectives, and influence with this crucial group. Only the jacobites and the Cameronians were potentially willing to take their opposition to the Union to God's Acre. But neither party immediately flew to arms in response to passage of a union they both believed was a betrayal of everything they held dear, and Hamilton was a major factor in their failure to do so. This essay thus takes a close look at the duke's part in preventing a major national uprising against the Union in the winter of 1706–7 and advances a new interpretation of his conduct and significance throughout the Union crisis.     

Edwardian Conservatism and the Constitution: The Thought of Lord Hugh Cecil

This article presents an analysis of the political thought of Lord Hugh Cecil. It argues that in order to understand Cecil's thought it is necessary to emphasize the role of the constitution in his thinking. There are three reasons for this. First, his opposition to Chamberlain's tariff reform campaign was rooted in a view of the detrimental effects the policy would have on politics, evidence for which Cecil saw in the tactics used by the tariff reformers. Second, because his opposition to the Parliament Bill and to the home rule proposals, which lay behind the removal of the house of lords' veto, was similarly rooted in what he saw as the unconstitutional nature of these measures. Third, because Cecil was an active proponent of constitutional reforms that were designed to ensure that the second chamber could still exercise a restraining influence on government and so stand up for the interests of what he saw as the moderate majority of the people.     

A Changing House: The Life Peerages Act 1958*

The year 2008 marks the 50th anniversary of the Life Peerages Act 1958. The first life peer to obtain his letters patent was Lord Fraser of Lonsdale (Sir William Jocelyn Ian Fraser) on 1 August 1958. The first life peer to be introduced in the Lords was Lord Parker of Waddington (Sir Hubert Lister Parker) on 21 October 1958. The first woman peer to receive her letters patent dated 8 August 1958 was Baroness Wootton of Abinger (Barbara Frances Wootton), and the first woman peer to take her seat in the Lords was Baroness Swanborough (Dame Stella Isaacs, marchioness of Reading), ahead of Baroness Wootton on 21 October 1958. This article gives an overview of the background to life peerages and women peers before 1958, including the importance of two peerage cases, the Wensleydale case 1856 and the Rhondda case 1922. It does so with particular reference to women and the house of lords. It also considers the passage of the act itself; the initial life peers created in 1958; final equality between men and women peers achieved by the Peerage Act 1963; and the impact of life peers on the House since 1958.     

The Politics of Chivalry: Sir Robert Walpole,the Duke of Montagu and the Order of the Bath

This article explores the complex circumstances surrounding the foundation of the order of the Bath in 1725, and seeks to correct the commonly‐held view that it was initiated by Walpole simply to augment the patronage available to his supporters in parliament. The proposal for a new order of chivalry based on the medieval ‘knighthood of the bath’ in fact emanated from the court, having been prompted by one of its central figures, the duke of Montagu. Walpole and his colleagues were by no means oblivious to the practical political value of such a move, but having only lately consolidated their position at court, their main priority was to seize a unique opportunity to flatter the new royal dynasty and garner popularity for it through the medium of the order's rediscovered history. The ministers selected the order's 36 founder‐knights with considerable input from senior courtiers, but ensured that those nominated were mostly peers and MPs who could evince ministerially useful connections between court and parliament. Though the order was later derided as a symptom of Walpoleian corruption, its foundation can be regarded as something of a turning point in Walpole's rise to power.     

The Great Landowners in the House of Commons, 1833–85

This prosopographical article demonstrates that the traditional British landed interest suffered very little by the terms of the 1832 Reform Act. They maintained their customary dominance of the house of commons, although voting records show that they had lost some of their ability to push legislation through the House that spoke to their more parochial interests. By contrast, the 1867 Reform Act caused serious erosion of their legislative power in the Commons. The 1874 election, especially in Ireland, saw great landowners losing their county seats to tenant farmers. Democracy was coming to Britain; just not as soon as some would have it.     

The Debate in the House of Lords on 'No Peace without Spain', 7 December 1711: A New Source

The debate in the house of lords on 'No Peace without Spain' in December 1711 was the first test of the strength of the administration of Robert Harley, earl of Oxford, in the upper House. Though there are more sources for this debate than is normal for proceedings in the Lords, few can claim to be by eyewitnesses. A newly 'discovered' anonymous letter from an eyewitness found in the papers of the lord great chamberlain's office in the Parliamentary Archives gives a detailed account of this important debate.     

‘With All My Oldest and Native Friends’. Joseph Parkes: Warwickshire Solicitor and Electoral Agent in the Age of Reform1

Joseph Parkes, Birmingham solicitor, electoral agent, whig party advisor and secretary to the Parliamentary Municipal Corporation Commission was a modern master of exposing corrupt and fraudulent electioneering and using it as a catalyst for the election of reform and Liberal politicians immediately following the 1832 Reform Act. Warwickshire's own political and legal history was the foundation for Parkes's understanding of how politics worked in Britain and what was wrong with it, and helped forge his vision for an effective reform in parliamentary and local government. This essay examines Joseph Parkes's understanding of national electoral politics, informed by his work in Warwickshire. As a local solicitor, Parkes gained the wisdom of controlling electoral registration, canvassing in a routine and orderly manner and establishing a network of professionals to secure that registrations turned into votes at elections. This experience would culminate in the formation of the Reform Club, a national organisation of whigs, Liberals and radicals, that would, eventually, become the base of the Liberal Party in modern British politics. In short, Joseph Parkes was a man who could not, and did not wish to, escape where he came from, at least in terms of his political education. His Warwickshire experiences and lessons learned, solidified a series of political reform goals that he pragmatically approached as a political advisor, operative and attorney, rather than an elected public servant, and marked the direction of politics for the rest of the century.     

The Parliamentary Organisation of the Whig Junto in the Reign of Queen Anne: A Further Note

The parliamentary organisation of the whig Junto in the reign of Queen Anne was far superior to that of the tory party. At the centre were the meetings in which three or four of the five members of the Junto were present together with some of their followers. Evidence of such meetings is rare but here is presented a letter giving the details of a meeting of all five in April 1713 at the home of Lord Somers, together with their ally, the tory earl of Nottingham, probably to discuss the forthcoming peace proposals, to end the war of the Spanish Succession, and the protestant succession to the British throne.     

Crossman and Beyond: House of Commons Select Committees in the 1960s

Assessments of the work and impact of house of commons investigatory select committees during the 1960s usually centre on the success or otherwise of the new ‘specialist’ committees established in the second half of the decade. This article uses both quantitative and qualitative evidence to give a more rounded picture, including both new and existing committees. It concludes that 1960s select committees were more popular, active and influential than has previously been appreciated. It also argues that there has been an overvaluation of the role of the Labour cabinet minister, Richard Crossman, in promoting and establishing these committees, and that support for committee work on both front benches and back benches was rather more widespread and substantial than has been assumed. In particular, the article contends that Harold Wilson's role in advancing the work of select committees has been underestimated.     

House of Lords Committee Accommodation and Its Use: Restoration and Renewal in the 19th and 20th Centuries*

Following the 1834 fire, the work of house of lords committees continued virtually without interruption, at first in temporary accommodation and, from 1846, in rooms in the new palace designed by Charles Barry. This article charts the history of house of lords committee activity and the varied use of its accommodation at Westminster from 1834 to the present. Major committee work immediately following the fire included an inquiry into prison reform. Barry's accommodation was scantily fitted out, and quickly needed technical and other adaptations. Committees themselves changed too, with the heaviest phase of private bill activity needed for the creation of the railways tailing off by the late 1860s. Following a low point in committee activity between 1940 and 1970 committee work has developed in fits and starts from 1971 onwards. The further expansion of committees following the Jellicoe committee report of 1992 was accommodated by the reform of private bill procedure, which helped free up committee rooms, and in October 2009, the establishment of the Supreme Court meant that the law lords no longer sat judicially in the large committee rooms 1 and 2. Since 2012, however, the further expansion of committee activity has not been matched by an increase in its accommodation.     

Of Male and Female Heirs; of English and Scottish Peerages: The Fine Tuning of the Peerage Bills of 1719

There were two versions of the Peerage Bill in 1719, one which was lost in the house of lords in April when the parliament was prerogued and one in December which was defeated in the house of commons. The first was constructed in debates in the Lords, in conjunction with the judges, based on resolutions introduced into the upper House by the duke of Somerset; the second was introduced into the Lords as a fully formed bill. Both bills underwent changes during their progress through the house of lords. The result was that the second bill differed significantly from the first. Based on the first bill, the second allowed for more peerages to be created, while trying to prevent the problems associated with female succession, particularly in the Scottish peerage, and more closely defining when a peerage had become extinct. This article is based on documents generated by the passage of the two bills through parliament which have not been studied before.     

Fixing the Membership of the Lords and Commons: The Case of Sir John Cam Hobhouse and the Nottingham By-Election, 1834

When Melbourne replaced Grey in 1834 he looked to recruit men with experience to join his government. He enlisted Sir John Cam Hobhouse, but Hobhouse needed a seat in the Commons. This was achieved by a writ of acceleration, whereby Viscount Duncannon, one of the sitting MPs for Nottingham, was called into the Lords in his father's lifetime to release a seat in the Commons. Writs had normally been used to strengthen the power of the government in the Lords, and the resentment in Nottingham at this political fix was expressed in a full-scale contest with accusations that the town was being turned into a government nomination borough. Hobhouse might have hoped for a free run as he had already been appointed to the cabinet. Rather, he was forced to fight for the seat, and to go through most of the activities more frequently associated with general elections.     

Before and after the Grenville Act: The House of Commons and the Morpeth Elections of 1768 and 1774

The Grenville Act of 1770 was designed to prevent justice being ‘sacrificed to numbers’ when election petitions came before the Commons. The fate of the petition following the Morpeth election of 1768 illustrates how ministerial and other powerful influences, as well as prejudice, could determine the result, the votes of freemen who had gained their rights by peremptory writs of mandamus from the court of king's bench being declared invalid because they had not been admitted to their freedom in the customary manner. At the 1774 election, the partisan returning officers rejected many votes, but a riot forced them to return the candidates having a majority with these votes. When petitions complaining of a forced return and counter petitions alleging bribery and corruption came to the Commons, a party succeeded in postponing to a distant date a hearing on the merits of the election, and in restricting the remit to the committee chosen under the Grenville Act. One of the sitting members was unseated but allowed to petition on the merits, but parliament was prorogued before his petition was heard. On renewing it in the next session, he made substantial alterations which were challenged and a committee was appointed to investigate. All who came to the committee were to have voices, and, realising that his cause was thereby rendered hopeless, the petitioner withdrew his petition. Thus a party in the House was still able to exert influence and, on this occasion, to bypass the Grenville Act, which, however, in other cases evidently proved satisfactory.     

‘Too Wild to Succeed’: The Occasional Conformity Bills and the Attempts by the House of Lords to Outlaw the Tack in the Reign of Anne*

By the late 17th century it had been largely established as a part of the ‘constitution’ that the house of commons played the leading role in proposing financial legislation and that the house of lords by convention could not amend such bills, but only accept or reject them. From the late 1670s, the practice developed of the Commons ‘tacking’ money or supply bills to other, controversial legislation, to try to ensure that the Lords would pass the whole bill. This underhand proceeding sometimes worked, but at other times the Lords amended the non‐monetary parts in such a way as to render the bill unacceptable to the Commons, but such actions sometimes resulted in the loss of financial legislation necessary for the king's government. From the 1690s, the whig‐dominated Lords attempted to ‘outlaw’ tory‐backed tacking by protesting at its unparliamentary nature. This culminated in a formal declaration by the House in 1702 of the unconstitutionality of tacking. The last major attempt at tacking took place over the Occasional Conformity Bills of 1702–4. The final bill of 1704 essentially failed, however, because of the party strengths in the Lords when the tories were outvoted by the whigs. The Lords, however, continued to condemn tacking until at least 1709.     

社会时代与历史认知：70年来五四运动研究衍变评述

社会时代对于人们认识历史的活动有着强烈的影响。中华人民共和国成立70年来,随着社会的发展,思想与生活的变迁,五四运动研究也相应地经历着某些值得关注的变化。特别是在运动的性质、领导权、与传统文化及西方文化的关系及某些关键人物的评价等问题上,不同时期的社会政治状况与思想倾向均对学界的相关认识与评价发生着明显的、强烈的影响,使之随着社会时代的发展而在不断地衍变。总地看来,70年来学界对五四运动的认识是愈来愈深入,愈来愈全面了。唯物史观认为,社会意识形态是社会经济、政治及社会生活的反映。历史认识是意识形态的重要内容,现实社会状况对于历史学研究的影响或制约也相应地更为明显。人们对于五四运动认识与评价的衍变证明着这一点。     

退休制度——新时期干部人事改革的重大成果

在历史的新时期,中共十一届三中全会确定党的政治路线、思想路线之后,以邓小平为核心的中共中央立即着手解决党的组织路线——特别是培养接班人问题。在这个过程中,为解决中青年干部的进和老干部的出,建立了老干部离退休制度。这个制度立足现实,意义深远,是新时期诸多改革特别是干部人事制度改革的一项重大成果。