Government and Legislation under William III

As king, William was no figurehead. He loved rule as much as had any Stuart, and he claimed prerogatives that his chief supporters, the Whigs, did not like. He was at the same time king, prime minister, minister of foreign affairs, and commander-in-chief of the army; and he exercised each one of these functions. He presided at the meetings of his chief advisers, made appointments, and transacted a great deal of business, without asking the opinion of any one. His chief advisers and heads of great departments formed an inner committee of the Privy Council, later to be known as the Cabinet. These ministers were appointed by the king, but were of no one party and in no way represented the majority in parliament. Their position was a difficult one, for many of them tried to serve two masters, king and parliament, at the same time. They did not resign when the vote went against them ; and if dismissed, went out singly, and not as a body. It was to be many years before the ministers as a body were to be held responsible by parliament for the acts of the king, and to resign as a body if parliament defeated any of their measures.

The House of Commons was inferior both in dignity and in importance to the House of Lords. An ambitious commoner always hoped eventually to become a peer. Furthermore, the House was not a very efficient body, and its members, who were easily drawn off to cock-fighting, horse-racing, and tennis, took their responsibilities very lightly, and spent more of their time in quarrels and impeachments than in legislation. The commoners had no great leaders and but little party organization, though the Whigs were in the habit of meeting beforehand to consider important matters. But there was no system and no party unity, and the wits of the time; Defoe, Swift, Dryden, and others, made endless sport of the way in which parliamentary affairs were conducted.

Parliament succeeded, however, in passing a number of exceedingly important measures. The Convention, declaring itself a lawful parliament, passed the Mutiny Act, which gave parliament the control of the army ; the Toleration Act, which legally recognized the Non-conformist churches, as well as the church of England; and the Bill of Rights, which embodied in the form of law the principal provisions of the Declaration of Right. The same parliament in 1689 settled upon the king for the use of the crown a fixed sum, known as the civil list, thus separating for the first time the private expenses of the king from the public expenses of the government. At the same time it made a definite appropriation for government, at first for four years, afterward for only one year, thus compelling the king to summon parliament annually. By neglecting to renew an old censorship act of 1662, it made possible freedom, of the press; and thenceforth newspapers and pamphlets were of great influence politically. In 1694 the second Whig parliament passed a Triennial Bill, requiring the king to issue summons for the election of a new parliament every three years; and in 1696 the third Whig parliament reformed the procedure in trials for high treason and made it more just and humane. Lastly, the Tory parliament of 1701 passed the Act of Settlement, which not only settled the succession upon the Hanoverians, but also placed definite limitations upon the power of the king. Each of these acts marked a great constitutional advance in the direction of better government.

Sources and Conditions of England's Wealth

Of equal importance with the constitutional changes were the changes taking place at this time in the financial condition of England. In the wars of the next century, victory was to be, not with the power that possessed the bravest soldiers and sailors, but with that which could furnish the most money. Though William was one of the ablest generals in Europe, he could have done but little had not England provided him liberally with men, ships, and the munitions of war; and all these things cost money.

After the revolution of 1688, parliament having gained control of the public purse, claimed the right to say how the money should be used and to know how it had been spent. By this revolution the financial condition prevailing under the Tudors and Stuarts was brought to an end. Thenceforth no king would be compelled to raise money illegally or to receive a pension from a king of France on the ground that parliament would not take the responsibility of seeing that there was money enough in the treasury to run the government. Parliament was managing the funds and was consequently obliged to gee that the supplies granted were duly raised by taxation. In taking these powers to itself, parliament undoubtedly acted as a check upon the king; but it also relieved him of a great burden. The finances of England thenceforth stood on a new footing.

Money was raised by customs duties, excise duties, stamp duties, and a tax on land and personal property. Customs duties were import duties on sugar, salt, tea, coffee, tobacco, and wines brought into the country, and export duties on English manufactured goods, such as woollen cloths, sent out of the country. Export duties were, however, eventually abolished. The excise was a tax on articles of consumption produced in England, such as malt, coal, glass, bricks, leather, soap, candles, and paper. Afterward the term excise, which had a hateful sound to the English people, included licenses to trade and to sell liquors, and taxes on luxuries, such as carriages, horses, cards, etc. Stamp duties were duties from stamps on documents of all kinds. The tax on land and personal property took the place of the old tenths and fifteenths and of the subsidies levied by the Tudors.

Notwithstanding the fact that the amounts thus raised were large, they were insufficient for the wars, and it became necessary to add to them by means of loans. Formerly goldsmiths and private individuals had made such loans, but without any certainty, since the Stop of the Exchequer, that they would receive the principal or even the interest. In 1692 parliament authorized the borrowing of £1,000,000, and the government asked for the money from any one who would lend it, promising to pay the interest regularly. Thus began the national debt of England. In 1694, when William was in great and immediate need of funds to continue the war, and a general loan was not thought expedient, a new device was tried. Parliament said that those who would subscribe £1,200,000, the amount desired, might form a company and do private business. The formation of this company was the beginning of the Bank of England. Hitherto only private banks had existed, such as those of the goldsmiths ; but now the government authorized the establishment of a public bank, which received deposits from private individuals, and when necessary, loaned these deposits to the government. These loans became a part of the national debt. The founding of the Bank of England introduced a new system of financiering, by encouraging the use of paper money and the saving of funds. The introduction of credit and capital made possible a great extension of business and stimulated enterprise. The moneyed class now came over loyally to the support of William's government.

The opportunities thus given to extend business and accumulate money were coincident with a new era in manufactures and commerce. Refugees from Holland and France—Flemings, Walloons, and Huguenots—had already begun to introduce new industries into England. Woollen manufactures had prevailed hitherto, but now silk, linen, and cotton began to be worked up, and scores of small articles, like combs, buttons, jewellery, and baskets, were made. Manufacturing increased twenty fold. Swifter and better methods were employed, but the processes were still crude, and production was on a small scale.

Parliament began to assume control in matters of commerce also. Hitherto private companies, incorporated by the crown, had been the leading agents in promoting trade and colonization. The great desire of all was to find new markets and to hold them for England, to destroy all commercial rivals like France, and to build up colonies that were to serve as a source of strength to the mother country. Parliament passed a navigation act in 1696, which had for its object a more efficient carrying out of the terms of the old act. In the same year it established for the first time a permanent board of trade and plantations, to look after commerce and the colonies; and it refused to charter any more joint-stock companies, with a monopoly of trade or of territory. The only exception to this policy was the re-incorporation of the East India Company in 1698.